#sorry i love literary analysis!! as if its my fault!!!!!

[frankingsteinery]

ok but walton if you look at the letters in the beginning, while i wouldnt go so far as to say he's a neglected child (we dont get nearly enough insight into his background to make those kind of assumptions) his parents were definitely, at the very least, not very present in walton's life or influential to him growing up. from my memory his mother is literally never mentioned, and the sole mentions of his father are fleeting. simply: 1) he didnt support waltons childhood dreams and interests in sailing and expeditions/discovery 2) he died, leaving walton an orphan to be raised by his older sister margaret 3) his fathers literal dying wish was for walton to never be a mariner. so while i am in no way suggesting his childhood was near as bad as the creature's, or even victor's, i think its incorrect to suggest that walton was completely blind and ignorant to neglect and parental conflict

"victor's creature would kinda be justified in not feeling bad" but he DID feel bad and therein, to me, is where his fault lies. i feel as if the creature would have felt no empathy, no care at all for victor or those lives he was taking, then i would actually blame him for his actions less -- because what creature did was murder innocent people, and destroy victors life, all while understanding and FEELING that it was bad. he did it anyways, while actively going against his own morality

creature "doesnt really like humans and kills them" is incorrect, his reason for killing them was NEVER because he didnt like them, its because he chose to murder for revenge while simultaneously wishing he could be part of the humanity he was destroying, which is why he was so distraught and upset when he was ostracized and met with their fear and hatred every time. because he LIKED THEM, he in his sort of parasocial way LOVED them and wanted to be loved and accepted by them

and walton sees this! which is what his whole speech and their interaction at the end is about! he sees the creatures humanity, he knows creatures life stories and feels for his misfortunes and is moved by his words and expressions of sadness, and even sympathizes with him in a way literally no one else in the book does, yet he also recognizes that creature actively chose to turn away from his innate humanity and goodness and consciously choose violence and revenge instead, while knowing and feeling what he was doing was wrong, and That is why walton condemns creature

"do you think he had enough for a conscience for morality when he was neglected by his own fucking creator???" this line is just funny to me. Because thats. Thats the point of the whole book. That he had a conscience for morality despite his horrific situation

im not going to get into the whole victor-abandoned-creature and the bride-situation because ive talked about it a Lot in the past and this post is already too long. sorry for dumping this all on you months after you made this post its all for the sake of literary analysis and walton is my babygirl i had to jump to his defense 🙏 🙏

walton = big dumb stupid head

it is so weird to me that despite hearing the same tale from victor that we have, when walton hears of victor's creature wailing over victor's death he's basically like:

"erm actually maybe if you listened to your concisnece nothing would have happened l + ratio + bozo!!"

like c'monnNn walton,, do you think he had enough for a conscience for morality when he was neglected by his own fucking creator??? and even then tbh victor's creature would kinda be justified in not feeling bad since again victor ran immediately and has been very against giving his creation a second chance, permanently at least with his bride and all.

and its like gee maybe the guy who lived on his own forever and who humans treated HORRIBLY doesn't really like humans and kills them? :0 woaaa walton crazy shit right there. Idk i just-like i like victor and all but c'mon man you don't neglect ur kid but if u do don't be surprised at the consequences and walton, walton just shut the fuck up

[toxicsamruby]

hello! i have to ask: what do you think about supernatural au's where monsters don't exist/monster hunting is not a thing? do you think the characters could even exist out of that realm? i honestly have conflicting views on this because on one hand i do enjoy the character dynamics but i also feel it would be wrong to just take away something that is fundamental to this show, idk though

i LOVE this question. thank you. im going to write a very long post now

obviously there are infinite ways to interpret a story, right? but sam and dean (and castiel too of course) as characters are completely inextricable from their backstories, and their backstories are inextricable from themes of transience, poverty, loneliness, violence, familial duty, masculinity, otherness, american protestantism, horror, humanity, and monstrosity. i dont think that it’s Wrong to take away the monster hunting as an element in the story, but i DO think it would be bad storytelling to do so bc the fact is that these characters w these personalities wouldnt EXIST without a few VERY crucial plot points/themes. and thats a GOOD thing!! say what u will abt the writers (and i do. i do) but the early seasons do an EXCELLENT job of building characters who are inseparable from their stories, characters whose every action is reflective of the Story itself in a bigger sense, characters who are interesting because of the way that they’re used to tell that bigger Story. there’s a sense of cohesiveness between character and theme and narrative, and removing one of these aspects would lessen the other two. that is the mark of good storytelling (that, in my opinion, distinguishes seasons 1 and MAYBE 2 from all the rest; although funnily enough i think castiel’s arc in s4 is the best example of what im talking about outside of s1-2. but anyways).

without these crucial themes and narratives, who ARE sam and dean? why do they even matter? what’s the value of them as characters? aus that strip away all those VERY important themes and plot points strip away the actual artistic value of the characters, and reduces them to objects of the audience’s emotional whims. the only reason u have any affection for these characters in aus is because you know and understand the source material, and you remember why those characters STARTED to matter to u in the first place. this is something that happens in a lot of fanfiction i think: the most essential themes of the original work are ignored for the sake of emotionally expedient scenarios where both writer and reader can clock out of having to do a bigger analysis of the story and just focus on, for example, a certain ship getting together and/or having sex, or a certain character getting a happy ending. and like i wont deny that theyre fun to read! they are essentially transplanting already-developed characters from their already-developed stories into a new fun scenario without the themes and narratives that actually made the characters compelling. and sure, sometimes a truly good author offers us a compelling new set of themes and narratives, ones that are interesting and make us think, but i’d argue that the characters in those rare good fics are 1. not...really the same characters from the show, since the story they’re in has been so completely transformed 2. basically shortcuts for the author to cut their teeth on writing original fiction. in any case, a vast majority of fics that remove the themes and narratives of the original story DONT offer a truly satisfying replacement, so the point is almost moot.

my answer, in short, is that aus without monster hunting destroy the character-theme-narrative cohesion that all good stories require, and by extension doesn’t require either author or reader to think critically about the story as a whole. you know that joke that goes around about supernatural just being a crate full of toys that we’re all sitting around and playing barbie dolls with? that is what the fics ur talking about basically are. it isn’t seriously engaging with a story as a piece of art, it’s grabbing a few barbies from a box and putting them in different clothes. and i think the fact that supernatural does fall apart both thematically and narratively so early in its incredibly long runtime is what allows people to treat it as a box of dolls, because most of the time it seems like the writers themselves treat the show as a box of dolls instead of a story that deserves respect and care and thought. so i actually do understand the urge to play with the barbies, so to speak, and to a certain extent i dont even think it’s a bad thing. but i DO think that sometimes, especially online, ESPECIALLY with a show like this where the lines between genuine engagement with the text and playing barbie dolls gets so blurred, people actually start to lose track of which is which, and THATS what irritates me. people start to view the ENTIRE STORY as just a way to see their personal favorite character do what they want that character to do. the character (and their emotional attachment to said character) becomes the whole reason for the story, instead of the story being the reason for the characters. playing barbie dolls is fine! but it DOES need to be balanced out with actual engagement, with literary analysis, with criticism if the story needs it (and my GOD does supernatural need criticism!), and there needs to be an understanding of the difference between genuine analysis and personal loyalty to a character. 

like, not to be a snob or anything, but it is important to engage truthfully and fairly with a text. things arent good just because you want them to be good, and stories can only offer you genuine satisfaction and critical/artistic growth if you truly engage with them. engaging with supernatural means thinking/writing about monsters and the Other, and to remove monstrosity as a theme and narrative hollows out the story completely.

[faustonastring]

your take is bad. saying “i’m not saying you can’t feel x way about x thing” and then tagging multi-paragraph rants with insulting language in the LI hashtags is... telling people how to feel. if that isn’t your goal then why is it tagged? people are allowed to be upset, even if they used in-game currency. sorry, but the coins have monetary value whether you like it or not. people are pissed. the devs are not immune to criticism and neither are you

First I would just like to say this : I have a hard time articulating my thoughts into writing or words, so I can understand why you took it that way, but that’s not my intention. That doesn’t excuse what I said sure, but that’s not what I meant.

I didn’t mean to tell anyone how to feel, and I totally get why it came off that way, it’s hard for me to express what I’m thinking so this is gonna sound weird and all over the place so bare with me (not excusing what I said, simply explaining)

What I meant when I said that is: it’s simply just a game, and it’s not worth hurting people over no matter the circumstances. It’s one thing to criticize and it’s another thing to bash people because of simple change. My wording for that was not right, and I’m taking full responsibility for that, and I totally understand why you would be upset. I didn’t mean to tell any one how to feel, and I’m sorry if it came off that way that wasn’t my intention, and I hate to hide behind the excuse “I don’t know how to articulate myself” but I don’t, and I know it’s a shitty excuse, and I’m not trying to excuse my self, I’m trying to explain why it came off that way, I want to make that very clear.

When I said “It’s okay to be super pissed if you spent money on something and it’s now gone, but if you just used in-game currency, and not any of your real money, you can still be a little pissed, sure, but it’s not as big of a deal as actually spending your real hard earned cash on something.“ I didn’t mean you can’t be upset, I was giving my opinion on the matter and how I saw it, (which I shouldn’t have done looking back at it) not every one is going to agree with me. I do admit I worded that wrong, and I should of took more time to word that better, but that doesn’t change how I think. I then go on to explain throwing a fit about something so simple as a prologue change is childish, which it is. I wasn’t directing that at the person who sent in the og anon ask, I was directing it at people who bully and harass the devs for stupid shit.

The devs and I aren’t immune to criticism yes you’re right, but harassing and throwing a tantrum is not criticism. There is a difference.

“Criticism: the analysis and judgment of the merits and faults of a literary or artistic work.”

“Harassment: aggressive pressure or intimidation.”

It’s one thing to analyze the arcana and write about some things you didn’t like about a scene in a chapter that didn’t sit right with you, but it’s another thing to pressure the devs into changing the prologue back, or send them hurtful messages. They’re real people too.

And before you message me or send me another ask, I understand why you might try to say my response was “harassment” because it has an angry undertone to it, but I promise that’s not what I was trying to do, I was pissed. I do understand why it might come off that way, but i was just going on a angry rant, and if you want to talk about it, then pls message me.

And if something I wrote hurt you, please message me, so we can talk this over like mature adults. I’m not going to be mad, or expose you, or even dox you, (I wouldn’t want that to happen to me so why would I do it to you, ya’ know) and I quite frankly prefer if you did, so I can better explain my self, and we can try to find a common ground.

I do admit it was immature for me to say those things, and I should of thought it through more, and I’m sorry if I hurt or offended you, that was never my intention. I put some of my bad energy into that angry rant which I shouldn’t have done, and I truly am sorry. From now on I’m going to try my best to only write response to things like that when I’m in a good head space so I don’t hurt any more people. I know this doesn’t make up for any of the harm I might of caused you, but hopefully it precedes any future mishaps (and if there’s anything I can do to make it up to you please send me a message, I would love to make it up to you/help In what ever way I can)

And you’re right, the devs aren’t immune to criticism, but again there is a difference from criticism (which I rarely see) and harassment and people trying to rewrite their story and characters which I see far to often. And you’re right I’m also not immune to criticism. But that’s not going to stop me from voicing my opinion, and speaking up on some of the toxic traits of this fandom so people don’t have what could be their ‘safe space’ taken away from them. People aren’t going to agree with me, I understand. And people aren’t going to always agree with you either. This might be one of those things we don’t see eye to eye on and that’s okay. Like I said before, it’s okay to get mad but it’s another thing to blow things out of proportion, especially over a game. And maybe were just missing each other and if you want to respectfully talk this out I’m more than happy too, (it will probably help us better understand where we’re coming from)

And one last time, I never meant to say “ you can’t get mad over this thing >:(“ that was never my intent, but I sure as hell see how/why you think that. You have every right to be upset, you have every right to not like the devs. But don’t harass the devs because they changed something. It’s immature. The same type of immaturity I exhibited when I generalized and told people how to feel.

I hope this better explains everything, and again I’m sorry.i hate it when people tell me how to feel and I feel so god awful thinking I accidentally did one of my biggest pet peeves, even when I tried to avoid it. I really am sorry. If you want to talk to me about it, feel free to message me, or if you don’t feel comfortable doing that (I swear I’m not some big scary person) you can send in another ask, (its just a little harder to answer correctly because I don’t know exactly how you’re feeling, if that makes sense.)

[darrowsrising]

Hi! Hope you don’t mind that I wanted to respond. I think I have an addiction to literary criticism. Ugh, why am I like this?  PS I can rant/talk about other stuff! Anything in the series you wish you saw discussed more? 

I don’t agree with this:“a character doesn’t have flaws/their flaws aren’t significant if they don’t impact their narrative” — Interesting. I mean this in a completely sincere way: it did not occur to me that a reader wouldn’t be bothered by a lack of results stemming from flaws on the page. But we all want different things from our reading experience, right? And knowing you feel this way I understand where you’re coming from better. 

For me, the measure of how important something is is directly linked to how it impacts the story (or how it impacts a character’s personality/development). Having a flaw that doesn’t impact the character or the story in any way is underwhelming for me. It’s setup with no payoff. It’s a Chekhov’s Gun that doesn’t go off in the third act. 

I agree with you that not every flaw needs to impact the character in some huge negative way. Like, if a character is clumsy, I don’t need them to trip and fall to their death to have a satisfying character arc. But I want to see them run into a sofa or something. If you aren’t going to address a character’s flaws in any way, why even bother including those flaws? I think it’s great that we as readers can dissect plot points and come up with our own interpretations and analysis of characters, but with something as important as character development it feels cheap if none of it is actually on the page. 

she chose to play by her father’s rules (manipulate, win at all costs etc.) and she intetionally put herself through the ringer I consider that a mistake on her part. - I consider what she did a mistake too. And I’ll give it to you, I believe it did cause her pain. I just wish this had informed some of her actions or impacted her relationship with her allies. 

I wish there was more exploration of her reformist views, — I agree! It’s clear as early as RR that she has sympathy for low colors, but what was her vision for a more fair system? Virginia is a planner so there’s no way she didn’t have some idea of how she would have changed things. However, given her reaction to finding out Darrow was a red her views weren’t always aligned with the rising. It’s disappointing to me that we don’t get more or her opinions on this. 

She sacrificed herself. She did what Adrius or Nero would have done and it was painful for her. She bend her own morals to protect her family and she is the kind of person who has a lot of respect and love for her moral compass. - I didn’t see it as bending her morals, actually. Her morals tell her she needs to protect family and she does, even if it makes her miserable. I see this more as sticking to her moral code than bending it. Honestly I’m more mad at Pierce Brown than Virginia about this (I know that sounds crazy lol). She’s so smart he couldn’t have given her something better/more interesting to do than sleep with Cassius? 

You think Virginia manipulates everyone in the same way  - lol ouch. Honestly I do think Virginia manipulates people, intentionally and unintentionally. Virginia says herself she’s always been able to manipulate people. And I don’t mind! I think it’s really interesting. I just wanted to know more. She’s someone who wants to Do The Right Thing, so how does she view this ability of hers? Does it bother her that she can manipulate people? Does it scare her? Does it remind her of her brother? When she brings it up in that conversation with Darrow in GS I thought oh cool, is she going to be questioning her relationships with friends now? will she hesitate to reach out to new people because she thinks she’ll accidentally manipulate somebody? But it never goes anywhere. And I think this does a disservice to her. Alternatively, if Virginia isn’t supposed to be someone who manipulates people, why even have that line in the book? 

I do think she felt bad about using Cassius, but it wasn’t as impactful to her as it was to be something she wasn’t. - agreed (and it makes me feel bad for Cassius, because I think this whole relationship really messed him up and she was able to more or less shrug it off) 

In Morning Star there is a big emphasis on the fact that she chose to save Orion and the rest of the fleet and even let Orion have the fleet. It was because she chose to do the right thing. — Okay but to be fair, she didn’t have much of a choice but to save the rest of the fleet, right? I mean at the end of Golden Son her options are: fight the sovereign (who just killed her father and who she thinks has killed Darrow) or give in. To fight she needs a fleet. Orion has been in charge so why mess up a good thing? It’s not exactly a hard choice. 

I do feel that her trust in her family was a flaw too: she was really willing to trust Nero that he’ll give the Reformers a chance - he was going to kill them and let Darrow lick her wounds. That was really naive of her. — I agree her trust in her father was naive. But she never has to confront that. How much more impactful would it have been if she had to choose between her father and the rising in golden son? What happens at the Triumph forces her hand. Instead of choosing between her father and the rising she’s choosing between the sovereign and the rising. That’s an easy chose. Because of that her decision to “save the fleet” just didn’t have the same impact for me. 

To be honest, everyone’s flaws in the Red Rising Trilogy (ok, maybe almost everyone…) are a thing of interpretation. not everyone has to suffer for them. Not everyone’s flaws impact them on page./The focus is Darrow and we don’t see other characters dealing with their flaws on page either - look a Victra: her narrative isn’t directly impacted - it’s more implied than anything and there is nothing wrong with that. /The most on-page development in the trilogy is Darrow’s and that is totally valid - it’s his pov, his story, his views. All the other characters that get any development get on and off-page development - Sevro being the most proeminent, but we can also include Ragnar. Cassius’ development is mostly done off-page. -  I agree that in this trilogy about Darrow there isn’t enough time to fully flesh out other characters. But one of the things I love about this series is its ability to make characters come alive with just a few scenes. 

I love Victra so let’s look at her. Her narrative is directly impacted by her flaws. She has a super complicated relationship with her sister and it messes with her head. Victra says she has poison in her veins — we as readers can interpret that a bit but however you see it you know Victra is upset. She says she’ll just ruin everything and breaks up with Sevro. That’s a direct impact on her narrative because of her flaws. And it’s all on the page (Sevro tells us the whole story). 

I also want to bring up my favorite Victra scene here. When Darrow and his council are all clamoring to torture Cassius in MS it’s Victra who stops them when she shows them the scars from her own torture. It’s a beautiful moment and it really highlights how complex Victra is. Victra is as tough as they come but she can be vulnerable too. I think it’s interesting that Darrow observes at this moment “I don’t think Mustang would ever let her guard down in public like this.” 

Sevro, Ragnar, and Cassius all get enough on page development that I can connect the dots in their character arcs. Sevro has always been an outcast, and so when he sympathizes with other outcasts it makes a lot of sense. We see interactions between him and his father and we get a sense of their strange but ultimately loving relationship, so we can see how the death of his father would impact him. We also see how vicious he is so it’s no surprise when he leads the rising down a path they probably shouldn’t go. We see him fail on the page, and we see him grow when he ultimately decides he wants to stop the cycle of violence and save Cassius’s life. 

In RR Cassius’s moral code is set up. He doesn’t want to hurt innocent people, but he’s got a lot of dumb ideas about honor and he’s under a lot of pressure from his family. In that way he’s a lot like Virginia (struggling with loyalty to his family vs what he thinks is right). His flaw is his loyalty to the system and because of that loyalty everything he loves is stripped away from him. And we see it all on the page. And we see little scenes with him (he covers Darrow with his cape, tells Darrow about the nukes, and has whiskey with Darrow). Every time you see him he’s a little changed. I think you can trace his arc very well. 

Some others: Tactius can’t choose a side (flaw) and pays for it with his life. Roque is so proud of his color (flaw) that he takes his own life. 

All this is not to say that Virginia had to be more like Victra. Sevro, Cassius, or anybody else to have a good character arc. My only point here is that PB is really good at writing flaws/character arcs/character development in minor characters. I just wanted more from what he did with Virginia. 

Virginia’s hatred for showing vulnerability affects her relationship with Darrow in Morning Star. - how? I’m genuinely asking. She keeps her distance but Darrow sees that all as his fault. Her inability to be vulnerable never makes Darrow question whether he loves her. She never has to be vulnerable to achieve anything. 

The Rising isn’t too pleased with having her as an ally - see Dancer. — this conflict lasts for one scene so it never felt super impactful (in MS anyway. in Iron Gold I think it’s explored better). 

Her relationship with Victra doesn’t go smoothly - Victra was the first to insinuate that Virginia only joined them for power, because she couldn’t explain it otherwise.  — Ok, this is an example of how Victra was mean to Virginia. That’s not really illustrating any of Virginia’s flaws. Sorry, that was nit picky. The main thing for me here is that again, this conflict lasts for all of one scene. However, I’m glad PB didn’t press this point because (as mentioned later) there aren’t a ton of female friendships in the original trilogy and it would have been a bummer to have these two fighting. 

Deanna doesn’t shy away from calling out bullshite when she sees it. So I highly doubt that Mustang would have (manipulated) her. — I agree. Deanna genuinely likes Virginia. And…fine. It’s kind of boring but whatever. I guess this is supposed to show us that Deanna can tell that Virginia really loves Darrow. But then, Deanna doesn’t like Victra and I firmly believe that Victra loves Darrow (as a friend) too. IDK, I think PB just liked to contrast Virginia and Victra. 

As for Virginia testing Darrow? It was a trust test. — I just — this isn’t how trust works. When you trust someone you’re honest with them. You don’t “test” them. 

Because they lost that trust they had. - This is so interesting. I’ve been listening to the Howler Pod podcast (it’s really good) and they’ve been re-capping Golden Son. And one thing I forgot about that book was how many times Virginia confronted Darrow about letting her in. She’s no dummy, and she knew he was keeping something back from her. She begs him time and again to let her in and tell her the truth. There’s that great scene where she’s hitting him with the practice razor to try to get him to open up to her. 

And in the end of GS, he does. 

Darrow tells Virginia the truth about himself even though it’s really dangerous for him and all the people relying on him. He tells her the truth even though they are finally back together and he doesn’t really have to tell her. 

He takes a leap of faith. He trusts her with this secret. With his life’s purpose. He trusts her. 

And…she leaves him. She doesn’t kill him sure but she does let him twist in the wind. I completely understand that she was shocked but he thinks she might turn him in to the sovereign. It seems like she could have at least gotten a message to him to say “hey I’m not going to rat you out but I need a minute to process this.” 

So when this whole trust thing comes up in morning star I’m left wondering if I read a different book lol. Darrow trusted Virginia with his whole life and with the whole rising. She knew he was keeping something back from her. She’s logical and she’s a genius. It seems wrong to me that Darrow is the one who gets all the blame for breaking the “trust” between them. He did trust her. 

I was just re-reading MS to try to find a quote to use, and in that scene between Darrow and Cassius, Cassius says, “I never thought about the weight on you. All that time among us. You could never talk to anyone.” And I kind of think — shouldn’t Virginia be saying that to him? It’s presented in the book like she feels betrayed and its up to Darrow to make things right. Where’s her compassion for him? If you say she saved the fleet, that benefitted her as much as it did Darrow. 

And it needed rebuilding. It was rebuilt on the ice. - Darrow says “I felt like I proved myself on the ice, but it hasn’t gone away.”  Implying that even after the ice Virginia is still testing him. 

But what she really wanted to see was - what kind of world does Darrow want for the Colors? Can this world include their son? Is Darrow just warlord? Because that is what the Sons of Ares are considered - especally after what Harmony did. Mustang knew Darrow au Andromedus: a highly skilled Peerless Scarred, so skilled he was saw almost as an Iron Gold, an orphan with many ambitions and a quest for glory, she saw a good friend to his mates, she saw someone who broke paradigms to suit himself or his moral compass, she saw someone who never used Pinks, never abused Browns and respected other Colors, she saw someone who murmured an off-Color name in his feverish sleep, she saw much of Darrow. But she never expected him to be a Red. SHe felt as if she never knew him at all. And it’s not a great thing, but it is understandable. - Yes, I understand how she felt all this. But it’s not really fair to Darrow, is it? I feel like MS reduces their relationship to something so one sided. It’s all about how Darrow has to prove himself to Virginia. I’ll admit my criticism is subjective here, but if you want to build trust with someone and get to know the real them, isn’t the first step by being honest with them? Virginia never voices any of the concerns you mentioned above until the very end of the book. I don’t really connect with their relationship because of this lack of communication. 

In Iron Gold, we see the consequences of her actions more than the consequences of her flaws: — I agree! But I think her actions are her flaws 

I am pretty sure every POV character minus Darrow has something against her. - Lysander seemed ambivalent to her, Ephraim hates everybody, and Lyria…I tracked down Lyria’s reaction to seeing Virginia: “years of anger, resentment, now compromised by the subtle beauty of her, by the rolling power of her calm voice…she was tall, beautiful. But that’s not the impression she left on me No, the Sovereign is tried. What would it be like, to be responsible for so many lives?” I left out a few things but the passage stresses how Virginia is “brilliant, perfect, beautiful” a lot. And Lyria’s anger fades. IDK, it reads to me like Lyria sees her and is like, oh she’s so pretty I sympathize with her now. Little underwhelming to me when I think about all the reasons Lyria had to be angry with Virginia. 

Another mistake I think she made was severing so much of her power -  she’s partly at fault for the rise of the Red Hand and the Syndicate. And she’s partly responsible for the fact that the Republic is divived so much: her string of pardons pissed a lot of people off and rightly so, but on the other hand it isn’t like she had much choice — i agree in Iron Gold we see real fallout from her decisions, and I’m hoping we get even more in Dark Age 

I do wish there were more interactions between her and other females, in Golden Son, especially. I wish there was more exploration of her pregnancy, her relationship with Niobe, Thraxa, Xana, the Arcos women (who remained her allies).  - Agreed. I do chalk this up to the fact that the books are only so long and you can’t fit everything in, but hopefully we get more in DA 

So if you’re willing to really give Virginia a chance, I do believe you won’t be dissapointed. But if you’re not…well, we can always agree to disagree. — It’s not even that I want to “give her a chance” it’s that I see how she could be a more interesting character (to me anyway). I don’t hate her now. I just wanted more. 

Astrea:

Ok, so, I guess we'll just agree to disagree on this one. But it's ok. It's not like we aren't respectful about it.

I can understand where you are comming from and I respect the fact that you don't like Virginia. And I never, at any point, tried to change your mind. I'm sorry if it ever came out that way. I'm not here to change opinions, I'm here to give my take on thing, my interpretation of these books. I'm not big on saying I critique books, I just give my honest opinion on them. Me saying that I'm a critic would make it seem like what I say has much more value than the average person and that's not true. I'm no George Călinescu.

I won't delve into comparing Virginia's journey with Cassius's or Victra's, but I do stand by the fact that all of them were dealt mostly off-page and all are valid. It's just a matter of interpretation which will end with a never-ending back and forth I refuse to engage in.

From what you said in your response I really want to adress some things. I'll just say what I think, of course, you can disagree, what I say is not absolute truth, it's just my take.

Virginia's journey in the books was mostly off page and I think that it can be traced well enough to make for an interesting character. That is my opinion. That's how I interpret her story. You obviously disagree with that and that's your right.

I think that in Morning Star, her relationship with Darrow suffers the consequences of both their actions. They reconcile bit by bit on the ice (between the attack at the Peace Treaty and the siege on the Gold Gods, they have some rocky steps to deal with and they still have their moments when they shut the other out and there are a lot of fade to black scenes where anything can happen - including disscussing feelings and stuff, although Darrow states that 'there are a lot of things between them' yet they kinda choose to be together inspite of them, because life is short and they can die at any time...which is a trope I find easy to make annoying, but I feel it works in the Red Rising series, because it is so focused on action). A lot of their reconnection takes place during the time they spend on the poles of Mars to get the Obsidians and it's not something instant, but I get that it can be considered unsatisfactory. But Darrow isn't instantly trustful of her - he himself tells Victra that he will sacrifice Mustang if necessary.

Trust is not always black and white, sometimes you need some reasons to trust. And Virginia needed some reasons: with Darrow believed to be dead, Virginia continued to live for her son and she wanted to know (after she found out he is still alive) if there could be a future for her son in the world Darrow tries to build or does he want to just turn the pyramid upside down. Now, I don't know if this is a right or wrong reason, but I think it is understandable. When Pierce Brown came to Romania he talked a little bit about the fact that Virginia as a mother needed to be assure her son's future, because he is half Gold and half Red.

I think that motherhood changed her a lot, not having Darrow near her during pregnancy might have played a part too - she states that she dreads being left alone again by him. But I can accept it and I get it that other people don't.

Another reason was the fact that Darrow had all the right to be angry at Golds and want vengeance. He lied to her about his identity for many years and he hid a lot of things from her, so she wasn't sure about some important things when it came to him. Plus, it's easy to put 2 and 2 together and figure out that Darrow planned to assassinate Nero to obtain power and change the Society. She wanted to kbow what he wanted to do with that power.

I don't know if it was fair to Darrow or not, but her reasoning was valid to me.

What she actually wanted to know about him after the ice was how he is with his family - that's when she was absolutely sure he just wanted a prosperous future for his family. Afterwards I think it was just about Pax, how would he feel about Pax, if she should tell him. Because immediately after Darrow says that about the 'trust test', she tries to tell him about Pax and ends up just showing him.

I think that, while Pierce had to create some tension between them, he didn't insist on it or on explaining their relationship that much, because he simply doesn't write too much about romance. He focuses more on action and that's valid. I don't complain, I love what we got until now as far as romance goes, although I'd admit that Victra and Sevro coming back together because of a life-threatening situation was a bit boring as a trope, but in the end it was pretty well-executed. I've read pretty bad ones and this one (and those between Darrow and Mustang) wasn't bad at all compared to those.

In Iron Gold they have a huge fallout due to miscommunication and lack of proper communication and that's a good thing for them, because they are not telepaths. As much as they know each other, that doesn't compensate for communication in their relationship.

Secondly, the whole manipulation thing...just because it comes easy to do, doesn't mean she does it all the time. I say that because it comes easy to me too. Everytime I want something from someone I get it through sweet, kind words, friendliness, not too much, not too little, just enough, some interest taht is at least half true and you get what you want from people (I got lots of favours from teachers this way and lots of good quality courses from fellow students...and lots of bonus points at annoyingly hard classes). It's easy to do, but honestly, if you want genuine relationships with people, you don't do this. It's not like it's some uncontrollable behavior. It's always a clear delimitation between manipulating people to gain something (or to make them like you for a higher purpose) and trying to make yourself pleasant for the purpose to build a relationship. Deanna is the kind of person who sees through bullshite and doesn't shy away from saying it like it is. And honestly, I don't see a reason why Mustang wouldn't want a genuine relationship with Deanna. Her mother died when she was young and she obviously respects Deanna because she asks her for what to do about Pax and Darrow. Plus, Deanna watched the interactions between Darrow and Mustang and I think she made up her mind about her through Virginia's action, not by just pretty words. That is my opinion, though. That's how I saw it

Lastly, I think Lyria hated Virginia for so long and once face to face with her she was at a loss for words. She blamed her for a lot of the bad things in her life, but when she looked at her she couldn't find what to say to her because what she saw didn't match her perception of her. Like when you spend time hating on a person, but face to face you just can't justify your feelings. Now, that combined with the fact that she was the only one willing to listen to her and not torture her or just kill her, I'd bet she was willing to chnage her mind about hating her.

As for Lysander, he may have named her Conqueror, but that doesn't mean he likes the fact that he's not on the throne or what Virginia did with grandma's Empire. Not to mention that Lysander insinuates his support for his godfather a lot - he's quick to point out what the Republican forces destroyed with savagery on Mars, but it's Cassius who reminds him that Magnus is not a slagging saint either.

Plus, Julia au Bellona, Dancer, Sefi...they all have to certain degrees a lot of resentment towards her. Julia because she's...Julia. And Dancer and Sefi...well, mostly because she is Gold and then, because her policies aren't vegenful enough for their tastes. Though, I agree that for a Gold is hard to understand other Colors (being married to a Red and having a son it's not going to make her perfect in understanding all Colors), it was the only way the Rising could win without having to destroy the entire Gold Color. Because as Darrow said it and as Roque showed it - Gold won't bend for Red. They'll bend for one of their own.

Well, that's my take on it. I'm not claiming absolute truth about it. I just felt like I should say what I thought about some stuff.

To me, Virginia au Augustus is an amazing character and I think she'll be even more amazing once we get into her head more.To you, she just has/had the potential to be one. I doubt we'll ever come to a consensus, but that's not a bad thing.

Anyway, I'm not going to insist about this subject anymore than necessary, because I feel satisfied with where it came to. I understand that my interpretation and yours are different and I respect that. If you want to add your take on what I said above, be my guest, I'll read it, post it, respect it. No problem!

It'd be awesome to talk about something else regarding Red Rising. You stated something similar when we talked long ago about the GS plot, but we never got around to talking about something else and that was too bad.

Hope you'll pop more often in my inbox, honestly. If you did, I'm sorry, I didn't know it was you and the previous statement has no use.

Here are some stuff I'd like to see more talked about:

Lilath and Antonia

The Valii-Raths

How Darrow's superhuman abilities are balanced out through out the books

How Darrow ends up inspiring characters in the books and how it affects their lives (and his)

Capitalism and the Solar Republic - why Sun Industries prospers, but the working class doesn't (add speculations, we have little stuff about it to make concrete arguments)

Reds and the Vox Populi

Martial arts, individual fighting styles and warfare in Red Rising

Traditions in various parts of the galaxy

Weaponary, tools, guns, ships etc.

Apollonius liking the Sauds might play a part in solving the issues with the Rim Dominion? How the hell will peace be restored when the Republic is being attacked on all fronts: the remains of Octavia's empire, the Rim and from the inside.

If you guys have any other ideas, please add in a reblog. 🤗

Howl on!

Later edit: I'm sorry, I made some grammar mistakes and a pleonasm. I tried to fix as much as I could. Promise I'm not dumb, I just think too much and try to write all the ideas at once...that's dumb, but that'a how my brain works. Again, sorry!

[liketolaugh-writes]

I don't really follow MCU universe much but I am curious on what are your opinions Tony Stark? Personally I liked him but a friend of mine kinda is really anti of him and since I didn't delve much deeper into it I let it pass but after reading CC, I am curious on your thoughts since you are usually pretty good at characterization from what I've seen with your DGM works? Only if you want to, I mean.

Tony is my favorite, okay? I know this isn’t at all clear from my Avengers work, but you’d pick it up pretty fast going through my bookmarks.

So, speaking purely from the intellectual let’s-do-a-literary-analysis-right-now standpoint, his character growth is absolutely amazing. He has a very distinct character arc, with its ups and downs, definitely with a general upwards trend. You compare Tony in the first Iron Man movie to the one in Homecoming, you’ll see what I mean, yeah?

He makes mistakes. He makes a lot of mistakes, okay, he’s an ass. But he learns from them, and it’s obvious that he learns from them, that’s the whole point. The very first Iron Man movie is literally all about this, him fixing the mistakes he made in not keeping close track of his weaponry. He messes up, but he also tries real hard, and despite what a lot of people say he actually is one of the first to fess up to his mistakes. He just doesn’t do it in, y’know, words.

Let’s talk about Civil War, because let’s be real, it’s fucking always about Civil War; it’s the highest, most extreme point of Tony and Steve’s character arcs so far. And again, yeah, it’s always about Tony and Steve, they’re the two main focus points, and anti-Tony is almost always meant as pro-Steve.

Civil War, for those of you who don’t remember, is about two things: the Accords, which put the Avengers and, I believe, other superhumans, under a set of restrictions. Don’t remember the specifics, I haven’t seen it in a while. And then there’s Bucky, who, through no particular fault of his own, has been running around killing people. The Accords would make him suffer, and prevent the Avengers from doing anything about it.

In turn, Civil War can only be fully understood within the context of the rest of the MCU - more specifically, the character arcs of Steve and Tony. But this is about Tony, so I’ll just talk about his right now.

Tony’s is first, because I love talking about Tony’s character growth. First, we have the first Iron Man movie, our starting point - Tony the billionaire, Tony the playboy, Tony the selfish, narcissistic asshole with only a minor quantity of self-awareness.

And then he gets blown up by his own weapons, and gets a huge, a massive kick in the ass. Won’t bore you all with the details, I’m sure you remember most of this part, but he gets out, and - starving, hurting, tired - one of the first things he does is shut down the weapons sector of his company. Because it’s hurting people, and now he knows it.

Cutting forward a little, we arrive at Age of Ultron, and Tony makes a huge mistake. He creates Ultron, who attempts to destroy the world. For some reason, the entire blame for this tends to get laid at Tony’s feet? Y’all, he picked up a HYDRA thing, found an AI, and mostly just left it sitting there. That’s literally it. Anyone could have done that. But, I digress. At the end of the movie, he takes responsibility for it, and leaves the Avengers.

And then, when Civil War arrives, he firmly takes the side of the Accords, which would force the Avengers to take accountability for the damage they cause. Tony, with a history of stolen weapons and huge mistakes, thinks they shouldn’t be able to go home free. This is what we call character growth, and it’s so good, it’s so damn well done and Tony’s learned so much.

This is my favorite thing about the MCU. At its core, it’s a moral debate, not just a single black-and-white theme, which is one of the reasons it works so well as a franchise instead of a small set of movies, a trilogy or something. It just wouldn’t work as well. But anyway, I’d present Steve’s side, but then I might have to debate it more fully and I do not have the time for that right now, I’m meant to be avidly reading Spiderman fanfiction.

I’ll take you one step forward, too, to Spiderman: Homecoming. Now, it doesn’t have a Tony focus, but I’ll drop one key point: one of the biggest things he teaches Peter is accountability. He makes sure Peter knows that recklessness could cost lives. (Considering Iron Man 1 and 2, I repeat: this is character growth.)

Anyway - more personally, I just really like him!! I adored his role in Homecoming, guys, he’s trying so hard to do right by Peter. I’d say more but, well, the movie’s really new, so-

Tony’s actually pretty demonstrative, but it’s unconventional, and to a lot of people it looks like bribery. To those people, I would like to introduce the concept of ‘5 Love Languages’, one of which is gift giving. Tony’s inability to express himself in words despite talking constantly shouldn’t be held against him, yeah? (There’s also ‘acts of service’, ‘physical affection’, any of this sounding familiar?)

And again! He tries!! Really hard!! If you’ve ever talked to me about Howard Link for too long, you know how much I love that. Allen too. Trying isn’t everything, but it’s not nothing. Tony throws a hell of a lot of effort into everything he takes halfway seriously.

I could go on for ages, but I think that’ll do. *laugh* Seriously, I love Tony, he’s great. Sorry if this is more than you expected, anon!

[justmytwobits]

JMTB: Daring Done

So, I’m going to be right up front: I’m going to pretty much be going off on a tangent in this post, so I’ll address my thoughts on the episode briefly and upfront:

It was…kinda meh, to be honest.

I saw it when it was leaked on YouTube last week, but I didn’t post about it because I wasn’t sure what to say. I didn’t love it or hate it, and I wasn’t sure if there was anything it added to the world I wanted to talk about that I haven’t already discussed (I consider Sonambula’s story to be equivalent to the legends from Campfire tales, and I gushed about those enough in my post on that episode).

So I used the fact that I saw it early to wait a bit before writing up this post, waiting until I’d at least seen Dr. Wolf’s take on it (he posts promptly, and sometimes, he’ll have noticed an element I didn’t that gives me something to talk about), and less than two minutes into his video, I knew what I was going to post about…and it doesn’t have that much to actually do with the episode.

It’s a phrase—an innocent phrase on the surface, and one that, as an actor/writer, I have been bombarded with since at least middle school: ‘willing suspension of disbelief’ or, it’s shorter form, ‘suspension of disbelief’. Dr. Wolf used it in the context of struggling with this episode because he felt as if he were being asked to suspend his disbelief to cover some pretty huge logical and narrative leaps or inconsistencies.

No.

In such circumstances, it is NOT the audience’s fault, but the content creator’s, and I say this as someone who views this primarily form the creator’s perspective.

Time and again, I have heard this phrase used as a way of telling the audience to pretty much sit own, shut up, turn off their brains and accept whatever it was they were being shown. No. no. no-no-no-no-no-no.

In its proper context, the willing suspension of disbelief is a contract between the presenter and the audience: the audience will accept the world being presented SO LONG AS THE PRESENTER RETAINS INTERNAL CONSISTENCY.

Severe character breaks, events that violate the pre-established rules or logic of the world, or circumstances or events that simply can’t happen all break this internal consistency, and thus, the contract. The audience is NOT obligated to accept something that breaks the world of the story, because it is the presenter who broke the unspoken contract.

Now, debate can happen about whether an event or choice truly violated the world as presented, or a character as established. And the character one is tricky, because well-rounded characters occasionally do something outside of their own norm, and generally this event is revelatory rather than contradictory. In such cases, though, I believe the presenter should welcome audience discussion and debate, rather than ask them to ‘shut up and accept’, as discussions about a work often enrich the experience of it in the first place. That’s why the analysis community exists, why literary analysis is a huge part of the academic scene, and why, for every art form that exists, there is a corresponding field of criticism.

I’ve no issue with the concept of ‘suspension of disbelief’ in its proper context: I watch shows about pastel ponies, teenage superheroes, and read books about wizards, dragons, etc. I have to suspend my disbelief that such things ‘can’t’ exist, and enter a world where they do.

I’m trying not to sound too negative, as it’s actually a positive agreement, I guess I just feel horrible every time I hear someone criticize themselves for not being able to ‘suspend their disbelief’ when, in truth, it was the presenter that broke the rules of the world they themselves had created.

 Again I am sorry for the tangent, but that’s just my two bits…

-Narrative Arc

 To my readers:

What do you guys think? Have you ever been troubled by a world-breaking moment in a work of fiction? Have you ever been told to stop picking at an element and suspend disbelief?

Have you been on the other side—the creator’s? How do you understand the presenter’s obligation to the audience?

Did you like the episode? Do you feel that I was being unfair to brush it aside for most of the post? Did you like it? Dislike it? Struggle with it?

I’d love to hear where your opinions lie!