#sorry that it turned out to be kinda a long post ><< /div> Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[4outof5ghostslikemynightmares]

Sorry, y'all couldn't leave this in the commentary (?) portion of this post, it was just too good. Also tagging @caramelc0rgi because. @velvet4510I once read a comment from a real steel mill worker who said that kind of work forms a special brotherhood among the workers and no worker in his right mind would EVER get a colleague in trouble for saving one of their lives. @mapofyourstars: literally! my grandfather was a steel mill worker for his whole life, and he would have died for the men he worked with - them turning on erik should have never happened, lol

Not to mention, wasn't this still communist Poland, too? What blue collar person in Poland is calling the Police? My good friend growing up was Polish and he'd tell me about they mistrusted the Hell out of the police and that folks just kinda, er, did their own justice because no one felt comfortable trusting the police/government. I could swear that I've also seen commentary to this effect (affect? don't butcher me for terrible grammar sorry!) where like no one would have ever called the police on Henryk -- both because they worked long ass hours for probably shit pay and clearly sub-OSHA standards in a hot and terrible environment in a COMMUNIST country where police and the government were corrupt. So, if anything, maybe on that day there was some POS corrupt government official there to take a bribe from the Safety and Compliance people? IDK, but this part always stuck out to me as the worst possible excuse to fridge Magda and Nena (Nina?)

instinctively protecting in x-men: apocalypse

[cuppajj]

Is this the ask box? If not I'm so sorry I'm not used to tumblr literally only got it to follow your au. It's great btw love everything about it.

But anyways can I bonk Dragonberry on the head with a stick to get her attention and say hi, but with a really long stick so I'm not close to her when I do so? She's my favorite but she's scary and I while I would prefer to write her a letter but I don't want her to have my return address.

Also I've had my own au in the works but never actually bothered to start writing or properly figuring things out till after coming across your au which inspired me to start doing so and I just wanna know how you set everything up and figure out how to use who where and how you split stuff into arcs? I currently have 2 arcs based on the continent one being Crispia and the other being Beast-Yeast and both have chapters but Beast-Yeast is becoming a lot longer than Crispia due to how my au is set up and the fact the canon Beast-Yeast storyline isn't fully out and I was just wondering if you have any advice on what's best to do? I do want to eventually post my au and I've already gotten to work on the designs but I don't know the best approach to make it into something that others who are unfamiliar can understand.

Also sorry this turned out kinda long!

You can!! Though would advise against using the stick bc if she feels like it she could grab it and fling you while you’re still holding it

As for your second question about how I use arcs, it really just boils down to being a way to manage all the characters that are in the AU. Each saga focuses on one beast (including their respective of the original 5), the protag who is usually related to them in some way, and whatever story takes place in that specific arc alone. They’re meant to be mostly self contained, but they’d feed into a bigger narrative. The Vanilla Saga is a little different because while it’s technically self contained, Crepe as the main main character dabbles in a little bit of everything; but only crepe (also choco technically). You’re not likely to see Princess in the Lily Saga unless the two stories surrounding Dragonberry and Midnight Lily overlap.

I do have plans for sagas to overlap before the “all stories converge for the final saga” part, for example the Vanilla and Berry sagas will converge in Parfaedia well before that, but that would be a single story arc before they split up again. Some sagas can/would share the same events but would still largely be self contained.

Im going off on a ramble here but basically, BAAU’s sagas are just info management lol. With so many characters and stories to handle, it would be very confusing and bad if all of them were crossing over at every turn. When you’ve got a plot line that can serve as its own thing, it’s easier to tell where pieces of information belongs.

So that being said I should really start tagging the sagas in some of my baau posts 😭😭😭

[haru-chi]

Now that Miharu's arc is done and I gathered my thoughts and my strength, I feel like talking now for a bit ...

-contain manga spoilers-

Firstly, what the anime has done wasn't so bad at all, in fact I think they did the best they can without changing much which's I'm kinda surprised with for this season overall, it has the least changes out of all seasons so far (?), even the production value is far better than the last two season which was something I worried about tbh yet was pleased in general despite few little things 👀

With that being said and out of the way .. what come next isn't "hate" at all, so don't mistake it so :)

I found the anime version just lacking something .... it just didn't feel the same for some reason ... maybe the perfect word I find to describe what I feel is "detachment" ?

I don't know, was it because they simplify things which made things lose its gravity? Was it because they omit certain lines which had moved me the most in the manga ? Or was it that their interpretation of certain scenes was different than the manga vibe I got ? or they put emphasize on not what I thought they should've been ?

It's like, I felt Seiji/Miharu's burden, longing, wishes didn't hit that heavily ? Even Natori's inner struggle and action ... It's like I'm detached in certain way from their emotions which I don't even know if that's the perfect word to use but can't find a better word for what I felt ...

Hmmmmm, it's like, in the anime you feel like an outsider watching those people's story and struggles while in the manga you're an insider seeing all of this firsthand because of those little details etc thus you'd feel/understand it all better >>> don't know if this is a perfect example ><

I wondered if this was because they didn't do an extended hand before it, but as a manga reader this doesn't matter much for me so that's not it ...

But then I realized that this actually an on-going anime issue I always noticed and felt ... I even experience it firsthand being an anime-only way back then in the distant past ....

I feel the anime treat Natsuyuu's stories as standalone more than they should .. like aside from big arcs (mostly exorcist) then it doesn't matter what order everything else goes to ..maybe most fans think so too .. they don't realize that there IS a seamless story-flow under it all .. not all story follows it yet most stories can rely on it for building up be it on-going issues or questions and answers around it be it indirectly or directly (take an extended hand and Miharu's stories for example)

I was under this same misconception too back then, which's why when I jumped to the manga I was shocked by its depth and way of storytelling that genteelly indirectly connect most of its stories, which's why it resulted in Natsume's growth ...

His growth wasn't because of that certain story you just noticed it in it but was a result of the small ones before it which you thought was unrelated yet in fact it was a build-up and added depth to his character (maybe I'll talk in depth about it in different post?)

What I'm trying to say is, most story's order is important than some people think, and Midorikawa pay close attention to that and it's part of her storytelling and style which I really admire and love ... how there is an unspoken rule or something that put into attention few details or add more depth to the world/characters without directly saying so and that easily to miss ....

Do you remember how Homura's arc was something she wanted to do from early on yet because Natsume wasn't ready so she withhold for a very long time ... or how she didn't reveal Seiji had a sister before revealing that Taki had a brother (Seiji's sister arc was the next vol from Taki's brother reveal if no one noticed btw which's something I love and always wanted to mention and talk about)

That's why I said the anime treat Natsuyuu's stories as standalone more than they should and alot of things can gets lost ....

Miharu's arc didn't happen until an extended hand story happened before it .... and those stories are too important to each other ...but since I talked about this in a different post, I won't go about why that is here...

But this anime mindset results in Miharu going first which even after watching it I still find it a weird decision since there was room to do an extend hand then finish the season with Miharu's arc ....

I'm here thinking how such a simple thing can change your perception of things greatly or how can omitting or putting emphases on certain thing can change your view of them... I find that interesting but in the end that's why because of this the anime can never reach that same depth, that same unspoken indirect beauty ....

I really wonder why ? I feel like they had an idea or certain view about Natsuyuu which isn't wrong per say but can be harmful or a hindrance in the long run ?

Miharu's arc in the anime had me just setting here thinking and trying to understand why I find it lacking or feel this detachment and absent of gravity or weight from it that I felt in the manga ....

I'll stop here, it just I don't get it and kinda feel disappointed ? Sad ? Tbh I really don't know what I should be feeling other than I wanted something more for one of my best arc, it wasn't the worst yet wasn't that great either :)

[m3tr0n0m333]

🎵A Pearl - Mitski

Sonic and Nine animatic

[little-pup-pip]

could you make a moodboard that smells like cloves, and old books?

i feel like that’s a really weird way to ask that but also the only way i can explain it? Masc, please!

Please and thank you!

Definitely!!

[kitocrystal]

[crescentfool]

i love ryomina

no but seriously. even when i’m thinking about other things that captivate my interest, i find myself coming back to them and feeling like i fell down three whole flights of staircases every time i do. they are one of my favorite pairs in media and are very special to me.

it’s the way that ryoji and minato’s lives are inevitably intertwined with each other due to the circumstances 10 years ago on the moonlight bridge. without no minato, there is no ryoji. minato as he is today is because of ryoji. they have irreparably affected each other’s lives that you cannot discuss one without bringing up the other one.

ryoji mochizuki, who is death, pharos, thanatos, nyx avatar, the man of many names and identities, is the perfect summation of p3′s messages and themes.

minato arisato, the wildcard and protagonist, who has boundless kindness in his actions despite the unfortunate cards handed to him.

the two of them complement each other and tell a beautiful story from start to finish.

minato’s personas capture this perfectly. he awakens to orpheus, who’s flames burns bright, is snuffed out by thanatos during the encounter against the arcana magician. a visual precursor of the idea that ryoji stole from the life that minato could have had.

it’s the way that over the course of the game as minato interacts with pharos, talking throughout the dark hour, forging a bond that cannot be broken, that allows ryoji to exist. minato humanizes death.

november. the bells toll, calling the appriser. and yet, it’s peaceful... quiet, and full of life. ryoji, who breaks free from death’s chains, refusing his role, is given the chance to live for a month. to make the most of the humanity that minato has given him over those ten years. and what a life he lived. ryoji’s life is a reflection of what minato’s life could have been like in another universe.

it is the way the two of them are reflections of each other. ryoji with his hair down is just like minato. they are both stubbornly committed to choosing to be kind, to love life, yet are chained down by the cards the narrative dealt them with. they finish each other’s sentences, knowing each other intimately in a way no one else does.

how is that, a boy who lived for only one month, profoundly changes the course of the narrative? he is simultaneously relevant and irrelevant. blink, and you miss it, the beautiful life that he led.

ryoji is horrified at the revelations of being the appriser. he who so desperately wished to forget that his existence was meant to bring the end to all life, was unable to escape the inevitability of death. in a non-human way, of course. he becomes remorseful. a shadow of his brief time as a human who was enamored by the small beautiful things that life had to offer.

he is swallowed by grief. grief knowing that his very existence will take away not only minato’s life, but everyone else’s. the very thing that ryoji loved- life, fundamentally went against the role he was born for- to be the harbinger of death. and unable to grapple with this sadness he believes that the best thing for minato to do is to kill him, so that SEES can live in bliss not knowing about their inevitable end.

SEES is left rattled, calling into question what the meaning of life is and what they do when faced against the inevitability of death.

and!!! minato chooses!! for ryoji to live!! even in spite of what ryoji is MEANT to embody, minato still stubbornly chooses to defy death itself! and if that’s not cool i don’t know what is!! minato wants everyone to have the chance to live!!

so he climbs. he ascends tartarus, to meet ryoji, again, who is now the nyx avatar. and i just think there’s something so so beautiful about being able to use messiah, minato’s ultimate persona, against nyx avatar.

messiah, being the fusion of orpheus and thanatos is peak ryomina to me. because ryoji and minato have established an unbreakable bond from having been entwined for 10 years, minato still has a piece of death with him, and by proxy!! ryoji is able to defy and rebel against nyx trying to bring the fall! and i think that’s fucking cool shit if you ask me!

even when all of the arcanas have been gone through, it’s still not enough to stop the fall. and yet. minato knows. in the way that ryoji was sealed in minato 10 years ago by aigis... minato becomes the great seal so that everyone can live. it comes full circle.

march rolls around. he fulfills his promise to SEES on graduation day. minato dies from exhaustion. but goddamn does his sacrifice make me weep- he’s had such, such a tiring journey. he’s been through so many things because he was at the wrong place at the wrong time. but at the end of it all, he’s reunited with ryoji in death.

and i think this is why ryomina continues to evoke so much emotions for me, to this day. the relationship that they have embodies so much of persona 3′s messages and themes that it makes me feel like a microwave with nothing running in it.

p3′s message is very hopeful, for me. my favorite takeaway from it is that even if death is inevitable, appreciating the life that we were given and choosing to live as best as we can with kindness (even if we can’t feasibly do everything), is just? really nice? and you see this manifest in both ryoji and minato’s personalities and what they do for the other characters.

ryomina just feels so distinct to me, the flavor that their relationship ties back to my favorite takeaways from this game and im just!!  god!! i love you minato arisato! i love you ryoji mochizuki! im so glad that i could meet them! i’m happy that they changed my life! they made me want to appreciate the connections in life even if they were fleeting! they made me!! want to pay attention to the good moments in life and cherish them!

i love ryomina so much!!! i’m so glad that these two could bring so much joy into my life! and i hope that others can have this joy too! 💛💙

[alonelystargazer]

Sharing some thoughts about how I've been recently feeling as a fanfic writer

I'm ngl I think I'm scared of publishing any of my fics now since it's been so long (6 going on 7 months is long by my standards) that I've published anything, I feel like I've lost my edge.

I'm really slow at writing bc I have to find time on between everything else going on in my personal life and my other interests, but I am working on a few projects, going back and forth

So when the time comes and I have something finished and ready to share, I would definitely love for people to read my work and enjoy it and leave comments and maybe even recommend it to others, but at the same time what if I've hyped myself up too much and my work doesn't live up to the audience expectations? I don't wanna disappoint the readers.

And part of the reason why I even share wip updates is to prove to myself and potential readers that I'm not a fraud! Like "yeah see I'm a writer! I'm working on stuff, it's just really slow progress but I'm doing something!"

Maybe I've been feeling insecure recently bc the fics I'm currently interested in writing are for JJK (mainly itafushi) and it's a big fandom with lots of talented writers and artists so sometimes I think to myself "what I am bringing to the table? Everyone else has already eaten delicious food so why bother?" but then I have to remind myself that "hey more food!" or whatever the phrase is

(I also wanna write a Kagurabachi fic but the fandom is still quite small right now so I don't feel as pressured)

I get insecure about my writing skills bc I've been writing fanfiction on and off since I was 17 (and I'm closer to 30 than 20 😬) but I haven't noticed a big difference in the quality of writing, and I've mostly accepted the fact that I'm not suited to write long stories with multiple chapters, mainly through time constraints, so I have stuck to writing once shots. There's nothing wrong with one shots though! I love that you can have a concise story in a few thousand words (my one shots range between 1k and 5k words).

As far as I know, I haven't had anyone say that any of my fics has been their favorite, or that they have recommended it to anyone. But I'm not looking for fame or wide appeal. I really am thankful to everyone who has ever read my fics and left positive comments! And I would also like to thank all my fellow fanfic writers that I follow here for ask the encouragement!

All that being said, I will still continue to write bc it's always been a favorite hobby of mine, and I have ideas I want to share and hope that readers will find even a little bit of enjoyment.

[ilovecoelacanths]

12 & 18? :>

12: this one is hard! probably either a humboldt squid (woooo squid!) or a humpback whale (i've been told that humpbacks are a basic choice out of all the whales but i can't help it if humpback whales are sick as hell dude). both of these would be inconvenient to have as my were-form (definitely turning into a whale would be more inconvenient tho) but i think they would both be cool and worth it!

18: my plush coelacanth Milo! my friend made him for me and i love him, he is one of my most prized possessions and when the fire alarm in my dorm goes off he is one of the few things i grab in case there actually is a fire. here he is with some of my other marine plushies :]

(from left to right is Mariano, General Cylinder aka Fat Fuck, Milo, and the most recent addition, Ophelia! she's a whale she is just also incredibly round)

[kirkwallnightmarepolycule]

ok separate post to talk about some more spoilery thoughts after finishing the game. overall i had a lot of fun and i really enjoyed 100%ing the game, BUT there was a lot i was disappointed by.

For one, it really felt like there wasn't enough romance content. It felt especially weird that while party banter was great in this game, better than inquisition especially imo, i can only recall maybe once or twice where my romance with taash ever came up? i really like taash and enjoyed romancing them, but i wish there was more.

Also, the lack of decisions carrying over into this game from a custom world state was disappointing full stop. i understand to a point that they wanted a soft reboot to appeal to newcomers, but it really felt like the only thing that matters anymore is solas, and solavellan. to be clear lol i have NOTHING against solavellans im happy you guys are being given content etc etc. BUT it would have felt so much more like a dragon age game if there were more threads from past games in veilguard. even if it was just some little stuff.

Like, even though both dorian and my inquisitor, who got together in my world state, were both there in veilguard, it didnt feel like that mattered at all. dorian and my inquisitor spent one scene in the same room, stood 5 feet apart from each other, and there was one line of dialogue exchanged between the two. i wasnt expecting, nor did i really want, a whole sidequest focused on their relationship or something. i didnt need them to matter that much at all. but given that the inquisitors romance didnt matter outside of solas and the decision to disband the inquisition or not didnt seem to really come up at all iirc, it feels like the last three games only culminated in SOLAS and nothing else mattering. i LIKE solas but come on.

And the lack of world state customization felt like it weakened the cameos we did get too. interacting with morrigan during some of the mythal stuff felt like the well of sorrows mission, which seemed like it would have big impacts at the time when my inquisitor drank from the well, meant nothing. i enjoyed seeing isabella again but i cant help but think about other peoples canons where they had a worse relationship with her, or gave her to the arishok. what does it mean in those world states that kirkwall 'taught her about family'?

idk again i did really love the game but sometimes it didnt really feel like i was playing a dragon age game, at least not one that was in my worldstate.

[brittlebutch]

some early sketches of Augustus & The Changeling

[pumpking64]

.

[korattata]

i think i am going to actually go insane

every program on my computer is displaying images differently

if i take a snipping tool snippet and paste it, it becomes desaturated. but if i go to the original place it automatically saves snips, it looks fine.

photoshop is more desaturated than my firefox browser window

if i download a photo from the internet, open it in photoshop, and make no changes but press save, then reupload it to the internet through imgur, it is desaturated like in photoshop

if i upload it to tumblr it looks fine

......nevermind this time upon uploading it to imgur it did not keep the photoshop desaturation EDIT: if i upload it to discord it is desaturated tho. edit again nevermind it's ALL of discord that's desaturated

but to prove my point, image / image after i used snipping tool and then pasted that into the post / image from the automatically saved snipping tool screenshot

i just wanted to give my neopet's petpet a transparent background instead of the white box.

this is the image if i copy the contents in photoshop then paste it / if i use the snipping tool to snip the photoshop document then paste it / the saved snipping tool screenshot

yet when i saved the photoshop doc as a png and uploaded it it did in fact look like the very first one posted.

I JUST WANTED TO GIVE MY NEOPET'S PETPET A TRANSPARENT BACKGROUND INSTEAD OF A WHITE BOX.

[todayisafridaynight]

so yea im here again to bother (anonymously bc thats the only true way to communicate to ppl amirite) so let's pretend rgg writers didn't pull an asshole move on him and he lives and now hes like. a side character or whatever u can catch him to chat whatever the point is hes alive AND THE QUESTION IS: do you think he keeps appearance aoki-style clean and tidy or he goes back to masato-style emo swag? or is he gonna be the most cursed mix of these both cause i can't decide what to draw and probably im gonna just sketch it all slap it on one sheet and post but i've been hit by sudden interest about what my fellow aoki fan thinks?

my heart wants him to go back to his e-boy swag ways in this purely hypothetical timeline but honestly im not sure, it's somethin i ask myself a lot also: it's beyond just aesthetics and the sort that make up masato arakawa and ryo aoki, so i can't confidently say one thing or another

if you dont care bout aimless ramblin uhh skip the Read More cause i could just wrap up this ask here :)

heh. you care about my aimless ramblings :]

'ryo aoki' represents 'the paragon of japanese men' yk: clean shaven, conservative haircut, neat and tidy (glasses are just bonus points for 'yeah he looks smart') etc etc. that's not to say ryo aoki was purely a facade or persona, masato obviously had to harbor some puritan ideology beforehand in order to pursue his career as passionately as he did (though spite and a need for love and attention are strong, he probably wouldn't have been as effective in his position if he didn't believe what he was preaching to an extent)

im rambling about all of this cause without the need to keep up that 'perfect image' anymore and being ready to start over, aoki would be free to present however he wants without worrying about his image. would he still like to be seen as immaculate ? would he be ok with that more rugged look again ? a part of me doubts it since that was 'the lowest point' of his life, so why go back to it

that's not to mention how preppy was his aesthetic from birth to his 20's, though now i ask if that was his choice or if that's how masumi thought to present him to look like a regular civilian (not saying masumi was being a control freak over him obvi, im just saying did urge masato towards that kind of style yk. it's just a things parents do, and considering masumi is aware the yakuza lifestyle isn't something to aspire to i'm sure he wanted his son to appear as detached from it as he could--but now this is turning into a ramble about masumi SORRY)

plus, by 47/48, i think he would have outgrown the gritty-yet-flashy aesthetic. if anythin, maybe he'd just dress like masumi did during his 20's- not exactly the same, but something similar

assuming he wouldn't be in jail in this timeline and he was Just Chilling, i also have to ask if he'd want to restart his political career but genuinely this time and pursuing things that would actually benefit japanese society. that's tiptoeing into greater speculations tho but it's somethin' to consider if you want to ask 'what would aoki be like in LaD8'

[mg549]

tagged by @graveyardrabbit 👍!

last song: mama by mcr <3

currently watching: nothing 😔✊idk its hard to get me to watch tv shows. oh i did jst remember like 2 years ago or sth i started watching Every X-Files Ever with a big excel sheet of all my opinions and shit. but its been hard to get thru bc the later seasons have not been very enjoyable and also ive been Busy with work n putting out consistent art n shit that its hard to justify sitting down and not doing anything for that long ig. ive also slowly been getting thru various slasher franchises&watching iconic horror movies since i love horror but havent watched a lot of the movies, &its easier for me to get thru an hour and a half of sth Complete than 45 mins of a Part of a larger story. the original scream is def the cream of the crop of what ive seen so far, meanwhile i watched the first saw last night and it was incredibly stupid and frustrating to watch. 9/11 rly took its toll on media

currently reading: 😶 even harder than videos bc i absolutely cannot multitask while reading. recently finished frankenstein (which i started literally almost 3 years prior (its not that long or difficult i jst struggle to justify spending time on things that i dont consider “work” in my brain) (also it was p good but you could literally cut out the second part and the story would benefit imo it jst rly slogs down the pace and axes any tension for a lot of details that could be conveyed much quicker if they were explained in less detail)) and the communist manifesto (didnt take nearly as long bc its like pamphlet length gbdkjd) edit everyone go read izroulia actually a new series came out today&i haven't been able to read it yet but its been keeping me going fr i love how earnest it is in being itself its such a good piece of safe media for me if that makes sense

current obsession: ughhhhhhhhh ive been in between obsessions for a lil bit i feel like. idk this is sth i struggle w/ bc the last thing i felt fully like Enveloped in was the adventure zone (orig. arc) which ended. 5 years ago. lemon demon&lemonville came shortly after but it was hard to feel it was on the same scale bc it was actively in creation as i was there and associated #Drama also lessened its grip faster than it would’ve had it been like an existing show or sth. plus theres less ppl obvs. had a brief good omens phase but it burned out pretty quick bc i had so thoroughly dissected it very quickly. &since then ive kind of jst been cycling between existing interests (monster high/fashion dolls in general, mercreatures, creepypasta/slenderman/horror in general) plus the occasional mcr blast but it doesnt quite Grip the same bc there arent like Characters i can rotate. the best ive gotten is obsessing over my own ocverses but its not the same.... idk i rly rly Want to feel the Passion that fandom brings but none of the media thats blown up interests me enough to consider consuming the media or i take a peak&dont like it cause im picky...idk my fundamental problem is that im picky and hard to please bc i can deconstruct things so easily to see its Bones and if a story is more surface level and straightforward and easy to understand its hard for me to keep my attention on it at the stage of my life im in. that being said aquamarine is my fave movie tho so. but then again i think ppl jst write it off cause its a chick flick. idk recommend me things but dont be surprised if its not my vibe ig

ummmmmmmmmmm idk who to tag u can do this if u want to&say i tagged u but i think i was kinda a bummer w/ these answers so 😔✊

[vole-mon-amour]

I reached 30 tags so screw it:

if they made it like Silco and Vander had a fallout way before the Mom's death, it could've kinda worked 'cause Vi could've recognized Vander but not Silco, so Jinx still jumps into a stranger's embrace and Silco ends up raising her.

but then again, Vander tried to murder Silco WAY before that scene in the bar in s2. Vander looks way older, even though Silco looks completely different to what we see in flashback in s1.

it's like they didn't put any effort at ALL. it doesn't match. it doesn't make sense. was s1 good on a accident? should have they tried to at least get rid of inconsistencies? or don't go with the theory in s2? because so far it truly looks like "this is the story we wanted to tell" vs "this is the story we actually told" and now it's two completely different stories.

ugh.

I think ignoring s2 and treating s1 as a standalone might be the best choice here, cause s2 is definitely not going to work with the story they told in s1. what a shame.

The Vander/Silco Shitshow - generic, juvenile, and gimmicky slop

So, I think that Vander/Silco flashback was terrible. Tropey, careless, juvenile, clichéd bullshit that stripped away everything that made their season 1 story nuanced and poignant, while simultaneously ripping open a fat plot hole because the team got careless and did not catch the discrepancy between the story they'd written in their heads and the visuals that ended up on screen in season 1. This is just going to be a long rant post detailing the reasons I absolutely despised this flashback. Obligatory disclaimer that this is just my (strongly held) opinion.

1) The timeline plot hole

No, I'm not misusing the term. So a plot hole is an inconsistency in a fictional narrative that cannot be explained away by any plausible in-universe justifications. There are many moments of weak writing in Arcane that may be contrived, rushed, weird, convenient, etc. but aren't plot holes.

This Vander/Silco situation however. Oh boy. If you all remember, Season 1 opened with the bridge massacre, also known as the Day of Ash. Vander is shown cracking enforcers' skulls. He looks like this.

The sisters, seemingly recognizing him, ask him where their parents are. He gestures to their corpses, the sisters cry, Vander has his "violence is not the answer" epiphany, drops the gauntlets very dramatically to underscore this massive turning point of character development for him, then picks the girls up and leaves the bridge.

In episode 3, we are shown a flashback. Vander is trying to kill Silco in the river. He looks like this.

Let's compare this to how he looked like on the Day of Ash.

Yeah. According to the visuals shown in Season 1, the falling out of Vander and Silco seems to have occured in the past before the Day of Ash, evidenced by how much younger Vander looks. Unless Silco is a time traveller who jumped forward to the future to throw a molotov at the riot because he just loves violent extremism that much, or Vander took the time to shave his beard and apply heavy duty anti-aging lotion on his face before hunting Silco down, there are no plausible in-universe explanations for this inconsistency. Not to mention, if Silco and Vander were really as close as brothers and the sisters knew Vander, then it's impossible they wouldn't have known who Silco was.

Yet, in Season 1, that's exactly what we see - not a single sliver of recognition between Silco and the girls, nothing to imply they knew of his existence before episode 3. Not a single conversation between Jinx and Silco implied that he knew, let alone was close to, her mother. Nothing from Vi throughout the entire first season indicated that she knew of his past friendships with her mother and Vander. They acted like total strangers to each other.

Many fans already caught this inconsistency during the three-year gap after writers' comments online implied Silco was involved in the Day of Ash. We had hoped the writers would catch on to this discrepancy too and either iron out the timeline if they want to do serious flashbacks, or just avoid calling attention to it completely by not doing flashbacks of their falling out. Alas.

2) Leonardo Dicaprio pointing meme

Death to the everybody-knows-everyone trope and lines that only exist to invoke the "Leonardo Dicaprio pointing" meme. Throw them into a fucking fire. Boring, mind-numbing, clichéd, overdone garbage. Not every character needs to have some kind of half-baked relation with each other. Not every major incident needs to be tied back to the main characters. Not every single detail needs to be overexplained and justified and again, somehow tied to a main character. They are unnecessary, and make the world feel so much more claustrophobic and smaller than it should be.

"The enforcers actually commited the Day of Ash massacre because SILCO threw a molotov. Vander actually tried to kill Silco because of VI AND JINX'S mother. She knew both Silco and Vander personally and TOLD THEM to help her raise her kids. VANDER named Vi."

Bullshit like this really fucks with immersion, because it becomes clear very quickly that the world is only occupied by a small handful of real characters while the thousands of other people in it are nothing more than inconsequential set dressing and wallpaper. The story and world no longer feel real, vast, and immersive. And these forced "connections" between main characters are so obviously manufactured to generate "OUGHHH" and Dicaprio pointing reactions. Idk about anyone else, but it takes me completely out of the story when I can obviously tell the writing is trying too hard to blow my mind.

The girls' mom waltzing up to Vander and Silco and just. Fucking telling them to help her with her kids lmfaoooooooo. (OUGHH and they both really ended up raising her kids WOAGH😱🤯). Jinx's mom saying choosing a name is stressful because her child will feel stuck with it (GASP and Powder ended up changing her name WOOOOWW😱). Vander coming up with Vi's fucking name. (OUGHHHH HE REALLY WAS MEANT TO BE FATHER ALL ALONG WOADGHHGHDHDH🤯🤯🤯).

Fucking kill me. Arcane Season 1 was surprisingly good precisely because they DIDN'T, for the most part, resort to tropey bullshit like this. It had, for the most part, originality. Uniqueness. In fact all the strongest aspects of Season 1, aspects I loved, were deliberate subversions of overdone clichés. For Season 2 to resort to this kind of writing reminiscent of Disney slop is insanely disappointing.

I'm waiting for a character to unironically say, "What are we, some kind of League of Legends?" in Act 3 now.

3) "Ohhhhh so THAT'S why he did that!!!!!!!!!"

Also death to overexplanations and giving justifications for things that never needed justifications. You know what I was never confused by while watching Season 1 of Arcane? Why Vander adopted the girls. Why Silco adopted Jinx. Why both came to care for their girls so much, they were willing to sacrifice so much for them. I thought the reasons for those things were very clear and poignant in the first season. I never needed an extra on-the-nose justification for the adoptions in the form of, "they wuved yo mama". It's not only redundant, it's also one of the most tired ass tropes in fiction. To me, Vander taking in the girls and Silco taking in Jinx are so much more powerful if they really were just random guys with no real connection to the girls' parents.

But I've already seen some positive reactions to this flashback with "Ohhhhh so THAT's why Silco/Vander cared for the girls so much, now I understand😯🤯😓" mf what exactly did you not understand before??

4) Character motivations

The motivations of both Vander and Silco are made downright bizarre by this flashback. So Silco was hellbent on murdering Vi last season, despite being close friends with her mom whose death he may feel guilty for? Literally despised her and wanted to kill her the entire time with no hesitation lol. So Vander had that aforementioned dramatic moment of character development, dropped the gauntlets, realized violence wasn't the answer, and carried the kids to safety... then doubled back to violently hunt down and murder Silco? But not before shaving his beard and applying youthful lotion of course. Can't kill your bro while looking crusty. Then he failed to kill Silco so he just... went back to the kids and pretended like nothing happened? Lol.

Silco being close to, let alone loving, the girls' parents makes no fucking sense for his character. Vander knowing them at least makes sense, but casual friends would have sufficed. "I was lowkey crushing (?????) on your mom and also named you" just cheapened the entire Vander/Vi and Silco/Jinx surrogate father dynamic. Vander's motivation for killing Silco being yet another fridged woman is also weak as fuck. First Viktor with Sky, and now Vander/Silco. They really should have left this one up to our imaginations if this was the boring tripe they came up with.