#technically this isn't even the b plot It's like the D Plot

[ranvwoop]

very obsessed With guys from my brain. Con: I am the only one who knows About guys from my brain

[crimeronan]

one further worst timeline thought: when hunter goes to find Luz, it is very much without any sort of permission. because They Don’t Know Belos Is Dead.

so lilith raine and darius’ priority list goes. like.

a) prevent total collapse of society

b) prepare some kind of defense In Case He Comes Back

c) somehow locate human realm experts who can give them even a semi-accurate sense of what Belos could even be Doing Over There

d) oh phew the healers say hunter’s going to make it. thank the titan. wait what do you mean he’s a WHAT

etc etc. as much as they love her, mounting an expedition to the human realm to find luz and probably fight her dad are like. WAY down the list.

so by the time hunter’s recovered enough to help there are still zero concrete plans to rescue luz. which. okay. fine. as usual I have to do everything around here. oh you strictly forbid me to go to the human realm by myself? well okay but I’m Gonna.

at which point amity, who would absolutely be going along were she not the single fragile tether holding Lilith and her sanity together, hands hunter a packed bag and says, shh. chill. wait for the third shift, they’ll leave you a gap in the guard at the portal.

sorry to keep worldbuilding your au for you but it Captivates me

GOD. YEAH. hard to imagine a world where hunter tracks down luz himself after recovering from near-certain death & doesn't have anyone else breathing down his neck about it, Unless he goes in secret.

i was already thinking that the reason it took him so long in the first place was because he kept getting sent back to bed & then having his room guarded to make sure he isn't gonna sneak through the portal while he's still, like.... so messed-up from whatever belos did that he can barely stand up straight.

(darius is behind this dastardly conspiracy. he is right for this.)

hunter spends At Least a week snarling "don't TELL ME WHAT TO DO, i OUTRANK ALL OF YOU" while lilith is like "i.... am not sure that's technically true anymore....?" and darius is like "even if it is, consider this a coup. cope and seethe about it, kid."

so eventually hunter decides his best tactic is to play nice and pretend he's definitely not plotting. while plotting. so much plotting.

LOVE the idea of amity conspiring with him. love thinking about the conversations leading up to her deciding the situation is drastic enough to pack him a bag.

like. her having a Pretty Clear Idea of how bad the circumstances are, given the whole Hunter Almost Fucking Died thing, but she's still like, "do you think he'd badly hurt her?? she's human, he knows she's fragile-"

and hunter is like. "he doesn't have anyone ELSE to hurt now, does he??"

amity promises a slew of lilith-related favors to the guys on third shift & stuffs a truly impractical number of weapons in the bag alongside some clothes n rations. and she's like "listen. don't fight the emperor. don't even Think about fighting the emperor. just sneak in to wherever he's keeping luz and get her Out. okay??"

hunter is like yeah okay. sure. i owe you forever. amity is like uh huh. but if anybody asks, i had Nothing to do with this. especially if the person asking is lilith. or darius. cool??

great!! go save luz.

[thearvariblues]

"Vegas doesn't want to leave the mafia because it's all he's ever known, and also because yayyy, murder!"

Yes, I'm sorry you're missing the point of his entire character arc, I guess?

Now bear with me. I agree that in canon, he probably doesn't want to leave this life, and for several reasons, the "it's all he's ever known" being one of them. He doesn't want to or try to leave despite the fact that he clearly hates some aspects of it - most importantly the constant battle with the main family, and also his father bossing him around and using him as his personal punching bag. His other reasons include:

a) the need to prove to his father that he is a worthy son

b) the wish to beat the main family as he's been taught to do his whole life

c) the need to protect his younger brother because let's face it, Vegas being an obedient son is likely the main reason why Gun doesn't extend his parenting methods to Macau, too

d) the mere fact that Vegas doesn't have a single reason outside of the mafia that would encourage him to get the fuck out of there

And then Pete turned his life and brain upside down and Vegas got hit by feelings - and, a little later, a few bullets.

By the end of canon, everything has changed for him. As he himself says, he has nothing left. His father is dead, the minor family is no more, all that's left of it is a vague concept that has already been served on a silver platter to Porsche. He barely survived being shot, and he has months of recovery before him, and it's unlikely that he'll ever be able to fully recover and gain his strength back. He will suffer the consequences of his injuries, and he won't be the same Vegas who was able to go on raids. He'll be tired. He'll be in pain. He'll have bad days when he'll barely be able to function. We don't like to hear it, but it's a FACT.

And on top of that, all his reasons for not leaving the mafia are... Gone. He doesn't have a father whose approval he would want to win. The minor family has been taken away from him. He doesn't need to protect Macau anymore, at least not from his father. And he has a reason to leave all the bullshit behind him - he has Pete, who told him, loud and clear, that he's not about to leave him. And he has his brother.

And what's more important, neither of them loves or needs him because he's Vegas the killer, Vegas from the minor family. They love him because he's VEGAS. They are their own little family now. And in the hospital scene, we can clearly see that Vegas is happy. Content. He doesn't mention going back to his mafia life, and Pete, judging by his clothes, so different from his bodyguard days, isn't about to do it either.

I mean... Why would Vegas go back to being a nobody, to being the main family's bloody hands, to being even less than he used to be, because he's not even the heir anymore?

(And on a related note - why would Pete want to go back to a place where he had to constantly wear an impenetrable mask when with Vegas, he's finally being seen?)

Do I think that no matter what, Vegas and Pete will get dragged, kicking and screaming, back to the mafia bullshit? Oh, yes. It doesn't matter whether it will be by emotional blackmail or some other strategic coercion methods (aka "you see, the main family technically paid for your recovery, so you owe us"), they will get dragged back, but they sure as hell won't like it.

Vegas learning that there's something more important than his mafia life and the violence it entails is the whole POINT of his character arc, for fuck's sake.

And to reduce him to "well he's mafia because he's always been mafia, and also because he loves murder, hahaha" is missing, well... basically the whole plot, really.

Sorry, not sorry.

[itsclydebitches]

I know you’re focusing on Ted lasso right now (which after seeing your gifs and meta I’ve started watching it and I love it, but I was wondering what you thought of what little tai and summer content we got?

If it’s not too much trouble

TED LASSO CONVERT HELL YEAH! :D

We only got a couple of seconds of content, though one thing that stands out to me is Tai's anxiety about Summer leaving.

Honestly, I feel like this is a case of writer/audience knowledge informing the scene in ways it technically shouldn't. Meaning, we know Summer is going to (presumably) die on this mission, ergo her final goodbye is treated as an Emotional Moment even though, from an in-world perspective, this shouldn't really be something to worry about. Yes, there's the generic understanding that they have a dangerous job but

1. Tai is mostly inclined to view this as a "run of the mill patrol" that they'll laugh about later. AKA nothing serious (something Summer encourages because it helps sell her lie).

2. This is, obviously, pre-Summer's death so Tai shouldn't have any reason to be more worried than any loved one would be when a huntress/Inner Circle member goes to work. Not unless there's something else in his backstory we don't know about yet.

3. 90% of our RWBY content treats this job - even the war portions of the job - as something that's dangerous only in the theoretical sense. That's likely due to most of that content stemming from our protagonists with their plot armor, but the overall effect is that being a huntsmen really isn't treated as this inherently anxiety-inducing career, so Tai's sudden worry over Summer leaving on what he believes to be the fighting equivalent of a milk run stands out. If our title team + JNPR had spent less time treating their own missions as fun-times-cannon-fodder-look-how-amazing-we-are outings, I might buy this moment more.

So we have this foreknowledge influencing the scene (Summer's gonna die! Make it emotional!!) but outside of that meta reading, this seems significant to me because Tai is right to be worried. This isn't just him grappling with the fact that any mission is inherently dangerous, we know that it's more dangerous than usual because Summer is going off on some Special Secret Mission... and she's not telling Tai about it.

Worse, she was planning to leave without saying anything at all. Tai clearly startles her: "It's not like you to rush off on a mission in the middle of the night."

This isn't a case of Summer planning Mission A and then selling Mission B - "I'm off to complete the task Ozpin definitely set for me. See you later, honey!" - it's a case of her trying to sneak out, failing, and then spinning a yarn to cover her tracks. Summer read the girls to sleep and then fully planned to disappear without a word, knowing - despite everything else she might claim - that there was a damn good chance she might not be coming back. Why else would she leave a token for Ruby, just in case?

Really, this whole scenario does not endear me to Summer. In some respects Tai is lucky he caught her and got a lie as a pseudo Band-Aid. Can you IMAGINE waking up in the morning to your wife being gone with NO explanation as to where she went or what might have become of her? Did she leave me? Go on a mission? Get kidnapped?? That would have fucked with him even more than simply loosing her did. Summer was willing to walk out without a word to Tai, she left a token for only one of her girls, she lied about who Tai should hold responsible when she eventually disappeared, and half of this team (because remember, they are a team just like RWBY and JNPR are supposed to be) is plotting something dangerous with the other two being completely in the dark about it. What a mess. Can you imagine if Yang tried to sneak out in the dead of night when Blake hopefully wouldn't notice, plotting something secret with Weiss, tosses out that she's leaving on Jaune's say-so, is killed, and Blake is left with no explanation because Weiss refuses to say anything and Jaune, obviously, has no answers to offer her? This moment does not help sell the team's bond or the love between Summer/Tai and I REALLY wish the show had actually engaged with this instead of brushing it aside with, 'Omg. Mom said she loves me just the way I am ^_^' RWBY is absolutely stuffed with characters who lie, manipulate, don't trust each other, throw each other under the bus when it's most convenient, engage in morally gray choices while railing at others who do the exact same... and the narrative isn't willing to acknowledge that unless your name is Ozpin or Ironwood. The fact that Ozpin is at the center of everything important in this scene - Summer's lie, their cute recitation of what he would say - just further highlights how he remains the most narratively significant character we've got, but the show doesn't want to acknowledge that because it's supposed to be a story about Ruby. So we just get weird scenes like this where - nearly a decade in - more questions are introduced instead of answering old ones, characters are depicted as having crumbling relationships that are never explored, loved ones aren't allowed to engage with those revelations, and incredibly loaded lines are tossed out without them ever going anywhere because the character they put at the center of all the action isn't actually supposed to be there.

[silverquillsideas]

Thai BL Favorite List

I have been tagged by @littleragondin thank you so much!

Credit to @thatgirl4815 for the original.

Favorite Thai BL:

I've watched a pretty decent number of thai bls over the years, but none have given me as much joy and laughter and butterflies as My School President :D I didn't expect it to take the top spot from A Tale of a Thousand Stars, but here we are :P

Favorite Pairing:

tbh this keeps changing for me everytime I get hyperfixated on a new show, but currently, it's both mileapo and geminifourth :3

Most underrated actor:

I don't know nearly enough about a lot of other thai bl actors in general, I confess T-T but I'd still say Mark Pakin! he's a really really talented guy, and he needs to be in more shows, and in main roles. He's for sure gonna kill it in a rom-com type of show, in a comedic main character role. dude is naturally hilarious lmao

Favorite Character:

toughest question HOW CAN YOU MAKE ME CHOOSE? UNFAIR!!!

I'm gonna pick two, because it'll be cruel to separate them, even in a tumblr ask game TT_TT

and they are : heartliming!!! my babies! my two little sunshines! I adore them both so much!! *sobs in the corner* altho I know MLC technically isn't a bl, but I'll still pick them <3

 Favorite Side Character:

Tiwson from MSP XD what can I say this show and its characters got me GOOD laskgskalsfs

Favorite Scene in a BL:

oh hands down the rooftop kiss from bad buddy the series!!! :D shit makes me feral even now, literal goosebumps T-T

Favorite Line in a BL:

oh I absolutely don't remember dialogs until it's something truly life altering asjhaskfsfs I'm genuinely drawing a blank here :")

Most Anticipated BL (and why):

tbh none currently. I'm not keeping up with new shows atm, so I don't really know that many upcoming shows rn

Healthiest Relationship in BL:

I'm glad we are getting so many more of these in recent bls! but my faves are (unsurprisingly) tinngun and heartliming!! it's really not an exaggeration when I say they healed my soul TT-TT

Most Toxic Relationship in BL:

tbh I mostly selectively forgot the plots and characters of most of the awful bls in the past. but it'll probably be th*ntyp* skgsjfsfs

Guilty Pleasure Series:

none??? If I do end up liking something cringey and awful by popular standards, you can bet I'll still scream abt it with as much enthusiasm as any other show I liked lol :D

Most Underrated Series:

I'd say He's Coming to Me and Moonlight Chicken. both deserved so much more hype than they got. MLC deserved a longer runtime with more fleshed out storylines (but P'Aof did a stellar job, as always) and HCTM was way ahead of its time in terms of the themes and messages it tackled. Thun's coming out scene to his mom still haunts me T-T

+BONUS

Favorite Setting/Location:

with this one, I'm the most basic b*tch ever, so I absolutely jump with joy whenever the thai bl staple emotional support BEACH SCENE comes along !!!! :D so many magical moments come out of that single beach episode, literally nothing beats this trope lol

I'm pretty sure everyone in the thai bl circles has already done it, but still : @solana-ceae @watchingblsnowandforever @bevioletskies @trilliastra @purple-worm and anyone else who wants to!! :)

[gt-jar]

Hey do you have any plans with stories after your current one? Or any current plans/ocs you’re thinking of?

I DO!

I have sooooo many ideas :D

Mostly for multi-chapter storys, because for some reason I find it difficult to come up with ideas that are fitting for a one shot. All the ideas I have - or rather the plot I have in mind - need more time to develop :/

But! A few days ago an idea maybe even two crossed my mind that could work as a one shot.

Nothing really special or super original, but something cute and fluffy :3

So there is that.

So yeah, I definitely have plans for other storys after "Two Worlds among the Stars".

And they all include a father-son relationship and the found family trope, because I love these two things :3

And because I don't wanna just tease, here are a few little pieces of information about the ideas that are living rent-free inside my head:

(To make things easier, A is the tiny character and B is the giant character.)

1. A was created in a lab. Said lab gets busted. B is part of the rescue team and is the first nice human A has ever met. A almost instantly clings to B. B ends up taking A home. To add some spice: A technically isn't an orphan. And I'm playing with the idea that A has selective mutism.

2. I really really wanna write a story with the "grumpy neighbor" trope. I already have a few ideas for A, for example A is homeless and lives on the streets. A group of kids (who also live on the steets) dares A to trespass B's property. I haven't decided what I want B to be like yet, but I'm leaning towards B being really mean at first. I just need a good reason for B to change. Any ideas?

And this is for a possible one shot:

B is a farmer. A is an avian.

Oh, and B has a chicken coop.

If anyone has a question regarding my story ideas, please go ahead and ask! Talking about them will help me with fleshing out the plot.

Or add your own thoughts and ideas, maybe I'll include them. I definitely would like to hear them :3

[magpierrecanarie]

Old Note (February of 2023, literally 2 in the morning): id like to say that this was a doodle but im highkey starving and sleepy and i kept getting mad and fussy at every detail so this is not very good and i would rather have redone it BUT i am not in the mood to do that anymore B)

New Note from Magpierre: Technically, "fanart"? It's Oliver from a Vocaloid AU of mine that I'm halfway through sorting out the plot-points. I can kinda divulge some information about it since it's a bit messy and they're not really THAT important. Basically, the premise is that the Vocaloids are like their original Voice Provider counterparts that were biologically enhanced to look out of this world (with side-effects). They can live very long lifes when they take the VocaSerum™, which is based off of the version of the APP itself btw, and they're usually much more energetic with stronger vocal chords and the like. The downside to that is that if you don't take the updated versions of the VocaSerum™, based on how long ago your previous intake was, there's a high likelihood you might d i e. On the other note, the VocaSerum™ itself isn't all that safe either, as mentioned previously that there's side-effects to some people. It can be almost life-threatening (in Oliver's case) or it can be relatively harmless (in Sonika's and Miku's case). I'm not going to write a list of which individual was affected or not since there's literally like what...60+ Vocaloids (not even counting the other synthesizers) at this point in time? I'd be dead before I finish.

For clarification sake (since I think it's a bit iffy to write about very much alive people in fanfiction): The Vocaloids may (or may not, if their VPs are annoymous) be inspired by their original VPs in both origin and design. I am NOT going to reference them beyond that point since it's a bit off-putting to me. Deadass, Piko's the MC and he's a massive dickhead in the story, so I don't want to sound like I'm implying that irl Pico is also a dickhead (since I don't know him personally). Also, this is very much a side note but Rin and Len are n o t related in this story, they just look really alike.

See you tomorrow! B) I think I'll elaborate on Oliver's character concept a bit more once I manage to find his character design sheet, so you can look forward to that!

[theme-park-concepts]

Like what I'm thinking about is this:

In screenwriting (and other types of writing) it's common to make an outline that looks something like

Because of x then y, Because of y then z and so on.

Which is fine for writing a screenplay, but thinking of a story in those terms isn't always conducive to creating an nonverbal experiential story even if you technically could frame it that way. Like when you do that you almost always by consequence get stories that require characters to explain things to you along the way, lots of changes that are hard to follow, a big ole plot etc.

I'm thinking a bit of what sondheim says about lyric writing and how it differs from poetry. In poetry the words are the entire piece of art and must carry themselves. But in songs, the words sit on the music and come alive. So you have to take that into account when writing them. On the page "oh what a beautiful morning oh what a beautiful day" looks too simple and boring. But you sing it and it soars. And I think something similar happens in experience.

Like you almost have to craft an experience that on the page, or explained, actually looks too simple, like the events of a children's picture book. Because once you add in the actual experience of it, it comes alive.

Like with flight of passage, the actual ride portion beat list would look positively boring for great chunks of it.

It'd be like:

we follow our tour guide through the air and down to the river. And then to the waterfall. And then to the forest. And then to the ocean. And then a whale jumps in our way so we turn around and fly under the wave. We fly past more rocks. A big dragon gets angry at us and chases us for 2 seconds so we get out of his way and rest in a cave. We look at the cave and some glowing dandelions. We leave the cave for no particular reason and do some fun flight tricks because we can and it's the climax. We basically repeat the beginning now, flying back over the trees, down to the river, rhinos get in the way this time so we back up slightly, and dive off a cliff because I guess that's the way we get to the ocean again. We look at the whale jump up again and it's over.

Like can you see how this kind of storytelling utterly doesn't work with an screenwriting/plot framework of a leads to b, b leads to c, c leads to d? Like technically everything in the story does have a cause and effect but the cause and effect are largely irrelevant to the larger experience arcs at hand. The reasons are often just "because that's the way to the next destination", or "because we're really into flying now". And it'd be so tempting if viewed from a traditional story writing angle to make the encounter with the banshee a much longer and multi-step battle, or to cause the cave to collapse to make us leave, or turn the momentary 2 second minor obstacles into big sequences, or send us on a "quest" of some kind. So many modern rides will do this and create an intricate flowchart of events that lead to each and every 13 second scene and it's just too much to keep track of. Too much to communicate in too little time. "Because that's the way the road goes" is all the reason you sometimes need. The plot requires itself to be way simpler than you expect.

And then the real question becomes how do you tell a story with sophisticated themes while having a plot no more complicated than The Very Hungry Caterpillar. And the answer seems to be, or at least one answer, is priming the audience with a shit ton of exposition in which the very simple plot can sit inside a very complex world in which it is meticulously framed. Which luckily, in the theme park world, you have 2 hours worth of queue to do that work in.

[hedgiwithapen]

Ok, so, in relation to that post you reblogged about the Avengers not really being friends... like, what are some things that the studio should have done? I'm looking for something a bit more specific than "actually show them being friends" but not as specific as "in <movie>, there should've been a scene <approximate point in event timeline> where <characters> did <thing>". Asking as a writer looking for advice, please help or point to someone who'd be better to ask about this; thank you

so like, this isn't avengers specific because I straight up never watched all of them, and like, the Avengers didn't have to be friends technically but look, superhero teams are more fun when people are friends, and the storybeats that count on characters risking a lot for each other or feeling betrayed fall flat if there isn't /some/ foundation and the avengers SHOULD have been friends-- but! some of my thoughts on writing Characters Being Friends: I don't think the writers (in marvel, but apply all this generally pls) needed to do anything huge--they didn't even have to follow up on the "everyone has a floor in the tower" thing. you don't need to have huge grand " you are my best friend I pledge my life, platonically, to you" for everyone. It can be great to have one or two moments like that, but if you have a huge cast... trim it down, save if for the characters who've had the hardest time with friendship or trust or liking each other, so it'll have the most impact (Ani and Enna in the goose girl have a great moment, not repeated with the other friendships in the book to the same degree because that's not what's needed. ) a lot of small things would have sufficed in marvel, and in other media. it comes down to just... let the characters be friends--that they like each other! more than just tolerate being in the same room!--, and that friendship exists off screen as well, so acknowledge and lean into that. the characters don't only exist in the scenes they're in. think about what they've been doing, and what other characters are doing the same. dos A like work out? might A and B work out at the same Gym? maybe C and D have siblings or kids attending the same school and get dragged to the same silly elementary school talent shows or little league games. maybe E and F are both art thieves--they'd find themselves in the same frame shops or galleries or museum cafes.... use that as a base. if they've only just met because Plot, what things are they gonna use as icebreakers? let them have some conversations that aren't just about the End Of The World/ The Angsty Backstory/plot related things. let them have a fast argument about the best 90s boyband or share agreement on the best Ben and Jerry's flavor. Downtime is great, but harder to get in movies than in books or shows because of time constraints. Not every scene has to be about the big ongoing plot. let the characters get drinks, or ice cream (or, to quote cisco and caitlin in a good downtime scene of s1 of Flash, whichever they find first) and play games or be at a book club or walking out of a movie theater-- let the audience know that these characters don't need the world to be ending in order to spend time in each other's presence. they don't live in the mission control room, waiting on the lead hero's phone call. maybe some characters get the Plot Important News together instead of everyone individually. maybe that info gets phone tree'd, and A says " I'll call B, they're on vacation this week" implying that they know B's plans and the number they'd be reachable under (Leverage does a neat thing with this where all the characters go to find another, and only one of them actually knows where she lives--the two in another car have to hack into the other group's GPS) maybe they eat lunch together every day in the school/ work caf, maybe they carpool. they don't have to be long scenes or big flashy ones, just little nods. references to off screen moments-- a phonecall that opens with "Character? What's up--if you need help with Noodle Incident, I already told you no," before getting to the real reason for the call, comments on " you still owe me 5 bucks from our bet about Characters C and D" have characters remember favorite foods " I brought potstickers!" " my favorite!" "I know, you never shut up about them" or "hey, isn't that my shirt?" " you left it in my car it's mine now." (think GoGo in big hero 6 grabbing for one of Wasabi's tools, she's clearly done this before, and Wasabi's reaction to his nickname--'it was one time people!'--we know

these characters do shit in each other's presence a lot, to the point where jokes get made!) on screen, demonstrations of trust. a character who doesn't show much physical affection leaning against another. During a tense meeting/discussion, a hand of comfort or warning on a shoulder, reaching out to offer a hand. a knowing look and wince of pity from character A when something deeply personal for character B gets brought up, to indicate that A knows this is fucking with B's head and they're not alone. (Beau's habit of putting her hand on Caleb's shoulder in Critical Role) silence, too. moments of characters just existing in each other's space without any plot reason, they're just... together instead of apart. (Tris Reading her book outside the forge while Daja works in Tamora pierce's Circle of magic-- tris didn't have to be there, she could have been in the main building, and daja could still have called to her with magic for help--but they're friends! so Tris is hanging out in proximity!) the Fastball Special is a nice tool here, too-- where two characters have a code for a plan of attack or special move. we learn from that that they practice together, train together, someone came up with this move and they've done it before. throw in some inside jokes between characters! have characters quote each other! (will anything wreck my heart as much as Eliot using Hardison's " age of the geek" in Leverage "the long goodbye job? no.) some things can be even smaller. a blink and miss it shot of a phone indicating that A has a silly emoji next to B's name, a group photo on the wall or desk or computer background. indications of hangouts/ meetings on a calendar. a matching tupperware from A's set in B's kitchen. a third chair already dragged up to the table in a house only two people live, or a mug that refers to a thing C loves that doesn't go with D's style but is on the counter anyways, and C never has to ask where the plates are--unless A has just redecorated and moved them. something to show that C knows this place well. maybe we see a bracelet around E's wrist, and later we see A absently braiding another one in a scene where they have their hands free, and still later, that new bracelet is on B. little things. small details that add up and add up. sure, there are some things (like saving the world or fighting a mountain troll) that make fast forged friends... but most friendships are made in a series of small things. think about the places your friends have intruded--indented--on your life, the way the characters have with each other... and write them in as set dressing. this isn't everything, of course. there's a lot of ways to show characters as friends! but the main thing I suggest is think about the missing moments and what's not "on screen", and use those as a foundation for what you as a writer DO put on the page.

[the-insomniac-emporium]

J Watches Arcane: Episode 3, Random Thoughts/Play-by-Play

Back at it again, ready to have my fucking heart ripped out (if the ending if the last episode is any indication of what's to come). Under read-more because I have lots of thoughts! Okay, well, plenty of them are jokes, because I haven't been the same since watching MST3k. But also the episode starts with a monologue about drowning, and as someone with personal experience in that area, well, had to add in my 2 cents :D

Includes time-stamps for watch alongs/curiosity.

Reminder: These thoughts are just initial observations, and are subject to change. Some scenes hit different in retrospect, and some thoughts end up being null by the end of a scene (though I try to note that, if things change soon enough for me to write it down).

(0:43) "Ever wonder what it's like to drown?"- Silco. Uh, it's like coming home?... Movie reference aside, I know what it's like to drown, and lemme tell you, it's just as horrible as you've always imagined :)))

(0:55) "There's peace in water. Like it's holdin' you, whisperin' in low tones to let it in."- Silco. Maybe it's because I almost drowned close to shore, and was in water less than a foot taller than I was (for reference, I was between 3 and 5 years old, and this is literally one of my earliest memories), but gotta disagree here. The waves crashed over me, over and over again, screaming at me to just stay down. No whispering, no soft caresses. It was like being beat to death, like getting kicked to the dirt, and stomped on. Repeatedly. Fucking sucked.

(1:20) "But then there's this thing, in your head, and it's raging"- Silco. YES, we agree on this. Pressure building in your chest, body struggling, fighting endlessly, even as the shadows start to creep into the corners of your vision. The water holds you down, but by God, your body will not let you go gently. You will not take a breath, will not flood your lungs, until it is the only choice. Flashing imagery aside, the visuals felt like a very accurate representation of the moments right before you pass out. Contrast between giving in to the unrelenting water and the strive to keep flailing.

(1:55) "For that I thank you... old friend."- Silco. Oooh la la, some of the first real hints towards Silco's complicated character. Since starting the show, I've heard a little bit more about what specifically people love about it (thankfully without many spoilers), and I'm looking forward to learning more about Silco!

(Intro/Opening Credits) Woot! I think I recognize almost every character in the intro now :D

(3:50) Oh, wait a second, are we doubling back on the trope subversion? I mean, okay, it's a common thing for either a father figure or an older sibling to give themselves up for the sake of the youngin. But it's less almost-maybe-cliche if Vi is the one who goes with the enforcers/takes the blame, even if she technically is the ringleader who orchestrated the crime. Maybe. Hmm. At the moment, as I am watching this, I'm not 100% confident about my trope analysis, so I might revisit this at another time.

The point is that I'm a bit surprised, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Should probably finish the scene before I say anymore, though!

(5:25) DAMNIT, this is why I shouldn't make comments before finishing the scene. Also fuck! Fucking fuck, man! Good shit.

(6:18) "This wasn't the deal!" The fuck did you expect, mate? You gonna trust a man with a glowing eye and a crime syndicate to keep his word? Amateur.

(7:15) At this point I am really wishing that I didn't have any vague ideas about future plot points (as in I wish I hadn't had anything spoiled), because right now my brain is reeling, trying to figure out how the hell we're gonna get from point A to point B.

(7:30ish) Viktor is kinda cute? Idk, the lil face he made when Jayce said that they need to "crank it" amused me.

Everything about that scene with Vander and Silco was fucking superb. Tasty lore, contrasting visuals, wunderbar voicework, etc, etc.

(13:34) "Wait, this isn't my bedroom"- Viktor. My man, you are officially the fucking best. Adorable.

Mel is gorgeous and I am a very smol, weak-willed gay.

(16:40) "I can't lose you, you're all I have left"- Vi. Characters love to say this, but they never seem to realize how it feels to the person they say it to. Vi tells Powder that she can't help save Vander, because it's dangerous. But that just means that Vi might die. Powder might lose her. There's no good solution, obviously, which is why lines like this hurt so much.

They're just leaving Powder there? I know that without Benzo, and with Vander captured, they don't really have any adults they can trust. But can't they at least have her hangout with Ekko? Small traumatized children need emotional support. They can cry together or something

At first I wasn't sure about having such an intense undercity plotline run concurrent with science experiments in Piltover, but on second thought it makes perfect sense. Jayce's experiments are somewhat of a parallel to Silco's weird drug shit. They're both endeavors to enact change, though the methods and intentions are very different. "As above, so below" and all that. Could probably write a longer post about this parallel/contrast.

(18:16) Seeing Powder having an emotional breakdown is... not fun. I mean, obviously, this isn't intended to be a happy scene or anything. I'm just stating that I am having emotions!!! Also reminded of my own breakdowns at her age, so, ya know, that's fun (/sarcasm).

(18:40ish) "I can help them"- Powder. OH NO. OH NO. This VERY MUCH feels like the lead up to that one spoilery meme I saw. This is going to backfire horribly, isn't it? fuck, man, I am not ready for this. Also my food is cold :( this episode has a lot more to it than I expected

(20:48) GOD, the look on Vi's face when she realizes that this is a trap, my heart hurts man. Not quite as bad as the last episode, when Vander realized what Vi was planning, but still... Definitely a testament to the facial animations.

(22:21) Rock 'em, Sock 'em, Robots! Uppercut! Ding ding, we have a winner! Fuck 'em up, Vi! I am amusing myself with these words to try and counter the inevitable heartbreak that this show promises me!

At what point does Silco pause and realize that Vi is the biggest badass in the building, and that maybe trying to kill her is a bad idea? If he had somehow gotten to her earlier and convinced her that his plan to fuck up Piltover was going to work, she probably could have done 95% of the work herself. Or something. I mean, a loser like Deckard + drugs = unstoppable monster. But a badass like Vi + the drugs? Not the kind of beat you'd want to mess with. Maybe that's part of the problem, tho. Maybe Silco picked someone like Deckard to experiment with because he's easier to manipulate. Idk, rambling, not really putting much thought into these... thoughts.

(24:23) Not gonna lie, Drug!Deckard reminds me of husks/indoctrinated people from Mass Effect, just purple instead of blue.

(25:18) hehheh. angry lil hipperdipper or whatever his name is. funny.

(27:14) Forehead bonk!

(28:42) POWDER FALLING FROM THE BUILDING MIRRORING SILCO FALLING THROUGH THE WATER FROM THE START OF THE EPISODE??? FUCK.

damnit. the meme I saw. was indeed. a spoiler. rip Ben-10 (Mylo is voiced by Yuri Lowenthal, who voiced one or more of the versions of Ben 10) and Goggles

Vander pushing himself out of the rubble = Spider-Man in the iconic "if this be my destiny" scene. I mean, not directly or anything. It's just vaguely similar, and I really love the Spider-Man scene, so the similar vibes are making me emotional, okay?

(32:16)... forehead... bonk...

Drug!Vander has more of a pink tint, compared to the strong purple of Deckard, and I'm not saying it's a connection to Vi (and her hair), a subtle sort of thing, but I'm also not saying that it's not connected.

(34:44) "Take care of Powder"- Vander. this line hurts a lot more when I think about what I've heard regarding future episodes.

(35:52) WHAT THE FUCK, VI. maybe this is just, like, a personal thing. but I never, ever understand when a character's response to trauma is to hurt other people (obviously Vi will regret this choice, and it's not what she would do if she had more time to process everything that just happened). of course, my personal response to excessive emotions is to direct all anger/desire to cause harm at myself, which is very clearly a result of my childhood trauma and mental health issues, and isn't healthy (I mean, hurting other people is also not healthy. neither option is good, is what I'm saying). this scene just. fucking HURTS so much.

(35:56) "Because you're a jinx!"- Vi. First of all, hate that this is how Powder gets her name. Second of all, that's not even true! Vi left her behind to keep her safe! Again, I know that Vi is going through an inconceivable amount of trauma right now, I am just pointing out reasons that make everything about this hurt more.

(36:29) this hurts. so much. Vander's last words were literally telling Vi to take care of Powder, and now Vi's walking away while Powder cries after her. Why am I watching this. Oh my god. This hurts my heart. So much.

Oh. Oh. So is Silco going to take Powder in/take care of her out of some weird empathy, because her sister just abandoned her, just like Vander betrayed Silco? Is that what this is? More parallels? Hmm. Painful. I need a nap.

[detectivenyx]

im sorry but the first statement is blatantly at odds with itself. BG3 can't be 'appealing to a niche audience' and also be built on a legacy (not to mention bethesda rpgs are a legacy of their own). it's not really niche given the skyrocketing popularity of d&d thanks to stranger things and critical role. i was wrong on the date, but the argument is 'baldur's gate 3 was spared the fate of starfield because it was actually good' which was a. my argument, and b. not what you were arguing.

i never said either game was spared the hissy fit; i'm saying it didn't dominate the discourse. cyberpunk 2077's ultimate legacy was destroying the goodwill of CDPR they built up with the witcher 3 with the ultimate discourse being a few cups of piss in the ocean. BG3's legacy is likely to be the gold standard of RPGs for years to come. it's not all the discourse around the game like you're claiming is the only discussion starfield is having.

as for the game's plot all you kind of described was stuff you can do, and it sounds like a cluttered unfocused mess, no wonder it didn't take off. i wasn't actually interested in the game's plot, it was an example of how far bethesda's fallen that i know vaguely what happens in fallout 3 and 4 despite never having played either by a month into their launches but starfield didn't. starfield has one of the most famous RPG studios behind it and the money of microsoft, larian didn't even see much of that WOTC/D&D cash.

#(Also I know technically RE8 left an impact with Lady D memes but I'm gonna be real...#all those memes are about wanting to fuck Lady D and I don't think it should count. It literally porn.

that was literally your tag left about lady dimitrescu, that her being attractive and people being horny for her wasn't good enough reason for the game to apparently count (i would argue differently given she kickstarted the entire mainstream interest in MILFs and overwatch,,, didn't). and you know you can fuck the illithids in BG3; i didn't know shit about starfield until you said anything. starfield's legacy isn't even being horny.

I think the biggest sign of the grand “fall of Bethesda” or whatever is the fact that Starfield officially released a full calendar month ago today and I literally have zero idea what it is about or what happens in it. absolutely zero cultural osmosis seems to have happened, which would’ve been unthinkable for a Bethesda RPG like ten years ago

[kickassfu]

k so I binged the series and my tldr thoughts are that I would have enjoyed the series more if it were better written.

It's way to short to carry all the emotional beats it tries to put in and the relationship dynamics between Geralt and Yennefer falls completely flat and they are among the most forced ship dynamics Ive ever seen in any show. Theres zero indication why Geralt is suddenly so obsessed with her or why she is so into him.

I don't ship them but jaskier and Geralt have an unambiguously better build up and dynamic even though it was also very rushed and could have used more development given how close they seem. Other than that I love Ciri and Yennefer and I wish they had more screen time.

Ciri in particular isn't given enough development given how essential she is to the overarching plot and political struggle. I kinda wish that instead of the back and forth time skips which just leave me confused and not knowing what's happening they just wrote a linear narrative with flashbacks. given that Geralt actually doesn't do much in most of the series besides B plot monster hunting quests I think his character would have been enriched by sticking to a linear narrative instead of the back and forth.

If I (a person who has never written anything elaborate in my life) were to have written the show I would have filmed one season separated into 3 parts, one following Ciri, one following Yennefer and one following Geralt that you can watch side by side or after the other and they all end end with Ciri and Geralt meeting and Yennefer mysterious fate.

within the series there would be connections and Easter eggs that you can put together once you watch the other series. it wouldn't have only helped build the overarching plot as well as the character and relationship development and felt more like a video game adaption.

Apparently the series also cost 10 mill per episode which I assume must have gone mostly to Henry Cavill because it's simultaneously the cheapest and most expensive show I've ever seen. Some scenes look really good but others look like a fanmade film. Not that those films are bad and I don't know how to explain it but they have a quality to them that makes them not look real even if the costuming and video quality is good. Like that scene in the cave with that goatman and the elder.

I'll see how the second season is reviewed once it comes out and I'll think about checking it out. I know I complained a lot lol but I didn't hate it.

oh i'm actually really happy that you decided to come tell me your thoughts. and i don't disagree with most of them honestly haha

in a better written show maybe i'd ship geralt and yennefer (i don't hate them together btw, and also they're hot so they make a nice picture xD) but the show doesn't give me anything, they meet and suddenly??? geralt is just tying himself to her in such an intrinsic way? i just don't buy it. it's weird, and the writing does not pay off what they show us.

i do ship geraskier, but i get it if you don't! they do have more of a buildup than yennefer and geralt. it seems more natural, and gradual. but again you're right, they could have shown us more of their development.

i like Ciri as a character, but i was bored watching most of her scenes, they just don't do her justice, and the show seems to slow down whenever she shows up (to me). and i also love yennefer, she's a very interesting character!

i actually kinda enjoyed how the show isn't technically very linear, but at the same time it is. because geralt's, yennerfer's and ciri's stories are indeed linear, and yes we're seeing them at the same time as if they were going on at the same time but they aren't. and it was neat when their stories finally aligned. and i enjoyed looking for context clues to see when something has come to be in one of the other one's stories. it was another way to keep me focused in the show when i so often have a hard time to focus on the thing i'm watching lol so in this we kinda disagree. i do understand that it might be complicated and boring to other ppl tho.

having it be three different stories could work better to develop the characters more i agree. but it'd be boring for me, and i'd probably not be able to get through the 3 different shows/parts of a show like that. but again its a matter of preference and i understand where you're coming from.

oh def....some of the cgi is BAD lol and it does come off cheap at times for sure, even if other scenes are amazingly well done. but it's a first season and they were finding their footing so i forgive them to a certain extent.

i am going to watch s02 no matter what the reviews say. not because i love this show but because i love Jaskier LOL he just makes the show so fucking fun for me, you have no idea. and i am interested in what's gonna happen as well. i'm glad you got some enjoyment out of it!

also i'm sorry that my thoughts are also too long akjsdhsdfjhsd sorry

[lichfucker]

Hi! (feel totally free to ignore btw!) I used to looove starkid back in avpm days, but I haven't seen anything since Starship. You posting abt Black Friday is making me want to go back tho! What starkid/tcb shows should watch vs skip? I know twisted, saf, (&apparently bf) are great - which of the others have you seen & liked? Thanks! ☺️

twisted, saf, and bf are all TOP TIER and you absolutely should watch them

the guy who didn't like musicals is, like, technically kind of a prequel to black friday? they take place in the same town and there's a handful of overlapping characters (and since black friday is generally a lot. heavier in tone, a lot of the Jokes that get big audience reactions are just references to tgwdlm). you don't HAVE to watch tgwdlm to enjoy bf, and in all honesty I really didn't like tgwdlm very much (it's just not my kind of humor personally and the ratio of songs I liked to songs I didn't is just a little too low, y'know?). you'd be missing out on a LITTLE bit of context my watching bf without watching tgwdlm but not even really that much, they do a good job of re-explaining all the plot-relevant details and the relationship between the shows isn't quite as straightforward as prequel/sequel. so it's up to you whether you'd think it's worth it to watch tgwdlm in addition to bf

you mentioned starship which I LOVE. worth rewatching. starship and holy musical b@man are maybe the most underrated shows in the company's oeuvre. I love hmb so much it makes me insane. I'm so sick of superhero media that takes itself really seriously lmao the concept is inherently absurd and ridiculous, and hmb really leans into the idea that, like, this is all dumb as hell. the characters don't THINK it's dumb as hell, and they DO take it super seriously, but it's still very much dumb as hell

trail to oregon has a lot more potty humor than I usually like, but I absolutely fucking love it. tto makes me so happy makes me go 🥰🥰 turn my brain off and watch ppl be dumb abt The Frontier. (in case you couldn't tell, most of starkid's shows revolve around people being extremely stupid and they're soooooo good at it.) trail to oregon also has a choose-your-own-ending thing which is fun and because I'm me I have extremely strong opinions about which one is the best lmao but I won't tell you which bc I don't want to influence your decision-making

AND THEN THERE'S FIREBRINGER. the perfect lauren lopez vehicle. dumb idiot cavepeople my BELOVED. if you were On The Internet in 2017 you probably saw clips of the song 'work to do,' the "I don't really wanna do the work today" song. 'twas a big meme. it's very very good. and the music?? my g-d. heavenly harmonies. firebringer is just... fun. it's fun and very bisexual, if that means anything to you

don't watch me and my dick. it's good for corey dorris having a solo and bad/uncomfy for almost everything else. most people dislike ani; I have mixed feelings abt it. I'm not THAT into star wars so a lot of the references were lost on me, and a lot of people really didn't like that they don't sing (they did it in rep with tto, and tto took most of their best singers). that's not to say there's no music-- there is!! but the band does it all, movie soundtrack-style, instead of the characters. a lot of the songs are really good, though!! and clark's voice is soooooo 🤩. but it's, y'know, stylistically a very different experience than most other starkid musicals, and it's steeped in the granular details of star wars canon far more than the other parody musicals are in their source material. and in all honesty I haven't really watched much tcb beyond saf so I don't feel qualified to rec any other tcb stuff, though iirc people seem to really love solve-it squad

thank you for allowing me to ramble abt starkid lmfao :3

[janiedean]

So GRRM said in an interview a few days ago that D & D kept PART of his outline and that he isn't changing his plan even if fans don't like it. What do you think he's referring to since he's confirmed some stuff was changed? Also does the fact that he still hasn't confirmed the Bran=KoT7K plot detail that Isaac claims is coming from him means that Isaac was not told the truth from D & D?

in order:

he probably told them the general ending also because he’s most likely not publishing wow/ados yet because he got plot-stuck somewhere so he most likely has to get over that kinda thing even if he knows more or less how it’s supposed to go but it also depends on what the hell went on behind the scenes and whether those post-finale leaks about jaime being jon’s hand after killing cersei were true or not because like...... that ending, while imvho not the same as the book at all, had a lot of things I had thought would be canon so we should know if that was a thing or not, so I’m not gonna put sure dibs of what was GRRM’s for sure in the finale. that said.......

point one: jaime/cersei/brienne are definitely not ending like in the show. theon is not either. reasons in case: they split jon connington and aegon’s subplot on a) jorah b) dany c) cersei d) jon e) euron and they cut lady stoneheart which is where jaime and brienne’s sl was heading and cersei is most likely going in KL because aegon/jonc storm it and then dany takes it again at the end of WoW or smth, so that part is definitely not grrm’s in any way shape or form. as far as theon goes: they gave his main storyline to sansa and then they kept him around for basically nothing when in the books he’s a damned main character and the main pov for the winterfell/stannis/northern stuff that’s not the wall so like.... that shit ain’t happening same as the war against the others, or not like in the show; (and let’s not even touch dorne)

point two: bran being king of something makes sense (I wrote this meta on how him being a fisher king deconstruction supports such an ending after the finale before the maybe alternate finale leak happened but the basic point still stands) but at this point given that other leak... if it’s true I’d put that the seven realms split and bran is king in the north with jon in the south, if it’s not and king bran is actually endgame then rickon is getting the north and I’m getting to it in a moment, but anyway bran being king of something or somewhere is most likely grrm’s;

point three: if the fake leak isn’t true and bran gets king’s landing, then jon going back north could absolutely be a canon thing because like... let’s be real he wishes every other moment he could go back with the wildlings and he fit better there than anyone else, so that actually could have been a thing, otherwise he’s getting the south;

point four: sansa being queen in the north is definitely not happening imvho but as rickon is being set to be the key to the northern conspiracy and davos is going to get *him* in book canon I see as way more likely that he has a role of a lot more importance than RUNNING WHILE RAMSAY PLAYS TARGET SHOOTING. now, if bran stays north he’d probably adopt his heirs, if bran goes south he gets the throne and sansa is a lot more likely to be regent (for rickon) or counselor (for bran) rather than that qitn thing that makes no sense and was there for... woke points or smth;

point five: if arya goes around the world she goes with gendry. friendly reminder that if house baratheon goes presumably extinct in case shireen and stannis die then EDRIC STORM exists in the books, gendry isn’t there for that, and whatever arya ends up doing he goes with her most likely;

point six: I don’t think dany dies she doesn’t give me the vibe, but I always thought she’d give the throne up because she’d realize she eventually didn’t really want that as much as thought she should have it because viserys wanted it and go back to essos and thrive there because tbqh she was a lot better as a khaleesi if you ask me, but anyway.... technically she did go back to essos just not alive, but I think that might be a possibility;

point seven: the one thing I’m 99,9% sure that’s straight out of grrm’s outline is the small council switch to... well, basically at the beginning of the books the small council is pretty much your westeros equivalent of old white rich republican men or smth pass me the analogy, at the end of the show you have other than a king who’s disabled and a hand who’s disabled.. a woman, two former commoners (davos and bronn) and sam who might have been born noble but a) is an abuse victim, b) comes from his father, c) technically lost his title the moment he swore himself to the NW, d) knows exactly how it feels to Not Be Privileged and is in a relationship/has children with/has married a wildling woman who was also an incest/abuse victim, I mean let’s be real the entire small council has gone people belonging to extra privileged categories and who never knew discrimination in their life to all people who couldn’t access full privilege if they were nobles (brienne, sam and tyrion) or weren’t born into privilege (bronn and davos). that seems honestly to me like a thing that comes straight from grrm or this entire series isn’t about how cripples, bastards and broken things eventually come up on top (and guys come on asoiaf is also that and it’s a good portion of it). now, I don’t think that the books’s final small council will end up being the same as the show (for one I highly doubt brienne is in it and as LC, like hell brienne ends the series in the kingsguard, it goes against everything in her arc, and most likely bronn isn’t gonna be on it either, and if the leak where jaime was jon’s hand is true I have a feeling the switch might be with a bastard king [which is still not a thing that happens] plus tyrion would be on the council but as master of coin or smth else) but I think it might mirror the same idea ie that it’s all going to be made up of people who didn’t come from privileged categories or couldn’t access privilege fully if they did. like that was the one thing that while watching made me go like YEAH OKAY THAT’S GRRM THERE NOT D&D. that said with tyrion I think he gets casterly if he’s not hand but he’ll still be on the council anyway in some form but yeah tldr I think that the small council’s radical change in that sense is the one thing that they definitely grabbed from the outline.

I mean, I think that roughly that’s the stuff that might have been in the general outline, then again they killed all of dorne, ignored the greyjoy storyline, ignored lady stoneheart and jonc and changed stannis’s storyline in such a dumbass way that they might have written themselves into a corner because cutting all of THAT means that you can’t really follow an outline for which those elements were KEY IMPORTANT sooooo....... whatever he told them that then was shaken up/around for SUBVERTING EXPECTATIONS so now we have not the direct thing but some fourth-hand version of what grrm told them and you can try to guess but idk that’s me speculating. *shrug* 

[ofoceansandtombsanew]

*cracks knuckles* time be self indulgent as hell (by talking about the technical aspects of the faerie faerie fruit, model banshee. thank you for giving me an excuse to talk more about it/the lore @head-empty-just-ace)

i) i ate the faerie faerie fruit a good chunk of time after we left dawn island (still in the spade pirates era but before we went to the new world) which can be read about here in something also extremely self indulgent. so i chalk it up to a) we're not close to dawn island if he did leave behind a ghost and b) maybe there was no ghost sabo left behind because not all people leave one (which ofc later on i learn sabo was never dead to begin with)

ii) in my universe ghosts do generally stick close to home (aka the region they died in) for various reasons like waiting for family to die so they can move on together or regrets are keeping them tied down. but they can traverse to where there are symbols of themselves

(ex. think an altar for the dead made in their honor/an offering for them/a child is a symbol of their parents so if their kid is alive they can go see them regardless of where they went, etc)

or if they are specifically attached to an individual or group of people (ex. a pirate ghost following their crew). treasured objects can leave behind a spirit too (ex. the merry). animals tend to leave more ghosts behind than humans and a good chunk move as if they haven't even realized they've died. often at sea i see the spirits of sea creatures so it adds a layer to my enjoying the sights

iii) they do remember how they die and their ghosts are in the state they died in. so if a ghost was someone who died getting stabbed to death in the torso, that will reflect on the spirit. a very grim reminder of how their lives came to an end

iv) they eventually pick up that i can see when i am making it clear i'm looking their way and just straight up start talking to them. at first i'm cautious about it because as far as other people are concerned, it looks like i'm just talking to the air but as time goes on i'm more shameless about it. usually the ghosts are very very surprised and make the typical shocked one piece face you know the one

v) i've gotten "help me move on" requests from plenty of ghosts throughout my adventures on the seas. it's kinda like my own mini side plot to whatever main storyline we've got going on

vi) yep i do end up wrapping in ghosts for intel after some time passes to help assess a situation (this comes ahead during our short stay in wano, asking ghosts about the situation and so on and so forth). this becomes particularly important during the 'marshall d teach is a snake' era

but the real bread and butter for the banshee model is that users instinctively wail, keen and scream when someone is going to die soon and i specifically ate it in hopes of preventing the deaths of people i care about if i know it's coming

so i guess for the rapid fire rounds of devil fruit ability explanation if you were curious:

banshee eyes: just the passive ability to see the spirits of the deceased

death sense: an ability with 2 variants but it isn't something i can actually control buuut death's CAN be prevented (contrasted to my banshee novel's verse) is instinctively triggered based on death rearing its head

death sense: warning: i just tear up uncontrollably because death is nearing. but the death is one that is preventable as the loom of fate has not reached a point of no return so there is still time to do something about

death sense: absolution: uncontrollable screams and sobbing that alerts those on the other side death is coming for an intended individual. this is not an avoidable death, the quick time event has been failed gg

mourning keen: forces people within a certain range to grieve and cry uncontrollably, good for incapacitating opponents (or forced therapy jgfngjn you are gonna grieve whether you like it or not)

scream queen: just a loud enough scream to stun people within a certain range (technically nameless but why not give it a title)

heavy metal: i do not control the rate by which people die (nor do i know the 'how', i only know when it's 'near') but there is a limitation to how much loud noise someone can handle before either going deaf or straight up getting unalived so it is curtains. technically a nameless ability but why not give it a name too)

drawbacks:

like i mentioned before, users of this fruit don't know the specific time or date someone will die or how they will die. so if it's a death that is preventable, it's up to the user to piece together the mystery of the specifics and hopefully succeed in avoiding someone dying

users of this fruit can't sense their own death so there are no warnings for if my final hour is coming

death sense is an ability that's passive so i can't control it or stop myself when it triggers and it is pretty draining

you can look kinda crazy just talking to the air from someone else's pov

potential drawback depending on the user: you see ghosts 24/7 and it's not an ability that can be turned off or controlled

person: omg you hate a devil fruit? which one??

me: faerie faerie fruit

person: ✨o✨ oh wow really?! so do you get wings or-

me: not that kind of faerie

person: oh

i have disappointed many a child because of this. sorry tama

[ponyvsthebottle]

Alright y'all it's time to lay down the fucking FACTS and the fact is that Fingolfin is the best elf in the Silmarillion so far here let me lay it down for you

The Devil: Yo Feanor, your stepbrother Fingolfin is plotting to steal the throne from you!

Feanor who has, like, -8 to Sense Motive: Hmm! Well, if you can't trust the prince of lies, who CAN you trust? Time for me to INVENT SWORDS so I can threaten my brother with them.

Fingolfin who is sitting in his house minding his own business: Oh hey, Feanor! What's good?

Feanor, a frothing fucking lunatic: YOU WON'T STEAL MY KINGDOM FROM ME YOU SON OF A BITCH

The various gods and demigods who, technically speaking, actually rule this kingdom: Wow Feanor maybe you should be banished for a few years to chill out.

Fingolfin: No no it's my b, Feanor I'm sorry that I apparently did something so awful you had to invent the crime of assault.

---

Feanor: THE DEVIL STOLE MY BOMB-ASS GEMS, AND YOU'RE COMING TO HELP ME GET THEM BACK

Fingolfin: Wait why

Feanor: Remember, you felt so bad that I threatened to kill you that you promised to make it up to me by doing whatever I told you to?

Fingolfin: Oh.

---

Fingolfin, yelling across the ocean: HEY FEANOR DID YOU AND YOUR BOYS REACH THE OTHER SIDE OF THE OCEAN

Feanor: YEAH WE DID

Fingolfin: ARE YOU GOING TO SEND THE BOATS BACK SO ME AND THE BOYS CAN CROSS TOO INSTEAD OF STARVING TO DEATH OVER HERE

Feanor: ACTUALLY I'M SETTING THE BOATS ON FIRE THIS VERY MOMENT

Fingolfin: WHAT DID YOU SAY

Feanor: FUCK YOU

---

One of Fingolfin's rowdy boys: Sir what are we going to do? Feanor and his boys sort of killed 80% of the elves who knew how to make boats, and we killed the other 20% because of a misunderstanding, and the valar _probably_ won't let us back into heaven so we're liable to just starve to death out here.

Fingolfin: Boys our only option is to walk back to Middle-earth

Another of the rowdy boys: By what method do you propose to accomplish this

Fingolfin: We're going to walk up to the fucking arctic, and walk across the fucking arctic, and walk back down out of the fucking arctic.

A third of the rowdy boys: Well, I guess that's a plan. I hope a lot of us don't die along the way.

The jagged and hungry wastes of ice: ;D

---

Fingolfin: WOW that was the worst experience of my entire LIFE where is Feanor I'm going to kick his ass.

Feanor's rowdy boys: Actually he got whipped to death by balrogs with fiery whips.

Fingolfin: Okay well where's his son Maedhros

Feanor's rowdy boys: Well, the devil proposed a peace conference, so Maedhros had a bunch of goons come along to he could attack the devil at the peace conference, but it turned out that the devil actually also brought goons, and more of them, and anyway he's been stapled to a cliff wall by his hand.

Fingon, Fingolfin's son: Oh I'll go grab him down from there.

Fingolfin: Nice. Well, I guess we can put all this behind us.

---

The devil: What's good babies, I just invented dragons and my orcs are tumbling over the countryside and spilling buckets of blood it's a PRETTY GOOD TIME to be evil rn

Fingolfin, standing literally right outside the devil's house with a boom box: COME OUT HERE AND FIGHT ME

The devil: Wow isn't this exactly what I have balrogs with fiery whips for? Take care of this, boys.

A balrog with a fiery whip: I mean, uh, we can, but there's some worrying rumors going around

The devil: Some rumors

Another balrog with a fiery whip: It's alleged that you "cry like a baby all the time" and that you "pooped yourself like a baby because you're scared."

A third balrog with a fiery whip: It is further alleged that you are, in actual fact, a tiny garbage baby who is afraid to actually fight, y'know, an elf. Just one. In front of your house. With all your boys around you.

The devil: Hmm.

The first balrog with a fiery whip, shrugging: Well those are the rumors, anyway.

---

The devil, who is like eighty-eight feet tall and is carrying like a freight train as a shield and he's dressed like some kind of gothic cathedral and also he has the three silmarils set in his crown, which burn him because he's evil but he's committed to his aesthetic: Alright Fingolfin I'm going to hit you with this mace that is bigger than the country you were born in and you're going to die, what do you think of that.

Mace: Whammo!

The ground: I burst asunder and vomit fire and lava!

Fingolfin: Wow I guess even a big idiot like you couldn't miss the ground. Anyway, I'm going to hack open a big part of your arm now!

The devil: Ouch! I hope that never happens again!

But it happens seven more times:

The devil: Damn! I hope these heal, in any event!

They never do:

The ground: I'm basically peppered with holes now! Sure would be awful if SOMEBODY were to fall into me.

Fingolfin: Alas!

The mace: Aha!

Tolkein: "Thus died Fingolfin, High King of the Noldor, most proud and valient of the Elven-kings of old. The Orcs made no boast of that duel at the gate; neither do the Elves sing of it, for their sorrow is too deep."