#that doesn't make him a good king

[starry-bi-sky]

this just in: danny fenton is just as much of a mask as Brucie Wayne? - another danyal al ghul au

Turns out, being placed in a civilian family who have no knowledge of your background is actually detrimental to the health and development of a child assassin due to lack of proper support! Surrounded by strangers in a foreign city, Danyal Al Ghul does as assassins do best. He hides. Espionage is one of many teachings one learns in the League, and it only takes half a day for Danyal to construct a new persona to hide behind: Daniel Fenton.

By the time dinner rolls around, Danyal al Ghul is safely and securely tucked behind the face of Danny Fenton; brand new adoptive child of the Fenton family who came from overseas. A shy, quiet little boy with a thick accent and curly hair, with brown skin and blue eyes, and an avid interest in the stars. The best fictions are always cobbled together in a little bit of truth, it's some of the only truth he ever lets through. He apologizes in a meek voice for his behavior early, he didn't mean to be rude, and he watches the three of them eat it up with coos.

Lies roll like silk against his lips, he struggles to meet their eyes and offers them his weakest, shyest smile. It's too easy. It's easy to go from there.

Danny Fenton, adoptive son, shy and awkward and unconfident but friendly. Who struggles in his classes and isn't the brightest, but tries his hardest. He makes bad jokes and has a quick tongue and a sarcastic mouth. He wants to be an astronaut. He's got the best aim in school, and is a terrifying dodgeball player. He's one of the least athletic kids in his grade.

It's like playing two truths and a lie, but there's only one truth, and the rest are lies. It's easy to pretend when he knows it's insincere.

Danyal Al Ghul, grandson to the Demon Head. Deadly, trained assassin. Has spilled blood, has had blood spilt from. Environmentalist, animal activist. He loves the stars. He owns a calligraphy set. A sharp tongue, an even sharper blade. He's clever, quick-witted, he would be top of his grade if he tried harder. He purposely doesn't.

He misses his family. He misses his mother, and he misses his brother. Mother visits a few times a year, so few times that he can count it on both hands. He cherishes every visit, as brief as they are. It helps remind him who he is.

Sam and Tucker are Danny's best friends. They've never met Danyal, but Danyal's met them.

It becomes routine to become Danny Fenton. As familiar and as easy as pulling on a shirt in the morning. Danyal wakes up and is always first to the bathroom in the mornings; stares at himself in the mirror until he can finally see Danny staring back at him. At night, he locks his door and sheds the mask.

Dying throws a wrench in his mask; splits a crack straight through the porcelain. He's able to smooth it over with sandpaper and liquid gold, but it's a little hard keeping his ghost form under wraps. It instinctively wants to shift to show his true self. Danyal can't have that, he's spent four years as Danny Fenton, he'll spend another four as him as well. Even if the feeling of the hazmat suit in his ghost form feels restrictive, like a too-small shirt suctioned to his skin that needs to be peeled off.

He'll live. Er-- well, you know what he means. It's frustrating however, trying to keep his Danny Fenton mask up even as Phantom - fighting in the air is something he needs to get used to, and the sudden propping of powers throws him off. But he is nothing if not adaptive, and he hates that he needs to slow his own skills down in order to keep pretenses up in front of Sam and Tucker.

The first time Danyal summons a sword when he's alone, is one of the few times Danyal gets to grin instead of Danny. He's fighting Skulker, and from an invisible hilt he draws a katana from thin air. It startles them both. Skulker takes a step back at the smile that spreads across his face.

They're both silent as Danyal examines his new sword.

"Do you know what people like me do to people like you, poacher?" Danyal finally asks him, the accent he began to hide a few months in slipping through. He drops all pretense, dragging the flat end of the blade slow and appreciatively against his palm. It's a good make, and when he cuts it through the air, it slices through like butter. He looks up at Skulker with a smile; "are you ready to find out?"

When Sam and Tucker ask about why Skulker seems so skittish around Danny now, Danny shrugs at them and says with a playful smile; "I don't know, I guess I kicked his butt too hard after our last fight." and he watches as Sam rolls her eyes exasperatedly, and Tucker snickers with his own joke.

By the time he reunites with Damian before their 15th birthday, Danyal is buried beneath so many layers of Danny Fenton that his brother will need a shovel to dig him out. He's not sure what he'll find.

[tnbc-thoughtsandheadcanons]

Love how Jack’s first reaction with greeting a child is by booping their nose

[allthatmay]

So, today my husband said, "Some people think Shanks is a radial leftist, but I think he's the most centrist character in the show. Dragon fills the role of the radial leftist/anarchist that people often attribute to Shanks."

And, huh, yeah. People do often talk about Shanks like he's an anarchist, but he's really not. I've always said that Shanks is a mediator, keeping a tentative peace between the pirate tribes and the government until the time comes wherein the One Piece can be claimed and the mysterious consequences can happen, but that means he is effectively playing the part of a centrist—straddling the fence, as it were. The key difference, I think, is that Shanks knows for certain that change is coming in the form of a rubber deity, and he is trying to guide it into place. All his work is done behind the scenes with very little violence if he can help it.

Now, it's easy to assume that Shanks' plans involve the complete dissolution of the government as it presently stands; that he is simply using his power & influence to mitigate harm for the many until the "real fight" can begin (and, with him having recently decided to chase the One Piece, now it has), but that might not be the case (and, even if it is the case, a lot of centrists use "mitigating harm for the many" as a reason not to take action against some truly heinous acts). The reality may be that Shanks doesn't see the need for the total collapse of the government, or perhaps he knows something about it that we don't (i.e. because he might be of Celestial Dragon blood). I don't really believe this is the case because, as far as I'm aware, Shanks hasn't ever shown any real support for the World Gov but he has shown, time and time again, that he believes in dreams, in people's personal willpower, and in the ability of anyone to become strong and change the future. But the truth is that we can't know his intentions for certain without Oda giving us more information, so my husband's assertion that Shanks is a centrist makes some sense.

In particular, Luffy is what makes this theory interesting: slap him in between Dragon and Shanks, and there's a very real dichotomy between the two "fathers" in his life. See, Luffy idolises Shanks and thinks of him similarly to a father, but he might realise as time goes on that he can't be like Shanks; he might realise that Shanks' ideals will only carry him so far. After all, what good is it to be a pacifistic when your enemy is a powerful government that is comfortable with mass murder?

(My rebuttal is that Luffy is the only one who can be like Shanks. He is effectively Shanks' dream: Shanks wants to be strong enough to do all the work himself, to suffer all the pain himself, and while he is one of the strongest men in the world, he simply can't do that; what he can do is only achievable through the support he has at his side. Meanwhile, Luffy has close support in his crew, and he has the Gum-Gum Fruit! He can literally become a godlike figure and shape the world around him! He can do everything that Shanks wants and needs and, as sure as I am that Shanks wishes he could have done it himself—I'm thinking back to his days with Roger here—he knows that it was never meant to be him.)

This is where Dragon comes in. Dragon, in direct contrast to Shanks, uses violence as a tool whenever he can. He's all about the greater good, for lack of a better term. His thinking is along the lines of, "People are suffering now and we can help, and we have no qualms in forcibly dismantling a government that uses slavery, genocide, and imprisonment to control its populace. We don't wait for the right time to act, we simply act." Do I think Shanks would approve of Dragon's goals? Yes. Do I think he would approve of Dragon's means in achieving those goals? No, but mostly because Shanks is very self-sacrificial and tries to take whatever suffering is necessary for change onto himself, relying only on his small, personal crew, whereas Dragon is happy to let other people martyr themselves for the rebel cause. He lets a small, amnesiac child join them, for crying out loud—something Shanks would never do, not even if the child proved very capable.

If anything is to come from this difference of ideals, I think it's that Luffy will learn from both of them and find his own way to the One Piece and into the world waiting beyond. Why? Well, because Luffy is all about freedom, and no one on the side of Dragon or Shanks is truly free. As for the world itself, it's hard to predict what will happen after Luffy's done with it because it's pretty dependent on Oda's philosophy. For instance, Oda seems to approve of monarchies, which is not something I would personally imagine remaining in a world without a governing body—but, hey, what do I know?

Of course, we all know that the true centrist in the show is undeniably Garp. He will let real, undeniable harm befall those he cares about in order to maintain the status quo, or to stop the government from toppling because [gasp] that would be the worst thing ever! He's a man who believes the government is essential and joins up in order to change it from the inside, only to fall short of his own expectations because he won't stand up when it matters most. Not even for the sake of his beloved grandson.

[hooked-on-elvis]

Those are absolutely two of my favorite pictures of Elvis. Of course I like the details and all the info I can get on the pictures. One thing I have to say is that in that moment Elvis was in his 7th season at the International Hotel in Las Vegas (August 4th - September 4th 1972), and it was the first time he brought Linda Thompson to accompany him during the concerts (prior to that she had only accompanied Elvis during rehearsals in July). You can imagine how jealous I am of her because, well, just look at Elvis! 🫠🥲 Anyway, here's a little story about the fans with Elvis in those pictures:

Las Vegas, NV. Monday, August 28, 1972. Elvis with two Italian fans. The woman is Nicla Crippa and the man was the President of the Italian fan club, his name is Livio Monari. Livio Monari started the Italian FC in 1962. Together with Nicla Crippa, a personal friend and member of his Fan Club, they met Elvis just after the Midnight show on 26th August 1972. Photos taken that day didn't come out, so they asked to see Elvis again... to have new ones taken on the 28th August (2nd meeting) which are the ones shown above. They had just attended the Dinner & Midnight shows on the 28th Aug: when a waiter approached them - that Elvis was waiting for them.

Nicla said the following about the meeting:

1972 was a special year for me, I picked up all my saving of a year and together with Livio Monari at that time president of the E.P.F.C. of Italy, I flew to Las Vegas in August to see Elvis performing. When we arrived we were so excited that we started immediately to ask anybody of Elvis entourage if we could meet Elvis, crook Col. Parker was at a gambling table with his cigar and he said very rude "NO, you cannot met Elvis", then Joe Esposito who said No too, and when I told him "Hey Joe you are Italian like us" he answered "I'm not Italian, I was born in Chicago" very rude too... until I saw the name of Emilio Muscelli on an office door, I knocked and entered and I said with all my 18 years old enthusiasm (in fact I was not yet 18, I would have turned 18 on December 30) "Hi Emilio, we are Italians and we are here to see Elvis concerts and meet him"... well he took it good to his heart and from that point on he treated me like his daughter - he was 50 years old. We saw 14 concerts in 7 days and we met Elvis TWICE, the first time on August 26 but the pictures Joe Esposito took with Livio's camera did not come out as Livio due the emotion charged an already used film in the camera... the second time on August 28, this time we called a professional photographer to take the 2 pictures to be sure. When I saw Elvis the first time coming out of his dressing room I ran towards him and I almost jumped on him, I hugged and kissed him and he returned the hugs and kisses to me and he asked me "Hey baby how old are you" I answered "18" and he said "And you came all the way from Italy just to see me?" "Yes Elvis" and he "Oh baby..." and he hugged me again very tight. We stayed with him for 15 minutes, we gave him a trophy we brought from Italy unfortunately we have no picture of Elvis with our trophy but I saw it at Graceland Trophy Room in 1987. He wrote a dedication to me, and one to Livio, on 2 LPs we brought with us, he gave us a yellow scarf each, but especially I held his right hand in my hands for a long time, and he did not withdraw it, on the contrary he caressed my hands. He was such a gentle, sweet and tender person, he made us feel at ease and he slowed down speaking English as at that time I could not speak English well. We asked "when will you come to Europe?" he said looking at Joe "I definitely wanna go, after a project I have for January 1973 (Aloha from Hawaii) I'll ask Parker to organize a tour to Europe". The night after Emilio gave us seats in the first row, Elvis saw me from stage and he stooped down and he put a red scarf around my neck... and on August 28 we met him again same place backstage and he said "Hey you are still here, good", he had such a sense of humour. Those 2 meetings with Elvis still are the best moments of my life!

Credits: elvis-collectors.com

[beatcroc]

pest control TWO!!!!! heres the first one

adn heres the obligatory bonus bc i can't help myself :')

[diseaseriddencube]

normal people: alastor is aggressive with lucifer because he's actually under the control of lilith and needs to keep him away/help charlie or sth

me: alastor is aggressive with lucifer because he saw someone with two ounces more power than him, someone who could help charlie more than he has and show him up as worthless, and he Is Not Having Any Of That anyways do you wanna hear my npd headcanons and why he is actually me and

[finemealprompt]

DP x DC Prompt #38

The observants are in a bit of a pickle, at the moment. The young Danny Fenton is refusing to be the Ghost King, saying he is too busy and doesn't want the responsibility that comes with it. Clockwork insists they don't need a king, but what does he know?

Who else could be their king? The other halfa, Vlad Masters? No, no, he'd be almost as bad as Pariah Dark. The clone? No, she's not nearly stable enough. Ruling the realms would be the definitive end of her.

That's when they remembered. There was this guy who reeked of death in Gotham. He had started a legacy, he helps lead one of the strongest team of heroes in the world, surely he'd be a great fit! He's not exactly a ghost, but beggars can't be choosers!

[ladystoneboobs]

no of fence to jon snow fans who for some reason care about his exact age, but these discussions just annoy me no end. not only bc there's no way any weirwood flashbacks bran has to rhaegar/lyanna will come with time/datestamps, but also bc there's always comments like this:

SEVERAL turns of the moon (ie, months)?! have these people never seen a human baby before or just have no concept of their ages? even if we take into account travel time from the toj to wf, meaning jon was not a newborn too fresh out the oven when catelyn and robb arrived, there's still a difference between a newborn and a 3mo and an even bigger difference between those infants and an older baby 5-7mo. there's very good reasons these lines were cut. whatever birthdates can be worked out internally for jon and robb from when they're first mentioned as 15 and 16 don't matter in the end, bc grrm doesn't care about a consistent timeline and the actual text of catelyn's pov and ned's convo with robert about cheating on her should outweigh any guesstimates about jon's official nameday wrt robb's. catelyn may not have cared for jon, but she would sure as hell have noticed his nameday if it came before robb's and made him ned's firstborn. if jon's birthday canonically came before robb's then either ned's cover story would not involve adultery (not impossible for him to sire a bastard before his wedding), or he'd just give jon a new nameday along with his new name to fit the adultery lie. it makes no sense for him to lie about one and not the other, undermining the big lie with a little public clue of his story not adding up. whatever else she was as a stepmother, cat wasn't stupid and a bastard who was actually the eldest son being raised alongside her trueborn heir could be an even bigger insult than whether he was born of adultery or not.

BUT, the unknowability of jon's true birthday is not the only reason this annoys me, it's bc this is all based on the assumption that jon must be older since rhaegar/lyanna ran off together before ned married cat, as if both boys must have been conceived asap as robb canonically was when his parents consummated their marriage. and that's not how human reproduction works! even if you don't understand how fast babies grow in the first year, you should know that people who get pregnant do so through ovulation cycles and a lucky sperm finding an egg and all that, not just immediately getting knocked up as soon as one has p-in-v sex for the first time. not unless you only know mean girls sex ed where if you have sex you will get pregnant and die. (even tho lyanna did die, there's plenty of canon examples where pregnancy did not lead straight to death. also examples of people who did not get pregnant right away and even some who are/were sexually active and childless without always having moon tea on hand.) we can't know how long lyanna was having sex before that sperm+egg match happened or even how long she was with rhaegar before losing her technical virginity. if they were married, doesn't it make sense to think they didn't consummate their relationship until the wedding night either? that's the only leverage there is to ensure a status as wife rather than just mistress.

and while i just said grrm doesn't care about exact timelines and a lot is still foggy surrounding the rebellion and esp rhaegar, there is one timemarker wrt robert's rebellion he voluntarily threw in, time and time again: that stannis was besieged at storm's end for almost a whole year. that siege, which mind you, did not match the duration of the entire war. it only started after robert won his battles at gulltown and summerhall, returned to storm's end, and then went out and lost the battle of ashford, leaving his homeland open to the reachermen. the same siege which only ended when ned made a detour there after the sack of king's landing, before going to the toj. even if lyanna may not have given birth that exact day ned found her, she could only be waiting in that bloody bed for weeks at the most, not months. so if rhaegar knocked her up the very same night he carried her off and jon was still a newborn when ned found her after the siege of storm's end had ended, wouldn't that mean lyanna was pregnant for well over a year? that's not how human pregnancy works either! so, maybe that's proof that jon and robb, whichever order they were actually born in, were actually very close in age as babies, much closer than if they were both conceived asap.

and really, jon's actual birthdate does not matter imho, when he was raised not just as the bastard to robb's trueborn heir, but with robb also known by catelyn and the world as ned's firstborn (which he was, in any case, as jon was ned's nephew by birth). what difference could a birthdate before robb's make (even were there some means of discovery) after ned, cat, and robb are all dead? if one is looking only at his birth parents then he's only a firstborn child on lyanna's side, but definitely a second son on rhaegar's side. maybe he was always meant to be a second son with a not much older half-brother! even if the aegon fka young griff is not in fact rhaegar's son, he'll still be known as aegon vi targaryen, meaning jon will never be known as any father's elder son. if i may reference mean girls again, it's not going to happen.

[hazmatmaid]

i know probably nobody gives a shit about it anymore, but i'm high key so fucking glad that Queen showed up in Ch2 perfectly alive, finally putting to rest all those fucking "died in childbirth" headcanons that were rampant back in the Ch1 days to explain where Lancer's mother could've gone if she wasn't present.

somehow that was like the only explanation people seemed to care about, which made absolutely no sense if they were going off of Jevil's "THE QUEEN RETURNS" line.

[fideidefenswhore]

Was the young Henry VIII a very friendly and gentle person?

Assuming you mean on a personal level (since, obviously...ordering executions is not especially 'gentle'), that seems to be the general judgement. There's not actually much variation from it from 1509-20s, foreign observers extol his gentleness and generosity and piety throughout the early 1530s, their only specific criticism there is that he's enthralled with a woman of 'bad character' (shorthand for 'low birth').

'the kindest of princes' (Cranmer, 1526) ‘a man of gentle friendliness, and gentle in debate; he acts more like a companion than a king’ (Erasmus, 1529) 'affable and gracious, harmed no one' (Venetian ambassador, 1519) 'He is kind and affable, full of graciousness and courtesy, and liberal; particularly so to men of science (virtuosi) whom he is never weary of obliging.' (Venetian ambassador, 1531)

There's some interesting post-contemporary observations on this matter, too (that have to be considered more doubtful since they're more influenced by hindsight and sometimes, by partisanship); such as:

"her Majesty's father, though otherwise the most gentle and affable prince in the world, could not abide to have any man stare in his face; or to fix his eye too steadily upon him when he talked with them".

And while I won't arm-chair, body-language 'science', pop psych-analyze that one (search results yield that specific source quote to 'narcissism' discussion), since it's neuroableist particularly to suggest an inability to maintain eye contact is indicative of innate deceit/dishonesty ...it is an interesting observation, considering how long he was in the public eye.

'Otherwise' gentle and affable is what's interesting about this remark, really, because are gentleness and friendliness mutually exclusive with a certain self-consciousness? I don't think so, and I wonder if this manifested particularly once he got to the point in a public ceremony/spectacle where he became overwhelmed by the attention and scrutiny, it is not typically how he's thought of but it's such a specific observation connected (but 'contrasting') those specific traits you asked of, I thought it was worth mentioning.

Mantel touched on this,

‘The burden of kingship,’ he says, ‘no man can imagine it. All my life, to be a prince: to be observed to be a prince; all eyes to be set on me; to be an exemplar of virtue, of discretion, of excellence in learning; to have a mind young and vigorous yet as wise as Solomon; to take pleasure in what others have designed for my pleasure, or be thought ungrateful; to discipline all my appetites, to unmake myself as a man in order to make myself as a king; to waste not a minute lest I be seen to waste it; for idleness, no excuses; always alert to prove, always to show, that I am worthy of the place God appointed me … When I was a young man I suppose I showed the calf of my leg to an ambassador and said, “There, has your French king a calf as good as that?” And my words were reported, and all Europe laughed at me, a vain idle boy, and no doubt people laugh still. But being young I asked myself, if God had formed François better than me, which prince did He favour most?’

And I also thought Mantel touched on this (although I can't find it in my highlights atm, so maybe I'm misremembering); I distinctly remember this scene...where somebody is recalling, as Duke of York, Henry was placed on a pony or horse when he's only two or three years old, and this is really his first public appearance, and he's reported to have acquitted himself well, to have been charming and gracious and graceful, even then...but even then, there was always this dark spectre. The timing of his ennoblement as Duke of York was chosen with purpose, it was in the shadow of a pretender. Was there a sense of unease, even then, that he couldn't articulate until later: that behind every smile, could be a knife?

'[Henry VII]'s children grew up in a world of threats, intrigue, and paranoia', '[Prince Henry]'s earliest years were as emotionally insecure as his father's reign was politically uncertain', '"he is so subjugated that he does not speak a word except in response to what the king asks him"'; again, the latter does not match the gregarious (perhaps even, more self-fashioned than natural) personality he's recorded as having as an adult.

The possibility that he oscillated between two opposite settings, and adapted accordingly, back to back (relative isolation and circumspection, to complete immersion in public celebration and celebrity and grandiose openness/friendliness); could account for the contradiction of an "affable" young man that gradually became uncomfortable with the level of scrutiny to which he was held, and maybe even modulated his habit and outward persona to fit what was expected of a king.

[starry-bi-sky]

Who is the more well-adjusted twin; Damian, or Danyal? Why, it's Damian, of course!

And I have an explanation for this! But first I wanna preface this that this is just me like, rambling about this thought I have and it's not an attack on the trope as a whole. I love the Danyal Al Ghul au which is why i'm so deeply passionate about it, because I think it has a lot of potential to be explored. It's no secret that I've mentioned before that I think Danny's psychological development tends to get overlooked and underutilized in DAG aus, and the impact that growing up in an assassin league often goes ignored. This is just me further expanding on that.

Now lets set the stage! This is specifically for Danny who is adopted by the Fentons later down in life. Lets go twin au. At 10 years old, Damian goes to the Wayne Family, Danny is adopted by the Fentons (regardless of their affiliation with the League). By 14 years old, who ends up the better adjusted, more socially aware, spiritually in-tune with themselves, sibling? Why, Damian is! Why is that?

Because he has the actual support he needs compared to Danny. And I'm not talking about good or bad parents Fentons, because either way my opinion doesn't change. Damian would end up the better off twin, because, frankly, his family knows his background. They know he grew up in the League, they know what the League's teachings are, and they know he's a born and raised assassin. Knowing this, they can then help tackle and dismantle the teachings and lessons he has been given and ingrained into by the League. They may be a dysfunctional family, but they're functional enough to at least actively help deprogram all of the League's teachings that have been ingrained in Damian throughout his childhood.

Can't say the same for Danny.

Lets say Fentons here don't know his background -- and even if they do, the results may just stay the same if they play their cards wrong, -- Danny's now just been thrown into the deep end of a pool and is essentially being told sink or swim. Regardless of how he got there -- undercover, faked death, etc -- he has no proper support. He knows the League is meant to be secret, he's not gonna speak on it for various reasons. Whether it be some still lingering loyalty, fear of harm, or whatever. Whatever the reason is, he does not have a proper support system in the Fentons, no matter how nice they are. They can only tackle the surface level stuff and whatever Danny allows them to see -- if Danny ever lets them see it at all. For what do assassins do when they don't want to be caught? They hide. Sometimes in plain sight.

"But Jazz--" Jazz is a child. She is 2 years older than Danyal and no better at giving him a proper support system than the two adult Fenton parents, even with parentification. We don't know when she got into psychology or how long she'd been studying it by the time Danny's 14. We just know she's really into it. Even then, Jazz is not a licensed or reliable therapist, or even an experienced or implied good therapist, and should not be used as one either. It's a disservice to her character to reduce her down to 'supporting female emotional crutch'. Besides, therapy only works on people who want to get better. Danny, who'd be hiding who he really is, has very little incentive to want to, or to even think something is wrong with his way of thinking, even with exposure to the outside world.

When people's beliefs are outright challenged, they tend to double down on them, and Jazz canonically has a habit of psychoanalyzing her family and declaring what she thinks is the problem -- regardless of whether or not she's right about it. Jazz would get into psychology, try and psychoanalyze Danny, and all it would do is cause him to clam up, shut into himself further, and throw up even more walls so that she can't figure out that he has been lying this whole time. It would do more harm than good, and would actively hinder any progress he'd make in trying to open up to them. Roads and good intentions and all that.

That being said, I think Danny's development and dismantling of the League's teachings would be slower than Damian's. Much slower. Because he would be the one having to pick apart everything and figure out what is right, what is wrong, what he wants to keep, and what he wants to toss. Everything he unlearns would be stuff he has to unlearn himself. If he even gets to that point at all -- depending on his experiences, he very well could not change at all, or change very little. The League acts as a purge for humanity, meant to reign in their hubris and retain balance, they just also happen to be assassins for hire. Danny's time spent in Amity Park could as well strengthen his belief in their teachings just as much as it could weaken it, especially if it goes as canon and he gets bullied.

Regardless, being tossed to a civilian family as someone who is very much not a civilian, without any support, would be actively detrimental to Danny's overall mental health and development. Especially to strangers like the Fentons. Damian was closed off and standoffish even with blood family, and it took him time to open up to them -- Danny, with the Fentons, would be even more so. He doesn't know them, he doesn't trust them, he has no rhyme or reason to open up to them, and since the Fentons don't actually know him, they can't help him the way he needs. Once "Danny Fenton" is made, he has even less reason to open up. So long as Danyal allows it, they will only ever know Danny, and they'll never know Danyal.

TL:DR the Fentons aren't the better family option just because they're civilians, and actually that makes them the worser option between the two because they can't give Danny the proper support he needs. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink.

[dazais-guardian-angel]

kinda wild to me that one of the most compelling aspects of both Chuuya and Kunikida's characters to me, that I never really see talked about, is how they're heavily set on a doomed crash course towards complete and utter destruction, and how I am so, so worried for them both.....

[mischiefprincess]

I've been thinking a lot about Loki and Frigga these days, I don't think she's an evil, manipulative monster like some people but I do think she's a very flawed mother, from what we see in the movies she's very quick to justify and sugarcoat Odin's actions, Yes there's a deleted scene where she confronts him about Thor's banishment but it was deleted for a reason, in the movie itself we see her telling Loki that "there's always a purpose to everything your father does", she's always defending him, never her sons and that tells us a lot about the kind of mother she is, idk if it's bc she puts her position as queen above her position as a mother but she always stand by Odin's side no matter what.

Ofc we know she asks Odin not to kill Loki in tdw but that's just the bare minimum she could do, she always does everything thinking about pleasing Odin above all, she goes visiting Loki as a illusion, in secret to not anger her husband, when Loki is going through the trauma of finding out the truth about his adoption she never acknowledges any responsability for what she and Odin did, she justifies his lies agian by saying he lied to protect Loki

She doesn't acknowledge Loki's pain or his right to be angry at them, she tells him he's their son as if that's enough to heal his wounds, she doesn't ask for forgiveness and doesn't offer Loki any comfort bc her husband was taking a nap and she had to stay by his side at all seconds, it doesn't matter that her son had his whole sense of identity stripped away from him, holding Odin's hand was way more important than giving Loki a hug or anything else

I think at some moment Loki realized that she cared more about being Odin's queen than being their mother bc she'd never stand up for her sons and defend them from the abuses Odin put them through, she just kept justifying it bc she wouldn't dare going against her king, it must've hurt for Loki, realizing that he was truly all by himself in Asgard, he couldn't count on his own mother to publicly defend him from the humiliations he undoubtedly suffered, she would just sneak into his chambers and whisper some words of encouragement privately but when in public he was entirely on his own and he knew it

That's why I care more about Loki reuniting with his friends/found family than him going to New Asgard or to Asgard in the past, I have no doubts that he loves his family with his whole heart and he wants to see them again but I love the new family he built for himself in the show, he has Mobius who will defend him with everything he has and will be his emotional support, validating his feelings and genuinely listening to him, he NEVER felt like he belonged in Asgard but in the show he finally found his place, he found the people he belonged to (as stated by the crew) and he fought to save them for hundreds of years so there's no way I'd want him to leave his new home for him to go back to the place where he was mistreated, belittled and mocked just for being who he was, I want him to stay in the place where feels free to be his true self thank you very much

(Ofc that doesn't mean I don't want him and Thor to reunite again, I just think it's best for him to stay with the people he chose to be his family)

[cloudsoffire]

big godzilla fan but i will never in my life interact with the fandom based on what i've seen on here

[skitskatdacat63]

I don't know how I'd ever convey this in art but. Thinking very deeply about how in boy king au, a very crucial part of characterization is that Seb is a wolf in sheep(or lamb more specifically)'s clothing and Fernando is a sheep in wolf's clothing.

Seb is very unassuming, very delicate, seemingly very vulnerable and malleable. But, deep down, he can be very ruthless. It's in the the way he hesitantly declares war, with a spark in his eye and a suppressed smirk. In the way he challenges someone to a card game or a horse race, proclaiming that he's not great, but winning every round and prancing around the room and mentioning it ad infinitum. The way he's able to instantly turn the tide in a debate in one fell swoop. By showing all his cards constantly and letting himself be vulnerable, he's making himself invulnerable. No one would ever consider him to be able to make big moves, so he wins every single time, because no one even thinks to expect it from him.

Fernando on the other hand, is constantly committed to having a looming presence and harsh reputation, but deep down, he's soft. He knows what happens to people when they're vulnerable, and he's not going to let himself be taken advantage of. The way he keeps a brave face when being informed of the marriage proposal, but goes back to his room and cries. The way he proclaims that he was always going to be the rightful ruler of Spain, but confides to Flavio that he never thought there was any real chance of it ever happening. The way he takes himself so seriously in public, but inside feels so giddy whenever he can make someone laugh. Everything to him always feels unstable and ready to crumble at any moment, and he's not willing to contribute to that by letting himself relax.

I think thats why it's very difficult for them to get along at first, because they have completely different approaches to how they carry themselves and make their way through life. Seb is confused at Fernando because he feels that he's very bland and overly serious at first, but truthfully he's not really seeing the actual Fernando. And Fernando finds Seb to be naive and easily taken advantage of, but that's because he's never seen Seb at his most cruel. Seb really loves when he eventually gets to see Fernando being vulnerable, and Fernando really admires and respects Seb when he sees him being serious. I think it just takes a while for them to show the other their full and complete selves, even the parts they can sometimes be ashamed of. There's this very compelling dichotomy in Seb laying out all his cards, but still being very difficult to read, and Fernando keeping his cards to his chest, but his intentions often being easily seen through.

[hooked-on-elvis]

"If I Loved You"

HOME RECORDING, GERMANY.

LYRICS Composers: Oscar Hammerstein Ii / Richard Rodgers All my life I give for you If I loved you Words wouldn't come in an easy way Round in circles I'd go Only to tell you But afraid and shy I let my golden chances pass me by Soon you'll leave me Ought you would go in a misty day Never, never let you know I love you eternally