#that was the inciting incident to him being killed

[undercover-stories]

I don't like how the Untamed changed the events of nightless city as being AFTER the Wen Remnants had been killed instead of before. Because the insinuation for Wei Wuxian appearing there is that he's out for revenge for what they did. He is there to vent his very justifiable anger, but it's a huge difference to why Novel Wei Wuxian did it.

Novel Wei Wuxian showed up to there to talk. Even after hearing Jin Guangshan rile up the crowd to thirst for his blood and the Remnants, he still tried to talk. It was his last ditch to protect the Remnants without bloodshed. He showed up to see if the clans would keep their promise to the Wen siblings and he was right to do so because, as he expected, they weren't.

It's why it's so important that the clans shot the first arrow. That was the inciting incident to the proceeding fight between Wei Wuxian and the clans. He was there to talk, and instead, they proved once and for all that there was no reasoning with them. They wouldn't rest until he and the Remnants were dead.

He fought to protect the Remnants from them. It was a 100% selfless and justified move on his part. It's why it's ridiculous that the clans still had the audacity to seek retribution from him for their losses that night during the second siege. Its also an obvious way to show that the clans hadn't changed and that it's unsurprising that afterward they had no qualms in switching their attention to Jin Guangyao after all the revelations about him and Su She.

[pro-anomalocaris]

This also applies to mentally ill men* whose oppression is worsened by how men are seen as more dangerous.

(*Footnote before people argue with me: Every movie ever with an evil mentally ill male villain who must be killed to save the non-ill and therefore good at/for something protagonists has a direct line connecting it to yet another cop who kills a mentally ill man instead of talking to him and then claims he was 'armed and dangerous' or 'violent and threatening'.)

The more I think about it the more I suspect that a lot of the reason people are resistant to the concept of transandrophobia is that to accept it would make it harder to avoid reckoning with the way we treat men of color, and hell, POC in general.

I know part of it is just...a long-running misunderstanding of intersectionality as "the intersection of various axes of oppression, in which Privileged Identities are irrelevant or even take away from it" rather than "the intersection of all aspects of a person's identity to form a whole that may look very different from someone else who shares a singular trait, or unexpectedly similar to someone who doesn't", and thus reading the concept as "ACKSHUALLY it's WOMEN who oppress MEN and so WE'RE the ones with TWO Oppression Points, not those stupid and shallow and overprivileged trans women!"

But I cannot help but suspect that a lot of people really fucking don't WANT to break away from that misinterpretation because it would mean having to reckon SPECIFICALLY with how that misinterpretation has hurt POC. How it reinforces all the ideas that lead to the brutalization of MOC. How some "anti-racist" people on this site would absolutely have sided against Emmett Till had they lived in that time with the same mindset - that it's not a coincidence that the decline of Black tumblr became so sharp around the George Floyd protests. How they only care about how Black and brown women are masculinized and transvestigated so far as they can hold them up as "collateral damage" evidence of why we should leave white trans people alone.

And honestly, I HOPE that as this exclusionism wave dies down, it doesn't just come with the recognition of the risks that white transmascs face, or white transmascs claiming the increased risks of police brutality as their own struggle first and foremost; I want it to be a fucking leg-up to acknowledging the way gender intersects with MULTIPLE other factors INCLUDING RACE.

I know that "popping the bubble" - grappling with the fact that the way you've misunderstood something has hurt people - is painful. I get it. But you have to fucking do it because the alternative is "keep hurting other people."

[nemesis-is-my-middle-name]

also on the subject of "whoops the main character got written out of the story," if luffy isn't there, then there's nobody to go after arlong and stomp him immediately after he has the marines seize nami's savings, meaning she's just stuck in that situation where she's just been crushed and also everyone she's been trying to save has now decided to go throw themselves on arlong's crew's blades.

so maybe after that happens, she does manage to talk the cocoyasi residents into waiting a little bit longer, but only until, like, the very next time she returns. so when she goes out again with zoro (who i guess at this point is in the know about her situation), they're like, ok, fuck, we gotta pick up the pace. we can't just keep scraping up pennies anymore, we gotta go Big. what's the biggest most lucrative thing we can go after rn. ...so maybe they wind up pursuing the krieg pirates to the baratie

[twenty-qs]

Everything between Jayce and Viktor can really be traced back to their childhood inciting incidents and it’s killing me.

Jayce: a miracle saves him and his mom, forever imprinting him with the certainty that miracles do exist, they can be controlled, he can save his loved ones no matter how awful things get, if he can just be smart and bold and quick enough.

Viktor: he saw the horror of what Singed had done—of forcing a creature to live against its will, of the degradation and terror of being fundamentally changed. For a while he thought he understood Singed, when he decided that he was willing to throw away all his principles to survive his own body. But he didn’t, really. He didn’t understand. There was still a line he would not cross. He wanted to die human.

It’s fitting, then, and unspeakably tragic, that Jayce is the one who played Singed’s role in the end. Because you can’t ask Jayce to let a loved one go, when he knows there’s a miracle that can save him, the solution is right there, it will work if you will just let him try—and so he forces a change onto Viktor against his will. He traps him into the Arcane, takes apart and reassembles his body, strips him of his selfhood and humanity. All so that Viktor will live. Singed wasn’t talking about the desperation not to die—he was talking about the desperation not to lose someone you love.

And so Viktor is…changed. He lives, whether he wants to or not.

And so Jayce loses him anyway.

[undertalerainbow]

Welcome to Wonderland Clover

Hi, I just moved into my dorm today and was busy most of the day. I did get some of the Nick Poem drawing done, including the shading and the concept of his background, but not much. After the day I had unpacking, I was too tired to continue that piece today but I still wanted to draw. I was listening to the "I Only Paint in Red Now" Alice villain song by Lydia the Bard and "White Rabbit" by Egypt Central and thought "What about an Alice In Wonderland Au?". Well actually the thought process was more like this: let's make an au of all the soul kids having a different Disney story au, which then got me thinking about which Disney story fits which kid, which then led me to think Alice in Wonderland for Clover. I thought Clover would be a perfect fit for Alice, Flowey as that smarmy cat was obvious, Martlet as the scatterbrained rabbit fit perfectly (plus being the inciting incident for Clover falling into wonderland fits perfectly with Martlet being how Clover fell into the dunes), and Starlo as the Mad Hatter because I thought it would fit nicely with his whole losing himself in his persona and becoming mad would be interesting, plus having those playing tea parties. Ceroba as the queen of hearts was something more of a stretch to me that I still think would be very interesting, like maybe Ceroba was this cruel queen because of what happened to her husband and daughter, possibly killing any threat that comes into Wonderland to ensure that never happens again. Also, I think the whole queen and castle would be more Japanese themed to match Ceroba like maybe she is the "Empress of Hearts" rather than "Queen", maybe Mah-jongg instead of croquet, and more of a Japanese style palace rather than an English one. I do have ideas of the feisty five being playing cards based on their suits and being at Starlo's tea party, if its a tea party maybe I could make it those Lassons instead? I also had an idea of Dalv being the Caterpillar but I don't know if that would fit him, which is why I'd like to get others' thoughts on it. What do you think the others would be? We could make this into a small group project lol. I'm not gonna dive into this au much, I just wanna make silly sketches when I need a break, also I just wanted an excuse to put Clover in a cute dress, sue me. So if anyone wants to take this idea to make a comic just at least credit me (if the designs or ideas you used were mine), or @ me so I can see the lovely art.

[astral-herald]

Uncritically Enjoying Mage Viktor

sometimes when i turn off my angry (logical) brain, i achieve some very sentimental mage viktor clarity that i would like to share <3

this is a lot different from my other Thoughtful "Analysis" Posts. my plan is as follows: address my understanding, slim though it may be, of mage viktor; bullet-point all the less than critical/theory driven reasons why he makes me happy; make a somewhat melodramatic point about reading/viewing for fulfillment over critique. mage-tor enjoyers, unite!

What is Mage Viktor's Purpose?

Try as I might to turn off my thoughtfulness, I am typically critical of the media I enjoy, so I'll be among the first to admit that Mage Viktor was certainly a retcon. That seems to be the fandom consensus, so I won't reiterate too much on that point. It makes shots like this especially funny, though, because that is simply not the Viktor we know, interdimensional or otherwise:

But something I would like to push back on is a pervasive "favorable" read on Mage Viktor as we come to know him in season 2. I fully disagree with the idea that Mage Viktor sought Jayce out in every timeline because he loved Jayce, rather than as a means of saving the countless innocents Viktor in other timelines would inevitably kill thanks to Hextech, the Glorious Evolution, etc. Hear me out for a second!

Bestie @arowyn-m pointed out to me that Necrit confirmed that Hextech is THE canonical event, the linchpin, so to speak, that ignites the chain of events we see culminate in season 2. These are the same events that Mage Viktor seeks to prevent. It takes however many lifetimes and iterations of mass destruction for Mage Viktor to gather two vital facts about the universe: Hextech is the inciting, inevitable incident, and Jayce is the complementary indelible constant. Hextech is inevitable, but only Jayce can show Viktor how to stop it.

Viktor's love for Jayce is not what motivates Mage Viktor to seek him out - it is the inevitable result of their being "inextricably bound." Reducing Mage Viktor's manipulation of time/space/what have you to his desperate need to protect Jayce in every timeline morphs him into a very out-of-character Genocidal Eldritch Being when he's supposed to be the antithesis of OUR Machine Herald Viktor. By taking up Mage Viktor's quest to kill Machine Herald Viktor under these very specific circumstances - acceleration rune in hand - Jayce can end the cycle. He trumps the inciting incident. His love for Viktor reigns supreme.

The fact that this is so awkward to explain speaks to the severity of the retcon. I guess what I'm getting at is that Mage Viktor was not acting out of selfish, obsessive love (as romantic as that may seem to some); he was searching for a way to right his wrongs and found it in Jayce, his inseparable other half.

"Only you could show me this."

MORE TO THIS POINT: even Mage Viktor, for all his implied wisdom, having seen countless lifetimes wherein they failed to stop Hextech, still does not anticipate the depth of Jayce's love for him. He (presumably, because don't see this exchange, because Riot made egregious cuts) tells Jayce that the Viktor of this world must die. Jayce "can't fail." As far as I can tell, he never tells Jayce that he has to die along with him. Jayce rejected Viktor's bid to be partners again, after all...

Mage Viktor, like the true Viktor that lurks within the Machine Herald, still believes that Hextech is fully his fault. He still believes in his own weakness and his shortcomings and is so reliant, obsessed with independence that he refuses to share this responsibility. When Mage Viktor reveals himself to Machine Herald Viktor, and he's confronted with the depths of his own feelings, he shoves Jayce away in a last-ditch attempt to preserve his isolation.

Jayce does not allow this.

The love that keeps Viktor "inextricably bound" to Jayce is not one-sided. Viktor, in all iterations and timelines, does not bear the responsibility for Hextech alone. In his dying moments, when he finally understands that LOVE is what has kept he and Jayce together all this time, his humanity returns to him. They save the world - literally. Love literally conquered all. No Viktor, not even Mage Viktor, anticipated this. All Jayce really had to do was kill this Viktor, but he couldn't bear to part ways.

TLDR: Mage Viktor found a way to save the world, but Jayce found a way to reignite Viktor's humanity. Neither of things could coexist without the other.

Smaller, Less Important Reasons Why I Like Mage Viktor

I'll never forget the breathless whiplash I felt upon Mage Viktor's reveal. I feel pretty alone in that experience - oh well! I'll be the pariah! - but here are the reasons why he's made such an impression on me.

Seeing an aged Viktor hit me like a bus. I know he's still stricken with the arcane, but there's so much wisdom and kindness and life experience in his expression. I never thought we'd see that. I doubt he did, either.

BEARD VIKTOR TRUTHER.

It gives Viktor some agency back. I wrote in an earlier post that Mage Viktor being the one to liberate Viktor from his own tragic narrative is pretty awesome, and I stand by that.

Mage Viktor's vulnerability. I feel like Mage Viktor, finally realizing that this Jayce is the right one, that this moment is the pivotal one, says a lot of what Viktor in all timelines longs to say to Jayce.

The question of lifetimes - how many times did Viktor search for Jayce? How many times did he watch a timeline go by without him? How much loneliness did he endure (for the greater good?). What was it like seeing that in-universe Viktor had killed Jayce?

Reading Uncritically (I Swear This is Relevant)

Rita Felski, a very cool literary critic who we all should read, said the following about reading critically (the way that lots of us engage with Arcane on tumblr): "It is a mode of interpretation that adopts a distrustful attitude toward texts...that remain inaccessible to their authors as well as to ordinary readers" ("Suspicious Minds" 216). Even though she's writing about academia/literary criticism, I think her point still stands. We engage with media with the intent to expose, unearth, and problematize. We eagerly search for moments where the text fails us at the expense of the "superficial" that would otherwise uplift us. We are practicing the "hermeneutic of suspicion," which can be exceptionally draining.

It's pretty melodramatic of me to apply this kind of theoretical work to Arcane, of all things, but this story means a great deal to me. It is deeply flawed - the Mage Viktor retcon is kind of appalling if you stare down the barrel of suspicion. But, in looking through a reparative lens (Eve Sedgwick's word, not mine), I see Mage Viktor as a agency-ridden Viktor, an aged Viktor, a vision of the future Jayce and Viktor together make possible. I'm enriched by that.

Felski asks us: "How else might we venture to read, if we were not ordained to read suspiciously?" (232). What can we derive from Arcane by putting the pieces together with the goal of harmony and fulfillment? In the smallest sense, we may feel a bit better about the ways in which season 2 seriously let us down. In a larger, more hopeful sense, moments like Viktor confessing an ultimate love and attachment to Jayce, and Jayce returning it in kind, may fill us with an even deeper appreciation for unconditional love as the culmination of human connection, a world-ending and world-renewing thing that stares down the BBEG of Arcane and wins.

You could probably read all of this as my apology for enjoying what so much of the fandom has condemned. That's alright. There are so many pieces of Mage Viktor that fragment under the critical microscope, but I can't shake the emotional impact of his reveal, so I'll live in that space for the time being. Had Arcane allotted for any explanatory conversations, flashbacks, and/or given up their soft world build to account for Mage Viktor, we'd be in a better place plot-wise. Alas, here we are instead. Everyone can point and laugh at me if they did all this just to bring back God/Made/Eldritch Being/Whatever The Fuck Viktor in future projects. That'll be my penance!

And, finally, if you really didn't like Mage Viktor, I fully respect that, but this is my self-indulgent post and I'm not overly interested in debating...there's little anyone could say that I wouldn't agree with. I'm just avoiding the suspicion of it all :)

[drac-kool-aid]

Y'know, something that gets me, is that in the book, Dracula's intentional predation of Lucy starts off with an accidental meeting. Sure, Lucy slept walked, and an argument could be made her path might have been supernaturally influenced, but I say she'd already been a known sleep-walker, and she went directly to a place she was familiar with.

Her stumbling onto Dracula's hiding spot in a very vulnerable state was just an accident, and from there, he intentionally set out to harm her, and through that, everyone around her he could get.

This is sort of related to Jonathan, too. Had Mr. Hawkins not come down with a bad case of gout, Jonathan wouldn't have been sent to Castle Dracula in his stead. Sure, Dracula probably would have had his fun with Hawkins before inevitably killing him, but I doubt he would have drawn it out so long or taken so much delight.

Dracula never sets out with a master-plan to attack Lucy or Jonathan. They just end up in his path and spark his interest. We know that if he isn't interested in you, he'll kill you. He'll, he breaks Mr. Swales neck doesn't even bite him. But the two victims he decides he's going to make suffer the longest he possibly can, he just stumbles upon and goes "oh this will be fun". Later, we see him start choosing victims as a way to retaliate, but for the two inciting incident victims upon which the rest of the story hangs...its just wrong place wrong time.

The reason this struck me is that I was misremembering. For some reason, which I now believe due to thinking about the *through gritted teeth* Coppola film, is that Lucy is sort of hand-picked by Dracula to be his victim. And yeah, the fucking film ain't subtle in its blaming of Lucy's victimization on the fact that she was Too Pretty and Too Flirtatious and Dracula psychically drew her into the garden in a flowing diaphanous dress, but it's really her fault....I hate this movie.

Like, i just read the films Wikipedia plot synopsis, Dracula "psychically seduces" Lucy before biting her. He chooses her out of everyone in England deliberately.

And just...no. That's not what happens. Lucy got so stressed from her wedding that her latent sleep walking started again. Mina gets so tired from the constant stress she falls asleep without meaning to. Lucy went to their favorite spot...Dracula just happened to be there and took advantage and both Lucy and Mina weren't floating along softly into a garden with a fan letting their hair blow, but cold, scared, and covered in mud and blood, and forced to sneak back to the house that way, facing not only the supernatural but the very ordinary horrors of being caught outside at night by a strange man.

Idk. The tragedy is that Dracula didn't set out to fuck with these people. It's just that they were the ones who crossed his path that he took an interest in, and he decided to draw it out as long as possible.

(Oh fuck, this is the crew of the Demeter too. It isn't like Draculas got some big plan. He just decides he's going to play with his food. Had he boarded any other ship it would have ended up the same way.)

I guess in conclusion, I find it odd that adaptions seem to need to find a reason for him doing what he does. Like, Coppola has to conjure up a whole reincarnation backstory at one point, but I don't understand why!! Let Dracula just be an opportunist, his casual cruelty knowing no reason. That makes him scarier.

[sandsorghum]

And I sat with my anger long enough...

A Reflection on How Trauma, Rage & Grief shaped Higuruma & Nanami (Differently)

Nah, Don't be fooled - Higuruma is not Nanami 2.0, or just a rebrand of noble, stoic workaholic. I explore some of these psychological nuances below in depth.

Frequent Comparisons

People draw parallels between Nanami and Higuruma mostly commonly through their Frustrations towards the System. For Nanami, that's been both Capitalism and the Jujutsu world, and for Higuruma it's the Justice system. This results in an aura or impression of emotional detachment, but it's certainly not to be mistaken for apathy. Quite the opposite in fact! It's because both men are so propelled by their principles that they don't permit themselves the "luxury" of (excessive) emotional fervour - but there may be some distinctions with how they go about that too!

Both have been worn down throughout the years, but both also have an Inciting Incident of a significant traumatic episode. I'll explore how both the long-term slog and traumas have affected them, but first let's make a distinction about each of their inciting incidents.

Duelling Dualities

Both Nanami and Higuruma's major turning points are based around how they couldn't protect someone they cared about, namely Yuu Haibara and Keita Oe respectively. These two also represent a loss of innocence for them.

On the surface, the loss and demise of a friend during formative years (Nanami was still in his teens!) would seem to have a much more significant impact than "losing" a client or case as a working adult, plus the degrees of emotional intimacy and investment are vastly different.

Nanami has also suffered this kind of emotional gradual decay but his experiences were less high stakes, less intense and less drawn out. As a salaryman he was only enduring it for himself, and didn't have the added burden of inadequate efforts jeopardizing someone else's life or liberation.

However, his loss is more literal than the lawyer's - as far as we know Keita isn't dead, but I can't imagine his fate to be very favourable given the circumstances around his..."mistrial". (I don't know what the legal ramifications of your attorney going berserk and offing the prosecution is, but I doubt those are good odds. I wonder if Keita's fate weighs on Higuruma too, after the canon events in the manga.)

Speaking of which, having someone die in front of you for the first time is monumental, and here's where we have another distinction; the kind of Guilt Nanami and Higuruma suffer. *Survivor's versus Perpertrator's.

[*As a a caveat, I'm no expert in clinical psychology so I want to add it might not be wholly accurate to characterise Nanami's guilt as classic Survivor's Guilt, and it's hard to say to what degree he experienced this specific sort, or for how long, but I'm sure he felt a significant sense of failure at being unable to protect his friend, which later expands into frustration into being put into such a situation in the first place.]

When I said "these two also represent a loss of innocence" earlier, I wasn't referring to Keita's, but Higuruma's corruption when he kills the prosecutor and judge. We are led to believe that Keita is plausibly innocent and didn't commit the crime, and is thus morally whole - whereas there's absolutely none of that ambiguity on Higuruma's part

Higuruma's is a moral failing, compared to young Nanami's one of ability and insufficient experience, exacerbated by the jujutsu system's flaws. We don't have the details about how Nanami's ill-fated mission with Haibara unfolded, only that they expected a second grade curse but were faced with a higher level opponent, which they weren't skilled enough to take on.

Nanami might be able to "offset" some of his guilt at being unable to save Haibara by blaming broader forces beyond him, or his circumstances of being too young and not being better prepared - although I don't think this is his nature to rely on that sort of naiveté reasoning and he carries that grief with him anyway (any iteration of survivor's guilt can be quite immune to logic.)

But for Higuruma, that burden of his ethical lapse rests entirely on his shoulders.

Higuruma fails in a way that feels or can be deemed to be much more personal; even as his actions are also similarly compounded by an unfair system but at the end of the day, he still killed with his own two hands.

There's no rationalising around such a crime of passion. There's no abstracting it out to the tolls and pressures the system takes, even if they are critical factors. The system is broken, and breaks him, and for a while Higuruma would rather blame and contend with its flaws rather than his own.

A man strung up by his own high ethical standards, what is he to do?

Conceits Revealed Through Self-Deceit

In times of severe emotional crisis, it's common for people to avoid the truth of what they really feel and/or want, because it's saddled with a lot of pain. As mentioned above, there's a specific kind of grief that festers with Higuruma's guilt which isn't present with Nanami's.

Higuruma snaps and he has to pick up the shards of his world view, we actually get a pretty coherent albeit funhouse mirror version of his moral reasonings but to be clear, this is less confrontation and more qualifiers to deal with the fact that he's now a murderer.

It manifests as a cynicism-fueled delusion where he attempts to argue, or rather persuade himself the killings were just or justified, not only that but that Culling Game killings could be an equally valid if alternative recourse for justice - his own Domain is a reflection of a courtroom turned theater, satirizing the legal process. A show trial in other words. 1ichtbringer has an excellent analysis that further unpacks how his Deadly Sentencing technique falsely stages a trial so that it appears to be impartial, and points out how Higuruma tampers with the process too. Highly recommend reading it to understand how beautifully deranged Higu's processing is, despite dressing it up in the rhetoric of logic (omg he's a delulu is the solulu girlie just like us!1!!)

Higuruma attempts to assuage his guilt by disregarding the justice system (and to an extent, the moral parameters) he has worked within his entire life, by harping on its limitations and flaws which are all fairly valid, but doesn't negate the fact that he's a criminal now

Furthermore, he is confronted by the contradiction between his and Yuji's killings, and the way each contextualizes their culpability couldn't be more stark. Yuji immediately confesses and doesn't try to rationalise or make any excuses. Higuruma on the other hand contorts his heart and head through several hoops so he doesn't have to feel such guilt - until he does.

From Higuruma's perspective, Yuji wasn't culpable for the Shibuya slaughter. Even as Yuji feels responsible, he is still innocent because he was acting under the influence of someone else's will - unlike Higuruma who carried out his executions with his own volition and more self-awareness. Quite simply, being blinded by rage doesn't hold up in court as a reason. Emotional states and pressures can be considered during sentencing but I doubt they would be much of a mitigating factor. Unfortunately for Higuruma it's difficult or impossible to defend his violent outburst of emotion since his framework of ethics and justice is premised so much on logic, which makes the nature of his moral lapse even more tragic and a particularly effective example of Gege writing dramatic irony.

And now, let's discuss the fiction Nanami Kento sells himself on.

When we get Nanami's flashback in Ch30, we're lead to believe he's the kind of guy who has never worried about "the meaning of life or his purpose on earth". Oddly enough, I think there is an element of truth to this for Nanami - Having faced an existential threat at such a tender age probably puts one off contending with such existential conundrums.

But then shortly after we get these panels:

This echoes one of Marx's central critiques of Capitalism, where workers are separated from both meaning and the means of production. Technically, Nanami's job scope - presumably as some type of wealth/hedgefund manager (or heaven forbid a stockbroker) - doesn't even have a traditionally tangible means of production, which only further reinforces the lack of importance of who he is as an individual and the sense of alienation, a pretty common phenomenon under Capitalism where workers feel psychologically and probably emotionally estranged from their work. Oh, the routine malaise!

[I fall back in love with him again each time i see the tear wiping part]

I don't think people have such profound insights or realisations if they haven't considered at length these broader philosophical questions regarding their priorities in life - but what I've always found pretty sexy was the simplicity of the scenario that gave Nanami this insight; an epiphany under ordinary, understated circumstances that he set his mind to without further equivocation. (And yes, I said it, it's sexy)

Who knows to what extent Nanami believed in his obsession about money for those four years; was his sole goal really just to retire young and migrate somewhere cheap? We know he still harboured dreams of moving to Malaysia; perhaps he could have afforded to by the time he was in his 30s, but there is also something within him that compels him to earn that retirement, not in an economic sense but rather in a way that addresses the question of what makes him feel like he'd deserved it. In short, how he earns a living in a way that aligns with and finances living a good life, does matter to Nanami. And by good we reference not just quality but morality too of course. The way things are done, the minutiae and attitude towards process matters very much to Nanami, not just the end goal.

I think that might be another way he differs a little from Higuruma, who could be a tad more impatient and results-oriented or focused, hence he'd be willing to take more risks (personal), bend rules and take advantage of loopholes - these tendencies all dovetail with his background navigating an already unfair legal system.

So, now that I've laid out the "lies" Nanami and Higuruma temporarily let themselves buy into, let's unpack what it indicates about their personalities. Gege often puts his (ill-fated?) idealists through their paces and what these pretences or obfuscations suggest about each man is fascinating and endearing to me in different ways!

The justification of his murder of two civilians is the central fib Higuruma tries to believe, but it's a delusion underpinned by disillusionment and years of constantly engaging with the incontrovertible ugliness and darkness of human nature encountered in his profession. That's how he spends his early adulthood.

Nanami, almost on the opposite end, doesn't want to acknowledge, let alone face such suffering and darkness for years - we might call it wilful or deliberate ignorance, or it may even have been a more subconscious choice. Either way, the avoidance stems from the tragedy of his personal history.

One man believes in his self-deception because he has faced the truth for too long, the other pursued a false priority because he has been attempting to avoid the agony and brutal realities of his calling.

When I think about the nature of their jobs, there also seems to be differences in the emotional and psychological tolls they're dealt. Being a sorceror has less overlap with social work and to my mind, has more parallels with law enforcement with missions revolving around investigation, surveillance, nullification of threats and broadly, maintaining a status quo and security for civilians. Most curses are abstract entities birthed from an amorphous mass of negative energy, there is an erasure of sentience, or at least a greatly reduced need to account for it, since they're already monsters meant to be eliminated in the most straightforward sense. A more sensitive take would be that these mutated souls must be put out of their misery. As for most curse users, fortunately or unfortunately, there's little opportunity, let alone necessity to understand their humanity (apart from Geto, more on him later.)

Compared to a criminal lawyer who has to deal with and get to know (probably not the nicest) individuals over several months, handling their suspicions and doubts, cultivating the trust and human relationships; that takes a lot! No wonder Higuruma gets worn out.

"I have never been and never will be frustrated by my own uselessness." -Nanami Kento

Our bodies have something called a Sympathetic Nervous System and biology predicates its sensitivities and capacities for emotional duress; this also influences how much of others' sorrows we can take on before we become fatigued. Every individual is born with a different endurance. Higuruma and Nanami likely have very high tolerances, but everyone has their limits.

This part is pretty speculative but I think how these two men empathise is different as well; Higuruma definitely uses intellectual empathy primarily, while Nanami experiences emotional empathy slightly more often. He has genuine care and concern for his colleagues, and relationships with them - they may not appear to be exceptionally close ones but they are important to him. Just remember what happened to ponytail guy after he injured Ijichi.

Higuruma on the other hand may not have had the opportunity to cultivate such personal connections with those he works with, either by circumstance, choice or a hybrid of the two. I think he cares about people in a more abstract sense, as representations of his duties, rather than actual individuals whose emotional interiority he must grasp. Perhaps it's out of necessity or an instinct for self-preservation that he maintains this sort of distance. This isn't to say he's callous, just that the way he relates with those in his occupation is more analytical.

Where they are alike is that both probably know it's unsustainable to operate from a baseline of righteous fury or indignation in their jobs. Going off his occasional outbursts, Nanami does seem to have more of that undercurrent but I don't think he's suppressing his anger daily or at least, he has some way of coping with it long term so it doesn't reach a critical mass, whereas Higuruma, if he had any awareness of his encroaching cynicism, probably couldn't afford the time and headspace to process his emotions properly.

Corroding Cynicism, Corroborating Hope

Initially, I had a difficult time understanding a particular line in Higuruma's monologue in Ch166, the version I read translated it as:

"I thought I should value that very depravity, which other animals don't have!"

I realised this line has a resonance with another ardent idealist, Geto, who observes this hideousness in "monkeys" as a trait he abhors, unlike Higuruma who cherishes it and believes it's the thing that sets us apart from other beasts.

It was only after contrasting this pair of idealists' motivations that I could comprehend Higuruma's breakdown.

Unlike Geto, Higuruma's raison d'être (before he gets a taste for homicide) isn't in achieving grand ambitions, he's not trying to permanently overturn a system but would rather manoeuvre within one. It's not so much revolution as it is mitigation (via litigation, hah). He is determined and convinced he can do this despite the odds he's given.

The issue with this granular type of change of course is that it's just as likely to erode their agents, through "the accumulation of little despairs". Not so little in Higuruma's case of course, since even his hard won interventions are significant as they determine the fate of people's freedoms.

What initially confounded me about Higuruma's breaking point and his tirade about how "the darkness before your eyes is just darkness" is that it didn't seem to challenge or contradict the reality he knew about before he snapped, that people can be awful.

Weakness and ugliness will always exist in humans, but I don't think Higuruma anticipated or believed such weakness was embedded in the legal system to such an extent. He's finally made aware of it with Keita's case, and I think that's when he decides the system isn't simply flawed but fundamentally corrupt and that he can no longer make any further progress within it, that his struggle isn't worth it.

The inherent fallibility of humans remain a fact. However, there's a distinction between universal and personal truths; the former often informs the latter, but what really matters for how we act are those individual, internalised truths. Higuruma's most fundamental truth is:

He's someone who operates from his principles, regardless of results or odds - it's why he fights losing battles, it's why he goes up against Sukuna. But for a moment, he's blinded by disappointment and anger and forgets that this is his ultimate north star.

Nanami goes through a lot less to remember his conscience, and I partially attribute that to surviving something as terrible as he does at an early age. Closure might be a bit ambitious, but I'd like to believe how he handled and addressed the loss of Haibara was to honour him by returning to the jujutsu world and looking out for other young sorcerors in his own way, guiding those like Ino and Yuji.

The sense of accountability and empathy he indirectly instills in Yuji is something Higuruma picks up on later, and it gives him some semblance of hope that there are other people like Yuji trying to do the right thing, those worth protecting and supporting, and keeping his eyes open for.

Conclusions

One last thing I want to compare between Nanami and Higuruma is how they approached the talents they were born with. Nanami has his Ratio technique, and Higuruma is intellectually gifted though later we understand his true inherent genius lies in his jujutsu abilities.

In a way it's inevitable for our destinies to be shaped by our capabilities, but I think it's interesting that Nanami tried to deny this innate rare skill as a sorceror and find something else he could do. If he wanted to lead a fulfilling life helping others, say as an educator or firefighter or paramedic (swoon) I don't doubt he could have, but he chose the path not many people are cut out for, returning to it not because it was pre-determined or cause he'd excel in the area, but because he knew he could guarantee doing it well in the moral sense.

Higuruma strikes me as another individual who'd be impressively competent at almost anything he sets his mind to. But the thing he's best at, given the circumstances he discovered them in, are skills he's now obligated to use in service of jujutsu HQ's higher ups. Higuruma wouldn't go so far as to reject using his natural powers and skills as a sorceror because of the unpleasant association of their origins, but he might struggle with how best to use these new tools, instead of being used. There may be another period of apparent futility he'll have to contend with.

I don't think Higuruma's faith is restored in the justice system by the time the manga concludes, and he'll have a hell of a time navigating the jujutsu one too, however he's more suited to being a sorceror as it would let him act more freely, in accordance with his own assessments, in ways that strike a better balance between his own moral code and jujutsu society's law,; something that he might even be able to shape in the wake of the Culling Games and a paradigm shift for Japan, now it's been forced to reckon with this whole other world.

(Gambatte, Higuruma!)

[fantasywater]

These are the reasons Stolas Horseman still gets dragged for his infidelity even though the circus was supposed to FIX THAT.

This is for Stolas's Western Entergy interpretation and for the fans who agree with it:

Stolas is an adulterer.

No one gets to change the definition of a word just because they don't like it being said about their favorite character.

He's a domestic abuse survivor and an adulterer. Both are true. 

The reason Stolas still gets criticism is because of the execution of how it was written and the Octavia factor.

We were introduced to Stolas and Stella's dynamic with her being pissed that her husband of at least seventeen years cheated on her.

That anger is empathy-inducing to a lot of people because being cheated on, or knowing someone who has, is a relatable experience. It also looks extra disgusting on the one who stepped out when a family is involved.

Even her throwing things at him could be excused because of the context in which it was happening.  

There's a reason why temporary insanity is welcome in legal circles because it gives leeway to the perpetrator in that it asks the question would they have done this awful thing if it wasn't for an extreme mental break forcing them to? 

Stolas's infidelity was that mental break.

Trying to kill him can also fall comfortably under temporary insanity. 

Plus having our protagonists kill innocents as a job also takes the bite out of it. 

It also doesn't help that both Stolas and Stella's voice actors gave their own explanations that pretty much stated what I said above.

Even our first episode was about a cheated-on woman going to extremes, but she was shown in a sympathetic light despite it. 

Yet the very next episode shows the same issue, but because Stolas is a main character we are supposed to fall in line that the adulterer is whose side we should be on. 

Octavia having a mental breakdown(twice now) because of Stolas's infidelity is also not endearing him to the audience.

What he is doing to his child is the biggest reason why his remorseless, continuous, infidelity is not a take-back-my-power move.

The inciting incident for both Stella's recurrent violent anger and death "threats", as well as Octavia's mental breaks, is Stolas's cheating. Therefore what is happening to him now is a consequence of his own actions.

The writing in the problem. We were introduced to a wife and daughter showing anger in different ways because a spouse and father betrayed their family, and yet Viv still expects us to feel sympathetic to Stolas.

In reality, Stolas is the antagonist of Stella, Octavia, and Blitz.

That role was especially blatant in Loolooland.

As for Stella Viv tried to course correct by being heavy-handed in showing her as a cartoonish monster in The Circus. 

However, because of the initial execution of writing her as a scorned wife due to her remorseless, repeatedly cheating husband for a whole season, she has forever poisoned the well for Stolas and she has no one to blame for that but herself.

She is the one who wrote one of her supposedly sympathetic main characters doing Sexual Extortion(Blitz), Adultery(Stella), Mental Break/Child Neglect(Octavia), but then seems to have an issue when a nice chunk of the fandom still thinks only his victims deserve sympathy.

Nevertheless, since the Circus is in the canon now does Stolas owe Stella loyalty and remorse? No. 

However, Stolas is not just a husband. Octavia exists.

Therefore Octavia will always be the reason why his (continuous) infidelity was a selfish and vile act. 

That's also why what's going to happen to him in the leaks is on him.

His karma warranty is up.

The problem is that the karma Viv gives is an illusion because she still wants you to feel sorry for Stolas. That's why there's always a sturdy flavor of demonization in the narrative toward anyone he's harmed to facilitate that.

However, considering the nature of his crimes his comeuppance is deserved, but she still writes like it's not and expects the audience to fall in line.

She also did the same thing with Blitz's issues with him.

So it's a pattern, and it exists because a fujoshi is writing this story. 

It's a failure in the execution when the author's intent and the audience's takeaway is this broken.

[literaryvein-reblogs]

How do you write a positive character slowly being more and more pessimistic? Example: Character is a sunshine at the beginning of the series but after something happened, they became less and less positive. How does the process look like?

Writing Notes: Negative Character Arc

Character Arc - the path a character takes over the course of a story.

A character’s arc involves adversity and challenges, as well as some changes to the character, and ultimately leads to resolution.

Character arcs generally progress in tandem with traditional three-act story structure.

Most protagonist character arcs start with the inciting incident that sets up the stakes and central conflict facing this character.

The way the arc progresses from there depends on what sort of story you are telling and how the character functions.

Negative Change Arc: As the name implies, a negative change arc involves a character starting out as good or benevolent and descending into evil or ill fortune over the course of a story.

Some Related Tropes

Face–Heel Turn: A good guy turns bad.

Fallen Hero: Not all villains are born. Some are made, and none are more tragic than this trope. As the name implies, the Fallen Hero used to be a hero before turning bad. They may even have been an Ideal Hero or another equally optimistic archetype, up until the moment when they suffered something bad enough for them to lose all faith in good and idealism, be it the loss of a loved one, too many good deeds coming back to bite them hard, betrayal by someone they trusted the most, too much distrust from those who should have been allies, or some other faith-shattering event. It might even be a drawn out process of seduction to The Dark Side or fall from grace. What they choose to do about it determines what they become:

If they retreat into themselves and fight evil mercilessly to dull the pain, they become an Anti-Hero, though if this fight is motivated by vengeance, they may run the risk of becoming like the very monsters they have sworn to destroy.

If the loss of faith with humanity and/or society and government makes them decide to do something drastic to "fix" it, they become an Anti-Villain, most commonly a Knight Templar or Dark Messiah.

Alternately, if they just jump off the slippery slope and embrace chaos and the destruction of humanity as the only solution to their pain, they'll become a straight up cackling Card-Carrying Villain. Especially those who only became a hero for fame and glory, rather than for any good cause.

Or they'll be a fusion of the second and third examples and decide that killing/destroying everything is the ONLY way to save EVERYONE from the pain/pointlessness of existence, often becoming a Straw Nihilist and an Omnicidal Maniac.

They might withdraw from society, become a hermit or drunkard, and ignore the ongoing state of the world. If the current generation of heroes meets them, the fallen hero will mock how their deeds are useless. Most likely, however, they will help the new heroes in the hopes that they won't suffer the same fate.

Or they can ditch all of their once good qualities and become a Complete Monster.

The Tragic Hero: A longstanding literary concept, a character with a Fatal Flaw (like Pride, for example) who is doomed to fail in search of a Tragic Dream despite their best efforts and good intentions. This trope can work as a protagonist or an antagonist. As an antagonist, their goals are opposed to the protagonist's, but the audience still feels sympathetic towards them.

The Protagonist's Journey to Villain: A plot in which the protagonist, who starts out well-intentioned, turns into a monster.

Used to Be a Sweet Kid: This applies when a villain or other dark and troubled/troubling character was not so as a child.

Examples

The Shining. It starts off with Jack being a happy family man, albeit with a dark past, until the influence of the hotel drives him to madness and monstrosity.

The Lorax (2012): A good portion of the movie sees the Once-ler telling Ted his backstory, how he went from a kind-hearted, free-spirited inventor to a Corrupt Corporate Executive character trope who causes the extinction of trees due to his greed. However, the Once-ler in the present day really regrets his actions and sincerly helps Ted to restore the trees.

The title character in Carrie (1974, and its film adaptations) is a kind-hearted, but socially outcast teenage girl who spends the first half of the book getting slowly beaten down and pushed to her Rage Breaking Point by her classmates, the school faculty, and even her own mother. The second half is about the massacre she commits as a result when what happens at the Senior Prom makes her snap.

Alexandre Cabanel's The Fallen Angel: Lucifer, once God's brightest angel, lies defeated and resentful after his jealousy toward human beings and power-hungry tendencies drove him to fight (and lose) a war against Heaven.

Arguably the central plot of Breaking Bad, which follows the journey of Walter White across five seasons from sympathetic, kindhearted chemistry teacher and family man suffering from cancer to a fairly loathsome Villain Protagonist. Gets briefly paused halfway through the fifth season when Walt, having reached the top of his empire, having taken his operation global realizes that he has made more money than he could ever hope to spend and far more than he even set out for initially. This leads him to decide he is out of the game, make amends with his former business partner by giving him the money he's owed and try to start over fresh with his family. Then his DEA agent brother-in-law finally figures out he's a drug dealer, causing him to slip back into his criminal ways and his moral degradation resumes. Even if he won't physically harm them, he's perfectly willing to throw his family under the bus to save his own skin like making a false confession tape implicating Hank or in Jesse's case, teaming up with skinheads to have him killed when he becomes too much of a hassle.

The Favourite (2018): Arguably the case for Abigail. She starts out a kind-natured Fallen Princess after her father gambled away both the entire family fortune and herself, so she sets out to join her cousin Sarah at Queen Anne's court in hopes of getting it back. However, as she is sucked into the world of politics and abused consistently by everyone around her, Abigail adapts to their cruel, underhanded ways alarmingly quickly, playing nice around Queen Anne as an antidote to Sarah's personality, faking tears when people push her too far, drugging Sarah's tea, seducing a Lord, marrying him and then all but dumping him once she gets her title back. Her cruelty finally culminates in getting Sarah officially banished from Court and intercepting her letters to the Queen, leaving Anne heartbroken, blatantly cheating on her husband in front of him, and finally stomping on one of Queen Anne's beloved pet bunnies (whom she views as surrogate children) until she nearly kills it. Queen Anne is not amused.

Les Misérables: Inspector Javert is on the side of good and law, but he is so inflated with extreme self-righteousness that, when confronted with Valjean's nobility, he has no choice but to kill himself.

In The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Archdeacon Claude Frollo is a compassionate man in the beginning, but after seeing Esmerelda, he goes mad with lust and slowly becomes evil, desiring to either have her for his own or kill her if she won't become his.

The Percy Jackson and the Olympians short story "The Diary of Luke Castellan" shows this off with the titular Luke, a villain-turned-hero who used to be a very sweet kid. Or, as in this chapter of history, a sweet teenager. He's brave, protective, and caring towards his little adopted family, to the point that he closely resembles the later hero of the series, Percy.

In The Witcher as seen by the flashbacks to his childhood with his "Ma" Visenna in the finale episode of Season 1, Geralt was once an adorable little Momma's Boy full of optimism. Completely unlike The Stoic Deadpan Snarker Knight in Sour Armor character trope he is in the present.

Sources: 1 2 3 4 5 ⚜ More: References ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

There are so many possible causes as well as directions you can take your story in with this idea. Choose which of these tropes you would like to incorporate into your writing, and also found some examples for inspiration. More information and examples in the links above, hope this helps!

[maxwell-grant]

The Penguin: Episode 1 Breakdown

(Episode 2) (Episode 3) (Episode 4) (Episode 5) (Episode 6) (Episode 7) (Episode 8)

Thank you Lauren LeFranc, Mike Marino, Colin Farrell and Matt Reeves, we owe you the world for this, good God. It's finally here everyone and I've decided I'm gonna give each episode it's own post/breakdown of thoughts, because hahaha holy shit you guys this is beyond what I even dreamed of, and we're gonna be covering this for a while I think. I've worked out enough madness about this out of my system by talking with friends and I can't seem to be able to work on anything else till I get this done, so let's do it.

Bottom line: This isn't even just a must-watch if you like the Penguin or if you like The Batman, this is something I'd recommend to just about anyone in a heartbeat, something I can point to when people ask "why do you like The Penguin so much" and, instead of the elaborate nerd ramble that usually turns them off, I can just tell them to watch this. A friend of mine (who already loves Batman and digs the Penguin quite a bit) even told me as much, that he's starting to get why I love the character so much, and truly, is there a better feeling than this? Well, there is, and it's watching the show. Let's dig into this first episode:

Right upfront I'm gonna say that this doesn't really seem to be the Sopranos rip-off that people have been calling it before release, although there are definitely Sopranos comparisons to make here. I've spent the past months finally watching The Sopranos in order to get the comparison and definitely want to talk about those comparisons after I finish it (and this show ends). This thing aims to stand on it's own legs as a crime show and it's smashing out of the gate with an extremely promising first episode.

So this just casually opens with the reveal that all along, there was a second rich Gotham the whole time that was completely unaffected by everything we saw in the movie, already throwing a great twist on the events of that movie, and further reinforcing how fucking full of shit The Riddler was. All we saw Batman and the others deal with in the movie was just affecting the poorer parts of the city. All Eddie did was drown rats, and make life worse for the people already in the bottom, while never even getting close to targeting the systemic rot that ruined his life. He retains ideological worshippers in subways obsessed with the corruption of the city without doing anything to actually improve it, and because of him, the streets of Gotham are waterlogged shitholes while the rich Falcone suburbs are doing just fine, peachy even.

I said a while back that, in spite of having about 6 scenes/10 minutes of Penguin runtime, The Batman managed to squeeze impeccably controlled Penguin Trademark Scenes, and this show opens with the last one they didn't get to then: Penguin killing someone for making fun of him. In the movie, he tries doing that with Falcone and is beaten to the punch, so here he gets to actually do it to disastrous consequences.

Fucking adore that the inciting incident of the show is based on the fallout of Oswald killing someone for making fun of him. He pours his heart about the dream he lives his life for, his new boss makes fun of him for being an embarassment to their profession and then he does the most typical Penguin thing by killing him for it and laughing afterwards. And then he realizes how badly he fucked up, and then we get a fucking perfect titledrop with his musical theme, the exact moment we finish The Batman and enter The Penguin.

God it is so fucking cool how the make-up/lighting, the scar across his face, makes it look like he's got a genuine beak from certain angles, how they're able to achieve that effect without giving him a more literal beak for a nose. Everytime they talk about the character, Reeves and Farrell always emphasize how integral the make-up was to them figuring out what to do with Oz, how little they knew what to make of his six scenes until Marino created their monster and suddenly everything fell into place. Mike Marino fully deserves co-credit for the creation of Oz.

Pretty amusing that Victor, as designed to be Penguin's Robin, has exactly the same origin as Jason Todd, a poor street kid trying to steal the hubcaps off the Penguinmobile (I'm sure this bodes very well for his odds at survival), as is the way in which Oz goes on about his recruitment. He press-gangs this kid at gunpoint to help him bury a body arguing with himself and eventually the kid why shouldn't he just kill him to be safe, while trying to impress the kid with his car and air freshener and later that bullshit about "What, you think I hire any schmuck off the street?". From the tile drop onwards, he's doing everything on the fly while also spinning long-term plans set in motion as soon as he's on screen, he's taking this kid in out of sympathy and because he enjoys a power dynamic over someone weaker than him and because he very much needs someone to help him get stuff done. I'm extremely interested in exploring Penguin having a mentorship dynamic and I'm beyond curious as to what happens with Victor from this point onwards, but that poor kid is in for a terrible fucking time.

Found it very funny how much he half-asses the murder threat to Victor. Like it's his first time actually doing it and he's trying to be serious, but not too scary because he's already seeing himself in the poor kid with a stutter and wants the kid to think he's also a cool guy like he wants everyone to think he's a cool guy. I also think having Victor as the POV helps to sell moments like these, because it's still terrifying to him. Even as we follow their stories, these power players of Gotham are still big scary monsters to people caught in the dregs and Victor helps to reinforce that.

I enjoy Oz being friends with sex workers and drag queens off the street as much as I enjoy Oz being depicted as the kind of guy who deludes himself into thinking the prostitute he's with actually likes him, Lauren and Farrell launched into a bit about in on the podcast and I'm curious to see what's going on with him and Eve here.

Lots of perfect funny little character moments across the whole thing. Oz insulted by the idea of taking extra pickles off a poor kid's dirty mouth, but with zero hesitation whatsoever for picking jewelry off his boss' corpse. Dude is governed by principles even as he actively has to break them to survive.

"Technically it's plum." "He is the - or was the - new kingpin", "He's got nurse-like qualities." The show is not overtly trying to get you to find Penguin likeable as much as it wants you to find him engaging - making you think he's likeable is Colin Farrell's job and he's masterful at it, definitely a lot more matured within the character compared to the movie.

If there's anything in particular I'm thankful for regarding Gotham (well okay Gotham led directly to Telltale Penguin which was the basis for this one, so really I do have a lot more to be thankful with Gotham), it's the decision to give him a legit waddle via the broken foot, but the way they incorporate it here with the club foot does so much for him, so much as a modern day reinvention of The Penguin. Adds so much to why he's never been a serious candidate for mob leadership, why he kinda had to spend all his time in the Lounge, why he actually needs someone to help him run affairs, why he has such a gaping ego wound and is so murderously angry at people making fun of him / calling him a goddamn penguin, adds so much validation and so much darkness and nuance to Oswald's overwhelming anger and bitterness over how the world treats him (and so much power should he opt to reclaim it, in turn). It's the kind of thing that frankly feels like it should have always been part of the character, like what all the previous versions were itching closer to or trying to get at. Of course this is a guy gets called a penguin and he hates it badly enough to murder people over it, of course.

This gets to really highlight how differently Oz acts depending on who he's with. Traditionally, one of my favorite things about The Penguin, and one of the things that puts him above the other villains, is that, due to his position, he has to interact with a lot more people than the other Bat-villains. He has to manage a lot more relationships and dynamics, he has to play peacekeeper and puppetmaster. he's the only one in the United Underworld who's regularly interacting with and recruiting other villains to do business with. He's the guy who you pin stuff on like the Gangland Guardians, Team Penguin, doing betting pools with the Rogues taking cover in his Lounge while Joker War is happening, having to rig games to keep good standing with Maxie Zeus and Frenchy Blake in Batman Audio Adventures, and so on. So I greatly enjoy this beat here of him talking about how makes himself smaller before the Falcones, and that moment of him adjusting his outfit and practicing expressions in the mirror before meeting with them. How he contorts himself is present in all of his relationships, and retroactively adds to the way he carries himself in The Batman.

It seems that Oz is functionally regarded as the Paulie Walnuts of the Falcones: useful muscle, loyal for the most part and amusing to keep around, but largely an unstable self-serving dumb asskisser kept where he belongs, a liability if not kept on a short leash. I think the show does a good job of highlighting all the reasons why Oz has never been seriously regarded as a viable option for a boss, even putting aside his disability. He is a fundamentally embarassing person for these serious respectable criminals to be around and of course, the joke is ultimately on them..

Of course, there is only two people in the show who actually know what he's capable of, Francis Cobb and Sofia Falcone, said to be the central relationships defining the show moving forward. Both of them also a defining commonality with Oswald, being people who are looked down on and dehumanized, and characters who are underestimated until it's time to bear their fangs.

Extremely invested in where they're going with Sofia Falcone, Cristine Milioti's been killing it, and will in fact not stop killing it. What a perfect villain for Penguin they've set up with her, someone who has his Kryptonite: she does not underestimate him. Although we know in advance that Oz is going to live and be in the next movie, the question here isn't even so much who's going to win the gang war, and rather how much damage these two freaks will do to the city until Batman gets back. In many ways, Sofia represents the shape of things to come just as much as he does.

She is this embodiment of both the pristine unfathomable wealth and privilege and power that he both detests and strives for, as well as this brutal new breed of madness and violence attacking the streets that he has to survive against and make deals with (and is himself very much a part of, however he denies it). She is Falcone's legacy in every way that matters, both a Kingpin of Gotham whose existence creates the oppressive conditions under which a Batman or a Riddler are created, as well as the Arkham Rogue, the larger-than-life sadist with a tragic origin and a signature torture-murder method and an embarassing name for the papers.

Even the fact that she is The Hangman, and Carmine was defined around his penchant for brutally strangling women - regardless of whether or not she did the crimes that got her in Arkham, she's become this larger-than-life themed expression of a violent obsession in a way that sets her up as every bit the Batman villain that The Penguin is. The two champions of the two Gothams, duking it out in this new world The Batman and The Riddler made, The Penguin vs The Hangman.

I am so glad Lauren LeFranc made the call for binning Alberto in the first five minutes so the rest of the show can focus on Sofia and make a real character out of her in a way nobody's ever really done before, every step of the way so far LeFranc has been perfectly on the ball about where to take these characters and their conflict. And speaking of those,

I feel very confident in saying that this is the first time anyone's ever really had something worth doing with Oswald's mother as a character in her own right and not just a source of anguish for Penguin (Gotham was almost onto something with Gertrude, but not nearly enough). When it comes to Penguin origin stories, my favorite's always been the Pre-Crisis one, where he's poor and bullied but happy with his mom and birds until she dies and the government seizes everything he has, which doesn't necessarily involve her much. But here? Francine Cobb is a real character in what little time we get to know her, and what a character she is. We quickly understand the role she's playing in Oz's life, not just as his mom and person he loves and strives to protect, but the person who's sculpting him into the man he's going to become.

She is vulnerable and she does need meds and she's not quite all there, and Penguin's need to care for her is visible in other actions of his. But then they turn it around by showing how strong and demanding she is, how she is fiercely ambitious and pushing him to be something he would otherwise not be, how much she loves him and sees greatness in him. She knows he's a people pleaser, she knows how to push his buttons, and she wants him to be more, so of course he's going to be more, because he lives to please his mom.

Related to this is this absolute bullseye of a summation of The Penguin, that Lauren LeFranc delivered in the podcast: "Perhaps his greatest fear is that love is transactional. And that yet, everything he does, every decision he makes, is as if that's true. As if "love is transactional" is a truth he abides by". Oswald's conception of power is being loved and revered like Rex Calabrese, and the love he wants most in all the world is the one from his mother. So in turn this, and all extensions of it, drive him to greater and darker lengths.

He doesn't have that ambition quite down yet, it's his mom that does. She who's pushing him to take over the city and not just be a guy scraping by for survival. He's smart and ambitious and extremely good at slipping out of trouble, but she's pushing him to be the guy who will be taking the city by the horns because that's what he has to be for their sake. Her legacy to her son is nurturing him having that dog in him that will make him the supervillain who picks fights with Vengeance. She is the force that's turning Oswald into The Goddamn Penguin and I can't wait to see how she's developed.

Of course he reprimands Victor in that scene for lacking ambition, who do you think he gets it from?

Really love what they've done with Sal Maroni in here so far. I like adaptations that take these throwaway Batman backstory gangsters and make something out of them, in this case, with Clancy Brown lending his power and voice and reputation as The Grand Boss of Villainy to play the last Respectable Gangster of Gotham, this intimidating principled old tiger who's inversely proportional to how much of a petty and scummy piece of shit Carmine Falcone was. Extremely a guy I'd want to see playing a hand in the creation of Two-Face. Just as crucial is the fact that he is the one who gets the most effortlessly outplayed by Oz here, because this is The Penguin Show: no room for traditional or respectable gangsters anymore, their purpose is to be crapped all over by our wacko birdman.

There's a lot about this that re-contextualizes his behavior in The Batman and the one I'm gonna point out is: even though he can't be sure his plan didn't completely go to shit, he is still keeping his wits and not being terribly scared about being beaten up and tortured and staring down the scariest Falcone with a gun shoved in his throat. But he craps his pants at the sight of the Batmobile. He gets pain, he gets indignity, but he doesn't get Vengeance, what kind of sick freak would come up with the stuff that guy does. A gun in his mouth and Falcone torture is just Tuesday, but a car that wants to eat his soul is some psycho shit he's just not ready to deal with.

It is the delicious tasty fucking irony that Oswald thinks Vengeance is this weird freak who doesn't play or bend to any rules and is here to fuck up everything, just like the madman who flooded the city, and thinks of himself in turn as a justifiable guy standing for the respectable old-fashioned empathetic way of doing things, instead of the exact same thing that Riddler and Batman are. Only Sofia gets what he really is, the same thing as her, and that's why she is the arch-enemy / the biggest thing he's gotta defeat in life for now.

God, how fucking PERFECT it is that he gets caught and tortured because he, after stabbing out a man's eye and causing him to get run over by a schoolbus, stops to wave at the kids in that schoolbus while covered in blood. Just the Rex Calabrese of it all, the self-image, this guy who's both a mean nasty son of a bitch and also a real bleeding heart softie and in ways that ruin his life and allow him to slip and wriggle his way out of shit he has no right to, as demonstrated by the finale.

Thinking about Sofia chastizing Oz saying he thinks she is a toy to play with, while rattling off the ways in which she owns him and everything he has, all the ridiculous little accessories her daddy let him play him, and he in turn is a ridiculous little accessory for the family she is twisting until it breaks. Perfect fucking villain for him. Can't wait to see how badly these two are gonna burn Gotham.

I knew deep in my heart that all I wanted out of a Penguin show, the thing that I simply needed to have in it, was Penguin pulling a heist set-up in advance, and it fucking delivered. He doesn't even complain at Victor for being late, because if anything, getting captured and tortured while the car crashed was even better for him. No, he complains at Victor for not being sufficiently gruesome with the body. See, unlike other cowardly anti-hero reinventions of Bat-villains, the show never wants you to forget that Oz is a weird freak and a disgusting piece of shit, even if he is a very likeable and even aspirational one. Only by the most random stroke of fate it wasn't Victor that he fed to the wolves at that moment, that he sees himself in the kid isn't exactly ensuring that he's gonna make out of this in one piece.

Mr. Vengeance gets Nirvana, and Mr. Boniface gets Dolly Parton, perfect credits.

In conclusion: Out of everything they could have done following the thunderous success of The Batman and it's ensuing influence over the DCU, out of all the offers Reeves must have gotten to helm their new universe after delivering a megahit reinvention of their breadwinner blockbuster character, Matt Reeves went "Nah, I listened to my crew, and what we really want to do is 8 hours of television about the waddling freak who's in my movie for 10 minutes", and he and his crew deserve the world for that. I dreamed as a kid of getting to make a big Penguin story or show, a wild impossible idea that would never actually happen, and now it's here and it's better than anything I'd ever imagined.

I'm fit to burst with joy and riding a high of no longer having to hunt for scraps and washing away decades of put-downs for the character and enjoying a Penguin renaissance like one I never imagined happening. I am extremely not an unbiased reviewer here, this show rules and I've waited for it since I was a kid and it's here, drink it the fuck in cause it's only the beginning.

[ectoimp]

Ya know what I find interesting. There are almost no "Lewis lives/is resurrected" fics. Fics where he doesnt die, just swap him dying for someone else dying.

If you go to the "lewis lives" tag on ao3 there are 11 works. All except 2 are actually precave, lewis hasnt died yet or the kind where someone else died instead.

and there are 2 resurrection fics and of those one still involves someone else dying (arthur killing himself specifically)

And yeah, Lewis' death is the inciting incident to the series, but I certainly dont think there are no stories to tell there. I think there could be very interesting character drama there. Especially when you dont have the amnesia thing to make it so no one has to deal with the aftermath

With no ghost induced amnesia, Vivi has to deal with the fact that being the leader, Arthur getting hurt was on her. Lewis getting hurt/almost getting hurt is on her. They went cave exploring with no safety gear. In street clothes (chucks for hiking in a wet cave??). They didnt even have a flashlight. And its seems that no one knew they were going into this cave (since it seems like Lewis' corpse is still there) So they broke every basic rule of caving safety https://www.fs.usda.gov/visit/know-before-you-go/cave-safety

Like even if you dont blame her, I think she would blame herself. And its another thing I dont think I saw explored much. I'd see it get mentioned but usually it would immediately get brushed aside, usually by one of the boys.

But with how unsafe there were being....Lewis could have just died from slipping. No possession required. (obviously the doylist reason is because it would be a pain to design whole new outfits for one scene that was added last minute. They would look super cute in little themed caving outfits tho.)

This started out with just me thinking about "Lewis lives" But now its more about how I kinda want more Vivi angst......

Imagine if Lewis knew Arthur was possessed. If Arthur hadnt been clear he didnt want to go in the cave. Imagine if Lewis blamed Vivi.

[1moreff-creator]

You've done this before so this is exclusively self indulgent but can you give your thoughts on DRDT foil theory again haha... I'm enamored by it and think about it daily.

I'll point out as well that there's been a trend regarding which characters are relevant to the chapter's case based on the order of the foils so far.

In chapter 1 it was [Xander, Min, Teruo & Charles] while in chapter 2 it was [Eden, Arei, Nico, Ace] - following this train of logic next chapter's main players would be [Hu, Veronika, Rose, J].

Hu's arc has just started (her beliefs are being challenged), Veronika became worst + Arturo is going to be centered at the start of chapter 3, Rose's arc just started + a money motive would be relevant to her & J's conflict with Arturo is going to be centered at the start of chapter 3.

Feel free to ignore this if you feel it's too repetitive, I just like it when I see people talking about my theory lol.

Well, if the creator of the recap foil theory asks me to talk about it, who am I to deny? It's probably, like, in my top three theories about DRDT, so I'm gonna enjoy talking about it! :D

(Btw I totally get you about enjoying when people talk about your theory. Whenever I see someone mention one of my posts I always go ":O that's me :D" it's great lol)

CW: Murder, electrocution, execution, suicide, self-harm, eating disorders, discrimination against a non-binary person, manipulation, poverty, harmful environments during childhood.

As a quick recap (heh): at the end of the CH1 recap video, the characters are paired up in a certain way. The theory states that they're paired up in a way that represents some of the most important foils in the cast. And... well, it seems to hold up quite well! I'll talk about them here in the order they show up in the recap video.

1) Xander & Min

And what a start! These two are basically eternal foils, with everything about their characters being contrasted with each other in some way or another. From the very first moment they're seen together, in Min's introduction, they immediately start beefing simply due to their respective talents.

The biggest point of contrast comes from their past with education. From Visiting Graves, we know Xander used to be a diligent student like Min, but he stopped when his family died while he was away studying. He's come to the conclusion that the things taught in school are oftentimes kind of useless for most people's lives, and his rejection of the education system kickstarted his rebellion against systemic issues in general.

Min, for her part, actually has a lot of the same views. Her Bonus Episode makes that pretty clear; she doesn't think things like Hope's Peak's history are really all that useful, and feels insecure because she doesn't see the same value in her talent as she does in others. However, Min still wants to maintain her talent, at least in title, seen as her first instinct when the killing game started was to grab an anatomy textbook and start studying it. Meanwhile, Xander dislikes his talent title greatly, as he believes calling him a "Rebel" undermines the stuff he does.

All of this is literally baked into their first interaction, as mentioned before. Xander seems to project heavily on Min upon first meeting her, assuming that she probably has no hobbies or friends if she's the Ultimate Student and judging her for it quickly. Min isn't particularly thrilled over that, given he knows nothing about her life.

Speaking of backstories, there's other points in those where they contrast. Particularly, the involvement of large companies and rich people in said backstories. Duke Spurling did a thing that killed Xander's entire family, which was the inciting incident for Xander officially leaving behind his studious nature. Meanwhile, XF-Ture Tech helped Min's family out of property, but pushed Min into studiousness for the Ultimate Student title; more or less the opposite of what Spurling did for Xander.

The same can be said of their relationship with Hope's Peak, which is elaborated on in the Bonus Episodes. Xander went to Hope's Peak for some kind of ulterior motive-

Unnamed Classmate [BE2]: I think your ability to get back from adversity is really admirable. That determination of yours is admirable. If you set out to do something, then never give up on that, no matter what obstacles may stand in your way. Even if it's risky or against the rules, as long as it's for a good cause... I'll trust that you know to do the right thing. Xander: Yeah, of course. That's why I've come to Hope's Peak, isn't it?

-which we can somewhat confidently assume to be bad for the school given Xander's... Everything. For Min's side, just getting to Hope's Peak was Min's entire goal for the entirety of her childhood, playing right into the hands of the Ultimate Contest for Eminent Students, and thus into the school's hands.

By the way, if you go back and look at what Absolutely-Not-Mai says to Xander, the idea of "bouncing back from adversity" could be connected to Min's whole "mistakes are to be corrected" thing. This one's an insane stretch, though.

For another point, though I don't know much about this particular topic, I find even their designs are opposites in some ways. Although arguably that's more a result of them being foils in general and DRDT having good character design but y'know.

Both of them seem to wear some kind of school uniform, but in totally different ways. Xander does everything he can to stylize his, be it wearing his coat as a cape, or getting a tongue piercing specifically because they weren't allowed and he could hide it, as stated in a Q&A, doing everything he can to fight against this institution. On the other hand, Min wears hers normally, and several Q&A answers clarify that she finds comfort in the colors and style of her uniform. One fights against institutions, the other works withing their systems (Min even wants to be a teacher which is an extension of that idea), you get the point.

Also this plays into the theme of fate because of course it does. Just replace "institutions" with "fate" and you kinda get the point. Xander fights against it, Min accepts it. Or, she accepts the fate of being the Ultimate Student, at least.

Their relationships with other characters, Teruko and David in particular, is another point of foiling. I've brought this up before, but as a recap: Xander betrayed Teruko so she openly hates him even though her real feelings are much more complicated than that, while Min tried to save her only to then panic and try to win the class trial, which causes Teruko to openly hate her even though her real feelings are much more complicated than that. But Teruko takes on Min's philosophy of fixing mistakes in the second trial, which is notable because in the same trial, David calls Min pathetic before his magical girl transformation, only to reveal that he's following Xander's ideals a while later. And while Teruko and David may not be recap foils, they sure are foils in general, so the foiling Xanvid and Terumin duos are formed. Cool!

As a minor point also connected to relationships, I could see the angle that Xander's friendship with David might parallel Min's thoughts on Mai. This one's iffier because anything about Mai is iffy, but I think it's worth mentioning.

The starting point of the Xanvid thing is the fact that they both used to idolize each other, but eventually decide that they should just be friends like any other friends. Cue the whole "foxes and children" quote from The Little Prince that shows up in LGI in the "I hate the things I love..." scene- I don't know how many people can follow what I just said, but I hope the main idea got across, at least.

Xander [1-5]: Enough with these idols or role models, okay? Let's just be friends.

In the same way, everyone loves Mai, but Min's Mai quote is:

Min: An average girl with nothing special at all about her.

Which can kinda be said about Min too, but the whole point of the end of the Bonus Episode is how Min is special to Mai.

Think of David as Mai and Xander as Min. David and Mai are idolized by everyone who knows them (pre 2-11 anyways), but Xander and Min see them as regular people (post 1-5 for Xander), while Xander and Min aren't idolized (by most of the cast at least) but are special to David and Mai respectively. I don't really know if it works perfectly, but it's close enough for me to mention.

You can even try to fit in some kind of point about the theme of cooperation vs competition, though I'll admit it's a bit of a stretch.

Competition is greatly important for Min's character, but she doesn't often go out of her way to help others. She helps when asked, sure, as she does when Surely-Not-Mai asks her to help her study in BE1, or when Eden asks for help baking and the subsequent clean-up. However, there's several scenes where she avoids conflict by reading that anatomy textbook of hers, such as in her introduction and when Arei's yelling at the Baking Squad.

Meanwhile, Xander doesn't really compete on anything with anyone aside the arm wrestling contest (which isn't much of a competition anyways), but he constantly tries to butt into other people's issues. It happens in Min's introduction, in his chat with Nico in 1-5, right before stabbing Teruko, you get the idea. So, he constantly tries to cooperate even without the consent of the person they're trying to cooperate with. Again, a stretch, but kinda works.

All of these foils culminate in Xander's death and Min's murder. Xander, like always, is proactive and acts even with incomplete information:

Xander [1-5]: Then, why did I do this? I don't even know... Why? Just why did you ask me to kill Teruko?

Trying his best to cooperate with an unknown ally to, presumably, hinder the mastermind's plans; fighting against the killing game like he fights against any other system.

But then Min barges in. She was just trying to fix the mistakes of the past, aka cleaning up the remnants of the baking thing. But just like her being randomly sponsored by XF-Ture Tech was in some ways both a blessing and a curse, she once again finds herself in a situation where, depending on how you look at it, she's either in the right place at the right time (to save Teruko) or at the wrong place at the wrong time (because she'll end up dying from this).

Xander attacks, and there's a bit of brain vs brawn thing that happens. I hadn't mentioned that theme before because Xander is intelligent and Min is arguably not the smartest in the cast, but it's true that Xander's physical prowess and Min's intelligence are some of their most notable strengths. This is brought to the forefront when Xander tries to kill Min by overpowering her only for her to outsmart him with the light switch trick.

However, again similarly to how she was pushed into a corner by the XF-Ture Tech contract, Min now finds herself in a position where she must compete with others for her own survival. And not just any form of competition, but a class trial. Once again, Min has to compete under the rules established by an institution, as she did in the UCES. She ultimately gets executed, but kept trying to survive until the very end, fighting for her life the same way she'd been fighting for her future her entire childhood; by trying to give the right answers in a test.

Look, there's probably more foils (because each time I look at these two I find more of them), but I need to stop at some point. These are characters who foil even in their fucking custom weapons for God's sake. Xander's "gun" looks extremely dangerous, when in reality it's nothing but a piece of plastic; and Min's pen looks totally safe, while actually hiding a knife. If I keep looking, I'll keep finding, and I have to talk about 7 other foiling pairs, so I'll keep it at that for this post :v

2) Teruko & Charles

There's plenty to talk about with these two as well! The main point of foiling is their respective character arcs so far.

Charles started out as a prickly and judgemental guy, pushing the others away as he felt superior due to his talent. However, after the events of the first trial, he started opening up a bit more, and hanging out with the others, mainly Whit.

Teruko, for her part, started out friendlier. She made a quick connection with Xander, and we saw her socializing with the elevator scene with Ace and Levi, and the baking squad scene. However, she went the other way after the first trial, pushing the others away to avoid getting attached and trusting no one. She's swinging back to trusting now, but the point stands.

Basically, Teruko and Charles went in opposite character arcs in the first two chapters. In that sense, Charles exists as an early warning to Teruko about the dangers of pushing others away, as the only reason Charles managed to get through the first trial is because Whit trusted him and his hemophobia. So, trust, relying on others, important themes their stories share.

And it's not just the in-killing game arcs, as their backstories also vaguely foil. Charles had a pretty privileged upbringing, while Teruko obviously had a lot more issues with her luck and all. Funnily enough, this includes them having scars they don't properly remember getting. Charles believes the dog bite wound on his arm is a birthmark, while Teruko doesn't know where the scar on her back came from.

Which is what gets us to the theme of memory we got going on. Both of them have memory issues, albeit different ones: Charles has childhood amnesia, Teruko has prosopagnosia. They even both have a brother of indeterminate fate, what with us not really knowing what happened to either "Kyo" or Elliot. Well we know Elliot's dead at least but you get the idea.

Speaking of the Elliot situation, one can tie this pair to a theme I can best define as "challenged preconceptions." Basically the idea that there's preconceptions these two carried into the killing game which are challenged by the events within it. That can technically be said about a lot of characters, sure, but Charles and Teruko have a fair amount of very specific notions which are only begin doubting in the killing game.

For Charles, this would be the existence of Elliot; that's the point I was trying to make with that segue back there. Charles thought he was an only child, but turns out he had a brother at some point.

Charles [2-7]: From birth all the way to the present, there are probably many things that you had taken for granted to be true. Things you never thought to question before, like those frivolous lies about "Santa Claus" or the "Tooth Fairy." Or perhaps less frivolous lies, like the idea that your parents know what's best for you. Once you're given some hitherto unknown information, you may begin piecing together a bigger picture of your past. Things you had accepted as truth your whole life begin to reveal themselves as lies. And once all the pieces are in place, you realize you were blind for never seeing the whole story before.

It's what Charles' numeral in LGI references: "if you doubt, brittle things are broken."

For Teruko, there's a few preconceptions that get challenged over the course of the killing game, but probably the most notable one is the idea that she's doomed to live a horrible life due to her luck.

Teruko [2-16]: I have always said that my misfortune, my personality, the choices I make, everything was all a product of a bad luck that I can't control. That I grew up in such horrible circumstances, so I was destined to grow up to be a terrible person. That everyone else abandoned me, so it's not my fault that I'm alone. I want to say that it's fate's fault, and that I had no choice in the matter. But, even so... Even so... Everyone. Xander, Min, Arei, Ace. Maybe even Levi. Is it my fault that they died? [...] Whether it was the fault of fate, or my fault... I already knew the answer. I had known what the answer was since a long, long time ago.

I think you can kinda see the point.

Their aptitude in class trials can also be mentioned. Although Charles was sorta out of it during the first one, he was definitely pretty good in the second one. And Teruko is far and away the most influential character in trial discussion overall. The fact they're equally matched intellectually speaking helps them play off each other pretty nicely.

Like with Xander and Min, there's probably more to talk about, but that's enough for me in this case.

3) Eden & Arei

The girlies! Arei's playground breakdown very neatly captures a lot of the themes these two foil on. Mainly, the theme of kindness and being a "good person." Arei used to try and be kind, but she was hurt because of it and thus decided to fight back against her sisters through becoming mean. Eden, meanwhile, remains kind and compassionate even through the despair of the killing game. This also plays into the idea of strength; while Arei is physically stronger and more forceful when it comes to getting what she wants, Eden is stronger in her resilience, her ability to remain Silly despite the horrors. Both have their merits, as we see for example when Arei defends Eden from Arturo and when Eden manages to move Teruko in the 2-3 kitchen scene, respectively.

Meanwhile, when we speak of being a "good person", Arei's breakdown of what that means in 2-13 is really all we need to talk about. Eden's seemingly unending patience and kindness is not what's truly needed to be a "good person", as even she must have made mistakes and hurt people in the past (cue fork CG). Rather, being a "good person" just means trying to change for the better whenever you mess up, represented by Arei. Not to say Eden's not a good person; she is, but you don't need to be like her to be "good"- you get the point.

In the same ballpark, we have the theme of friendship, what it means to be friends. In fact, Arei's little 2-10 reconciliation speech connects both this theme and the last.

Arei [2-10]: Being a good person means doing nice things. So if there's anything you need from me... Whether it's defending you from scary jerks like Arturo or baking some stupid fucking cake... I'll do it. I promise. I'll do anything for you. Okay? Eden: I... Arei: Because... because... Because that's what friends do.

Arei believes friendship to be all about doing things for the other person, protecting each other. This is pretty central to her character, seeing as "Because that's what friends do" is her secret quote. Eden brings up the same thing when acused of murder.

Eden [2-14]: I just wanted to help Arei.... I didn't kill her... Teruko: You know I can't just take your words at face value, Eden. Eden: Please, Teruko... You're my friend, aren't you? Friends help each other.... So please, help me...

So. That.

One could also connect Eden's theming around new beginnings (birthday right before New Year's, favorite color is daffodil yellow and daffodils represent new beginnings, her name references the Garden of Eden which comes from a story about the beginning of the world) to Arei's redemption arc, as Arei gets a "new beginning" in the kindness she once showed. This even ties into Arei's death thematically, as Arei not only dies trying to be a good friend to Eden (tying into the theme of friendship), but she specifically dies in the playground, a place connected to childhood. So we once again get "new beginnings" by connecting her place of death to her origin point and the time when she was kind, if you get the idea.

Again, probably more here, and for this one in particular I'm not even sure I really scratched the surface, but I'll call this good enough for now.

4) Nico & Ace

So these two have a ridiculous amount of beef and that's not really new. Even their very talents have foils; both work with animals, but Nico loves all animals, while Ace hates them, especially horses. 

Ace [1-5]: Animals are fucking lame, anyways. Seriously, they suck hard. If someone told me their cat was acting up or something, I’d give it a good punt.

But the main point of contrast is the theme of agency and taking control of their situation.

Ace’s thoughts on this are expressed quite clearly in his secret quote, “I don’t know what to do with myself anymore.” He feels he lacks control over his talent (forced into it despite being deathly afraid of horses), over his feelings (obvious), over his relationships with the cast, etc. And so he tries to feel in control by bullying Nico, especially when he gets their secret so he can try to blackmail them. Not that Ace doesn’t bother Nico before that, but it does get worse in CH2. He repeatedly does self-destructive things just so he can feel in control of something, be it killing Arei because he feels everyone hates him and he has no way of fixing that before he dies, or trying to find reasons to get mad at Levi so he can try to control his feelings towards him when they become inconvenient for the whole murder thing.

Nico, for their side, keeps having their agency undermined by people around them. They get pushed by both David and Ace into revealing their secret before they were ready, Hu keeps defending them even after they ask her not to, they keep getting spoken over during the trial, etc. You can even extend that to stuff like feeling like they have to present as a man at the start of the series because the people from their backstory don’t respect their identity, or more minor events in the killing game like Ace reproaching them for just… wandering around.

Nico [1-8]: The motive was on my mind. So I was nervous. I tend to pace around when I’m nervous. That’s not a problem, right?  Ace: Seriously? You were ‘wandering around’ all alone? You’re definitely the killer!

Basically, Nico struggles to assert themselves a lot of the time, which means they end up going from 0 to 100 pretty fast on the whole “murder Ace” plan. 

That’s how we get to the theme of victims/perpetrators, or rather, how sometimes things are more complicated than that dichotomy. The theme is explored throughout their relationship, with Nico originally being a victim of Ace's bullying, then Ace being a victim of Nico's attempted murder, then Ace being a perpetrator of actual murder, you get the idea. Pretty straightforward there. 

Going further, this also connects to the theme of forgiveness and apologizing, which comes up a few times in the trial. Nico doesn’t apologize to Ace after explaining their plan because they still hate him and know Ace isn’t going to forgive them, so they see no point in doing it. This parallels how Ace doesn’t expect anyone to forgive him for killing Arei, though with Nico, the question of forgiveness is currently open-ended, as there’s several characters who either have shown a willingness to ignore their crimes (Hu) or don’t know what to think of them (Rose). Basically, Nico has a chance to move past their mistake, which Ace isn’t getting.

And as usual, Ace’s death is the culmination of the themes his character embodies. He kills Arei, who is connected to him via the theme of bullying. He does it out of fear of death, because he feels he doesn't have enough control over his life to avoid getting killed by the enemies he made by insulting them all. Arei was on the path of forgiveness with Eden, which Ace cut short. Ace replicates what Nico did to him because Ace’s murder is the conclusion to everything that’s happened to him in the killing game, with everyone hating him and all that. You get the point. Hopefully.

For a relatively smaller theme, we can bring up dissatisfaction with their body. Nico is non-binary, meaning they’re presumably not very happy with the sex they were born with. Meanwhile, Ace has an eating disorder, not to mention that he always wears gloves for some reason (hiding his hands), and he wears heels to be taller because he’s shorter than he’d like, even though he’s also tall for a jockey. Can’t win, this guy. 

Again, probably more to talk about, but I’d like to get this post out at some point this year :v

5) Hu & Veronika

You mention in this ask that, since the first two recap foil pairs were important for CH1 and the third and fourth were important for CH2, it's possible that Hu-Vero and Rose-J could be important for CH3. That's certainly an interesting observation! We could also extend that to CH4, I guess, but that's a bit too far for me to talk about... so I won't! I will talk about CH3, though.

I'll get to Rose-J in their section, but I could definitely believe that Hu-Vero could be important for CH3. There's a fair bit of setup for both of them going through some kind of arc in the chapter, which you kinda mentioned in the ask (Hu has to deal with the fallout of the Nico situation, while Vero's reactions to Levi's near death and Ace's execution imply she's getting worse), and there's already a narrative connection between them through their pact about the secrets in the second trial. Not to mention that Vero's always given people CH3 death vibes, which I get even if I'm hesitant to say that myself.

But that's just speculation. What about the foils we already have? Well, the main point of contrast is their reaction to conflict, especially when it comes to a specific person they're particularly interested in. Hu always tries to mediate conflict and defend the people she considers good, mostly seen in her white knighting of Nico all throughout CH2. Veronika's the opposite. She enjoys watching conflict, stirring the pot with her psychoanalysis, and particularly enjoys whenever Arturo does some bullshit. Basically, Hu goes "I can fix them" while Vero goes "I can make him worse." Classic dichotomy there.

Then there's the matter of change, metamorphosis even. Hu’s character is designed around it, with her butterfly hairpin and the fact her name means “still lake”, as water is often connected to rebirth. And we know she has changed, from the hopeless child who attempted suicide three times into someone who seems quite attached to her life, if her secret quote is anything to go by.

Hu [Profile Source Code]: I want to pay for what I’ve done. But even then, I still want to live.

Much in the same way, we know Veronika in present is not the same person she used to be years ago. She mentions having been quite outdoors-y back in the day, some of that bleeding into her excitement about the playground, and of course her motive secret is that she used to self-harm, but no longer does.

And yes, the theme of self-harm/suicide is another one where these two foil, which has even come up with their motive secret pact in CH2. We don’t have many details on that yet, though.

That said, the reasons for why they harmed themselves seem to be quite different, which is noteworthy. Although we don’t know what exactly led Hu to attempt suicide, we do know that nowadays she desperately wants to be relied on so she feels useful, meaning it’s very likely her suicidal tendencies came from a feeling that her life had no meaning, or something equally depressing. Meanwhile, provided her secret is to be believed, Veronika just hurt herself when she was bored. Definitely very different reasons for self-harm there.

Looking over your original post on this (have I mentioned I’ve been cross-checking my own thoughts with your own? ‘Cuz I’m doing that), you also bring up maturity, which is indeed an aspect in which they foil. Hu’s character profile states she acts motherly, and the highlighted word in her subtitle quote (“Can you please try and act with a little more maturity?”) is, in fact, maturity. Meanwhile, Vero has childish tendencies, most evidently seen in the scene where the playground gets introduced.

There’s definitely a lot of things about these characters which we currently don’t know about, so I’m sure this section could get significantly larger in the future. But for now, this feels decent enough for me.

6) Rose & J

According to the extension of the original theory stated in this ask, J-Rose might be an important pair for CH3. And I can definitely see that! Rose's mental state has deteriorated a lot, so CH3 is primed to be a turning point for her character. Your point about Arturo being important at the start due to Levi's condition, and that possibly leading to attention being drawn to J, is also very reasonable. Not to mention that, as you seem to be aware of given what you said in the ask, DRDT's motives have so far aligned pretty well with the THH motives, with the first one being videos of their family and the second being secrets. This is important because, if that pattern continues, the third motive might be related to money. And one of the themes in which these two foil is wealth and poverty, which we'll get to in a moment, so it's entirely possible this pair could be quite relevant as a result of that. Not a bad idea in the slightest.

In any case, this is another set that mainly foils through backstory, at least for now. Rose was born into poverty, J was born into wealth. Rose tried to do everything she could for her family, J tries to distance herself from her mother as much as she can. Some parallels can be drawn between the influence the Spurling Foundation has on Rose’s life and the things Mariabella tries to force J to do. I can’t recall if this actually got mentioned in the series itself yet, but based on the childhood drawings post, we can tell J was probably forced to wear dresses despite disliking “girly” things per her profile, and from there infer that she was likely forced into doing a lot of things she didn't want to do.

These backstories can additionally connect to the ever prevalent theme of fate. Rose has accepted her fate, in a sense, believing that she’ll never escape her contract with the Spurling Foundation (see: her secret quote, “In the end, the only thing I can do is watch my wretched life go on”). On the other hand, J constantly rejects her fate by going against her birthright and hiding that she’s a Rosales (see: her secret quote, “Please don’t call me your daughter ever again”).

This is literally baked into their designs btw. Rose’s apron is stained all over, as if to signal she’s stained by the mistakes of her past, while J wears a hoodie as if to hide her identity as much as possible. Notably, J’s shirt actually has a paint splatter design, so she literally is hiding the stains (which in her case would be her last name) that Rose doesn’t bother covering up. 

(Btw while I was looking at their designs for this I noticed J’s hoodie has two zippers, which threw me off a lot lmao. Apparently those are a real thing, but it still caught me off guard and I wanted to mention it lol)

On the topic of design, why do they wear the same shoes?

(Rose's on the left, J's on the right)

Like, Rose’s are a bit less saturated and maybe a bit more green than blue, but that’s the only difference I can see. I don’t think there’s any other pair of pairs of shoes that look this similar in the cast. Whit and Arei’s are similar to these, but they have a few different details. I don’t even think this is a foil thing I think Rose and J just have very similar taste in shoes. I find this amusing. 

Anyways. Their talents are artistic.

…Yep, that’s the parallel! Admittedly, it does come up a bit, with J saying the decor looks new during the prologue, and Rose saying she could figure out a few things about the building if she could analyze the paint on the wall. They be detective-ing and stuff.

Arguably, the theme of betrayal can also be brought up, though it’s very minor. Rose got betrayed by Nico, who used her turpentine for their attempt on Ace. And something like that kinda happened to J around the same time, as she dragged Teruko into a dressing room to avoid Arturo and got a knife to her throat for the troubles. It barely counts, but given Teruko is one of the only people J seemed to genuinely like before that point, I’d say the situations are similar enough to mention, if nothing else. 

Leaving it off there!

7) Arturo & Levi

Let’s get the obvious one out of the way. Their talents are aesthetic related, be it related to people’s physical appearance or the clothes they wear. These talents connect to some of the other themes of their characters, such as Arturo’s obsession with beauty and Levi “styling himself” as a good person by doing things good people do, if that makes sense.

Then there’s the other big one; their family situation. Arturo’s home life was likely pretty bad, which we can infer from how desperate he seemed to get the hell outta dodge; and his sister committed suicide because Arturo left. Levi also left his family behind, although in his case he says everyone was a “bad influence” on everyone. Plus, he directly killed his father for one reason or another. We did get to see how Arturo felt about Levi’s nonchalance about the death of his father in the second trial, and that furthers their foiling. 

Arturo [2-13]: How could you simply *forget* that you murdered your own family member?

Yeah that.

Going back to the talents, there’s some contrast between how they got them. Arturo studied from a very young age and for years to become a Plastic Surgeon just as he entered adulthood, while Levi admits to being relatively new to fashion. They both kinda use their talents to escape their past in some way (it was part of Arturo’s plan to get the hell away from his home and Hope’s Peak is the reason Levi was never convicted for his murders), just that one had a little more planning behind it. 

Then there’s the matter of protection. Arturo repeatedly resents the idea that because he has some medical training, he has to be the cast’s doctor every time someone gets injured, and panics when he’s asked to do something as serious as saving Levi’s life.

Arturo [2-16]: I–! I’m not that kind of surgeon! I’ve told you, over and over, I have no experience with saving lives!

Levi, conversely, actively wishes to protect the others, seen for example when he attacked MonoTV in the Prologue and when he jumped in front of Teruko right before she got shot at. It’s even clarified in the subtitle quote of his profile (“I will do my utmost best to make sure that you all are safe”). Levi likes to protect others so they see him as a “good person”, which segues nicely into a more vague theme of categorizing important people in some way. Levi wishes to be seen as a good person and thus is quite interested in those he considers good (eg Eden), while Arturo is only interested in talking to beautiful people. It’s very vague and I don’t have much to say about it, especially since we don’t know exactly where Arturo’s obsession with beauty comes from, but it’s there.

Speaking of that, another point of comparison is the way both of them seek the approval of one specific person in the cast. For Arturo, it’s J because of her mother. For Levi, it’s Ace because of what happened in the first trial. They do it in quite different ways, but it is a thing that happens, and the differences help highlight the main narrative points these plot points bring to the table.

I’m calling that good enough!

8) Whit & David

We sure left a pretty interesting one for last. This is probably one of the ones I’m the least clear on, mostly because both Whit and David are sorta unclear characters. However, there are still a few interesting things I can bring up.

Let’s start with the theme of idolization of the dead, because it’s quite literally what Whit’s secret quote references.

Whit [Profile Source Code]: We tend to idolize the dead. 

Whit idolizes his mother, and thus tries to be like her in any way he can. He dyes his hair blond, he completely ignores the fact she’s dead, you know the drill. Meanwhile, David idolizes Xander. Take a pick from any of his 2-12 lines or any of the Xander related LGI bullshit to see what I mean by that. 

Though, speaking of family members, Diana Chiem. Given we have no idea what the deal with her is yet, I won’t speak too much on it. But if you’ve watched my Vivisection of the David MV, you might know that there’s a theory brought up there that Diana may have died during Hope’s Peak time and that David’s started saying she never existed when that happened. The link sends you to that section of the video. It’s kinda insane, but there’s some basis for it, and it would create a pretty clear connection between Diana and Elizabeth (Whit’s mom) so I’m bringing it up. 

Then there’s the theme of hiding/avoiding sad topics and the like. David is obviously not as happy with his life as he presents himself as, at least for most of the story, while Whit has a history of horrendously avoidant behavior when it comes to anything that’s even remotely negative.

David does occasionally talk about heavier topics, but always behind some kind of persona. Either as the inspirational speaker who takes on a leadership role in CH2 (see: revealing his family history of depression (which I think is true, even if he probably never thought that was actually his secret), comforting Arei in the playground) or as the cartoonishly evil person he pretends to be immediately after his magical girl transformation (see: “Arei was a weather spell” line). He’s seemingly a bit more candid when it comes to Xander in 2-12 for a bit, but then he mostly reverts back to just being an asshole most of the time, other than a few outbursts of genuine emotion (funnily enough, one of them being David shouting at Whit to take things seriously). Meanwhile, Whit (in my opinion) doesn’t seem to have a persona, per say; he’s just kind of an unserious person who repeatedly uses humor and other tactics to distract from the Horrors. He’s a deeply strange person, but that’s kinda just who he is.

Then there’s- say it with me everyone- the theme of fate. David believes people can’t change, that they’re fated to remain the same no matter what happens during their life. He’s made that stance relatively clear. Whit, for his part, has a much more optimistic view on humanity and the like, as he tells Teruko.

Whit [2-3]: Charles… No, everyone here… we might act callously, but we’re all only human. We're all real people with our strengths and weaknesses.  You included, Teruko. Just like Charles, even if you’re acting cold, there’s still a part of you that’s good–

(And yes, “we’re all only human” can be contrasted with the whole “David doesn’t really feel human” thing from LGI and Tally 5)

Thus, his connection to fate is actually something that hasn’t been talked about in the main series yet, but rather comes from his character profile. All it takes is noticing the repeated references to luck and thing that are “guaranteed” (aka fated) to happen, and you can kinda piece it together from there. 

Whit [Profile]: It’s said that if you get the Ultimate Matchmaker to find you a romantic partner, you’re guaranteed to have a happy and stable relationship for life. Unfortunately for Whit Young, he seems to lack all luck when it comes to finding a relationship himself.

And since that profile talks about his talent, I'll use it as a segue to look at similarities between Matchmaker and Inspirational Speaker. Both are talents based around influencing and advising people on how to achieve happiness, either in their love life or their… life life. Thus, both require some level of understanding on how people think and act, which manifests in Whit’s self-proclaimed intuitive nature and David’s confidence in his beliefs when it comes to people not changing and all that. 

And… yeah I’m gonna say I’m okay with that for now.

-

Wow, that was quite a bit, now wasn’t it! And it still feels like I could find more if I thought about it long enough, but I hope this was enough for you. Thanks for the ask! The DRDT cast is really fun to talk about, though, so the excuse to do so is always welcome :D

[silcobrainrot]

I was typing out a reply to this post and then I realized I lost the plot so bad that I didn't want to derail OP's point so here it is. OP's points that I'm reflecting on:

Zaun is a very fucked place with a very fucked system. He’s doing what he thinks needs to be done in order to at some point be able to rein it in and make it better. He wanted to give Zaun a fighting chance against Piltover. He wanted to make them equal. And in a place where there are no rules. And people talk with violence. You’re going to have to make some very awful choices in order to not only take control, but have enough power to fix it. He may not have been the one to change Zaun, but he’s raised the girl that could.

"but he’s raised the girl that could." SO fucking true and I wish s2 had let her. firing that rocket at the council was a promise to make their lives hell. i didn't need to see her as the leader of a movement but it would have been nice to see her enable and enact change just by being a powerful loose cannon. Act 1 almost gave us this but then she decided that Jinx was dead in ep 4 and then we don't see her do much of anything until she shows up to the battle in the finale. She could have spent the season being unhinged, having agency and making actual choices that have consequences for herself, Zaun, and Piltover (she was responsible for most of the inciting incidents in s1). The good consequences and the bad.

Let her run wild. Show her lose herself to her grief and anger and how much she misses him and how fucked all of this is. Then bring her back. Not in a redemption arc way, I don't think she needs that, but in a way where she finally understands what she wants her life to be. She mourns the loss, she comes out of her grief, she forgives herself for killing him because it's what he would have wanted, and for the first time ever, she gets to choose what her path in life will be. It's time to be her own person. She's not a hero, she'll never lose her enjoyment of violence and chaos, but she is no longer fueled by anger and hatred and vengeance.

Let Sevika use the stuff Jinx does on her own--avenging Silco and taking vengeance against Piltover--to lead a movement. Let Sevika struggle with keeping the people who worked under Silco loyal to the mission. Show us how Sevika got on good terms with Scar [the firelights' leader while Ekko was away] and what an alliance between the movement for change inspired by Jinx, and the firelights, could accomplish for Zaun. Bringing them hope that change is really possible. Getting them out of their homes and their "every man for himself" mentality and get them believing in something. Wanting more for themselves. Organizing. Community services. Shared resources. Fucking unionizing idk. We see so many of Zaun's worst people but there are normal people living in normal poverty just trying to get by down there, too. Show us the Zaun Silco had become so disconnected from due to isolation and obsession.

It started with Silco, despite how flawed his methods were and how they did so much damage to the Undercity. An evil he thought was necessary because he didn't know any other truth in life besides pain and misery. But it started with him, and it gets realized by his daughter and lieutenant. Sevika is probably the closest thing he had to a friend, who stuck by his side despite how much their methods were hurting the people they were trying to liberate. The people who worked closest to him, lived closest to him, and could see the flaws in both his methods and him as a man, finishing what he started.

But instead we get Jinx committing suicide and Sevika joining the council which. Jesus fucking christ I don't even want to get myself started on that bullshit. @wetnoodle thank you for the brain worm

[sunderedstar]

good books of 2024

according to meeee.

there is no order here, at least one of these was published ages ago, I'm just working my way through my 2024 timeline, godspeed spiderman. 🫡

Metal from Heaven

surprise hit of 2024. top of the charts. stunning, spectacular. gorgeous. Metal from Heaven FUCKS. almost every single main character is an explicit spicy toxic hot mess of a lesbian committing literal highway/train robbery, the bad guy is literally named Industry, leading to such peak sentences as "I am going to kill Industry." the prose is synesthetic in a way that most writers cannot sustain for a full novel but which here culminates in a moment of pure blissful Neon Genesis Evangelion that I will not elaborate on due to spoilers. the author pulls out the FUNNIEST lines, and also the most abrupt and heartbreaking tragedies. we're not here to be subtle, we're here to put the pedal to the metal until the engine explodes. such a damning, whip smart condemnation of industry, capitalism, power. all in the form of Lesbians. also the phrase 'clown orgy' is mentioned. this shit is like gideon the ninth with CRUNCH. NSFW.

but don't take my word for it. take amal el-mohtar's.

Absolution

Absolution is a hard book. requires thought and rigor at all times to absorb what's going on - and also a reread of the entire trilogy beforehand, because there's time travel nuance involved, which makes it next to impossible to sum up the plot coherently on its own without spoiling things. jeff vandermeer described it partially as 'fuck that alligator from the movie' and - valid. the first 60% had me; the later section...swapped gears drastically, which meant it took a while to hit its stride (aka until it reached Area X again). in hindsight I was just not prepared for one of the POVs to be the Freudian, violently stoned, unreliable narrator love-child of Karkat and Dave Strider whose perception/conception of the heart of the Southern Reach is extremely phallic. and then suddenly cannibalism happens. I liked Annihilation and Acceptance better, but damn. it almost feels like this should be the set up to another trilogy. much 2 think about.

Yield Under Great Persuasion

I don't know why I didn't hear anything about this one before it came out! (instead, I only saw posts about rowland's other book released this year, running close to the wind - which sadly did not hit for me at all). Yield Under Great Persuasion is just ridiculous enough to be fantastic. stubborn little gremlin man, big mad about Pumpkingate years after the original inciting incident that set him at odds with his love interest, attempts to pack his little rucksack and run away from all his self-inflicted gay problems, fails, is forced to deal with said personal problems by direct goddess-intervention. you know it's gonna be good when the guys are hate-banging by page 2. a short, delightful mix of (extremely silly and low-stakes) enemies to lovers and hurt/comfort and working out your emotional and communication issues on page style comfort food. self-indulgent in a fanfic way that is rowland's trademark in a taste of gold and iron (which was also fantastic and probably deserves a reread now.) NSFW.

The Spellshop

between this and yield under great persuasion there's an odd cozy fantasy pairing here. a self-isolated shut-in spellbook librarian who lives for her work escapes the fall of her city and sets up shop back in her old hometown on a severely magic-deprived island. there's some internalized trauma being worked through, against a simply charming backdrop of community and solidarity and magic spells. really. I was. charmed. which is a rare reaction on my part.

The Hunter's Gonna Lay Low

the curveball of the list, The Hunter's Gonna Lay Low is a translated (gay) Korean web novel, and it's the perfect intersection of a decent translator meeting an author who knows what they're doing. notorious tumblr user @spockandawe has a write up of the plot and its major themes here, but in essence it hooked me with its hunter/super-hero meets Pacific Rim setting, its themes of gifted kid burnout and unacknowledged trauma with the weight of the world on his shoulders, and the fact that the author clearly plotted out all of this in advance, with minor details from the opening chapter being extremely plot relevant a hundred chapters later. also, the characters are FUN! the relationship compels me. clownery abounds in all the best ways, while the world-ending stakes are also scarily sky high. its translation is currently incomplete as far as I'm aware, which is literally this story's only downside right now, since you can read it online for free - but so much of the main story is up and translated already that it's hard to imagine how much higher the stakes can go, and I'm dying to know if these two make it through and get the happy ending they deserve. a delicious repast.

Apostles of Mercy

I'm gonna rant here. this is the story of a series that got the redemption arc it deserved.

if you don't know, axiom's end is lindsay ellis's blatant Bayverse Transformers female lead alternate history fic. period. she has openly admitted this. you can easily and clearly pick out the Optimus/Megatron/Starscream expies. and that first book was GOOD. it understood the assignment. loved it.

then...truth of the divine happened. book two of the series. was frankly. god awful. it was like twilight's new moon, where the main character's depression saturates and therefore stagnates the entire narrative, in this case to its detriment. it dragged. the entire appeal of first book of the series is the bond between the main character and her new definitely-not-a-Transformer life partner, and book two managed to both sideline that - the entire point!!! the main thing you're reading it for! the alien time! - and introduce the most skeevy and (for me) unpleasant to read human hetero romance of all time. it was so unpleasant I actually forgot how bad it was.

somehow. somehow. palpatine returned. after I spent three years mourning what could have been. book three saved it. Apostles of Mercy addresses the whole damn skeevy toxic mess that was book two and refocuses on what matters - the alien love interest and a LESBIAN love interest. yes. it's true. once again the sapphics won. we now have a book where the main character is reliving lesbian sex memories as an alien-robot-insect-definitely-not-a-Transformer mindmelds with her so I mean. good job team? her love interest also acquires an alien life partner of her own to expand this into potential alien foursome range? the assignment is once again UNDERSTOOD. in terms of the action scenes, to quote myself while reading it, "I can't believe I'm saying this but you needed to channel far more Bayverse" [for book 2], and doing so for book 3 has produced a work of art. I would say skip book 2 entirely and thank me later, but experiencing how bad the series got at its darkest point is part of what made book 3 such an exhilarating high in comparison. possibly that was the goal all along, impossible to appreciate until now. I just need lindsay ellis to get the contract to write the currently-in-publication-limbo books 4 and 5. because the series deserves it. it only just got good again! NSFWish because I can't remember currently how explicit they got all these months later, forgive me.

The Deep Sky

yume kitasei is new to me, but this book hit some interesting notes as a sci fi debut. it too is about gifted kid burnout and imposter syndrome, funnily enough, in a thoughtful take on the standard sci fi concept of 'a bunch of rigorously trained young adults are sent out into deep space as an ark to save a dying humanity' that actually does discuss how fucked up that is as a concept, both for the kids as they grow up under enormous pressure to win a spot on the mission and for all those people being left behind, in what might just end up being an overhyped waste of resources, since civilization sure is still kicking when they leave. the summary on the book is somewhat misleading - asuka, the main character, doesn't fall under suspicion until wayyyy late in the book, and spends the majority of it in a pseudo-detective role that is absolutely sanctioned by those in charge. she's not 'an immediate suspect' like the book blurb insists. go figure. it didn't knock me out of the park like most of the books above, but it was an engaging little read.

The Bees

a weird one from 2014, picked up on a whim - it's literally about bees! fictionalized bees! with personalities and priesthoods and caste politics and everything! I cried about it to be honest. very plotty, somehow all of it neatly taking place within the Lifecycle of A Bee™️, which takes some real craftsmanship to pull off and make compelling as a narrative. since I'm an unrepentant Raksura fan, I was like 'wow...how Raksura coded...' knowing full well that Raksura are dragon bee people, not the other way around. also the Raksura could never be as toxic (complimentary) as these bees are. 😂 it's just good literature your honor.

honorable mentions:

Heavenly Tyrant

has not come out yet. but let's be real. it's on the list in anticipation. it's what she deserves.

The City in Glass

I love nghi vo's work, have read and adored all of the singing hills cycle novellas. it took a month for my library hold on this book to be available. and then I promptly got distracted by metal from heaven and the hunter's gonna lay low 😂 I will read it!!! the first eight pages were good! vitrine's voice is very good! I've just had a very busy end of the year interrupting my everything. (update: I read two more pages and it immediately and promptly popped off. whoops. guess I'm reading that next. whenever I have free time again...)

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

I’m always curious about Kankri being redeemed in any way (maybe because he can become the sufferer). Obviously to do so would be simply punting him to reality and force him to live it, no help from his shoddily-made support structure. But I’m curious how you would go about doing it

Given their role thematically in the story, I'm actually usually not on the train of "fully redeem the dancestors", but I do like giving them some catharsis and reckoning, a place in the fight against LE. One last chance to do something good with their lives/afterlives before the end, and a(n implied) new start as wigglers born into the new universe.

So to that end, in my head, the "turnaround point" for Kankri - the inciting incident that makes him have a mental breakdown that results in him finally taking some accountability for his shitty actions - is having a conversation with Eridan.

In my head, the Dancestor reckoning happens gradually, alongside a series of retcons where the dead trolls are brought back one or two at a time, and deal with their emotional issues a little more with every cast member added back into the party.

The TL;DR series of events is: Terezi asks to bring back Vriska, Vriska asks John to punch out Tavros before she can kill him, Tavros's influence makes Gamzee ask for Equius and Nepeta to be brought back, Equius asks for a redux of Aradiabot, Aradiabot grabs John by the arm and gets him to undo her death and Sollux's fall into depression, Sollux asks for Feferi to be brought back, and then Karkat asks for Eridan.

We know from (Vriska) that the Game Over/Alpha Timeline characters still exist post-Retcon, so those characters would also be continuing their character arcs, just in the afterlife prepping for the LE fight. For example, I think Meenah's reckoning should be delivered by (Karkat) - after having had so long to reflect on his own failures as a leader, he would be perfectly poised to scream at her for hers, which would also serve to make this confrontation a final thesis for Karkat as a whole - what leadership means (caring about your team) - and a conclusion to the Meenah/Karkat dynamic.

So when I say that Kankri needs to talk to Eridan, I mean Eridan and not (Eridan). Full character development, all his teammates are alive, taken full accountability and responsibility for his actions, team good guy Eridan. And as I noted in this essay, Eridan with full character development is actually more annoying than regular Eridan, because he's also the "Devastating: Worst Guy You Know Made An Excellent Point" guy. In bulleted form:

He's still an advocate for murder. Murder is literally what kept his friends alive long enough to play the game, and playing the game itself involves genocide, so he would be the Token Evil Teammate who reminds the team that, hey, murder is an option - and enemies will be considering it. Even at his very best, he's going to struggle with empathy and have an extremely blase view of violence and murder - those were literally just facts of his life through his most formative years.

This also makes him a TOTAL downer, as he's the tempering voice that reminds them that decisions have consequences, and utopia requires sacrifices, and nothing is ever worth fighting for that won't eventually need to be fought for. Like I said, worst guy you know, excellent points. In fact, he's out here volunteering to do the murdering when the situation calls, if nobody else wants to get their fins dirty. He's really good at it.

He's still an idiot who doesn't listen to people. He's perfectly fine at taking orders, but having a conversation with him is still really difficult. I feel like if you make Eridan too smart, mentally flexible, and socially aware, you lose a lot of his Eridan-ness, and I think these characters, fully realized, are more of themselves, not less. I also don't know how you could reasonably expect to fix these traits. He's just Like That.

He drops his fake pro-Empire stuff, because that was basically all just empty posturing in the first place, but...

Now he's a pretentious-ass hipster who judges you for liking Trollor Swift and Troll Marvel. Given that Jake's indiscriminate taste is actually linked to his deficit of Hope (he has little conviction, he's wishy-washy), Eridan coming into full Prince of Hope regalia involves getting even more annoying about his taste in media (shittons of conviction, refusal to budge).

He is also a wizard. He will not shut up about this.

And finally, I think he'd still be out here using slurs. First of all, because it'd be really funny, because he's literally not casteist, but second, because there's two types of "it's equality" - the kind where nobody ever says anything offensive, and the kind where "offensive" stops being a relevant concept because true equality has been achieved. Think of the discourse surrounding the reclamation of slurs IRL, or how the "it's equality" meme gets used - this idea that words can be stripped of power by changing the context of who's saying them, or that objectification/discrimination stop being problems if they're applied evenly across the board, instead of limited to specific groups. I think that this is the exact type of nuanced idea that Homestuck would tackle and its fandom would get incensed about, which is why I think it should stay.

Eridan's role, thus, becomes a sort of "unpleasant truths" kind of character. Violence, both physical and verbal, is unpleasant as hell, and the natural instinct is to avoid it. The problem is, in any true discussion of what society should look like, they're topics that can't be avoided, and are even sometimes necessary not just to recognize, but to utilize (no revolution is bloodless, etc.). Eridan - an extreme personality - is going to represent the uncomfortable extreme of the debate. And by that I mean he's going to be saying slurs and talking about murders and is still going to be unquestionably a force for good.

The reason I'm going so in-depth into this is because Kankri very much represents the opposite: using "polite" language and couching it in the language of courtesy, activism, and liberal ideology, Kankri hides - and worse, spreads - his classist, ableist, misogynistic, puritan beliefs. He enforces the class divide and actively works against his teammates' best interests.

He whines that the lower blood castes should stop complaining about oppression, because others have it worse. He tells the team feminist that misogyny isn't real, then slut shames her. He tells the guy with brain damage that he's making other neurodivergent/TBI people look bad, exacerbates Latula's shame around her inability to smell, and actively guilt trips Cronus into ignoring his epiphany and self-reflection. Kankri is only an activist in that he actively makes everybody worse.

But why does he act like this? Well, it's due to the fact that he was probably culled, and on-sight at that, like Karkat would've been if anyone found out about his mutant blood. Kankri doesn't seem to have a symbol or lusus, either, two thinks Karkat only had because the Signless's followers prepped them for him, so the chances are very high that Kankri was culled since he was hatched. Given the way he discusses culling with Latula, and viciously despises being mothered by Porrim, it's clear he has some really complicated feelings regarding having his agency dismissed. Thus, his work to hamper his team - at least some of which is wilful on his part, as he'll outright cast aspersions on Horuss or Cronus's beliefs for being "imaginary" even as he encourages them to commit to them - is motivated by something quite simple: power, attention, entitlement, and control.

When he goes on his grand lectures, he frequently slips and reveals that he sees himself as a great, unquestionable spiritual leader, often trying to place other characters in subordinate positions to himself - Karkat is his "pupil," and his monologues, I mean, sermons, I mean, diatribes, are spoken as if from a position of authority. He outright tells Meenah that this is what he believes himself to be.

It's a very Seer sort of problem - both that of hubris and that of willful blindness. If you chart out the actual "end goal" of his beliefs, it appears to be a world in which Kankri himself is both the biggest victim and most important voice in the room. He regularly disparages those with actual disadvantages (Damara, Porrim, Mituna) while playing up the false problems of those who don't actually have them (Horuss, Cronus). Those with disadvantages should have their voices amplified - except lowbloods should stop whining and misogyny isn't real. And those with real power should check their privilege - but won't somebody think of the poor highbloods who have ~emotional problems~? Kankri will, and all the highbloods need to do is bend the knee and treat Kankri as their specialest boy.

In short, he's using his intellect, rhetoric, and forceful personality for selfish, emotionally-driven pursuits. The actual substance of his arguments is ephemeral and contradictory because that's the trick - the point is NOT to further equality, but to verbally browbeat his conversation partner into submission. In other words, you can't beat Kankri in a regular debate, because the moment you start trying to actually engage in a debate with him, he wins. The moment you start lunging at his arguments, he's got you in his red-texted labyrinth. The moment you start treating his points like they merit genuine discussion, you're in the pews of Kankri's church, and he's up at the pulpit.

And Eridan is the destroyer of faith. He's also an idiot who doesn't listen to people.

I don't really know exactly how it would play out, but I know in my heart. In the pit of my soul. That Eridan would call Kankri several slurs, (correctly) point out that Kankri's celibacy is stupid because it's clear he has feelings for Cronus and Latula, (correctly) point out that his pro-equality stuff is stupid because he calls violets "Royal-V"s, (incorrectly) accuse Kankri of hitting on him, (correctly) point out that the entire point of a slur is that it hurts and insults the person it's used on, (correctly) call Kankri several more slurs, (correctly) point out that Kankri just wants attention, especially from highbloods, (???) go on an unhinged rant (maybe more) about being a wizard, being a murderer, and being a murderer wizard, (???) insult Kankri's taste in music, and finish it up by (correctly) revealing that Eridan and Karkat are moirails who make out sometimes.

I think Kankri would start crying.