#the owl house discourse

[hikaaa-bi]

whenever someone says they dislike huntlow, the usual comeback from toxic huntlow fans is that “you're a misogynist and you don't want to see the woman in a relationship being stronger”. so i want to address this issue today. is huntlow bad only because willow is stronger than hunter and isn't a damsel in distress?

in my opinion, absolutely not. that's not the case. i myself am a fan of subverted tropes and relationships where the woman isn't just a passive damsel with no personality. i like seeing independent women and i like seeing men being vulnerable for once.

to demonstrate my point on why huntlow doesn't pull off this trope well, let me compare it to a ship with a similar dynamic: sokka and suki from avatar the last airbender.

let's go through each of the reasons why sukka works as a ship where huntlow fails.

1. Does it make sense for the characters?

the first question here is: do the roles of the strong independent woman and weaker man suit these characters?

sokka was introduced as.. just a guy. he was a regular teenager who wasn't trained in combat. he could fight well enough if he wanted to and being the only man in a village full of mostly children and elders, he was the best warrior in his village (if we are even to believe his claims in s1, that is).

suki, on the other hand, was a trained warrior. she had spent her whole life training in combat and fighting to continue kyoshi's legacy. in her very first appearance, suki is confirmed to be a skilled warrior who is much stronger than sokka.

this setup makes perfect sense. it wouldn't come as a surprise later on that suki is stronger or a better fighter than sokka, and would have to rescue him or help him out in a moment of crisis.

now let's come to huntlow. in s2, hunter is introduced as the emperor's right-hand man who is young but powerful. while most of his intimidation factor came from his artificial staff, it was clear that he was not an amateur and had decent combat skills.

this assumption is only solidified when we see him go head to head with amity, only losing because 1. he was using a new staff 2. he was sleep deprived and 3. he was in an extremely erratic emotional state.

willow, on the other hand, was the sokka in this relationship. she was a regular teenager who grew up in a normal family and went to a regular magic high school.

she was certainly incredibly skilled in plant magic but she was not a trained child soldier like hunter. she had a lot of potential to be a good fighter but she had only recieved the education that every other student had recieved. not to mention, most of her stronger magic came from her emotional outbursts.

so.. does the whole girlboss-malewife dynamic work with huntlow? no. it really doesn't. even if willow trained and grew as a witch, there's no reason why she should be stronger and more skilled in combat than hunter, who had to pass seemingly impossible trials in order to qualify as the golden guard. especially since after the first half of s2, hunter was not only weaker than willow but just weak in general.

i get it, he doesn't have natural magic like the others. but he was still shown to be a very competent fighter. he was also shown to be cunning and strategic, being able to find a way out of any situation if he wanted to. but after joining the hexsquad, he is dumbed down to willow's shy and pathetic boyfriend, who doesn't really do much on his own.

2. are they in character when in a relationship?

when writing a relationship, this is really important. if you write a relationship where one or both characters have to act wildly out of character to make sense for the relationship to happen, those characters are not compatible. it's like when your friend acts uncomfortably different around their crush or partner.

let's start with sokka and suki.

sokka is goofy, cynical and quick-witted, with or without suki. his relationship with suki doesn't drastically change his character, but it does improve it. suki helps sokka change his misogynistic worldviews and respect women, but apart from that necessary improvement, sokka is still the same. he is not out of character when he is with suki.

as for suki herself, we don't see a lot of her away from sokka but it's still safe to assume that she is being herself around sokka. she is not forced into a new role in order to be in a relationship with sokka. the times we do see her on her own, she is pretty much the same rational, independent and nonchalant person that she is around sokka.

and yet, both of them have incredible chemistry and very clearly care for each other. it's not one-sided and it doesn't feel unnatural.

but huntlow?

hunter is introduced as a sarcastic and bratty but deeply traumatized teenager. he is quick to start a banter with whoever he is with, he tends to talk too much, and he generally has a nonchalant attitude to cover up with trauma.

but with willow? hunter is not just shy or awkward around her, he is a completely different person. i can understand that being attracted to a person can make you act strangely sometimes. but with hunter, that awkwardness never fades away. he is always blushing around her, he is often portrayed as pathetic and helpless, and constantly needing willow's support and guidance.

as for willow, she is introduced as this insecure and good-natured teenager. after her confrontation with amity, willow is pushed to the back for a while. all we know about her at that time is that she's the supportive mom friend of the group. she builds her confidence after a while but she is still shown as a kind person who doesn't use force on someone else, unless necessary.

but with hunter? willow is suddenly not just confident but also dominant and forceful. she basically snatches him from the sky and drags him to the ground, just to invite him to her flyer derby team. hunter is practically terrified at this point, but it's played off as a fun cute-meet. later, when hunter wants to leave the team for understandable reasons, instead of respecting his wishes, willow once again forces him to join her again.

i wouldn't call willow toxic or abusive, because she isn't. but i would say that she didn't respect hunter's boundaries in the slightest. she doesn't treat anyone else the way she treats hunter. she's not exactly mean to him but she also does not seem to respect him as an individual. again, she is written wildly out of character just so that she could fulfil the role of the “powerful girlboss” in the relationship. and it doesn't help that a dominant and forceful figure is the last thing hunter needs, considering how he was controlled and abused by his uncle his whole life.

3. Equality

it is my opinion that in a relationship, both individuals should play an important role. and they should balance each other out, instead of clashing with each other. it doesn't necessarily have to be an “opposites attract” situation, they just need to have qualities that brings a balance to the relationship.

in sokka's and suki's relationship, we've already established that suki is the brawn. she's the trained warrior and her agility, skill and speed are her strengths. sokka, on the other hand, is the brains. suki is still a rational and smart person but sokka is the strategist, the “idea guy”.

here, there's a balance. neither sokka nor suki are weak or incompetent, they're just skilled in different areas.

but when it comes to huntlow, willow is the brawn while hunter.. does close to nothing. after meeting willow, he's basically useless. the most impactful thing he does is stand up against belos in “Thanks to Them” and rescue willow from a short fall in the next episode. otherwise, he is mostly pushed to the back despite, again, having a personality and his own strengths prior to meeting willow. the problem here isn't that hunter shouldn't be weak or vulnerable, but rather that he is forced into the damsel role when it goes against his original character.

4. Screentime, interaction and development

one thing that huntlow and sukka had in common is neither ship had too much screentime together. suki wasn't officially part of the gaang until s3 and before that, she just gets two interactions with sokka. but these interactions were used to their fullest potential.

when they first meet each other, sokka and suki do not get along well. sokka was convinced that women aren't good warriors and his pride is hurt by the fact that suki is stronger than him, while suki is understandably put off by sokka's misogynistic and condescending attitude. after he tries to teach her how to fight and is consequently defeated by her, sokka rethinks his worldview. he goes back to suki and asks her to teach him how to fight, apologizing and admitting his mistake. suki agrees to teach him and through this, they bond. it is revealed at the end of the episode that both sokka and suki may or may not have a thing for each other. afterwards, sokka has to leave and suki has to stay behind.

their next meeting is a lot more brief but even here, we see a clear demonstration of their dynamic. sokka is overjoyed to see suki but he still hasn't moved on from yue, so when suki confesses to him and tries to initiate a kiss, sokka rejects her. suki apologizes to him later for what happened, and sokka kisses her as a confirmation that he has now moved on and likes her back. we see a clear respect of boundaries and personal choices from both sides.

finally, after suki is captured by azula, sokka frees her and they are reunited again until the end. at this point, they're basically a couple. there's no more awkward blushing or stuttering; they're just a pair of teenagers who are in love with each other. they have a bit of playful banter and they're very casual and comfortable around each other.

suki was originally supposed to be a one-time character so it's incredible that they pulled off on the best ships in atla with her and sokka. their chemistry was undeniable from the beginning, and the writers knew how to expand on it.

now let's come to huntlow. hunter and willow meet each other for the first time in the s2b episode ‘Any Sport in a Storm’. willow is looking for candidates to join her flyer derby team and she sees hunter flying on his palisman. completely unprovoked, the willow who normally never attacked or forced something on people for no reason, decides that the best way to scout this random guy she doesn't know is by encasing him in vines and dragging him to the ground, destroying the concrete in the process. this may have been portrayed as something of a slapstick comedy, but that kind of humor never stuck with me.

after willow explains herself to hunter, he agrees to join her team, thinking it would be an easy way to recruit students into the emperor's coven. fast forward, they get a few members to their group.

hunter notices that all of these members are visibly slacking off and gets discouraged. he turns to leave and willow stops him in his tracks. when she tells him to give them a chance, hunter ‘opens up’ to her a little, by telling her that he had to earn chances, especially as a “half a witch”. this comes out of nowhere because we never see hunter being referred to as half a witch by anyone prior to this. there were certainly characters who disliked him, like lilith and kikimora, but they called him names like “golden brat”. in fact, it's not even clear if anyone other than hunter and belos knows that he has no magic. the whole half a witch line was added so that hunter and willow would have something in common.

willow, instead of reasoning with hunter or respecting his choice to leave, drags him to the ground once again and seemingly teleports him back to the flyer derby team. while this may not have been done with malicious intent, it was still another instance of willow invading hunter's boundaries and forcing him to do something.

hunter is convinced that the team is, in fact, competent. he plays the game with them and has fun doing it. after getting the team captured to join the emperor's coven and saving them from darius, the episode ends with darius turning out to be the good guy and hunter getting a penstagram (or whatever they call it, i forgot).

after this, the huntlow scenes are very scarce. we barely see them interact, especially not alone with each other. in the next episode, we see willow standing up for hunter and hunter blushing and recognizing that the fake willow isn't willow. while this would be sweet for an already established couple, since hunter and willow barely had a bond at this point, it just comes off as hunter being observant. which is somewhat in character for him.

afterwards, there's just a sprinkle of this ship, most of it consisting of hunter being shy and nervous around willow. and willow treating him like she treats everyone else. there's no sign of willow liking hunter back until literally the episode before the finale. where, instead of focusing on hunter's recent trauma with being possessed by his abusive parent and losing his best friend, the show decides to focus on willow's issues instead. of course willow deserves her own arc, but she already got it back in s1. there was no reason to give her ANOTHER issue to work on, just so that hunter can comfort her and give her a reason to like him back.

overall, it was really forced and these two characters never had the kind of natural chemistry that sokka and suki did. their interactions were either awkward or surface-level wholesome. we get exactly two (2) episodes where they interact properly and even that isn't done well. it just feels like these characters were pushed into a ship dynamic that they didn't naturally fit into.

[spop-romanticizes-abuse]

“catra is a complex poc” fuck that. here are some ACTUAL poc animated characters who are just as, if not more complex than catra.

grace monroe (infinity train) • black american

connie maheshwaran (steven universe) • indian-american

katara (avatar the last airbender) • inuk

wolf (kipo and the age of wonderbeasts) • black american

suhara/shadowsan (carmen sandiego) • japanese

korra (the legend of korra) • inuk

jesse cosay (infinity train) • indigenous (apache)

lars barriga (steven universe) • filipino

azula (avatar the last airbender) • japanese

ryan akagi (infinity train) • japanese-canadian

luz noceda (the owl house) • afro-dominican american

(there are a lot more, so i'll be making a part 2!)

[letsplaythermalnuclearwar]

Which best describes the ship you're currently most obsessed with?

it doesn't have to accurately describe the ship, just the descriptor you think is the most fitting. all gendered language is there to preserve the meme and should be read as gender neutral. please reblog for a greater sample size. if you are equally obsessed with multiple ships or currently not obsessed with any, just pick a ship you enjoy (if you don't like any ships, the dynamic you think sounds the most entertaining)

edit: if multiple fit perfectly, chose the aspect you like best about the ship

[enemywasp]

WHY ARE PEOPLE EVEN IN FANDOMS ANYMORE

[derekfoxwit]

How Animation Discourse Can Feel At Times: The Complete Collection

[kiapet2]

Alright, it’s less than a week since the Owl House finale aired and as expected I’ve already seen two direct comparisons to Steven Universe’s ending and several more vague-blogs, because one of this site’s hobbies is using other queer shows to put down Steven Universe. So let’s do this, then. Let’s compare the endings of Owl House and Steven Universe, and what each is ultimately trying to say.

Steven Universe and the Owl House are both shows that deal heavily with the clash of individualism and self-expression vs. socially-mandated conformity, and both shows’ final villains ultimately embody this conflict. One major difference, however, is that Owl House approaches this from the perspective of legal/societal structures, while Steven Universe approaches it from the perspective of family structures.

Steven Universe has always been about family--and particularly the ways traumas and biases are passed down through a family--and it has always heavily used the language of metaphor to discuss these topics. The Diamonds are the ultimate extension of this theme, something a lot of bad-faith (or just bad) takes on the ending miss; they interpret the diamonds in their literal capacity as dictators, rather than the way Steven Universe always portrays them, which is as matriarchs, i.e. the heads of a family who dictate and control all the family’s other members. This metaphor becomes more and more blatant until it outright becomes text, with the Diamonds turning out to be Steven’s literal family members, with whom his part of the family is estranged because of their previous controlling behavior.

In accordance with this theme, we ultimately find out that the Diamonds’ toxic ideology, with its rigid standards of perfection, are not only something they enforce on the gems below them, but also on themselves. They are suffering from the system in their own ways, unable to live up to the standards they themselves created. And who among us hasn’t known someone like that? A parent or grandparent who grew up under a cruel, oppressive worldview, and instead of rebelling against it internalized it--who turned around and said “I dealt with this, and so can you”? And so the ending of Steven Universe is the Diamonds realizing exactly how toxic the rigid ideology they’ve spent their lives perpetuating really is, and confronting the fact that their adherence to this ideology is what destroyed their relationship with Pink, and that the only way they’re going to have a relationship with Steven is if they’re willing to commit to changing both themselves, and the family structure they’ve enforced for so long.

Emperor Belos, in contrast, is not suffering from the structures he created, because his rules were never meant to apply to him. He sees the witches (and demons, and so-on) as lesser beings, evil beings, who exist to be controlled, and ultimately, exterminated. And every element of the society he built--the schools, the government, the police force, the religion--he intentionally constructed to keep these lesser beings under his control. The real-world allegory isn’t hard to see, here. And because what Belos represents in the story is, in fact, a fascist leader, the story shows that he can’t be reasoned with in any way that matters, and instead he is ultimately ground into paste beneath the boots of the people he sought to destroy. Different themes, different endings.

Now the usual argument that comes up here is as follows: but the Steven Universe ending isn’t as realistic! Not everyone is going to change, not everyone is going to be able to be reasoned with. Not every older, conservative family member is eventually going to accept you for who you are. And while that is true, ultimately SU isn’t meant to be realistic; it’s meant to be a power fantasy. Rebecca Sugar has come out and said before that they wrote a world in which there was good in everyone, because that’s the way she wishes the world could be. That’s the world they want to be able to believe in. And I am never going to begrudge a person, much less a queer person, for finding healing in writing that kind of world.

But you know what else is unrealistic? What else is ultimately just a fantasy? Grinding your government’s fascist leader into paste under your boot, then taking over and remaking society into something that accepts everyone. Sadly, Trump is not likely to get his ass beat any time soon. And more generally, punching fascists, while ideologically sound, is something most people are not going to get to do, due to real-world consequences such as “getting beat up by the fascist’s angry friends” and “being arrested for assault”. And even if you did depose one leader, our very society is set up in a way that perpetuates all manner of injustices, and systemic change is a complex and lengthy process that almost certainly won’t be completed in our lifetimes. But it’s fun to imagine we could, isn’t it?

Both endings are power fantasies. Both show the way they want the world to be, rather than the way it is. They are very different power fantasies, which fill very different--and at times conflicting--needs. And in situations like that, internet culture really likes to pick one to be the right fantasy, the right way to look at the world. 

But the truth is, both fantasies are needed! Some people need stories about your queerphobic relatives finally realizing the error of their ways and taking the necessary steps to accept and reconcile with you. And some people need stories where you get to grind fascist bastards beneath the heel of your boot. It’s okay if you prefer one type of fantasy over the other! But in the end, both are valuable, and both are important. 

And isn’t it wonderful, for us to have such a diversity of great queer stories? That we can explore both of these deep, conflicting needs? Let’s appreciate each of these fantastic works for what it was meant to be, rather than trying to pit them against each other or make them conform to a single, “best” way to tell a story.

[sjbattleangel]

Whenever discourse around cartoons like Steven Universe, She-Ra, The Owl House, The Legend Of Korra, video games like Spider-Man 2, Life Is Strange, Alan Wake 2, Forspoken, Usual June, Dustborn, comics like Ms. Marvel, Ironheart, Champions, Unstoppable Wasp and other diverse media pops up...

I'll leave this here:

Lisa Simpson presentation: 'Diverse Media made by and/or staring women and marginalized groups are always held to way higher, harsher, unrealistic standards compared to media made by and starring non-diverse groups of people (especially cishet white men).'

[averysherwood]

A guide to determine who are siblings and who are not on the example of TOH

Follow the instructions below and don't harass people for nothing

1. Do they have the same parents?

Yes? Congratulations, they are siblings! ✅

2. Do they have one same parent?

Yes? Cool, they're siblings! ✅

3. Is one of them adopted by another's parent(s) / Are both of them adopted into the same family?

Yes? No questions, they are siblings! ✅

4. Do they have the same parental figure who raised them / Do they call each other brother/sister?

Yes? Then... It's complicated. They're not siblings in the usual sense, but it's still really wierd to see them in a romantic way, even if they don't have any other problems (king x luz clearly does have other problems, don't get me wrong)

5. Is none of the above list suitable for characters in question?

I have some news for you, they are NOT siblings! ❌

You can headcanon them whatever you want, but it doesn't give you any rights to harass people who doesn't see them in the way you see!

[alex-rambles]

I don't even ship Luz x Hunter but some of yall are genuinely awful about how adamant you are about this ship being bad. Yall will be screaming "sweet home alabama" if you see Lunter art bc "tHey'rE siBLiNgS." No. They are not.

It'd be one thing if Luz's mom adopted Hunter. But if your excuse is "Well in Thanks to Them-" then Lumity is also incest bc Camila said "I never expected to be a mother of SIX." Which counts Amity.

If you're saying "well they ACT like siblings," genuinely just stop because my boyfriend and I have the same dynamic??? Relationships have more to them than "heehee handholding and kissing and blushing." Sometimes there's arguing (playful and otherwise). Sometimes relationships are more relaxed.

And if you're saying "but Luz is dating AMITY," cool, in canon, she is. Multishippers exist. AUs exist. Poly ships exist.

Just because a ship can't be canonically possible because another relationship is implied (Huntlow, which I ship) or active (Lumity, which I also ship) doesn't mean that anyone shipping outside of canon is bad.

So on that note, if you're crying about it because "it's just not canon," you better not have ANY ships outside of canon in other materials. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

It's one thing to have a ship you don't like. I don't like Lunter either. But yall need to stop accusing people of being proshippers or endorsing "incest" because they drew two characters who are not biologically (like shipping, idk, Dipper and Mabel) or legally (as in the case of Gumball and Darwin) related.

Have your headcanons. Have your ships. Stop shitting on people who don't follow them.

[hikaaa-bi]

hot take: gustholomule was way better developed and had more chemistry than huntlow, despite not being a canon ship

[spop-romanticizes-abuse]

oh btw the existence of real witches with magical powers destroys any commentary toh was trying to make about the witch trials.

because guess what? the witch trials were just a glorified form of misogyny. it wasn't directed towards people with actual magical powers (obviously) or even people with any power or autonomy at all. the witch trials was a way to make sure that women stayed powerless and any attempt to be an individual, outside of social expectations, would get them killed.

so applying all of that to a setting where witches are real and can defend themselves defeats the whole point. yes, these witches are still nice people (mostly) but the commentary about puritan dogma and the witch trials doesn't really hold up because they're mixing it with fantasy. witches aren't an oppressed group, they are not helpless and tortured in the way women were in the era of witch trials.

i think real world social commentary could definitely be applied to a fantasy setting and carried out efficiently, but not in this instance. toh trashes the direct connection between witch trials and misogyny, and makes it seem like people who publicly burned women at the stake or hanged them.. kind of had a point because witches exist and are naturally stronger than human beings. it doesn't matter if the witches are good or not because this is no longer an act of discrimination and oppression, as it was in the real world.

[candyskiez]

what if we badly summarized the plots of our interests. I'll start

1. tiny neurodivergent bisexual with internalized ableism goes into a fantasy world and learns how to be an anarchist

2. chosen ones but make it an abuse allegory

3. kid goes to sleep and wakes up to literal mass murder

4. kid makes an entire fantasy RPG in his brain as his childhood friends lives fall apart due to their respective trauma

5. several lives are ruined because a kid stopped eating a sandwich and found a cool rock instead

6. several people are forced into high risk therapy by a morally ambiguous robot and also try to kill each other sometimes

7. a trans shark teaches a gay guy the power of incredible violence and fuck the police. the gay guy then proceeds to take that sentiment extremely literally.

[autistic-ben-tennyson]

While I’m not a Luz/Hunter shipper, I do think it gets too much flack from hardcore Lumity fans. After looking at fandom discourse last night, I kind of realized it has some similarities with another controversial ship which happens to be my OTP. That being Shinji/Rei from NGE. A depressed 14 year old befriends an imperfect clone who slowly breaks out of their shell and becomes their own individual despite being made to serve a cruel master. TV tropes even describes Hunter as a male example of a Rei Ayanami Expy. The arguments against them by antis are even kind of similar.

Two arguments that have been levied against both are “they’re sibling coded” and “it’s gay erasure”. First, Luz is bisexual and can be in a M/F relationship and Shinji doesn’t have a confirmed sexuality. Liking Lunter or Reishin does not make someone a homophobe who hates Lumity or Kawoshin. The sibling criticism is based off Rei having some of Yui’s DNA which makes people uncomfortable at the idea of pairing her with Shinji and how people view Luz and Hunter as adoptive siblings. The romantic implications were more explicit in the rebuilds and manga but were there in the 90s anime too and there’s no problematic elements like incest or pedophilia in Luz and Hunter’s dynamic.

I never picked up on the similarities between these pairings until now but both get too much hate from the fandoms. If you don’t like it, fine, but leave people who do like it alone. It’s like people haven’t learned a thing from the SU fandom about not bullying people for liking a different pairing.

[strawberry-slushy]

i hate whenever artists just mind their own business, shipping a non canon ship and then the canon shippers come into the comments of their art “___ is canon!” as if the op doesn’t know that.

it’s not that hard to just block and scroll please and thanks.

[jack-fruit]

Sorry but personally disagree with everyone mad that Hunter wasn't there when Belos died. Like you are absolutely allowed to have wanted to see that confrontation but idk personally I don't think Belos deserved that. Hunter already had his final confrontation with Belos in Thanks to Them and personally I wouldn't want to shoehorn him into the final confrontation just so I could have every detail of Belos's life spelled out when we already have enough details to piece together the story on our own.

[aroaceconfessions]

I'm so sick of people saying stuff like "oh well aroaces can still date/have sex!!!" and "oriented aroace people and queerplatonic relationships exist!!!" when people say to stop being aphobic towards canon sex and romo repulsed aroaces.

I'm specifically talking about lilith clawthorne from the owl house here. she's canon aroace and is literally confirmed to be sex and romo repulsed.

I'm so sick of people saying "she's an aroace lesbian" and stuff. not every aroace person has to have another orientation and experience tertiary attraction. and I'm saying this as an oriented aroace person!! I'm so sick of fandoms being so aphobic towards aroace characters. we barely get any aroace characters yet people have to complain so fucking much because they can't ship one fucking character

Submitted March 14, 2023