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falquinold · 4 years ago

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MY FORMAL DEMAND TO BE GIVEN THE RIGHTS TO (1) JOAQUIN TORRES. ( AKA - The Big Canon Expansion Post™ )

steve vc: so.... you got played by the writers. you put your trust in them when you probably shouldn’t have. they lured you in with a false sense of security and promises of representation, and then ripped the carpet from below your feet. and the sad thing is... this isn’t the first time.

hey! stupid opening aside, this is gonna be my explanation of torres’ backstory up to his presence in the falcon and the winter soldier, including the character arc that i believe he would have had if the show had been allowed to keep its original 10 episodes. this is mostly based around my own personal headcanons, so i please ask that you don’t steal or reblog this!

anyway, putting it under a cut since it’s longer than i thought it’d be!

PART 1: PRE-IW.

like in the comics, joaquin immigrated to the united states from mexico with his mother and grandmother when he was 6 years old. they moved to sonoita, arizona, where they soon found a place to live and started to settle into their new life. while the first half of his school years consisted of him working twice as hard as any of his classmates due to the faults in the american public education system, he eventually shot up the class list, earning his spot as valedictorian by the end of his high school career.

this caught the attention of multiple military recruiters, who came to his school with hopes of swaying as many teens (specifically teens of color) to join the forces as possible. with promises of great pay, free housing and healthcare for himself and his family, and the opportunity to use his intelligence to help ‘change the world for the better,’ the eager 17-year-old didn’t even have to think twice. that very same week that they showed up at his school, joaquin had taken the asvab test and passed with flying colors, soon putting in his application for the air force academy.

the next 3 years went by in a flash - joaquin moved out of his home and to the academy in colorado, along with 1000 other teenagers who had found themselves in a similar position. he remained at the top 5% of his class, though all of his studies did nothing to prepare him for the day that thanos and his army broke through the atmosphere.

PART 2: IW --> ENDGAME.

in the 3 years that joaquin had been a student at the academy, the strict schedule of his day had never been broken. however, when the giant spaceship hovered over new york, thousands of students crowded around any available tv to stop and stare. he watched for what seemed like hours, frantically texting his mother to make sure that she and his grandmother were safe back at home in arizona. everyone watched with baited breath, until the students in the mess hall started disappearing. everything went in slow motion after that, with the blaring alarms ringing and the remaining teachers instructing everyone to go back to their dorms. the halls filled with dust and the yells for people that had vanished into thin air.

calls and texts weren’t going through, and the news stations that everyone had been anchored to soon showed nothing but static. after a day, the school allowed for people to leave, and joaquin took his car and made his way back to arizona as fast as he could. he burst through the doors of his childhood home, to see dust settled on the couch in front of the tv that still blared on. he was alone.

the few weeks remaining of the school year had been cut short, and in that time joaquin found himself spiraling. at the advice of one of his teachers, he sought out peer counseling, and eventually was able to come to terms with what had happened. at the end of that summer, the true nature of what had happened had finally dawned on the population - the avengers wouldn’t be saving them and their family members. nobody was coming back. the world continued to spin on, and with that, was the air force academy sending for the remaining students to finish out the rest of their time there. joaquin, now a senior and only 21 years old, was left with no choice but to sell his childhood home and pack as many family memories as he could into the trunk of his car, making his way back out to colorado to finish what he had started.

the school looked like a ghost town, and the air of dread and grief hung around all year. at graduation, there were still the same 1000 seats on the football field. however, half of them remained empty - memorials for the dead scattered amongst the living.

after graduation, joaquin started his service. he started renting a small one bedroom apartment outside of langley air force base in virginia, where he had been recently stationed. he threw himself into his work, moving up the ranks and proving himself for 4 years, up until the very moment that the dead started coming back to life. he found himself right back at his childhood home, where the new inhabitants had freaked out over the people that had revived themselves in the living room. after realizing what had happened outside, they had allowed them to stay there until joaquin could make his way down to find them. after a series of long hugs and tears shed outside the house that he grew up in, he took them back to his apartment where they tried to make sense of what had happened.

PART 3: THE FALCON AND THE WINTER SOLDIER.

six months after the dead had returned, joaquin’s family still lived in his small apartment. it was nearly impossible for anybody to find a new home when half of the world’s population needed places to stay. relieved that his survival meant the avoidance of the rapidly-filling grc camps, he and his family were more than happy to make do with what they had. he’d become the sole supporter of the household at 26 years old as his mother struggled to find somewhere to work, and he yet again poured himself into his own job, but he brought a new sense of optimism into the mix. the family that he mourned for years had returned to him. in his eyes, anything was possible.

he soon found himself working alongside sam wilson, acting as his ‘boots on the ground’ and as his intel provider for his missions alongside the air force. after a successful rescue of one of his supervising officers from batroc and his crew, he found himself starstruck at what the man was able to accomplish completely on his own. the two quickly bonded and joaquin offered his help wherever he could give it, especially after sam seemed to take an interest in the flag smashers, a group that joaquin had been following since the creation of the grc camps. promising that he’d continue to watch the group’s movements online and notify sam if things started to escalate, joaquin found himself in switzerland just a couple days later, figuring that the best way to get information would be to get in the mix himself. that lands him with a broken orbital thanks to a man that has super strength, hinting at the possibility of the flag smashers being much more than meets the eye.

after the reveal of john walker as captain america, the air force immediately puts both him and lemar on the newly formed flag smasher case. due to his discovery of the group, joaquin is recruited onto the team as the only intel officer, helping to locate any and all information on the group and keep walker and hoskins up to date as they go and try to apprehend them. at the same time, sam is running his own mission on the side, as he’s able to use redwing to track the flag smashers to an abandoned warehouse in munich. joaquin drops everything to fly the plane and take them there. he doesn’t know that the ops department put a hidden tracker inside of redwing, but that revelation makes him start to become weary of them when sam tells him.

after he returns to langley air force base from munich, he’s immediately spoken to by his superiors. he’s no longer under orders to help sam wilson, as that was a one-time mission to save captain vassant, and is told to instead focus his energy on what he was assigned to - assisting walker and hoskins. he’s not punished for his actions, but there’s a threat should he get caught helping someone with air force resources again. he agrees, though has no intentions on stopping his contact with sam. joaquin calls him after that, letting him know what went down and how he had to be more careful if he wanted to keep being able to help with things. he keeps his head down for a while, just doing what’s asked of him while trying to keep an ear out.

eventually, he’s called by sam and asked to find information on donya madani. he finds out that she and karli were registered at the camp in riga, lativa, and that she appeared to hold a loved position within the community. because of the rising threat of the flag smashers, the air force adds two more intel officers onto the case, which keeps joaquin from being able to delay information from getting to walker. he’s only able to buy sam and bucky a couple hours, before walker and hoskins meet them in latvia and the rest of episode 4′s events unfold.

joaquin sees the video of the murder in the plaza along with the rest of the world, and immediately watches as the base turns to chaos with the higher ups seeking to take control of the situation. his scene with sam remains the same, and he excitedly picks up the bag with the wings and keeps it in the trunk of his car. he then goes back to dc (?), where walker’s punishments are set to be read to him. as a part of the team, he’s told to stand at the back of the room and bear witness, and he hears the accusations that he spews to the government officials. he doesn’t expect them to make sense, taking the seeds of doubt that had planted themselves after being told to work against sam and sprouting them into a genuine distaste for the air force.

before he can leave, he’s stopped by the major from the vassant mission, a man that he’s known since his first days out of the academy. he reminds joaquin about the upcoming run of promotions, and how he’s been a first lieutenant long enough to apply for captain if he wanted to. with the reputation that he got after being the one to discover and report about the flag smashers, the major tells him that he was almost guaranteed to make the promotion if he applied for it. with walker’s voice still echoing in his head, and the wings now passed down to him, he hesitates and plays it off as being humble, telling the man that he’ll think about it.

during the time that passes during the montage, joaquin spends his time trying to locate the flag smashers while fixing his wings in secret back at his apartment, until he finally realizes that their next target is new york. since the wings aren’t finished by that time, he offers to help as himself, pushing the fact that he told sam he was his boots on the ground, and he meant it. meeting them in new york, joaquin worked to evacuate people from the buildings, and was the person to hack into the flag smasher app to apprehend them. he’s also there with the big circle of people as sam has his speech to the government official, a giant smile on his face. it’s in that moment that he makes his decision regarding his promotion - sam was able to help countless more people in just a week (?) than joaquin had in the four years after his graduation from the air force academy. he doesn’t put in an application for promotion, and makes a mental note to leave the air force in the next couple months, once his 5 years of contractual post-grad service are completed.

a few days later, joaquin video calls sam to show him the fixed wings, extremely proud of himself. sam then starts training him to take over the falcon mantle, and joaquin starts getting accustomed to the superhero world that he’s found himself in and everything that it entails.

#tfatws spoilers /#✷ ━━━━ « SAVED. »#[ this goes without saying but if the character you write is mentioned and you're canon divergent in any way #i am more than willing to accommodate that!! this is just a solid baseline as far as the eps themselves go so that i can get a feel of what #his mindset would be in any given scene! <333 ]#[ this took me...way too long but it's important let me have this ]#[ baby falcon gang how are we feeling ]

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1a-imagines · 5 years ago

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A knights promise

[Characters: Izuku Midoriya]

[Overview: He swore to become your loyal knight so he would never have to leave your side again.]

[A/n: I'm not saying Knight izuku has my entire fucking heart but- that's exactly what i'm saying. I love him.]

"Come now honey, sulking in bed wont change a thing." Your father patted your back as you shoved your small head into one of the many silk pillows on your bed. It was a bed that was comically large for a child your size, but that’s the perks of being royalty, you could have just about anything you wished for.

There weren't many things royalty could complain about, there was no doubt you had almost everything a person could ever want! But being a ten year old with no friends, only butlers and maids surrounding you day and night, would make anyone a bit upset. Especially when the servants had jobs to do and no time to play around.

"There's no one else around here that’s my age! It gets really lonely." Came your muffled reply but all your father could do was chuckle at your huffy behaviour.

“What about your brothers?”

The mention of her older brothers made her groan. “They’re boring now too! They never have time for me anymore!”

As her brothers grew older the more duties they had to fulfill, whether it was training to fight or learning the in’s and out’s of being proper royalty they were always busy with something. Which meant they had little free time to spend with their sister. You used to find them annoying, as do most siblings, but now you missed the time you all used to spend together.

“I can’t believe I finally made a friend my age and he lives outside of the kingdom.” You sighed solemnly.

A few years back you and your family would often go into town to talk with the people and help around. The kingdom wasn’t the richest in the lands, nor was it the biggest but life here was happy and your father liked to show you and your brothers how the town worked. Everyone helped each other to live comfortable lives and it was your duty to check up on them and fix any problems in order to maintain peace.

You remembered your father was preoccupied with talking to a bakery owner when you noticed a mop of green hair poking out from the side of a building. Being the curious child you were, you stared at it to see what it was? A person? A fluffy animal? Your imagination ran wild with thoughts until a head poked out to look at you. As soon as the boy saw you staring back he turned red and jumped back into his hiding place.

You smiled at the memory. You were only 6 years old at the time and yet you two were able to form a friendship like no other. You remembered walking over to him and calling him out for spying but it turns out he was just curious about you, having never seen someone dressed so fancy in town before. You two spent the whole day talking and playing pretend around the kingdom. It was much more fun than standing around as your father talked to the townspeople.

The two of you were inseparable from that day forward.

But the sad news was that he lived outside of the kingdom with his mom and only came to town to buy food or sell produce once a week. So you two were only able to see each other when he was visiting and for years it stayed that way. You would wait on the outskirts of the kingdom every Tuesday at precisely midday for them to show up and the two of you would spend the day talking and playing around as his mom took care of chores.

As you grew closer your parents allowed you to stay over at each other's homes every so often too! You would never forget the way his jaw dropped once he set foot inside the castle. The look of awe on his face as you showed him around was nothing short of hilarious! He made such a big deal over every little thing that you were so used to. Like being served the best food in the lands! Or having so much indoor space to run around! Or the amount of servants that were willing to serve him simply because he was your friend!

The first time you went over to his small little cottage you were awestruck too! It was so tiny! You couldn't comprehend how they lived together in such a small space! Your bedroom was bigger than their house!

They even did all the work on their small plot of land themselves! They grew vegetables and took care of animals, cooked their own foods and cleaned their house without any help from servants! It was like a completely different world to yours but you were thankful for the experience! His home life was so cozy, even if they did not share the same riches as you. You liked to think the whole experience had made you more down to earth.

You realised how thankful you should be for all you had and you swore to yourself that anytime you came over you would help them with their work as much as you could!

You even forced the two royal guards that accompanied you at all times to help them as well.

You two were polar opposites in terms of lifestyle but it made things more interesting. You had taught each other so much in just a few short years! Never did you think you would work on a farm!! It was dirty and sometimes a bit gross but it only made you appreciate all the commoners in your kingdom. They all worked very hard to make a living.

It was safe to say that your friendship had grown pretty strong in those 4 years, even if you couldn’t spend every day together. He had to help his mom with work around their farm and you weren’t allowed outside of the kingdom since there were a lot of dangerous people who would jump at the chance to snag a princess and sell her back for heaps of jewels.

But that didn’t stop you from having guards deliver letters and gifts to him and his mom. You cared for them as if they were your own family now, they had been nothing but kind to you and you wouldn't trade your friendship with him for the world.

He just had a way of making you so happy! His smile alone was enough to cheer you up and you were sure that this was a once in a lifetime sort of friendship.

“Yes, I know. I hear this complaint everytime you miss him- and you miss him a lot.” You could hear the amusement in your father's voice. His tone made you wonder if he knew something that you didn’t? Why wasn't he taking you seriously? Why was he brushing you off and laughing at your misery?

You pulled your head from your pillow and sent him a glare to tell him you weren’t amused. You were in no means a bratty child but you could get pretty grumpy when you hadn’t seen Izuku for awhile.

“Oh don’t give me that look, you’re lucky he misses you too.” Your father gave you one last path to your back before standing up from his seat on the edge of your bed.

“What does that mean?”

Your father opened the large double doors to your room and as soon as you saw that messy green hair that you adored so much, peek through you dashed forward without second thought. You almost knocked your father over in the process.

You wrapped your arms around him tightly with a smile that could rival the brightness of the sun. “IZU!”

“Y-Y/n-!” You were aware that you were crushing him with your hug but you couldn’t help yourself. You had missed him so much! You let him go and grabbed his hands in yours. “What are you doing here!?”

“I came to see you of course! My mom said I’m allowed to stay here for a few days since I’ve been working extra hard on the farm!!” His smile rivaled your own.

He had been running around all week, trying to be the best golden child he could be and do all the jobs his mom wanted done just so he could spend some time with you. He was tired and it had been a lot of hard work but seeing your radiant smile made it all worth it to him.

You turned to your dad knowing he must have had something to do with this too. Perhaps he had sent his mom a letter to ask permission for him to stay with them for awhile?

Your father reached down to pat the top of your small head. “Don’t say I never do anything for you. Try not to cause too much trouble you two, and be in bed by 9pm, I’ll make sure to have the guards check on you so no rule breaking!” He warned with a gentle smile and you both nodded enthusiastically. No amount of rules could bring down your spirits! You were going to make every second together a special one.

As soon as the doors shut you began jumping up and down unable to contain the excitement you felt. “I’m so happy!! I can’t wait!! We’re going to have so much fun! We can play games and tell stories and oh! I can even show you some of the magic I've been learning in my magic lessons!!”

Seeing him take the bag he had on his back off and put in on the ground made you feel giddy. It was probably filled with clothes and other necessities. It just made this whole thing feel more real! He wasn’t going to be leaving anytime soon and you could spend the next few days making memories and having as much fun as you possibly could!

And so you did just that.

The next few days were spent, baking with the chefs in the kitchen (and ultimately resulting in a food fight and then being scolded for the mess), showing him the new spells you had learned, reading stories together, playing games, having the guards teach you both to spar and pulling pranks on your brothers. Though Izuku was a lot less enthusiastic about the last one, he felt awful for pranking royalty! Even if it wasn’t his idea. Luckily your brothers took it well, though they swore revenge on you two and that scared him more than anything.

You felt like you hadn’t smiled or laughed this much in so long, it was perfect. You wished it could always be this way. That he never had to leave again. The castle just wasn’t the same without him around.

It was the night before he had to leave you again. The moon shone brightly, it was high up in the sky reminding you of how you were both breaking curfew. But neither of you wanted to sleep. The sooner you slept the sooner he would have to leave. You didn't want to sleep and waste those precious seconds with each other.

You were both sitting on your large window, staring out at the beautiful clear night sky as you tried to name all the constellations. Though, knowing this was the last night you two would be together before he disappeared for another week or two, had made you too upset to concentrate on what he was actually saying.

You pulled your legs to your chest with a sigh and that got him to stop talking and turn away from the stars to focus his attention on you. “What's wrong?” his small voice asked, his big green eyes filled with worry. You glanced up at him with a frown, “You know what’s wrong… You’re going back home tomorrow and I won’t be able to see you for weeks! I always have so much fun when you’re around… I feel as if I'm at my happiest with you! But-” you curled up tighter and turned your head away, “But you always have to leave and then I’m left alone again!"

Izuku listened to every word with his mouth partly agape. He understood how you felt. He was always happiest when he was with you too. He missed you every second you were apart, he had never had a friend before you and you were his most precious person. Even if he was too shy to say so out loud. It always felt so surreal that he was best friends with the Princess herself but he wouldn’t trade any of this for the world.

He crawled forward until your legs brushed together. He leaned over to place his small hand on top of yours. It was such a gentle and innocent action that was only intended to soothe a solem friend.

“But no matter how long I’m away for I will always come back to you, and every second we are away I promise to think of you. Maybe if I think hard enough you’ll be able to feel how much I miss you and you won't feel as alone!”

You blinked at his words. “How will I hear if you think about it? If you want it to reach me you will have to yell to the gods and then they will give me the message and every night I’ll yell back so you know I miss you too! But make sure to yell, really, super duper loud. Ok?”

“Ok! I promise I’ll yell as loud as I can!” He nodded so determinedly that you had no doubt that he would keep to his promise. Satisfied with his reply the pair of you fell into a silence as you sat and watched the stars twinkling from the confines of your dark room. It was peaceful, and the way the moon illuminated the two of you and your surroundings seemed magical.

There was nothing in the world that you would trade this moment for.

“You know… the past few weeks we were apart, i’ve been thinking a lot.” You heard Izuku start. You took notice of the way he nervously fiddled with his hands as well as how he seemed to smile like he was content with whatever he was thinking. “I can’t see you more because I have to work and help my mom, and you can’t leave the kingdom because it’s too dangerous..” He continued before suddenly looking up at you and it was only then that you realised how red his cheeks were.

“I want to become your knight!!” He exclaimed.

“Huh!?” You felt your cheeks heat up at the sudden declaration.

“Well.. If I work hard to become your knight then not only can we be together everyday but I’ll be able to protect you from all the dangers out there too! And that’s all I want in my life! ” He sent you a closed eye grin.

“When I grow up I promise to become the best knight in the land for you. I will protect you with my life and stay by your side forever! Then we never have to be apart again!”

----

Ah what a silly little promise that was made between ten year olds. It had been 13 years since that night and-

You honestly had not expected him to stay true to his words!

“Princess.” Your ever faithful knight bowed down on one knee to you and you couldn’t help but roll your eyes at his formal behaviour. Especially when no one else was around to see it. There was no need to put on a front when you were alone. “You’re guests are awaiting your arrival.”

“What have I told you about formalities? You may be my personal knight but you’re also much more than that.” You crossed your arms and Izuku looked up at you with a playful glint in his eyes. “I don’t say it for formalities, I say It out of love. A pet name if you will? You are my princess after all.” He stood up, enjoying the way your face turned red.

“You’ve gotten a bit bold lately, aren’t you still worried about someone finding out? A princess and her appointed knight dating is a bit taboo after all.” You watched as he stepped forward to take your hand into his. He always held you as if you were the most delicate thing on the planet and it never failed to make your heart swell. Even with just a simple touch he was able to show how much he loved you, how he would never dare let any harm come to you.

"We've been keeping this secret for two years now- almost three. I'm starting to find myself not caring who finds out anymore. I want them all to know how much I love you." His hand came up to gently brush through some of your stray hair. The action made you close your eyes. It was blissful to be able to share these moments with him.

"I wish for that too, but if word were to spread around we could both be in danger. There are dangerous people out there that would use this love against us." It was saddening to know that you two could never be open with your relationship. It seemed that you always had obstacles in your way, and yet your love for each still bloomed and stood strong. You knew this was that true love all of those stories you'd read as a child would talk about. There was no doubt in your mind. Your relationship may have only been going on for three years but your love for each other had been around for much much longer.

"Yes.. I know." It was selfish of him to think of showing his love for you to the world given the dangers but he could at least dream about it, right? "At least I'm able to spend all my time with you and no one dares question it since I am your loyal knight. Even if you hadn't returned my feelings I would have been content just to stay by your side." He leaned down to press a kiss to the back of your hand before holding out his arm for you to take.

"Now shall we? Your guests are still waiting for you."

You let out a groan and hesitantly took his arm. "Fine, let's get this over with." You muttered bitterly, knowing what was waiting for you in the grand hall. "But you know my orders right?"

You saw Izuku nod from the corner of your eye. "I will stay by your side the entire night. You don't even have to give the signal, as soon as any bachelors try to steal you away I will be there to save you. Even if I can't be open with my love for you, I wouldn't dare let anyone steal you from me." He declared as you walked the empty halls. He still kept his voice low even if there was no one else around. All the servants had gathered in the grand hall to serve the royals at the party but there was no harm in being cautious.

"As if they could." You scoffed and tightened your hold on his arm. "No prince from any land could match up to you. You don't just own a piece of my heart, you have all of it. That cannot be changed."

A smile crept onto your lips as you watched his cheeks turn red. He may be one of the top knights in the kingdom- hell, he was known as one of the strongest in the lands! But he was still so easily embarrassed, so easy to tease, he still held a lot of the same traits he did when he was younger, staying true to the shy, sweet boy he was. Although now, he wasn't as weak and you could tell just from holding onto his muscular arm.

He wasn't as innocent either, but that was more your doing. You tried to hide your smirk as you recalled all the times he had to bite down on your pillows to muffle his needy moans from any nearby servants. He had even torn a few of them from how harshly he had to bite them. It may be awful to hide your love but it was very fun to see him try to contain himself. The risk of being caught added a certain spice to it all as well. It was a wonder how you had never been caught after three years of this same routine.

The party was exactly as you expected it to be. Extravagant and filed with royalty. You could already feel the gazes upon you as soon as you entered the room. Kings and princes alike staring you down and hoping to get the chance to talk to you and arrange a marriage so your kingdoms could be united. It made you sick, not that all of them were bad people, but you were already in love and the thought of having to marry another man was what made your stomach churn.

Izuku must have felt you tense up because his hand came up to place itself on top of yours. "Don't worry, I'm here. Just smile and brush them off, they won't dare bother the princess and risk ruining their chances at an arranged marriage." He said with a smile, though the smile was only for show. You could see in his eyes this bothered him just as much as it did you.

You had been doing this song and dance for years, you should be used to it by now but every time proved just as torturous as the last.

"You certainly take your time." You turned to the source of the voice to see your brother standing there. His wife of five years on his arm, they looked happy and you couldn't help but envy the fact he was allowed to be open with his love. Lucky him, falling in love with a princess. He never had to worry about what people would think or worry about losing her. Their love was considered a blessing from the start.

"Brother." You bowed before him and he laughed. "Took you this long to show your big brother some respect huh?"

"Well, you are the king now. It would be rude not to show the king some respect." You replied with a smile. You father had passed away a few years back which meant your eldest brother now took the role of king. He did suit the part well, he was just like your father in many ways and you knew he would make a great ruler.

Your brother chuckled again. "See? She only acts like this in front of other people. Perhaps we should throw parties more often so I can get a bit of respect from her every now and then." He told his wife who laughed with him.

'Oh god please don't throw anymore parties.' You silently pleaded as your brother let go of his wife and stepped forward. "Actually, I have some great news! I've found a prince for you! I know you’ve been picky about it and you’re not all too thrilled about the idea but he has a lot of the same interests as you, I made sure he was down to earth and not a stuck up snob, and he's quite handsome too- not more than me of course but i'm sure he'll fit your low standards just fine." You would have elbowed him for that jab at you had the dread in your stomach not settled in already.

Your brother was not aware of your love for Izuku, otherwise you were sure he wouldn't have bothered with all this. But you refrain from telling him out of fear you two might be separated. The relationship between you two was to stay mostly professional, everyone knew you two were best friends but to be more than that could cause problems. In fact, even being best friends had made a few people worry that he was not fit to be your knight. Feelings could get in the way and distract him from his main duty. The relationship was supposed to be strictly professional so he could focus on protecting you.

Somehow izuku had managed to convince your family he would let no such thing happen, and he stayed true to his word. He never let himself slack off from his job even if you tempted him to. He was always prepared to protect you with his life and he trained hard everyday to make sure he was fit enough to be your protector.

“Ah- brother- about that.. I'm not sure…" but before you could protest further a tall, handsome man with kind eyes was shoved in front of you and you were being introduced to each other. “Why don't we leave them alone for a bit. Come with us, Midoriya.” and thus you were left to helplessly watch as Izuku, your emotional support, was taken away from you. How could you get through this party if he wasn’t there to keep you from losing your mind?!

You ended up being stuck talking with this prince for hours, listening to him talk about his family, his kingdom ect. He seemed nice enough, you had no problem with him. Under normal circumstances you were sure you two would get along just fine!

At least he wasn’t being rude to you like a few other snobby princes had in the past. But no matter how nice he was you could never love him.

Not in the same way you loved your precious Izuku. This was never going to work out for you. You refused to subject yourself to mindlessly talking with a guy you had no interest in. You weren’t even really listening to him, your eyes were glued to Izuku the whole time. He was standing by one of the walls along with a few of the other knights. His eyes never left you either, the rest of the room faded away as you longingly stared at each other, but with your brother's eyes on you, you both felt obligated to stay away.

The more you stared at him the more your heart tugged you towards him. You were unable to take any more of this, you craved to be encased in his arms. To have him pet your hair as he whispered loving words into your ears as he always did when you were upset or stressed. Why did the world always have to keep you apart when all you wanted was to be by each others sides?

You shook your head in frustration. The staring from all the other royals, forcing yourself to smile and act interested, having to be torn away from the one you really wanted to spend your time with. It was everything you hated all at once and you suddenly felt your patience snap in two.

With a sigh you stopped the prince from speaking any further by raising your hand. “I apologise but I need to go now.”

Was all you left him with before walking off, not caring how rude you might have seemed. All you cared about was rushing over to your knight.

You weaved through the endless crowd of people to get to him. He perked up immediately seeing you walk over, pushing himself from the wall and meeting you halfway. “Let’s go Izuku.”

He followed you out of the grand hall and through the long hallways, his step in time with yours as to stay close to your side. The walk was silent, he got worried when he saw that look in your eyes. You looked exhausted, frustrated, upset and he suddenly felt he should have done more to help you back there.

Though the knight held no authority against a prince and to intervene would be highly inappropriate. Not to mention it would raise suspicions, Especially when the king himself had told Izuku to give you some space so you could converse with your "potential future husband", he couldn’t go against the king! He felt so helpless! The whole time he was staring at you he was trying to think up a way to get you out of there and back by his side.

He would be lying if he said he hadn’t been a little bit jealous of the prince taking up your time but it hurt him even more to see that look of sadness in your eyes as you forced yourself to endure it all.

As soon as the doors to your bedroom closed you turned to him and the spark of determination in your eyes made him freeze up. Your expression had completely changed and it had startled him. You looked so upset a second ago that he had half expected you to cry or rush into his arms for a hug. What was running through your mind?

“Lets run away together.”

“WHAT!?”

“Shh!” you panicked at his outburst, hopefully no one was around to hear it. “I said let's run away together. I can’t deal with this life anymore.”

He didn’t know what to say. Run away? It was so sudden. You had always seemed pretty content with your life here. Especially when he started living in the castle. His room was right by yours and you were able to spend everyday together like you had always dreamed of as children. Not only that but you had a wonderful family and everything you could ever want, and now you suddenly wanted to run away?

“Princess… I don’t think you’ve thought this through- You’re tired from the party and you must feel upset from having to deal with all of that but- running away? That’s a really big deal.” He tried to reason, running away with you sounded like a dream but he couldn’t just agree when it would mean you would be leaving your family and whole kingdom behind. You would be giving up so much to run away with him and it would be selfish of him to jump at the chance.

“Is it? Think about it! I'm never going to become queen or anything- especially since I refuse to marry any of those princes. It’s not like I have duties to fulfill, I’m practically just around for show at this point.” You argued as you brushed past him.

“I know but..” he weakly tried to argue but his feelings were stopping him from doing so. As your knight he had to pull some sense into you, but… as your lover he would want nothing more to be free with you. To love you openly and not have to worry about arranged marriages or sneaking around 24/7.

You grabbed a hold of his hand and smiled up at him with nothing but love in your eyes. “It may seem like some rash decision but this has crossed my mind many times before.” You spoke softly.

Your room was dark with only the moon to illuminate it just like it had the same night he made that promise to you when you were ten years old. The day he swore to become your knight and protect you forever.

“You remember what you said to me all those years ago. Right over there.” You said as your eyes turned to the window, he followed your gaze. Of course he remembers how he could ever forget? “You said all you ever wanted in life was to protect me and stay by my side forever and that’s all I want to. To be by your side. Forever.” You gazed into his eyes and he couldn’t help but admire the way the moon light bounced off your face, it was a breathtaking sight. You looked like a goddess, your skin was shining, your eyes sparkling.

He couldn’t believe that you were really his. That your heart belonged to him.

“Imagine how freeing it could be! We could go on adventures! See the world! Maybe someday settle down somewhere and start a family, but most of all we would no longer have to worry about princes or hiding our love. That’s all I want! Not riches or parties or fancy clothes, none of that matters to me when you’re around. You’re all I need.” You finished.

He must have been trying to hold it back but you still noticed the way his eyes gleamed with tears. You reached up a hand to cup his cheek and his larger hand came up to cover your own. “Then lets run away together.” He finally spoke.

His smile grew with yours as he leaned down to press a kiss to your lips. It was sweet, soft, innocent, a kiss made to seal a promise.

“I will stay by your side, forever and always, My princess.”

#mha midoriya #midoriya x reader #bnha midoriya #midoriya izuku #izuku midoryia #izuku midoria x reader #izuku x reader #izuku midoriya x reader #bnha imagines #mha imagines #bnha scenarios #bnha scenario #mha scenario #mha scenarios #bnha fanfiction #mha fanfiction #mha x reader #bnha x reader #midoriya izuku x reader

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starsgivemehp · 4 years ago

Text

The Argument Against and Defense of Hetalia

Let me preface this by saying that I have not watched the show or read the manga in a few years now, and thus I am working mostly off of memory and what fan content I see these days, which is not a lot. Also, I am a gentile, and I don’t claim to know a lot about the Jewish community or traditions. I am, however, a writer and I have plenty of practice analyzing and criticizing works of fiction from multiple angles. With that in mind, this essay is an attempt to explain everything that is wrong and not wrong with the show, the comic strips, and the fandom.

I’m putting this under a read more for sheer length, this was 11 pages on Google docs.

Let us start with the list of grievances assembled largely from one post, the majority of which I had to go digging for as the original person in this post who mentioned Hetalia said, and I quote, “i dont feel the need to link a source for [hetalia] because…” and then listed two things, one of which is incorrect entirely. But I digress, I will address each one at a time. The list of grievances is as follows:

It is called ‘Axis Powers’ Hetalia

One of the main characters is a personification of Nazi Germany

The entire point of the series is:

Advocating for eugenics

Racial fetishization

Advocating for fascism

Nazi sympathizing/propaganda

The entire franchise is terrible due to rape jokes, racism, and Holocaust jokes

Hetalia fans are all terrible due to rape jokes and other issues

Death of the author cannot apply to this fandom

There may be more that are in other reblogs of the post in question, and I may add addendums further in this essay, but for the time being, I will address each of these grievances and explain the validity or non-validity of each, from a position understanding of both fans and of non-fans. Thus, in order:

‘Axis Powers’ Hetalia

When people talk about Hetalia, they usually are referring to the anime due to its widespread popularity. However, Hetalia began as a series of strip comics posted on a forum by Hidekaz Himaruya (and I spent a while trying to actually find the original comics, but I can’t, there are links to his blogs there in what I’ve provided). It later was formatted into a manga, and then later became an anime. While it was originally titled Axis Powers: Hetalia and the first two seasons of the show are named as such, it usually is only referred to as Hetalia. The anime seasons after said first two seasons have all been ‘world’ focused: Seasons three and four were titled World Series, season five was titled Beautiful World, season six was titled World Twinkle, and the upcoming season seven is titled World Stars.

For the purposes of tagging everything, I tend to see the tags ‘hetalia’ and ‘hws,’ which is short for Hetalia: World Series. This name of the third and fourth anime seasons is the most widely accepted and used name for the series as a whole. While it is true that, years ago, people referred to it as ‘aph’ for Axis Powers Hetalia, the fans and the series have put that behind them, for good reason. It is understandable, even righteous, to not accept the title ‘Axis Powers.’ It does draw focus to the WW2 era, and place the fascists and nazis as the ‘main characters,’ or even, ‘the good guys,’ which is not the case. Obviously, the Nazis were terrible and the entirety of the Axis Powers did horrible, unspeakable things during the war.

It must be noted, to anybody who has not seen the show or read the manga, that the first one to two seasons do have a ‘focus’ on the WW2 era, per se, but it largely talks about interactions between countries, as they are the personified party, and makes extremely few allusions to the war itself, and none to the Holocaust. I will address that in a later section. For now, the point to make is that after these original two seasons, Hetalia branches out into a much wider worldview, adds several more characters, and focuses more on said characters in individual arcs and offerings of historical facts - as generalized as they may be. Nobody claimed that Hetalia was correct in everything it said, but it aims to play out some historical information in a simplified and humorous way. This is due to the fact that the characters are all singular people meant to personify entire countries, which leads us to point two.

The Personification of Nazi Germany

This is the second complaint of the strand of the post in question that I was presented with, quoted as “one of the main characters is a personification of nazi germany.” This is an entirely incorrect statement. ‘Nazi Germany,’ as people call it, is the state of Germany during the era leading up to and of World War 2. The country is still Germany, the people were still German, the Nazi part comes from the political regime in power, a real world nightmare. In the Hetalia series, the characters are called by their country names, because that is who they personify. This may change at times. For example, the character now known as Turkey was previously called Ottoman Empire. They come to be when civilization starts or a colony is introduced to a place. This can be seen in the strip or episode where China ‘finds’ Japan as a small boy and begins to teach him reading and writing - and Japan thereafter invents hiragana. It can also be seen in the comic where a young child, Iceland, questions who he is and why he knows his people are “different beings” than him. The country that speaks to him (I only have the comic here in my likes in that list, the name isn’t mentioned and it’s been a while, but it might be another of the Scandinavian countries) explains that he is Mr. Iceland, they don’t know why he is Mr. Iceland, but they know he is.

What I am attempting to explain with all of these other examples is that there is no ‘Nazi Germany’ character. There is a character called Germany (or Mr. Germany), and all of his adult life, he has been called Germany. He is never addressed by anything else. He does, however, look remarkably similar to a childhood friend of Italy’s, Holy Roman Empire (or just Holy Rome), but as far as it has been explained in canon, Holy Rome went off somewhere and, later on Germany and Italy met as strangers. The general consensus is, due to the area where the Holy Roman Empire used to be is around-ish Germany, the characters are the same. But never, in any of the comics, anime, or movie, is Germany referred to as Nazi Germany. I don’t believe the word ‘Nazi’ appears at any point in time, even, though I cannot claim I have seen every shred of content, so I may be wrong. But I doubt that very much, as it is not in the nature of the series to do such a thing. Moving on.

Advocating for Eugenics

I will start and end this section by saying that Hetalia was, in the original post, roped in with Attack on Titan, of which (as far as I know) the author advocates for eugenics - or the idea that certain people should not be allowed to produce offspring due to their race or other factors. There is no example of Hetalia content wherein this disgusting opinion is ever mentioned or supported in any way. This is at worst a flat-out lie, and at best lumping Hetalia in with a much worse show that does do this (but I won’t get into that, I have never seen more than a few episodes of Attack on Titan and I don’t care to see any more of it. Throw your opinions or defenses elsewhere, I care 0% about it entirely). I have no more need to prepare a more detailed response to this accusation. It simply is not true.

Racial Fetishization

This particular accusation is a difficult one. Fetishization may be a strong word, as the series is largely a comedy. Everyone gets their turn in the spotlight, so to speak, so I find it hard to plainly state that any one character is fetishized or displayed as the most powerful. There is, of course, Rome, who only appears in small segments as Italy’s grandfather and is, in the series, touted as an amazing empire who had it all. I do not believe this is what the accusation is referring to. This accusation seems to be some sort of insistence that the show and creator believe that white people (or possibly just Germans/Nazis/the Aryan race?) are touted as the most powerful and nobody else can compare. I can confidently say that while that is never said anywhere, there are a few issues. Hetalia, particularly the animated series, had (and may still have) a longstanding issue of whitewashing countries that should not be white. This includes Egypt and Seychelles (who both later got a darker skin tone, probably still not dark enough though) as the worst offenders, and even Spain, Turkey, Greece, and Romano (southern Italy), and so on. Yes, this is a big problem. There is no defense against that. It should not be the case. These characters obviously should have darker skin. I will note, however, that many fans are already completely aware of this, have been complaining about it since the beginning, and tend to draw these characters with more correct skin tones in their fanart. This is a case where yes, the original content is not good, but the fans make their own fixes. If you are angry at Hetalia for whitewashing, good. You should be. But I do not believe this should reflect on the entirety of the content and the fandom (And note that I am not linking any particular fanart here, because I want nobody to go attack any fans).

It is also important to note that yes, a large majority of the series builds upon stereotypes. No, stereotypes are not good. No, you should not assume that the personifications of the countries encompass all citizens of said countries. The entire premise of the show is one person = the embodiment of a country, and that person changes and adapts with the times in terms of uniform and personality. It is extremely hard to do this without stereotyping. Most serious fans are aware of this, and do not in any way believe that these characters represent everyone from these countries. It may be true that much younger fans used to, and it may be true that people do not want to watch the show because stereotypes are, arguably, bad. But do remember that this is a comedy, and every character is picked on. Every one. And it is understandable if this branch of humor is not for you. I, personally, don’t like Family Guy or South Park or any shows like that for their humor. I also don’t attack the people who do. I ignore it.

Advocating for Fascism

This is another area wherein I believe the accuser is simply lumping Hetalia in with the original poster’s subject, Attack on Titan. Again, I will not defend or attack that show, as I do not care about it at all. However, regarding Hetalia, I can confidently say that it does not advocate for fascism. While the first two seasons are (sort of) set in WW2 era, as previously mentioned, the fighting is not really a big part, and nobody is touted as correct - only struggling in the conflict. For example, there is a scene where Germany, post WW1, is shown making cuckoo clocks by hand and lamenting the fact that he has to make so many thousands in order to pay back France. This is by no means painting fascism as a good thing, or explaining anything about how poverty and other struggles lead to the formation and rise of the Nazi party. It is simply a scene where we see a man frustratedly making cuckoo clocks and complaining while France’s big head jeers at him in his imagination. The surrounding scenes and the end of this one are making note of how Italy keeps coming over to his house to try and be friends and Germany keeps kicking him out because Italy is annoying and whiny. The episode further goes on to mention that Germany is attacking France again, and Italy has suddenly become his ally, and he is not happy about it for the aforementioned reasons. Again, this does not in any way paint Germany as being ‘right.’ The purpose of the segment(s) is/are to show him disliking the annoying Italy (whom the show is named for) and trying to get him out of his house before eventually giving up and accepting that they can be friends. Is it all 100% historically accurate? No, not by a long shot. Does it paint him as sympathetic? Sort of, you feel bad for the guy making a thousand cuckoo clocks, but only in the sense that he is one person doing a lot of work, a completely fictional situation. But Italy - and the audience - obviously know that attacking France again is not a good thing, so does it advocate the Nazis or fascism? Also no.

Nazi Sympathizing/Propaganda

I pretty well covered this in the previous section, but I will expand. I have alluded to the first two seasons as “focusing” on WW2, in a way, and also mentioned that this is a generalization of sorts, so here I will attempt to clarify. The first few episodes do, indeed, touch on ‘the way they all met’ in a sense; Germany is starting a war and he reluctantly becomes allies with Italy, and less reluctantly becomes allies with Japan, who examines both of them and decides he is content with this situation. However, none of it is very serious, and these ‘formalities’ give way easily to more humorous personable interactions, such as Italy hugging Japan without warning and the touch-anxious Japan pushing him off and getting flustered, Italy petting a cat and then freaking out when he is licked because a cat’s tongue is rough, the two of them ‘training’ by doing your regular old exercising and jogging and Italy being late, etc etc. Stupid, personable jokes.

On the flip side, the show covers the Allied Powers quite a bit too. A lot of this is the five big ones - America, Britain (/England/UK), France, Russia, and China - all meeting around one table and squabbling about various things. I fondly recall one scene where China arrives late and has a bunch of workers suddenly building a Chinatown in the meeting room because he was hungry and wanted his own food, and the others protesting. They are then offered food and become okay with it, because food. Other such nonsense plays out in other, similar meetings. There is also a segment where the Axis powers are all stranded on an island for… some unknown reason… and they set about attempting to survive via campfire and fishing and such. Twice (three times?) the Allied powers ‘attack’ them on this island via China whacking them each with a wok and, as the three of them are in a sad heap, something interrupts the scene to make the Allies retreat. One time, it is Rome’s sudden and also unexplained entrance across the sky singing a song, and another time, it is England’s preoccupation with a cursed chair. Also, at one point, Austria is playing a piano. Does any of this magic logical, real life sense? No. It’s stupid and funny and has nothing to do with war. These are just personable characters thrown into weird situations so they can be funny, with some extremely mild historical context along the way.

I will note again that WW2 is pretty much completely dropped after these two seasons, with the war hardly addressed at all, and future seasons focus more on other characters. The Scandinavians get to all have fun together, the Baltic trio is mentioned, there is a lot about Switzerland taking care of Liechtenstein (wow I spelled it right after all these years, go me) and being stiff and formal with Austria. There is also plenty about people mistaking Canada for America, and England and France squabbling throughout the years, and Spain finding Romano cute but also very grumpy, etc etc… This series is largely Eurasia-focused, yes, and it can be criticized for not being as diverse as it should be. But boiling it down to ‘Nazi propaganda’ is outright, obliviously false.

I don’t know if this is the best place to put this particular note, but I couldn’t think of anywhere else to place it, so here it will go. I would like to mention that in the series, some characters, like Germany and Russia, express outright fear of their ‘bosses’ in certain points in history. It is important to realize that Germany, Japan, America, etc… these characters are not the actual, real-life humans in charge of these countries, but people of a fictional, separate species than humans who grow up as the nation grows and have lives that are affected by these world leaders (we even watch in the show America shooting up from child to young adult as the colonies expand, and England comments on how quickly he grew up - but not as quickly as his people, of course. We’ll get to Davie later). The president of the United States is America’s ‘boss,’ and naturally, that boss changes every time the president changes. The emperor of China is China’s ‘boss.’ It follows, thusly, that at one point, Hitler was Germany’s ‘boss.’ The terrible person himself was alluded to, as far as I know, exactly one time, not by name, and no face was shown. In a very brief scene, Germany laments that his new boss is scary and he was just ordered to go force Austria to come live with him. Said boss is shown as, I believe, an evilly laughing shadowy figure. That’s it. That’s the scene. There is no other mention of Hitler, nor is there any mention of the Holocaust anywhere. One could argue that the show is then trying to say that the Holocaust didn’t happen, but I think such an accusation is frankly absurd. It’s a comedy, it was always a comedy, and what in the fuck would be comedic about a mass genocide in any way? Nothing. None of it is funny. Of course it is not brought up in a comedy.

Rape Jokes, Racism, and Holocaust Jokes

While I did somewhat address racism already in the section about whitewashing and racial fetishization, I have another clarification to make, especially regarding the jokes. A lot of people complain that there are rape jokes throughout the series, and that there are two Holocaust jokes. I will begin by saying yes, this is all true, those things did happen during the course of the show. However, it is important to note that all of those things happened in the English dub of the animated show, and none of these terrible jokes exist in the Japanese/subbed version, or the original comic strips.

The English dub is, on all accounts, pretty terrible. Everyone has an over exaggerated accent, there are the aforementioned jokes, there are name changes (England referred to as Britain, among them, very confusing), and the voice actors themselves make mention in commentaries that their goal in this job was, to paraphrase because I haven’t listened in a while, ‘to be as offensive as possible to absolutely everyone’ (and one of the English dub voice actors is even a convicted sex offender, but that’s it’s own mess). Not the most glamorous or noble of goals. One could say ‘at least if it’s everyone, it’s not really racism, is it? Just humor?’ There is a case for that. Many comedians will say that they poke fun at everyone to avoid singling anybody out as inherently superior. It cannot be said to be the best way to make humor, but it cannot be said to be the worst way, also. Overall, I don’t like the English dub, I don’t watch it, I prefer the subs. And yes, the subbed version has a few issues of its own, but I can say that at least, no, it does not make any Holocaust or rape jokes. Are those kinds of jokes excusable? Fuck no. They’re completely inappropriate. Should you judge the whole series and fandom based on the grossness of the English dubs? Also no, the people who did the English dubs have zero to do with the original creator, the animators, and the fans. Screw them.

The Fandom Being Terrible

I must again preface by saying I was never super active in the fandom at large. I had my own little niche of friends and I stuck to them and I didn’t often branch out. I did, however, go to cons back in those days, and saw plenty of cosplayers. The main complaint I see regarding the fandom is that most of the fans are completely rabid, make a bunch of rape jokes, and even dress up as ‘Nazi Germany’ (iron cross and red armband and all) and pretend to shoot up synagogues. Now, I have not seen cosplayers do the nazi solute or do such photoshoots, but I can believe that people have done it. I have seen plenty of rabid fans, and some of the OCs created for Hetalia, especially many interpretations of individual states (or Antarctica), were extremely cringey, racist, and overall just not good. And yes, these things are undeniably bad. They are very bad things! Those people should be ashamed. They should know better, regardless of their ages or anything, for fuck’s sake. The nazi salute is not a thing you do jokingly, pretending to shoot people is not a joke. Everyone is aware of this. The people who did, or maybe even still do, those things need a serious sit-down and to be woken the fuck up, because they are acting terrible.

However, it is extremely unfair to paint all Hetalia fans in the same light. That is a very stereotypical thing to do, no? As I mentioned earlier, I stuck to my little niche friend group of fans, and while we all had our own flaws and were younger and kinda dumber, we never did things like that. I never did things like that. Rape jokes were never funny, I never liked them, I never accepted them. I have people I still know who still like Hetalia and they never made those kinds of jokes either. I think, as the years have gone by, a lot of the more rabid fans have died out of the fandom. They’ve either grown the fuck up or they’ve went off to pollute some other fandom. Recognize that, especially in the beginning, the anime was low-budget and had a lot of that old and gross queerbaiting and stuff like that, so it was undeniably a magnet for crazy yaoi fans. But the majority of fanart, fanfics, and just overall fan stuff that I see these days are nothing like that. Overall, the fandom has seriously calmed down. A lot of the focus is much more on taking these characters and applying them to other historical events with more accuracy than the show might give. The history in these fanfics and fanarts may also be of questionable accuracy at times. I personally once wrote a fic where I made allusions to the death of Joan d’Arc and, later, the death of Elizabeth I, but did I add much historic fact? No, do I look like a history major spilling all this? The point of the fic was England - the character - maturing through starting to love one of his rulers and recognizing a terrible thing that he did before. It’s not the best piece of work out there, and maybe someone could point out a few things I did wrong with it, but for what it’s meant to be, it’s harmless. Takes on characters not actually in the series, like Ireland, Scotland, etc etc are generally pretty mature from what I see, fanart tends to just be the characters in various poses and styles. The overall love the fandom has, I think, is in the better character designs and in the very concept of the countries as people who laugh and cry and live through war and peace for thousands of years. And here is where I address the final grievance that I personally saw in the notes of the post which started this whole thought process and essay.

The Death of the Author

A lot of people might not fully understand what ‘The Death of the Author’ means. The death of the author is a belief rooted in the 20th century that the personal intentions, beliefs, and prejudices of the authors of certain works can have no bearing on their produced content, because once it is out in the public, every reader may then have their own interpretation and belief system. By publicizing the content, the author ‘dies’ and the reader is born.

There are some scenarios where this cannot apply. One example is JK Rowling, a very special case of a very problematic woman who happens to be so powerful, and so rich, that consuming any type of official (or even unofficial) Harry Potter anything can and will give her that much more power to spread her TERF bullshit. Let me be frank: Any time that consuming a product is allowing a bigoted or problematic person to gain extra money or extra power that they then use for evil, the death of the author cannot apply. You cannot use it as a moral justification. You might perhaps use it as the reason why you struggle to let go of a fandom near and dear to you, as Harry Potter is to so many people, but you absolutely must recognize that purchasing the books, the movies, or any other official content is outright supporting a TERF.

That in mind, there are dozens of other cases where the death of the author absolutely can apply. The easiest, of course, is with authors who are actually dead, such as Lovecraft. Lovecraft was a complete bigot and racist, an overall terrible person, and his works are saturated in that racism. But he is dead, and his work is very popular, and there are ways to take and use his work that do not contribute further to racism and bigotry. All you have to do is slap a non-racist cthulhu on a page. Make that cthulhu eat everyone equally. That’s a good cthulhu right there, a nice, safe cthulhu.

So where does Hetalia fall in this spectrum of can or cannot have death of the author? I believe it leans more to the side of yes, you can apply it. For one thing, you can definitely find the show for free in some places, and watch it without giving Himaruya a single cent. The comics are also available online for free, and while you might be giving your ‘support’ by being a viewer, I think overall, that’s not only negligible, but does not contribute anything bad? The author of Attack on Titan has many charges levied against him in the post which prompted this, and arguably, giving him any money is bad. But as far as I have seen, while Himaruya might have started out with a flawed premise and may have some whitewashing issues, I have seen nowhere that he funds any kind of racist, nationalistic, fascist, etc anything of any kind. This is not like Chick-Fil-A, where offering any kind of patronage is (or maybe used to be) sinking funds into terrible organizations. This is not supporting literal Nazis, as the complaints claim. This is a largely mediocre series with good parts and bad parts and zero ties to horrific organizations or ideals. Consuming good fan content does not make someone a racist or a bigot or a nazi sympathizer. Even rewatching some old favorite scenes or checking out the new season doesn’t make someone that. By all accounts, the show is flawed but not a means to fund nazis.

The Bad Anything Else

I will now take some time to talk about some other problems Hetalia has, because no, it is by no means flawless. I already discussed the whitewashing and stereotypes and the mess of the English dub, but there is more. I made mention of the fact that battles and seriously bad events such as the Holocaust are not mentioned, and this holds true throughout pretty much all of the series. There are certain points where ‘battles’ of a sort are seen, but only flash moments. One scene in particular that I really enjoyed as a tween and can now see the problems with is the whole revolutionary war scene. This was a scene split into two episodes (for some weird reason, even an unrelated episode in between, like, what? Why??) about a particular (unnamed) battle in the American Revolution where England faced down America, they each had a gun with a bayonet, and England charged America and his bayonet deeply scratched America’s gun, and America declared he was no longer England’s little brother, and the whole thing was played out as an extremely emotional scene. England is lost in the past of seeing America as a cute little kid he took care of, who has now grown up and is being reckless and stupid, and America is all righteous and independent and proving he’s a grown up, it’s all very emotional, I cried, other fans cried, there was much fanart.

This scene is problematic in a way. Boiling down an extremely nasty conflict following lots of really bad laws and protests to this one scene doesn’t do history any justice. It says nothing about the struggles of the American colonists, the struggles of the British empire, the awful things the colonists did to the natives, etc etc. It is one small scene and it focuses on these characters as humanoid, with feelings, and completely ignores the complexities of history. And yes, in a way, that is bad. But it is bad in the sense that nobody can - or at least should - take this show to be the end-all be-all of history. It is not. It is not often entirely correct, and it picks and chooses what points in the past several thousand years to play with, and trying to use it as a map for history is a bad idea. However, this focus on the countries as human-like and struggling can also be a good thing.

It is also important to note that there have been other problems. The portrayal of South Korea, for example, is extremely controversial, and while I do not know all of the specifics, I believe that it was banned in Korea due to this, and the character was entirely removed from the anime, among other things. Obviously, a bad take, a bad character. There are also just straight up not great characterizations in certain cases. I don’t, for example, like anything about how Belarus is portrayed as a crazy psycho constantly begging Russia (her big brother) to marry her? I think that that is ridiculous, and I know nothing about Belarus as a country but I am pretty darn sure that that is not how one ought to go about portraying the country. There are a few other examples, but my purpose here was not to pull up a list of every country and explain what is correct or incorrect about each characterization. It is enough to say that some characters were not portrayed perfectly. But with that in mind...

The Good Anything Else

It is the most important to remember that this, all of this, is fiction. This is a silly, silly fantasy series. The countries are not humans, they are some weird semi-immortal species that share a universal language and know they are not human and are referenced by humans as ‘those people.’ They are fictional constructs. But the good out of all of this is that they explore human emotions. The American Revolution scene should not be taken as how the revolution was, and who might have been right or wrong. But it is a very emotional story of a big brother unable to accept that his little brother has grown up and wants to make his own choices. That, right there, is a heartfelt scene that I’m sure plenty of real people can feel something about. And there are plenty of other scenes that really grab you by the heartstrings, especially given how crazy, stupid, and humor-oriented the rest of the show is. And I will take a moment and enthuse about some of the more popular scenes that I think are, in fact, pretty good.

There is one episode in season 5, Beautiful World, where an American woman visits France (the place). This woman, Lisa, is blond and bears a striking resemblance to Joan d’Arc. While visiting some historical place somewhere or another in Paris, France (the person) spots her and rushes up with an odd look. When she questions him, he apologizes and offers to give her a tour of the area, which she accepts. He then proceeds to lead her around and explain some history and show off some beautiful sights, and he mentions some stuff about Joan d’Arc. She butts in and lists off some stuff she knows, he beams and looks proud and says yes, she’s right. The end of the scene has the two of them standing alone somewhere and him commenting how young Joan was when she was killed, and that he always wished she could have had a better, nicer life. He then states that he is very happy that she got it, while giving this American tourist a gentle smile. She looks away for a moment, distracted by something perhaps, and when she looks back to ask just who the heck he really is, talking about a historical figure like he knew her, he is gone. It’s a very emotional scene in a quiet sort of way, because the watcher/reader understands that he took one look at this woman and instantly believed that she was, in fact, Joan d’Arc reincarnated into a totally different and totally average life, and he is so genuinely happy that a woman he saw as a hero gets this chance to live normally. Whether or not you may personally believe in reincarnation, and regardless of how often other times in the show France is shown as an obnoxious sexaholic, this is an extremely tender scene that lots of fans seriously love. It is very ‘human.’ And I feel like this is what the series as a whole strives to offer. These human moments. They may be peppered in a sort of lackadaisical style in the anime, but they are far more prominent in the comic strips, so it is important to realize that that kind of scene is more of what the creator likes to focus on.

Another very popular and touted scene is the Davie scene. I don’t remember if it was put in the anime or not, I read it as a comic. It was a scene set in colonial America, where the man himself was just a very small child. Little baby America was hanging out in a field with a rabbit and sees this boy, who introduces himself as Davie. Davie brings America to his house and opens up a botany book and points out a blue flower (possibly a forget-me-not) that he wants to see but that isn’t in the New World. America assures Davie that he will find him one of those flowers, and goes off to do so. He fails his search and goes back to Davie, who is older now, but Davie looks embarrassed and turns and walks away. Distressed, America runs to England and explains about the flower, and England says the flower is not there, but they do grow at home, and he will bring some the next time he leaves and comes back. America happily waits, and when England returns with a bouquet of the blue flowers, America takes them and runs off to Davie’s house. He is let in by a boy who looks just like Davie and presents the flowers, and the boy then puts them on (or maybe in) a coffin of an elderly man. America, smiling, does not seem to understand what is going on, and hopefully calls the boy Davie.

This entire scene, in the comic, has very few words. Davie’s name is repeated a few times, but most of the rest of the ‘dialogue’ is in images. The flower, England saying it is not there, etc. This makes the scene extremely poignant, and when we reach the end, we, the audience, realize suddenly that while baby America was fixated on finding a special flower for his new friend, years and years went by, and that friend grew up and got married and had children and eventually died, all while America remained looking the exact same age and understanding the exact same things. Look, folks, I don’t know about you, but that is some angsty stuff right there. I cried. We all cried. We all miss Davie. Mention the name to fans and you will get sobs. We love you, Davie.

Which brings me to my penultimate point, that this series is heartfelt and, while it avoids a lot of the bad of history, can be very poignant about what human nature is like. Human lives are long, very long, but also so very short, they fly by. Some lives end in tragedy, others are mostly peaceful, and maybe we get second chances if you believe in reincarnation, maybe not. Maybe it’s good that our lives are so short, maybe the fate of living forever and watching people you connect with die is tragic. Or maybe it would actually be really fun, having friends for thousands of years that you may squabble with at times but ultimately care for. Maybe nothing is simple and life is about finding joy where you can, and everyone needs to sometimes take a step back and realize that everyone is flawed, and there might be good and evil but the vast majority of people are in a grey area, trying to live their own lives and do what good they can for whatever reason they might give. I want to end with one last topic, one I have not yet addressed this whole time. The big white alien in the room, if you will.

Paint it: White!

There is a Hetalia movie, folks, if you didn’t know it, and it’s called Paint It White. This movie has just as many silly parts as any other Hetalia thing, but it also has a plot! In this movie, strange, all-white aliens are starting to invade the Earth. They arrive and anything they touch, they turn into completely identical white humanoid blobs, even the country personifications. With this scary and seemingly-unstoppable threat, the main eight - America, England, Russia, China, France, Japan, Germany, and Italy - all try to infiltrate the alien spaceship in frankly hideous uniforms to find out more and figure out a way to defeat them. Hijinks and disaster ensues, and at the end, each of them is fighting a mob and gradually being defeated. Italy is the last one standing, and as Germany is slowly being transformed into a blob along with the others, he tells Italy to smile. Italy then finds (or has? the plot isn’t great, it’s just there) a black marker and he suddenly starts going around drawing ridiculous faces on everyone. He draws fitting faces on each of his friend blobs, like a stern face on Germany-blob, a deadpan face on Japan-blob, etc etc. The invaders suddenly stop. They look at each other, marker-faced, and start to laugh. Then their leader of sorts comes out and is basically like “wow, we thought you were all stupid and you have wars and stuff, but this? This is beautiful. Wow. We all look exactly identical on our world, and these faces are cool and new and unique. We’ll turn everyone on your planet back if we can have this magical thingie you’re holding.” And of course Italy hands the marker right over, and everyone is put back to normal, and crybaby, scaredy-cat, useless Italy saves the world.

The plot is, obviously, not super great. It’s not going to win anybody any awards. But it has a very poetic premise. The strength of humans is that they are all unique. Every human has a different face, a different body, a different life. Our differences may cause conflict, but they are also something to celebrate. At the end of the day, Hetalia is an okay show that can get you hooked on history and tries its best to teach you that we’re all only human and there might be war and conflict and bad things, but you have to reach for the good things and find yourself good friends and have stupid laughs and enjoy life, however long or short it may be. I think that that’s a pretty decent message to send out to people.

The Bottom Line

In the end, this is a fandom like many others. Hetalia has its flaws and its cringe moments, and it certainly had its fair share of awful fans. But I truly believe that painting it overall as nazi propoganda and one of the most problematic and harmful shows out there is a blatant lie and disregards… just about everything of the actual content. I think it is difficult for someone to concretely say anything is super good or super bad without seeing at least some of it, or doing some research, and this business of blithely going along with what everyone else says just because they use big danger words does not do anybody any favors. Spreading misinformation is, I’m sure, the exact opposite of what most people want to do. And make no mistake, I am definitely not saying that everyone needs to like, or even watch, the show. If you never ever want to watch this show in your life, that is absolutely fine. Go forth and never watch it. But mindlessly following the herd and yelling overgeneralized, unsupported opinions about it is not a good thing. I beg of you, do research on the things you want to form or share an opinion on, think critically, and for the love of God, do not swipe a giant paintbrush to forsake every single individual fan of a show as a terrible, awful person. By all means, hate nazis, they are pieces of shit. Boycott things that support genocide and fascism, yes, fight for equality, yes. But do not go accusing without thinking, and do not overgeneralize. I leave you with the words of my old laptop bag that I bought years ago at a convention:

Make pasta, not war.

Thank you for reading.

#I wrote an essay #I could probably source this way more #but I've been working on it for hours #Just take it

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sunriserose1023 · 4 years ago

Text

Puzzle Pieces

WARNINGS: Some behind-the-scenes info, memories, the reader learns more, alcohol consumption, slight violence (?) WORD COUNT: 5127 AUTHOR’S NOTE: This story is full-steam ahead. Information overload, doors closing to others opening, and what the reader thinks she knows is actually nothing at all.

MASTERLIST

You sat in the sand, tears slipping down your cheeks. You didn’t even know why you were crying, but it felt good to let it out. You picked up your phone, staring down at it for a moment before looking out over the water. You took a deep breath and tapped your phone against your palm, then unlocked the screen, narrowing your eyes at a crack in the glass. You sighed and shook your head, tapping the screen until you found the name you wanted to call. You bit your bottom lip, glanced back out over the water, then dialed the call.

“Hello?” “Matt, it’s Y/N.” “You see, I have a little feature on my phone where a voice audibly tells me who’s calling. Comes in super handy when I’m trying to screen my calls.”

You laughed, sniffling.

“You alright?”

Your face fell as the tears started back up.

“I don’t know.” “What’s wrong?” “I don’t know that, either.” “Where are you?”

You gave a shaky exhale, glancing around.

“Rockaway Beach.” “What the hell are you doing in Queens?”

You laughed, sniffling again, pulling your knees up.

“I’ve got some business here.” “Well, get out of there as quickly as you can.”

You laughed again, closing your eyes and feeling the ache in your heart ease just a bit. You loved how territorial New Yorkers were, and their disdain for the other boroughs of the city. Matt’s voice came through the speaker again, softer this time.

“Maybe you can make your way to Manhattan and let me take you out to dinner.”

You pressed your lips together, closing your eyes.

“I’d like that. I … I’ll call you later?” “I’ll be waiting.”

You gave a quiet exhale, keeping your eyes closed, speaking softly.

“Thank you.” “Anytime, honey.”

You hung up the phone and set it beside you, opening your eyes and staring out at the water. You took in a breath, letting it out slowly, standing up and brushing yourself off. Sand was everywhere. Your phone started ringing and you looked at the cracked screen, seeing your sister’s face smiling back at you. You blinked, staring at the phone until her face went away and a notification appeared, letting you know you missed the call. You glanced up, looking out at the water once more before slipping the phone in your pocket and walking away.

You gave a slow exhale, straightening your shoulders as you stared at the apartment door. You felt your hands shaking, and you closed your eyes for just a moment, groaning softly as your phone started vibrating in your pocket. You lifted it, closing your eyes before you answered the call.

“Hello?” “I’ve been trying to call you all morning. Where are you?

You glanced at the apartment door, then walked down the hallway, back towards the elevator. You clicked your tongue in your mouth, then answered your sister.

“Dad had some things he wanted me to look into, so I came to the City.” “Which City?” “New York.” “Y/N, you went by yourself?”

You huffed out a breath.

“I’m not a child, Betty. I can do things on my own.” “I know, honey. But you don’t have to.”

You nodded, glancing down the hall.

“I needed some space.”

Betty was quiet, and you swallowed before you spoke again.

“Betty, I’m about to go into a meeting. I’ll call you later.”

You didn’t bother waiting for her reply. You shut your phone off and dropped it into your purse, walking back down the hallway to the apartment you’d been standing before. You took in a breath and let it out slowly, lifting your hand and knocking at the door. After a moment, the door opened to reveal a woman standing there, her long brown hair hanging down, a wide smile on her face.

“Hi!”

You smiled, returning the greeting as she ushered you inside.

“I am just so excited to meet you.” “I’m excited to meet you, too.”

You held out a hand and she eagerly shook it.

“Lucy Whitmore.” “May Parker. Please come in.”

You followed her into the apartment, a smile coming to your face when you saw the homey space. May shook her head as she turned to face you.

“Are you sure we’ve never met? There’s something about you that seems so familiar.”

May tapped a finger against her chin.

“Lucy Whitmore. Did we go to high school together?”

You gave a quiet laugh.

“No, I don’t think so. Maybe I just have one of those faces.”

You turned away so May wouldn’t notice the flush on your cheeks. She softly clapped her hands together and you looked back to see her smiling at you.

“Pete’s finishing up his schoolwork right now. We decided to homeschool when the comics blew up the way they did. All those kiddos he went to school with suddenly overtly interested in him was just too much.”

May rolled her eyes and you blinked.

“He’s homeschooled?”

May turned to you, eyebrows furrowing.

“You’re surprised?”

You smiled.

“Very, actually. I’m afraid I haven’t done adequate research on my part. My coworkers made it seem like Peter was … older.”

May smiled.

“We get that a lot. He’s fifteen, but he acts older. Well … sometimes. Fifteen-year-old boys have their moments.”

She rolled her eyes and you gave a quiet laugh. You glanced away, swallowing once before May spoke.

“Can I get you something to drink?” “Water would be lovely, thank you.”

She nodded, walking into the kitchen. You gave a shaky breath, licking your lips as you walked towards the small window in the living room.

Peter Parker, the artist responsible for the comics you’d been reading, was a kid? The cover story you’d given May, that you were a journalist wanting to write an article about the comic books taking the world by storm, was quickly tanking. Especially since, with Peter Parker being only fifteen years old, May would definitely want to sit in on the interview. You closed your eyes, blowing out a slow, shaky breath.

“But what if I need a cover story?” “Why would you need a cover story?”

You shook your head, one hand messing with your hair. You heard the low laugh behind you a second before warm hands slid over your hips, pulling you back against a wide chest.

“If you ever need a cover story, just call for me.” “But what if you’re not there?” “I’ll always be there. Especially if you need me.”

You felt lips against your neck and your eyes slipped closed before his voice echoed in your ear.

“The trick is, there are no tricks. Play it as best you can, and if you can’t, get the fuck out of there.” “Language!”

Laughter was still ringing in your ears when you noticed May standing in front of you. You blinked and she shook her head.

“I said, are you okay? You kind of spaced out there.”

You pushed a smile onto your face.

“Sorry, I … I get lost in my head a lot.”

May nodded sagely, handing you a glass of water.

“I’ve heard that happens quite often with writers.”

You nodded, taking a sip of the crisp, cool water.

“May, I’m done! And if you say anything about chemistry, I swear …”

The boy stopped as he walked into the room, eyebrows furrowing. He was wearing a shirt from one of the local pizza places, tilting his head as he looked at you. You smiled as May rushed over to him.

“Peter, this is Lucy Whitmore. She’s the one writing that article I told you about.”

Peter quickly looked to you and narrowed his eyes, and you couldn’t help but lift an eyebrow. He smiled, stepping forward and holding out a hand. You shook it, and Peter turned to May.

“You know how we were talking about me taking more responsibility and stuff?” “No, sir. This is not what—“ “Come on, May! I’m not going to say anything stupid.” “Pete, we—“

You cleared your throat and they looked to you. You smiled and nodded to May.

“I can email you a copy of the article before I publish it. Make sure to get your okay before I send it into the world.”

She sighed, looking back to Peter, who was staring at her with hopeful eyes. She held his gaze for a moment, then exhaled sharply.

“No spoilers.” “None.” “Any details about upcoming issues is off the record.”

You and Peter nodded, and May shook her head before she ruffled his hair.

“I’ll be right out here.” “You’re the best, May.” “Yeah, yeah.”

You giggled softly, nodding and winking at her before you followed Peter down the hallway to his bedroom. It was cleaner than you were expecting a teenage boy’s bedroom to be, and Peter offered you his desk chair. You sat down and he locked the door, crossing his arms over his chest.

“You’re not really a reporter, are you?”

Your eyes widened and he nodded. You smiled, meeting his eyes.

“How did you know?” “Lucy Whitmore? That’s who Drew Barrymore played in 50 First Dates. The movie where she—“ “Has short-term memory loss. You’re smart.”

Peter shrugged, and you looked down at your hands.

“Who are you really and why are you here?”

You let out a breath, lifting your head to meet his eyes.

“I really am here to talk about the comics.” “I can let you read a little of the next one, but …” “No, that’s not …”

You sighed, reaching into your purse and pulling out the Avengers comic you’d stashed in there. You held a finger on the big “A” on the cover, looking back to the boy across from you.

“Where did you come up with this?”

Peter’s eyes widened for a split second, before he tried to play it off. He shrugged his shoulders, lifting a hand to scratch at the back of his neck.

“It just came to me one day. In, uh … Advanced Math, if you can believe it.”

You slowly nodded, leaning back in the chair, crossing your arms over your chest, crossing one leg over the other.

“And you just … imagined all these characters fighting together?” “Well, sure. I mean … there’s some humans, some … ‘enhanced’ beings, if you will.” “Not to mention the demigod.”

Peter made a face as he moved closer to the bed, glancing down at the comic.

“Well, he’s not really a demigod. He's kind of a god, but then kinda not? He’s Asgardian and he controls the lightning, but he gets hurt like a regular human, so it’s kind of …”

He looked at you, letting his rambling trail off as you smiled. You gave a slow nod.

“Semantics.”

Peter swallowed and nodded.

“Who are you again?”

You took in a breath, letting it out slowly.

“My name is Y/N Ross. I’m …”

You let your words die when you saw Peter go pale, his body visibly trembling as he scrambled to get away from you. You shook your head and Peter pushed his hands through his hair before he turned to you, shaking his head.

“You—you have … you have to leave.” “Peter, calm down.” “No, you—you can’t be here. You have—you need to go.”

You stood up, watching Peter wrap his arms around his torso, muttering under his breath as he shook his head. His body gave a hard shake and he turned for the door, but you shot out a hand.

“Wait!”

He turned his head to look back at you and you shook your head.

“Just talk to me for a minute. What happened?”

Peter kept his mouth shut and you took a slow step forward.

“Was it my father?”

Peter’s jaw went slack and you nodded, closing your eyes and swallowing hard. You opened them to look back at him and you shook your head.

“I promise, you’ll be okay. My father doesn’t even know that I’m here.” “Please, just … just go.”

Tears filled your eyes as you slowly shook your head.

“What did he do to you?”

Peter squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his lips together and you took a step back, your legs giving out when you were in front of Peter’s desk chair. You covered your mouth with a hand, closing your eyes. Peter’s voice was soft and so very young when he broke the silence.

“He said … I didn’t have a choice. He threat— he said May would be … and I couldn’t. She’s all I got; I couldn’t let anything happen to her.”

You lifted your eyes to the boy standing across from you, hands sliding up and down his arms. Your heart broke for him and how terrified he must have felt, and one of the pieces of your heart lit up in anger at your father for putting this sweet child through that. You met his eyes again and you shook your head.

“I’m so sorry. I don’t have any idea why he’d do that.”

Of course you do, your brain screamed. It was because of you; of that, you were certain. But why? Your eyes slid closed as you moved a shaking hand to the comic book still lying on Peter’s bed.

“It was real, wasn’t it?”

He didn’t answer you, and you slowly opened your eyes, turning your head to face him.

“These … characters, these people, these stories … they really happened.”

Peter just stared at you with wide eyes. You gave a slow shake of your head, a humorless laugh leaving your lips.

“That’s the only explanation. These comics really happened and I had something to do with it. The General’s trying to hide that.”

Your shaking hand moved to cover your mouth and Peter shook his head as he walked over, kneeling in front of you.

“I don’t know the whole story. Really, I don’t. The General came to me and told me to make these comics, backdate some of them and he’d help me send them into circulation. As long as I did what he wanted, May would be safe.”

You closed your eyes, reaching out. Peter took your hand, holding it in both of his.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” “Don’t apologize, Peter. You haven’t done anything wrong.”

You opened your eyes and smiled at him. You moved your hand to pat his that was holding yours and you sighed.

“I’m going to make sure that you and May are safe. Do you understand me? Whatever my father told you, I’m going to make sure that you’re okay.”

You gave his hand a squeeze and Peter nodded. You shook your head, letting go of his hands, turning to pick up the comic book and sliding it into your bag. You hung your head and slowly exhaled, shaking it again, disbelief in your heart, but a somehow unsurprised feeling in your bones.

You thought you knew how far the General would go, the lengths he’d go to see what he wanted come to fruition. To see the truth made you feel sick at your stomach.

“Hey, Y/N?”

You turned to Peter, saw on his face the internal battle he was fighting. After a moment, he tossed out his hands, giving a sharp exhale as he looked to you.

“There’s this garage over in Flushing. Ask for Eddie Collins. He can help you.”

You narrowed your eyes, but Peter nodded.

“Trust me.”

You slowly nodded.

“Eddie Collins?” “Make sure you ask for him. Don’t talk to anyone else.”

You blinked but nodded again, making your way to the door. You held your hand on the knob, turning back to him.

“The people you write about. Are you like them?” “Do I save the world?”

Peter gave a laugh.

“I’m just a kid from Queens.”

You lifted an eyebrow.

“You need to work on your truth-telling skills, my friend. I can see the lie all over your face.”

Peter’s eyes widened and you gave a quiet laugh. He lifted a hand to rub the back of his hair.

“I’m still trying to iron out all the kinks.”

You smiled and nodded.

“Well, take it easy, friendly neighborhood—spider.”

Peter’s eyes widened.

“What?”

You pointed to the wall behind him.

“Careful. There’s a spider.”

He turned, giving a quiet laugh when he saw the spider crawling on his wall.

“Thanks.” “Take care, Peter.” “You, too.”

You sat in your chair, glass of wine in your hand. You smiled when you saw the man walking towards your table, sitting up straighter when he put his hands on the back of the chair across from you.

“Hello, Miss Ross.” “Hello, Mr. Murdock. Please, sit down.”

He nodded, pulling out the chair and sitting across from you.

“Have you been here before?”

You gave a quiet laugh.

“I don’t know. Some things seem familiar, but … I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

You went quiet, and Matt’s voice was gentle when he spoke again.

“Why do I have the feeling that’s a loaded statement?”

You gave a quiet laugh.

“Because it is?” “Do you want to talk about it?”

More than you know, you thought. You shook your head, smiling as you reached across the table and laid your hand on his.

“No. I’d rather talk to you.” “Oh, and here I thought we’d have fun tonight.”

You gave a quiet laugh, taking another sip of your wine.

“What’s that you’re drinking?” “Cabernet. Do you want a glass? I ordered a bottle.”

Matt’s eyebrows rose above his dark glasses and you gave a laugh.

“It’s been a day.” “I understand that.” “Tell me about your day, Mr. Murdock.”

Matt smiled, gently rubbing your hand with his thumb.

“Well, it all started down at the office.”

You had your arm through Matt’s, the two of you close together as you walked through Central Park. The night was cool, comfortable, even more so with the heat from the man beside you.

“I … I hope I’m not being too forward.”

You smiled.

“If you were, I wouldn’t have agreed to walk home with you.” “I know, but we’ve only gone on one date.” “But we’ve talked nearly every day since we met.”

Matt nodded, and you gave a quiet sigh.

“Nothing has to happen. We’re just getting to know each other a little better.” “You’re right.” “I know.”

Matt gave a soft laugh, his cane scratching the ground as he constantly moved it. You looked around, always enraptured with the sight of New York City, the skyline able to take your breath away whether the sun was visible or not.

“I love New York.” “Are you wearing one of those t-shirts?”

You laughed, nudging Matt’s shoulder with your own as he smiled.

“No, but I need one.” “You only love it because you don’t live here. If you live here, or if you were from here, you’d have to hate it. Unless someone tried to speak ill of it, in which case, you kick their ass.”

You laughed.

“You New Yorkers are all the same.” “This is true. No one can talk bad about New York except those of us from New York. If anyone else tries, we must defend her honor.”

You rolled your eyes, a smile on your face. Matt slowly came to a stop, tapping his cane on the ground.

“This is my building.”

You nodded, unlooping your arm from his, taking hold of his hand. Neither of you said anything for a moment, until you spoke softly.

“I can get a cab and go back to my hotel.”

Matt nodded, stepping closer to you, speaking as softly as you had.

“You could.”

He lifted a hand, and you closed your eyes when his fingers tucked some hair behind your ear before tracing over your jaw.

“Or you could come up with me. No pressure, no promises. I have a fairly comfortable couch if the wine hits you.”

You gave a quiet laugh.

“I feel fine.” “Really? We went through two bottles. And I didn’t have that much.”

You lifted an eyebrow and Matt gave a laugh.

“I’m not calling you a lush by any means. I just don’t want to—“ “If you say ‘take advantage of me,’ I’m going to take that cane and bop you on the head with it.”

Matt laughed, giving your hand a squeeze. You gave a soft exhale, studying his stubbled face.

“I’m in complete control of my faculties. I can walk in a straight line, touch my fingers to my nose.” “Can you say your ABCs backwards?” “I can barely say them forwards.”

Matt laughed, squeezing your hand again.

“Okay, then. Follow me.”

You stood in the middle of Matt’s loft, shaking your head at the sheer size of the place.

“How do you afford this place?” “Give it a second.”

You waited, quickly turning away and blinking over and over again when a neon billboard lit up the space. The light through the multiple windows made the loft feel like midday, even though it was night. You smiled, shaking your head.

“Okay, now I see.” “No one wants to live with the lights that bright. Doesn’t bother me, so …”

You gave a quiet laugh, accepting the cup of water Matt handed you. He had a smile on his face, a cup in his hand that he sipped from. You looked down at your cup, speaking softly.

“I had a good time with you tonight.” “Me, too. I hope I was able to take your mind off of whatever it is that’s going on.”

You sighed.

“It’s a lot of stuff. And you did, I … I don’t usually drink that much. And I don’t drink often, or whenever things are going kinda crappy.” “Hey, calm down.”

Matt took the cup from your hands and you pushed them through your hair. He picked up one of your hands and you shook your head, closing your eyes as he spoke.

“I completely understand wanting to make the world go away. Especially when it feels like everything is ganging up on you. But look at you. You said it yourself, you’re in complete control of your faculties. No sloppy drunks here.”

You smiled, lifting your head to see the soft smile on Matt’s face. You gave his hand a squeeze, then let it go, reaching up and taking the glasses off his face. He stood still and let you, and you spoke softly.

“I’ve never seen you without the glasses on.” “Would you mind if I did something?” “Probably not.”

Matt gave a quiet laugh, lifting his hands and cupping your face in them. You were still as his fingertips began to move over your skin, your eyes falling closed as he mapped out your features through touch. His hands went back to cupping your face as he quietly spoke.

“Just as I thought. You’re gorgeous.”

You took in a breath as Matt leaned in, gently pressing his lips to yours. Your hands slid around him, pulling him close as his hands slipped into your hair. You moaned as Matt’s lips moved from yours to your cheek, down to your neck. You pushed a hand through his hair, holding him against you, and he moved your shirt aside to kiss your shoulder.

Your eyes flew open as your body suddenly felt ice cold. You weren’t seeing anything, but you could feel a different pair of lips on your neck, different arms around you, and you suddenly felt so wrong.

“Wait. Wait, stop.”

Matt pulled back, concern visible on his face. You stepped away from him, shaking hand flying to your lips. You shook your head and Matt spoke softly.

“Y/N? Are you okay? What is it?”

You moved a hand to place it against the wall, pressing hard, trying to steady yourself. You sank down to your knees, sliding off them to sit on the floor. Matt sank down beside you, one hand sliding from your shoulder down to your hand.

“God, your pulse is racing. Talk to me, Y/N.”

You took your hand from his, moving to your hands and knees, staring at the floor as you tried to ground yourself. Matt gently laid a hand on your back.

“Do I need to call someone? Are you okay? Please, say something.”

You gave a shaky exhale, closing your eyes, a tear sliding down your cheek and hitting the floor before your barely audible voice spoke.

“I’m sorry.” “Don’t be sorry. Jesus. What happened?”

You shook your head, opening your eyes, staring at the hardwood floor, studying the grain.

“There is someone.” “Someone who?” “I don’t know. I don’t know anything. God!”

You slammed your fists into the floor, hanging your head and screaming through clenched teeth. Hot tears coursed down your cheeks as you squeezed your eyes shut, anger and pain rolling through you like a tidal wave.

“Um … Y/N?”

You opened your eyes to look at Matt, seeing the confusion on his face. You could see his shoulders moving, and you followed the line of his arms until you saw his hands, fingers moving over two deep grooves in the floor.

Grooves from your fists.

You’d nearly punched holes in his floor.

“Oh my god. Matt, I … I’m so …” “How did you do that?”

You stared at your hands, turning them over and over again as your body started to tremble. Matt gently laid a hand on your shoulder and you flinched hard, moving away from him and sitting with your back against the wall.

“Don’t. You should get away from me. I don’t … oh my god.” “Just breathe. You’re safe here.”

You laughed, shaking your head as you looked to him.

“How can you say that? I’m a complete mess.” “Kindred spirits and all that.”

You shook your head as you studied his handsome face. He had a slight smile on his lips, eyes trained down, away from you. You exhaled, speaking softly.

“I think something happened to me. Not an accident like everyone says. Something worse.” “Like what?”

You shook your head.

“I don’t know. My sister tells me it was a car accident. That I unbuckled my seatbelt to get my phone out of the backseat and crashed. But Matt …”

You sighed, studying the floor as the billboard lit up again, multicolored lights streaming in through the windows, covering Matt in an almost halo. He crawled until he could sit beside you, taking your hand. You let him, leaning over to rest your head against his shoulder.

“I don’t think you would have done that.”

You didn’t say anything, and Matt went on.

“You don’t seem like the kind of person to risk your life for a stupid phone.” “I don’t want to say I’d never do that, but … I had my phone hooked up to my car. I remembered that, how I used to press a button on the steering wheel and make a call.”

You shook your head.

“I don’t know what really happened, but ever since I woke up, I feel … I don’t know. Like I don’t know my own strength. I think I broke my phone the other day just by tapping it against my hand. And now your floor …” “Don’t worry about my floor. Tell me more.”

You sighed, watching the lights dance across the floor.

“I felt fine when I woke up, but the doctors were flabbergasted. They said I shouldn’t have been able to even turn over in the bed. My muscles should have atrophied and I should have been weak, but I was fine. I could move, I could walk. And then I stepped on some broken glass, but by the time I got to the bathroom to bandage the cut, it was gone. I mean, I was bleeding. But there was no evidence of it.”

You blew out a breath, shaking your head.

“This didn’t come from a car accident. Not unless someone drugged me or something while I was in the coma, but I don’t think Betty would have left me alone long enough for that.”

Matt sighed beside you, shaking his head.

“I wish I could help you.”

You smiled, reaching over to pat the hand you were holding.

“You are.”

Matt smiled, resting his head on yours. You swallowed, speaking softly.

“I’m sorry for earlier.” “Don’t apologize.” “No, I … I feel like I’ve been leading you on or something.”

Matt chuckled softly.

“It’s okay. I figured from the beginning that there was no way you could be single.”

You shook your head.

“I don’t understand. I feel like there’s someone important, but where is he? Where has he been all this time? I feel like there’s someone I love that loves me back, but … how can that be if it’s been nearly two years and I haven’t seen him?”

Matt gave your hand a squeeze and you shook your head.

“I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t be dumping this on you. God, I’m awful.” “Hey, I’m cool with this. I’d rather be your friend than nothing at all.”

You shook your head again, this time a soft smile on your face.

“You’re a good man, Matt Murdock.” “Eh, I’m just glad I’ve got you fooled.”

You gave a quiet laugh, patting his hand again.

“I should go.” “But it’s so late. I can’t let you go out into the City alone.” “Matt, I’m a big girl.” “Yeah, but it’s still New York City at night. Sorry, but I’m putting my foot down. Not like you, because then it might go through the floor, but—“

Your shocked gasp trailed off into a laugh, and Matt was grinning when you gently shoved his shoulder. He brought your hand to his lips and kissed your knuckles, giving your hand a squeeze before he stood up.

“Take the bed.” “I’m not kicking you out of your bed. I’ll sleep on the couch.”

The billboard lights blazed, making you squint as you got to your feet. Matt just smiled at you, and you gave a sigh, sniffling and nodding your head.

“Alright, fine. But I’m not happy about it.” “Noted.”

You turned to face Matt, stepping forward and wrapping your arms around him. He hugged you back, gentle hands rubbing up and down your back. Your voice was soft when you whispered in his ear.

“Thank you.” “Anytime. I mean that.”

You nodded, tightening the hug for just a moment before you stepped away, heading for his bedroom. Matt stood in the blazing lights of his living room, staring after you, eyes slowly closing as he gave a deep exhale.

TAGS: @star-spangled-man-with-a-plan, @captain-rogers-beard, @bionic-buckyb, @deaniebeanie666, @shynara51, @wolfarrowepz, @captain-s-rogers, @m-a-t-91, @lovemesomepietro, @the-obsessive-fangirl, @winchesterenthusiast, @iamwarrenspeace, @until-theend-oftheline, @evansrogerskitten, @thatgirl-xx-thatgirl, @thisismysecrethappyplace, @jjsoccer11, @theotherplath, @unapologeticallymimi, @the-obsessive-fangirl, @beardburnsupersoldiers, @geek-and-proud, @moonlessnight14, @xhoneybearsx, @castellandiangelo, @stressedandbandobessed7771, @get-loki, @theladybiers, @patzammit, @maddie-laufeyson, @queenoftrash97, @xxashy999xx, @oliviaadamswrites, @theunofficialduke, @mizzzpink, @sergeantliz, @sea040561, @nerdy-bookworm-1998, @potteryourotter, @animegirlgeeky, @capsiclesdoll, @their-bibliophile, @thefandomplace, @peaceinourtime82, @fallenoutofrose, @geeksareunique, @heyyouwiththeassbutt, @hidden-behind-the-fourth-wall, @chrisevansgirl, @lili-ann-love, @sister-of-stars, @distractedgemini, @walkingchemicalfire, @buckybarneshairpullingkink, @not-another-fangirl, @thefandomplace, @jubileestreetv

#when you come back to me again series #marvel fanfiction #mcu fanfiction #marvel reader insert #steve rogers x female reader #mcu #mcu reader insert #marvel au #mcu au #steve rogers fanfiction #captain america fanfiction #canon adjacent #female reader #reader insert

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rustandyearnings · 4 years ago

Text

How This Ends

Loan Tran

Two weeks into quarantine I read an article in The Atlantic titled, “How the Pandemic Will End.” It still felt wildly early to make any predictions about the future and the course of the virus. It has been now over a year that I have been trying to write a response to what I read, not because of any substantial disagreement but I foresaw then what I know now to be true, that after nearly a year of pandemic life: none of this simply ends.

There are no numbers and statistics, CDC guidelines, or even well thought out epidemiological reports that captures the depth of what it means that over 2.75 million people have died from COVID-19; over half a million of them alone in the U.S. We have witnessed a year that has made everything that was terrible before, much, much worse. And we know how we got here—especially being in the belly of the beast— we know all too well what regimes of power are capable of in their commitment to greed and profit. If you are like me or if you love people like me, you may know too that the world has come to an end many times before. What is different about this ending? If anything?

It was mid-March. My partner and I were on our way to the beach for her birthday. During our drive, we got news that the airports were starting to shut down and we were uncertain of the rumors about the National Guard being deployed to ensure compliance with stay-at-home orders. The beach was still there, and still sweet as always. We celebrated her the way we love each other; we ate delicious food, we laughed. She made her family’s shrimp: Lee Adam’s Shrimp. Which is comical, she says, because this was the only dish he would ever cook, and he got it named after him. Meanwhile, the family functioned because of women who made everything else possible. Such is our lives.

The Atlantic Ocean on the coast of North Carolina in mid-March is wind-swept, vast, very quiet. The sand becomes these large mountains to be trekked over before the water meets your eyeline. But once you see it, you know exactly where the ocean departs the sky. It was terribly cold. Yet, I was grateful to be by the water as our world began to shake us into conference calls and organizing meetings. Within just a few short hours of our Governor declaring lock down, we had formed the United for Survival and Beyond coalition. And knowing the year we were going to have and coming out of years of pavement pounding work, we were already exhausted. Deeper than the exhaustion is the truth that we must stick together, and we must find a way to continue on, especially now, with the cards so clear on the table: some of us will live and some of us will die. And there will be no logic to the madness.

The political work is instinctual to me; it makes sense in any crisis to bring together as many people as possible to understand a situation and to then take action. But the political work is also sometimes slow moving, even when we are all speeding and incredibly busy. So, I did other work that I felt, by my own standards, was more tangible. Like organizing a group chat of the queers I know who need medication on a regular basis. Or joining the local Mutual Aid Groups (and then promptly leaving all of the groups, which was simply a matter of exiting the Signal threads). Making a phone tree that was unreasonably the size of a phone book itself was an early action, too. And of course, cooking. There have been gallons upon gallons of pho. And gumbo. And at least 1,000 meatballs. Anything to attempt at satiating what I knew would become a growing hunger inside of me for a normalcy that still has not yet returned.

Things were deteriorating quickly all around me. By March’s end, my mom and I are on hold with her retirement company. She wants to get her money out of her account before the stock market steals it all away. This economic system routinely comes tumbling down for her; and often does it too line the pockets of the already ultra-wealthy. She has earned her retirement from working at the same alterations shop for over 20 years. She is paid for the time it takes to hand sew sequins onto wedding gowns that cost more than her year’s entire salary. She makes the inseam of your boutique jeans go from 32” to 30” with you never knowing the difference. She helps make people feel good, never questioning their own frivolousness in paying someone else to replace a missing button on their jacket. Her job has treated her well. This pandemic was beginning to test it as she’s filed for unemployment, without assistance from her bosses. The alliances that had shaped her life up until this point were beginning to fall apart, as is the case for so many of us.

It would become easier in the summer, but even then, the sweaty walks and the sitting outside in the beating sun just to eat a meal with someone who I wasn’t also sleeping with most nights began to tire me. I was unsatisfiable. I am lucky to have eaten many good meals, celebrate even more pandemic birthdays, and have extra money to keep supporting my parents’ and sister’s bills in between our socially distanced visits. Things would seem relatively calm for some weeks, when I felt like the weather wasn’t badgering on me. Which is to also say, that when things felt turbulent, it really just meant I was incredibly sad.

As I’ve been writing this piece in my mind, mulling over—as I usually do—which details feel relevant enough to evidence in words, the world around us has danced to the precipice of something new and back again. In between it all, I have had some of the most elaborate dreams of my life, the dreams at the heart of how I wish life could be.

I am home in Viet Nam. The sky is a dreamy pink, small stripes of orange and some residual blue as the sun sets and the moon takes over. I am sitting by the water and before me stretches a few miles of the bay. On the other side, mountains: spotted gray from granite and green from trees. I think to myself, “this is beautiful” and I take out my phone so I don’t forget what this looks like. My mom is here with me and it is quiet and perfect. Standing in line waiting to buy coffee from a street vendor, I think to myself, “wow, I get to be here,”; there are children and their parents who look my kin weaving around my stillness on the side of the road. I smile at someone I clock to be like me: a little odd, short haired, sweet looking in the face, stern and tough but kind in spirit. Then I wake up. It’s a dream. And all I know is that it’s a beautiful, perfect dream.

While time stretched and I could dream and I could travel in my mind, buoyed by my memories, telling stories that after the 3rd or 4th re-telling feels almost untrue, time also pulled me back to reality. To the everyday where I had few answers for the big question of: what now?

So what of time now? What is its worth? And what is worth it? I wear a watch every day still and I check my calendar still. And I still want Fridays to feel how Fridays are supposed to feel, still: they should release me. I still want to wake up slow on a Sunday, my favorite day, still. Things feel numbered and open all at once. Do I measure the worth of my life in this way or that? Do I consider tragedy to be where we start or is it having a witness to it that makes the clock run? Do I count the pints of soup I have made? What about the distance between us? There have been more cardinals than usual, but I’m really not counting. I do miss the children in the streets and the laughter beaming from their hands. Making sense of quiet and calling this place, my ever-growing city of just nearly 270,000 people, a ghost town seems a little defeatist; some days it seems just right, and some days it feels like an opening: to stop counting the time.

There is a slowness of this period that I have come to appreciate, even as it frustrates me. The slowness to remember and reconsider and re-learn the basic unit of relating: care; to care for each other and to care for ourselves. And we are being subject to the realities of care’s absence: there are millions of people—while they toil and make our world turn, even against the heaviest measures of despair—are disregarded as undeserving of housing, of health(care), of food, of life itself.

These systems of violence and domination continue to evolve, as showcased by this next phase of neoliberalism, with its elite colors and sloganeering. Coca-Cola racial justice investments and Nike’s you can do it to end racism and NFL’s $250,000,000 check to shut it (what, exactly?) down. Our task is more urgent than ever, yet there is still, simply this: you and I making a road where perhaps previously there was not, where perhaps previously there were, and it had been bombed or torn apart.

I am on the eve of my second pandemic birthday. And between the last time I dared contemplate how this ends and this moment now, there have been attempted coups and multiple mass shootings; there have been more vaccines distributed in the 1st world and essentially none for our sisters, brothers, and kin to the global south. Schools in my city are reopening and the people who suffer are made to blame each other.

A pandemic of this kind, through which a virus has served as the vehicle sounding the sirens of human plight, has the potential to lure us towards conclusions about the ever-deepening crises of white supremacy, patriarchy, and capitalism that will be regretful for us in the long-term. Namely, while it is true many things are outside of our control, like how a virus may mutate or transmit, there is so much more that is within our control.

We have witnessed that even in the middle of a pandemic, our people have risen up across the globe to declare that there must be another way to live. What deserves to be said again and again is that on one hand there is the science of this pandemic and the science of greed which profits on sickness; on the other is clear the science of solidarity; the science of organizing; the science of returning people back to each other; a sense of attention, a regard for care, an interest in ourselves and each other and the planet as people and places worthy of a world different than what centuries of violence and domination have conditioned and forced us toward.

At last, I do not know what the end of this pandemic means. But it seems to the hopeful, revolutionary optimist in me, that we have tried our raggedy best this year. I have appreciated more than ever our attempts at an honesty we may not have been willing to demonstrate. It seems to me that I haven’t been the only one to lie about how much I don’t know. And if you are looking for a script right now, about how to be, or how to cope, or how to regard yourself as belonging to those around you who do not look like you or speak like you or understand as you understand, I hope you’ll remember that there is no one else to make the future but us if we are to see ourselves in it.

I am embarrassed by my desperate need for things to return to normal. I am so desperate that I lay awake at night: wanting something I know I cannot have and the intelligent part of me knows that if I could have it, it would not be good for me or the people I love. The desperation is also a grief, fear, fatigue. But I also lay awake some nights taking audit of my gratitude; that beside me is my lover deep in restful sleep, that somehow in the morning our hands always find each other; and when we get out of bed, to make breakfast, or step outside: there is another day that affords me the time to learn how to be more human, and perhaps that is what this is worth. And those of us who still have it in us, and even those of us who feel that we have lost it, we must help this situation by becoming more and more human, as that is the only way I would want this to end.

This piece is dedicated to my dear friends who have kept me this year, in particular Zaina, Mindy, Margo, and Nadeen. It is also dedicated to our beloved Elandria (E) Williams, may they continue to rest in piece and know that we are taking their mandate for us to care, seriously. It is dedicated to the best pandemic pal and partner I could have ever asked for, who has also vowed to return the favor next pandemic, Chantelle. This is dedicated to the streets, to the uprisings, to all people everywhere who believe life doesn’t have to be this way, that we are so much more—these people include city workers, educators, youth and students, organizers, healthcare workers, and more. Thanks for the example of your lives.

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jace-the-writer-guy · 5 years ago

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Braid

///A little story I wanted to do based off of this adorable comic here drawn by @puresnowyfurball Nothing major at all in terms of spoilers for those that haven't seen the new episodes yet///

Sitting in front of the mirror in the dorm team RWBY had been given in Atlas, Weiss couldn't help but let out a sigh. She had gone through so much to get out of Atlas months ago, and put Klein in danger of losing his job and now she was right back in the floating city, right back under her father's nose. It wasn't something she expected to happen so soon, but here she was, and she had to face it. But, what made her smile a bit was the knowledge that she had her friends to back her up against her father. She knew none of them would put up with her father's abuse of her if and when he discovered her presence in Atlas, and she loved them all for it.

Weiss looked at herself through the mirror and could see the smile on her face. It always felt good to be able to genuinely smile, and with all the friends she had made in Beacon and the friends that stood with her now, those smiles came more and more often even through the situation she and everyone else were in. There was a lot of bad things going on in the world now since the fall of Beacon, and even before the fall, but Weiss could find solace in the presence of her team, Ren, Nora, Jaune, and even Qrow and Oscar. They were all like one big team, and Weiss knew she could be safe with them all. She just wished Pyrrha could be there with them.

Soon, she remembered just why she was sitting in front of the mirror and she ran her fingers through her long, platinum hair. She saw that Ruby and Blake had restyled their hair, and she knew Yang would never do that, so she wanted to do something new with hers too. Plus, she really needed to brush it again anyways now that they had finally found a bit of time to relax. Weiss reached for her brush and took hold of it, but then it was gently taken from her hand. Caught up in her thoughts about her friends and her hair, she hadn't noticed that someone came into the room and when they stood behind her, Weiss could see through the mirror who exactly it was.

"Your hair has gotten longer since we've last seen each other," Winter said softly and began to run the brush through her sister's locks, "You've always loved letting it grow."

"O-oh, hello Winter," Weiss greeted the elder Schnee. She truly didn't expect her to come visit, "Shouldn't you be working with Ironwood?"

Winter chuckled a small bit. "I took a short leave with his permission so I could come see you. No training, no missions... I just want to spend time with my little sister again."

Hearing that made Weiss' heart warm up from the cold of being back in Atlas. "Thank you, Winter," She felt her shoulders slack a bit in relaxation as the brush slowly went through her hair, "I've always missed how you brushed my hair."

"I have too. I remember your hair used to only reach the middle of your back. Now..." Winter trailed her fingers through Weiss' hair right after each stroke of the brush, always sure to lift her hair up and brush through to the tip as well, "It's so long and beautiful, just how you've grown to be a beautiful young woman."

Each moment that passed by with Winter brushing Weiss' hair, the younger Schnee felt more and more relaxed. Each time the brush and Winter's fingers passed through her hair, she hummed lightly. She looked at herself in the mirror and looked up at Winter's face, and she could see a small smile formed on her lips. It was a smile of happiness, one that Weiss could barely remember seeing from Winter. Soon, Weiss couldn't help but begin to smile too, and her eyes closed in happy contentment. An hour seemed to fly by as Winter just continued to brush her little sister's hair. There had been no more words shared between them. Both of them were happy to be able to spend time together like this once more for the first time in forever, and it filled them both with joy and gave them both a much needed morale boost.

Eventually, Weiss felt the brushing stop and then she felt Winter playing around with her hair. She was curious about what Winter was doing, but she was perfectly okay with keeping her eyes closed. It was so relaxing that she could fall asleep right then and not have a care in the world about it, but she wanted to spend every second she could with Winter. She then felt Winter begin to slowly braid her hair, and she remembered that Winter had always loved to do that when they were little. To be able to look back on her childhood in such a happy way filled Weiss with absolute joy. It made her completely look past the hell they were both going through because of their father. Those were some of the only times Weiss and Winter found happiness as children, and those memories were what Weiss clutched onto in this moment she shared with her big sister once more.

"There," Winter said after a few more minutes and Weiss slowly opened her eyes to see what Winter had done, "What do you think?"

Weiss pulled her braided hair in front of her and she looked over it, and her smile grew. "It looks really nice. I love it. Thank you, Winter. I... needed this."

Winter smiled softly. "I did too, Weiss."

Weiss stood up from her seat and turned to face Winter, and she hugged her once more. Winter didn't hesitate for a single moment before returning the embrace, hugging her sister tightly. "Be careful, Weiss... This is a very dangerous thing you've involved yourself in."

Weiss scoffed a bit. "Anything is better than being locked up at home."

Winter couldn't hold back a short, low laugh. "That is fair."

"You be careful too," Weiss said to the specialist, "I never want to have to hear that you've been killed in action... I don't know if I could bear it..."

"If that day comes, then I know you can," Winter said gently, "You're stronger than you know."

Weiss stayed silent for several moments. "How much longer until you have to return to duty?"

"I have a few hours still. I'm not going to let this time slip away. I want you to know that whatever may come in the future, I will always love you, Weiss. You're my sister, and nothing will ever change that."

Weiss hugged tighter. "I love you too, Winter."

#weiss schnee #winter schnee #rwby #rwby volume 7 #rwby 7

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historianatlarge · 5 years ago

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1917 - Film Review

A few days ago, my wife and I went to see ‘1917’. I’m certainly a bit behind the curve in terms of writing my review of it, but the film has stayed with me since we were there, and I feel the need to get my thoughts down. Really, that in a nutshell is the best recommendation I can make to you about this film – well over a week later, I am still turning over what that moment means to me, what the memory it created will mean in the future.

I had been hesitant to go see it in theatres, in part because I had seen so very many films about the First World War. All these films had a sort of rhythm to them, an almost traditional way they played out, dependant on the country that made the film, or whom it was portraying. In short, I had expectations – certain themes, certain notes I expected ‘1917’ to strike. In the end, it was my mother who convinced me I should go see it and she was not only correct but extremely correct in urging me to do so. At every turn, ‘1917’ caught me by surprise – it struck hard and gave me a moment of renewed belief in the power of cinema to reinforce the importance of history to a mass audience.

Before I review it in further detail, I will indulge in an aside; one that represents those little moments of life that we tend to remember for a long time after as odd or strange, perhaps even a little bit humorous. We went to see the movie on the 14th – perhaps not the most obvious choice on Valentine’s Day – the same day that Sonic the Hedgehog premiered. By coincidence, 1917 was showing in the theater next to it, and both movies emptied out within a minute of each other. You can imagine the very, very odd juxtaposition between a roomful of gleeful children, teens and parents compared to the very, very somber and even sorrowful people coming from next door. In short, I now have a superb example of ‘contrast’ to use when teaching an English class.

To return to my main theme, however, all of this – even the aside – speaks to the idea of the unexpected. At its core, I believe that is the key to 1917’s power and very real feeling. It abandons many of the old tropes to focus on the moment, with a galaxy of circumstances the audience, and the movie’s characters, can’t know about all circling around in the distance. This, in a very critical way, was the First World War. To the individual, the war was beyond comprehension – and in many ways it remains difficult to understand today. A war of millions of people in a labyrinthine, mud-soaked hell couldn’t fail to be anything other than that: a grand, confused mess on which a great slaughter was carried out. Throughout the film, every character finds themselves not only part of events they do not have any control over but are surprised by it – something I can assure you happens to the audience as well.

The violence in the film is sudden, and unexpected. Death is never predictable, never something forecast – it is at once a routine part of the larger tapestry but a sudden, awful surprise in moments that arrive either with pure shock or by unusual circumstance. This emphasis on circumstance is a crucially important concept to understanding the life of the individual during the war. By abandoning the look at the big battles, director Sam Mendes has crafted something unique. It gets us past mere statistics, past stereotypes or national myths and to the crucial reminder that these were ordinary, real human beings and not just names on a cenotaph or a granite monument. Years of a family’s love and care, a bundle of hopes and memories and emotions – all of it suddenly ended in sometimes absurd ways in a war that was itself absurd and, in many ways, unreal.

This air of unreality is reflected in the reactions of the film’s characters, and the audience. The movie is all about reactions, of course, since nobody has any mastery of the world they find themselves in – another very real take on the conflict. But as they make their way through the film, practically every character must come to terms with something unreal to them. The larger event that frames the film is the German retreat to the Hindenburg Line, a measure taken in 1917 to shorten the German defensive front by falling back to a heavily prepared defensive line and freeing up resources. This they achieved with near complete surprise, so much so that apparently at least one soldier left up a sign for the advancing Allies saying “don’t be angry, be amazed!”

The very idea that the Germans would retreat without making the enemy wrench territory from them inch by bloody inch is an astonishing surprise to the characters in the film, to the point where some simply don’t believe it, and you simply cannot blame them for their error. Again, these characters – these people - are not masters of their own fate. Advancing into the abandoned German defences brings yet more surprise, at the solid, clean and well-prepared nature of German positions (which often were superior to Allied entrenchments for reasons best gone into elsewhere) – and then further surprise at the nasty surprises left behind.

All of this world of surprise, of sudden and unexpected violence, or strange events that are difficult to accept, is painted onto a background created with great care and even greater skill. Much has been said about the cinematography of the film, and the long shots are certainly unique in that they keep the audience from resting. You keep watching for the sudden changes, the unexpected twist – in short, the audience undergoes a shadow of the experience of the soldiers themselves. Their world did not cut away, it remained a constant threat where the most (seemingly) inconsequential decision could result in death.

This unreal world is depicted with both the grim reality and the strange, horrible beauty that war art often evokes. The ruins of a French town illuminated by starlight shells, for instance, presents a remarkable and grand tapestry while still depicting just one small place and one small moment. It is at once beautiful and terrible, and I am certain that any dedicated student of the First World War will understand this feeling, even if they struggle to put it into words. It certainly isn’t easy. For me, it reminded me of seeing Regeneration Hall at the War Museum in Ottawa. For all the beauty of the space, for all the care in its construction and message, the statuary was disturbing – and the image of their faces has stayed with me ever since. While the Hall is explicitly about hope for a better future, it reminds us about the horrors endured to get there. This is an unspoken and complex discussion, one that the movie carries on with expert skill.

The movie also abandons the stereotype of the officers as being almost evil and unfeeling, a hallmark of many First World War movies. This is replaced instead by an officer class just as overmatched by events as the regular soldiers, just as unable to adapt to the sudden changes on the battlefield. Some of the officers you will see in other First World War movies are almost comically inept and without any human feeling whatsoever – and while these people did exist, it certainly paints a more realistic picture to show the wide range of emotional responses to the war, rather than fall back on a singular image. Once again, this is a complex discussion – and I am glad the movie provokes it.

The film does more to conceptualize the war accurately, but I will avoid discussing that to avoid revealing any major plot revelations for those still planning to see it. To sum up, then, all I can say is that this movie sticks with you. You turn it over in your mind time and time again, and that is some of the highest praise I can think of for any motion picture. It brings a vanished world back to us, one that is at once very far away and just over the horizon if we fail to learn from the past.

The score, the cinematography and the acting are all superb – and by and large beside the point. It is the frank and new way that it deals with its subject matter that makes this stand out, at least from my perspective. I cannot recommend it more highly, for it has been a very long time since I left a movie theater with the words of Siegfried Sassoon so clear in my mind:

“Sneak home and pray you'll never know

The hell where youth and laughter go.”

#1917 #movie review #WWI #First World War #review #Siegfried Sassoon #Sam Mendes #history #history writing

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backtoreal · 5 years ago

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MY FAVORITE DRAMAS OF 2019 !

Hello everybody, I’m back for this annual drama pick !

Unlike last year, this year was good, not exquisite, but good. But, I’m still going to give you the best of the best, la crème de la crème ! Once again, this is only my humble opinion, and I might add, I can’t watch every kdrama of the year, so I guess this is quite a small list.

PS : I still can’t choose an order, so please, make your own ranking out of my choice ;)

The 2018 version of it !

Hotel del Luna (호텔 델루나)

Jang Man-Wol is the CEO of Hotel del Luna. She made a big error many years ago and, because of this, she has been stuck at Hotel del Luna. Jang Man-Wol is fickle, suspicious and greedy. Koo Chan-Sung, a sincere perfectionist but actually has a soft disposition, begins to work as a manager at Hotel del Luna, due to an unexpected case. The hotel's clientele consists of ghosts.

> Where to begin... I guess IU got me again this year (My Mister in 2018), but in a totally different role and kind of acting. I was not disappointed. This drama has a really good storyline, using modern days and history, and reality and myths and legends. This kind of mix works really well for me. All the cast was perfect and the two leading actors had a great chemistry, and it made me love Yeo Jin-Goo a little more. Plus, the scenery and special effects were really great ! AND let’s not forget the looks of Man-Wol, and the charisma of IU > PERFECT ! I guess this drama is in my top 3 !

Kingdom (킹덤)

10 days have passed since the King collapsed from an illness. Queen Jo and her father Chief State Councilor Jo Hak-Joo have forbidden anyone else to see the King. Even his own son Crown Prince Lee Chang is forbidden to see his father. But rumors spread that the King is dead. Crown Prince Lee Chang senses something sinister and sneaks into the King's palace. He sees a shadowy monster through a door and smells its foul stench, but he is discovered and escorted out of the palace. To find out what happened to the King, Crown Prince Lee Chang and Moo-Young travel to the Jiyulheon clinic in faraway Dongnae to see a physician. When they arrive, they discover that the clinic is in ruins and dead bodies are found under a building. A medical staff member Seo-Bi tells them that the dead they saw at the clinic are not dead and they will rise up soon to kill.

> If anyone asks, zombies are my thing, it’s been years, I literally dream of a zombie apocalypse (no, not really). As I’m not over Train to Busan, I was very excited to see zombies in a kdrama. And I’m not gonna lie, it was damn good ! And I was not very glad at first that the storyline happened in old time, because like I already said, I don’t really like historical drama. But this one made it to the list. Great zombies, great actors , great all ... I guess it’s Netflix ! (Mr.Sunshine from 2018)

My Strange Hero (복수가 돌아왔다)

When Kang Bok-Su was a high school student, he was falsely accused of committing violence and kicked out of school. This was caused by his first love Son Soo-Jeong and a male student Oh Se-Ho. Kang Bok-Su is a now an adult, but his life has not gone smoothly. To get revenge on Son Soo-Jeong and Oh Se-Ho, he returns to the same high school as a student. The environment at the school has changed and Kang Bok-Su gets involved in unexpected cases.

> In a lighter tone, my strange hero is a great drama with a great story and great acting from Yoo Seung-Ho, it kind of made me want to follow his project in the future. The story is a classic revenge one, but it really made me want to have justice for Bok-su, it made me attach to this character. Great drama to relax and enjoy the love story.

Touch your heart (진심이 닿다)

Oh Yoon-Seo is a popular actress. She is famous for her beautiful appearance, but her acting is bad. She gets involved in a scandal with the son from a chaebol family. Her acting career declines precipitously. Oh Yoon-Seo hears that a famous screenwriter wants her to play the lead female role for a drama series. The character works as a secretary for a lawyer. To gain experience for the role, Oh Yoon-Seo is required to work as a lawyer's secretary for a few months. Meanwhile, Kwon Jung-Rok is an attorney for a law firm. He is arrogant and cold-hearted. One day, his boss asks Kwon Jung-Rok to let actress Oh Yoon-Seo work as his secretary for 3 months. He is not happy about the situation, but he has to accept.

> Basic Kdrama trope, but this one worked on me. We can say that Goblin greatly influenced my choice, the chemistry between Lee Dong Wook and Yoo In Na is beyond everything. But my heart goes all the way for Lee Dong Wook ! Anyway this drama really shows some deep characters and I loved it ! Bonus : it’s funny as heck !

Leverage (Korea) (레버리지:사기조작단)

Lee Tae-Joon is an excellent insurance fraud investigator. An unexpected case changes his life. He quits his job and recruits talented criminals, that he once caught, to form an elite fraud team. The team includes Hwang Soo-Kyung , Ko Na-Beyol , Roy Ryu and Jung Ui-Sung . They scam wealthy criminals and return the money that they stole to the victims.

> As a huge fan of the original US version, I was forced to watch this one, and let me say that, for once, the Korean version did not disappoint ! It takes the best of the original series and adapt it to Korean standards, and it works very well ! We can feel a great union between the actors who plays the team !

He is Psychometric (사이코메트리 그녀석)

Lee An has a special psychometry ability. Whenever he touches someone, he can read that person's memory. Using his psychometry ability, Lee An wants to take out evil people in the world. Yoon Jae-In is a girl with a scar in her mind. She tries to hide that. Lee An and Yoon Jae-In happen to meet and they struggle to solve cases.

> I was never a fan of Park Jin Young, but damn this boy got me ! He really has a great future in acting in front of him ! But all the cast were amazing. The story for once was really outside the box, I think that’s why I liked it so much ! Kudos to Da-Som whom I hope to see in more dramas !

The Light in Your Eyes (눈이 부시게)

Kim Hye-Ja hopes to become an announcer. She is honest and has a positive personality, but she suddenly becomes a 70-year-old woman. 70-year-old Kim Hye-Ja gains the special ability to manipulate time. Lee Joon-Ha wants to become a reporter. He has worked hard to achieve his dream, but he now lives his life hopelessly. He gets involved with Kim Hye-Ja.

> You can never guess how much I cried at the end of this drama ! You should really watch this drama, for the great acting, but also the story, a brilliant and well made one, I think you never really expected the ending, it tells how much the directing of this drama was good. This drama is definitely a revelation for me !

Extraordinary You (어쩌다 발견한 하루)

Eun Dan-O is a student at a prestigious high school. Her family is wealthy, but Eun Dan-O has a heart disease. Her fiance Baek Kyung attends the same prestigious high school. She likes him a lot, but he does not like her at all. Suddenly, Eun Dan-O has short-term memory loss and she can see what will happen in the near future. She gets confused by her symptoms. Then, Jinmiche, from the school cafeteria, tells Eun Dan-O that she is a character in the comic "Secret" like everybody else there. Eun Dan-O learns that her character is not even a main character, but rather an extra and she doesn't have much time to live. Eun Dan-O is stunned, but she decides she wants to find her own true first love and not someone written by the comic writer. One day, she falls down the school stairs. She feels her back touch the back of another student, among a group of male students. Her heart suddenly starts to flutter. Eun Dan-O wants to find the male student who made her heart flutter. She eventually finds the student and he is her classmate. He is a character that doesn't have a name. They get close and Eun Dan-O names him "Ha-Roo."

> I really did not expect to like this, why ? Because the basic story of this drama has been already this a thousand times : high school crush, bullying, ... But the fact that it happens in a comic really changed it all, plus, the scenography is really pretty, and the acting is on point when you watch them shift of characters ! You should really watch this !

Search : WWW (검색어를 입력하세요: WWW)

The story of three women in their late thirties — Bae Ta-mi, Cha Hyeon and Song Ga-Gyeong — who work in the top two competitive web portal companies: Unicon and Barro. This drama is about the conflicts, the wins, and losses one experiences when working. It will follow the story of 21st century women, who chose to not be a wife or a mother and successfully work without discrimination or impediments.

Bae Ta-Mi works as a director for a big web portal company. She is in her late 30's and is quite competitive. With her competitiveness, Bae Ta-Mi enjoys success. The methods she uses to win has her wondering if she is doing the right thing with her life.

Cha Hyeon also works as a director for a big web portal company, but as the direct competitor of Ta-mi, she’s also quite competitive, fierce, but also has a soft side, a side that she only shows to Ga-Gyeong her superior and friend.

Song Ga-Gyeong, is a rigid director of Ta-Mi in Unicon and the daughter in law of the CEO of KU Group, a big society who wants to influence the politics via Unicon. She is used by her mother in law but quickly became a fierce woman who stands for herself.

> First ... THREE STRONG WOMEN AS LEADS ! What can go wrong ? What can do better than this ! I don’t know my dear friends, I don’t know... If you ask, yes there is a love story (it won’t be a kdrama otherwise duh !), but the main couple isn’t really that great, and I really didn’t care about that. I loved the show for the power that these three women shows, and how it’s natural for women to rule the world ! (Yes I said it !) Bonus : openly showing that some characters could be bi (Cha Hyeon), and it show a very natural side of people that often people (especially in Korea) think it’s deviant (not shy about expressing their feelings, implying sex scene, etc ...). Great great drama !

Honourable mention (but did not make it to the list) : Romance is a Bonus book (My love for Lee Jong-Suk did not help unfortunately ! The female lead was hard to like), Her private life (great drama, great actors but the fangirl story is a little cringey), Melting me softly (Nice but weirdly made love story...)

That’s it for this year !

Please feel free to recommend me some 2019 kdrama ! ☺️

2018 ; 2019

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gwidener · 6 years ago

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Kingdom Hearts III - Some Thoughts

I am coming to KH3 as a pretty big KH fan. I have followed Nomura's Wild Ride for a long time - multiple clears on KH1, then Chain of Memories KH2, KH2FM+, and BbS all comfortably under my belt. I tried 358/2 Days but it never clicked for me, got frustrated with Dream Drop Distance, and have never played the mobile game (but it looks like everyone is going to be checking it out, so maybe SE got what they wanted!); I am not a speed runner or everything, but have comfortably finished the games on their hardest difficulties and beaten most of the secret bosses (I actually still need to go back to KH2FM+ and finish the Data fights, but I have that save file on PS3, which is kind of a pain to go back to now. ANYWAY)

Going to try to go through gameplay first, then story stuff, so the major spoilers should be backloaded?

One of my better notes is that KH3 plays more like a KH2 than KH2. I stand behind this now, another 10 hours later; KH2 is much more refined and takes the battle system in subtly more interesting directions than 3 does. To beat the hardest fights in KH2 (and also BbS) I sometimes found myself taking combo extensions off and working my way back in the abilities to find which ones were leaving me open to new attack chains from these harder fights. KH3 does not have this. Turn everything on and level a bit and you will get through fine; I need to start running through the gates but from what I have seen this is going to pretty much be the case all around, and that is disappointing from a series that has given high-level combat a puzzle box in the past.

For someone who lost their strength and abilities, Sora is pretty powerful even early on. Formchanges are really good and probably the one thing I think this game handles better than past titles - KH2s forms often felt random in terms of triggering and not always very useful until they were leveled up.

That leads me to the attractions: they aren't really possible to use in a really strategic way other than giving you time where it is hard for enemies to hit you to let your MP recharge. I often used my formchange animations in the same way; free hits from an animation that leaves Sora in an invincible state. These are a big part of why the game feels so easy. (Kupo coins also make the game feel really really easy, but when you can just hit retry on the battle anyway, I don't think it really is actually easier.)

Outside of combat, I don't know how much really needs to be deeply looked at in a wrap-up post anyway: the gummi ship design is disappointingly regressive, but a good source of extra stuff to do; the secret emblems could have been really cool but end up being frustrating and a bad gate to the secret movie; the worlds are mostly really well-built and designed but some are way too long (Arendelle, for example, has a ton of variation in feel and how the player is guided but it is wasted when you are spending so long looking at the same color palette) and some are so disappointingly short - in particular, it is fun to run around in San Fransokyo but it is so small and really should have had a little more to it or been moved back in the game so that you feel more like you accomplished something heading into the game putting you on the track to the ending. Still, though, the worlds are far above what they have been in the past, to the point where I noted the Map Directors name in the credits (shoutouts to Yoh Miyazaki!)

One more thing I think I can get away with without being an explicit story spoiler is after 0.2 and KH3 I never, ever want to fight a Demon Tower again.

Alright, story spoilers follow.

Last warning.

Kairi is completely fucking wasted. I could write at least five paragraphs about how frustrating all the other keyblade wielders not really being a part of the majority of the game is but Kairi's story still being the same as it has been forever despite her being empowered with a Keyblade is just infuriating. Someone slap Nomura for this shit. It is glaringly bad in the face of almost everything else.

KH3 is as poorly paced as any of the previous games, but it is more frustrating here for some reason. A lot of this has to do with how much of this act of the overall KH story being in previous games - Dream Drop Distance and BbS 0.2 really are the first big chunk of KH3, which is extra comical because KH3 opens claiming itself as KH2.9. But really, the player and Sora do not achieve anything until the journey through the Disney worlds is over; the only real reason to have the recovery of these other characters start occurring in the final moments of the game is to stack emotion on top of emotion to ensure the reaction they want from the player. But these moments are going to be stacked with gravity wherever they fall in the game. If Kairi and Axel were to join up with Sora, Donald, and Goofy midway to tackle a considerable enemy or something, it would push the player more while giving them some reward halfway. Ultimately you get sick of the carrot on the stick only being at the very end of this journey.

Speaking of DDD and 0.2, the 2.9 portion of this - and those moments being split into their own games - feel like Nomura way overcorrecting from criticism of the KH2 opening being too long and somewhat boring. It *was* too long and kinda boring but that let Roxas build as a real mystery and something intriguing; KH3 forgoes that, putting those mysteries in other places, so that it can focus on a bombastic opening that draws players in from a gameplay sense. And it works! Olympus is really cool! But it is just one of several long pieces of nothing in terms of the overall story.

Similarly, stacking all of the real boss fights in the endgame kind of cheapens them as characters with regards to 3. I know the fight against Xemnas, Ansem, and Young Xehanort is cool as fuck because I have played the games to know that but if you are just coming to 3, these guys showed up to tease you a couple times and said some vaguely threatening shit in cutscenes. Not giving active confrontation to these enemies earlier on torpedoes the emotional resonance of the fights later, instead of adding to them which could have been the idea behind holding them all back.

So much of what happens in the end is not just predictable but the game straight up tells you it is coming. And any conclusion in this vein will feel like that, so it seems like I am grading it on a curve when I tell you that I did ultimately like the game and how it carried itself despite the above. But if it pulls too many twists on you, it would feel like it is moving the goalposts away from you but both you and the game know it has to go down.

It feels like I am being a little more negative than I mean so let me dive into something real quick that I absolutely enjoyed: the emphasis on Sora, Donald, and Goofy as a team and that being the way you spend the majority of your time in the KH universe. It feels like Nomura and his team read my exact criticism of old KH games for always having a final battle that is so laden with new mechanics and loss of abilities; having Donald and Goofy along when you go to Scala ad Caelum and for the majority of the final run of battles really makes it feel like you have come all this way together and that Sora draws strength from that (which buoys that as a theme as well.)

Finally (for now, I may revisit my notes later) so much of what happens before the credits roll feels kind of crappy. If you have played BbS, you kind of know Xehanort hasn't always been irredeemable shit, but having Eraqus show up and essentially forgive him, and having Xehanort hand Sora the x-blade, put positive feelings on a character that absolutely doesn't deserve it. He has murdered for his goals and had others do the same, throughout fucking time. He is a shithead and him getting to stand up and somewhat willingly hand power over after his defeat knocks the wind out of Sora as the powerful figure he is and should be at this point of his journey. Make no mistake: at the end of KH3, Sora is by far the most powerful character we have seen in Kingdom Hearts. He takes down a Xehanort over multiple forms who has the x-blade and has opened Kingdom Hearts; he reassembles his own consciousness and heart and body which is something nobody should be able to do, according to Chirithy. Xehanort does acknowledge this, but it still plays at deference to Xehanort instead of glorifying Sora and his success.

I know I said finally but secret ending stuff too:

I hope you like long stories is A HILARIOUS LINE in a KH ending. Looking forward to learning why Riku and Sora are in the Shibuya from The World Ends With You and why on earth the dude from Verum Rex and YET ANOTHER PERSON IN THAT COAT are there like what the fuck. Is this the only way Nomura can get to make another TWEWY because *I am okay with this*

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ganzeer-reviews · 6 years ago

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THE BEST OF MILLIGAN & MCCARTHY By Peter Milligan and Brendan McCarthy o-o-o-c

Madness. Sheer and utter madness.

I must admit that before MAD MAX: FURY ROAD, I hadn't even heard of Brendan McCarthy, which is a damn inexcusable shame. But to be fair, the work of Milligan & McCarthy hasn’t really been part of the dialogue in comix culture. Not even when it comes to talking about the impactful indie work that fell outside of the mainstream; you never hear their work cited alongside that of Frank Miller's SIN CITY (which, before the 2005 film release was only really known in pretty small circles throughout the 1990's) or Eddie Campbell's ALEC or Dave Sim's CEREBUS. But that silence is in no way reflective of the duo's influence.

About a year ago, I listened to an interview with Neil Gaiman for the British Library podcast focused primarily on the RAMAYANA and Gaiman's involvement in adapting it for DreamWorks. When asked if he had a particular style in mind when working on the various [never-produced] treatments, Gaiman was quick to point out Brendan McCarthy's work on ROGAN GOSH, which Gaiman describes as being birthed from Brendan's "Road to Damascus moment, where he ran into a pile of comics in India, and just went 'I love this, there's art stuff here that I've never seen in the West,' and started doing stuff and playing with it." He also goes on to describe ROGAN GOSH as "one of the most interesting moments of fusion between Indian and British and American comix culture."

Naturally, I immediately looked into getting my hands on some ROGAN GOSH and discovered that it was reprinted in the pages of an over-sized hardcover titled THE BEST OF MILLIGAN & MCCARTHY published by Dark Horse Books in 2013 and retailing for only $24.99 (down to $7.19 as I type this). Although a horrendously produced edition (pages are actually falling out in less than a year since purchasing it), I'm still happy to have gotten my hands on it because it has been blowing my mind ever since. Not least because of the work itself, but because it simultaneously exposes a very vital almost secret history of comix lost to... I dunno,an obsession with the founding of Image Comics and the less than negligible work its founders produced? If there was ever a demented, revolutionary punk rock duo in comix, Milligan & McCarthy definitely fit the bill.

ROGAN GOSH first appeared in REVOLVER, a short-lived anthology magazine for mature readers published in the UK between 1990-1991. GOSH was finally collected by DC Comics/Vertigo into a 48-page one shot in 1994. It is perhaps because of the book's modest page-count that it is never mentioned in the same breath as say THE SANDMAN or PREACHER, or THE INVISIBLES or other long-running titles central to the Vertigo imprint's identity. But hey, Aristotle's POETICS is no more than a sodding 44 pages, which is sometimes all you need to jump-start a revolution.

In Milligan and McCarthy's own words, surrounded by "long and bloated 'concept album' comics", they were more interested in "the short, sharp, throwaway pop single. The type you danced to. The type you had sex to."

While the above statement can most be applied to their series PARADAX (also featured in the book), it pretty much hits the nail on the head with the majority of their collaborations, including ROGAN GOSH.

By the duo's own admission, it is not only difficult to describe what ROGAN GOSH is about, it is even pointless to ask. What may have been originally conceived as a “sci-fi Bollywood BLADE RUNNER” rapidly evolved into something far more demented. It starts off with Rudyard Kipling in Lahore en route to a place "where men of all castes come to sleep the sleep of dreams." Essentially, an opium den where "karmanauts can relieve a man of the curses of his sins.” If you think that opening scene will give you any idea of what follows, you are sorely mistaken. Kupling is entered into a "jasmine-scented dream of the future" where we are transported to psychadelic trip after psychadelic trip involving completely different characters:

- A man named Raju Dhawan waiting on another named Dean Cripps at a Tandoori joint called "Star of the East" - The blue-skinned Rogan Gosh on the run from the "bloody-tongued, dark destroyer" Kali together with a small idol of Kipling. - Raju Ghawan as Rogan Gosh together with Dean Cripps on the run from robotic hindu "Karma Kops". - Rogan Gosh as a bull-riding ancient Egyptian cowboy of the future, roaming through the mythic land of Wild Bill Osiris and Horus Thuh Kid.

If none of this makes the slightest bit of coherence, well that's because there is nothing coherent about it. Rather than there being any kind of train of thought, it's more like a train blown to bits upon the detonation of atomic dynamite. Shards of ideas floating around a nebula, jabbing into each other with every turn of the page. It's bizarre stuff, heavy on logic-defying captions almost as much as the explosive visuals. If you, the reader, let yourself go, you'll find that the synergy of text and image in ROGAN GOSH will drag you around a strong relentless current of spicy thought soup. Washing ashore an island of utter confusion is inevitable, but not without a sense of thrill retained from the memories of the surrealist storm that was.

Imagine a comicbook operating along the logic of say, PROMETHEA, 8 years prior to PROMETHEA's publication and without any of the rigorous explanation of the world's mechanics the way PROMETHEA delves into. Instead you're just thrown into it and left to make connections entirely on your own. That's what ROGAN GOSH feels like; a weird transcendental spell cast in comicbook form.

It isn't a coincidence that Milligan & McCarthy share something with Alan Moore other than British citizenship. All three after all did get their start making comix in the indie music paper SOUNDS. Moore with ROSCOE MOSCOW in 1979, and McCarthy et Milligan with THE ELECTRIC HOAX in 1978. This discovery, although new to me, was not at all surprising, as I find that I am typically drawn to creators who cut their teeth in avenues that fall outside of "the mainstream". Where the ones "in charge" understand little about what they’re doing, where anything goes and opportunities for mad experimentalism aren't stifled.

The greatest discovery in THE BEST OF MILLIGAN & MCCARTHY for me has been the duo's work on FREAKWAVE, a comic that, by Brendan's own admission, was directly inspired by MAD MAX 2: THE ROAD WARRIOR which Brendan became obsessed with during his surfing getaway in Australia in 1981. After which Brendan coerced Milligan to co-write a "Mad Max goes surfing" treatment Brendan could pitch to Hollywood. Hollywood didn't bite, but the duo did get to produce it as a backup strip in the pages of VANGUARD ILLUSTRATED published by Pacific Comics in 1983. Pretty straight adventure story initially (well, as straight as Milligan & McCarthy can muster anyway), with the most striking aspect of the strip being character designs and world building.

FREAKWAVE is a post-apocalyptic punk-rock drifter who windsurfs a flooded Earth in search of floating trash he can live off. He battles it out with disease-ridden humanoid "Water-rats" and psychopaths in gasmasks wrapped in old tin cans and the random cultural ephemera of old. FREAKWAVE would later resurface as a punk-absurdist Tibetan Book-of-the-Dead story in 1984's STRANGE DAYS, an anthology showcasing the work of Milligan, McCarthy, and Brett Ewans published by Eclipse Comics. It only ran for 3 issues, but Warren Ellis says it "landed like a hand grenade from another world", which is still exactly what it feels like going through its contents 34 years later today. It is especially in the pages of STRANGE DAYS' feature comic FREAKWAVE that you see Brendan McCarthy and Peter Milligan really rocking out like some kind of alternative comicbook band, the pages crackling with the energetic buzz of an electric guitar. Brendan especially reaches peak McCarthiasm, with 90% of his visionary work on FURY ROAD appearing here first on the page a good 31 years before blowing people's minds on screen.

Which, by the way, how fucking cool is that? To be asked to work on the sequel to a film that inspired your scarcely read comicbook. And to be asked specifically because of your work on said comicbook?

Not to mention that FREAKWAVE, although given a pass by executives in Hollywood, very likely influenced the movie WATERWORLD in 1995, at the very least in terms of look and production design, which let's face it was the only really good thing about the film.

Nothing will give you that good kick in the balls to go off and make comix (or any ill-advised pursuit) more than looking at the work of Milligan and McCarthy. If a big part of the draw of comix for you is that it is medium void of filters between creator and reader, well then that cannot be more true of Milligan and McCarthy's collaborations. Because there are always editors keeping creators in check, or heck, even self-inflicted inhibition on the creator’s part. Not for Milligan and McCarthy.

Never for Milligan and McCarthy.

[Available on Amazon]

Ganzeer November 23, 2018

#comix

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araniaart · 7 years ago

Photo

Ace Comic Con Report!

@shipperhipster and I road-tripped to Arizona for Ace Comic Con in Glendale! (Afterwards, we made a side-trip to the Grand Canyon to make it a real vacation before heading home - more photos on that later!) BUT wanted to post about the experiences at the con! I did a separate write-up about how awesome it was to meet two of the top Art Designers of the MCU (Andy Park and Ryan Meinerding) HERE There were a lot of ups and downs about the convention itself. The SUCKIEST was that Chris Evans got sick the 2nd day of the con, which is the day we had our tickets to meet him/get photographs. It was going to be our first chance to actualy do a photo-shoot with both us with Chris & Seb together, and we were really looking forward to that. On top of that, Chris was only days off of filming Avengers 4, and he was actually in a rare state of clean-shavenness (which as much as I do love beardy-Steve, he still looks the most like iconic Steve Rogers to me when he’s clean-shaven. We had planned on capitalizing on that for some photo shoot poses :/ ) That being said, we still feel like we couldn’t be that upset about that. We’ve had the chance to meet him before and took an awesome photo with him. We had friends there who were going to be meeting him for the first time, and there were even people who had flown in from countries all over the world to meet him that may not have gotten the chance :( That being said, all in all, even with the disappointment of not getting to see Chris Evans, we still had a great time, and the things that did go well went very well.

Speaking of international visitors, right as we were heading in, an Uber pulled around and asked us if either of us spoke Japanese. Which was absolutely coincidental since I did actually take four semesters of it in college - even though it had been a long time, I knew enough to help translate between the young woman who had flown in by herself to the convention and the Uber driver. She was so sweet, another huge stucky fan, and we chatted as we waited in line to get into the con! (I have a terrible memory for names, but I believe she was Kanoko!) She was super sweet, excited to be there, and her sister had even spotted us at a different convention before and had photos of us - such a small world! She had a great movie-accurate Bucky Backpack with her that she was going to get signed ^^

The Location of the Arena was wonderful - since the stadium is designed to deal with a LOT of people, the area was beautiful with a ton of shops and restaurants in easy-walking distance that could easily handle feeding the crowds. There was an amazing Japanese place we went to called Kabuki after the con that only had a very short wait and some delicious sushi. There was a movie theater, Dave & Busters, bars who had decorated to cater to the comic convention crowd, and all-around a great time :) A comic convention IN an arena, however... there were definitely some growing pains. While the photo shoots were great, and they are run by a different company, all of the autographs were up in the top level of the arena - which meant if you had a narrow time-gap between a photo and an autograph, it could be tough. You had to sit in the very tight (especially if you were in a costume) nose-bleed seats that were angled so as vertigo could be a thing. It also meant that when you were waiting for your turn, since they were pulling people up a row at a time, you couldn’t watch other people interact with the guests while you were waiting.

The con also did not allot NEARLY enough time for the autographs. Sebastian Stan was running over an hour over his allotted time and the staff was rushing him with talking to people - we were at the end of his line, and when we came up he was talking to a handler about why they didn’t budget enough time, and feeling bad bout not getting time with visitors. Such to the point that while he was signing something for him and we were waiting for him to finish/finish speaking with the staff so we could say hi, one of the staff was trying to rush us out “you got your signature ladies, now go!” - I’m thankful Shipper said something - along the lines of we paid to at least get the chance to say Hi to him, and poor Seb - was very apologetic even though we weren’t directing it at him/he wasn’t the one trying to rush us out before we said anything. BUT - My wife got the chance to compliment him on his work on I, Tonya (during the panel, the emcee had spoken to Anthony Mackie and Chris Evans about other roles they’d done, but then asked Seb about The Martian (which he was in like 5 minutes of) and asked how it was working with Ridley Scott (who Seb said was like acting in the dark - NO guidance at all) - and you could tell he was miffed that he hadn’t been asked about I, Tonya since that’s what he’s been promo’ing and the movie is up for some good awards and he has a significant role in it! He also said that he liked my costume! Eeeee! Another down-side of the arena format was the stairs: we had brought a rolly-bag FULL of the MCU Artbooks (The bag probably weighed like 40 lbs) for signatures but rolly bags are not convenient for stairs. Most con floors - sure. Thanks again to Shipper for hauling it up and down the arena stairs TWICE before we were able to get them signed and taken back to the hotel. That being said, the upsides were good - All of the Arena staff were absolutely on-point. They were helpful, concerned about the experience and knowledgeable. When Chris cancelled they made sure guests had choice of alternatives (subbing-in a different op, doing partial-shoots and refunding the Chris “value” if he wasn’t there, or a full refund) - and stayed late to work on processing refunds. When the exchange-your-printed-ticket-for a photo-op coupon line got RIDONKULOUS (across the entire arena floor, up the stairs, and around a corner in the next level, arena staff got on it to make sure that people expedited it. And aside from the lady rushing us at Seb’s table, the rest of the con staff were nice and helpful. which after Comicpalooza, was incredibly refreshing.

That being said, one of my favorite things about cons - the artists’ alley where you have a lot of craftspeople selling interesting wares - was absent from the con. They had BIG comic/pop toy/etc dealers on half of the arena floor, and then a big circle of pro artists selling almost exclusively prints (which is great, but I like a variety) all around the (rotunda?) ground floor of the arena hallway. Then a few different vendors up around the signature area.

Tom Holland was absolutely sweet. I think that this was his first convention outside of SDCC - where he actually got to meet fans and interact with them. He had his own private security team that had a second round of checks after the convention group and were more limiting props for shoots, but that’s understandable considering how young he is and how up and coming he is! (And that this was his first con of this format I think) He was enthusiastic, friendly, and seemed genuinely excited to be there. He had also volunteered to be a sub-in for Chris Evans with group photo shoots, staying late to help people out. I missed most of his panel, but it looked like he was having a good time, and Ned’s actor was also thrilled to be there, taking photos of the crowd. Tom also was having fun peeking out of the curtain of his signature area and waving at the people waiting for him.

It was still a little weird for me to see all the girls likely half my age heart-throbbing after him XD I had no idea how popular he was with teens, but it makes sense! But we were thrilled to meet the MCU Spidey, get his autograph added to our shield, and I think he was an AWESOME Cast!

Signature Right in the blue in silver! Other things of note - Jon Bernthal makes me squee a little more every time I hear him talk. He spoke in his panel about the experience that made him an actor. He had gone to the college for sports, but wasn’t good enough for that to be a long-term career. He had wound up taking an acting class for an elective because he thought it would be an easy class he could hang in the back of. IT wasn’t what he expected and when he didn’t prepare for one class where he was supposed to bring a significant object and describe why it was meaningful, and seeing all his classmates breaking into tears talking about the things he brought, he felt put on the spot. He dug out a baseball glove and made up a story about it being from his grandmother. He had half the class in tears and felt bad - saying afterwards - no, man, this is just acting - it isn’t true. The teacher then pulled him aside - and said that he broke the rules of acting - he wasn’t genuine - but that he had a gift. She made him enroll in the play, and psuhed him. She changed his life and he tattood her name on his wrist and she officiated his wife and his wedding.

Ebon Moss-Bachrach (Micro’s actor), on the other hand, obviously didn’t want to be there. He came an hour late to his signing after a staffmember had to go retreive him, and apparently “came in with an attitude” about being rushed. He was pleasant enough to us for the signing (and was pleased that people picked up on his character's interpretation being a Snowden analog) - but at the panel he had stank face the whole time, and when asked the same question about what got him into acting it was “it seemed like the most logical choice at the time.” Moreover, when the emcee asked them about what their favorite role was the other actor had been in, Jon gushed about being a fan of Ebon’s work - his great role on Girls, some of his stagework, and Ebon just.... drew an uncomfortable blank - even after the fact two questions ago Jon had talked about his other roles. The moderator had to offer him to “come back to him”. It was kind of awkward. Anyway! All in all, the experience was worthwhile - and Shipper’s new iphoneX got some great photos of our cosplays :)

#Ace Comic Con #Tom Holland #Sebastian Stan #Chris Evans #Hayley Atwell #Punisher #Jon Bernthal #Long Post #MyWSCosplay #Winter Soldier #Captain America

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alexidewrites · 7 years ago

Text

Mari

A/N: Do NOT read this story if you have any triggers that can be found in the tags. Otherwise, proceed to under the cut to start reading this short story. You have been warned.

Empty boxes lined the dining and living rooms waiting to be recycled, while Alex finished unpacking the office and Elaine the bedroom. The two had moved into their new townhouse two weeks before, but due to work and wedding planning, only the essential boxes had been unpacked, namely bathroom and bedroom supplies, kitchenware, and pet supplies. Their cat, Snickers, lay in one of the boxes, somewhere.

While Elaine remembered what was in most of the boxes she had brought with her during the move, Alex couldn’t remember which box he had packed which thing in. He thoroughly regretted not labeling them now as he moved about the office looking for the box that housed his personal collections.

“Ah,” Alex said, shuffling boxes around for a moment before stopping and standing straight up. “I guess it got moved to the bedroom. I should’ve known that.” Alex moved out of the office into the hall, spotting Snickers jumping between boxes.

He walked into the bedroom, chuckling to himself.

“Snickers jumping around again?” Elaine looked up from digging through the box that Alex had just been looking for.

He nodded, moving to help her with his mementos.

Elaine handed him a few of his trophies from high school and college. “He’s been doing that all day. And you’re sure you can carry them all?”

“Yes, I can carry them all.” He took an armful back into the office with him.

“Hey, Alex?” Elaine called, moments later, as he set them down on the desk. “Do you know what’s inside this?”

“What’s inside what?” Alex walked back into the bedroom, seeing a wooden box roughly the size of a watermelon with a lock on it in Elaine’s hands. He stopped right in front of where she sat on the ground. “Where’d you find that?”

“It was in the bottom of this box.” She set it down in front of her.

Alex pulled his keys out of his pocket. As he sat down, he flipped to the small key that would open the box. “It’s a bunch of memories from high school and college. My parents must have snuck this in while I was packing it. I don’t remember what all I put in here.”

The lock looked just as old as he remembered, one of the rusted ones he had snagged from his dad’s lock box during the summer of his freshman year of high school. It looked as though his parents had attempted to polish it, to no avail, though, due to the slight glimmer from the metal. He smiled as he opened the box, excited to see what was inside. A miniature figure of Super Saiyan Goku sat on top with a lanyard holding his high school ID on the end. He pulled them out and passed them to Elaine.

“You weren’t kidding when you said you’ve been into Dragon Ball for quite some time.” Elaine laughed, setting the figure down next to her. She looked at the photo on the ID and chuckled something along the lines of how cute he was as a fourteen-year-old.

Alex paid no attention to her. He pulled out more items: a Hatsune Miku photo, a manga that no one had ever heard of, the very first comic of Captain Marvel he had hunted down during his junior year of high school and saved up enough money to buy among other comics he’d thought he’d lost, a couple of medals from his days playing baseball, a couple letters he had kept from friends who had moved away, and an envelope with only “Al-kun” written on the front. His smile waned as he held the envelope in his hands.

Alex stood up, turning towards the door. “Can you put everything back when you’re finished looking through it, Elie?”

Elaine looked up quickly from her smiling at all of the stuff he had pulled out of the box. “Sure.” She noticed the envelope in his hand and instantly frowned. “Is everything okay?”

He nodded. “Yeah. I just remembered why I haven’t bothered looking for that box in six years.”

“It’s because of her, isn’t it?” She carefully placed the figure in her hands back inside the box. “Do you want to put that back in there, too?” She motioned to the envelope.

“No. I think I’m finally ready,” he said, giving her a wry smile.

Elaine nodded in response, a knowing smile on her face.

Alex shut the bedroom door behind him, making his way down the hall towards the living room. He looked at the envelope as he sat down on the couch. “Al-kun,” Alex read the front of the envelope again. The name in a big cursive calligraphy that the girl, no… woman, who had written it developed. She’d been the only one to use it, too, and had never let anyone else attempt it. Just like she was the only one whom Alex had ever let her call him Al. He hadn’t particularly liked the name at first but had grown accustomed to it over the years after having met her their sophomore year of high school. “Art class, if I recall correctly.”

This girl had sat at a table next to a giant window of the art room, always staring at the outside world. Alex had sat right next to her. A book and a sketchpad always sat in front of her on the desk, so her drawing and calligraphy had caught his eye initially. It was the first time he’d seen her distinctive style, big, curly and elegant. He hadn’t been able to bring himself to talk to her in those first few weeks, only admire her work from afar.

Alex flipped the envelope open and slowly pulled the flap out. The edges of a picture and a piece of paper lay neatly inside, where he had left them. Having never read the letter due to not having the strength at the time, Alex had placed it with his most beloved picture of the two the night after their senior prom. They had laughed and danced the night away, among good friends, and family that night.

As he pulled the picture out, he smiled at it as his eyes began to water. They sat on top of the bar at his uncle’s restaurant where after-prom had been held. The girl’s amber eyes caught his attention first. Thin black eyeliner lined her upper eyelid, flowing out to a thin, but graceful wing tip. Her eye shadow faded from a deep purple along the outer edges of her eyelids to a soft lilac in the inner eyelid. They smiled back at him along with her gorgeous wide smile she was well known for. Her reddish brown hair fell in tightly kept curls barely falling past her left shoulder, still in the loose pony tail she had tied it up with. She wore a pink top with white flowers falling down the side and a pair of jeans, along with a corsage of white and pink flowers on her left wrist. He had delicately taken the corsage off later when they had chosen to taken the next step of their already two and a half year relationship, intimacy.

“Mari,” Alex muttered, a tear glimmered in the corner of his eye. He set the picture down for a moment, closing his eyes. He could see her laughing that night, having found himself laughing right along with her at another stupid joke of his, one that his uncle had told him when he had helped set up the bar for after-prom party earlier in the day. A grasshopper walks into a bar and the bartender says, “Hey, we have a drink named after you.” The grasshopper says, “You have a drink named Derek?” That had been right before a friend of his had taken the photo. The scene shifted. He could feel her hair between his fingers and his in hers. They lay intertwined on his bed, laughing about how much fun the entire night had been, including the awkwardness between them for a brief moment.

As Alex look back at the photo, he found himself smiling. His hair in the photo was slicked back, as it had been an inch longer then compared to now. He also sported a school t-shirt, along with khaki shorts. He held her right hand in his, smiling back at the camera, his mouth partly open from laughing so much. That had definitely been a night to remember, and one he would never forget.

He set the picture down on the coffee table in front of him. The letter sat waiting for him to read, but he wasn’t ready yet. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath, letting memories of their time together come flooding back: the two of them moving each other’s items into their dorm rooms at college, only three rooms apart from each other; dancing to the music of the cicadas as the sun set in the park; hanging out and playing video games or watching anime at her house; splashing each other with salt water at the beach with friends the summer after high school graduation.

Alex even remembered what their first fight had been about, which universe was better, DC or Marvel. Mari had been so adamant about Marvel being better than DC, but Alex held his ground. They’d have fought over this multiple more times, if they hadn’t had other stupid and silly arguments that they’d argue about periodically, such as which Vocaloid was the most emo, and which anime adaption of the manga was better. They’d always make up and kiss, possibly more later on, laughing about how silly their fights were, but agreeing that they could manage to come to terms by agreeing to disagree.

What popped into his mind last, though, was the day he first asked her out to the homecoming dance their sophomore year of high school, only a month after he had first noticed her in their art class. Mari had been quietly reading a book at the lunch table. Alex had noticed that she wasn’t a social light, but could tell that she was friendly to those who talked to her from paying attention in the classes they shared. He had been wanting to talk to her for quite some time, but hadn’t had the nerve to ask her yet, until that particular day, one friend dared him to ask her, leaving him with no choice but to walk over to her. She had looked up from her book, as he asked her out. “Only if you can make me laugh,” she’d said with a smile on her face. So he told her the one joke he could think of.

If anyone asked him now what joke he had used to get her to laugh, he always said he didn’t remember, which he really didn’t. He only remembered that it had something to do with whatever food she had been eating for lunch that day. He could still hear her giggling slightly all these years later, which caused him to reach for the letter.

Taking another breath, he began to read the letter as he opened it up. Even though he hadn’t wanted to cry, he found himself crying from the very beginning. The amount of tears grew the farther he read. After reaching the last line, he lay down on the couch, the piece of paper on top of him.

Elaine found him that way when she finally left the bedroom and made her way out to the living room. Alex sat up for her to sit down on the couch, then laid his head on her lap. Having noticed his tears, she asked, “Are you okay?”

“I’ll be okay.” He smiled up at her. “You’re here with me.”

She smiled back at him, running a hand through his hair. “We can stop unpacking for a bit if you’d like.”

Alex closed his eyes. “That sounds nice.”

After a moment, Elaine spotted the letter and asked, “Can I read it?”

Alex looked up at her, his eyes still watering. “You’ll cry.”

“No, I won’t.”

“Trust me. You knew her, too.” He held the letter up for her to grab. “Just don’t stop with the hair, alright?”

Elaine nodded in response, giving him her understanding that it would be soothing for both of them. Taking the paper into her hands, she began to read, letting the tears fall if they were destined to fall.

To My Love, My Dear Alexander,

You will never understand why I did what I did, but I will try to explain it to you anyway. I grew up in a house where I could have anything I wanted, to an extent. I had loving parents, grandparents, extended family, etc. I was in so many extracurricular activities until I found my passion, calligraphy, and art. Eventually, everything in my life started to look dim for no apparent reason. I couldn’t understand why I felt the way I did in middle school, always feeling sad, but hiding it with a smile. This feeling grew to even greater lengths in high school, that is, until I met you, or so I thought.

You know, the first time I saw you, I couldn’t take my eyes off of you. Your dark hair and eyes caught me by surprise, even if you looked dorky in your gym clothes freshman year. (Yes, we did have gym class together, just with different PE teachers.) .) I ended up having the biggest crush on you, but you had no idea who I was, and I was okay with that. Well, maybe I was just content with that for a while because when I noticed something had changed about you, I grew excited. You started to notice me.

When you approached me sophomore year and asked me to go to the homecoming dance with you, I had to play it cool, but I was actually extremely nervous. That’s why you got the “only if you can make me laugh” response. You told a really stupid, but funny and cute joke, too. “Why did the tomato turn red?” “I don’t know. Why?” “Because it saw the salad dressing.” “I assume that’s a yes then?” I had no choice but to agree, not that I didn’t want to go to the dance with you. I’m really glad I went with you. That turned into four amazing years with you that I will never forget, especially the night of senior prom. I don’t need to explain that. I’m sure you remember.

You changed my life. You erased most of whatever it was that caused me to be depressed. You gave me a reason to live, even if I ended up with only nineteen years of life. That’s why I couldn’t tell you that some part of that feeling, the depression, was still there, still fighting over control of my mind even though I thought it had disappeared. Which is why I’m writing this letter to you now. I’m pleading with myself to stop, to not go through with this. I want to live the rest of my life with you like we’ve discussed. I want you to propose to me. I want to say yes. I want to live in a happy home. I want to have three beautiful children with you who will grow up to be wonderful human beings just like their parents. I want to pursue that double degree in psychology and psychiatry so I can help people like me, people who don’t understand why they feel the way they do, who don’t feel like they should feel this way because they have great and amazing lives. I don’t want to disappear. I don’t want to... but I don’t think I can stop this feeling.....

I need help. I know I need help. But by the time you, or anyone, find this, by the time you find me, it will be too late. I’m too far gone. I’m not even sure how to come back. I can’t stop myself, but I want you to know that I love you. I love you with every fiber of my being. Please find it in yourself to live a happy life, make some amazing girl your wife, and please know, you are perfect in every sense of the word.

I love you, my Al-kun. I will always love you.

With All My Love,

Mari

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some-cookie-crumbz · 7 years ago

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Crumbles’ Big Dump of Upcoming Fics

Happy New Year, everybody! I certainly hope that so far things are going well for you all. I had been meaning to make this post a while back but things got kinda… delayed. Between a lot of really painful personal tragedies – including the death of my dad – and a stressful schedule with work and school, I’ve been a little all over the place. 2017 has been, by far, the cruelest and loneliest year of my life. My dad’s death has shattered me in a lot of different ways, but it had a huge impact on my ability to write, which crippled my usual coping mechanism. He was always really invested in the original stories that I work on as well and was also so supportive of my works. It made writing – something that I have always relied on as a stress relief and outlet for my negative emotions – painful and challenging and it, in turn, made me bitter and resentful at myself and at him. I’ll make another post about where I’ve been in my own mind fully just to get it all out eventually, but for now I just want to offer up an abridged version.

Most days I didn’t – and, honestly, there are still days where I don’t – feel like myself at all. But I feel that, at this point, not writing would be a disservice to his memory.

In the last few weeks I’ve felt a bit more clarity and I’ve been able to find my voice again. I don’t want to stop writing and I have no intention of doing it. In fact, my imagination has kinda jump-started back to near-normal capacity and I have a lot of ideas I’m really excited to share. This post is about the ideas I have in mind and when I intend to upload what. I want to put myself on a schedule because I feel like setting goals for myself will be a good way to get me back in the swing of things.

In preparation for this, I’ve actually gone ahead and made myself an AO3 account – which can be found [here] - because the ideas under the “Read More” are all going to be multi-chapter projects. I’ll still make posts here on tumblr when any updates go live (and should have schedules for when each fic will be updated), I just don’t want to post full chapters here, since I tend to write long chapters. I am also adding the disclaimer here that one-shots (with some exceptions)/ requests/ and other things of that ilk will not be listed here because those have no real schedule in mind.

Ships to Expect: SasuSaku (Naruto), SoMa (Soul Eater), Hance (Voltron), and a whole mess of Kidge (Voltron) because I have no control.

The Shrink Treatment 3: Voltron (Kidge): I am almost done with this one and, surprise to no one, there’ll be one more part after that to just wrap it all up. Regardless, though, I should be able to finish this short series up before the end of the month! Release Date: January 11th/12th, 2018 Update Schedule: Once (Part 4 will hopefully be done within two weeks from whichever day I upload Part 3)

Request 5: Voltron (Kidge): Leaving this vague, because I still want it to be a surprise, but the final of a list of requests I received a few months ago! This, much like The Shrink Treatment, ended up getting away from me. I relaly loved the idea and it’s taking me a while to get it finished. Release Date: February 14th, 2018 Update Schedule: Once (Valentine’s Special)

Like Treading Water: Voltron (Kidge): Love isn’t exactly an emotion that is easy to explain or acknowledge if you aren’t actively looking for it. Little nuances will stick out as something irregular and strange, but can be easily shrugged off when a mind applies logic or sound reasoning to it. You can blind yourself to something that is so obvious to those around you simply by virtue of coming up with other explanations. This is a chronology of how each Paladin realized that Keith Kogane and Pidge Gunderson were falling for each other; including the two Paladins themselves. Note: I started working on this back in October of 2015, shortly after I watched the first season and became Voltron trash. As such, I’m currently having to re-read what I’ve written so far to assure that it falls in line with the canon of the series thus far. Release Date: February 14th, 2018 Update Schedule: Once (Valentine’s Special)

Keidge Month: Not a multi-chapter story, but I just want to say I have every intention of participating in Keidge Month in March; in fact, I’ve already started to work on some of my prompt fills. I’ll post all my prompt fills to both here and AO3, just so that people can choose to read it on whichever outlet is more comfortable for them. It’s my number one ship and it happens to take place during my birthday month, so what kind of smuck would I be to not participate? ;3c Release Date: March 1st, 2018 Update Schedule: Daily (Month Long Event)

Cherry Bomb: Naruto (SasuSaku) – After an accident in the facility that she is interning at, Sakura Haruno gains super strength and an accelerated healing element. With the help of her role model, Dr. Tsunade Senju, she learns how to control and harness this power to help protect the denizens of the city. She is thrust into stopping a plot by other humans with genetic mutations to take control of the city using intimidation and force while also trying to keep her secret identity hidden from her photo-journalist boyfriend, Sasuke Uchiha. Note: I’ve been planning this project for roughly three – Hell, almost four – years now. This is going to be my final Naruto project – excluding any requests I get – and I want it to be something really special and significant to not just anyone who reads it, but also to my own growth as a writer. Naruto has been one of the longest fandoms I’ve been in and SasuSaku was one of my first really big ships; I want this to be a final love letter worth my time to write and worth everyone’s time to read. Release Date: March 2nd, 2018 Update Schedule: Bi-Weekly

Kidge Week: Again, not a multi-chapter thing but I really needed to say I have every intention of participating in this as well! My goal is to finish as many of my prompt fills for Keidge month before the prompts for Kidge Week drop in February as possible so that I can start working on that ASAP. Release Date: April 15th, 2018 Update Schedule: Daily (Week Long Event)

Hance Month: What do you know, I had way more things to list as non-multi-chapter fics for the first half of the year than I thought! Another extended event I have every intention of participating in because I really want to produce more content for Hance. It’s really such an great, under-rated ship that deserves more love! Release Date: May 1st, 2018 Update Schedule: Daily (Month Long Event)

Lance McClain vs. The World: After getting involved with a charming young engineering student named Hunk Garrett after meeting at a bar, Lance McClain finds himself getting dragged into a series of events that seem to be ripped right out of a comic book. He is given a warning from the leader of something called “Team Voltron”; a group of Hunk’s ex-lovers and close personal friends, dedicated to determining the worthiness of Hunk’s suitors through various competitive means. Never one to back down from a challenge, Lance agrees to the terms and is forced to learn various new skills and talents in order to compete with the roster of powerful opponents he faces. Note: The fact that there aren’t more Scott Pilgrim AUs in any of the fandoms I like is really disappointing, so I decided that I’d fix that problem myself. While I’ll be following the basic formula set up by the source material, I intend to take a very different approach and keep it fresh with some ideas of my own. So if you’ve actually seen Scott Pilgrim? This’ll be of a different flavor, so don’t assume you know what I have up my sleeve. ;3 Release Date: May 10th, 2018 Update Schedule: Weekly or Bi-Weekly.

Bodyguard AU (Title TBD): Voltron (Kidge): After publically calling out the shady business practices of Galra Tech, acclaimed actor Keith Kogane finds himself the subject of both an attempted assassination and threat of blackmail. Undeterred, he feels no fear at the prospect of making an enemy of the powerful conglomerate. Worried about his safety, both physically and his privacy being violated, his agent, Allura LeAltea, calls upon the help of an old charm school friend of hers. Enter Katie Holt; renowned tech prodigy and secret hacker known as Pidge Gunderson, hired on to be Keith’s personal bodyguard. The only catch? The two must pretend to be dating to assure that Katie can tag along with him wherever he goes without cueing Galra Tech into knowing their threats have had an effect. Note: I love Bodyguard AUs. I love Fake Dating AUs. I love deviating from the expectation. On top of that, an amazing Bodyguard AU one-shot has already been written by the talented Camphalfgalra on AO3, in which Keith is the bodyguard and Pidge is his client, so I decided to flip the roles for my own version of the trope. Release Date: June 15th, 2018 Update Schedule: Weekly or Bi-Weekly

Twilight: Voltron (Kidge): One night, Matthew Holt disappeared from his room without a trace. In the time that he’d been gone, his younger sister, Katie Holt, has been frantically pushing for more action to be taken in bringing her brother home; believing he has been whisked away to the deadly mystery of the forest around their small village of Kerberos. With her brother missing, her mother’s health rocky in her grief, and her father away to help a neighboring village with a fast-spreading illness, she is struggling to maintain not only all effort to bring her brother home alive, but also keep the family farm up to its normal functionality. The Head of the Village Guard, Thace Kogane, insists that she accept the help of his two children, Keith and Allura, to assist her with the farm. Initially cold and distant, Katie slowly warms up to the duo and finds that they may be able to offer her more help in finding her brother, as well as unraveling the mysteries of the dark forest just outside the fences of their small village. Note: I basically just threw the Voltron cast into the universe of one of my own stories – The Tragedy of Helena and Jeremiah – and went with it. Pidge is a pseudo-replacement for Helena and Keith is a pseudo-replacement for Jeremiah, though they have drastically different personalities from my own characters, and as such the story goes in a much different direction. I also borrowed some elements from another project of mine - Sweet Tooth - which The Tragedy of Helena and Jeremiah is a prequel to. Release Date: August 17th, 2018 Update Schedule: Bi-Weekly or Monthly

SingleParent!AU (Title TBD): Soul Eater (SoMa): Soul Evans has been struggling with life as a single father for roughly three years now; working two jobs and odd hours to support himself and his precious daughter, Harmony. Upon the announcement of his older brother, Wes, getting married, he is begged to return home to help with preparing for the ceremony and to be his brother’s Best Man. Feeling that he’ll have better opportunities with his family’s support and more time to spend with Harmony, Soul agrees to moving back to Death City. Through fate and circumstance, Soul meets Maka Albarn, the writer of his daughter’s favorite series of children’s books and intended Maid of Honor to Liz Thompson, Wes’ fiancée, and the two get along pretty well. And, perhaps from there, more will develop between them. Note: Bodyguard, Fake Dating, and Single Parent AUs are my fucking weakness. On top of that, I really want to write something that kinda messes with the typical tropes of Single Parent AUs that I’ve read. Hopefully it’ll be a fun ride for everyone! Release Date: September 28st, 2018 Update Schedule: Bi-Weekly

#crumbles grumbles #wow now that I look at it I have a lot of fics planned this year #and this isn't even all of them but just the ones I want to work on the most #might make another later with some other ideas #info dump about my fics

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