#their performance was very good and impressive

[empressofthewind]

Rating Reactions to Seeing Shinigami for the First Time

A comprehensive (and probably biased) list :-)

~~~

Chapter 1 - Light

Falls on the floor and screams, then recomposes himself and very unconvincingly pretends he expected this. This is the first we get to see of Light's Perfectly Normal And Chill Guy persona and I have to say it's not a strong introduction to his acting skills. He gets points for entertainment value though, and also for managing to scream without attracting the attention of his family???

Rating: 8/10

~~~

Chapter 7 - Kiichiro Osoreda

This is the guy who performs the bus-jacking that forces Raye to show his ID. It's a very entertaining scene, but he's being controlled and his reaction is therefore inauthentic, which makes it difficult to give him an accurate rating.

Rating: 0/10

~~~

Chapter 26 - L

This one doesn't technically count because L is merely hearing about Shinigami rather than seeing one, but it's too good not to include. He silently falls off his chair while actively solving a murder case in which the main cause of death has been heart attacks. Naturally the entire task force panics and thinks he's dying, and he does nothing to assuage these concerns. Absolutely iconic of him. Also makes for brilliant foreshadowing.

Rating: 10/10

~~~

Chapter 46 - Misa

We don't get to see Misa's very first reaction to meeting Rem, but we DO see their reunion during the Yotsuba arc, and she is horrified. She screams just like Light and L did, and her fear persists as long as Rem's hand is covering her mouth. She reacts pretty much how I would expect the average person to.

Rating: 5/10

~~~

Chapter 53 - Soichiro

Another pretty standard reaction. Falls backwards, screams and immediately reaches for his gun. Nothing remarkable about it.

Rating: 3/10

~~~

Chapter 53 - Aizawa

Exact same reaction as Soichiro, but he gets extra points because this panel of them both panting on the floor is utterly delightful. The eyes?? The pose???? They look like a pair of petrified crabs. I'm obsessed.

Rating: 8/10

~~~

Chapter 53 - L (again)

L has heard that Shinigami exist and already knows that there's a "monster" attached to the notebook, so he's not surprised at all by the time he actually sees Rem. Instead, he starts having such an intense and paralysing epiphany that he doesn't even notice Light taking the Death Note from him. The least dramatic reaction so far but incredibly on-brand for him in every way.

Rating: 6/10

~~~

Chapter 70 - Rod Ross

Freaks out once he actually sees Sidoh, but he's incredibly relaxed about the notebook flying beforehand. His line "I wouldn't be surprised if it's alive" is hilariously ironic given that the notebook does turn out to have a living component to it, and this does, in fact, surprise him.

Rating: 7/10

~~~

Chapter 70 - Kal Snydar

One of my favourite reactions purely for the implication that Rod might have recruited an 8-foot-tall man in a monster costume. Perfectly reasonable assumption to make.

Rating: 9/10

~~~

Chapter 70 - Mello

Much like L, everyone around him is panicking, but he stays impressively nonchalant. Immediately starts plotting ways to manipulate the demon creature for his own gain. This is essentially L's reaction if he was 90% more unhinged.

Rating: 10/10

~~~

Chapter 101 - Near

Only character to look genuinely happy about seeing the Shinigami which is an instant 10 for me. He gets an extra point for having the most precious smile ever <3

Rating: 11/10

[rainbow-volcano]

Too many thoughts!

L/N: saki is out very quickly. ichika would be fine, extremely average, good but not outstanding or noteworthy. shiho is all bark and no bite, I think she would put up a decent fight before losing. And Honami is very strong but I don't think she wants it that badly, and her performance would be driven by not wanting to let her team down rather than actually wanting to win, so it would wear on her over time.

MMJ: Minori and Shizuku are out due to general clumsiness/lack of awareness. Haruka and Airi would both go pretty far. Haruka might be the best fighter on the roster. Quick, precise, in excellent physical and mental condition, knows the human body very well, and has a wealth of stamina. Airi is sturdy and strong, but not very fast, and would end up absorbing a lot of hits.

VBS: Toya is dead weight, Kohane has grit but not a lot of experience, leaving Akito and An. Both of whom would be pretty good since they both get regular exercise and have grit and drive. I think they're about even with each other, and would be an even match against Airi

WxS: all of them are physically fit. Nene lacks stamina and would be the first to drop, but she has a competitive spirit and would be thinking outside the box to last longer. Rui is next, supposing he isn't allowed tools and doesn't cheat, his height, speed, and dexterity would all be excellent advantages against opponents like Airi and An, but he'd be outmatched by Haruka. Tsukasa would be next, he has a lot of grit but not quite the sheer strength so he'd likely lose to a taller and stronger opponent like Akito. But then there's Emu. Athletic. Acrobatic. Tireless. Unstoppable. No one is defeating her. *Maybe* if everyone on the other teams joined forces.

N25: Kanade is out, first one down, even before the girl with a chronic illness. Ena is also not athetic at all. Mizuki is a fast runner, but viscerally hates confrontation of any kind. That leaves Mafuyu, who works out regularly and can heal her own injuries. Her specialty is in a tool that probably wouldn't be allowed, but she has the one thing that might rival Emu's infinite enthusiasm: apathy. Mafuyu literally does not care. And that could push her extremely far.

Conclusion: As a team, wxs is the only group with 4 fighters. Next closest is l/n with 3, then vbs and mmj with 2, and last is n25 with only one. However, n25's single fighter is very powerful while l/n's three fighters are not particularly impressive. I think it would be wxs first, then mmj, followed by vbs and n25 (one mafuyu=akian) and finally l/n in last. I think Haruka is probably the best individual fighter, but this is about the team.

Bonus here's my thoughts on Individual strongest to weakest: Haruka, Emu, Mafuyu, Tsukasa, Rui, An/Akito/Airi, Nene, Mizuki, Honami, Ichika, Shiho, Kohane, Shizuku, Minori, Ena, Toya, Saki, Kanade. If we assign everyone a point value starting at 20 and descending, we can get an aggragate score for their team

Ln: 2+8+9+10=29

Mmj 20+15+5+6=46

Vbs 15+15+3+7=40

Wxs 19+17+16+14=66

N25 18+1+4+11=34

♫Daily Prosekai Poll #42♫

A fun little thought I had ^^

If all the groups fought each other at once, who would win...?

[heliianth]

when you say that nanika is a reflection of killua’s “worst traits”, what do you mean by that exactly? :O

genuinely asking bc i’m super interested and curious !!

ok so.... while trying my hardest not to be reductive, Killua and Nanika occupy very similar social spaces. But before we can get there, I kind of want to lay down the groundwork first.

Here's Illumi (un)helpfully expositing Killua's self-image—the one he spends his entire arc desperately running away from—for us:

Killua's narrative has a lot to do with dehumanization and questions about nature—whether somebody can choose who they are or whether their circumstances decide for them, what makes a human being, all that juicy stuff. He's almost a soft launch for what the series forces us to consider later in the CAA, which is so rife with questions about instinct, nature, humanity, and evolution that trying to navigate its character web without running into a Killua foil is like trying to walk in the rain without getting wet.

Nanika is, like the ultimate escalation of this same thing—when it comes to Killua and questions of nature, she's the final boss. Nanika (or, our initial impression of her, what we are invited via framing to think first) is almost a manifestation—a literalization—of what Killua is scared of being.

I say that because, like... what is Nanika? What do other characters see her as?

Nonhuman

Extremely dangerous by nature

Valuable due to the services she can provide

Ostracized by both the Zoldyck family (Killua is singled out as the golden child) and the outside world—meaning, not entirely belonging to any defined social group, and unable to fully fit in

A dark counterpart to a comparatively sweet, bright, and innocent personality (Alluka)

All 5 of these points hit very literally onto sore points of Killua's psyche. At least subconsciously, in some way, these are all things Killua thinks about himself; he recognizes them in Nanika because the way his family reacts to her is the way "outsiders" react to him. And he ends up dehumanizing her the exact way he dehumanizes himself—we know because he ends up unintentionally using Silva's words of being his son (positing Killua as an extension of himself, indicating similar mindsets) as an appeal during negotiations:

(Some English translations don't even use Nanika because it literally means "something")

That's what I mean when I say they occupy similar social spaces, or are part of the same social group. And Killua treats her accordingly—as in, he projects:

(elaboration on that last example here)*

Killua even ends up projecting traits onto Nanika he isn’t self-aware enough to realize he has.

For example, Killua thinks of love as a very lopsided and conditional transaction in which, due to his negative social identity group, he needs to perform something adequately in order to earn. And he assumes Nanika thinks the same way:

This aspect of the way Killua treats his sisters is consistently tricky for me to articulate because Killua doesn't end up treating her meanly or even think of Nanika poorly because of these projections—a lot of this is subconscious, Killua doesn't even realize he's doing it at first—which is what you might expect from someone who recognizes reasons for self-hatred in someone else.

I think this is simply because, at the end of the day, all of these negative assessments are still about himself—only about only his own emotions, his own internalized judgement. It’s not at all about Nanika. She's still a separate entity, someone in need of Killua's protection, so Killua can't hate her like he hates himself.

*In fact, Killua wants the best for her, wants people to love her as a part of Alluka which can be good, like he sees his own ugly traits. He even refuses to take advantage of her dangerous abilities, like he doesn’t want his own to be taken advantage of. Its projection of what he wants for himself onto Nanika—acceptance and love even if she is some Inhuman Dangerous Thing.

I can sort of infer this because Killua becomes confrontational with Illumi specifically when it comes to denying Nanika/Alluka personhood in a way he only does when Illumi is denying Killua personhood, which implies to me that Illumi doing it to Nanika/Alluka vicariously feels like another personal attack (which he can actually retaliate against now without that fuckass needle in his brain).

And just in case you weren't convinced, we do know this is projection because Killua kind of just admits it (lol):

I want to yap a little more about this but I'll put it under a readmore because it's kind of off topic. So if you just wanted answers for why I think Nanika is such a strong parallel to Killua, then you already have them lol

This scene (the one pictured above the readmore) sometimes cracks me up because of Killua’s reaction—the way he immediately slaps his cheeks and blames everything on Illumi. It’s a sort of comedic reaction to such a heartfelt (and extremely brave) ultimatum on Alluka’s end. I’ve seen some people think it’s just Killua wanting to defuse the argument, to get Alluka to listen to him so he can start to apologize correctly. But I don’t think that’s true, I think this reaction and the way he immediately brings up Illumi is a genuine realization on his end—after all, Illumi's name or presence is kind of a visual, verbal, and narrative shorthand for Killua's insecurities and the self-image he's clawing himself away from.

Up until now, Killua's never really thought about Alluka and Nanika as their own people, whether that be them separately or even just Alluka by herself. He never gave them real agency; not because he’s physically carrying them and not because he's not asking what they want, but because he’s just projecting that hard. Alluka is also tangled up in his feelings about his childhood (and Gon, as another facet of his projecting and also just as a consequence of the reason why he's rescuing them in the first place), and Nanika seemed to give her so much trouble—in the same way Killua’s own undesirable traits give him trouble—that I don’t think it literally ever occurred to him that Alluka could have a different opinion than he does.

I think Killua assumed Alluka would react to the news of Nanika needing to go away the same way he reacted to the news of him needing to leave Gon—with pained acceptance. That situation is a direct parallel to the dilemma of putting Nanika to sleep. But instead Alluka YELLS at him, and it forces him into realizing that his idea of his sister(s) was wrong. They aren’t the same person as him, his projection was unfounded, and he hurt them because of it.

Which is why he only realizes that his fear of Illumi was influencing the way he was acting then, because now he can actually look at them and see anything but his own reflection.

These pieces of dialogue: “I've been afraid of Illumi for so long... I got scared... and said some horrible things to you,” really do kind of say everything don’t they? He saw Nanika just like he sees himself, he wanted for her and thought about her this way for everything: both the good (wanting her to belong somewhere, to be safe) and the bad (the dehumanization, the deprioritization).

Killua can recognize that now, and apologize for doing that to her. For being a bad big brother.

And not only does doing this help him actually empathize with Nanika and Alluka as people whose experiences are unique from his, but Alluka’s reaction also demonstrates to Killua a self-love that isn’t reliant on the outlier model established in the Hunter Exam by Illumi and reinforced by Killua throughout the CAA (particularly echoed in the "You are light" scene, in which he directly steals 眩しすぎて out of Illumi's mouth).

As a side note, these two chapters are named Light and Darkness and Light and Shadow respectively—Gon being "light" (the novelty, the outlier) both times.

Alluka loves Nanika—her “darkness”—enough to cut off the outlier (Killua) if he doesn’t love her the same. Seeing someone he puts in the exact same ingroup as him so shamelessly love Nanika, in whom Killua recognizes things he hates about himself, actually gets through to him (whereas Gon’s previous affections couldn’t because he saw Gon as so fundamentally different).

It’s extremely important that Killua asks for this forgiveness. In the hospital, when he was talking to Gon through the window, we can see Killua knows the importance of apologies. He failed Gon, so saving him would be Killua’s apology. And Gon failed Killua too, so saying “sorry” would be his apology for that. It’s less about roles now, not about values or groups—less about Killua being useful and Gon being light—it’s more about actions.

For Alluka and Nanika, “big brother” was the role he felt guilty for not fulfilling—a catalyst for his projections onto them. Now he’s confronted with real proof of this failure and he doesn’t end up breaking over it like he might've before. Instead he apologizes because, due to Nanika, he knows Alluka loves unconditionally. And he trusts her, trusts her judgement of him, and trusts that he’s lovable enough to be accepted by her despite his failure.

—

Overall, I think it's really important that Nanika is introduced to the audience as a scary unknown, and that our first impression is slowly dissolved over time. It's a pervasive pattern in all the characters meant to ask questions of nature—Killua himself, the Chimera Ants, Palm, even the Phantom Troupe. Togashi is, like, deeply concerned with humanization and I think it's awesome because you get these narrative threads like the one with Nanika and Killua, where his doubts about himself and his own ability to love or be loved are narratively answered via giving or receiving compassion for/from someone else. In this way Hunter x Hunter tells us that proof of humanity is the capacity for connection. And isn't that something to think about?

[arttsuka]

I'm seeing so many people being homophobic (or non binary phobic I guess) towards Nemo like, leave them alone. Your favorite song not winning a stupid competition isn't an excuse to be a horrible human being (or target the lgbtq community).

[schnaf]

22 days until hyeongjun's 22nd birthday

day 22 aka THE COUNTDOWN IS OVER - hyeongjun's past birthday brrrr ppoppos

bonus: 🤫

[lambergeier]

adding jack antonoff to the list of people i gotta send ten dollars to, for some walking around money. i disrespected his strange desire acoustic remaster (because it's bad) but hey can i say: this guys puts on one of the best live shows i've ever seen

[koumeowkami]

people who say paralive anime's cgi is bad probably have never seen actual bad cgi (the argonavis anime)

[soullessjack]

okay so I’m finally rewatching adventure time in its fullest glory (not for the first time, I grew up with the show but just never actively finished it) so I can get to fionna and cake and idk.. I’m thinking a lot about that doily caterpillar from Finn’s imagination who says it could represent his secret desire to be civilized and then the “real you” episode where he tries to not be a stupid uncivilized hero boy for pb’s science convention and basically ends by (re?)establishing that being civilized is not the real him .. … yea. Don’t have anything to say yet tho, just know that I’m thinking about it. A lot.

[crescentfool]

the new p3 voice cast sounds GOOD ohhh my god im so !!! their excitement and respect for the source material is so so lovely and infectious im actually so so emotional over it what the hell... if you are interested in the remake please do check out faz’s channel to get a glimpse of it, it’s really nice....

[ferulacommunis]

Music recs etc

[koishua]

shining solo ep 8. my reaction rn 😐😐 took it a bit hard lmao

[kuwupikaa]

Can't wait for my over ear noise cancelling headphones to arrive so I can blast dance off the robe from Aida directly into my brain :)

[onesourceofbadinformation]

local production of play that goes wrong was so very deeply delightful and made me laugh extremely hard. special shoutout to the drop of spit that went flying out of chris bean’s mouth near the end of act ii which was basically a character in and of itself

[cryptoseraphim]

on a more positive note I am finally starting to understand what I really enjoy fashion wise for myself, the way I want to present as a person and that makes me very happy :))

[thesmokinpossum]

just watched Pearl and I enjoyed it but not as much as i thought i would and now i’m sitting there disappointed, ngl :/

[asterixafterthis]

ngl I think sometimes skz will write something that’s For one of them in particular. Like jjam is clearly written For Hyunjin to dance to. His style his tempo he’s been Very Into Performing It. I’m not a dancer idk what I’m talking about.