#them. but idk. i guess the closure was meant to be her seeing him save sylvie

[darlinghowl]

i have. mixed feelings on the musketeers ending. i think i like d’artagnan being captain and i think i liked aramis taking trevilles place but i feel like porthos’ end came completely out of left field?? and athos leaving paris with sylvie despite all the change she wanted to make felt so. idk like i understand life goes on and the point is they have a brotherhood that will always be intact and they all lived and are happy but it lacked Something. to me. the payoff didn’t hit for me ESPECIALLY for porthos’ end. cramming elodie in at the end and sending him away to fight in the war again while everyone else is safe at home or traveling is like. nuts to me? esp bc i can’t recall a single moment of this season where it felt like he wanted to go back? when they talked about promoting him i thought they meant making HIM captain, and i understand and appreciate it being d’artagnan but idk. IDK it was a good ending so i’m ultimately happy w it it’s just mixed feelings rn

[celestialmancer]

Mm.

Therapy has been. Interesting.

Bit more of a sensitive discussion so def tbd but yeah ;; (‘s not meant to be negative but like. Considering content well)

Been ruminating a bit, I guess, on something that we talked about, & its in particular this whole… element of just…

I guess at some point my therapist was talking to me about what I would do if I were to ever cross paths with M again, because I did acknowledge openly to her that I do in some way always have that sort of fear in the back of my head of his return—which, yeah, it is irrational considering its been 11+ years now since all that shit went down but… I mean, its part of why every now & then I admittedly will look back on the fucking twitter accounts that he used to have that are now. Well, dead & everything that was on em (which wasn’t much to begin with aside from… things I don’t wanna say on this blog) being wiped. Save for one indirect rt that was meant to be in ref to me that still makes my skin crawl to see, ig.

…& Well… I p much just told her straight up that I wouldn’t even let him talk to me. & Even if I did, the only thing that would happen is pure vitriol, pure unrestrained violence, I guess. Verbal I suppose since no way we’d cross paths irl, & hope to the heavens above it forever remains that way that there’s no way of reaching me irl… unlike how he almost did all those years ago? Yeah. I guess there’s an acknowledgment that beneath all the hurt there’s this INTENSE fury, anger, & I guess wish I could have fought back better or something. I don’t know.

Granted, there’s another sort of reaction i feel i would have if i crossed paths w him again but like—its. More. Morbid.

…& We also. Got into talk about the possibility of me potentially going out of my way to get ig some sort of assistance legally or w/e, to see if by any chance, he ever did happen to… post… things that I don’t wanna really say bc tw content (though, if you catch on to what i might be avoiding directly stating, well… ) but, yeah. & i’ve just been I guess mulling on that, dwelling on it.

…But realistically I think I’m better off not knowing. What he did with what he had of me before I got away. I’d rather not. Know. What corner of the internet that stuff was posted, I don’t think I’d be able to be fine if I ever did find out. Sure, it eats at me tot hink that that’s out there, because I know he’s the type to have gone forward with it & just it being without my awareness once I severed that line… but what can you do right?

Idk. Probably strange to say but i guess i find more closure in just… accepting that it probs is out there, not looking for it, & instead moving forward & healing what I can after all that. ‘S what I’ve tried doing & still am doing to this day, now that I excavated those memories & have to work through them after a literal decade of running from it all, but… I guess, at least, its getting easier in a way to talk about despite the hurt? Idk.

We still have more sessions to go surrounding the topic of M, & more graphic stuff to cover bc we still are only scratching the surface of the… more disgusting details of all that, & I know none of these upcoming sessions are going to be easy. It’s been really taxing mentally & ik im still kinda outta it from yesterday’s session esp bc at the start of it it was hard to tap into that headspace of revisiting all that, but—gotta keep it pushing I suppose.

We’ll… get through this.

& I guess amidst this, working on stuff certain characters in writing (esp a certain one whose based in my own trauma in a way) has also been a means of ig finding catharsis. Having em meet their own downfalls or w/e or having ppl rally against em or so on while also them liking my writing/expressing support w my writing & such has helped? With sort of revisiting this all… Which honestly holds a lot of personal weight to me that ive been met w that rather than being shunned over the exploration of this shit so, yeah…

[cuntycassandra]

SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 13

-

-

-

-

*sigh* AIGHT IDK HOW I FEEL ABOUT THIS ONE!

Again, it feels kinda like filler to me….but I still oddly really liked it. Let me be clearer.

Pros:

- cute Hunter and Omega interactions, even if it’s just the shoulder touching and the fact she runs to him after she’s held captive, she really does trust him the most, he is the one she always goes too, she likes to be with him because she loves and trusts him. I’ve gotta get back to writing these two as soon as possible.

- the Pykes are fucking hardcore. They dont fuck about. I was genuinely petrified when they took Omega, I was spamming my discord because I was so scared. I thought they were going to sell her to Bane or someone and they’d take her back to Kamino which would then lead the boys back to Kamino and then cue showdown with Crosshair while Hunter looks for Meg (of course they get both back. (oh oh! And then season two could entail their strained relationship as Cross is like hella pissed Hunter went after the girl instead of coming for him, not to mention the fact he was left for ages! Oh and poor Megs would be in such a state, the father daughter vibes it would admit it amazing…..shit did I just plan a fanfic???)) but anyways- loved seeing the Pykes! Even if they stress me the fuck out!

- I actually quite liked the criminal (I’ve already forgotten his name) he was a little cheesy but in a loveable way.

- I really liked the focus on Wrecker this episode, even if it was kinda silly sometimes. I thought it was done nicely.

- so we have “bandana/dark n’ broody”, “goggles”, “tiny”, and “muscles”, who’s betting that Echo is “wires”?

- Tech’s “I believe she’s threatening us” what a king lmao. I love his sass.

- Omega is just so kind and understanding, she wants to see the best in everybody. And I love that for her.

Cons:

- filler episode….we’re running out of time for filler episodes Dave. I know the last ep at least will be a lot longer…..but come on. I’ve made a post about this before, about how it feels everything is going to be rushed, and unless we aren’t getting Cross back this season and that’ll happen next season (?) we’re in for a rush, and I don’t want that, none of us do. We want this to be executed strategically. Think like ‘Meg would lmao.

- it just feels like a waste at this point. I would’ve enjoyed this episode maybe six weeks ago, but here it just feels out of place, as if we’ve still got another ten episodes to go to waste time… and we don’t have that!

- and I don’t even necessarily think any development was done here. At least in the last arc we had Hunter and a smidge of Tech development (and I mean a smidge) what did we get from this?? And sure maybe the Pykes will cross paths with the empire and be like “oh yeah we know some rogue clones, got a little girl with them too? Yeah yeah, Ord Mantell” but how certain is that? Especially with only three eps left!

- I just feel like there was no point to this. Where’s Crosshair??? It’s getting lowkey kinda ridiculous, he’s meant to be hunting, hunting doesn’t happen necessarily overnight, so I understand his arrival isn’t prominent yet, but we don’t have time for this! We don’t have time for him to find them at the last minute- I know we might not save him this season, if at all, but it just feels like so many arcs are open and nothing is being closed. We’ve got no closure to the huge questions.

- I’m sorry but what was so dark about that ep too?? I was so stressed out that something awful was going to happen, but…..all that really happened was the guy got his horn chopped off??

Extra potential pro:

- I guess this just means a season 2 is all but confirmed because there is no possible way they can wrap this up smoothly in three episodes.

I don’t have many interesting shots from today’s ep, pretty mediocre for key points if I’m honest. This one I personally really like because I like found family vibe, but otherwise :/. This this was hella cute tho. She runs right to him, and I think that says a lot about their relationship.

I think as an episode I’m going to give this one a 6/10, but overall I’m bringing it down to a 4/10 just based on the context :/ really cool and interesting episode, poor placement.

[lovelyfinch]

my summary of ranboo’s story of his character from his stream

copied from my 5 page google doc i wrote instead of doing homework

this starts at the beginning and goes until 1hr 28 minutes into the stream

(i think i got basically everything he said)

joined the server, killed by dream, received a small tour from niki

the next day, he got a tour from tubbo, president of lmanburg. they talked about how ranboo was also running for president

shaped his first thoughts on lmanburg. that it was a good place.

finding michael with tubbo!

meets tommy! tommy tells him about george and ranboo agrees to burn down georges house (in order to not make enemies since he thought they had more than him)

niki and puffy were on a date and they tried to sneakily get past (asking niki for her armor, not suspicious at all)

tommy and ranboo grief georges house, accidentally burning it down. they ran from it, thinking they got away.

puffy asks if ranboo did it. ranboo couldn’t remember and doesn’t know why.

dream started building the walls on lmanburg

dream shows them georges house, destroyed. tommy gets blamed, ranboo is questioned bc puffy says she saw him. tubbo kills ranboo with the spoon (not canon)

the meeting hall to meet with dream. 

THE MINUTES MAN OF LMANBURG - tasked with taking the notes for the meeting

there was a pig man watching the meeting

the meeting did not go well. tommy brings out spirit against dream. dream played along but didn’t truly care, only caring for the disks.

tommy stood up for ranboo at the trial. they asked ranboo about it and he said his memory was bad but they cut him off. he never said he didnt remember the burning, only that his memory was bad.

being the minutes man gave him the idea to make the first Do Not Read book, writing who to trust and not trust

dream tubbo tommy quackity and fundy on the wall. tommy being taken away for some reason. the exile.

ranboo felt guilty because tommy wasn’t the only one who destroyed george’s house.

things in lmanburg were going great, he had a house and pets and was the minutes man and technically part of the cabinet

feeling guilty, he visits tommy in exile a few times. ranboo could tell something was off with him, with dream. so he wrote letters to tommy, trying to understand what he was going through in exile.

things were good, he built the ice cream shop with fundy

one day ranboo was approached whilst writing in his memory book. quackity tells him that techno is a traitor, the reason things are bad. and that they were gonna go get him and bring him to justice. which ranboo thought meant a trial and such.

the first butcher army meeting. ranboo is confused by it, the bloody butcher outfits. 

traitors are bad right? can’t have traitors

the butcher army went to technos place. ranboo shot a few arrows, maybe intentionally missing “he is a person still”

q gets carl and so techno agrees to go with the army

the execution. no trial. techno gets executed but survived.

phil, who saved ranboo from lava, who ranboo liked, gets put on house arrest. phil is mad at the army but ranboo was saying how he didnt think itd just be an execution. so the two are on even/neutral grounds.

ranboo talks to ghostbur, who calls him an aaron burr. they go to the snow, to technos. techno immediately tries to kill ranboo, who was just part of the butcher army. threatens him until he gives back all his armor.

tommy was at technos too. with techno. ranboo is surprised and writes it in his memory book.

ranboo goes back to lmanburg. realizes he just betrayed the entire butcher army by giving the armor back and saying he doesnt know where tommy is.

he kept seeing techno and tommy around lmanburg with dogs for some reason

he was kind of on both sides, techno/tommys and lmanburgs. he doesnt want to choose so he decides to help everyone

the festival plan to try to kill dream. ranboo spent time making festival games (the trident game!)

dream arrives and starts building the wall again

before the festival ranboo met with techno and tommy.

the community house was blown up. gone. 

according to dream it was techno and tommy.

dream says hes gonna blow up lmanburg again. techno joins him. blow it all the way to bedrock.

dream calls ranboo out as a traitor in front of everyone. dream has ranboos book. the first memory book. which ranboo had lost a few days prior, and found somewhere he didn’t put it. it had been moved. dream gives it to tubbo

THE PANIC ROOM. a place for him to think. the water outside providing a white noise. 

ranboo realizes that he kept choosing sides. he decides to choose people.

ranboo wonders how dream had his memory book

he checks the memory book and just finds the smile. the first smile. “all that was left is a smile”

that book becomes the second memory book.

the destruction of lmanburg on the horizon, they band together to attempt to stop it.

he speaks out. there are lots of people watching him

eye contact. he lashes out at people, as his judgement is impaired

he goes back to the panic room

the dream voice. a voice that is him but sounds like dream. it tells him that by trying to help everyone he has just betrayed everyone. ranboo doesn’t believe the voice because all he did was give techno his armor under pressure, right?

he decides the best thing to do is help the people who have helped him. lmanburg. 

but the first memory book is still missing

“it was time for doomsday”

they thought they still had time to save lmanburg. but then they heard explosions and withers.

lmanburg. “it was falling. it was gone”

people were suddenly switching sides and in the chaos of the destruction ranboo hears techno ask “what’s this do not read book”

ranboo runs to techno to get the book, techno has it. techno gave him the book and told him to get out of there, that he has no issue with him. techno showed ranboo mercy when he could have killed him

ranboo doesnt know where he stands with the destruction of lmanburg. so he watched. “watched as lmanburg fell”

he talks with fundy, with quackity, after the fall. fundy seemed off. quackity seemed to forgive ranboo, having read the book and changed his mind.

ranboo didn’t know what to do

“someone came in and asked me if i was okay. phil. phil realized that when he blew up everything” that ranboo was one of the few who lived in lmanburg and had no more home. phil offers him a place to stay, with him and techno

the situation is awkward at first but they get through it

MELLOHI

ranboo hears mellohi. “a disk from somewhere far away” “it was from the panic room”

he goes back to the panic room. “why was i hearing this from all the way over there” and takes out the disk. but then “an old friend came back. the voice.” 

but this time with more to say. that he was more of a traitor than he thought. the voice tells him that he has been helping dream the entire time. but that he just didn’t remember that. that he had something to do with the community house and other things on the server.

the voice wasnt dream. it was what he thought was himself trying to fill the gaps with memories.

he denies the voices claims. “you have no proof”

the voice says to mine an obsidian block. behind it are two pieces of tnt. 

he still doesnt believe the voice

ranboo is very confused. did he do it? did he not?

the disk war. tommy and tubbo had begun to prepare.

“the disks were very important right?”

“and then i just… lived. for a while.”

“for the first time in a while, happy. and that was good”

and so he decides that he is done. “done with living in fear of the dream voice”

and so he goes to the dream voice

“the dream voice said, hey? you literally have a disk”

“there’s no way i could have a disk right?”

but the voice says that he hid it. he met with dream. so he searched. and he found a disk. the disk. in a chest under his house. 

“so then i realized. something’s going on. there must be a reason why i cant remember these visits with dream, right?”

he “had been sleepwalking of sorts but that was a problem for another day”

time for the disk war. everyone thought that both tommy and tubbo would die

(he forgets what happens next? canon? idk)

dream was now in prison.

he decides to call the sleepwalking state enderwalking

everything was good. except the egg, but “we don’t gotta care about that”

ranboo has the “good idea” to visit dream

so he visits the prison. everything went normally. except “dream told me exactly what i didnt want to hear. apparently i had been visiting dream. i had been talking to dream.”

“and apparently i was one of his best friends”

and dream hands him his own memory book. the entire chest was filled with memory books.

“dream disappeared. and the prison started to crumble. and i guess the entire prison visit was just the dream voice but even worse”

so he didnt know what to do “i guess i’ll keep my head down. i didn’t really do much during that time”

but he needed to visit the prison again. “for real. to actually get closure”

he gets in to the lobby. sam asks his questions. and asks when the last time he visited. “and of course i havent visited before. so i said this is my first time.” and sam said “very funny” and tells him he has visited before. 

“i had technically visited the prison in the enderwalk. i asked sam to show me the books and they were written in ender”

he looked through the memory books, the three he had now. nothing showed that he had visited before. “there must have been a fourth book”

“i dont know what the fourth book is. and i still dont know where it is to this day”

“the fourth book wasnt a memory book. it was a book of the enderwalk” so he’s searching for it

he tried but nothing worked.

“i guess i was just kind of living. i noticed my tools on lower durability and my beacon had gone missing”

“the best thing to do is just live”

visiting snowchester a lot

done cool things with techno. techno was his friend now

“i was happy”

building the bee n boo, got married for tax reasons. 

the news. “after saving michael we got news. tommy had died. tommy was dead.”

the grieving stage.

one day ranboo decided to just relax. and then he sees niki. “what was niki doing at me techno and phils house?”

decided to be “extra stealthy” and watch out the window

techno asks him about anarchy, and ranboo says “that sounds good”

ranboo “had become part of something called the syndicate” which seemed to be for conflict resolution

tells the syndicate tommy died

tommy was alive? “somehow tommy was still alive. how? how is that possible?” 

and then something happened. ranboo gets brought to a room. with two shrines and a hallway. with everything people value.

he started to remember. to hear things. 

“so dream had a revive book. he was trying to control the server by using everyones loved things against them”

he doesnt remember when punz and everyone came and saved tommy and tubbo from being killed by dream

dream had to be stopped “before he could bring back the villains”

he has michael to protect now

tommy approaches while he is with tubbo. and ranboo agrees with tommy. they build that tower

talks with ghostbur “and he seemed like he didnt want to go, which was interesting”

“so right now im trying to kill dream”

but the enderwalk is still an issue. he needs to figure out how to stop the enderwalk. “it hasnt happened in a while, right?”

the reason he is doing everything is to make sure his adopted son, michael, is safe.

and that is the story so far.

[kitkatopinions]

The baby boy himself, Whitley!

(for the ask meme)

Whitley is so my baby, I love my child so much. I’m realizing I say ‘I’m really excited for this one’ for like every character I get for this ask game, but it’s because I’m having so much fun! These take a bit to write, but they are honestly so interesting to me, so as an fyi, if anyone does have any character they want to ask my about, but thinks they might be too late, or I might be uninterested, I’m still totally interested! It just might take me a bit to answer. :)

My top three ships for the character

Whitley/Oscar is my top ship for this in canon currently. It works best if Ozpin could somehow be separated from Oscar (which is theoretically possible I guess,) but yeah. Farm boy vs rich boy, they look cute together, their personalities could vibe, and they’re both snarky, but at heart caring and compassionate. Whitley/Mercury. I mentioned this in my Mercury ask, but I was writing a fic with @why-i-hate-rwby-now where Whitley and Mercury were thrown together and had to work together to escape their abusers, and I just kind of started shipping them while writing it. O.O Also Whitley/Penny is cute as heck and I could totally see her grounding him and also making him loosen up, while Penny thinks he’s funny and interesting.

My three least favorite ships for the character

Whitley/Blake. I don’t understand this ship, Blake just feels like more of an adult atm compared to Whitley - a literal child. (Yes, I realize I ship Whit with Merc, but A. I thought Merc was sixteen while I was writing that fanfiction and he acts kind of on the young side, while Blake has been acting ‘as an adult’ and being treated ‘as an adult’ for two seasons at least while directly talking to Whitley, and has always been more of a mature character for her age anyway.) But on top of that, Blake seems to treat Whitley like an in the way child and is kinda judgey to him, while Whitley barely seems to notice her. Whitley/Henry Marigold just feels bad. And Whitley/Yang. Again, Yang has been written as a nineteen year old demanding to be treated as an adult (though I wanna say she’s less mature than Blake) but also Yang is a hotheaded character and has been acting pushy lately, and that’s fine as a character flaw, but I feel like it just puts me off her for Whitley especially.

My biggest criticism for the character

He’s treated like he’s not a victim??? Like, his abuse and neglect and even his struggles are just... Not really gone into or acknowledged very much, Weiss acts like he has to prove himself before she can show him the slightest bit of sympathy or affection when she’s his big sister, his relationship with Jacques is glossed over and he isn’t given closure there, Willow’s neglect isn’t really acknowledged seriously, Winter seeming totally disinterested in him doesn’t feel like it even matters, Weiss is treated as blameless in her and Whitley’s problems. And the writing kind of frames Whitley as having gotten a redemption, when the worst things he did was be a bit of an asshole while in an abusive situation as like a fourteen-fifteen year old with no aura or glyphs or fighting ability. Emerald and Whitley’s volume 8 arcs should not be comparable! Emerald is a full on murderer and was still willingly working with Cinder to attack people as a nineteen year old woman, and yet she and Whitley are treated very similarly by the narrative (helping one person and then that ‘making up for’ their ‘past mistakes’ and then them just being on the good side and carrying the team’s actions until the pathways arrive and they both go to Vacuo. To be clear, I think this framing was too much for Whitley since he never even needed a redemption at all imo, and not enough for Emerald, the literal murderer of Penny who was just recently willingly helping Cinder try and murder Penny once again.) Whitley should’ve been treated as the child he is, he should’ve been treated as the victim he is.

My favorite thing about the character

His potential dynamics, but specifically with Weiss. He and Weiss both had almost the exact same upbringing, only Weiss actually had more support, but guys... The way the two of them coped had similarities, but were also very different. Weiss hid behind anger and sternness, Whitley hid behind peppiness and smiles. Weiss copied Winter, Whitley copied Jacques. Weiss was always afraid of people putting on acts around her, Whitley was constantly putting on acts as a means of survival. Each of them are plagued by jealousy, pettiness, judgmental behavior, and they both have good qualities that are similar, but they both are too prejudice against each other to see those good qualities and need to learn to understand where the other is coming from. Weiss is a fighter, but a follower, while Whitley seems to have a bit of a ‘fawn’ tendency, but plans and enacts schemes under the table (even if it doesn’t have to be, like with Nora! Whitley’s instincts were to just figure out how to help Nora and then go off and do it alone without telling any of the obviously antsy people with guns what he was doing - after he was spying on them lol.) I just love the possibilities that exist with two characters that are so similar, but so fundamentally different. Also I’d love to see him resentful of Winter and snarky and passive aggressive with her, and Winter not really getting the problem, and Weiss having to mediate between them. Idk, there are so many possibilities of amazing interactions and connections Whitley could have with the others, and he could be a really new, good viewpoint if he was allowed to flourish. And maybe became kind of a ‘guy in the chair’ more permanent part of the team. Like, I know we don’t need more character bloat, but let me dream!

A headcanon I have about them

Before Weiss lost her inheritance, Whitley was sort of tasked with learning everything but being head of the company, like he was learning the financial side of things, the technological side of things, ordering, inventory, scheduling, all about Dust and mine operations... And Whitley’s naturally academic and a fast learner, so he absorbed a lot of it. But yeah, I think Jacques was trying to train Whitley up to be a sort of always available PA of Weiss’s that could handle anything she didn’t want to do / was too busy to do, and that was something Whitley really resented too. His skillset was essentially being crafted around helping Weiss, but never learning how to actually manage the company itself and severely lacking in the social side of things, like he’d never be able to make a proper speech. Also, like pretty much everyone I think he plays piano and writes his own music compositions (which in my headcanons he subconsciously writes to include vocals only for him to then get bothered that even his music seems influenced by Weiss. XD) Also I know this is three headcanons, but if he had been trained to fight, he would’ve used duel pistols and would’ve eventually developed a ‘born out of trauma’ semblance.

What I would change about them if I was making a re-write

I’d just allow his status as a victim to be recognized and for him to have the sympathy I feel his character deserves. I’d have him and Weiss both framed as having contributed to their bad relationship, but Weiss - as the sister four to five years older than him - would be the one who makes the first moves towards repairing it, proving she has changed enough to put aside her pettiness and be there for the brother she does truly love. I’d also get Willow away from him, or at least let Whitley be angry and distant and not have their relationship fixed over the course of an in-universe day. This is why I say there should’ve been another Atlas season, which I think is what I’d do when it boils down to it. With every plot point coming fast and then being pushed on the back burner for the next plot point, there’s no time to focus on any of it or to give the character’s sufficient growth from it. So then things like Willow having her hand glued to Whitley’s shoulder feels very ingenuine, because their ‘growth’ was so rushed. So yeah, I’d really just add an extra season and let Weiss recognize that Whitley is also an abuse victim, make her be the one to start making steps to be there for him, and let things like his relationship with his mother come slower and not be an easy fix. Also I’d have Winter acknowledge that she has a brother more regularly and have her actually care about him, even if she hasn’t shown it well at all.

What I I think of their character allusion and what (if anything) I would change about it

Whitley has no assigned character allusion and his name doesn’t offer very many hints, since it literally just means white meadow/field snow, but it’s easy enough to assume that like Weiss and Jacques - Snow White and Jack Frost - Whitley’s character allusion has something to do with the cold. I agree with the general opinion that he’s connected to ‘the Snow Queen,’ and is likely meant to be Kai, a once kind hearted boy who gets a piece of a magic mirror in his eye that only lets him see the bad in people and gets kidnapped by the snow queen. His best friend Gerda goes on a quest to save him - encountering a land of eternal summer and a talking crow amongst other things - and temporarily forgets him due to an enchantment, but then finds him almost frozen over and saves him by crying on him and through the power of her love that literally makes people and nature bend to her will, Gerda rescues Kai and dislodges the mirror piece from his eye so that he can be cheerful again. Pretty in tune with how the writers wrote things. I don’t mind this, but if Whitley is meant to be Kai and Weiss is meant to be his Gerda, there were two missed opportunities here that could’ve been great. One, Gerda is reminded of her love for Kai whenever she sees red roses, and Ruby and Whitley have a few similar mannerisms and kind of similar coping through their ‘cheery exterior’s’ even f Ruby’s lost all her sass and Whitley’s never had her spazzy, dorky, rough around the edges traits. I think it would’ve been cute and make for a more interesting dynamic if Weiss had mentioned to Ruby in volumes 1-3 that Ruby reminds her of her brother, and if it had made Weiss both harder on Ruby (since she and Whitley are estranged and he does drive her crazy a lot lol) but it also made Ruby all the more endearing to her and is one of the reasons they could be friends fairly fast despite Weiss’s early animosity (since she loves her brother and the traits he shares with Ruby compliment hers.) The next missed opportunity I can think of is that everyone thinks Kai is dead in the Snow Queen for a bit, but Gerda doesn’t believe it and goes looking for him instead. You could easily fit this into a narrative where everyone else has given up Whitley as a lost cause, but Weiss won’t believe that and is determined to help and to get close to Whitley again, which is what I think I’d want to go with. But also, a Whitley death fake out? That could be very good and very emotional. And it’d be easy omg. Weiss could think the Hound has killed him sometime during the fight (even if just for a moment,) but also if Whitley had been the first one to fall in the void instead of going through to Vacuo O.O 

Idk if we’ll ever get his character allusion confirmed, but if it isn’t someone from the Snow Queen, I feel like the whole fandom will say “What?!” at the exact same time. XD 

[enzo-zzz]

A vent on the fandom + cg

If you dont wanna hear any negativity, please just ignore this post. It includes dissatisfication on the yttd fandom and ongoing belief in it. I'm not going to use very kind words here, so just ignore this post. 3b spoilers included.

I like yttd so much, but the english fandom, i cannot interact because how toxic it is. Even the smallest different of which route you choose, will attract anyone to abuse, harrass, ridicule or humiliate you. And to be truth, there are many of them who are so judgemental, to the point that there is only one thing that are right and the other are wrong. Black and white mindset. The term "canon route" is what fans created itself. I guess there are many of them who are teens or kids, since most of kids who havent grown up yet tend to lean towards black and white mindset, even if they believe they are not. If you find people who keep arguing especially on social media, you can bet that its teens. Adult are too tired to involve in things like fighting with strangers. There is one time when the poll asked your age and the age range quite small to teens age. I guess thats why i think so.

OTHER THAN THAT, THERE'S ONE THING I'M ANNOYED WITH. ABOUT THE CG AND HOW THE FANDOM DECIDES THAT THE MORE CGS, THE MORE CANON IT IS. To be perfectly honest, i'm the one who came up with the analysis that on certain route 2-2 ending the cg is more. But people really use it the wrong way and now thought that anything that has more cg is the canon route. The word canon route is wrong in itself, who tf come up with the term canon route in yttd? Is the reason for creating two route is for one to be canon only, or for sparing different characters, or for having different storyline? (I personally think that on different route, the story will change and the ones who got to live at last is probably different ). Now i see those who misuse that information everywhere. "In sou route 2-2 ending evil joe AI dont even have new cg but in kanna route he has. See how biased the devs are? he should have drawn more if he really meant the route to be the canon one. Kanna route will get happy ending, sou route is bad ending." I think thats stupid. B*tch, he keep reusing his old art here and there. You can check for yourself. Joe and midori has same hand based on the cg? He's just reusing the hand art. The arm in 3b and 1-1 is the same arm he reuse. Sou and kanna 2-2 ending basically use the same sou drawing, he just changed it a bit. Sara in 2-2 kanna ending use the same cg as when keiji try to calm her in front of computer, he just changed the face. Midori and sara on the 3b game screen cg basically use the same cg in the 3b content, but changed a bit. So i can think why need to create new cg when joe is still malicious as the hallucination in 2-2 sou ending? If i want to create something i will also reuse this to save my time.

So if you wanna really use this cg argument, then maybe you can consider why alice memory game got so many more cg than reko's? and how ranmaru gone insane has so many new sprite and pose with the hair like that. And why when dummy is dead they got cg's. Especially the ranmaru dying one, he got moving cg's and how it was put more effort into that. Then that means dummy dying is actually the canon route since when they alive they got no addtional cg? This is my assumption, but i think the devs just do as many cg as it takes depends on how impactful the scene he's working on, not because its canon, thats really a lazy take if he is actually unwilling to do extra route but still forcing himself to do it anyway. Imagine if dummy is dying but no cg, instead a message " ranmaru/mai/anzu died ". Do you think that will really give impact to you? This game clearly hinting that joe is going to be the spotlight of the game, even in 3b. So when sou set the real joe ai in kanna route for sara, the script is written for the real joe to genuinely react to sara. of course thats going to be heartwrenching since joe himself is the very important part of sara's life. When the script is made that way, lacking of cgs will hamper down the storytelling nankidai genuinely want to deliver. All i can say is it come from the heart of the author himself. If it is just only text for something as tearful as that moment and no cgs, it wont really touch the feeling isnt it? It is the same with alice memory game that tells about how alice "kill" midori. I'm not sure how many it is but atleast there is 3 cgs with one of them has variant. The story of how alice kill midori is also important and should have impact, thus the extra CG's. I can say its about being passionate and indulged in the storytelling.

I dont even know if joe will ever heal sara in sou route, but based on how the story still keep joe relevant til the end, then there must be something that need to happen between them in the end right? Nankidai even made sure that sara see the dog keychain in 3a if player probably choose to not ask gin about the dog keychain he's hiding in ch 2. Its also for relating ranmaru and joe. Having closure or conclusion with joe in the middle of game is still valid, and having a closure with joe at the end of the game is still valid. Imo, having closure with joe at the end of the game after all of those suffering involving him makes the better climax or impact for sara chara development since the game build up to highlight joe and mr. Policeman, it can be even better if all of it are to be pull together in the ending.

Even if the devs has route he prefer, he's not abandoning any route he less prefer, only if its true that he ever have a route he prefer. Plus you dont know which route he's prefer if any. He's taking his work seriously, it just some "fans" looking down on him, even to the point calling him biased, he's punishing the one who take another route, treating like he only use his career for egostatiscal reason (it somehow clearly mirrors that you are the one who egostatiscal to the point of wanting to find any excuse to punish other, you just using the devs name to validate your mindset). If he's dislike people who chose that route that much, then why create that route? If he know its tiring to make alternate route, then why still make the choice to let 3 dummy alive route at the end? It will make more work. I can only assume its out of passion, or just that he deep down wants the character to be alive atleast in a route ( idk if this is correct, i just read google translated version of his public fanbox that he's actually very reluctant at first when the time comes and "crying" so hard when he had to kill joe in chapter 1. So the part where he wants to spare some character is only my assumption ). By this punishing logic, shouldnt he not make alice die when you push reko ai to spare gin, and only do it to those who dont push the ai to save gin by killing real reko? I am more sure that the variants is to tell a different story or who to spare, and specifically for who sara actually was.

Happy endings? I'm not sure. I've expected that once from story with a lot of deaths, wishing for atleast the protagonists alive. Anime or story with a lot of death is definitely my jam, but from what i see, most of them has bittersweet ending, it depends on how the author wants it to be. Some author dont mind killing them all till the end, and some author just easily kill them all because they plan to revive them later. And everyone sense is different. Some japanese people sense in storytelling is a bit different imo. As the one being the audience, happy endings is the most common wish the audience wants. But its all up to the sense of the author. This is why i'm annoyed with some kids from overseas who rarely watch or play many things that involves a lot of death from japan suddenly says that this "one happy ending, this one bad ending! Everyone will survive in this route, everyone dead in this route"

Just play any route you like, nothing wrong with that. Whats wrong is to start this war of ridiculing others or have that irritating attitude towards those who play their own first route and start bad mouthing or desperately throwing bad assumption that one route will end very bad just for the sake of feeling better for your choice and to scare others.You do know that when you read a book, you'll only know if the overall story is good or bad until you know the ending right? The ending will conclude everything that happened. What happening in the fandom is now like, you only read 3/4 of the book and already expecting that this one will have good ending and bad ending. What if its not about the binary, but for the difference in direction? Its not that bad if the story of the book is kinda predictable, but with how plot twists become the main part of yttd's charm, its getting more difficult to predict how it will end. There's a lot of story which was masterpiece in every part as seen by fans, until the ending hits. Its what the author wants, but its not what the fans wants.

If you pick fights with others, even passively, the consequence is all on you. Good luck taking care of your mess.

Thats why i'm reluctant to publish any theory because the fandom will always use it as an excuse to pick fights with other and say " i'm more right bcs i got this proof" . U see in my caption i dont want any of those harasser to even digest my theory. If you are one of them get out of my blog.

[magpiejay1234]

Defeated the main storyline with Zeromus, now I got stuck at Lunar Ruins because I missed the save point. Oh well. Further thoughts on FF4 GBA

*Cave of Trials is definitely a later addition, not because it literally is an addiiton for this version of the game, but it is also antithetical to the Sakaguchi approach. Not the bosses for the ultimate-ish weapons of the additional player characters. Specifically, there are 7 levels of this dungeon. In all other dungeons in the original version of the game, you only have 5-6 at the very worst, except for the Lunar dungeons.

Nonetheless, it was very enjoyable, and I managed to grind better here than on Lunar surface, which was quite harsh. I still used the “canonical” party of Edge, Kain, Rydia, Cecil and Rosa because the IGN walkthrough recommeded it as such, though.

*Of all of the ultimate-ish weapons, the one that surprised me most was Triton’s Dagger. I didn’t know Palom could use daggers, though considering both FFI Ninjas and Edge can use Black Magic, it makes sense.

The Triton part of the dagger is also interesting since Palom cannot use water magic, but it is meant to reference his final scene with an unnamed girl (Leonora, according to the After Years). Of course the After Years made them a couple essentially, of course.

*It feels weird to see King Giott and Luca in both the Mysidia Tower and the final celebration for Cecil’s wedding. Other NPCs, particularly those in Troia don’t show up. Granted, Luca will eventually become an actual playable character in The After Years, but it is interesting to see how SE decided to squeeze the ending for more creating more content. Again, very anti-Sakaguchi, but also very Pokémon/Digimon/Yu-Gi-Oh!.

*And Zemus, as many people pointed out, you either believe he is a Diablus ex Machina, or a moral anvil to hammer in the “Fascism is bad” theme. Granted, for a JRPG series, FF’s anti-fascistic streak is actually unique, since most other Japanese media tends to be very pro-fash (you can look around Tumblr to see why, or just read early AoT criticism).

I’m more weirded out by his design. He doesn’t have legs, and according to the Yoshitaka Amano artwork of Fusoya, neither does he. But in the DS version, Kluya clearly does. From what I can understand, the Lunarians in the original game were meant to be more like a mixture of Asian dragons and comets, and both Fusoya and Zemus fit the bill. But Kluya is just a dude with animé blue hair.

Speaking of Kluya, the original translation seems to imply Kluya has been on earth for at least a few centuries, and having many progeny. But in the DS version, it is implied he had a traditional marriage with Cecilia, and only two kids, after centuries of wandering. I’m not sure if I like this later reinterpretation, because it makes me feel Kluya only found value in humanity after finding a chick who looks like a Lunarian. IDK.

*Going with the crystal retcon in The After Years, the Lunar crystals have not only kept Zemus at bay for so long, but they also actively help your party. So yeah, I don’t think the retcon works as well as I previously thought it did.

*The game obviously has a lot of Judeo-Christian symbolism in addition to the Star Wars references. Some of these are clearly deliberate. Others are NGE-levels of visual and textual flair. I planned to do a deep dive ages ago, but there might be a lot missing stuff from the later versions I might miss. So if I do a post like that, it will be less of a compendium and more of an overview.

*For the endings of each character:

**Tellah surprisingly shows up at the final battle, which wasn’t something I expected. The final battle overall obviously inspired the final battle against Giygas with all characters praying for your success and recovering your party.

*Edward actually lives up to being a good king after his father’s death. Edge doesn’t, because he is very horny. 

*Yang being the King of Fabul after the king’s abdication feels weird, because I don’t think it was set up really well.

*Cid is still stuck at Baron. I thought he would be a bridge between Dwarves and regular people, but I guess the dwarves already have the village of Agart. I didn’t notice that he was the best man in Rosa and Cecil’s wedding, which is cute.

*Porom is the one that instigates people in Mysidia to pray for Cecil and the gang, which is interesting. I guess Sakaguchi and Takashi Togita (co-writer of the game) really liked the character. 

Palom, as mentioned above, becomes a chad at the age of 5 somehow (Leonora at the point of this game is apparently 7, even though her sprite is clearly shorter. Again, Palom is a chad.) With him, I always think of him as a Bumblebee-type character, a character designed for the younger children in the audience to relate to. Games after FFIV would keep this tradition, but it feels weird to see here since Palom would become an edgelord like Edge in The After Years (despite technically following on Tellah’s footsteps.)

*Rydia remains with her new adoptive family. But I feel weirded out by Leviathan’s comments regarding Rydia’s beauty. This wouldn’t pass by censors in this day and age.

*Of course, Cecil and Theodor’s(aka. Golbez) closures are meant to parallel Kluya and Fusoya. Theodor ultimately decides to go into cryogonic sleep with his uncle (The After Years would put a kibosh on that, though), and Cecil takes on his biological father’s morals while taking his adoptive father’s role as the King of Baron. Symbolism aside, I really like this. Cecil was a character in need of a cause, and Theodor was a character in need of a connection with his past. 

Not to mention, if he decides to return after the all the shit he done under Zemus’s influence, he will be crucified by at least 50 people. So there’s that as well.

*I’m still stuck at Lunar Ruins, but I really like the face on the moon joke. Speaking of the moon, I wonder if the humanoid enemies in the Lunar Subterrane inspired the Maenad in the After Years. Anyway, that’s for another time.

[calliecat93]

Top 5 Things I Disliked About RWBY Volume 7

Well everyone, Volume 8 will soon be upon us. IDK about anyone else, but I’ve never been so anxious about a volume in the near seven years I’ve been watching this show. Not even V3 had me this nervous, and I knew by nature of it being a Tournament Arc that it was gonna be painful. But as we near the new volume, I want to reflect on the previous one. So I am bringing back my Likes/Dislikes posts… except this time I DON’T have to do twelve posts for six volumes in a week. Only gotta do one Volume for today and tomorrow. Phew!

While V6 remains my favorite volume,V7 was a very well done one and by far the best written thus far. It was honestly super hard to pick five things I didn’t like, and are all pretty minor honestly. Heck I expect V8 to address some of these since V7 was clearly the build-up. But I did manage to make a Top 5 Dislikes List. As always, this is just my personal opinion and you are free to disagree with me. Take everything here with a grain of salt. Anyways, that’s enough exposition. Let the countdown begin~!

#5. Too Many Characters/Lack of Focus

RWBY has a lot of characters. A lot, loooot of them. You can tell it’s an anime for that reason alone, haha. Volume 8 thought might be the winner in the amount of it’s cast. We have our main cast, which consists of nine characters already (ten if you count Ozpin and eleven if you count Maria), which is already a lot to keep up with. But in this volume we have Ironwood, Penny, Winter, the Ace-Ops, Pietro, Robyn and her Happy Huntresses, the Schnee Family, Watts, Tyrian, and the list goes on. And those are just the relevant ones.

To the show’s credit, the volume mostly handles the focus well. They make sure that ones like Ironwood and Penny get a proper amount of focus considering their importance in this volume specifically. They also do a lot to showcase characters like Robyn, Clover, and Marrow so that we understand what they’re like and care about them, which makes how things end up even sadder. That being said, it did cause some of cast I think to get the short end of the stick a bit. Characters like Maria and Jaune pretty much got barely anything, and Blake and Yang would have also been out of luck if not for their talk with Robyn in Chapter 7. Some of the Ace-Ops, like Elm and Vine, and the Happy Huntresses who aren’t Robyn also didn’t get a lot of focus and the latter especially only got bare minimum glimpses into their personalities. Even with characters I was happy with like Ruby, Weiss, Ren, and Nora I feel could have had more done with their arcs here (the latter two especially but we’ll get tot hat later) had there been less characters and/or more time.

This is Number 5 because not only is it a minor issue, but it’s kind of inevitable. Shows only get so much time and the characters we focused on needed that time. Ironwood’s downfall wouldn’t have been nearly as powerful if it weren’t center stage. It’s one of those hard choices where you want to see more, but the show just had other things that took priority for the sake of both production and the story. Ultimately, it was the right decision and at most just makes me wish there was more.

#4. Emotionally Draining

Again, minor. I wasn’t even sure if I should add this because really I think it’s more of a personal thing than anything. But I failed to come up with another option, so... gotta take what I can get.

As good as this volume was, it was a VERY emotionally draining one. It was probably the only time I was kind of happy when it was over because ie meant a chance to breathe until V8. There’s the whole political plot that hit way too close for comfort, Tyrian’s murder spree and Penny’s framing, Ironwood’s downfall, everything from the halfway point of Chapter 11 to the end. Heck eve the first two chapters, and even bits of 3 and 4, were super tense and on edge. We had plenty of light-hearted and fun moments in the beginning. But by Chapter 6, that came to an end (or I didn’t find funny, like JNR’s antics in Chapter 8, sorry guys) and it was V3 again, but somehow even more on-edge.

Like I said, this isn’t really a dislike and is on here because I couldn’t think up anything else. As I said, the writing was very strong and on-point. I was nervous, but I’m pretty sure that’s because the writers wanted the audience nervous. They wanted us to feel the tension and fear. hey wanted us to be as conflicted about everything as the characters that we were watching. It was effective too. But it did leave me relieved that it was all over. I didn’t watch V7 in full again until recently when I got my Blu-Ray copy to put into perspective how drained I had been. I was fine upon rewatch, but yeah... way to rise up my stress levels CRWBY!

#3. The Ren/Nora Conflict

This is related to the Number 5 section. I think we can all agree that Ren and Nora tend to get the short end of the stick compared to Jaune and the rest of the main cast. V4 was an improvement, but 5 and 6 returned them to minor supporting roles and even V4 did more for Ren than Nora imo, who to this day is imo the least developed of the main cast. But clearly they wanted to start changing that, and given Jaune more or less got closure last volume it seemed like an ideal time to give the two development, especially where their relationship is concerned.

While Nora was overall fine, Ren... not so much? They do a god job setting up the two’s conflict, albeit the cliché ‘girl compliments boy, boy ignores her as they’re in the middle of something else’ joke in Chapter 3 was dumb. But Chapter 6 made it clear that there was far more going on. Nora is pushing to help Mantle and in the following chapter we have her snap at Ironwood for forcing so much sacrifice on it, but not on Atlas itself. Ren however is closed off (more tha usual), focus more or less solely on the task, is clealry afraid of their uncertain battle against Salem, and even seems to side with Ironwood in Chapter 7. It’s the first major conflict between the two with Nora just trying to get Ren to talk to her. She even finally kisses him... and we all know what happens after that.

The main issue here is two things. One, we NEVER get any clarity on why Ren is acting so cold to Nora, the one person he was always open around (well... for him anyways). I mean I have a good idea why and I’m 99% sure that V8 is going to go into it, but without any clarity it just comes off as him being unfair to Nora who is just concerned for him. The other issue is there is no closure to 9it. We have the final chapter where Ren tries to fight Neo, but as she’s disguised as Nora it goes badly. The poor boy is tearful, snaps at Nora when she tries to calm him down, and it ends in the boy looking like he’s about to have a nervous breakdown. It’s heart-wrenching, but still ultimately leaves the conflict unresolved. Plus we had a pretty large gap between the Renora Kiss (Chapter 6) and that moment (Chapter 13) with some brief moments sprinkled in. Otherwise, Ren acted as we’d expect even with the goofy plan in Chapter 8 where he seemed unusually chill considering. So it just kinda feels like for a while they... forgot about it.

This is right in the middle because as I said, I expect Volume 8 to go more into this. They’ve outright said that if there was something we were confused by or felt didn’t go anywhere, Volume 8 was going to address. This was set-up, and it leaves me anxious to see how things will go with these two especially going off the brief lines we heard in the trailer. But it still sucked that we got no closure and didn’t go further into why Ren is acting like he is. I know I was unsure of how to feel when it was all over. But I guess we’ll see the final result soon enough.

#2. The Truth Revelations

If you were reading my Volume 7 reviews, you know that I REALLY did not like how Chapters 9 and 10 were done. Why? Because of the truth reveals. Now I now know why t was handled like it was, which actually saved it from being out at Number 1 on the list. But does that change me opinion of it? Nope.

First, I want to talk about how it more or less began. That being Blake and Yang revealing the Amity Project to Robyn in Chapter 7. While I DO like them taking matters into their own hands instead of being complacent, I STILL have major issues on how they didn’t talk to Ruby and Weiss about it. I’ve heard the arguments about it, but imo when we have Yang having major hang ups with lies and half-truths (it’s why she was enraged at Oz), her and Blake seeming to pull the same thing... doesn’t look good. There is zero on-screen indication that they let the other sin about it later, which had they done so then the group could have planned proper steps in helping the two sides which may have caused Ironwood to not jump off the slippery slope as badly. Will V8 mention this? IDK, but it does bother me and I would like it addressed especially concerning the themes of trust.

Then we get to Chapters 9 and 10, where my issues go into effect. Robyn drops the hostility and reveals her knowledge of the project, but wants to try and work with Ironwood. The heroes reveal everything to Ironwood and while understandably shocked, he otherwise takes Salem being unkillable well. Then the two leaders reveal this to Mantle, using Robyn’s Semblance to prove it, and... that makes the citizens okay. Yeah... even knowing what happens later I still have issues with this. Because even with that knowledge, there was NO GOOD REASON fo AY of this to go well.

Robyn may know why Ironwood was depleting Mantle resources, but it doesn’t change that he caused a LOT of damage to Mantle due to it. Ironwood, despite his expected reaction coming later, still took the Salem news far too well especially considering how on-edge of her he’d been at that point. The citizens of Mantle know about Salem, but not why ironwood was depleting resources. Plus it doesn’t change that he was a borderline tyrant towards them and he didn’t try explaining that part to them. The fact that THAT calmed them down so easily, even with Robyn’s presence, just came off as... too easy.

Which it was. All of this was an elaborate psyche out. We think that things are finally going well... then Chapter 11 happens, and it goes downhill from there. Can’t lie, they got me. Chapter 11 was a HUGE gut-punch for that reason. As such, I decided to put this at Number Two. But it’s only because of the psyche out. It was still done to make the shock effective and while it worked, it doesn’t change that it felt like things got downplayed far more than they should have. Still, it saved this form taking the top slot. So what DID make it? Well...

#1. Willow Guilting Weiss

For a character that only got one major appearance, Willow left one Hell of an impact. All we knew about her prior was an off-handed remark by Whitley in V4 that implied that she was an unhappy drunk. Here? We see exactly what Jaques has done to this poor woman. She’s a drunk, unhappy, and her expression just screams exhaustion and broken. She knows that she did nothing for her children once she broke, something Weiss makes very clear, but she does make some amends by giving Weiss her Scroll and the evidence needed to expose Jaques and Watts, She’s even relieved when We3iss confirms that she’s never returning for good. It’s a very powerful scene that in minutes makes Willow one of the saddest, sympathetic characters in the show.

I do have one huge problem, however. That’s when she leaves. She has one request for Weiss, and that’s for her to not forget about Whitley. While it’s been becoming more and more clear that Whitley is a scared kid who has been just as abused by Jaques as his sisters, he WAS still a cocky jerk to Weiss. He was never nice to her, and when he was it was for his own benefit. He had zero issue rubbing into Weiss her misfortune in V4 after the concert and how he’s the new heir. Of course Weiss wouldn’t like him and be justified in believing that he didn’t like her. When she points that out, this is Willow’s line:

Of course not. You left him here... with us.

Yeah, this really pissed me off and I think is a problem on the writer’s end. They want to have Weiss realize, like the audience is, that Whitley is like he is because unlike her and Winter, he can’t escape, has none of the abilities that they do, and is thus still a prisoner and under his father’s control.. He succumbed to it instead of fight or get away because that was all that he could do, and hating his sisters kept him in his father’s favor. It’s all very understandable and yes, having Weiss realize this and make an effort to try and help Whitley would show how much she’s changed and allow the Schnee Family to all break free form Jaques once and for all.

But the way the line is worded make it feel like Willow, and in turn the narrative, is gui9lting Weiss into not realizing this and not helping Whitley prior. Umm... no. Hell no. Weiss was under zero obligation to help her brother, who at the time portrayed himself as an egotistical snake to her. He rubbed his success in her face. he rubbed getting the title in her face. He was even trying to do so again in the very same chapter Willow was introduced. Weiss HAD to help herself. And unlike her, who as far as we know never hated Winter and the two always treated each other well, as far as we can tell Whitley never had that relationship with them and we don’t know if he ever tried. Jaques made sure that Whitley and his sisters would be divided, and Weiss shouldn’t feel guilty at all for not seeing this.

I get why some may get after Weiss and what Willow was trying to hint to her. We know that Whitley is a victim. We know that because he had no one, he became the way he is. He still has hope, but Weiss is the only one in any position to get him the help that he needs. I expect V8 to go into this, especially since Weis sis why Jaques is now in prison and took away the only figure that Whitley had (a HORIRBLE one, but still the only). However Weiss did what she could in her position, and doesn’t have the advantage of NOT being in the audience to everything. Do I expect her to realize all of this and try to get Whitley to as well? Yes, and it’ll be her character coming full-circle as well. But did she deserve to be guilted? Hell No. Don’t think it was intentional, but it still rubbed me the wrong way and I still don’t like that bit. Thus, it is the moment I dislike most in RWBY Volume 7.

Okay, that’s it for now. Tomorrow, I’ll post my Top 5 Likes. Which trust me, I got plenty of ‘em~! See you all then~!

[luninosity]

Okay! Time for a slightly longer Avengers: Endgame thoughts post!

First, I do really, really like the film overall, so let’s get that out of the way right now: I had moments of wanting to cheer, tearing up, all that, and I want to see it again immediately.

Having said that...I do have Some Thoughts, which are not 100% positive.

Spoiler warnings, obviously! Only read if you’ve seen/don’t mind spoilers!

First, the AWESOME. OH MY GOD SO MUCH AWESOME.

--STEVE IS WORTHY OH HELL YES *screams in delight* And Thor’s genuine excitement about this! So perfect!

--STEVE ROGERS STANDING ON THAT BATTLEFIELD FACING DOWN THANOS’S WHOLE ARMY. This is a brilliant Steve Rogers character moment, it’s a brilliant narrative moment, it’s a gorgeous shot visually, it’s EVERYTHING -

--AND THEN EVERYONE ELSE SHOWING UP AT HIS BACK, YES YES YES, I WANTED TO CHEER AND CRY, LOOK AT THEM ALL TOGETHER AND FORMING UP BEHIND STEVE AND “AVENGERS ASSEMBLE” AND *screams more*

--Valkyrie getting to be king! She already has ideas for change! It’s a small moment but so satisfying, seeing where she is now versus her introduction in Ragnarok.

--”AMERICA’S ASS”

--actually everything about that Steve-on-Steve fight scene, Chris Evans’ delivery of every single line, the name-drop of Bucky being what worked

--I actually really love pretty much all the time hops, and Tony going with “Howard Potts” as his alias is both hilarious and heartwarming

--Morgan! Tony being a Good Dad! 3000!

--cheeseburgers, oh god my heart, this moment actually made me tear up

--Tony’s death felt well-earned, satisfying, and in-character, and that “I am Iron Man” - oh god yes, see above about in-character and also heartwarming and heartwrenching simultaneously

--Sebastian Stan continues to be very pretty

--Thor doesn’t magically get his old pirate-angel body back - I have a LOT of other less positive thoughts about this representation, which we’ll get into in a sec - the thing is, I do like this one aspect of it, because he doesn’t need to be magically “healed” of his fatness or anything like that; he’s chubby and damn heroic and still good at being a hero, and speaking as someone who always struggles with weight, that was actually really lovely

--Paul Rudd continues to be weirdly superhumanly likeable

--Gamora’s reaction to Star-Lord

--Nebula! Karen Gillan is fantastic throughout, and so central to the storyline

--Sam taking the shield! I love this - Bucky’s tired of the fight, which Steve knows; Sam has the heart and the will, and he deserves it, and Bucky’s clearly fine with that, and I’m so excited to see Sam Wilson as Cap

--just everything overall felt so fulfilling, like, yes, this is good, thank you, MCU, thank you

The Ambivalent (sure, yeah, okay)

--Clint and Nat: I actually really like Nat’s choice and sacrifice, doing it knowingly, and it also feels in-character for her as a dedicated protector; I don’t quite get why we’re pushing Clint to the forefront so much in this movie when he’s been so absent, and I dislike the implication that he somehow has more to live for because he’s got a biological family, versus Nat’s found family

--Thor’s killing of Thanos and the “I went for the head” and also the arm - yeah, look, you learned something! But also...it really just makes you *not* doing that in Infinity War seem...even dumber. But at least you learned, I guess?

--the Girl Power(tm) moment in the final battle. You know, the super-unsubtle obvious shot. Like, part of me went YES!! and another part of me cringed because WOW, that felt...not at all organic and incredibly staged

--Steve Rogers part one: I don’t actually mind that he took a side trip and saw Peggy and got some closure. It’s a nice nod to the end of First Avenger. And I love Steve getting to retire - not die - as Cap: he can still do so much as himself, maybe art or activism or support groups or all of the above, and he deserves a chance to find out who Steve Rogers is when not Captain America. Having said that, this is ambivalent because I really don’t like how it was done. More on that later.

--I love that Harley showed up at Tony’s funeral, but at first neither I nor Awesome Husband knew who the random person even was. We figured it out, but if you don’t know, it’s really unclear

--Carol. She’s wonderful and amazing in every scene she’s in, but also...weirdly...underused. Were they afraid she was too powerful?

--maybe I’m just kinda over Chris Pratt, I don’t know, but a lot of his dialogue didn’t land right for me? Clunky. Trying too hard to be funny? Maybe.

--I don’t really understand how time travel works in the MCU, but whatever, let’s just roll with it

--Loki! Fantastic to see again, also underused, but I’m very curious to see what’s next

The Not So Positive

--ALL the Thor fat jokes. This is a big one, and it pulled me out of the movie as I was watching it, as this kept happening. It’s obviously a serious manifestation of his trauma and PTSD, and yet pretty much every single character cracks a joke, and no one actually tries to support him. I’m...not a fan of that. (Side note: having just rewatched Infinity War, there’re fat jokes there too, about Quill. Do the writers/directors have an issue with fatness?)

--after Nat dies, there’s a whole lot of scenes of Rooms Full of Only Dudes, and Primarily White Dudes, at that, directing the narrative

--speaking of, how about a memorial service for Nat?

--Steve Rogers part two. (We’ll get to Steve and Bucky in the next point; this one’s about the time travel.) Like I said above, I don’t mind him wanting to take a side trip and get closure; he deserves that. And if I’m understanding MCU time travel right, he created an alternate branch, so “our” reality still all happened and everything. So. My first problem here is that we can assume he spent that alternate reality still Being A Hero - fighting evil, saving Bucky, getting into a happy triad of Steve/Peggy/Bucky if you want to imagine that - but we’re not shown any of that. We’re shown him...suddenly pining a lot for Peggy, which feels odd anyway: part of Steve’s arc has been him finding his place in this new century and his new found family. And then we’re just shown the dance. SHOW US STEVE AS A HERO IN ALL TIMELINES, PLEASE. But I digress. If this is a branching timeline, the way Steve shows back up on the bench shouldn’t work. He shouldn’t just live through all the years and wander over to the bench at the right time, because he’s not in the right timeline for that. (Maybe there’s something we’re not shown, like him tinkering with his time travel GPS? If that’s the case it needed to be much clearer.) There’s also no particular reason he needs to get or stay old (maybe he wants to experience aging, idk?) - we’ve established that we can de-age, for example, Scott. And Steve Rogers is a stubborn kid who will always want to be able to fight whatever might be coming - even if he’s still retiring as Cap, doesn’t he want another few decades with his current family - Bucky, Sam, Clint, Morgan Stark, everybody? Now he’s...much older than everyone, physically and mentally, and I guess that can still work but...it’s going to be a whole strange adjustment for him and for everyone...but anyway, the time travel as it’s shown seems to...break their own rules, and also I don’t like how suddenly emphasized his desire for Peggy is in this film, and I don’t like having to just sort of...guess about what Steve does in that timeline. (Also, side note: why is *only* Steve returning all the stones? Wouldn’t having a partner be helpful? In case things go wrong, as things so often do? AS WE’VE SEEN IN THIS VERY MOVIE.)

--STEVE AND BUCKY. This is the other big one. We all know I am a Steve/Bucky fan, but honestly I’m not even factoring that in here. It’s not about shipping. It’s about the fact that Steve’s narrative arc, Steve’s character arc, has been so entwined with Bucky up to now - and here they barely interact. The person Steve lost - the person Steve keeps losing - is Bucky. The person Steve shares memories of couch cushions and moving in together and Sarah Rogers’ name with - is Bucky. We’ve had to the end of the line, we’ve had even when I had nothing I had Bucky, we’ve had (paraphrasing here, I know it’s not an exact quote) he said Bucky’s name and suddenly I was a kid in Brooklyn again, we’ve had all of Winter Soldier and the relevant parts of Civil War, we’ve established over and over, canonically, that Steve and Bucky save each other. Bucky knows Steve even through brainwashing. Steve fights to save and protect Bucky. They love each other. (Friends love each other. It’s okay to show that.) They sacrifice for each other. And that relationship - in a film that’s meant to be a culmination, a wrapping-up, and closure for Steve Rogers - is almost entirely absent. And I’m not okay with that, emotionally and also as a narrative choice for Steve’s arc - like, as a writer (and English professor!) myself, this legitimately bothers me. I don’t feel fulfilled and I don’t feel happy about it. Especially not - as in the article I reblogged a bit ago - when we’re given other reunions, like Tony’s joy at getting “the kid!” back, with real pathos. I know the film’s already over three hours, choices have to be made, etc. But we could’ve had fewer fat jokes and a few more seconds of Steve and Bucky interacting, y’know? I just...I don’t like it. It doesn’t feel good or right.

Okay! Those are my thoughts.

Once again, I really really like the movie overall, and overall I am left happy and wanting to watch it again. That’s true. There’re just...some things.

I may or may not attempt to write my fix-it fic. There are so many already and I’m not sure what I could add that’s new, and I think I still don’t understand MCU time travel. But I also really want to deal with some of these emotions. We’ll see.

[runningwhilenotdying]

So! This is quite late but I’ve been crazy busy with school and I knew typing all this out would be A Task. This race was about 10,000 times harder than I thought it would be. I thought that I respected the marathon distance going in but it turned out I absolutely did not. My time was quite a bit slower than I was expecting even though I didn’t have an exact goal in mind and my splits were ridiculously positive (pic 7). I’m honestly not disappointed at all though. The marathon is a mean, tough race but I’m even meaner and tougher and that is absolutely something to celebrate. Full race recap under the cut because it’s almost as long as the marathon itself.

- The day before the marathon was pretty much ideal actually. Did my 3 km shakeout run in the morning, made pancakes, lounged around my house, and picked up my bib. My super old family friend/honorary sister was in town to run the half and my mom was running the 5k, so we all went out for delicious pasta the night before along with my boyfriend and my friend’s mom.

- I slept AWFULLY the night before. I lay awake for ages, then slept in short little bursts that probably added up to like 3 hours overall. My cat also woke me up at 5 by biting my feet and I almost tossed him out the window. 

- Woke up for real at 6:15, miraculously not tired and not particularly nervous either. I had a bagel with PB and a cup of coffee, put on a huge pile of throwaway clothes over my race outfit, and took an Uber to the start

- I was paranoid about road closures so I gave myself a ton of extra time, but we ended up not having any trouble at all. That meant I got to the start just over an hour early, which was a big problem considering the temperature was a degree or so above freezing

- I waited for my friend to show up, walking around in aimless circles to keep warm. She showed up about 20 minutes early, we took some nice pictures in our 5000 layers, and got into our corrals right around when the gun went off for the elite corral

- This is a FAST race, so my corral was pretty far back and it took about 15 minutes from there to actually cross the line. I was planning on throwing away my fleece, hat, and two pairs of mittens at the start but I ended up keeping them on. I got rid of the mittens and fleece by kilometre 4 and kept the hat until around kilometre 24

- By the time I started, my feet were completely frozen. I spent the first few kilometres wiggling my toes trying to get the feeling back, but I was basically running on ice blocks until the 5k mark 

- Other than that though, I felt awesome for the beginning of the race. The energy of the crowd and the other racers were infectious. I was checking my watch every kilometre, and my splits were a bit faster than planned but I didn’t worry too much about reigning it in. I’d been having a bunch of random pains all down my right side all through taper, but I wasn’t feeling anything

- I decided not to count down kilometres or even think about the overall distance until 10k, and I actually did a pretty good job of that. I started having a dull pain in my right hip around 8 km, but other than that I was feeling awesome and determined to enjoy the race for as long as I could

- Between 10k and the halfway mark, things gradually got a bit harder, but I generally still felt in control. My breathing was still good and I was sticking to my schedule for taking energy blocks. But my hip was still nagging and my left hip flexor had joined in as well. The pain was super mild, but I was anxious about it getting worse and that started affecting my mental game in general

- The last time I felt genuinely good was probably around 19 km, right before the half-marathoners split off. We went past a huge cheering station where they were blasting Abba and giving high fives. I was so psyched I actually sang along to most of the chorus of Mamma Mia as I ran past

- Once the half-marathoners split off it got quiet fast. Less than one third of the racers were doing the marathon, so suddenly there were a lot fewer runners and barely any spectators. I was starting to feel sick and my hips were still hurting and I was grappling with the idea of running the complete distance I’d already ran again

- This is where it started getting hard. I’d brought headphones to listen to music, but I wanted to put off using them until I absolutely NEEDED a power-up, so I was pretty much alone with my thoughts until I gave in at 28 km. At this point finishing seemed completely unfathomable and I was starting to wonder what the hell I was doing this for

- The race basically just got harder from here. I was feeling sicker and I started putting off my scheduled energy blocks. I was supposed to take a Gu at 24 km, but I couldn’t even imagine putting it in my stomach. I don’t remember when I started worrying about DNFing again, but it was probably around this point. 28ish km to 32 km was probably the hardest part of the race mentally

- When I finally hit the 32 km mark, things turned around a bit. 32 km was the point last year where I slammed headlong into the wall and dropped out because I couldn’t walk in a straight line or carry a train of thought. So when I got here this time, I realized that even though I felt like absolute shit, I was doing 100 times better than last year. This is when I realized that I probably actually was going to finish

- Even though my mental state improved a tiny bit, my physical state was getting worse and worse. Starting at 32 km, I let myself walk the first minute of every kilometre. This 100% saved me mentally because it gave me something to look forward to every kilometre. It also let me stretch my hips out a bit, which definitely helped physically

- Even with the walking breaks, I was in the absolute worst pain of my life for the last 8 km or so. The only thing stopping me from walking the rest of the way was my desire to be finished the fucking marathon as soon as possible. I wasn’t checking my pace anymore, but I was probably down to around 6:30/km not counting the walking breaks

- Every 900ish metre stretch between walking breaks felt impossible and never-ending, and once I was walking, starting up again after 1 minute was the worst kind of mental challenge. The last few kilometres are pretty hazy in my memory, but I distinctly remember thinking “am I actually going to DNF with less than 2 km to go? IDK. Maybe”

- Finally, finally, I hit 41 km and took my last walking break. That was when I remembered that the total distance was 42.2 km, not just 42. It sounds ridiculous, but the thought of that extra 200 metres was almost more than I could bear as I finished my last walking break

- Every step of that last 1(.2) kilometre was a fight. I was checking my watch every half block and counting down the individual metres. With 600ish metres to go, I saw my mom cheering on the sidelines and almost broke down. She started trying to run with me down the sidewalk, but I discovered later that I’d somehow averaged 4:59/km for the last 800 metres of the race, so she couldn’t keep up with me

- I started seeing signs counting down the last 400 metres and finally accepted that I was definitely going to finish. I took out my headphones to hear the crowd for the last moments, and heard the announcer call my name as I came up on the finish line

- Stepping across the line was the most overwhelming moment of my life. I’d felt so awful for so long, but I’d fought through it. The fact that I DNFed last year and left feeling like such a failure made it even more powerful. As soon as I crossed the line I started full-on weeping, hand over my mouth, sobbing at full volume. Some of it was pain, but most of it was pride and astonishment

- My friend and her mom started calling my name and I walked over to them. Opened my mouth to say hi to them and instead threw up twice directly at their feet, so I guess I can really have no doubt in my mind that I gave the race everything I had

Anyway, this is by far the longest tumblr post I’ve ever written and I’m sure no one’s still reading, so I’ll wrap it up. Four days later, I’m still walking on air over this. My right knee and hip still hurt like a bitch, but I’m happy, and proud, and I ran a FREAKING MARATHON

[gamingofkenna]

KH3 Day 7

I only have three plot-related achievements to go, so I think I’m pretty close to the end....!

I do Not like flying around in this giant space cube. Free me.

the Keyblade Graveyard I’m very worried. The Sephiroths appear and start talking about trying to start another dark war, but for the purpose of the great creation that comes after the war or something like that. So OK, pretty standard ‘im gonna do the evil thing for the benefit of all’ bad guy BS.

There are a million enemies onscreen how is the CPU handling this.

So they find ‘Terra’ but he’s been possessed by the villains, and his hair literally turns white. I’m real sick of white hair being the villain marker. Look your hair color should say nothing about the character of your heart this is not a mechanic I’m here for.

Why are they still protecting Kairi when her whole shtick this game was that she wanted to be strong enough to fight for herself and protect Sora? I’m also pretty sick of the ‘cute tiny eternally-underaged-looking girl who must be protected while she stands there defenseless’ trope. Let her fight. She and Axel trained together idk what her background before this was but she should at least be about as ready to fight as he is?? Let me see Kairi’s keyblade. Let her kill the big bad.

So... we lose. There’s practically a gameover scene. And then we’re back up to the chess board, except they’re different chess players? They look like maybe the same players, but younger now, and there’s a ‘checkmate’ by mini-Sephiroth, but young Hanzo pulls his king back and says the game isn’t over.

The Final World.

OK so all of this is.... very meta and existential and dramatic. Can we talk about how the spikes in Sora’s hair make it look like he has cat ears on close ups?

I don’t... really understand what happened with Kairi there. Was she the star in the final world, and by talking to her there Sora already saved her? (Was it possible to get through the final world without talking to that star? I wanted to talk to ALL of the stars it was so weird and sad and interesting) Was she never really gone in the first place because Sora seeing them all get taken and assuming all was lost was really jumping the gun on his part?

Why are we... repeating this scene? Did we time travel? I think we time traveled.

HOLY FRICK HOLY FRICK HOLY FRICK

OK we revived all the keyblades from the original keyblade weirders but these looks like usernames?? Like Earthbound ending level meta but where are these usernames drawn from??? Is this just meant to SEEM like you’re calling upon the community or do these actually come from the KH community, winning the day for us?? Either way that was SO COOL!

The X-man is trying to make the X-blade. My joke comes full circle.

So the whole picking everyone off one by one thing is very tedious yes, but ALSO very thematic and I love getting closure on all of these faceless nameless pions. Blue-haired-guy gets a happy ‘death’. Weird antennae girl gets a happy death. Sora reassures someone’s just going to get ‘recompleted’ whatever that means and it sounds VERY dystopian scifi.

ROXAS IS BACK THE BLACK CLOAK GOOD GUYS TRIO IS REUNITED!! Yay congrats y’all!!! The girl’s name is Xion apparently which is funny to me, both that it’s another X name, and because I finally realize where that weird Japanese manga name ‘Shion’ comes from.

Ugh don’t kidnap Kairi again this is getting so boring.

So Xion must be the girl Axel was seeing in Kairi when he was kidnapped and trapped with her on a deserted island by a crazy wizard. They do look a little similar? Not that there’s enough variety in face models for that to be important - two main characters are literally like identical twins or something.

Y’know this fight would be so much easier if Roxas and Xion didn’t look exactly like the bad guy I’m fighting.

Why do all the trios have one girl? I mean I know the answer is sexism but what’s the in-universe answer? Is one of the ‘guys’ really nonbinary and it’s now my job to figure out which one it is in every trio because that’s what I’m doing now.

Now we freed Terra!! I think that’s everyone we were trying to find? Except the girl who’s in Kairi, and now we’re also looking for Kairi again ugh. Look Kairi doesn’t need to be a butt-kicking hero of the day like Aqua is, but can you elevate her somewhat above ‘cute little girl who is always in trouble’?

Last big fight with the Sephiroths, and then we’re coming for you, Baldie.

Aaaaaand.... he killed Kairi? Or something? I guess we know that coming back from the dead is totally an option so.

And we are In! Kingdom! Hearts! I think!

OK wait actually X-man calls this ‘Scala ad Caelum’, the nexus where all the worlds are born. Literally the ladder to heaven. Probably the topmost level of the Inception dream - beyond this is literally only our actual reality.

I died like fifteen times in that fight.

So one of X-man’s moves was literally to pull the light out of Sora, turning him into the dark Sora form that I jump into whenever my health is low and I really don’t wanna die. I’m still not sure if I morally should be doing rage form or not.

TERRA HAS BEEN HANZO THIS WHOLE TIME??????

Holy friiiiiiiiiick ok so the chess game was a long time ago, like when the first Keyblade war was.... and Terra’s teacher along with X-man were there, or something, being the chess players, and grew up to be the Keyblade teachers - except X-man was all doomsday prophet and all that, and decided to do time travel shenanigans to try to reset the whole world. Which like, valid? But also Sora’s whole ‘thats not your call to make’ should be your FIRST thought when you decide the world sucks and you wanna reset it!!

Anyway, Hanzo/Equius/whatever his name is.... probably like died or something in a previous game, or maybe even before the series started, except death is fake and he lived on metaphysically to help the new kids stop his old chess-mate (lol) from resetting the world and hopefully now y’all can CHILL.

Is Kingdom Hearts like actually just the moon tho. Was this game Majora’s Mask the whole time.

“His heart and his mind are made up” yeah but like technically.... this whole game is made up....

No joke if I was even a hair more invested in this I would be crying, I would be sobbing about this ending sequence, everyone moving on and being happy and having friends and the cat-thing found not-Roxas and some girl gets put in the replica body I don’t know who she is - is she Namine?? - but Riku is really happy and I don’t know how y’all can stand this. They’re playing on the beach with old bad guys and and Kairi is there in the sunset and they’re holding hands and Sora is gone???? He pulls a Luke Skywalker and vanishes what is this???

There’s more after the credits - eyepatch from before shows up at the Keyblade graveyard, with the black box everyone was hunting for earlier and promptly forgot about. Four white-robed people with animal masks show up too.... I don’t get any of this, but it suggests there’s something bad still on the horizon (of course).

Then we’re back to the chess game and baby Hanzo says there’s a new game - baby X has seven pieces (four of them have animal tops like from the previous scene) and then Hanzo pulls out the king (representing Sora!) and says ‘Just watch’!! So??? New series???

OK and I didn’t get enough hidden mickeys to unlock the secret ending to brb while I do that.

OK SO THE SECRET ENDING IS JUST AN AD FOR THE NEXT GAME.

I would assume at least - I actually looked up the phrase and apparently it’s nonsense that’s at the end of all the games so that’s nothing - but we see Sora, alive, and he and Riku are in the Verum Rex world, so I’m guessing.... that means something? There’s more I guess is what it means.

OK it’s midnight, I’m spending three more bucks just to sleep and turn this game in tomorrow, I’m posting this tonight and I’ll make a proper post-game tomorrow.

[trash-by-european-villains]

Umm is it just me or was that Wyatt 'I love you' the most bullshit thing ever. This is a guy who bitched at everyone in the episode previous about them being suspicious of his WIFE, then told Rufus he couldn't lose her again and that he wouldn't come back from it, and spent all of 2x10 continuously putting his teammates in danger for Jess... d'you think they'll keep going down the Ly@tt road if there's a season 3?

The most bullshit thing ever

Fair warning: salty as, if not more than, the dead sea. 

First I want to address that both Wyatt and Lucy mentioned his family and whether or if he would suspect them… Listen, Flynn is always wary abut Rittenhouse; what they are doing and their motives. Always questioning what they are doing. So, if he knew that Rittenhouse went back and saved his family… Hell yeah, he would be glad. But I think overall he would smell something fishy. He would ask, “Why?” (Yes, I know everyone question Jessica too. But they didn’t really do anything.) He would spend every moment trying to figure it out, if he was suspicious of them.

He also said that if and when he gets them back, he was going to see them, hug them, and walk. away. Definitely not bring them to their secret bunker.

Whether or not Rittenhouse knows this or not is not known. My guess? Probably not. (But they are creepy bastards so I wouldn’t put it too far passed them.) You know what I bet? Rittenhouse knew that Wyatt was obsessed with his dead wife. Flynn knew because Lucy wrote it in her journal. So, I wouldn’t be surprised if Emma knew or found out somehow. And who is Emma? Rittenhouse. They found a perfect distraction and vantage point. 

…Wow, sorry I went way off there. My bad. Back on track.

So, yes. Wyatt was being childish and bitchy to everyone concerning Jess. And his thing to Lucy about Amy..not cool man. Then the talk in the alley with Jessica? I do feel like he meant all of it. I do. He wants them to work. He wants to have a family with her. (But he’s gripping onto this leash he threw around Lucy, and is just dragging her around.) 

Then after all that? Going to Lucy, telling her you love her? Then telling her Rufus would cheer him/them on? Hell to the no. I don’t think Rufus would do that, honestly. I love Rufus, but I haven’t spent much time analyzing much of his character oops so I could be wrong about this but… also fight me

Maybe he was just getting it out for some sort of closure?…idk. But I don’t really believe it. I believe he believes it. He thinks he does..

Also…He’s sitting there saying, “I love you, Lucy.” to her and doesn’t look the least bit phased that his child, as of now, is going to grow up in Rittenhouse. This child he was so worried about an hour or so, prior. This child he told Flynn not to shoot Jessica for. 

Just…. ugh! 

Do I think they are going to continue Ly@att in season three? Sadly, yes. I do. I think they are going to keep pushing and pushing and pushing it. Because a bigger part of the show ships that. (That’s a whole other subject I’m not gonna get into right now.) Unless, they’ve always had Garcy has endgame and they are just very slowly letting it burn (and throwing drama into the midst /eyeroll), I do think they will continue to push them. And it’s a sad, sad thing. 

[ask-svt-hearteu]

If You Come Back ` Hong Jisoo (part 2)

 Admin note: Hey there everyone! I’ve decided to make this a series. I honestly just really wanted to write this story and I know it probably won’t get that many notes but I’m glad I get to try something a bit different than what I normally do ^~^ (there’s going to be multiple parts:)

Recap: Several years have passed since Joshua left to follow his dreams. What may happen when you decide to see him one last time?

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

I Missed You

waiting

waiting isn’t something easy to do is it?

waiting for the future especially

because the future is unknown

waiting led you to this moment

waiting implies that you were hoping for something

you expected something

and it was waiting for him that made you do this

made you impulsively buy a plane ticket

that would take you half-way across the world

to him

you reached instinctively for your suitcase

it was small

only contained enough clothing to last you a few days

some toiletries that you knew you would need

and a letter

you reached for that letter that had been kept carefully in your carry-on

and took a deep breath as you reread what you had written

the letter was several pages

you started on page 1

Page 1

“Hey Josh! How are things over there? I know you don’t get to contact home very often, but your mom said I should probably try to write what I wanna tell you down on paper. That way when you do call, I’ll be able to say everything I wanted to. So uhhh, I guess the first thing I wanted to say is hi! I hope you’re eating well, I hope you’re sleeping well. I hope things are going well. Graduation was kind of boring without you. We could have stood in a corner somewhere being the socially awkward nerds we are together, while everyone else celebrated the end of high school. But don’t worry! I saved you some of your favorite chocolate that your mom got me for graduation. Though I’m not too sure how I’ll send it to you. Anyway, I just wanted to say, that things are going good over here and ummm… I miss you.”

the date read four years ago

you were finishing the last year of college

when you decided to take this trip

the trip that would somehow end up giving you closure

this first page of the letter was four years ago

when he left

at first

right after he had left

you didn’t expect it to hurt quite so much

you didn’t expect Joshua being gone to be quite as difficult as it turned out to be

you missed him

it was hard calling him

he wasn’t given all that much time to call home

and when he did

you didn’t want to take away his time from his family

the truth was

you had to stop every fiber of your body from screaming

if you got on the phone with Joshua

every part of you wanted to scream

and tell him you missed him

that you wanted him to come back

but you also knew how much it meant for him to be there

and so the rare moments you did get to talk to him

went nothing like that

”How are things?”

”There are a lot of trainees, and we have English tests and take vocal lessons and dance until our legs want to fall off. I’m struggling, y/n, it’s hard.”

you want to tell him that you miss him

you want to tell him that if it’s hard, he should rest and that he should get sleep and eat and take care of himself

you want to tell him to be happy

”I believe in you. You can do it.”

and that’s all you say to him

and that’s all you get to say to him

you moved into the dorms for your first year of college

making the trip back to your house

and then the 127 steps down to Joshua’s house

weren’t really an option

not with projects and homework assignments and exams

no rest for the weary

you were ok though

Joshua’s mom talked to your mother quite often

and she would tell you how he was doing

granted you only heard indirectly

but anything left was more than enough

and three years along the line

you never quite forgot about him

never quite understood why your college friends always insisted on setting you up with cute Mike from the biology department

or the babe Zack from the the fine arts department

”Honestly y/n, it’s like you’re married to someone else when you’re hella single.” your friends would tease

”I suppose.”

but all these years you had liked Joshua

had missed Josh

it was a bit like waves crashing on the shore

loving him was like the sound of crashing waves

the sound of the waves was constantly in the back of your mind

fueling all your actions

but never quite so loud that they blocked out your everyday life

which is why

as nice as Ryan from Stats class was

you were ok being in love with your childhood friend

who lived across the ocean

you didn’t tell anyone except your roommate

Cara was more than a bit understanding

and three years of being roommates and friends

was enough for you to find out how wonderfully supportive a friend like her could be

late night convos would be had over love and life

and she’d ask you how long you were willing to wait for him

”I’m not too sure.” would always be your answer

but she understood that

and then

he debuted

you heard from your mom

finally he was going to debut

that was the first time in three years

you had driven home in a rush

tears, happy tears, in your eyes

back home to where your parents were

and treated them and Joshua’s mom to dinner

celebrating how amazing it all seemed

and when his mom handed you her phone asking if you wanted to say something to him

you sat quietly tearing up again

but turned her down

saying he would be busy

but you were scared

what do you say

no it’s better this way

you ordered his first album

his voice matured more when you listened to him singing

no longer quite the boy from church you remember chasing around begging him to sing you something on his guitar

from which he would play a bit of something, any song, just for you

but it was still very much his voice

and when your album arrived

”Ooooh which one is Joshua?” Cara asked you

you looked through the 13 photo cards included and pulled out his

”God y/n, I hate you, your love story is straight out of a movie.”

you thought back on the memories fondly while waiting for your flight

over the years, you had ordered each of his albums

the 12 other boys also had your heart

because they took care of Joshua

and were his friends and family

for that you were happy he was happy

”Flight 207 to Seoul boarding. Flight 207 to Seoul.”

this was it

you dragged your suitcase over and boarded your plane

looking out the plane’s window in your seat

the night sky welcoming

you had thought you could wait for Joshua

well no

you never really expected him to come back

you had hoped he would

but it had been four years already

and while he could very well have moved on

you wanted to see him one last time

to tell him he had done it

he had done well, he had worked hard

you had no plans for how you would see him

surely everyone would think you were just some crazy fan

but you had to

at least one last time

tell him to be happy

and then maybe you’d finally be able to move on

four years is a long time

you drifted to sleep while flying through the clouds

Day 2

Korea was beautiful

after a quick nap in the hotel room after landing

you had decided to just explore the nightlife of the city

going around to various shops

eating food from various food stands

it was all very beautiful

it felt like a dream

you shouldered your backpack as you took in the city lights

staring at awe in everything

you can imagine falling in love with a place like this

you wonder if Joshua fell in love staring at the city lights here

as you begin walking again you feel a sharp pain in your side as you’re roughly shoved

you catch yourself with your arms as you trip onto the ground

”Oh.”

you huff pulling yourself up to face the guy who had just accidentally pushed you

”You know that was very rude. Even if you are in a hurry, there’s no need for pushing!!!” you say brushing off yourself to face the perpetrator

he has a mouth mask and a cap so you can’t see his face really clearly

he doesn’t say anything

”Oh sorry, you probably don’t understand English.” you say switching to Korean, “Anyway, I expect an apology, I fell, you’re lucky I’m not pressing charges-”

”Y/n?”

you freeze

that voice

out of the entire city of Seoul

just your luck

just like fate

that voice

you recognized

Joshua slowly pulled off his cap and pulled his mask down

revealing his identity fully to you

you held your breath

honestly the universe couldn’t have waited until tomorrow for you to meet Joshua again after four years

you had imagined this moment over and over again

imagined what you would say

”So hey” “I traveled halfway across the world to see you again.” “Hey remember me from high school?”

all of your responses drained out of you

you didn’t know what to say

”I-” you begin

you watch at the sound of your voice

a sound he wasn’t quite sure if he’d remember

his face light up at it

it was almost as if he heard it everyday

and before you could really react

his arms pulled you

pulled your very physical being

crashing into his

like waves on a shore

the closing of hundreds of miles of distance

of years of time

as he held you in his arms

as his warmth enveloped you gently

and as you settled your arms around him too

the feeling was indescribable

everything felt blurry and bright and colorful and safe

it felt like home

”I missed you.”

Admin note: More fluff to come, a lot more fluffy, but maybe some angst too? idk you guys tell me what you want from this series

MASTERLIST

[survivorelsalvador]

Richie’s Jury Responses

austin: austin: Okay austin here’s the TEA! Your vote out wasn’t random, it definitely wasn’t because you’re new, and there was a lot of thought and logic and reasoning put into it….. At the one premerge tribal we went to me you ashton lily formed a group and we were trying to decide who to vote out and you expressed disinterest in voting out dana which is cool you said you liked her and that was it because willa got evaced

At the merge boot it looked like it was going to be a 5-5 vote with nicholas/zak/willow/dana/josh voting out ashton and then me/you/chips/lily/ashton voting out josh +kai doing whatever kai was going to do lmao

Veryyyy shortly before the vote lily came to me and said [6/30/17, 9:41:28 PM] Lily Douma: Austin is throwing us under the bus... [6/30/17, 9:41:34 PM] Lily Douma: Told Dana I'm voting for josh

So based on my perception and the information i had been collecting it seemed like you had a relationship with dana and your loyalty to me and “our side” was in question and if 20 minutes before the vote i’m told that youre going to people we weren’t working with and telling them our plan then it would make sense that youre not with us and youre not going to vote with us so a 6-4 vote with me being in the minority was possible and looking more and more realistic.. At that point i knew that i needed to play the idol to save ashton and my reasoning behind voting you out was because all signs were pointing to you were not with me so if you stayed in the game you would not only be a number for the other side but you would be someone who had previously been working with us and had receipts and information that could be used against me so taking you out right then would be smarter so at the last minute i chose what i thought was the most logical game move………….. When the votes were read i saw that you did in fact vote josh out and i had a mini panic attack lmao but yeah there was definitely reasoning behind it i thought you were playing both sides and your actions were making me perceive that you werent committed to working with us so thats why you left… i’m not saying this with any tone btw im not bragging about this being a good move or anything i’m just answering the “why” so that you have the closure and understanding on what was going on in my mind and what went down that lead to you getting voted out

Okay so I know that this was your first tumblr survivor game and im sorry that it ended so abruptly and came so out of nowhere you did deserve better i hope that this experience doesnt spoil your view on tumblr survivor orgs and i know that you need to keep up with wearing your retainers because its important to keep your teeth in tact so that all the money you spent on braces doesnt go to waste learn from my mistakes!!!!!

Josh:

Austin: charlie brown bc nice and genuine but in this game you got shitted on it was very much the defeated womp womp charlie brown 

Josh: Finn from adventure time, knows how to kick ass but still likes to have fun Willow: Rory Gilmore, really nice and smart but more complex of a human than that Zak: tbh anyone from it’s always sunny in philadelphia bc youre hilarious and messy and crackedt but somehow still loveable even though theres no real reason for you to be <3 Nicholas: leslie knope i feel like youre super involved in the org community and youre passionate and a little crazy but still fun loving Dana: Annalise Keating from how to get away with murder, bad ass who will say and do anything to get her way and looks great doing it Lily: this was the easiest one for me the second i read your question this was the first one to pop in my head okay if you’re young you might not get this reference but watch this iconic character in tv history sweet kind adorable but watch out when she’s mad lmao https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsBN9lvmjac

Willow: Hey, Willow! Whatsup? I loved you in one world, but when we got to merge we ended up on opposite sides and during the early stages of merge i tried to keep my distance so that i would avoid being overly deceitful which would likely lead to more bitter feelings of personal betrayal should i make it to the finals. Everything I did in this game was calculated and fueled by logic and reasoning based on my perception, but that doesn’t mean that I played a flaw free perfect game, I’m definitely a self aware bitch and I know that I can be a little cracked’t. Obviously everything worked out to the point where I got to the final 3 so I can’t say that I would do anything differently, however to answer your question, I would say that my biggest mistake would have to be the timing of voting out Austin. There were many things that lead me to making the decision to take him out at that moment in the game, but when the votes were read and I saw that despite all the red flags, he had voted the way he told us he was going to. Okay, now to answer your general questions! This isn’t a good jury favor pageant answer but tbh my favorite part of this game was making the movie poster, I love being creative and storytelling so I just had such a fun time making that. If I were in the jury, so that would make this a final 2 of Chips and Ashton? Right? Is that what you meant? You can’t answer me right now this is a one way conversation I’m having with myself…. But in a f2 of Chips and Ashton, I would vote for Chips.  If I weren’t here and I had to pick only one person to be in the finals, I would choose Dana because I think she played one hell of a game. A minor move of mine was during the premerge one world stage. I made sure to try to make somewhat of an impression of people not on my tribe, like Zak Willow Nicholas and Josh, by having at least one brief conversation that coming at merge we wouldn’t be complete strangers, but not too much that I came off as a strong social threat. Okay, I think that I answered all your questions, I hope I did and I hope that my punctuation usage made this easier for you to read because I’ve gotten so many complaints about this before, I type like I think and speak which is just one nonstop cracked rambling with absolutely no structure asdfdsfhjasdfj i tried really hard for you lmao

Zakriah: ICONIC QUESTION kelly wiglesworth 1-10 jury question teas wow…. Okay 3 genuine compliments about you 1) i’m a self centered narcissistic bitch and i think i’m hilarious BUT when we shared the title for best sense of humor in touchy subjects i was like okay true he’s worthy i’m not mad about that 2) this is like our 5th game together but realistically our second game where we’ve interacted and it’s easy to see that youre a well rounded player who knows how to integrate yourself with people you display game sense and ability without coming off as a big threat that needs to be targeted 3) i literally can never tell if you actually hate me or if we’re friends or enemies or frenemies but despite that i still really like you and want to be your friend even if you hate me and idk why so good job on misting me i guess????

nicholas: Kiiiiiiiiiiiing i cant believe youre making me have to chooose ahhhhhh i mean theres just so many for so many different occasions but wow okay i think nothing has ever been as iconic as this http://68.media.tumblr.com/2da6f1baef40ca34d8d800938ba6e940/tumblr_of3p98IyeO1vzwwmeo4_250.gif

dana: Dana queen legendary icon the night you left i knew you were leaving (despite the valiant effort you put into trying to get me and ashton to vote with you and you almost had ashton so thanks for making me put in just that much more work to talk him down from it) but at that point out of respect for you and your game i just was like straight up ill be real with you because you deserve it… and because i knew you were leaving so building you up a little before you go to jury couldnt have hurt ;) BUT FOR REAL the things you did in this game left me shook over and over and over the way you speak and your ability to lay out valid strategic arguments that make it seem like they dont even benefit you its just all about the person youre talking to’s best interest…. Incredible and mesmerizing i LIVE for a binch that doesnt quit and your stamina and determination is truly incredible and ill say all this to you after the game and forever so dont think this is pandering because youve earned your Bad Ass badge for life

lily: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ sorry <3