#themes and motifs

[limnsaber]

One of the best things about writing, in my opinion, is being able to sprinkle in lines that foreshadow or reference things that are so so significant.

How To Train Your Dragon, for example. Hiccup loses his left leg at the end of the movie the same way Toothless loses his left tail fin. That symbolism surrounds the relationship that the whole movie is based on, but littered in the movie are lines that allude to/foreshadow this.

“Trolls exist! They steal your socks. But only the left ones. What’s with that?”

“Yes it was. You’ve just never seen me from the left side until now.”

Hiccup is also ambidextrous, and alters between using his right hand and his left hand dominantly.

This left side symbolism connects the two main characters, and the throwaway lines are small ways that acknowledge and bolster these connections.

[frogman-inator2000]

Hello internet I want attention, here is some art I made I will add closeups later

[liliesbythewater]

so I've watched frances ha

Charlie xcx, "I think about it all the time" | Noah Baumbach, Frances Ha | Billy Joel, "Vienna"

[taxidermy-chic]

We should bring back double features!

Specifically, watching two different movies back-to-back to explore a similar theme. Some ideas for horror double features I think would be great:

- The Thing (1982), followed by Annihilation.

- Wicker Man (1973), followed by Midsommar.

- Rosemary’s Baby, followed by Eraserhead.

- Black Swan, followed by Suspiria.

- Nosferatu (‘20s), then Dracula (‘30s)

Just a few off the top of my head, please share your ideas if you have any! 🖤

[theghostofbean]

Cool people in my phone do you know about the Themes and Motifs? Would you like to know about the Themes and Motifs? The Symbolism also? take my hand

[mx-ryder]

Some thoughts on Hazbin Hotel

I literally just watched HH this week, followed by binging Helluva Boss on YouTube right after. And my Dash is full of HH and HB stuff now. And the other day I saw someone posted their thoughts on the show, including one specific take that it falls right back under the typical "Sinners are bad but hey, we can fix them!" sort of trope. (I really don't know if I'll be able to find the post again, if I do, I'll reblog/link it here or something).

And hey, I'm not gonna argue that it doesn't, per se. I just think there's a bit more to it than that.

c.w for general religious trauma talk, SA mentions, drug use/abuse, alcohol use, addiction, gambling, probably other things I'm not thinking of

(Also please don't feel like you have to read this. It's literally just me rambling because I haven't been able to stop thinking about this topic all fucking day, so I wrote it down to get it out of my head. Obviously if you read it and want to comment/continue the discussion, feel free. Just please. Be respectful.)

Now.

All my thoughts on HH are very much colored by my past experiences with religion, US christianity, specifically. More specifically still, the sort of christianity that makes people believe that "home schooling" their kids, isolating and indoctrinating them away from anyone who might make them question it all, is the best course of action. I grew up bouncing from church to church, from home schooling co-op to co-op, all so my bio-mom could find the exact group to echo her own sentiments back at her.

Among the things I grew up believing were great ideas such as:

Sexuality is inherently disgusting, and something you should always be forcing down/avoiding/punishing yourself about. Masturbation, porn, sex before marriage, dressing "immodestly", and any sexuality outside of heterosexual were inherently evil and worthy of punishment. Sometimes that punishment was being assaulted, because really, she should've covered up, right? Girls, sometimes girls as young as 12-13 (if not younger) were villainized for wearing tank-tops and shorts, because they were causing the boys to stumble and immodesty was a moral failing on their part.

Drugs, alcohol, substances in general, are bad and wrong and using them, or heaven forbid becoming addicted, is a moral failing on your part. You are a bad person for consuming a drug, and therefore deserve to fall into addiction, houselessness, starvation, and/or abuse.

Poor people deserve it. Accepting help of any kind is leeching off good, hard-working people. Your worth as a person is directly tied to your ability to be a "productive member of society."

Any mental health issues are your fault, and are either because you don't believe in jesus hard enough, or because you're inherently broken and sinful and therefore unsaveable. There is no room for sympathy or empathy for anyone struggling.

There's a reason these are the same stereotypical archetypes you see in this sort of show. The queer sex-addict. The gambler. The "weirdo" who isn't like other people and enjoys "weird" things, or enjoys things "too much". Even just the party-girl character. Because these aren't just stereotypes. These are actual entire groups of people who are ostracized and vilified just for being who they were born to be, for making choices christians don't like, or for being sick.

And that brings me to Angel Dust. Who, by the way, I wish I could've been given a content warning about, because holy shit Ep 4 and Addict hit me really fucking hard. My friend recommended the show to me without having watched it, so I went in not expecting that sort of storyline to punch me in the gut out of nowhere.

Anyway! Angel Dust! Literally named after a drug. A gay porn star who flirts shamelessly with anyone and everyone, who proudly shows off his best films to his friends, who secretly hates his job, not because of the sex, as we come to find out, but because he's under the thumb of a fucking psycho who treats him like shit and actively physically, sexually, and mentally/emotionally abuses him. He's basically been trafficked, and hates that he doesn't have any say in what happens to him in front of the camera. It's a horrifying position to be in, and one that left me a little shaken up, tbf.

The take I'm mostly writing this based on is that Hazbin Hotel falls into the trite tropes of "rich white girl attempts to fix people who are below her" and specifically mentioned disappointment in how Charlie didn't try to argue that Angel Dust didn't deserve hell based only on his addiction or sexual past, but that she instead claimed that she could "fix him."

And I just . . . think that's a little bit of a black/white take.

For the first part, what would people rather she do? Put all her time, effort, influence, and power into trying her damnedest to help her people, who are being slaughtered by the thousands every year just because Adam is bored? Or sit at home and use all that time, effort, influence, and power to make rubber duckies like her father? She could just ignore everything going on, call it hopeless, give up, and ignore the suffering of her people. Would that be better? Would that satisfy this weird little "she's just a rich white girl with privilege" gripe?

Charlie is a rich girl. A princess. Someone with huge amounts of privilege, power, influence, etc. But you know what? She's also stuck in hell. She was born there, through no fault or choice of her own, and because of who her parents are, she is trapped in literal hell, with no hope of ever, ever ascending to heaven. She does not get a chance at redemption, because she was born to the wrong people. She is a young woman who was born into horrifying circumstances, living in a world that she frequently expresses disgust for (her frequent discomfort with sexuality, her disgust toward the cannibals, her dislike of violence, even necessary self-defense).

And she still loves her people and wants to see the best in them.

She would be completely justified in hating everything about hell, her life, the people around her, her parents, heaven, everything, really. She has every right to hate her entire existence, but she puts all that hatred for the system into her efforts to fucking do something about it. Why is that a bad thing, just because she was born into a position of power and authority??

And now on to Angel Dust.

Charlie never once makes a judgement call about Angel or his habits, his work, or his personality. She expresses discomfort with the sexual nature of his work (tbh wouldn't be surprised if she's a sex-repulsed ace), but she does not think he's a bad person because of his work. Nor does she think that he needs to stop doing his work in order to become a better/good person. When she tries to get him some time off, she's explicitly doing it because she wants him to have time to decompress and participate in activities at the hotel, not because she wants him doing less of his specific kind of work.

She never condemns his partying, either. She has a bar in her hotel! She defends him partying, right to heaven's face, because she knows everyone present has partied, everyone has enjoyed a drink with friends. There is no condemnation of his partying activities, and I don't think she ever makes it seem as though Angel needs fixing.

What I got out of that episode, watching Charlie passionately defending her friend in front of the worst fucking person in the universe, was that people do not need to be fixed, but some love and support can help them make better choices for themselves. Angel still has a good time. He still has his job (contract, y'know, but would probably be in the industry regardless). The only thing different about that particular night of partying is that he's out with people who care about him, and who he cares about.

Even Cherri, though she expresses some joking disappointment that he's spending so much time worrying about Nifty, doesn't actually seem that put out by it. She teases him a little, but leaves him to do his thing. And his thing is making sure his friend, who is less experienced at partying (and who is significantly smaller/more vulnerable than most other people), is safe and okay. His thing is defending his friends from an extremely dangerous person, at massive risk to his own personal safety.

And he didn't do any of this because he'd been "fixed" or because he'd "changed." He did it because, for possibly the first time ever, he has people around him who love and care for him, and who want the best for him. And who he loves and wants the best for in return. He said himself that he stays out of his mind on substances, allows himself to be drugged and assaulted, puts on this persona of care-free-crack-whore-who-only-thinks-about-sex, because he is trying everything in his power to dull the pain he's in. Because he doesn't believe he deserves any better.

And this, this is what Charlie is trying to show Heaven. She is trying to show them that there is nothing morally damning about alcohol consumption, or even drug use, sex work, or anything that makes Angel who he is. She's trying to show them that, with some love, care, and support, with a safe place to call home, with their base physical and emotional needs being met, people don't need to resort to the sort of destructive behavior heaven/Adam is condemning! People can choose to engage in these behaviors safely, consciously, and with people around them who want them to be safe and have a good time.

Then we get on to the idea that this entire episode ends on. Heaven doesn't know how people get there. They don't know what it takes to be "good enough" for heaven. Sera herself admits that Adam was just "the first soul in heaven," all but admitting that he's just there because he defaulted into it. (Though that does make me wonder, what about Abel? He would have died long before Adam, and considering how long Adam lived, and that there were plenty of other people around by the time he would have died, where were all those souls going??).

And Adam is the fucking worst! He is literally the worst, most selfish, violent, vulgar soul in the entire show, but he is allowed in heaven, for reasons no one even understands.

You know what the difference is between Adam and Angel?

Adam can't be fixed.

His behaviors are all destructive, not to himself, but to others. He insults, abuses, hurts, and kills with abandon. He made this weird, shitty deal with Hell and Lucifer because he wanted to murder innocent souls, because he was bored, and the rest of heaven doesn't even know about it. He has free reign to be an absolute piece of shit to everyone around him, damaging people left and right, and he will never face any sort of justice for it, because hey, he's already in heaven!

But Angel? Angel's behavior is all self-destructive. Again. He gets fucked up to dull his immense pain. He allows himself to be drugged and assaulted because he believes he deserves it. Because he's been told, for who knows how many thousands of years, that he's a whore anyway, so why shouldn't he be free to use for anyone who wants to take him? He has been beaten down, physically, emotionally, sexually, until he's a shell of a person who is struggling to find any reason to continue his shitty existence.

And he hurts only himself.

I mean, okay, he does piss off Husk sometimes, crosses boundaries/etc. But he and Husk pretty clearly fix that between themselves. There's no lasting damage there, and idk if anyone else noticed, but he stops that behavior pretty much entirely after that ep.

Angel is hurting. He is hollow, and hopeless, and trapped. And he does not need to be fixed, nor does Charlie ever attempt to do so.

All she does is reach out a hand, and say, "Hey, I see that you're struggling. This place is fucked up, isn't it? Maybe I can help."

Charlie is a flawed person. She takes her privilege for granted. She feels the immense weight of her choices, and the pressure of having taken responsibility for a people who may never want her help. She messes up, because somehow, she's endlessly cheerful and optimistic, despite her upbringing and the world she grew up in.

Charlie is flawed. But she's trying her fucking best. She isn't trying to fix. She's trying to help.

We all need some help, every now and then, don't we?

[oldladymapleseed]

NtN spoilers!

the reveal that Alecto is Earth’s resurrection beast has me reeling. I wondered why, if the ghosts of planets killed to built the nine, the Earth was never specially mentioned. Fuck, oh boy.

from the very first chapter of GtN, what stood out to me about the world it was setting up was the worship and prioritization of death. I learned that Gideon was a serf, and that death was celebrated and skeletons did the menial labour, and I knew that I would not get along with their Emperor Undying. Death is convenient, valuable, sacred. Death serves Gid. Life has no importance in the ninth house. There is no trace of our Earth there, no green things, no one who would mourn them. In all of the houses, thalergy is an occasional necessity and frequent inconvenience. The true source of life, not God’s power over death, means nothing to any of his children.

Harrow is the perfect child of the ninth, the perfect student of the Necrolord Prime. She embraces secrets, and darkness, and coldness, and the sanctity of death. She accepts the conventional teachings of necromancy diligently and unquestioningly. She was made to serve him through horrible, indiscriminate sacrifice of innocent life for the sake of power to feed a perverted universe fuelled by guilt and a tyrannical scale of value. She is everything that John’s empire is, and he and I both believed she did not belong to the Earth anymore.

then she goes against everything she had been taught, chooses survival despite her intentions, chooses curiosity, and she finds the world that was ruined just like she believes she was, without either of their consent, to the detriment of both of their sanity. Harrowhark, the cold, colourless, skeletal, bone-crazed student of death and daughter of genocide looked at the source of life and adored her. And when Alecto was removed from her anger and the pain of her body and became Nona, she looked at Harrow’s face and found her beautiful too. Nothing could stop them from loving each other, even if they din’t really understand how to love anything else anymore, and that is a fucking statement, and it could not be more satisfying.

[sparrowgrace]

Victorian Patriarchy

To be born in a woman’s body was almost incarceration, as she would then be trapped within the roles expected of her, of her body specifically — this can be seen by the marital bed being nailed to the floor in the narrator’s room, a clear demonstration of what is prioritised by men in her life. To be born a woman was to spend one’s life being oppressed, abused, infantilised, just as the narrator of the Yellow Wallpaper is trapped within the old, queer house with barred windows and an immovable marital bed.

I wrote an article over on Medium, if anyone's interested. :3

[strongerpotions]

[starship-prism]

Hi everyone there are. Two bees hanging out on a sunflower I grew. Watching them my childhood rooftop.

[demontisms]

phoenix girlfriend whos the first to come back from the fire

[beeinyourbreadbox]

Okay everyone wants to talk about 'oh yeah cannibalism as a metaphor for all-consuming love' but I personally think that's tired. How about cannibalism as a metaphor for unhealthily co-dependent relationships (not even talking romantic, necessarily) born out of harsh environments?? Huh??

They cut chunks off of each other. Just small ones. They consume each other, but never completely, never enough to fill their stomachs. Just enough to keep going, hopefully small enough cuts that they'll heal without too much trouble. They laugh harshly but with a certain haunting light to each of their eyes about how gross it is to eat yourself and someone else. They hold each other gently and tears roll down their faces with each slice and sink of the knife, each small chunk of flesh that they offer up to each other. They pass the blade between each other with far too much casual trust for two people who are slowly cannibalizing each other.

"Fuck, that hurt," the elder of the two by two years says, but with a sort of deranged laughter hiding behind his tone. He throws the flesh that's been rended from his thigh on the cast-iron skillet propped over the fire while he holds a cloth to the wound. His companion grimaces as they swipe the blood off of the blade with their shirt and hold it out handle-first.

"You'll survive," they say, though not unkindly. "Now. You do me. Try to go for somewhere on the legs this time, my arms need a break." They say it without horror, with far too much casual energy for the situation. Because they know he won't kill them, won't take more than is needed, won't betray them or trick them.

Because if even one of them died, then who would the other have to nourish themselves from?

The two reluctantly cannibalistic companions carefully peel off a small layer of skin from each of them one night to contribute to the small meal of foraged berries and watery soup. On a particularly desperate evening the slightly older of the two offers up their two least favorite fingers. The younger one eventually donates their ear despite the less-than-ideal texture and taste of cooked cartilage. It was damaged to begin with from an accident in their childhood and probably needed to be removed eventually anyway, and hey. It's calories!

The two laugh and joke while bandaging each other's wounds to the eerie yet somehow tempting background music of their own flesh sizzling over their shared fire. At night, the younger one runs their finger over a particularly large bandaged divot in their beloved's arm. Tears well in their eyes and grief warps their features as they look at it. But they don't cry, because that would wake him up and he needs his rest. "I'm sorry," they whisper, voice trembling. "Fuck. Fuck I'm so sorry. This is so fucked up. I'll make it up to you, somehow. Someday. I promise."

Absentmindedly, they reach up to tuck their hair behind their ear out of habit, but there is no ear to tuck the hair behind so it simply falls back into their face. They would laugh if it wasn't all so fucked up.

The intimacy of saying 'i know. I know you don't want to hurt me. I don't want to be hurt and I certainly don't want to be doing the hurting either. But we have to survive, so we have to hurt each other, whether we want to or not. I know I know, It's okay. Don't cry. We'll carry the burden together. We'll keep each other going even as more parts of us disappear. We'll love each other through it anyway.'

The devotion and love and determination of 'me. Consume me. Use me. Hurt me so we can both stay alive long enough to see a day where we no longer have only each other to consume. If we can ever find our way out of here I promise I'll buy us a turkey and we'll prepare it together. I promise. This isn't forever,'

'I don't want to keep eating you. I don't want to keep hurting you, I can see all the damage we're doing to each other but there's nothing else. There's no one else. It's only us, and we have to survive. Here. It's my turn to be the main course, you're still healing. we'll do a few toes this time, just wash them before you cook them."

"gross! I'm not eating your toes!"

"oh, what, but you were fine with an ear? Shut up and eat my toes before we both starve to death,"

And when the two are finally rescued, they try to love each other still but they can't stand the sight of each other. He can't look them in the eye anymore, and they can't be near him without remembering how he tasted, and a deeply twisted part of them misses it and they hate themselves for it.

They're not in the wild anymore, they don't need to hurt or consume each other anymore but neither of them remembers how to do anything else, so two people with suspiciously large and deep scars never see each other again. It's better for the both of them, but sometimes he runs his fingers over the divot in his arm, and they never bothered to get a prosthetic ear.

Just. Yeah. Lots of potential there. See also: Cannibalism as a metaphor for people pleasing, cannibalism as an allegory for abusive/toxic relationships, cannibalism as a symbol of rebirth and rebuilding (especially in stories about transness!)- eating your old self, serving it up on a platter to nourish your new and better body. Just. Yeah I feel like we're missing out by limiting ourselves so specifically to metaphorically eating people we also want to fuck, is all I'm saying.

[dragon-discourse]

Rainbows

A common motif in mythologies across the world is to zoomorphize the rainbow as a serpent or dragon. Examples of this include:

The Balaur is said to travel along rainbows, or in Romania the rainbow itself is a two-headed Balaur.

In parts of Ukraine, the Rainbow is called tsmok, a common term for Slavic Dragons. It drinks water from the ground and transports it into the sky, where it becomes rain.

Hong is a Chinese Word for Rainbow, which is depicted as a dragon with a head on either end. This term, as well as the other two words for rainbow: didong and ni, all contain Radical 142, a radical associated in the Chinese language with insects, reptiles, and dragons.

Ayida-Weddo is a snake loa found in Vodou, which is associated with, among other things, Rainbows. This loa is connected to a similar figure found in West African mythology, who holds the world in their coils.

Aboriginal Australian mythology has a wide range of Rainbow Serpent deities and entities.

[cherrybombfangirlwrites]

WIP Themes Tag

tagged by: @arctic-oceans thanks! (this has been sitting in my drafts for ages oops)

tagging: Open Tag and soft tagging @wherearetheplants | @oh-no-another-idea | @bloodlessheirbyjaquces | @italiangothicwriteblr | @lyralit | @enchanted-lightning-aes | @winterandwords

how to: bold the themes that appear in your WIP (& italicize those that are loosely covered)

Fractured Stars Falling

addiction | beauty | betrayal | change vs. tradition | chaos vs. order | circle of life | coming of age | communication | convention vs. rebellion | corruption | courage | crime and law | dangers of ignorance | darkness and light | death | desire to escape | dreams | displacement | empowerment | facing darkness | facing reality | faith vs. doubt | fall from grace | fame and fortune | family | fate | fear | fear of failure | free will | friendship | fulfilment | good vs. bad | government | greed | guilt and forgiveness | hard work | heroism | hierarchy | honesty | hope | identity crisis | immortality | independence | individual vs. society | inner vs. outer strength | innocence | injustice | isolation | knowledge vs. ignorance | life | loneliness | lost love | love | man vs. nature | manipulation | materialism | motherhood | nature | nature vs. nurture | oppression | optimism | peer pressure | poverty | power | power of words | prejudice | pride | progress | quest | racism | rebirth | relationships | religion | responsibility | revenge | sacrifice | secrets | self-awareness | self-preservation | self-reliance | sexuality | social class structure | survival | technology | temptation and destruction | time | totalitarianism | weakness | vanity | war | wealth | wisdom of experience | youth

(the big one that's not on the list: trauma, how it affects us, and what makes life worth living)

The City is Ours

addiction | beauty | betrayal | change vs. tradition | chaos vs. order | circle of life | coming of age | communication | convention vs. rebellion | corruption | courage | crime and law | dangers of ignorance | darkness and light | death | desire to escape | dreams | displacement | empowerment | facing darkness | facing reality | faith vs. doubt | fall from grace | fame and fortune | family | fate | fear | fear of failure | free will | friendship | fulfilment | good vs. bad | government | greed | guilt and forgiveness | hard work | heroism | hierarchy | honesty | hope | identity crisis | immortality | independence | individual vs. society | inner vs. outer strength | innocence | injustice | isolation | knowledge vs. ignorance | life | loneliness | lost love | love | man vs. nature | manipulation | materialism | motherhood | nature | nature vs. nurture | oppression | optimism | peer pressure | poverty | power | power of words | prejudice | pride | progress | quest | racism | rebirth | relationships | religion | responsibility | revenge | sacrifice | secrets | self-awareness | self-preservation | self-reliance | sexuality | social class structure | survival | technology | temptation and destruction | time | totalitarianism | weakness | vanity | war | wealth | wisdom of experience | youth

Galaxy Destroyer

addiction | beauty | betrayal | change vs. tradition | chaos vs. order | circle of life | coming of age | communication | convention vs. rebellion | corruption | courage | crime and law | dangers of ignorance | darkness and light | death | desire to escape | dreams | displacement | empowerment | facing darkness | facing reality | faith vs. doubt | fall from grace | fame and fortune | family | fate | fear | fear of failure | free will | friendship | fulfillment | good vs. bad | government | greed | guilt and forgiveness | hard work | heroism | hierarchy | honesty | hope | identity crisis | immortality | independence | individual vs. society | inner vs. outer strength | innocence | injustice | isolation | knowledge vs. ignorance | life | loneliness | lost love | love | man vs. nature | manipulation | materialism | motherhood | nature | nature vs. nurture | oppression | optimism | peer pressure | poverty | power | power of words | prejudice | pride | progress | quest | racism | rebirth | relationships | religion | responsibility | revenge | sacrifice | secrets | self-awareness | self-preservation | self-reliance | sexuality | social class structure | survival | technology | temptation and destruction | time | totalitarianism | weakness | vanity | war | wealth | wisdom of experience | youth

(ones for this one that aren't on the list: fighting fascism/the dangers of capitalism (in the background of the story), learning to love something and protecting it, that's a baby not a weapon)

[idolsgf]

anyway watching moulin rouge now and i’m just thinking of a solavellan au

[bobauthorman]

It's kinda ironic and a little sad that so many of RWBY's fandom become fixated on viewing the characters from a single viewpoint when the first volume alone warns about seeing things in black and white.