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potatoplace · 3 months ago

Text

Truthteller

Azriel x Reader

kinktober day 8 | knifeplay

kinktober '24 masterlist | ACOTAR x reader masterlist

Story Summary: Your eyes have been drawn to a certain dagger at your mate's hip for weeks now. And maybe your thoughts, as well. What you hadn't expected was for your mate to notice your drifting attentions.

Warnings: knifeplay, cutting a your partner's name into your skin (do NOT do this irl unless you are VERY committed and trusting!!), light smut

Words: ~1.8k

Author's Note: well it's a couple of hours late but it's here! Some fun lil knifeplay Az, and it's a lil fluffy too imo. I like it. I hope you guys do too!

18+ only pls

💙🤍💙🤍💙

For weeks now, your eyes had been drawn to the daggers constantly at Azriel’s hip, lingering over them until Azriel felt your eyes on him, and you looked away with a blush on your cheeks.

Every night before bed when he would take off his knife belt, your eyes tracking his movements.

Tonight was no exception.

Azriel had been teasing you more than usual at family dinner earlier, letting his shadows play under the skirts of your dress. They had trailed up and down your legs, leaving a path of slight cold from your calves to your inner thighs. Az himself had also let his hand rest on your thigh throughout most of the meal, his fingers drumming an entrancing beat into your skin.

By the time the two of you said your goodbyes to his family and returned to your house, you were more than ready to find out why Az had been so insistent on driving you mad with his touch all night.

Azriel opened the door to your shared home, letting you pass through the doorway first before following you, shutting the door and turning the lock.

“Let’s go into the bedroom, hm, doll?” Azriel suggested in a low voice, a hand on your lower back already leading you past the living room and kitchen, through the hallway and into the master bedroom.

You loved when he was like this.

Confident, commanding. Taking control.

“Turn around and sit on the bed, doll,” Azriel told you as he turned to shut the bedroom door.

You did as he asked, settling down on the edge of your plush mating bed, the sapphire bedding rustling beneath you.

Azriel was facing you when you looked up again, and he crossed the distance between the two of you in slow, decisive steps, his wings flaring behind him.

And still, your eyes slipped from his face down to his favorite knife, Truthteller.

It was your favorite, too.

Probably not for any sane reason, but, well, you had never claimed to be fully in your right mind.

One of Az’s fingers lifted your chin so you were looking at his face once more.

“Do you want to tell me what’s on your mind, little mate?”

Your face flushed. You shook your head, his finger still holding your chin.

“Oh? Not going to share those pretty little thoughts with me?” Another slight shake of your head. “How about if I guess, hmm? I want to know what keeps distracting my pretty mate from me,” Azriel said possessively before leaning down to claim your mouth in a kiss.

If he guessed… You supposed that could be an… easier way to admit what you wanted.

“Okay,” you said softly. Azriel smiled down at you, hazel eyes so captivating that you couldn’t look away.

Until Truthteller was raised in front of your face a few seconds later, Az’s smile turning to a satisfied smirk at your widening eyes.

“Did you really think I wouldn’t notice that my mate’s eyes had drifted from my cock to my dagger, doll?” He asked, twisting the dagger in his scarred hands. “I’d just like to hear you say why, Y/N.”

You bit your lip. If he had already guessed that you’d been fascinated by the dagger, then he had to know the reason why already… Which means that he wants you to say it.

He always had liked pushed you out of your comfort zone in the most pleasurable ways.

And this might prove to be the best one yet.

“I…” You started. “I want you to…” You buried your face in your hands, hiding yourself from his piercing hazel eyes.

Azriel kneeled before you, placing Truthteller on the bed next to you before taking your hands in his and gently prying them away from your face. “Keep going, love, you’re doing great,” he praised, placing a gentle kiss on your forehead.

“I want you to use Truthteller on me,” you whispered, finally admitting your most recent obsession. You met Azriel’s eyes, happy to see so much warmth and love within them.

“Such a good girl for me, little mate. How much do you like this dress?” He asked, running his fingers along the sleeve.

It was a beautiful dress, in a dark blue that was nearly black with long, flowing sleeves and a semi low cut neckline, showing off a decent amount of your cleavage.

But the trouble in Azriel’s eyes promised a night worth losing something as replaceable as a dress.

“Not too much,” you replied, biting your lip in anticipation when Az’s mouth curled into a predatory grin, and he grabbed Truthteller from beside you.

“Tell me if you ever need me to stop, doll,” Az said seriously, waiting until you nodded in agreement to move again, standing from his place kneeling on the floor. “Stand up.”

You did as he said, watching with butterflies in your stomach as Az circled you, the cool bite of metal just barely grazing your skin as he tore through the laces of your dress with ease. You breathing hitched when the tip of Truthteller pressed into your lower back just enough for the pinch of metal to register, before Az was circling back to your front.

He cut the dress from between your breasts to just above your pelvis, then pulled the dress off of your body. All you were left in now was your underthings, a pale cream set that had Azriel’s gaze lingering over you, even more appreciative of your body in the delicate lace.

Azriel pushed you back until your knees hit the bed, then tapped your shoulders. You laid down as he requested, your breath hitching when he followed you down.

The two of you shared a soft kiss, tongues dancing together before Az pulled away. He leaned on one arm as he brought the other up to the strap of your bra, using Truthteller to slice through it, repeating the action on the other side.

Then he slid the knife underneath the band of your bra, twisting it so it was resting vertically on your skin, letting the smooth edge of the knife press into your breastbone. You bit your lip as you stared up at him, your hips twitching, ready to chase your pleasure.

He felt it, of course, and rewarded you for your impatience by slicing the remaining fabric on your chest, pulling it away from your body and tossing it to the floor.

Next he moved to your hips, knife making quick work of your panties so that Azriel could pull them away, leaving you bare for his eyes to feast upon.

And his mouth, if he had any say in the matter.

You were glistening in the low light of the bedroom, worked up from the soft glide of Truthteller against your skin and your mate above you, watching you with heavy lidded eyes. You met his gaze, certain that you already looked wrecked from the small amount of stimulation.

“Still feeling good, doll?”

You nodded your head, giving your mate a small smile.

“Good. Now, do you want more of soft brushes of the blade,” he demonstrated, the light press of the blade tickling your skin and leaving a small red mark in its wake. “Or, do you want something more focused? Maybe even have me write something? It’s all up to you, doll.”

The teasing brush of Truthteller against your skin had you squirming beneath him, but you tried to focus, for Az.

“Uhm… both are… both are good,” you said slowly, teasing passes of Truthteller against your stomach distracting you. “I… I’ve thought about, uh, having your…” you hesitated. This was the big part that you were worried about. “Your name on me…”

Azriel’s mouth split into a grin, something you saw so rarely. “You want my name put into your skin, my sweet little mate? Hmm?” He hummed as he leaned in to kiss along the expanse of your neck.

“Mhm, please,” you begged, wrapping your arms around his neck and pulling him in for a reassuring kiss.

When your lips parted, Az was looking down at you with such fondness, such love in his eyes that you couldn’t help but smile up at him.

“Where do you want my name, doll?” Az asked softly into your ear as one of his hands drifted across your skin, waiting for you to choose the spot where he would gently carve his name into your flesh. It passed over your breasts, giving them each a soft squeeze before drifting lower, passing over your ribs, stomach, down to the curve of your hips-

“There,” you breathed as his hand passed over the skin of your lower stomach, just above your pelvic area.

“Right here, front and center doll?” You nodded your head vigorously in agreement, propping yourself up on your elbows to watch as Az grabbed Truthteller and readied the tip of the blade against your sensitive skin. “Let me know if it gets to be too much,” he said seriously, waiting for you to nod your understanding before moving the blade even a hair.

And when he did move…

The soft pinch of the knife against your skin, just barely cutting it open was perfection, the small amount of pain pairing wonderfully with the arousal thrumming through your veins.

Az’s careful, steady hands worked the blade into your skin as lightly as he could to get the effect that he knew you were desperate for, by now. Between letters he pressed his lips to the skin of your inner thighs, your hips, just barely skirting around your dripping cunt each time.

You were barely able to keep yourself still by the time he was finishing the last stroke, the ‘L’ in his name, but you managed, reveling in the look of pure approval in your mate’s eyes as he looked you over.

“Look at it, baby,” Az said, helping you sit up so you could inspect the imprint of his name.

And there it was. Delicately carved, with very little blood coming from them. More like deep scratches than true cuts, but the effect had your heart beating faster either way.

“It’s perfect, Thanh you Azzie,” you said softly, pulling his face to yours for a heated kiss. “I love it. And I love you.”

Az smiled at you. “I’m glad you like it, love. Now… were you wanting another treat?” He asked, his eyes darkening. You nodded your head. “Good. Go ahead and lie back, and just enjoy,” Az instructed, a hand on your back making sure that you lowered yourself down slowly.

You kept your hands by your sides, as much as you were dying to wrap them in your mate’s hair.

In the next moment, his mouth had descended upon you, his shadows joining the fun as well and wrapping around your breasts, giving them a squeeze.

You were in for a long night.

General Taglist: @daughterofthemoons-stuff

#truthteller #Azriel x reader #az x reader #Azriel x reader smut #Azriel #Azriel acotar #acotar x reader #azriel shadowsinger #knifeplay #smut #acotar #acotar fic #acotar fanfic #kinktober 2024 #acotar kinktober #kinktober #kinktober '24 #tato writes

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hollowed-theory-hall · 10 days ago

Note

hi!

we see harry’s anger truly manifest in ootp, and it was a treat reading your analysis on his ptsd!

but it’s been a longheld belief in the fandom that harry is this firecracker with concerningly poor anger management. which is absurd, frankly imo, because i understand his default style is quiet, intense intimidation, or sass and snark. except when his fury reaches the threshold of his control, and he lets go fully and spectacularly. we also see in the later books that harry keeps trying to rein in the onslaught of fury pouring from voldemort, and while he does channel that anger outwardly, he isn’t making a habit of frequently lashing out at the people around him.

what i’m really asking is, what are your thoughts on harry’s anger and how he manages his frustrations from age eleven to seventeen?

Hello 👋

Thank you! I love my boy Harry and his anger and trauma so much! His trauma doesn't manifest in the way most fandoms usually like to portray trauma, but I always loved how Harry breaks when he reaches his threshold. He's a fascinating character and I find myself disappointed in his treatment over the years in fanon.

As to your question, boy, okay, this is complex and is greatly affected by Harry's mental state. I mentioned here how his anger is often colder and sassier and the fiery anger that's all shouting and cursing is something we only really see from him in OotP and onwards and I believe is the result of trauma, as I mentioned here & here.

But I decided, you know what? I can take a few scenes of his anger from each book. It's something I have a lot of notes about, and I'm surprised I haven't written about it here yet since it's a subject I love talking about.

Now, I do think he has issues with emotional regulation in general. I mean, he was raised in a cupboard under the stairs, he is not emotionally well-adjusted even if he knows to appear as if he is. His anger and how it manifests is a result of years of trauma and abuse. Honestly, though, he manages his anger better than he could have considering his life experience.

So without further ado:

Philosopher's Stone:

In the first book, we see Harry angry at the Dursleys and their unfair treatment of him. This anger is interesting. He has every reason to be angry but it isn't just anger. It's his frustration and helplessness that he feels as anger because he lacks the tools to understand/deal with his emotions.

How we see this anger come out though, is mostly through sass. And even then he makes sure to run/duck away before they could hurt him:

“They stuff people’s heads down the toilet the first day at Stonewall,” he told Harry. “Want to come upstairs and practice?” “No, thanks,” said Harry. “The poor toilet’s never had anything as horrible as your head down it — it might be sick.” Then he ran, before Dudley could work out what he’d said.

(PS, Ch3)

Harry doesn't really have the luxury to get angry or upset because he's the one who would suffer for it. So, he bottles up all his anger and frustration and only lets it out in cold glares and sass even when he's fuming inside. In his heart of hearts, he wishes he could do something to the Dursleys, to hurt them back, but he can't.

I do want to note that Harry's hold on his range isn't him managing it well, it's him bottling it up. This would be very relevant later in this post.

The incident with the Boa Constrictor is one I like. Harry later refers to it as revenge in a moment of anger:

and the very last time Dudley had hit him, hadn’t he got his revenge, without even realizing he was doing it? Hadn’t he set a boa constrictor on him?

(PS, Ch4)

“Out of the way, you,” he said, punching Harry in the ribs. Caught by surprise, Harry fell hard on the concrete floor. What came next happened so fast no one saw how it happened — one second, Piers and Dudley were leaning right up close to the glass, the next, they had leapt back with howls of horror. Harry sat up and gasped; the glass front of the boa constrictor’s tank had vanished. The great snake was uncoiling itself rapidly, slithering out onto the floor. People throughout the reptile house screamed and started running for the exits.

(PS, Ch2)

He's unaware that he's doing it, of course, but Harry's magic is powerful and incredibly attuned to him, so of course, it acts up when he's angry. Of course, his magic gets revenge on Dudley when Harry is so angry but feels helpless to do something with it. Harry's magic here shows Harry wishes he could do something, that he could take revenge:

Hagrid almost had to drag Harry away from Curses and Countercurses (Bewitch Your Friends and Befuddle Your Enemies with the Latest Revenges: Hair Loss, Jelly-Legs, Tongue-Tying and Much, Much More) by Professor Vindictus Viridian. “I was trying to find out how to curse Dudley.”

(PS, Ch5)

He just can't. So he bottles up his anger instead.

The other person we see Harry angry at in the first book, is Snape. Harry responds to Snape quite similar to how he responds to the Dursleys:

“Thought you wouldn’t open a book before coming, eh, Potter?” Harry forced himself to keep looking straight into those cold eyes. He had looked through his books at the Dursleys’, but did Snape expect him to remember everything in One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi? Snape was still ignoring Hermione’s quivering hand. “What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?” At this, Hermione stood up, her hand stretching toward the dungeon ceiling. “I don’t know,” said Harry quietly. “I think Hermione does, though, why don’t you try her?” A few people laughed; Harry caught Seamus’s eye, and Seamus winked. Snape, however, was not pleased.

(PS, Ch8)

He gets angry, inside his head he is fuming, but outside his head, Snape hears a sassy retort said quietly and calmly. Even when Harry is angry he acts calm and quiet and looks like he's joking from Seamus' response. It's why it's so easy for Snape to believe Harry is like James. Harry doesn't show his anger. External he's quiet and sassy becouse he knows if he started shouting he'd be punished more (like at the Dursleys).

So, 11-year-old Harry is quiet outside when angry. Only really shows glares and sass when he's upset while bottling his feelings up. This would continue throughout the years until year 5, for the most part.

Chamber of Secrets:

We see more of this way of handling his anger in CoS (though way less). CoS is not a very angry book, but I found a few examples.

“I have not been visited yet. The name Malfoy still commands a certain respect, yet the Ministry grows ever more meddlesome. There are rumors about a new Muggle Protection Act — no doubt that flea-bitten, Muggleloving fool Arthur Weasley is behind it —” Harry felt a hot surge of anger.

(CoS, Ch4)

Harry is angry. He likes the Weasleys and hates hearing them being talked about like this. Still, no one else sees his anger because he's hiding, and he knows he'd be worse off if he left his hiding spot. Harry isn't all that impulsive (yet). He just swallows his anger down for the sake of what needs to be done — in this case hiding.

“Dobby is used to death threats, sir. Dobby gets them five times a day at home.” He blew his nose on a corner of the filthy pillowcase he wore, looking so pathetic that Harry felt his anger ebb away in spite of himself. [...] Dobby mopped his bulging eyes and said suddenly, “Harry Potter must go home! Dobby thought his Bludger would be enough to make — ” “Your Bludger?” said Harry, anger rising once more. “What d’you mean, your Bludger? You made that Bludger try and kill me?”

(CoS, Ch10)

Here, we see more of Harry's usual anger and how he bottles everything up. He is rightfully angry at Dobby for everything he did, but he also feels pity for him, his anger doesn't cloud Harry's ability to empathize with others. And if you look at the second quote, you see that in his head Harry is rightfully angry at an attempt to murder him but he's talking calmly and quietly. He isn't shouting. He isn't being violent or impolite. Harry's anger, as seen by others, is cold and quiet because he bottles it up.

“And why did you want to meet me?” said Harry. Anger was coursing through him, and it was an effort to keep his voice steady.

(CoS, Ch17)

This is later, when facing Tom. Harry feels betrayed. He wanted so bad to be Tom's freind, he tried so much to ignore what was happening so he could keep his new BFF and first crush. But when he is betrayed, he gets angry, rightfully so, again. And we see he isn't shouting or acting angry and rashly. He's speaking steadily and quietly and makes an active effort to do so.

Harry knows how he comes off and is actively trying to make his voice steady and not sound angry/scared! He's smart and not impulsive. He's very aware of his external behavior and actively conceals his anger from appearing externally.

My boy is angry, but he isn't a brash hothead.

I do want to note another thing about Harry's anger. Harry responds with anger when he's scared, when he's grieving, when he feels helpless. Anger is just the easiest emotional response for him to go to, and it's why he reacts with anger to a lot of the things he goes through. Anger is an emotion he understands, so everything kinda feels like anger that he can keep pushing down.

Prisoner of Azkaban:

In PoA, we have a few interesting scenes showcasing Harry's anger really well. Some of the anger descriptions from this book are my favorite by far but we'll get to it.

This is the first book we start seeing Harry act out in anger. Until now, we saw Harry fuming inside but acting calm to the outside world. In PoA, he still mostly does that, but we start seeing him cracking under the weight of life. That bottle he's been filling up for years is close to it's threshold.

just as Uncle Vernon burst out of the dining room, his trouser leg in bloody tatters. “COME BACK IN HERE!” he bellowed. “COME BACK AND PUT HER RIGHT!” But a reckless rage had come over Harry. He kicked his trunk open, pulled out his wand, and pointed it at Uncle Vernon. “She deserved it,” Harry said, breathing very fast. “She deserved what she got. You keep away from me.” He fumbled behind him for the latch on the door. “I’m going,” Harry said. “I’ve had enough.”

(PoA, Ch2)

This above has Harry acting rashly and impulsively in anger. He is ready to just up and go in a moment of rage with little to no forethought which isn't how Harry usually operates. Aunt Marge and Vernon just made him reach his tipping point. Some of that anger has spilled out and Harry's acting out because he doesn't know what else to do.

This is a kid who up to this point never even had the chance to grieve his dead parents properly. He never got to just sit there and feel any of what he's going through. He just keeps swallowing it down and here, we see him start to slip. What he's been pushing down is starting to become too much.

I will note that still, even when he is more brash and angry here, he isn't shouting. He's speaking calmly and evenly even as he's raging inside.

I also want to note the situation with Hermione over the Firebolt:

Professor McGonagall turned on her heel and carried the Firebolt out of the portrait hole, which closed behind her. Harry stood staring after her, the tin of High-Finish Polish still clutched in his hands. Ron, however, rounded on Hermione. “What did you go running to McGonagall for?” [...] Harry knew that Hermione had meant well, but that didn’t stop him from being angry with her. He had been the owner of the best broom in the world for a few short hours, and now, because of her interference, he didn’t know whether he would ever see it again. He was positive that there was nothing wrong with the Firebolt now, but what sort of state would it be in once it had been subjected to all sorts of anti-jinx tests? Ron was furious with Hermione too.

(PoA, Ch11-12)

Harry is mad at Hermione, he has his reasons to be, but he understands why she did it. He is angry, but he's smart and empathetic and he knows Hermione. He knows she only wants him safe, he's still mad, but he doesn't shout at her like Ron does. He pushes his anger down because he doesn't want to upset her. He;s not as furious as Ron is.

In the early books, we see Ron stepping forward to curse Malfoy, shout at Hermione, or stop talking to Harry over the tournament. Ron's the one that is more hot-headed in the early books and springs to act in moments of anger while Harry tends to stay cool-headed (because he pushes his anger down). He is angry inside his head, but he stays calm outside and even stops Ron from going after Malfoy (eat slugs incident, Harry tried to stop him).

(I will note this might have to do with Ron having siblings. Letting your emotions out is a good thing. It is a good thing to tell people you are close to you are upset with them. Arguing with your siblings and shouting at them on occasion can even be healthy! It can keep you from creating grudges and getting bitter. It's not necessarily bad. It's just that Harry and Hermione didn't have siblings and don't know how healthy arguments between people who love each other (which is what Ron is going for with Hermione above) work.)

One of my favorite moments of Harry's anger in the series is everything to do with Sirius when he thinks he's guilty:

A hatred such as he had never known before was coursing through Harry like poison. He could see Black laughing at him through the darkness

(PoA, Ch11)

A boiling hate erupted in Harry’s chest, leaving no place for fear. For the first time in his life, he wanted his wand back in his hand, not to defend himself, but to attack . . . to kill. [...] “NO YOU DON’T!” roared Harry, and he aimed a kick at Crookshanks that made the cat leap aside, spitting; Harry snatched up his wand and turned — “Get out of the way!” he shouted at Ron and Hermione. They didn’t need telling twice. [...] Black was sprawled at the bottom of the wall. His thin chest rose and fell rapidly as he watched Harry walking slowly nearer, his wand pointing straight at Black’s heart. “Going to kill me, Harry?” he whispered. Harry stopped right above him, his wand still pointing at Black’s chest, looking down at him. A livid bruise was rising around Black’s left eye and his nose was bleeding. “You killed my parents,” said Harry, his voice shaking slightly, but his wand hand quite steady.

(PoA, Ch17)

This is the first occurrence we see Harry in a true rage. The kind of anger that pushes him to act impulsively and violently. Harry actually screams in rage.

It's not unreasonable, he thinks Sirius betrayed his parents, these same parents Harry never really got the chance to mourn. But Harry doesn't really shout when angry, he's quiet in his anger usually. But here he actually roars out. He demands Ron and Hermione move from his way, he kicks Crookchanks and goes to kill Sirius. Harry is acting completely from anger without really thinking or realizing what he's doing. This is the kind of rage where you see red and don't really know what you're doing until you're doing it.

I love how he describes it: "coursing through Harry like poison". It's just such a visceral description for a very visceral emotion. This isn't Harry's usual anger, this is rage, this is beyond his usual anger. It's the type of anger most fans associate with him because of OotP. This uncontrolled rage that pushes him to be impulsive is a trauma response. It comes up when Harry is at an emotional low. When there's too much, when he feels to many things and he can't handle them all so he lashes out in anger.

In this case, Harry is facing the man he believes sold out his parents, who trusted him, of course, he's angry and betrayed. Of course, it's different from the anger he feels when Snape is being a dick. It is different. It's rage, and grief, and fear, and pain, and it's a cry for help.

Harry has an impressive capacity to bottle up his emotions, but from book 3, we see him teetering on the threshold. And it just gets worse from here (like his experiences in the books).

Goblet of Fire:

GoF is a rough year, and Harry is very angry throughout this year. Still, we see his usual "cold anger" not his rage. He's angry inside his head, we see it, but he doesn't act out on any of it, nor does he even say anything about it. He's bottling it all up. If we weren't reading his thoughts, we probably wouldn't have these gems of anger:

Harry’s ears were ringing. The injustice of it made him want to curse Snape into a thousand slimy pieces. He passed Snape, walked with Ron to the back of the dungeon, and slammed his bag down onto the table. Ron was shaking with anger too — for a moment, it felt as though everything was back to normal between them, but then Ron turned and sat down with Dean and Seamus instead, leaving Harry alone at his table. On the other side of the dungeon, Malfoy turned his back on Snape and pressed his badge, smirking. POTTER STINKS flashed once more across the room. Harry sat there staring at Snape as the lesson began, picturing horrific things happening to him. . . . If only he knew how to do the Cruciatus Curse . . . he’d have Snape flat on his back like that spider, jerking and twitching. . . .

(GoF, Ch18)

Harry felt oddly separate from everyone around him, whether they were wishing him good luck or hissing “We’ll have a box of tissues ready, Potter ” as he passed. It was a state of nervousness so advanced that he wondered whether he mightn’t just lose his head when they tried to lead him out to his dragon, and start trying to curse everyone in sight.

(GoF, Ch20)

Harry spends a good chunk of GoF wishing he could curse Snape, other students, and even Ron occasionally. He feels helpless and that makes him angry. But he doesn't actually curse anyone. He doesn't even sass Snape in the above example, he just glares.

But you'll notice, again, the way he handles his anger/other issues is not really about mastering the emotion and letting it go. No, Harry just holds that anger in. He never learned to let it go, so all the times, his anger came off as cold and chill to others; it's because Harry's keeping a lid on things. By GoF, Harry can barely keep the cap on:

From the moment the article had appeared, Harry had had to endure people — Slytherins, mainly — quoting it at him as he passed and making sneering comments. “Want a hanky, Potter, in case you start crying in Transfiguration?” “Since when have you been one of the top students in the school, Potter? Or is this a school you and Longbottom have set up together?” “Hey — Harry!” “Yeah, that’s right!” Harry found himself shouting as he wheeled around in the corridor, having had just about enough. “I’ve just been crying my eyes out over my dead mum, and I’m just off to do a bit more. . . .” “No — it was just — you dropped your quill.” It was Cho. Harry felt the color rising in his face.

(GoF, Ch19)

And so we get scenes like the above. Harry is walking around like a powder keg waiting to explode. He has been bottling his frustration and anger all his life, he comes off as chill not because he manages it well but because he hides it. He makes his voice steady and quiet because it's what he learned at the Dursleys, but it's not that the anger disappears, he holds onto all of it. That's why the worse the situation is, the worse Harry's anger is. He doesn't have the capacity to push it all down.

And this is why he occasionally starts blowing up in GoF. The more helpless and frustrated he is, the more his bottle is filled and he just can't handle it beyond a certain point.

Order of the Pheonix:

OotP is Harry at his angriest. If I wanted to copy all the qoutes from this book that show Harry's anger, I'd probably have to copy the whole book. As it is, I've hand-picked a few examples:

“SO YOU HAVEN’T BEEN IN THE MEETINGS, BIG DEAL! YOU’VE STILL BEEN HERE, HAVEN’T YOU? YOU’VE STILL BEEN TOGETHER! ME, I’VE BEEN STUCK AT THE DURSLEYS’ FOR A MONTH! AND I’VE HANDLED MORE THAN YOU TWO’VE EVER MANAGED AND DUMBLEDORE KNOWS IT — WHO SAVED THE SORCERER’S STONE? WHO GOT RID OF RIDDLE? WHO SAVED BOTH YOUR SKINS FROM THE DEMENTORS?” Every bitter and resentful thought that Harry had had in the past month was pouring out of him; his frustration at the lack of news, the hurt that they had all been together without him, his fury at being followed and not told about it: All the feelings he was half-ashamed of finally burst their boundaries. Hedwig took fright at the noise and soared off on top of the wardrobe again; Pigwidgeon twittered in alarm and zoomed even faster around their heads. “WHO HAD TO GET PAST DRAGONS AND SPHINXES AND EVERY OTHER FOUL THING LAST YEAR? WHO SAW HIM COME BACK? WHO HAD TO ESCAPE FROM HIM? ME!” [...] Harry was not sure his anger had abated yet; but his thirst for information was now overcoming his urge to keep shouting. He sank onto the bed opposite the others.

(OotP, Ch4)

There are two aspects I want to note about his anger here. Harry, as I mentioned above, even when he is mad at Ron and Hermione, he usually doesn't shout at them like this. This is Harry way past his threshold, traumatized with no idea how to handle any of the emotions he's feeling. Ron and Hermione are getting the brunt of that bottle exploding here.

And Harry has a good reason to be angry with them here, don't get me wrong. Harry usually has really good reasons to be angry. I'm just noting that he would have held back his anger if he wasn't in the worst emotional state we've seen from him up to this point. If he had the capacity in his bottle of emotions, Ron and Hermione wouldn't even know he was upset with them.

The other thing I want to bring up is the second section from the above quote. After Harry lets out a bit of the steam he's been building up for years by this point he swallows it down and caps it again because he wants information. He's still angry, he's still upset, but he holds his tongue to get information. He still doesn't feel free or capable of explaining why he's feeling what he's feeling. A lot of it isn't just anger at Ron and Hermione. It's everything. And he has no idea how to parse what he's feeling.

Like I mentioned in the past, Harry doesn't like showing weakness, he doesn't tend to act emotionally or rashly because he knows how people see it. But he isn't actually letting go of all that anger, he lets it build up:

“Harry?” said Hermione tentatively. “Well done,” said Harry, so heartily it did not sound like his voice at all, and still not looking at her. “Brilliant. Prefect. Great.” “Thanks,” said Hermione. “Erm — Harry — could I borrow Hedwig so I can tell Mum and Dad? They’ll be really pleased — I mean, prefect is something they can understand —” “Yeah, no problem,” said Harry, still in the horrible hearty voice that did not belong to him. “Take her!”

(OotP, Ch9)

And up.

He just keeps pushing his anger down. If Sirius hadn't noticed and told him that he and James weren't prefects either, Harry would've kept stewing in it. Because he wouldn't have told Ron and Hermione he was jealous because he doesn't really tell anyone shit. He just lets it build:

“Oh, shut up, the pair of you,” said Harry heavily, as Ron opened his mouth to argue back. Hermione and Ron both froze, looking angry and offended. “Can’t you give it a rest?” he said. “You’re always having a go at each other, it’s driving me mad.” And abandoning his shepherd’s pie, he swung his schoolbag back over his shoulder and left them sitting there. He walked up the marble staircase two steps at a time, past the many students hurrying toward lunch. The anger that had just flared so unexpectedly still blazed inside him, and the vision of Ron and Hermione’s shocked faces afforded him a sense of deep satisfaction. Serve them right, he thought. Why can’t they give it a rest? . . . Bickering all the time . . . It’s enough to drive anyone up the wall. . . .

(OotP, Ch12)

And keeps snapping at everyone becouse he doesn't have a handle on his emotions. He doesn't really process what he's gone through/going through and he's lashing out.

Harry's anger in OotP is the powder keg blowing. It's why he's more rash, more vocal, actually screaming at people in a way he hasn't before. It's why we see him lose control of himself in anger more than before:

Harry was not aware of releasing George, all he knew was that a second later both of them were sprinting at Malfoy. He had completely forgotten the fact that all the teachers were watching: All he wanted to do was cause Malfoy as much pain as possible. With no time to draw out his wand, he merely drew back the fist clutching the Snitch and sank it as hard as he could into Malfoy’s stomach — “Harry! HARRY! GEORGE! NO !” He could hear girls’ voices screaming, Malfoy yelling, George swearing, a whistle blowing, and the bellowing of the crowd around him, but he did not care, not until somebody in the vicinity yelled “IMPEDIMENTA!” and only when he was knocked over backward by the force of the spell did he abandon the attempt to punch every inch of Malfoy he could reach. . . .

(OotP, Ch19)

Because he reached his limit of how much he can bottle up and he has no healthy means of letting any of it out. The D.A. helped a little as a distraction, it helped him feel less helpless, but he only just addressed the traumatic experience he had in the graveyard by talking about it when more just kept getting piled up onto him.

“Harry — no!” cried Lupin, but Harry had already ripped his arm from Lupin’s slackened grip. “SHE KILLED SIRIUS!” bellowed Harry. “SHE KILLED HIM — I’LL KILL HER!”….. [...] Hatred rose in Harry such as he had never known before. He flung himself out from behind the fountain and bellowed “Crucio!” Bellatrix screamed. The spell had knocked her off her feet, but she did not writhe and shriek with pain as Neville had — she was already on her feet again, breathless, no longer laughing. [...] “Never used an Unforgivable Curse before, have you, boy?” she yelled. She had abandoned her baby voice now. “You need to mean them, Potter! You need to really want to cause pain — to enjoy it — righteous anger won’t hurt me for long — I’ll show you how it is done, shall I? I’ll give you a lesson —”

(OotP, Ch36)

Running after Bellatrix was an impulsive decision. It's that same rage that overtook Harry to kick Crokshanks and try to kill Sirius. It's that seeing red sort of rage that encompasses everything. Grief overflowing Harry's emotional bottle and all he knows how to react with — is anger.

Harry, as I mentioned in the past, doesn't cry in front of others. He doesn't let himself. and the emotions gotta get out somehow. For Harry, that somehow is anger.

Half-Blood Prince:

After Sirius' death, Harry is much rawer. He basically starts this book beyond his threshold.

“If there’s anyone else here who’s not from Gryffindor,” roared Harry, who was starting to get seriously annoyed, “leave now, please!”

(HBP, Ch11)

So he gets annoyed more easily. He lashes out and shouts more often. He tries to physically attack more often too:

“Another ten points from Gryffindor,” said Snape. “I would expect nothing more sophisticated from you, Ronald Weasley, the boy so solid he cannot Apparate half an inch across a room.” “No!” whispered Hermione, grabbing Harry’s arm as he opened his mouth furiously. “There’s no point, you’ll just end up in detention again, leave it!”

(HBP, Ch21)

Something he didn't do up until OotP and even then rarely. Harry is hot-headed not because he's easy to anger (again, his capacity for bottling up is impressive if he just seriously started lashing out in GoF), most of his grievances are reasonable, he's hot-headed becouse he's suffering and has no idea how to handle it.

“Just now!” said Harry, who was refraining from yelling with enormous difficulty. And then, suddenly, he could not stop himself. “AND YOU LET HIM TEACH HERE AND HE TOLD VOLDEMORT TO GO AFTER MY MUM AND DAD!” Breathing hard as though he was fighting, Harry turned away from Dumbledore, who still had not moved a muscle, and paced up and down the study, rubbing his knuckles in his hand and exercising every last bit of restraint to prevent himself knocking things over. He wanted to rage and storm at Dumbledore, but he also wanted to go with him to try and destroy the Horcrux; he wanted to tell him that he was a foolish old man for trusting Snape, but he was terrified that Dumbledore would not take him along unless he mastered his anger. ... “Harry,” said Dumbledore quietly. “Please listen to me.”

(HBP, Ch25)

Again, he snaps and shouts way more than before. And he knows he shouldn't, he knows it comes off bad and people take him less seriously when he's angry and lashing out, but he can't help it as much since he still hasn't started letting go. He's still at his threshold all throughout HBP.

It's why we see him react the way he does after Snape kills Dumbledore, too. He was so angry all year. Since Sirius died, he's been running on fumes. The keg already blew in fifth year, and it didn't help him at all while he's barely holding himself together (but no one else sees this). And then, he had more pushed onto him after he already had less than zero capacity to deal with things.

Deathly Hallows:

Much of the anger we see from Harry in this book is due to either the locket or the Horcrux in him, but I'm not counting that sort of anger. I want to focus on Harry's anger.

The grief that had possessed him since Dumbledore’s death felt different now. The accusations he had heard from Muriel at the wedding seemed to have nested in his brain like diseased things, infecting his memories of the wizard he had idolized. Could Dumbledore have let such things happen? Had he been like Dudley, content to watch neglect and abuse as long as it did not affect him? Could he have turned his back on a sister who was being imprisoned and hidden? Harry thought of Godric’s Hollow, of graves Dumbledore had never mentioned there; he thought of mysterious objects left without explanation in Dumbledore’s will, and resentment swelled in the darkness. Why hadn’t Dumbledore told him? Why hadn’t he explained? Had Dumbledore actually cared about Harry at all? Or had Harry been nothing more than a tool to be polished and honed, but not trusted, never confided in? Harry could not stand lying there with nothing but bitter thoughts for company. Desperate for something to do, for distraction, he slipped out of his sleeping bag, picked up his wand, and crept out of the room.

(DH, Ch10)

Harry's feelings of grief over Dumbledore are interwind with betrayal, helplessness, and feeling lost in general, and he feels all of it as anger. As I mentioned above, anger is Harry's go-to emotion when he's grieving, when he's in pain, when he feels too much and has no idea what to do with any of it — it lands him in anger.

It's a big part of why he reads as so angry with Dumbledore throughout the book. He has complicated feelings about the man, feelings he has no idea how to even start to unpack, so he feels angry.

In DH too, we see him more easily agitated than in the first 4 books. Harry is way past his limit in this book, but he tries so hard not to show it. To keep that lid on (nevermind that it exploded two years ago).

“I’d never have believed this,” Harry said. “The man who taught me to fight dementors—a coward.” Lupin drew his wand so fast that Harry had barely reached for his own; there was a loud bang and he felt himself flying backward as if punched; as he slammed into the kitchen wall and slid to the floor, he glimpsed the tail of Lupin’s cloak disappearing around the door. “Remus, Remus, come back!” Hermione cried, but Lupin did not respond. A moment later they heard the front door slam. “Harry!” wailed Hermione. “How could you?” “It was easy,” said Harry. He stood up; he could feel a lump swelling where his head had hit the wall. He was still so full of anger he was shaking. “Don’t look at me like that!” he snapped at Hermione. “Don’t you start on her!” snarked Ron. “No—no—we mustn’t fight!” said Hermione, launching herself between them.

(DH, Ch11)

He's shaking from anger. His voice is calm and quiet like his usual response for hiding his anger, but he can't fully hide it. His body gives him away becouse he feels so much of it.

Harry was 100% right to call Lupin out, but I think the ruler way he did it was because he's suffering. He's in emotional turmoil, and twisting his words like a knife, in a way he knew would hurt Lupin, made him feel a little better. It let him take some of that anger out. It is a form of lashing out.

Him snapping at Hermione after and being ready to fist fight Ron is an extension of this lashing out. Harry, when at his limit, lashes out in anger becouse it's all he really knows how.

(He needs a better grieving method. He needs a fucking hug and for someone to tell him he's allowed to cry. He needs a good cry. I think it's why he's calmer after going to Godric's Hallow. He cried a little, grieved his parents, truly, for the first time in his life, and it helped him let some of his pain out in a healthier way)

“It’s not a case of what you’ll permit, Minerva McGonagall. You time’s over. It’s us what’s in charge here now, and you’ll back me up or you’ll pay the price.” And he spat in her face. Harry pulled the Cloak off himself, raised his wand, and said, “You shouldn’t have done that.” As Amycus spun around, Harry shouted, “Crucio!” The Death Eater was lifted off his feet. He writhed through the air like a drowning man, thrashing and howling in pain, and then, with a crunch and a shattering of glass, he smashed into the front of a bookcase and crumpled, insensible, to the floor. “I see what Bellatrix meant,” said Harry, the blood thundering through his brain, “you need to really mean it.”

(DH, Ch30)

Still, things just keep getting added onto his plate. How I see Harry's anger is why I don't think the above scene is out of character for him. His anger fueling the curse isn't just about Amycus spiting at McGonagall. It's about how they tortured Neville, Ginny, and Luna. About his year on the run. About Dobby's death. About him being forced into a position he feels he wants ready for and has no idea what to do. This is years of feeling angry and helpless coming to ahead.

Amycus didn't suffer just for that one crime of his. Spitting on McGonagall just happened to be the straw that broke the camel's back.

To Summerise:

Harry isn't really good at managing his anger, or any other emotion really. He bottles it all up. His frustration, fear, grief, anger, helplessness, and pain all go together into Harry's little box of feelings so he can do whatever he needs to do and appear calm and quiet. It's why we see Harry fuming and boiling with rage inside his head while he's externally calm and cold and composed.

This lid he keeps on everything starts breaking as the emotions keep getting bottled up and he keeps not really processing them. So in GoF Harry is teetering on his very impressive threshold and then, after the graveyard, he breaks.

He suffered so much all at once and then was left alone to stew at the Dursleys for a whole month, suffering from nightmares and having no idea how to process any of what he's been through. Of course, he fucking breaks in OotP.

And when Harry breaks, all these emotions he kept down come out as anger. The reason he reacts so dramatically to smaller offenses post-OotP isn't that he's easy to anger, he really isn't. It's just that he has accumulated pain and grief from 14 years of trauma and abuse that are just now being let out in the form of Harry angrily lashing out.

So, I wouldn't say his anger management is amazing, but his problem isn't really the anger itself, it's emotional regulation in general. He needs to learn to deal with his emotions instead of bottling them up. If he does, he probably won't have any issues with anger management and would just sass his way through life.

#harry potter #hp #hp meta #asks #anonymous #hollowedtheory #harry james potter #harry potter meta #my best boy hjp #character analysis #hp thoughts

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fannyspammy · 2 years ago

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Butterflies

Adam Warlock x Reader

Summary: Adam has never felt the way he feels when he’s with you.

Warnings: none ! just a lotta fluff on fluff on fluff hehe hence the cheesy title. There aren’t really spoilers i think unless you count the location maybe? Idk it’s pretty general imo

A/N: watched gotg 3 twice over the weekend & im obsesseddd with this man lol. Might make this a series of firsts with Adam if yall would read it 👀 lmk if you’d like to be tagged in future chapters!

[not my gif]

He was built like a man — perfect in every way with his chiseled body & god-like strength — but he had the innocence of a child. And y/n loved that about him. He was the purest person she knew, embracing every new experience & every new discovery with such wonder. And she loved that she got to share so many firsts with him.

Y/n always smiled to herself when she remembered the first time he told her he had feelings for her. Or tried to, at least.

They were sitting in silence on a roof in Knowhere, people-watching. They’d come there every afternoon since meeting after the defeat of the High Evolutionary. Having lived in Knowhere with the Guardians before the attack (his attack, ironically), y/n knew all the spots for when you needed a moment alone, & when they’d met, she could tell he was someone who needed that space to just be.

So she introduced him to her spot, & they’d been coming ever since. But Nebula had needed their help with a few tasks that afternoon, so their daily retreat was pushed later into the evening. By this time, the community was out in the streets, dancing & playing & having fun. Music & laughter filled the air, & the faint scent of liquor presented itself as everyone began to drink the night away. It was getting late & y/n was getting tired, so she scooted closed & rested her head on his shoulder.

Y/n felt him tense at the initial contact, before quickly relaxing and melting into it, laying his head on hers. After a couple minutes he spoke.

“Y/n, I… feel something.. when I’m with you.”

She looked up at him without moving from her position, raising an eyebrow in confusion. “Hm?”

“Something.. warm. Tingly? I-I don’t really- how do I- it’s hard to explain…”

Y/n giggled at his flustered attempt to explain himself.

Adam sighed & tried again. “I.. care about you. A lot. But it’s different from the way I cared about my mother. Or Blurp. Like, I want to be with Blurp all the time & hug him & cuddle him, and I want to do the same with you, but in a different way. But I can’t explainhowit’sdifferentitjustknowthatits-”

“Adam!” y/n said with a laugh, stopping his rambling. She lifted her head from its resting place to look at him, amused. “Slow down!”

“See! When you smile at me like that I feel it!”

Y/n bit her lip to restrain the smile spreading across her face, her brows furrowed in thought.

“Can I try something?” She asked. Adam nodded.

“Do you feel it when I do this?” Y/n gently brushed a lock of hair away from his face. He nodded again, slower.

“What about.. this?” Y/n brought her hand down to his shoulder & dragged it down slowly to rest on his chest. She felt his heartbeat quicken.

“I feel it more now.”

Using her other hand, she grabbed his arm to raise it between them, and then placed her hand on his, gently interlacing their fingers. “This?”

His heartbeat quickened again and he nodded. A curious smile spread over his lips.

“I feel it right in my stomach.. almost like it’s.. like it’s fluttering. Like-”

“Butterflies.” Y/n said, finishing his sentence.

Adam nodded again, excitedly, like she’d just solved a puzzle he’d been stuck on for days. “Like butterflies!”

Y/n leaned in closer, resting their intertwined hands in his lap. “Adam, you like me,” she said with a teasing smile on her lips.

“Well yeah, you know I like you. I like most people. Except the ones I need to fight, which used to be you & our friends but now I like you guys.”

She chuckled and pressed her head against the nook of his neck, back resting on his chest, pulling his arm around her, fingers still locked together.

“No, Adam. I mean you like like me. Like, romantically.” She tapped his torso with her free hand. “That’s why you feel all warm and gooey inside when you’re with me, or when I touch you. You having feelings for me. Romantic feelings.”

“Romantic…,” he whispered to himself, then paused shortly. “Do you like me too? In the romantic way?”

Y/n felt his chest tense as his breathing hitched, anticipating her answer. He may not understand his feelings yet, but he knew he wanted her to feel the same way. She squeezed his hand softly in reassurance.

“Mhmm. I like you a lot.”

He eased beneath her & then was quiet for a moment, as if deep in thought, processing the new feeling he had just discovered.

Then he held her tighter, and she felt him smile as she melted into his embrace.

“I like liking you. It feels nice.”

#adam warlock #adam warlock x reader #adam x reader #will poulter #will poulter x reader #adam warlock imagine #will poulter imagine #gotg #guardians of the galaxy #guardians of the galaxy vol 3 #gotg 3 #gotg imagine #gotg vol 3 #gotg v3

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beelzeballing · 1 year ago

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actually i dont think ive posted my thoughts on ofmd s2 overall here yet have i?

ok here goes: i think it had incredibly high highs, and at some parts i genuinely enjoyed it more than i did the first season, episode 6 being peak imo. however, it had equally abysmal lows with some glaring writing-, tone- and pacing issues that all came to a head in the finale.

i once read someone say that, if you ever feel like a finale ruined the whole story, maybe you should take another look at the story. there were most likely cracks and problems all along, and the finale did nothing besides dashing the hope that these would perhaps be addressed later. very rarely do genuinely well written stories go completely off the rails in the finale and ruin the whole thing.

i think this is applicable here in some ways, SPECIFICALLY in regards to edward. good god edward was a MESS this season, and it's so sad because i loved the starting point! the kraken era was absolutely terrifying and iconic as FUCK but... they shouldn't have leaned so hard into the drama and trauma of it all. don't get me wrong, i loved that it did. it's one of my favorite parts of the season and i'm so glad we got it. but if they wanted this arc to work with the overarching plot as they wrote it, they would've had to lighten up the tone here CONSIDERABLY. had they played the kraken era for comedy then sure! edward's bad youtuber apology would've been funny. his fast redemption would've been less jarring. the lack of consequences less disturbing. but as it stands in the show, this arc is too dark to function with the later episodes.

i feel like they wanted to have their cake and eat it too here. they wanted the gritty drama of ed coming off the hinges entirely but also didn't want to deal with the aftermath of such a heavy arc in their silly pirate romcom. be that due to time constraints and budget cuts or because they were simply unwilling to, doesn't really matter in the end. the result is the same either way: a very tonally messy season with some accidentally troubling implications regarding abuse.

and mentioning troubling implications regarding abuse; izzy. my poor, poor izzy... his arc was absolutely glorious. i liked izzy the second he showed up in s1 and i was absolutely EATING this season up in that regard. and i think in this case, they genuinely did fuck it all up in the finale with that one stupid choice:

choosing to kill izzy was the DUMBEST thing they couldve done here.

ive talked about this over and over and over again. ive reblogged so many meta posts. and still i am left absolutely flabbergasted by how stupid of a decision this was. the fridging, playing at the fallen woman trope, killing the beating heart of the season and the character who delivers what is essentially a thesis statement, killing off the character whose arc is about coming to terms with his disability, having him die in edward's arms, comforting him and apologizing after an entire season of finding community and love outside of edward, the absolutely godawful pacing of it all, the extremely easy and obvious solution of just having IZZY become the new captain of the revenge to mirror s1 and hammer home how much he has developed since then in one go... i could go on. and i have. it was a stupid writing decision, completely fucked the tone and pacing of the finale and took away attention and time from things that really would've deserved a better wrap up (lucius and black pete deserved better)

now. the whole prince ricky & zheng plot line... yeah that shit sucked ass, sorry. they bit off more than they could chew here. i honestly think those are the arc words of this season:

✨️ bit off more than they could chew ✨️

right off the bat: i think he was good as a concept. bringing in a foil for stede who just doesn't Get It as stede does could've made for very good comedy and drama (and to be fair there is some of that). but that shit got away from them extremely quickly. nothing about how he's implemented past his first episode works, and i think this is very specifically because he's mostly played as the comic relief in his debut episode. making this completely bumbling fool, who gets his nose hacked off on his first job, the main villain of your entire season is... definitely a choice. idk. he didn't work for me at all.

ok wow mentioning shit getting away from the writers. this definitely got away from me. this was supposed to be a short lil post. well. i guess tl;dr i loved this season but jesus christ there was a lot wrong with it. if you want to hear more thoughts. ask box is open. be my guest. i have more to say so even if you dont ask i might add more to this at some point but im tired and have work tmrw.

#i was going to do shit today and now look at me.#0:18 at night #laying in bed #writing this shit #i havent even eaten.#christtttt #moogsin'#ofmd #izzy hands #our flag means death #ofmd meta #ofmd critical #ofmd s2 #ofmd spoilers #the izcourse #im not tagging any of the other characters cuz i shittalk all of them 😭#listen i love edward hes my babygirl but this season did him DIRTY.

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gasolinerainbowreads · 1 year ago

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↓ ICON LEGEND ↓

🌈 = title 🪆 = series, multiple parts, etc. 💎 = hidden gem/should have more reblogs/followers imo 🔋 = make sure your vibrator is charged before reading 😈 = Horny Demon Hours™ approved 🥹 = hurts so good/ouch, my feelings 🧠 = did somethin to my brain/altered my brain chemistry

Here's what I read in September along with a comment/thought/favorite excerpt:

@atticrissfinch

🌈 Now I See Daylight ⇨ 🪆🥹 we get punished, and we do not like it. This made me feel VERY BRATTY reading it lmaoooo. DO NOT GIVE ME THE SILENT TREATMENT, DADDY.

@softlyspector

🌈 Moss & Mushrooms ⇨ 😈🧠 IT’S GIVING THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER WITH BONUS DICK DOWNS, AND I AM GOBBLING IT UP! SUPERB. 🌈 Blush ⇨ 🪆🥹🧠 IMPECCABLE. INSANELY IMMERSIVE. SICKENING TALENT. MAKES ME WANT TO GO TAKE A NAP IN A MUD PIT. GETTING THE SIDE OF THE OREO THAT HAS THE CRÈME FILLING ON THE WAFER. YOUR FAVORITE FLAVOR OF SLURPEE IS READY TO BE DISPENSED. YOUR HANGNAIL DOESN’T TEAR OFF. YOUR SHOELACES DON’T DRAG ON THE GROUND BC THEY’RE TOO LONG. THIS IS THAT. NO I WON’T BE EXPLAINING ANY OF IT.

@thetriumphantpanda

This series really covers a whole lotta kinks for me lmao. Breeding kink. Pregnancy kink. Creampies. Daddy kink. 🌈 Come Away with Me (Tuesday) ⇨🪆🔋🥹 “Imagine this is it?” He mumbles against the skin of your shoulder, leaning forward, “Imagine the time it takes is the time I fuck you against a tree like this.” 🌈 Come Away with Me (Wednesday) ⇨🪆🔋🥹 “Gonna fill me up, daddy?” You ask, the word slipping out of your mouth before you can catch it. 🌈 Come Away with Me (Thursday) ⇨🪆🔋🥹 “You’re in love with me, aren’t you?” He asks quietly, it’s soft, there isn’t an ounce of judgement or remorse to be found in his voice, and it’s not there in his eyes when you push yourself off his lap and turn to look at him. “Isn’t it obvious?” You ask him, “You’re in love with me too.” You don’t accuse him, it’s a statement of fact, because you know he’s been in love with you since the night he stayed when you were trying for Joshua.

@joelscruff

🌈 Beyond Infatuation ⇨ 🔋🧠 “Jesus,” Tommy mutters, and you open your eyes enough to see them both staring at your fucked-out hole, watching Joel’s come dribble downward into the sheets, “Filled her up real good.”

@swiftispunk

🌈 In My Hometown Headcanons ⇨ 🪆🥹 Omg it's the Lil Sebastian of Joel fics 💕 he can hardly remember how it felt to fear this, to fear being with you. now, he can’t shut up about you, giddy every time he gets to call you that word. it’s such a simple thing, reminds him of being young - “my girlfriend’s pickin’ sarah up tonight,” “my girlfriend chose this shirt for me,” “my girlfriend and i are goin’ out later” - doesn’t matter the context, he loves referring to you that way, even if it’s a little trivial maybe, even if it doesn’t quite capture how deep his feelings really run for you. if he’s honest, it might be that he likes the word “my” better than “girlfriend.” 🌈 Your Summer Dream, Day 6 - Savour ⇨🪆🔋🥹 Get you a man who blows your back out so good he blows his own back out, too lmaoooooo 🌈 Your Summer Dream, Day 3 bonus ⇨ 🪆🔋🥹🧠 my brain skipped the tracks on this one, babes. derailed me for a hot minute. the whole in the doorframe thing just makes my brain go fucking static. 🌈 Mad Love drabble ⇨🔋😈🧠 “kill him,” you say and joel finally looks over at you, sees you with your hand over your cunt, another smirk playing at his lips at the sight.

@ezrasbirdie

my bb rly scratchin that somnophilia itch with these 🌈 Claim ⇨🔋😈 “That’s right, baby, that’s right. Goddamn, you sleep heavy,” he murmurs. He slides another finger in and makes the same noise, fucking you gently with both of them, pulling your legs open further, and repositioning himself between them. “One more, sweetheart, one more for me,” he says. A harsh sigh emerges from you as he pushes a third digit inside of you. It almost hurts. You want it to hurt more. 🌈 More ⇨ 🔋😈 the debauchery is unhinged and perfect

@toxicanonymity

🌈 Clock ⇨ 🪆🔋😈 this lil dehydrated, crybaby bitch is the loml some days. 🌈 Needs ⇨🪆💎🔋🥹 Part of her "Finally Fucking Friday". Virginity loss. Soft!Joel. 🌈 Fires ⇨🪆💎🔋🥹 POV switching done well. inadvertently hilarious reader.

@sugarcoated-lame

🌈 untitled ⇨💎🔋🥹 idgaf if this isn't technically a proper fic. it's more of a ramble/thots type thing, but i enjoyed it immensely and am putting it on this list because it made me horny and also bc i fucking want to.

@gracieispunk

🌈 Bloody ⇨ 🪆🔋🥹 my fave menace is back aka tenant girl who is innocent and perfect. the panic at being in missionary sent me. 🌈 Heat Wave ⇨🔋 Joel is just ssooo thoughtful when he hears you moaning in your sleep and decides to help. What a gentleman.

@millerscoffee

🌈 Heat Lightning ⇨ 💎🔋😈🥹 sub!Joel. mommy kink. aftercare.

@bageldaddy

🌈 I Know It When I See It, Pt 5 ⇨🪆🔋😈🥹 HOW THE FUCK DOES THIS JUST KEEP GETTING BETTER?!?!?! --- also, i want to punch the fucking air over the fact that i cannot go onto pornhub and type in "Lucky+Texas+bondage" and have this come up. life is NOT FAIR.

@frannyzooey FREE MY BITCH FROM TUMBLR JAIL!

🌈 In The Dark blurb ⇨ 🪆🔋😈 *screams into the void* --- hot. HOT. I'm obsessed with In The Dark (go read that entire series right now if you haven't. It's so beyond amazing.). This was just icing on the cake. 🌈 Squirming ⇨🔋 the way I would be THRASHING so I could get a "goodnight treat" lmaoooooooo 🌈 Short Days, Long Nights 13 ⇨🪆🔋🥹 The words come pouring out of his mouth before he can stop them, but once they’re out, he can’t stop saying them. Burying his face in your chest, he says the words directly over your pounding heart. “I love you, honey. Fuck, I love you.”

@iamskyereads

🌈 Compulsion, Pt 6 ⇨🪆🔋😈🧠 One of THE BEST versions of Ezra I've ever come across in fic. SO GOOD. SERIOUSLY SO FUCKING GOOD.

@netherfeildren

🌈 The Cassandra Complex, Pt 3 ⇨🪆🔋😈🧠 This story is so well-written, the plot is beautifully crafted, the imagery is wonderful. No surprises there, right? It's Vic lmao. It ain't gonna be anything but amazing! Having said that... the smut in this chapter..... whew. WHEW. You outdid yourself, Vic.

@velvetmud

🌈 home video blurb ⇨🔋😈 But you don’t find the words or the energy to conjure up an answer. You’ve become too lost, too deep in the moment giving your own boyfriend’s dad another long orgasm he’s been saving up just for your face. “Gonna tell him his dad’s thick cock fucked and wrecked this throat all night?” he asks, pointer finger dragging down your aching jaw. He continues with a whisper. “That I split that pussy open on it whenever you come over to see him, too?”

@psychedelic-ink

🌈 Ravish ⇨🪆🔋😈 Okay I love the set up of this story and also the way Joel is chill about ~cam girls~. But I did bust up laughing when she saw his dick and was like wtf idk man idk if that's gonna fit and his ass hits her with the I've seen you shove bigger dildos into your pussy you'll be fine lmaooooooooo.

@tieronecrush

🌈 Only Angel, Ch 2 ⇨🪆🥹 “I’ll be waiting for a call, Javi. And I’ll see you Monday, Professor Peña.” You give him one last look, giggling as you shut the door and he hits the top of the taxi before you drive away, standing there with an idiotic smile on his face.

@cavillscurls

🌈 Eyes on Me ⇨🔋😈 Tommy watches you fuck Joel. Just go read it already! 🌈 Lover Man ⇨🥹 Soft and fluffy. You play with Joel's hair bc he is bb grl and deserves tenderness.

@walkintotheriveranddisappear

🌈 Waiting Room ⇨🪆🥹 I love this series, and this part carries so much of the story. The break down of relationship dynamics and friendships and people just trying to figure shit out was *chef's kiss*

@haylzcyon

🌈 Slow ⇨🔋 *chanting* EZRA EZRA EZRA EZRA “Fuck me slow, Ezra.”

@the-ginger-hedge-witch

🌈 Everything ⇨ 🪆🥹 from one of my all-time fave series Adversity. I'm not going to write too much of a blurb here bc I will go absolutely off the rails about Adversity if prompted lmaooooo.

@mandoblowmybackout

🌈 Eyes on Me ⇨🔋 Ezra gets his ass ate and fingered. *wipes tear* It's just so beautiful.

@leslie-lyman

🌈 Focus ⇨🔋 Ezra hypnokink that makes me very horny every time I read it.

@pascalisbaby

🌈 Heaven ⇨ 🔋 sub!Joel just wants to make us feel good, as he should. 🌈 Control ⇨🔋 now we're subbing and think we wanna dom but you know what sometimes it's just best if Joel doms 😅

@hier--soir

🌈 Whole New Can of Worms ⇨🪆🔋🥹 yyyooooo I wanna be BFF with Joel if it means getting dicked down that good. jesus!

@cupofjoel

🌈 Switching the Positions ⇨🔋🥹 The domesticity. The fluff. The fucking. Perfection.

@chloeangelic

🌈 Reflection of the Moon, Ch 5 ⇨🪆🔋🥹 Joel Miller ascending to baby daddy status. We love to see it.

@the-scandalorian

🌈 Mine ⇨🔋😈 🗣️ PRONE BONE ANAL

@northernbluess

🌈 Art of Healing, Ch 5 ⇨🪆🥹 I. Am. OBSESSED. with this series. Marcus Pike, art therapist. It's a slow build, and the story is PHENOMENAL. I have gone back and re-read chapters of this so many times. I adore this story!!

WHEW HOLY SHIT I DID IT.

I know this is basically a month late. I apologize. I'm gonna go ahead and apologize in advance for whenever the October wrap up rolls around bc I'm pretty sure I read even more this past month than I did in September. *screams into pillow*

If all the writers in this fandom could please stop being so fucking talented and amazing please that would really help my To Be Read list.

😩

SEE Y'ALL NEXT MONTH

#monthly wrap up

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zombie-bait · 11 months ago

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The Death of a Vampire

Lestat as a protagonist just works so incredibly well and a very significant aspect of that is him being Anne Rice's self-insert. Lived experience can be critical when it comes to writing a good story and many memorable novels will feature elements of that. Anne is built different, though. Lestat (book 2 onwards) is basically Anne's journal for dealing with her grievances and trauma, which, on its own, is a very questionable method of writing. More often than not, it causes him to be characterized inconsistently between books because Anne's own opinions have changed. But it also makes him so real.

You follow his struggles with religion, you see him yearn for forgiveness from a god that has seemingly abandoned him a long time ago and you feel it. The passage I will never get over is in the early chapters of The Vampire Lestat, when Lestat has a breakdown over his mother's (and frankly his own) mortality. He struggles and he cries and he can't get out of bed because there's nothing he can do. Eventually he starts to live again, forces himself to.

But.

"I wandered into the church and on my knees I leaned against the wall and I looked at the ancient statues and I felt the same gratitude looking at the finely carved fingers and the noses and the ears and the expressions on their faces and the deep folds in their garments, and I couldn’t stop myself from crying. At least we had these beautiful things, I said. Such goodness. But nothing natural seemed beautiful to me now! The very sight of a great tree standing alone in a field could make me tremble and cry out. Fill the orchard with music. And let me tell you a little secret. It never did pass, really."

I think about those last two sentences a lot. I think about them even more since Anne Rice passed away.

Every page of Interview is spent talking about death and yet (imo) it's only in TVL that you really feel it. Louis in book 1 welcomes death quite readily because, besides his toxic boyfriend and their traumatized daughter, he doesn't have much to live for. He's basically given up by the time Lestat appears. The greatest torture, to Louis, is the knowledge that he can live forever on the suffering of others.

But Lestat is the complete opposite. He wants to listen to music, to explore Paris, to perform on any stage that will take him, to embrace the man he loves and to send his ailing mother letters of his accomplishments. Death matters most to those who are desperate to live and god is he desperate. He's haunted by his mother's sickness, by the wolves on the mountain that threaten to end his life before he's even lived it, the witches place that reeks of meaningless suffering. And in a way, the dark gift provides opportunity to escape that. But it is still death. It takes away Nicki in a very literal way and takes away his mother in a more personal one. Magnus, like death, chose Lestat arbitrarily. He sees the cellar of blonde corpses and knows that he was only one of dozens to meet an untimely death with no explanation.

Lestat also really wants you to know that he is, truly, a good person. He must be. He swears to only hunt criminals and then goes back on that two pages later. He reshapes stories to present himself as the noble protagonist and the audience has no choice but to believe him. He wants, desperately, to be loved for all that he is, man and monster. He wants to be the hero.

He's this awful, fascinating, very human man so clearly born out of the internal struggle to find meaning and love in a cruel, unpredictable world we all tend to share. He's made up of incredibly basic and powerful human desires hidden behind a mask of bravado and I can't recalling seeing another protagonist like him.

(Quick mention: This isn't some kind of "wow Anne Rice is an incredible author who can do no wrong" piece. She's written a lot of fucked up and bad shit that cannot be easily brushed over. But I don't think I'll ever get over reading TVL for the first time. To read someone bare their soul in such a way creates a truly unique experience. A lot of characters in a lot of pieces of media face death, but it's rare to see a character face mortality in such a personal way.)

(Also odds are I've written similar posts to this before but shhhhh these sad gay vampires are all I have)

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brf-rumortrackinganon · 7 months ago

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My theory is that Charles is showing us how he's going to rule differently than the Queen did. Since the beginning she kept EVERYONE even Phillip out of her regin. I read in Royals how she refused to speak with him about many issues, did not share the red box information nor let him sit in with the PM visits. From what I recall her own father didn't do that, he discussed everything with the Queen mother and leaned on her quite a bit. Charles imo chafed at Elizabeths reluctance to share power with him, to ease him into ruling. Also when the big public push to William to ascend probably caused a lot of jealousy kinda "pass me over when I haven't got to do anything as King?". So I think Charles was happy to have the then Cambridges spend their time raising their children instead of taking a chunck what little position he was given as PoW. But now that he's King he doesn't want to be like Elizabeth in that way. He realizes that he will have a short reign and needs to get William ready for the crown not just his position of PoW. A crash course if you will.

I can see this but I'm not sure I agree. It's definitely a sympathetic look at Charles, one that's absolutely worthwhile to consider, but It's not what I see when I look at it.

My sense is that The Queen felt her parents' "just us four" approach to family was ideal for raising heir and spare, where the duty is family with country coming later. It was how she was raised, it was what she had for a little bit with Philip, Charles, and Anne as Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh, and it was what she wanted for Charles, Diana, William, and Harry but I don't think Charles wanted that for his family. Obviously we know what happened in the Waleses' marriage so perhaps when William and Kate began planning, she supported "just us four" knowing that family needed to be the heart of the monarchy, rather than work.

And my sense is Charles was happy to go along with William's focusing on his family because with William away in Norfolk, Charles could spend more time as a "shadow king" without having to worry about the public being as vocal for their support (and admiration) of William. Don't forget, this was around the time that Charles and Andrew were pairing up to push Geidt out and install Young instead - truly the work of a shadow king, IMO.

We do know The Queen was mentoring William, as he spoke about it a bit, so we do know that William has been getting some kind of education in monarchy so the crash course from Charles isn't necessary. At most, Charles should be continuing the training. "Leveling up," if you will, since William (and Kate) received the fundamentals from The Queen and Philip. Did/is Charles continue/continuing that? I'm not sure.

Personally I don't see Charles mentoring William in that way, not after the way BP insisted Charles wouldn't call on the Counsellors of State to assist after his cancer diagnosis was announced. That doesn't strike me as someone interested in teaching, but someone who'd rather hoard - but perhaps that was Charles doing a kindness so William could stay with Kate. Because if it had been announced Charles was calling on the Counsellors of State, but it was Anne and Edward showing up with William MIA, who knows what would've happened.

I think where I disagree with you, anon, is that Charles wants to rule differently than The Queen. I think Charles wanted The Queen to share duties with him in the name of modernizing because she had done it independently her way for so long and he was tired of being "the backup" but he had every intent to keep William waiting in the wings as long as he could. and I think some of that reluctance has been made visible over the years. But much like external forces required The Queen to begin letting Charles "in" (age, Philip's retirement, the pandemic, her own illness, Philip's death), external forces have required Charles to bring William in earlier than he expected (the Sussexes, cash-for-honors scandals, and Charles's own cancer).

I also disagree that William needed a crash course for monarchy/the crown. As mentioned earlier, William was getting that from The Queen. He didn't need a crash course on being the Prince of Wales either, because it's the same work he did as The Duke of Cambridge (i.e., The Royal Foundation and its humanitarian-focused charitywork) just with a different title.

What William needed, and which Charles could give him, was a crash course for being the Duke of Cornwall. There isn't a whole lot on the record of William undertaking any preparations or receiving any kind of mentoring or instruction or access from Charles. Yes, William took some courses, but that's all we know. That's where Charles could be an asset to William, but again - it just looks like Charles kept a close, firm control on his work because he didn't want to share. And again, that's just the public perception; we don't know what the actual conversations were behind closed doors.

Sorry for the rambling. It's Sunday. I definitely lost the plot somewhere in here.

#brf #waleses

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venomous-qwille · 1 year ago

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Hi hello! I love how different and distinctive your characters are, so wanted to ask if you got any tips/helpful resources for how to write characters without blending them into something similar? Thank you for your work!

Ahh thankyou very much :) There was a LOT of kill your darlings involved in making characters for gitm. Originally I had a very long list of ideas that I cut down and down based on the kind of things and themes they would give me the opportunity to write about. I love long ensemble cast stories, thinking back to ones I particularly enjoyed and the ways those characters gelled together helped me a lot. For advice? That's kinda hard but for the gitm guys I made sure to answer a couple of character work questions: What lie do they believe about themselves/the world? How does it impact the way they interact with others? What central theme do they embody most? What do they want more than anything else? How do they feel about humans? Who are they at their best and who are they at their worst?

All basic character work stuff!

I found that by answering these sort of questions it helped me discover more about them, which creates more questions- rinse and repeat. The more questions I answered the further away they would get from each other in terms of similarities.

The thing that really helped with the gitm boys, especially because their origins are so similar, was leaning in to how different their experiences were post-fazco. They are different people because the world has made them that way.

Messing around with foils is useful too! Characters are no fun in a vacuum, it's how they interact with others that makes them interesting. Imo I like to create ones that will bring out the best and the worst in each other. I think about opposites a lot and I really like narrative symmetry- what lessons can the characters learn from each other? I find that stuff super exciting to read so I really wanted to include it. I'm not sure how helpful this all is! But yeah, I try to be pretty strict with myself about what I include. The only reason I would include two characters who were very very similar would be to emphasize a difference/divergence between them later on. Characters have to justify themselves by bringing something unique to the table imo, even if that thing is just a 'very different outlook on life' to the rest of the cast. <3

#im really not qualified to be talking about this lol #but these are my thoughts!#asks answered #gitm au #ghost in the machine au #qwillewrites #qwillechatter

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yarugawitch · 1 year ago

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Nnoitra/reader: Non-specific SFW and NSFW headcanons

Copied from my main acc. Was originally a request. As I said in the original post I think I was a bit dry because imo the dynamic with him heavily depends on the circumstances so you can always leave a request for something more specific or for AU headcanons :3c

>Masterpost

SFW:

He'd deny having any feelings even to himself but he'd be so terribly obnoxious with it that it's literally impossible not to notice. He's too clingy, too possessive, too annoying, too prone to jealousy and likes to get in your face both literally and figuratively. There's no such thing as personal space for this man I fear. Grabbing you by the wrists? Yes. Tugging at your ears? Yeah. Leaning closer to grab you by the face or annoyingly lick it if you're not paying attention? Sure

He's in a constant battle with himself and gives mixed messages all the time. At some point Nnoitra can hint at something or make a borderline romantic/sexual comment but once you confront him or make your own move he'd just hit you with his usual "What the hell are you saying?!" bs. The gaslighting is so real. Nnoitra is like an aggressive cat that yearns for affection with this one. He keeps you at arm's length and even though it's obvious he wants something - trying to get close when he's not ready will result in a nasty scratch

Calling someone he doesn't hate by their name is very intimate to him. So usually it's just "hey you", "idiot", "woman", "human", "shinigami", "quincy", etc.

Nnoitra suffers from cute aggression. There's nothing he'd actually consider cute in this situation of course but if something you did made him feel a little too much or he just happened to be next to you for too long his first immediate response is to want to squash you, break one of your limbs or bite a chunk out of you. Both because he can't deal with his own emotions and because "how fucking dare you"

Both him and Jaegerjaquez are very sensitive to smell and to Nnoitra your scent is very calming. I don't think he's desperate enough to constantly follow you and sniff you lmao but he's definitely stealing something that belongs to you for later. If you're fortunate/unfortunate enough to have the fifth Espada as your roommate and you're away for too long he will rummage through your closet to make a nest out of your clothing or occupy your pillow

The way he sleeps in front of you and whether he does or not in general is very telling. Imo he's a very light and restless sleeper. Constantly on his toes even in his slumber. Eons in Hueco Mundo can do things to you. So if he doesn't take fetal position to hide his stomach with you, won't literally jump up at the slightest of sounds and naps in your presence sometimes - congrats

I think he'd confess only if the situation is so dire he'd rather die than not do this. Like for example if you're having a huge fight and you're so close to leaving he's almost shaking and ripping his hair out out of stress which doesn't happen a lot. Or if there's someone showing interest in you and they're very much successful at making you happy. Then it's a question of defending what he thinks is his even though he won't admit it. Would he actually try to kill the other person? I mean it depends really but if it's Grimmjow or Szayel then fucking sure. Any day. Anyone else is not that big of a competition. Even Ulquiorra. "I mean have you seen him? What a fucking nuisance. He makes me sick. As if he has a chance with anyone at all"

Speaking of which - would brag in front of you all the time

Once you're together he'll never leave and will always make sure others know you're taken. Well not at first of course but still

NSFW (heavily afab leaning)

Tbh I too can't imagine him as an aggressive alpha-dom-top (tm) if he actually has any feelings for the person. So a service top or a damn bottom it is

The worst size kink ever. He may constantly talk shit about people who are weaker, smaller or frailer than him but once feelings are involved he's aroused by the thought all of a sudden. I think his fingers are not the only thing that is unusually long so not fitting all the way in is not a problem for him - it's even better in fact

As fascinating as the thought of penetration may be to him I think foreplay is his favorite part. Mostly because making you squirm is fun but also because only here he can actually assert domination. After that he's just too soft

I don't care what anyone says this man is a MUNCH

So so painfully slow sometimes. If he's on top he would just stop to tease and watch your reaction. Other than that making the process as long as possible is one of his goals. It's not like he has no stamina - he has a lot of it actually but during sex he can be as intimate and as close to you as he wants to be because under normal circumstances he can't afford to put it into words without having to grab himself by the throat

Talks a lot. It's not exactly dirty talk (I don't like it I'm very sorry babes) but he loves saying nasty things and would comment on everything that is going on. Otherwise he's nervous

I'm convinced all of the arrancars must be infertile since they don't reproduce this way so. He likes finishing inside. He won't have it any other way. It's special to him because how are you even letting him do something like this? but he also shows affection this way

The more vocal his partner is the better. Everyone must know

I mentioned that he loves your scent before so yeahhh. I hope you don't mind stains on your clothes

#nnoitra gilga/reader #nnoitra/reader #nnoitra gilga x reader #nnoitra x reader

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matataku-hoshi · 1 year ago

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Groundhog Day at the Old Vic, London 2023

*dusts off the old blog* It's certainly been a minute, hasn't it! Still here, still a huge GHD fan. In the intervening years, I got to see productions at San Francisco Playhouse and at the Paramount Theatre in Aurora, IL. (I also got married and went through a bunch of other life stuff, but that's neither here nor there). But then it was announced that Groudhog Day would be returning to the Old Vic in 2023 with Andy Karl, and my husband and I used that as an excuse to finally do that UK trip we'd been talking about for years.

Tumblr user colemckenzies did a great post outlining some of the changes between Broadway and 2023 Old Vic. I wanted to further elaborate on some additional changes I noticed. Obviously spoilers to follow:

In “There Will Be Sun”, the first chorus of “Tomorrow spring will come and then there will be blue skies my friend” is cut. It goes straight from “If not tomorrow then tomorrow or tomorrow there will be sun” to “Oh if I could I’d will these clouds away my love”

While obviously the revolves are gone (look at me picking up British-isms 😄), the bedroom set gets wheeled in every loop. They keep the trick from Broadway where this is always done counter-clockwise until the loop finally breaks.

As previously mentioned, there’s a wonderful lyric change in Day One. “Their dumb superstitions and vacuous chat, their total unawareness of the fact their trapped, perhaps you don't miss it if you don't know you lack it, I'm sure there was a pack of xanax in this jacket'

I adore this because of the foreshadowing, and how Phil thinks he’s singing about the townsfolk when he’s really singing about himself.

Dialogue change in 2023 when Phil runs into Jonathan:

Jonathan: “Off to the see the groundhog?”

Phil: “Why, isn’t there a tractor pull or a cow-tipping contest?”

Jonathan, looks confused: “I don’t think that’s today.”

When Rita introduces to Phil on Day One and reminds him of the flood story, Phil takes a second before recalling, groans, and goes, "Oh, the intern? They didn't even send me a real producer." After which Rita corrects him that she's a real producer now, albeit an associate producer.

On Day 2 when the sheriff drops his gun, Phil asks "How do you have a permit???"

At the end of Day 2, Rita sings “I mean he acts kind of asshole-ish still. I think he might be mentally ill.” While it’s on the cast recording and the early previews bootleg, I could have sworn it was cut in the final Broadway version. Regardless, it’s restored in the 2023 version.

Phil’s “Help me~~~~” at the end of Day 3 is cut.

In Philandering, they cut the line where Phil "proposes" to Nancy (which I prefer - no one is that stupid, and they make the point later that Nancy is more than a caricature)

Also in Philandering, you can hear the chorus singing, “Gonna party like it’s no tomorrow~~~” in the party scene (formerly the orgy scene). Phil also gets 10 pizzas delivered to his room.

Phil is less aggressive when he confesses his “love” to Rita in One Day.

On Broadway, they sit down directly on the stage, and Phil leans sideways to Rita to confess. As he gets more desperate, he starts to position himself over her and tries to take her hand, after which she slaps him.

In 2023, they’re sitting on a bench together. Phil tries to take her hand, and she pulls away and slaps him. Still creepy, but much less heading in the direction of sexual assault.

Either way Phil totally deserves to get slapped. I’ve talked to a few people who have said they could never root for Phil because of this scene (which is a fair critique). The 2023 version IMO makes the same point without so much portraying Phil as a potential sexual predator.

Right before Phil smashes the alarm clock at the end of One Day, he yells “Make it stop!” (“Somebody make it stop”? Memory is a fickle thing)

When Phil kills himself with the gun before Hope, it's more explicit that he stole the gun off of the sheriff with his faulty holster.

I don't remember if this is new, but when Phil wakes up at the beginning of Hope, he touches the side of his head where he shot himself and even though he knows that the day will always reset, he still looks a little surprised and it's heartbreaking.

For the third death/revival in Hope (where Phil climbs the ladder):

Broadway: Phil reappears in bed

Old Vic 2023: Phil reappears on the scene of the broadcast, fully dressed

As noted, lots of changes to If I Had My Time Again.

Cast recording: "The thing with these revolving rides / they're only fun because you know they're going to end"

Broadway (as of early in previews): "I was completely dead inside / But today I'm like 85%"

London 2023: We're back to the cast recording lyrics.

IMO the orchestration and lyric changes are for the better. I adored this song on the cast recording, but in the August Wilson theater it frequently felt swallowed up.

With the emphasis on just Phil and Rita, it’s a much more intimate song, which is what the scene needs IMO.

I also love Rita’s new lyric “Go to all the parties that I missed / Kiss all the boys I was too afraid to kiss”, because then it’s Rita fulfilling her “time again” when she kisses Phil during Seeing You.

After "If I Had My Time Again", Phil eats a carton of Ben & Jerry's while discussing the almanac with Rita. I love the implication that he’s eaten all of this junk food before, but he’s trying it again with her.

Dialogue change after "If I Had My Time Again"

Phil: "You know, Larry, we never really talk."

Broadway Larry: "Sometimes I think you don't notice that I'm there."

London 2023 Larry: "Well you never brought me donuts before."

Not a change, but I was sitting close enough one night to see the stock photos they use for Ned’s wallet pictures of his kids, and I realized that “little Mary” is just a baby. It really hit home that Ned has probably just lost his wife in the last year or two, and he’s trying to raise five very young kids on his own.

In the Broadway/cast recording versions of "Philanthropy", you can hear some melodic callbacks to earlier songs. In the London 2023 version, the chorus actually sings lines like, "I'm not sure what the point is / But this point is it don't matter" and "If I had my time again I would not do it all the same"

There's no pause of silence before "Seeing You" starts

After Phil and Rita run off into the snow at the end of Seeing You, the couples left dancing are Nancy/Larry, Debbie/Fred, and then Mrs. Lancaster dances alone in the snow in joyous wonder. I love this bit, becuase it feels like all the different ways you can find a new meaning of love (Nancy/Larry, the couple just discovering each other, Debbie/Fred, who have moved into a new phase of their relationship, and then Mrs. Lancaster, who even as an old woman can revel in the beauty of the snow)

In 2023 when Phil takes Rita to see the sunrise, he makes her cover her eyes, and then unveil them once the full sunrise is in view. It’s very sweet.

Anyway, I love this show, and I love talking about this show, so please feel free to hit me up! I may post more general thoughts, etc. if anyone is interested.

#andy karl #groundhog day musical #groundhog day the musical #groundhog day #phil connors #rita hanson #old vic #ghd musical

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