#thinking about making it for the ren fair

[ooooo-mcyt]

There seems to be a running theme with honor and “honorable” kills. Gem and Pearl, scar/jimmy and Grian, even Cleo and bigb with the betrayal. I’m interested to see how the alliances are torn/made with this

Also gempearl divorce

I think the focus on "honorable" kills in many ways comes down to the characters' desire for basic agency.

There aren't many choices anyone can make in this game. They have to play, they have to die. They don't get any choice over being here, over the game mechanics, over their inevitable fates. Any mark of agency characters get is in little things. How they choose to react to things, managing to scrape up some semblance of a 'win' for themselves, or being able to die on their own terms.

Most things in the series can be read through this lens of agency, but the "honorable kills" theme is one of the biggest ones.

Gem knows she has to die, it's part of the game, but there was something traumatic about the end of Secret Life from her perspective. Her team was strong, and then it wasn't, sustaining an injury they couldn't recover along, but continuing to drag themselves along as every single option and choice they thought they had was gone, and Gem died alone, two against one. This season she refuses to have that agency taken away from her, and she resents Pearl for trying, for refusing to give her an honorable fight.

The reason killing Impulse got to Ren so much is because Ren prides himself on his honor. Ren's never truly had much choice in his own life, but one thing he can always choose is to have principals, is to stick to his sense of honor. We see Ren do something he deems dishonorable and immediately make excuses, craft a narrative in which he was led to it, in which it wasn't his fault, in which he never would have done it on his own. Ren creates a boogeyman so he doesn't have to face the thought that his honor can fail. So he doesn't have to face the fact that the desperation of this game can take away one of his only ways of control in his own life.

Grian, when victim to 'cheap' kills, feels like it's a violation of his personal agency as well. He has a chance in a fair fight, or against a well laid trap, and when the kill is silly, well, usually he lets those happen for the bit. But a cheap kill isn't something that can easily be avoided, and it makes him feel helpless. What does it mean if someone can just kill him and he doesn't even have a chance to stop it? Furthermore, Grian practically offered to let Scar in specific kill him, and if Scar took him up on it, that would have been Grian's choice. But instead Scar turned him down and then went for the 'cheap' kill anyways, as if Scar was trying to make him as powerless as possible (scar wasn't, of course, but it must have felt like it)

People locked in an endless looping death game want to be able to feel like they have a choice, like they have agency, and they don't feel right when the little ways they can keep that agency are taken from them.

[cleo-serotonin]

making tswift bracelets for the eras movie and i made an h2o bracelet :)

[yellowhollyhock]

I just remembered how my sister and I used to very often have stories/thoughts to exchange when we came hime from fun-but-overwhelming events about our Characters in those events

Such as at the water park orrr well this is hard to do with family reunions but maybe dances? I think we mostly did it with parks like rollercoasters or mini golf or carnivals. Oh or like the mall

anyway it's very fun and all casts of characters should be put into Events and Activities in Your Hometown (without naming your hometown if you share the story). Very highly recommend

[thehunniestofbunnies]

I desperately wanted something to do with my hands while listening to podcasts and I had to send my laptop in to be fixed so now I'm learning how to make chainmail

[sysig]

Hey, those look familiar! (Patreon)

[foragergnome]

one year ago today i made my otgw beast!greg cosplay for halloween. i RLLY don't know what im gonna dress as this year

[trans-elrond]

well you see it establishes the show's absurdly satirical tone and the cruelty of the lengths magicians and con artists will go to in order to shock and dupe you because you're vulnerable when you're in a state of revulsion and disgust. and it establishes the protagonist's cynical and blase outlook on extreme violence and her capability and resourcefulness when faced with shocking situations and it also peels back a layer and gets you 'in' on the meta story the show is telling by introducing you right off the bat to an absurdly violent situation that is in fact a farce. and it also turns the entire situation back on the viewer to ask why we ourselves are invested in The Narrative when The Narrative is itself a work of emotional manipulation. but yeah what could it possibly add.........

[parf-fan]

Halloween 2023 no-context spoilers

[blujayonthewing]

I was gonna say I completely squandered today for Projects but then I remembered my new desk organizers came today and I spent several hours rearranging and organizing a bunch of my art supplies

[littlewitchbee]

we're playing through da2 and Beebo has a new tail feather coming in

[dragons-and-yellow-roses]

The irresistible urge to start a new knitting project when I have two unfinished projects already.

[lilgynt]

babies and kids love picking me at random events to speak to or ask direction of the general thing they can tell i love them and adore when they pick me and will die for them

[hippo-pot]

sadly i've wasted sooo much energy the last couple days just putting together a costume for a costume-mandatory event with Rules (it's a ren faire and i think they're making us do the employee dress code because we're volunteers) i know it does not sound like much but it does stress me out to be told how to dress, google what's appropriate (i've never been to a ren faire before), and worry that i'll be kicked out because i didn't do enough

like this is absolutely not the thing i should have been worrying about, i should have been practicing my ASL, which I'm going to need,,,,

[dragon-huntress]

.

[aconstantstateofbladerunner]

@rajghafa Hey there, glad you like the post! I’ve actually never met anyone else who’s even heard of these books besides me, so I’d love to hear more of your thoughts if you’re willing to share them.

As for your question about ableism, towards the end of the third book, main character Kelsey gets bitten by a shark and reacts in the aftermath like this:

(Apologies for the low-quality screenshot)

Apparently, people with amputations can’t find love or raise children.

Now, one could make the argument that these are the irrational ramblings of someone who just survived a traumatic experience. However, Kelsey walked off numerous other animal attacks earlier in the series, including getting mauled by a bear, so why is this one different? I don’t think the author put that much thought into it. Not to mention the main focus here isn’t the injury itself, but how it will hypothetically affect her love life, further emphasized by her boy toy Ren telling her on the next page that he would still find her pretty even if she lost both legs. That is the resolution. Not that Kelsey is being irrational, but that she’s still sexually attractive wife material no matter what.

Not to mention the casual sexism of it being a woman’s “responsibility” to get married and raise kids. Unfortunately, the misogyny is a much more common occurrence throughout the series.

I don’t think the author hates disabled people, but I also don’t think she bothered to consider how unnecessarily shitty and hurtful that was to write her main character saying. Just like she didn’t consider how to respectfully depict a culture she wasn’t a part of or if she should look up whether or not China still had an emperor in 2011.

@jelly-as-in-grape-concord made this for me

Tiger’s Curse book 3 is officially the worse book I’ve ever read and Colleen Houck is my eternal enemy.

[14dayswithyou]

As a humble admirer of Everything Yandere and of the inner workings of the sick and twisted minds of loving, lovesick maniacs and of their warped and muddled perceptions of love and intimacy, I pose you the question: What type, kind, flavor, species of Yandere is Ren/Redacted? I've gone through the asks on the blog answering what lovesick and yearning behaviors he goes through, why he does them, what they mean to him — but can we go deeper? What disturbing things does Ren do, be it for his own twisted satisfaction and perception of "love", be it to those he sees as threats to his Angel? What are his limits, where does he draw the line, how far is he willing to go to get what he wants, and who is he willing to hurt and how? Where does he draw the line when it comes to Angel? I know he would never physically hurt them, but what kind of mental warfare would he inflict on them to get them where he wants? Are we talking isolation, manipulation, gaslighting, brainwashing? And if so, how does that happen?

I'd be very very happy if you'd be okay with going into this analysis — and would it be possible to answer the Yandere Alphabet for Ren? Thank you for blessing me with this mess of a boy and sowwy for the ramble ♡ ♡ Tell Ren to clean up the bloodstains he left earlier ♡

⌞♥⌝ Because I get this question a lot, I personally feel like I've answered it to the fullest possible extent that I can gdkfgjdj ^^; So if you haven't already seen them, I reccomend going through these asks: one, two, three, four, and five!

As for your other questions:

I've highlighted them in pink to make it easier to reference/link it back to the questions above

The "disturbing" things Ren would do to his victims have been answered more or less in a few of the asks mentioned above.

Ren honestly doesn't have any major limits aside from physically harming or forcing himself onto Angel in any way. He doesn't find any pleasure in doing so, nor would he ever want to turn out like his father — much less subject the only person he genuinely cares about to the same things he had to endure as a child.

Ren also doesn't really draw the line anywhere — again, aside from upsetting Angel in any way — so anything is fair game when it comes to everyone else. But speaking as his creator for a moment, I will say that Ren is not the type to harm babies, animals, abandon his own/Angel's children, force himself onto anyone, or coerce anyone into sexual activities in order to get what he wants. That's icky af and I'm not rocking with it /gen /lh

On a slightly lighter topic, Ren is willing to go as far as necessary if it means having Angel rely on him and him only... So long as it keeps them happy at the same time. As much as he'd love to "remove" Angel's friends and family permanently, he won't entertain that thought if it'll make them upset. At most, he'd likely try non-lethal ways to get rid of them in hopes of keeping Angel happy (and oblivious).

One of Ren's major characteristics is that he's willing to change himself to suit Angel's needs, no matter how drastic it may be. If they find any sort of reliability or comfort in him by doing so, then he'll latch onto that notion and feed into it. By becoming someone Angel can trust and confide in, Ren would (potentially) be able to manipulate them and sway their thoughts... Almost like a metaphorical devil on their shoulder, in a sense lmao

I've said this a few times on this blog before, but Ren is the CEO of gaslighting and manipulation. He's down to try a bit of isolation if it's somehow possible to keep Angel happy while doing so, though I don't think Ren would be into mindwashing since he idolises, honours, and blindly trusts Angel's original thoughts more than his own. He wants them to genuinely develop feelings for him, not because he forced them to.

I've actually been asked to do the Yandere Alphabet by a few other people recently, so I'll get around to doing it sometime!! ^^