#this entire arc is hitting close to home in relation to what I see in the teacher training I'm doing* and I love it.

[dancing-rowlets]

I am. Very normal about this arc's depictions on teaching and learning, and how about so far the tests are not about winning the battle but rather what the character have learned so far on their journey as well as in the battle itself, and how the ones giving the lessons are not only the teachers but the elite four and the gym leaders too, turning them into a key part in the learning process of the students taking the terastal course. I am. Very normal about this.

[zonedelicious]

In the X-Men fandom this scene is constantly brought up to call the character Noriko racist, call the entire book racist, and even call the fans and writers racist. And as a Muslim fan of Academy X I am very confused at this harsh reaction because to me it is obvious the story is siding with Sooraya.

For starters X-Men can be very VERY racist and islamophobic. I've recently been reading Claremont's New Mutants and it's painful how racist that book is to Arabs. I wanted to stop reading because of the racism.

But I do not get this reaction from Academy X, which is my favourite X-Men book.

I think a lot of people don't know what kind of book Academy X is. Academy X is a book about delinquents. The main characters are a bunch of asshole kids. The appeal to me is seeing these shitty kids grow and become better people. Yes they make mistakes that's the point. They're stupid kids.

Noriko is one of these kids. She was homeless at a young age because of the poor relationship with her family and because of this she's afraid of ever showing any vulnerability. Choosing to rather lash out at others. It's a realistic coping mechanism.

The scene with Sooraya shows this as Noriko is projecting her own trauma onto a poor girl who only wanted to be nice to her. Yes it's shitty but that's the point. We're seeing how their personalities and viewpoints clash, and how Sooraya is challenging Noriko's beliefs.

I do not see how anyone can read this as the book being racist when the scene even shows Sooraya sad. Something like this never happens when an X-Men book is actually islamophobic. Yet people never react as harshly to actually racist X-Men books as they do to this.

It's actually very similar to a scene at the start of Ms Marvel, where Zoe is racist to Nakia. We can clearly see both scenes are suppose to make you feel uncomfortable and make you side with the Muslim girl. And both Zoe and Noriko are humanized despite being bullies.

We even get a conclusion. Some say this isn't enough, but remember that Noriko refuses to show emotions, so the fact she's willing to go against her instincts here is interesting. It's more interesting to me than simply having a generic anti racism speech.

Again Sooraya is entirely humanized here. The comic is understanding of her struggle. I do disagree with the way she's drawn at times, but the writing makes her a character I could relate to. And reading this conclusion only makes me more interested in both characters.

Sadly neither character ever got a proper character arc after the comic ended. But to me that just makes me wish there were more comics of this group where we do see Sooraya and Noriko become close friends like Nakia and Zoe. It makes me think of writing my own story with them.

I love this book and what it means for Sooraya. I love seeing Sooraya's relationship with the Hellions, Jay and Laura. This is still her definitive comic, so why are we dismissing it entirely because of one scene that exists to make us relate to her?

It's very strange that this one scene, that to me is well made and relatable, is being used as a way to hate the characters, the comic, and everyone who likes it. Most hate isn't even coming from Muslims so is it just performative outrage and misunderstanding?

Or maybe this scene hits at home for some people? With the conversation being very realistic and grounded, people may see themselves in Noriko. Maybe they had a similar reaction towards a Muslim girl and are remembering it.

Noriko's stance isn't even that different from ex Muslim feminists who say similar things. The issue is how she is projecting onto Sooraya. And maybe that's what makes people uncomfortable. The complexity this conversation has in the real world.

Whatever it may be, Noriko still clearly grows after this arc. We do see her become a great leader who stands up for her friends. And even if she has issues to deal with, she was slowly becoming a better person.

In conclusion I love this book because it's relatable in how it portrays its characters. I like Sooraya being a Muslim character who's also a protagonist and a big part of the story. I hope more people give this book a chance and see the charm of it that I see.

Anyway time to go listen to anime music and imagine my OCs hanging out with the Academy X kids (need to draw that one day).

[mothrocks]

Actually yknow what I can't forgive HBOMax for cancelling Our Flag Means Death. So today (it's currently 11:01 pm :D) I'm going to talk about why I love this show so much and why I (and the entire fandom if I'm being honest) am so upset over its cancellation. Spoilers ahead for those who haven't seen the show!

This show has helped me through so many rough times and I'm sure it's done the same for many others. The lighthearted comedy aspect is wonderful, but the themes of love and acceptance means so much to me. These characters are unabashedly queer and the show doesn't even make a big deal of their identities. Jim is just Jim, Ed and Stede are just Ed and Stede; the list goes on. Sure, several comparisons between the characters' issues and the current issues of queer people worldwide can be made, but their identities are never the root of their problems and it is just so refreshing to see.

Stede's arc of finding his own identity and place in his world is wonderful and very relatable. Throughout his life, he never fit in with other people and societal expectations. This is shown through his interactions with the Badminton brothers, his relationship with his father, and even his marriage to Mary. He leaves his old life behind to make something for himself and finds a home with the crew where he is accepted for who he is and eventually forms a loving relationship with Ed.

Furthermore, Izzy's entire arc of finding a loving family hits close to home. Izzy had gone so long without any kind of actual, real, unconditional love and from the moment he receives it, he changes as a person and grows. No longer is he the bully he once was, desperate to live in Ed's shadow. He now lives to be his own authentic self and it makes him a happier person overall. This is evident in Calypso's Birthday when he performs La Vie en Rose for the whole crew, makeup and all. The Izzy we knew in season one would never expose himself like that, let alone to this specific crew. Instead of being mocked or looked down upon in any way, the crew, his newfound family, celebrates him for being himself and it's just... so beautiful and meaningful.

This show means so much to me and it will forever hold a special place in my heart. Producing queer media in this world is such an uphill battle, and while I'm utterly devastated by this show's cancellation, I'm forever grateful to everyone who made it possible in the first place.

[maybirdie]

Horizon Asks

Thanks for the tags @singingkestrel and @meg-noel-art !

1. ride or die ship (your otp): Ereloy. As if that’s news to anyone lmao

2. most annoying ship: I see y’all trying to start drama, I’m not falling for it lmao. Oh wait actually...Talanah/Amadis 🤣

3. second favourite ship: Between Kotallo/Talanah and Abadund/Morlund. One for spicy, one for sweet. Also Petra and like, most of the women in the game

4. favourite platonic relationship: I love the big brother/little sis vibes between Beta and Erend even though we never see them interact really. I love that she mentions that he makes her laugh. Also Aloy and Gildun - obsessed.

5. underrated ship: Drakka/Yarra - LISTEN I KNOW but it’s the ultimate enemies to lovers and I love them. Also Avad/Ersa....starcrossed lovers ftw

6. overrated ship: more instigating I see

7. one thing i would change in canon: One? LMAO. So many things post-HZD. Particularly the way Erend got shafted and how many threads got dropped (we didn’t get a post-Daunt makeup scene? Really??). Also Talanah should have been an official GAIA gang member, hands down. And I’ll be honest, the way romance for Aloy was handled in general.

8. something canon did right: The entire arc of HZD is masterful and perfect and it’s been a long time since I’ve been that gripped by a mystery in any media. It was always going to be hard to top, but I would love if the next game reverted back to that kind of storytelling vs the “doing too much” trend of HFW

9. a thing i'm proud of creating for the fandom: A hard choice, but I think I have to pick Love Games just because it was such a labor of love between myself and @sorbetowl​. I had a blast collaborating with such a talented artist and friend! For that reason I’m SUPER excited to be working on the upcoming VN, Focus on the Heart - already such an amazing experience!

10. a character who is perfect to me (wouldn't change a thing): GILDUN GILDUN GILDUN GILDUN GILDUN

11. the character i relate to the most and why: Definitely Erend. There’s a reason I ship him with Aloy lol. I guess there are pieces of both of them I relate to hard - Aloy’s impatience with rude people/social situations and her love for solitude, Erend’s self-consciousness and sense of responsibility for keeping everyone happy and feeling good. The combo of them hits real close to home.

12. character(-s) i hate the most and why: Tilda was a really tough character for me for personal reasons. She’s a wonderfully crafted villain but she also makes my skin craaaaawl. Which I suppose is exactly what she’s meant to do, so well done Guerrilla 😂

13. something i've learned from the fandom: God so much. I rolled into the Ereloy discord totally clueless back in April 2022, and feel like I have so much useless lore in my head now (and I’m not anywhere near some of the real lore people I know). But beyond lore, I’ve really learned how important empathy and putting yourself in other’s shoes can be. It’s amazing how many new friends I’ve made from being open to other people’s POVs, and how much I’ve seen people hurt each other because they’re not open to it.

14. three tags i seek out on ao3: Sensual Fingerblasting (iykyk), There Was Only One Bed, Sparring as Foreplay

15. a song i strongly associate with my otp/favourite character: Slowly by Olivia Dean, Can’t Fight This Feeling by REO Speedwagon cause what better Friends to Lovers song is there?

tagging: No pressure tags!! Also sorry if this is a repeat for anyone. @souls-that-have-senses, @sorbetowl, @imamandajulius, @emtazer, @brekkie-e, @cranialgames, @nerd-artist, @xxxhellfireravenxxx 

[fragilecapric0rnn]

made this playlist for my friend @cheatghost's BEAUTIFULLY wonderful fic show me the place where he inserted the blade. i put a lot of thought into the playlist and was talked into doing an analysis. I will be diving into each part of the fic by going over how and why the songs i chose for each section relate to the themes and events that take place. each part will have it's own post.

here is Part II. After

II. After

Even if it is only 1/4 of the chapter, the After portion is so pivotal to the entire story in setting up what the rest of Steve's arc will look like. It really speaks to Lou's writing capabilities, that a fraction of the chapter, a blip in respect to the rest of the fic, was so compelling and conveyed all of the emotion and heartbreak that is Steve falling apart and self-destructing. So much so that it has its own set of songs that sum up the themes and events of that section. With that, let's dive into the analysis.

Side note: as we move forward, there are songs that I chose more for the vibe and the message within the song relating to the events/characters, so you will notice there is less of me pulling direct lyrics to match up with quotes and more of an analysis of how the song sounds and how the message of the song as a whole relates to the story.

I. Why Didn’t You Stop Me? By Mitski

Will forever be obsessed with the way this song (and other/most Mitski songs) have misleadingly upbeat tempos with the most devastating lyrics. This idea is brought up several times, the idea that Steve could have or should have done something to stop this from happening. As if he alone could have stopped the Suits from taking Eddie away.

The hauntingly optimistic beat paired with the sad lyrics is representative of Steve's mental state. I couldn't help but think of this line from the fic, "And Eddie is lost, now. So, Steve is staying put. If Eddie comes back, he needs to know where to find Steve, needs to know where to look. Steve will be here when he looks." The driving, the staying put, the waiting. He uses driving as a way to isolate himself from the others as he grieves Eddie, and grieves the coulda, shoulda, wouldas, of the entire situation.

… So why didn't you stop me? Why didn't you stop me

As the song comes to a close, I would describe the beat as aggressively upbeat, and representative of Steve in the middle of his descent - when he gets the shit beat out of him. No one is there to stop him at first, it's describe as this sort of primal instinct when he sees Jason and his cronies at the park, how he just stops what he's doing and starts wailing on them. But somebody does stop him. It's Hopper, it's his family.

II. Maybe by The Chantels

Unpopular opinion: oldies should be used in fandom playlists a lot more! You will see several on this playlist, as I push my oldies agenda. To me, there is a certain longing and yearning that oldies convey, whether that be through lyrics or the way vocalists belt those lyrics. This song's lyrics feel very evocative of Steve's downward spiral into despair in the direct aftermath of Eddie's removal from their lives.

Maybe if I pray every night You'll come back to me And maybe if I cry every day You'll come back to stay Oh, maybe

The word maybe feels very much like Steve in this section. His interaction with Locke.

"Steve cries. Loud, ugly hiccups. Big tears roll down his cheeks, land on his split lips with salt that stings. He pulls over and screams, hits his head against the steering wheel once, twice. Clenches his hands around it, lets his nails leave indents in the leather."

The desperation in the song matches the desperation that Steve feels.

III. Buzzcut Season by Lorde

Need to get this out of the way - LOVE that Mike is the one to confront Steve about his self-destruction. It makes the most sense, he is a loud-mouth, he tells it like he sees it, and of course he's going to want to kick Steve in the ass and yell "we're all hurting!"

And I'll never go home again (Place the call, feel it start) Favourite friend (And nothing's wrong, when nothing's true)

His moment with Dustin after this is when we see Steve start to pick up the pieces of himself. Steve starts to realize that even if he's broken, that Eddie took a piece of his soul with him, he has other people in his life that not only rely on him, but want to see him start to heal. Whether or not he wants to heal and move on (as we will see, he doesn't ever really move on), he needs to try. And that trying starts the sharing a hug and a cry with on of his favourite friends.

IV. Cranes in the Sky by Solange

Once again, another song that I would like to copy and paste the entirety of to this post! I think this song is Steve throughout this entire section.

I tried to keep myself busy I ran around circles Think I made myself dizzy

Another word choice that makes me go bonkers. I tried, I tried, I tried, I tried. He tried to fight those guys, he tried to gut information out of Locke, he tried so hard in the aftermath to fix it.

I tried to let go my lover Thought if I was alone then maybe I could recover To write it away or cry it away 

He tries to isolate, and that just adds to the hurt. He never allows himself a moment to really cope with any of it. He's not coping, he's trying. The trying is a constant theme that runs throughout the rest of the story, but starts here. In the After.

V. Long Long Time by Linda Ronstadt

The Last of Us intermission - I was listening to the companion podcast of the show and the director talked about how he went out searching for a song that was so full of yearning, longing, and heartbreaking devastation on purpose. And GOD, am I so glad he did, because this song is just so perfect. Similar to Maybe, there is just something about these old songs, the way they are filled with such a sadness. With such longing and yearning, it's like they were built for these stories, that are also filled with longing and yearning and loneliness. Regardless of anyone's TLOU brainrot, this song is just so so beautiful.

A thread that is woven through both the entirety of the fic and most of the songs on the playlist is the theme of loneliness. Loneliness and isolation is how Steve copes. It's what he feels like he needs to do, as he feels like he is the only one who understands the amount of devastation he feels with the loss of Eddie.

Wait for the day you'll go away Knowing that you warned me Of the price I'd have to pay And life's full of flaws Who knows the cause? Living in the memory of a love that never was

That last line is going to a haunt me forever. Because if you think about it, about Steve and Eddie, they never got a chance to explore their love to its full capacity. Their relationship was still in its infancy when Eddie was taken. So, the mournful yearning isn't only for the desire to have him by his side, but for the ache of the love that could have been. The love that was stolen before it could fully bloom.

However, this song was also chosen to represent the tidbit at the end of the chapter, the glimpse into Eddie's side of the story. They're both longing. They're both missing a piece of themselves. They're both going to hurt and miss the other for a long long time.

[mejomonster]

saw a kingdom hearts reaction where the person said kingdom hearts is about childhood and growing up and losing innocence, and childhood trauma

and like 1 yeah they hit the nail on the head. it makes you feel like a kid again, but also reminds you that life is heavy and complicated and these things that remind you of an innocent time before it all will always be touched by the present now that you are no longer naive and now that you’ve started your journey into adulthood (like Sora leaving the islands). it reminds you of what you miss, of what you hope for, some of the most impactful lines in kingdom hearts 2 are when hayner says (and axel reaffirms, and truly so Many character stories echo) “we can’t be together forever, it’s not about how often we see each other, but how often we think about each other. as long as we have each other in our hearts then we’ll still be with each other” those ideas i think most people eventually will relate to. so much of the kingdom hearts story is about best friends, making friends, valuing friends, and how the world and the passing of time pulls people apart. how to stay close to them, how to get back to them again, how to grieve when we can’t, when we don’t know the future, how we have to move forward every day because life doesn’t stop, the circumstances tomorrow are not guaranteed to be like they are right now this minute, and we have to cherish what we have while it’s here. hold onto it in our hearts when it’s out of reach, and try our best to remember it and what it’s done to change us forever. every friend we make is a part of us, every precious memory changing us and our entire lives even when the connection gets lost or strained, even when our lives change completely in ways we could have never predicted or stopped. the desire to keep things as they are forever, when they’re good and we have our loved ones, and how as much as we may want that and strive for it and sometimes do achieve it life is going to constantly surprise us and we can’t control what tomorrow will bring. “hold me, whatever lies beyond this morning is a little later on, regardless of warnings the future doesn’t scare me at all”, “when we get older you’ll understand what i meant when i said no things aren’t quite that simple/things Are Quite that Simple.” Utada Hikaru’s absolutely lovely main songs have lyrics which really hammer home the themes of kingdom hearts. 

just. yes on one level its an absolutely bonkers crossover visually, conceptually, in execution, in experimenting with combat and combination, and it’s wild it got made because who knows if it even could’ve existed if someone tried to make something like this today in the 2020s. but also it does have a heart at the center of it, an emotional thread that connects to everyone growing up and who already has, and it hits you right through to your core and it’s the reason the endless tragic arcs of the characters make so many people bawl their eyes out. yes its a sad story, many sad stories trying hard to fight to get a happy ending and reunite with their friends again one day. but its also a really, really, simple story. its a story we all go through. its covered in all these words like darkness, hearts, light, etc and this bonkers lore nomura keeps intensifying and piling on. but at the core of it all kingdom hearts is about our friendships and loved ones, about growing up and the passage of time changing everything, and how to bear it and go through this endless journey we’re all on. it hits extra hard to some (like me) because the childhood disney and final fantasy elements remind us of exactly when this reality starts to set in for us growing up, we were children, often surrounded by friends and family, and then one day people moved and died and school was over and nothing was ever stable again in that sort of concrete childish way when the world is only as big as your backyard and childhood home (like Sora, Riku and Kairi the world is only their tiny play island - they know nothing else, never had to be apart, and they wonder what’s out there... and we all find out eventually in life what’s beyond that small initial world we had). that’s the part of the story that hits. 

and then like i said, 2 she mentioned its about trauma and childhood trauma. i’m burning out of steam here but that streamer absolutely gets it. 358/2 Days is about 2 children who are raised by a cult (which is also a toxic workplace - oh no childhood home of safety they start out already in a workplace nightmare where their work is their entire life and they’re easily replacable if they aren’t “productive” and their entire existence depends on being valuable to the boss, they’re disposable, they’re told their feelings and wants don’t matter and YET they develop them anyway and DO find each other to love and make life bearable. they do make a family out of their friends, people they want to live for, live to see, love to have in their lives, people and connections that matter more than their job). 358/2 Days is about adults who once had lives they loved and valued, people they cared about (Axel and Saix being particular highlights of that), who were crushed by their jobs and the passage of time destroying their old lives and old safety, the whole world fell apart on them and they died and all that’s left of them are echoes of their old selves who grew apart, now adults and part of the very kind of system of adults destroying things that once upon a time destroyed their old world and old lives. Axel knows the reality that he’s a part of the destruction, and yet when he connects to Roxas and Xion he wants to badly for them to NOT lose their loved ones and precious lives they care about. To NOT be crushed by the very awful situation they’re in, to help them, to try and protect them but knowing in the way he knows because he’s been through it... that they can’t be saved, that time will pass and change things, and he thinks the evil he does is better than the worse alternatives he knows could happen. And they all break apart. And i think a lot of older people can see younger friends, younger loved ones, children they have, going through their own versions of these things. the naive idealism of childhood, of the safe world they’ve managed to have or carve out or temporarily found, and the looming awful reality that there are things out there that can and do destroy that ‘safety’. that nothing is guaranteed to be forever. you’ve got traumatized adults who already went through awful stuff, children being traumatized who can never find real safety and will eventually have even that ‘good thing’ thrown into danger they can’t stop. Riku, Sora, and Kairi went through their own version in kingdom hearts 1. Riku wanted to see other worlds, wanted to protect the friends he loved from all the looming dangers he figured ‘might’ be out there because he was older and growing up and realized before Sora and Kairi that their safe haven might not always be safe forever. He leaped without looking, and got into danger over his head and instead of learning about it so he could protect sora and kairi, he ended up damaged by it first and used by it as a tool to hurt his own loved ones. and so many of the kingdom hearts games explore this idea. Ventus, Terra, and Aqua also have a situation with 2 of them young adults trying to pass their exam that proves they’ve ‘graduated’ to adulthood, aware of the real potential danger and impermanence of the world in a way Ventus the younger kid whos still a teen is not. And Aqua and Terra go out trying to protect those they love (and the whole world from being hurt by the same things), and instead get used, instead even when they try their best it’s not always enough. Though it is enough to one day find each other again, to help some people on different worlds even if it’s not going to be their own loved ones for a long while, and so it was worth the effort. Their only options were to stay on their isolated world and be attacked one day by the reality of time passing, or go out, and no one will ever be ready for it. No one’s ever ready to grow up, no one can stop it and we’re all forced to go through that journey someday. And Ventus - he already comes to the world damaged, traumatized, already forced through pain despite his young age, already forced to have been used. In kingdom hearts, they just do not sugarcoat this. Ventus (in BBS) didn’t have any safe childhood or loved ones to cling to originally, he was alone and suffered and sometimes children do, sometimes any person does. He eventually does find a respite - a sanctuary with Terra and Aqua living with them, that he treasures and has made into his home. Axel makes that as an adult, Ventus makes that as a teen, Sora and Riku had that with each other since children. (I could probably argue somewhere in there that Eraqus and Xehanort once were each other’s home, sanctuary, and their growing up also meant that was lost and longed for one day again some how which is maybe why KH3′s ending made me cry despite me thinking i didn’t care about those two characters lol). My point is plenty of the characters are traumatized before and as the stories kick off, or through the stories, and i very much feel people who consider it a major theme of kh. 

[daikon1]

My 2022 Fanfic Year in Review!

I don’t know about the rest of y’all, but 2022 has been a rough one for me. Between challenges in my offline life and modding for the Drops of Moonlight Zine eating up most of my fandom time and energy, I didn’t write as much as I might have liked in other years.

Anyway, here’s my Ao3 Wrapped!!

Fair warning, spoilers for anything I posted this year abound below the cut!!

1. List of fics completed this year:

Well, I changed some of how I post this year (for example, I stopped posting to FFN entirely and decided to use ‘collections’ on Ao3 instead of chapters going forward for related but standalone shorts/one shots).

That said, I completed 5 fics:

A (Blind) Date with Destiny!

Moving In

then you showed up and I can’t get enough

We Do This Every Time

I Know All About Your Reputation (This is Bound to be a Heartbreak Situation)

I also began a new ongoing multichapter, Close to Home.

2. Number of words written:

61,054 that have been posted - fewer than previous years, but more than I’d thought!

3. Your most popular fic this year:

Of what I posted this year, (Blind) Date got the most hits, but overall The Runner-Up remained quite popular and got a lot of engagement.

4. Your personal favourite this year:

This is always a cruel question, given that everything I write feels like my baby/a part of me. The two I was most actively excited/couldn’t stop while writing were Blind Date and then you showed up… so… coin flip between the two?

5. Your favourite scene:

I *loved* writing the date in Blind Date with Destiny. Their dancing around each other and flirting and playing that ‘but do you remember me and if you don’t do I have to tell you’ game was SO MUCH FUN and basically flowed directly out of my brain and onto the page.

6. A fic or scene that challenged you:

Day six of my UsaMamo week fic (We Do This Every Time) gave me a lot of trouble. Turns out it’s hard to consolidate an entire arc from an anime into a single chapter, who knew 🤣

7. A line of writing you’re proud of:

I feel like this is always the hardest question to answer and the one I put off until the very end, in part because when you write 60k+ words in a year (which comes out to like 2.5k sentences the way I write them), it’s hard to single out one!!

This year, I’m going to highlight this line from Close to Home:

Mamoru took an obnoxiously slow sip from his water glass. “Do you bring a lot of dates home?” he asked in an offhand way that made her want to dump her curry on top of his perfectly coiffed hair.

8. A comment that touched you:

I always feel like I get too many sweet reviews to single out just one; in fact, I now have a designated folder in my email titled “Review Joy” where I file away some of the ones I want to revisit when I’m feeling low. So here is a much-too-short and entirely non-exhaustive roundup of a few snippets from some of my favorite reviews this year:

Just crossed your story today and *had* to go on Ao3 to read the second part!

I can’t picture things clearly or for long in my mind, but this scene was crystal clear, at least Usagi bowing to the little rabbit and talking in a friendly, but quiet and gentle, almost reverential way because Usako was part of Mamoru, vulnerable, almost like part of his soul.

I love all the check-ins for consent - they were so natural!! So good!! Thank you for writing!!

The scene of him putting things together was also suitably spooky and conspiratorial, like the ending of the Usual Suspects kinda.

Ngl I was SHRIEKING AT MY PHONE when I saw she'd written something SO SWEET into the book?! AND THEN DASHED LIKE THE LITTLE ADORABLE IDIOT SHE IS?

I’m always filled with excitement when I see a new story from you and it never disappoints. This is an absolutely wonderful beginning filled with emotions and sweetness and I cannot wait to see where you lead us.

Seeing bisexual rep in usagi meant the world to me as a young, questioning teen, and seeing you showcase that here and have her friends be so knowing & accepting of that really just made my heart feel so whole <3

Impeccable plotline, character depictions, and the fluff was *chef’s kiss*!!! 20/10!!!

I wish I could showcase all of every review I’ve received this year, but sadly I would run out of space way too fast. Just know that if you’ve taken the time to review for me, I am grateful from the bottom of my heart 🙏🏻

9. Something that inspired your writing this year:

Okay so I’ve already disclaimed it in the author’s note, but My Ex’s Best Friend by Machine Gun Kelly is the entire reason that then you showed up… exists.

Like honestly the line “I swear to god I never fall in love” just STUCK IN MY BRAIN as a very Mamoru-ish sentiment and I had to explore it. With instalove semi-blind-date hijinks.

10. Your proudest accomplishment (that one scene; finally finishing that one fic; posting your first fic; etc):

Probably have to go with finishing day 6 (Reunion) of UsaMamo week this year (We Do This Every Time). I basically knew what I wanted to do with it as soon as the prompts dropped, but actually whipping it into shape and getting it to be near the level I envisioned it took me longer than I hoped it would!! Was very proud to get that monster off my TBW list 🤣

11. Do you have any writing goals for the next year?

I would like to refill my tank, tbh. As I mentioned above, it’s been a rough year and in many ways I’m running on fumes - and I do think that’s been reflected in my writing (or lack thereof) in this back half of the year.

So in an ideal world, I’d like to have the time and bandwidth to feel excited about writing again. And maybe also make some progress on Close to Home.

————

As always, I would love to see some other people do these! I’m not going to tag anyone, but if you see this and want to participate, consider yourself tapped in.

Cheers to the end of 2022!! May 2023 be a gentle and healthy year for you and yours 😘

[devouredplague]

Re-watching the LOTR trilogy as an adult is so wildly different than watching it as a kid.

I could literally write an entire essay about it but I can’t be bothered right now, but if there’s one thing I’ll write, it is that Frodo has become my favourite character in the entire story.

obviously book!Frodo and movie!Frodo have their differences, but the way the journey to Mordor changes him in such a significant way that he can never return to his normal life when he is back in the shire speaks to me. As someone who experienced prolonged traumatic events for many years, I relate a lot to the feeling of being disconnected and not being able to truly settle and fit in with how things used to be. the people around you go on like usual. Your surroundings haven’t changed, but your entire reality has. The stab wound he got at weathertop that starts to ache when the date of the event approaches? all too familiar with my own experience when there’s an anniversary of a traumatic event that I experienced. His entire character arc is so bittersweet. He saved the world, but the quest ultimately claimed his life.

When he takes that first step on the boat to the grey heavens, to me, is what it feels like to finally come to terms with your circumstances. I had to leave a lot of old things behind in order to start a new life for myself and gain inner peace (even if some days are hard.) and seeing those feelings of trauma being described so well hits so close to home in a painful, yet comforting way.

[yeetlegay]

Kinn’s voice in episode 6: aka Kinn’s Camp Rock “this is real, this is me” era

So I genuinely didn’t even know where to start with this episode. There’s just SO much going on vocally, and it’s not necessarily as easily broken down scene-by-scene as in previous episodes. I’m honestly still frazzled, devastated, blown away by the episode as a whole to the point that I feel like half my thoughts can be summed up with that bizarre noise Emma Thompson makes at the end of “Sense and Sensibility” in that proposal scene (iykyk).

But I’m going to do my best to put my thoughts in actual words, so bear with me! There will be some tangents along the way that aren’t strictly voice-related, but hopefully it all comes together in the end!

Starting with the wandering around scene.

I went with this screenshot because it’s fucking hilarious, but also because of the fact that I literally couldn’t get a clean, clear frame of him in this particular exchange where they’re doing Rock Paper Scissors. He’s moving that fast.

What’s striking about this whole extended scene of them bitching at each other and going in circles is how unrestrained Kinn is. More than that, how much that lack of restraint is completely removed from any performance of power. He’s being forceful, yelling at Porsche, swearing at him, fighting for control of the situation, but with absolutely no real attempt to replicate the classic voice that would actually make him sound powerful and in control. He has absolutely no real authority in this forest, and even before Porsche calls him out on it, Kinn knows it.

They’re both clearly frustrated, Kinn especially, trying to navigate unfamiliar terrain while shackled together. But having seen the entire forest arc play out, the rewatch experience in this particular moment is...something.

Now we know that this entire time, Kinn could have taken those cuffs off, making a difficult situation slightly less so and giving him the freedom to go where he wants. But of course he doesn’t. He keeps the cuffs on, argues with Porsche, bickers with him, throws tantrums when he doesn’t get his way, and generally plays at being just as unhappy with the state of affairs as Porsche seems to be.

But he doesn’t take the cuffs off. He would rather be here, in this moment, sweating and dirty and lost, fighting with Porsche, than back home in his fine suits, air conditioning, and position of authority. He’d rather have a defiant, annoying, pain-in-the-ass Porsche than not have him at all.

I say all of that because listen to how Kinn sounds underneath all that unrestrained yelling and complaining. He sounds giddy. His voice is higher, more lightweight, more youthful, all the power and control hollowed out. He’s likely still running on some adrenaline from their dramatic night fighting off kidnappers, but more than that, he’s using volume and a more dynamic tone (voice falling and rising almost at random, from soft to hard, hoarser to airier, projecting without actual force) to distract from the very subtle, excited tension in his voice. If you listen closely, in certain lines you can actually hear a bit of a vibration, a nervous energy.

Kinn just so readily, so eagerly leans into this newfound freedom without the constraints of power, position, and class standing between him and Porsche. He allows himself to get excited, to be juvenile and competitive and expressive. He allows himself to mirror Porsche’s energy and even escalate it, exhilarated by this side of Porsche. It’s not that he’s never seen Porsche like this; it’s that now, finally, he’s able to respond in kind, to react more honestly to Porsche without having to think about how it looks.

And as soon as the two of them hit the water during their tousle, all his vocal bluster and posturing immediately falls away, and we see what a thin disguise it was to begin with.

The creek and truck scenes.

I couldn’t pick a screenshot because it’s all just AHHHHHHHH. The second he drops the whole frustrated act, his voice is just full. Listen to the laugh he lets out in that moment from the second screenshot above.

This is Kinn completely devoid of airs and masks. He’s just happy, here with Porsche, finally allowed to be carefree and not have to bother with the persona he’s crafted so painstakingly over the years.

Even when they get a little exasperated again later on as they head up the road, once again that exasperation fades away instantly when they find a new object of interest and usefulness (the truck).

For personal reasons, I will be replaying Kinn’s cute little “Hey! A truck!” on a loop for the next week. He’s a whole babie.

I really don’t even have much to say about Kinn’s voice because it’s just so straightforward in these early scenes. And that’s exactly the point! He’s reverted to a simpler, more honest, more open version of himself without need for artifice. There’s not much to analyze because he’s just in his element and focused on basic, uncomplicated emotions: excitement, giddiness, even joy. He’s not thinking too deeply, just allowing himself to feel and be without self-regulating.

I have literally no commentary on the fire scene other than what a fucking dumbass Kinn is in his most natural state. He literally woke up and immediately pointed an invisible gun at his “attacker.” And then pouted and called Porsche names when he realized what he did. Kinn, if anyone is a moron, it is definitely you. (Said with all the love in my heart.)

He’s just a pouty princess honestly. Like look at the petulant little retorts he throws back at Porsche, how he acts put-out when Porsche teases him, his bitchy little side-eye at Porsche. If I were Porsche, I’d almost think Kinn was flirting, albeit very badly.

As an aside, I think it’s at about this point that Porsche starts to fall for Kinn. Look at his expressions in this scene, how fascinated he is by this different side to Kinn, how enthralled he is by the version of Kinn that’s silly and cocky and childish and carefree and excited by the simplest things. Porsche would never have fallen fully in love with Kinn the Mafia Prince, but this Kinn? This Kinn seals the deal.

The fishing scene.

Once again I’m struck by how difficult it is to get a clean shot of Kinn during so much of his dialogue, because he’s moving around so much! He’s practically vibrating, bouncing in place, fully giving into his expressive, passionate nature.

I said toward the beginning that it’s harder to analyze this episode scene by scene, and it’s true because once again I don’t have much to break down here that I haven’t already said above. Kinn’s voice is just, once again, giddy. It’s straightforward. His voice is achingly honest in these scenes, because he’s not thinking beyond the simple pleasure of this moment, standing next to Porsche, learning something new, surrounded by nature, finally free just for a little while from the heavy weight of family, responsibility, and obligation around his neck.

Later on in this scene, when he and Porsche are sharing the fish they caught, even though Kinn is calmer, more laidback, his voice still has that very subtle vibration to it, almost a kind of musicality. It’s not smoothed over, polished, crafted to be what he needs for any given moment. There’s a complete lack of modulation that allows his voice to go lighter, sweeter, more melodic.

The dream jobs scene.

Oh. OoooooOOOOOoooooHHHHhhhhhHHhH this scene.

So full disclosure: I have an extremely low tolerance for cringe. I had to skip the actual singing the first time I watched because I simply Could Not. The second Kinn opened his mouth I knew what was coming. So the fact that I forced myself, in UTTER AGONY, to sit down and watch the singing bit when writing this post, is an Achievement.

Kinn’s voice is lower in this scene, a little calmer, but still has that melodic expressiveness to it. When he admits to his childhood dream of being a singer, his voice goes so soft, so wistful. He’s showing his belly in this scene, allowing himself not just to be himself but to share himself.

Note: Look at the way he glances repeatedly at Porsche, eyebrows lifted, eyes searching, actively seeking encouragement from Porsche without saying a word. He wants assurance from Porsche. He cares so much about what he thinks.

There’s also a barely automatically tremor in his voice as he starts talking about the singing competition and his theory that his dad essentially bought his win. It still stings, all these years later, to have had a dream quietly shattered, first by his father’s interference, and later by his brother’s trauma.

As he opens up further about Tankhun, he’s letting uncertainty bleed into his voice, vulnerability. He’s speaking to Porsche as an equal, asking for his input, trusting him with the doubts he’s never shared before. He knows that his questioning of Tankhun is more about him—his fears, his regrets, his grief for the life he might have had—than any genuine resentment toward his big brother. He’s trusting that Porsche will see the question for what it is: a request for validation, for someone else to empathize with where those thoughts come from while also reassuring him that they’re not true, that he can trust what he sees.

This extended scene just eases through so much character so naturally that you don’t even realize how much ground it’s covering on your first watch. We hear Kinn’s voice slowly open up, become softer, shyer, more vulnerable, as he gives more and more of his secrets to Porsche. He’s testing the waters, so to speak, to see how it feels to be honest with Porsche, to see how Porsche responds. And Porsche keeps meeting his honesty and responding in kind.

You can think of this conversation, in fact this entire episode, almost like a spiral, with the deepest truth at the center. At the outer edge, we begin with Kinn exposing a different side to his personality: impatient, unrestrained, excited. We go further into the spiral and see his childish side, his youthful joy, the pleasure he can derive from simple things like learning how to fish or finding an abandoned truck to sleep in for the night.

In this scene, we traverse a lot of ground deeper into the spiral toward that Big Truth, but we don’t actually get to the center. Kinn apologizes for the wrongs he’s done to Porsche, speaking gently and almost pleadingly, but he doesn’t actually name them. He’s shying away from the truth both because he’s afraid to talk openly about it but also because he’s not sure what Porsche is willing to hear.

So his voice, when he apologizes, is hesitant, halting, unsure. His eyes are shifting to and away from Porsche, trying to gauge his reaction to know if he should take the apology a step further. But in this moment, Porsche, who’s been meeting his honesty throughout the scene so far, doesn’t respond in kind. He thinks for a long moment, opens his mouth a little like he’s debating saying something, but then chooses to nod and give a vague acknowledgment.

Kinn knows, from Porsche’s reluctance to match Kinn’s first attempt at candor, that this isn’t the time to talk about it, to get to that Big Truth. So he lets it go.

The ravine scene.

This moment above has turned out to be one of my favorites in the entire episode purely thanks to Kinn’s voice.

On its own, Kinn’s first couple of lines spoken while they’re sitting opposite each other aren’t really that profound. But the way he says them? Holy shit.

Think about what happened immediately prior to this. Porsche was trying desperately to find a way to climb out of that ravine, frustrated at the handcuffs for making that escape impossible, asking, “Why do we have to be cuffed together like this?”

Kinn watches him in that moment, and even without his line (”But this makes us know each other so much better.”) you can see everything on his face. The reality, one of the truths sitting right smack next to the center of that spiral, that he’s holding Porsche back. He’s trapping him against his will, not out of malice, but out of selfishness, out of his own yearning for Porsche, without fully considering how Porsche must feel.

That moment, when he watches Porsche’s brief outburst, is when Kinn decides to take the handcuffs off. To let Porsche go.

But first, he’s going to be selfish for just a little longer. He wants a little more time, one more chance to talk to Porsche, to be honest with him as best he can. To get as close to the center of that spiral, that Big Truth, as he dares.

That specific context is why his voice in this scene is so interesting. It’s still soft, still low, still open, but there’s more control there. He’s making more of an effort to modulate his tone, not out of any need to manipulate or exert influence, but to express himself as carefully and intentionally as he can. This is the last chance he has to talk to Porsche, and he wants to do it right.

He doesn’t waste any time, choosing to share with Porsche that when he first heard his name being called, he didn’t want to leave. He’s trying to bare his heart to Porsche, haltingly, not sure how best to go about it, but trying to so hard to make his words count.

You can see that he’s forcing himself to keep going, that he’s determined to give Porsche as much truth as he can while he can, in the hopes that it can make Porsche feel better, but also ease his own guilt, make it easier to bear watching him leave. He pushes through his apology, knowing that Porsche may not be entirely ready to hear it, but also knowing he has to say it anyway. He keeps his voice gentle, soft, trying to ease the tension of the conversation as much as he can.

And Porsche, although visibly awkward and struggling for words, at last meets his honesty with his own. It’s vague, sure, and maybe not all he has to say, but at least they’ve acknowledged another truth, chipped away a little more at the space between them.

It’s enough for Kinn. It has to be. “Then from now on,” he says, even more gently, “we won’t have any doubts between us.”

The goodbye scene.

Otherwise known as the scene that ruined my life.

As stated above, Kinn decided hours ago to let Porsche go. And that decision gives him the freedom to finally be 100% open with Porsche, to let his voice really fill with all the tenderness, all the sheer feeling he has for Porsche, as he tells him to go home to his brother, to his life and his future and his dreams.

Kinn’s voice trembles here. You can hear the knot in his throat, the way he’s trying so hard not to let his own pain color all the hope and love he feels for Porsche. He wants Porsche to be happy so badly, is desperate for him to live the life that he wants away from Kinn’s world. And it only takes the slightest prompting from Porsche to admit it openly: “I like it when you’re happy.”

@clandestinegardenias​ said it so much better than I ever could in her post here about the line “Just go! That’s an order!” This is Kinn starting to step back into his old persona, all so he can give Porsche the out he needs to leave. Kinn is reclaiming the power that he gave up in the forest, all so he can use it for Porsche’s sake, selflessly, unhesitatingly. He orders Porsche to go because he knows that by giving Porsche the illusion of a command rather than a choice, he’s giving him the chance to leave without guilt.

The implications of that are...staggering. This is what Kinn can do with the tiny sliver of power that he has. When given the chance, Kinn chooses to use that power out of love, to protect the people he cares about. Every day he makes the conscious choice to sacrifice his happiness for his family, his role, his inheritance. He’s lost so much of himself, his childhood, his personality, his life, to doing the selfless thing. And here he does it yet again, not because anyone is asking him to, but because he knows it’s the most honest expression of love he can give.

That’s the center of that spiral. That’s Kinn’s Big Truth. That he loves Porsche, enough to give up his power, enough to hold onto him, but most of all, enough to let him go.

(And of course, as we learn a few minutes later, enough to die for him.)

Honorable mention: Porsche’s “FUDGE!”

I cackle like a witch every fucking time.

***

I’ve run out of room in this post so I’m going to leave it here, although there were so many wonderful vocal moments in this episode that some inevitably didn’t make it in here. If you’d like to read my previous voice analyses, links are below, and I keep a masterpost of all metas I do pinned at the top of my blog for easy access.

Why Kinn’s voice fucks me up: a silly little analysis (episodes 1-4)

Kinn’s voice in episode 4: basically my man is losing it

Kinn’s voice in episode 5: Kinn, respectfully, go to therapy

Kinn’s voice in episode 7: heart boners everywhere

[tobi-smp]

I was thinking about it while I was in the shower, so here’s another Hot Take on the discussion on whether we can (or should) consider technoblade as abusive

a lot of interactions between technoblade and other characters are difficult to gauge because c!techno obviously isn’t honest about his feelings at all times On Top Of cc!techno Very Rarely If Ever being completely in character, including and especially with very serious lore scenes. so how we’re meant to take anything he does or says is hard to parse, especially with the knowledge that other creators can take scenes seriously and incorporate it into their lore even if it wasn’t the intention at the time (like jack’s death at tommy’s hands during exile).

(technoblade has only recently come out to state that he’s intentionally playing his side of the story lighter to give people a break from the heavy angst in the rest of the server, but that’s hardly new. he broke the tension all the time during his partnership with tommy, namely with the confrontation with dream at the portal and tommy and tubbo’s first reunion, but it was even noticeable with doomsday, his perspective is a Palpably different tone from Anyone on the l’manberg side of things. which can make some Very interesting inconsistencies when it’s directly slammed into tommy’s more serious roleplaying style.)

you can Easily read him as Either a purely opportunistic character who uses the guise of being deeply emotionally wounded as a justification for Horrific Violence when he was never that emotionally invested in the first place Or a character that is rarely if ever honest and open with his feelings, who hurts other people by accident by trying to downplay his own vulnerability who is Nevertheless deeply emotionally invested in and impacted by the people around him. both interpretations can be soundly backed up by what we’ve been given and we can’t really discount the other reading because of the semi-canoncity of whatever technoblade does. we aren’t really gonna know unless technoblade himself decides to address it specifically.

so with that in mind, I want to take a second to take a more charitable reading, not as an argument that technoblade’s relationship with tommy Wasn’t unhealthy (because it objectively was no matter the reading of his intentions) but to ground the overall conversation a little bit here.

this, I think, is where the nuance in the intersection between “technoblade didn’t have the full picture of what happened with dream and tommy” and “technoblade knew enough to know that what he did on doomsday was wrong” Matters. 

if we read technoblade as a character that genuinely cares but either chooses not to or doesn’t know How to express those emotions in a healthy productive way (“tsundereblade” ala the scene of ranboo giving techno the axe) Combined With techno’s very dry sense of humor then it Is very possible to read some of the more uh, Unfortunate things that he’s said in a different light. which doesn’t excuse them by any means, people hurting their friends by not being emotionally honest or through jokes that hit harder than intended happens all the time and it’s the responsibility of that friend to apologize and change their behavior. but at the same time, people can’t actually change their behavior if they don’t know that what they’ve done is wrong.

we need to keep in mind that: - both technoblade And tommy express their affection with their friends by ribbing them. making fun of each other Is a sign of affection for them. if we’re meant to read that as part of their characters then it may not be entirely fair to say that technoblade should’ve known that putting tommy down was going to hurt him

- technoblade knows (or assumes) that dream wants to kill tommy and he knows that tommy has trauma. but technoblade Doesn’t know that dream systematically destroyed tommy’s self confidence to the point of being suicidal. he Doesn’t know how fragile tommy is about his own self worth, and he Doesn’t know that that kind of joking would hit tommy differently now than it would’ve back during their pogtopia days.

- technoblade knows that tommy was a child soldier, he knows that he was forced out of his home and isolated by someone that he’d trusted and loved, and he directly relates tommy’s betrayal to his own. he’s more likely to think that tommy’s mental state Now has more to do with l’manberg than dream specifically even if he recognizes dream as a threat to tommy.

none of this makes techno putting down tommy’s self worth Right, it doesn’t mean that we have to look at him charitably when he tells someone to their face that they aren’t equals only to turn around and destroy a country when he thinks he’s being dehumanized. but I also think that we can’t necessarily assume that he 100% devalued tommy both as a person and a friend from that interaction.

moreover, technoblade was For Sure being opportunistic in trying to recruit tommy. I’ve made my own analysis on techno obviously trying to prime tommy for a partnership at the start of tommy’s exile. but at the same time, I don’t think that’s necessarily Solely about taking advantage of what tommy could do for him, especially since he was trying to recruit tommy before he’d had his mind set on actively destroying l’manberg.

assuming that technoblade was as hurt by tommy as he was because he genuinely Cared about tommy, because he and tommy Were friends and he enjoyed his company, then he very well could’ve recognized that tommy being betrayed by the same people he was would open him up to being able to relate to him. techno and tommy have very fun interactions when there’s nothing driving them against each other, but they’re fundamentally incompatible on their morality and philosophies.

so the obvious solution to that would be one showing the other that their way of thinking was wrong, to let their relationship thrive without that barrier between them. and like, obviously technoblade is the extremist of the situation, it’s a little hard to swallow him trying to change tommy when he’s the one that refuses to compromise even when tommy tries to do it for him. but I think it’s worth recognizing when we’re having a conversation about whether or not he Solely saw tommy as an asset to use rather than a companion. if you choose to read techno as someone who refuses to compromise on his ideals but craves that interaction anyways, then the way he scooped tommy up while trying to relate tommy’s situation to his own, trying to convince them that l’manberg was bad for him, etc, can be read in a Much Less overtly malicious light. it’s still not a Healthy one, but at least it’s not Child Labor Meat Shield.

this particular reading Does have the fact that techno didn’t try to recruit anyone else on its side. for the entirety of tommy’s exile up until doomsday he didn’t try to seek out partnerships with anyone, even though there were Several people unaffiliated with l’manberg at the time. he sought tommy out the First Day of his exile, surely the moment he heard of it, and he was Noticeably Eager to partner with him the moment he’d found him in his house. if that was nothing but pure unadulterated ambition and opportunity seeking then you’d think he’d try to make at least One ally in the meantime.

then again, tommy was the most vulnerable person on the server at the time, you don’t have to know about tommy’s abuse to know that. if you choose to read techno as solely opportunistic then it’s easy to dismiss all of that and say that techno went for tommy because he saw it as the safest bet and that he didn’t gun for any other allies before him because he didn’t see it as immediately necessary until he’d been provoked. but on the other hand, it makes a lot of Sense that a character who’d just cut himself off from every ally he could’ve had but One would be kind of desperate for any chance at connection that he could get. that he’d seize the opportunity specifically Because he enjoyed his relationship with tommy before it went south and he wants to have a close partnership like that again.

technoblade’s a highly paranoid character, so you could argue that he’d try to seek out any partnership he could get his hands on if he was truly actively gunning for allies to the point of being willing to overlook his grudge against tommy to scoop him up as soon as possible. but on the other hand, technoblade’s a highly paranoid character, so he might not want to Risk someone ratting him out to the enemy if he can’t trust them or if they aren’t as neutral as they seem to be.

so ! with all that in mind I think that it’s a valid take to argue that technoblade’s actions could’ve been considered abusive whether he realized it or not, but I also think that it’s a valid take to say that it might not’ve been the intention of the roleplayers at the time and that some of the details that can be used to come to the conclusion that technoblade was abusive were tinged by cc!techno’s humor and him not thinking through the implications of tommy’s current arc. both takes make sense within the context of what we’ve been presented, we just need to make the space for both within overall analysis.

[transboykirito]

Kirito,

You weren’t the first character I could relate to, but you were the first one I could truly see myself in. You were the first character who coped with things the exact same way I did - immersing myself in fictional worlds and pretending to be someone else. The only difference between the two of us was that the world you got lost in were virtual, and the world I got lost in was... yours, honestly.

It’s been around six years now since I first watched Sword Art Online and fell in love with you, your friends and your world. A lot’s changed since then, for the both of us, and it’s bittersweet to think that, in a weird way, it feels like we grew up together. It hurts to know that someday, probably in the next few years, your story’s coming to an end, and, since you’ve been the one I’ve turned to for so long now, it’s scary to think about my story still continuing even without you.

When I first met you, Kirito, I was twelve years old and to say that I was struggling would be putting it lightly. I, much like you, didn’t know how to fit in with my family - though, it was for different reasons - and I isolated myself from everyone. I spent so much time reading, playing video games and watching my newly-discovered animes just for a chance to escape from my world for a bit.

After I finished Fairy Tail, an anime that also changed my life with a world I also got lost in and characters I dreamed of running away to be with, my mother suggested I watch Sword Art Online. She only recommended it because I’d recently been diagnosed with autism, and she saw a lot of those traits in you. So, I watched it, if a little apprehensively.

It was love at first sight.

I watched the entire Aincrad arc in a day. Your world was so immensely fascinating to me and, as much as I hated to admit it, I related to you. You, the brooding loner who had more play time than friends and an attitude problem to protect yourself from getting hurt. I wanted to know how you survived, I wanted to follow you on all your other adventures.

And then our story ended - at least, for a while I thought it did. My mother, in an attempt to protect me, didn’t tell me about the Fairy Dance arc. Instead, she played season two and, obviously, I understood nothing. So... I stopped watching.

It was a year later that I decided to give Sword Art Online another chance. The Aincrad arc was just as promising as I remembered it being and I thought with a little bitterness that it was a shame the weird timeskip ruined things. So imagine my surprise when episode sixteen started. I appreciate what my mother did now because I know there’s no way I could’ve handled watching Fairy Dance back then - even now it’s still a struggle, it still hits too close to home.

I was officially medically diagnosed with PTSD when I was fifteen. I felt like absolutely nobody could ever understand how I felt or understand the sheer horror I experienced every single day... but you did. The number of times I’ve replayed your conversations with Sinon about trauma and closure is frankly alarming, I can quote them from memory now. You introduced me to the idea of deserving to live on in spite of your trauma, the idea that I would someday find peace even if I never really got the closure I wanted. Honestly, it was your words that I clung to in some of my worst PTSD attacks, the days when all I want is to change the past and the days when I convince myself all I’ll ever be is an open wound.

I like to think that you’d be proud of me and how far I’ve come since I first found you. I made friends, Kirito, just like you said I’d be able to. I started making a family of my own, surrounding myself with people who love me exactly as I am, people who - I think, I hope - would hold me even when I feel like my trauma is chained me to like a weight I’ll have to carry for the rest of my life. I found people who are so warm and accepting, people who show me it’s safe to let my walls down, people who’ve given me more compassion and patience than I feel I deserve.

It’s nice, because, just like you, I felt for so long that I didn’t belong with my “real” family, for a variety of reasons. That feeling only got worse when I realised I was trans, and that’s technically your fault. Considering how trans-coded you can be sometimes, I think it’s fitting you were part of the reason I even realised. You were the first guy I ever cosplayed, and it was so comforting because I didn’t feel like I looked too feminine for it or feel like I looked out of place.

I started to really accept my gender by writing fanfics about you being trans. Starting HRT, getting surgery, dealing with your period, coming out. Every time I struggled with my gender I took it out on you in my Google docs, sorry bud. I’m on testosterone now, I think you’d be happy about that. Sorry I made you have dysphoria-induced breakdowns, like, five different times.

But you’ve always been a character I saw too much of myself in for my own good, for my identity, my emo “phase” and my gaming habit, my trauma...

Last year I turned away from SAO. I lost someone I never thought I’d lose, entirely of my own fault, and I tied him so strongly to this series that I couldn’t handle interacting with it anymore. Earlier this year, just under a year later, I reached out to that person to apologise. I don’t know what I expected or even if I thought I’d achieve anything with it, but I wanted him to hear it. I didn’t want the last thing I said to him to be what I’d said that night. We’re talking again, I can call him my friend again - I hope - and, just like you have been for so many years now, there you were. Watching my first episode in nearly a year felt like you were waiting for me with open arms and I wish I could tell you I hadn’t cried.

Through everything that I’ve been through in the last five years, Sword Art Online has been the series I’ve turned to. Bad break up? There’s Leafa. Fight with my mother? Asuna’s probably felt the same. Lost a friend? Eugeo would understand. PTSD attack? Sinon and Kirito would know exactly what to say.

It’s 2022 now. SAO starts this year. I’ve been counting down to the launch day since I was thirteen. It’s funny because by now you’re basically all grown up. You’re practically engaged, you’ve got a job, you’re about to start university. You have a partner and a daughter who bring out the best in you and a family of friends who accept you wholeheartedly. But at this time in the series, you were a thirteen year old kid who was alone and afraid, using fictional worlds as your means of escape - just like I was when I found you.

On your birthday this year I’m getting a tattoo of your elucidator. I’m getting it on my arm and, at some point, it’s going to be joined by the lyrics “I had the time of my life fighting dragons with you.” I really have, Kirito. Growing up with you, turning to you when I needed someone, going on adventures with you and getting lost in your world alongside you really has been the time of my life. You’ve given me so much to be thankful for and I desperately wish you were real, even just for a few moments, so I could hug you and thank you for everything you’ve done for me.

So thank you, Kirito. Thank you for being a hero, not just for me but for so many people. Thank you for letting me into your world and your life. Thank you for being there for me when I felt like I had nobody else to turn to. Thank you for saving my life more times than you will ever realise.

Love from the real world,

Taylor

[jamies-overalls]

For the character ask, gotta go with love of my life Alex Danvers

The one and only, the love of my life, Alex Danvers.

Favorite thing about her:

Her intense love and protectiveness for those around her. Does it cloud her vision sometimes? Yeah. But i think we can all relate to that in one way or another.

Least favorite thing about her:

The way the costume designers on the show decided to dress her, especially in the later seasons. Like... Chyler dresses more like Alex in her real life than Alex does on the show. Kudos to all the fanart peeps who give her the badass outfits she deserved.

Favorite line:

The entire coming out arc. I can't even pick one line from that. It hit so close to home and it aired while i was just starting to come out, so it just made me feel so comfortable and seen.

BroTP:

I mean, besides her and Kara (because the Danvers Sisters are the best but they're actual sisters so idk if it counts lol)? Probably her and Winn. I loved their dynamic and that he was a little brother to her but was also always there for her when she was the one who needed support. I would have loved to see more from them.

OTP:

Alex/Kelly. For sure. They are soulmates and they are perfect for each other. But before Kelly showed up and we didn't know what was going on with Alex, my answer would have been Alex/Sam. They had so much potential.

NoTP:

Alex/Kara. I don't think I need to explain why, but it's still considered a ship, so....

Unpopular opinion:

While I love Alex being Sentinel, she should have joined the Super Friends in a more scientific capacity. The show legit forgot that her entire background was in science when the DEO recruited her. I would have loved her and Lena working together on a project.

Song I associate with her:

happiness by Taylor Swift. It's a very bittersweet song, but it makes so much sense given her love life. She had a rough time after the break up, but she healed in time and found happiness in someone else eventually.

Favorite picture of her:

My joke answer that's also a little bit true...

My actual answer...

[nat1nonsense]

Okay so here’s my long, sappy post regarding the finale of The Seven, and then I’ll log off for the night lmao

This season meant the world to me. This story, these characters, their challenges and their individual character arcs, a lot of them felt so incredibly personal to me because I could see myself in so many of these characters. Everyone at the table this season managed to capture the essence of high school girls who are so close to graduating that they can almost taste it, but also the essence of teen girls who are scared or apprehensive about what comes next in their lives because so many of their friends are different ages so they’re at different points in their lives, or they want to take entirely different career paths compared to what they thought they would all be doing together. And this is just the group dynamic, I haven’t even mentioned each characters personal life and story yet.

Danielle, Sam, and Ostentatia are the characters that stood out to me the most. Each of them had specific moments in their stories that felt extremely relatable and hit really close to home. Danielle because she had her whole MomentTM at the ball, and the way Erika and Brennan described how Yelle was feeling in that moment compared to how she felt her entire life will always hold a special place in my heart. Sam because as a trans kid with a bit of a temper and more than willing to lay my life down for my closest friends, it’s hard to not draw a connection to her. Ostentatia because she was so bold and loud and loved her friends so intensely, and she also had her insecurities and worked hard to make sure that no one would pity her or worry about her or anything of the sorts. But it goes without saying that all of the seven have a special place in my heart because they’re all insanely wonderful.

The whole table did wonderfully this season, I am nothing short of impressed by all of them, but Brennan also deserves a special mention once again because, and I already made a post about this but I’ll say it again briefly, his wonderful talent of acting and storytelling and making connections between characters feel so raw and genuine is what made this season feel especially magical. Logically I knew that this was a d&d campaign with lots of role play, but at certain points it just felt like genuine moments between Brennan and whichever player he was talking to in the moment.

This season made me think a lot about my friends and where our lives are going and I could not be more scared but also more excited to see how things play out, and I wholly believe that this season is why I’m less scared of the future than I typically would be.

And that concludes my sappy post because it’s late and I’m sleepy and I don’t wanna get any more emotional than I already am :,)

[boldlyanxious]

Window of opportunity

Part of meet cute Mondays

All fic masterlist

Jason leaned back, pressing his shoulders into the brick wall. He didn't need to do anything else to blend in. He had lived in the streets of Gotham and he very much looked right at home there. It was what made him the perfect choice for scouting during the day. Red Hood would be very obvious hanging around but no one would give Jason a second look.

The street was empty and had been for awhile except for one car. But they still expected the move to go down at any time. He flicked a cigarette butt away that he hadn't really smoked. He didn't really like smoking anymore but it gave him cause to stand idly on against the building.

He glanced down at his phone but really he was watching the same car drive by a third time. It was traveling much more slowly this time. He hit send on his message to let the others know it was going down now. It's possible he was wrong and they would drive by again but he didn't think so. Slowing down was too noticeable on this mostly quiet street that usually only got fast traffic.

Then a door opened off to the side. He hadn't expected that. No one had been in our out of the buildings in the last hour except for him. And the car had been the only traffic. They had the entire loop that it had made watched today but the attack would start here.

There was no way the woman who stepped out lived in the shabby apartments above. She looked way too nicely dressed and put together to live there. But she stopped on the step and he could see her stow away keys and phone while doing a mental checklist that she had everything.

The timing was the worst. She stepped down off the entry step and turned the same way as the slowly moving car. She was almost to Jason's position when the window started creeping down. This could not be happening. She looked up and smiled at him as she got into polite smile range. He had to mentally kick himself back into mission mode after her their eyes met.

Tearing his eyes away from her was hard but when he looked back he saw a hand throwing a pipe bomb out the half open window. It landed on the sidewalk and she stopped suddenly looking down at it. He was wearing protection from the blast but he has been hoping to duck behind the brick wall surrounding the dumpster for added protection. She didn't have any of that.

He moved at the same time as her. He paused when he saw her kick with one stilettoed foot. The device lifted from the ground and arced back through the open window before it finished closing. If he weren't already moving he didn't think he could have picked his jaw up off the ground at the perfect shot.

She hadn't even set her foot back down when Jason completed his lunge into her. He heard the breath whoosh from her lungs as they landed. He rolled them, tucking her carefully into him away from the hard ground. His arm cushioned the back of her head and he arched his back to cover her whole body as the explosion rocked the street. He could feel the heat from the blast and pieces of shrapnel hitting his protected back.

He looked back after the debris cleared some. The car had flipped over into the passenger side but facing the opposite direction. He couldn't hear anyone inside. They were either dead already or had been knocked out by the first blast. He looked back down at her shocked eyes.

"That was very impressive aim with that kick. I think I'm in love."

"Be in love somewhere else. You are on top of me."

"Guess I actually said that out loud," he paused. "Did I ask you to marry me too or did that one stay in my head?"

"Are you seriously hitting on me right now."

"Yeah. I should probably stop that. But I'm going to stay here another moment to make sure there aren't--"

A series of explosions once again rocked the street. Jason braced himself, still covering the woman, for another few minutes until he was relatively certain it was safe. He lifted into a crouch to look around for any other people related to the attack before he stood.

He reached down and lifted her to her feet. She immediately took a step back. She glanced around checking for escape routes. He was also looking around for danger and didn't realize his hands were resting on her arms until she took that step back.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"Oh uh-yeah," she responded looking up at him.

He was much taller up close when he wasn't leaning against the wall.

"Did you get hit with anything?" he paused "Aside from me. There was a lot of shrapnel flying around."

She glanced at him as he forced himself to stop looking at her as he casually pulled pieces of shrapnel from his shirt. At first it all appeared to have hit a protective vest he was wearing but some came out with blood on it and he reacted the same either way.

"I'm fine. Just a bit shocked." She gestured to him. "Are you okay? You are hit."

He shrugged. "It's Gotham. But I just met the most beautiful woman in my life and I didn't even get her name. Yet."

She blushed and stumbled over her words a bit before she managed a response.

"I'm Marinette. I'm pretty sure you just saved my life. I did not expect additional explosions."

"Jason," he said. "You could save my life if you agree to see me again."

Pretty sure I'm on a government watch list now. If I wasn't already.

Tags

@theymakeupfairies | @emjrabbitwolf | @vixen-uchiha | @trythisagainlove

@technicallyburninggarden | @certainmuffinbagelcalzone

[crystal-moon-101]

I wanna hear your take on Benlie and/or Benkai. You don’t have to ship them, just say a few things you could have done to make them smoother and healthier, friendship or romance. You could even have both if you have an idea on a better, cleaner break up story.

Ok, so I’m a Benlie person, 100%, and while I don’t ship Ben and Kai, I definitely think they deserved to be handled better. So I have rewritten how those relationships, along with a few others of Ben’s love life, have gone, and I’ll share it here. Warning, this does get a bit long, and does have some violence at a certain point, but I hope you enjoy my take on it!

So the start of Ben and Julie’s relationship in Alien Force is mostly the same, though I did adjust it that they somewhat knew each other before hand, having seen each other in school, especially since Ben’s soccer practice took place at the same time and same kind of area as the girl’s tennis practice.  Ben asks her out, Ship appears and becomes her pet, Julie starts understanding the alien better, sees Ben have 14 moth children, the basic stuff from canon. However, my major changes start during season 3 of Alien Force, the part of the series that took quite the nose dive in terms of character arcs. I still have it that Ben and Julie start to have issues and argue, but in believable ways, and they still clearly love each other. The issues arise when Ben does start to get cocky a little, due to all the praise he’s getting from saving the galaxy from the High-Breed, and his accomplishment surrounding that are huge, since he hasn’t won something like that before. Again, doesn’t help that half the galaxy keeps praising him and treating him like a God, but Ben does still be a hero, and even starts to get anxieties since now he’s starting to deal with bigger issues, more people demanding for him to help their planets around the galaxy, and Ben wants to be that hero for them...but there is only so much he can do. He does love the admiration from everyone, feeling special and all that, but he does start to make him feel different, in and odd way...He’s struggle to connect with his human grounds now, due to constantly turning into aliens and spending time out in space, his relationship with earth just isn’t the same anymore. And even them, aliens around him treat him as something else too, like he’s not human or an alien, he’s something else, and not knowing what makes him nervous. To mask all of these fears, he uses his over-confident nature like a mask, and it does get pretty bad for a month or two until Gwen, Julie and Kevin make him see reason. Meanwhile, Julie is struggling in her own right after the High-Breed war. She was happy to have fought in it to protect her home and people, but after seeing a proper glimpse of the alien worlds outside of earth...she will admit that scares her. She didn’t go off world like when Kevin, Gwen and Ben did, mostly waiting for them on earth and did missions there with them, even lending them Ship when they needed it. While she didn’t judge Ben and was willing to live with idea of aliens after their first date, like adopting Ship, she still have a lot to process about there being alien life. It’s much harder on her than it was for Ben, because he learnt about it when he was young, his entire family knew about it and could support him through it, and even the Omnitrix provided better understandings for him. Julie...she didn’t have any of that. It was just her dad, Ship and her, and while Ship was a good start, he was still just one tiny piece of the outside world around her. She knew she’d have to accept it over time, now that she knew the truth, and especially when earth starts learning that truth too, but at times it felt like she wasn’t allowed to process. She doesn’t blame Ben for it, as he’s so use to it all by now, but there have been many moments where he seems to forget she is very early to this whole alien concept compared to him. She was afraid she couldn’t catch up, and even has moments where she didn’t want to take a step forward, afraid of what she might find. So she started joining less and less missions with Ben, Gwen and Kevin, and while she still hanged out with them, she tried not to get involved with their alien business. She will admit, maybe a part of her wished she didn’t know about alien life at times, to have a life back when things seemed more simple.

So these deep feelings from both Ben and Julie spark arguments, because both are unsure with themselves, thus unsure in relationships with others, especially each other, with Julie thinking she couldn’t keep up with Ben, and Ben thinking he couldn’t slow down for her. And it all eventually led to a point where things had to stop... And unlike Omniverse’s god awful handle of the break up, I instead had it like this. Julie is the one who starts the conversation, having called Ben over to her. She’s honest with him, saying that it’s just not working out, and that they should find different people that work for them. Ben does beg a little at first, saying he’ll try better, but Julie knows that right now they can’t be a happy couple and need space, and Ben eventually agrees, but it still hurts. It hurts more when Gwen and Kevin leave too, and Julie also goes on a tennis tournament in France, so Ben has to deal with the loneliness he feels for a while, even when Rook joins his side. Meanwhile, Julie meets Herve in France, who was taking photographs for sport magazines. The two talk and eventually hit it off, Julie somewhat clinging a little as Herve is very much the down to earth and normal human guy she thought she wanted, someone who wasn’t related to any alien business. She does miss Ben, a part of her not letting go, and while the two agreed to remain friends, they did drift a little over time. They would still voice chat, send some text and Ben would check up on her tournaments when he could, but both of their lives got rather busy and they drifted away for a couple of months, though still dearly missing each other. Ben takes his time to heal, still dealing with all the other problems he’s facing, especially the whole “Am I human, am I alien, am I something else?” and “How much of a hero am I without the watch?”. His friendship with Rook grows pretty well, and he settles somethings with Gwen and Kevin since they moved to university. So most relationships of his are going well, expect for romantic relationships...  He struggles to settle and commit to most of them, and mostly dates around for a bit, spending some time with people like Looma, Rook Shar, even Attea on one date. He does eventually settle with Ester for a bit, and the two seem like a good match. Both fun loving, eager for adventure, and enjoy each other’s company. And Ben did try and make it work, he really did, Ester was a great girl and he wanted the best for her but...again, it was hard for them to keep up with each other. Ester is a girl full of energy, and very much wants to do something 24/7, and while she doesn’t fault Ben, she will admit she does get lonely when he spends so much time off on missions she can’t join in, and the two break it off when Ben couldn’t be what she needed. But they are still close friends and hang out pretty often. Again, alone in his love life, Ben felt hopeless in it. Was he cursed to be single for the rest of his life? So when Kai came back into his life, his first proper crush he can remember, he will admit that maybe he jumped into things too quickly. There was no Kenny time traveling nonsense in this version, no fate tying to together, rather just two young teens jumping into a relationship neither ended up wanting. But they stuck with it for a while because they felt like they had to, despite the arguments and bickering. Both were scared to be alone, as Ben couldn’t lose another girlfriend, and Kai realized just how lonely her work made her feel. They didn’t hate each other, they just weren’t in love. It didn’t help that, since Julie returned to Bellwood with Herve, Ben felt jealous at Herve. Which annoyed him, because Herve was actually a really nice person, and gave Julie a lot of love. Really, it was more Ben angry at himself that he couldn’t provide the things Julie needed...And while Julie and Ben did talk and hang out from time to time, Ben was distance often, even when Julie reached out to him. It was just...seeing her so happy, living a normal life, Ben didn’t want to taint that with his presence.  It wasn’t until one fateful day that things started to turn around, though the start was pretty bad. It was another day, another fight with Vilgax, who was rampaging through the streets, clashing with Plumbers, Ben and Rook. Julie and Herve had been nearby when it started, and the two decided to help get civilians to safety, splitting up at one point to cover more ground. Julie ran into Rook and Ben, who tried to usher Julie away, but unfortunately Vilgax noticed her, and saw Ben’s panic of worry for Julie to run. It didn’t take long for Vilgax to remember who this young teenage girl was, and decided to use her as hostage against Ben. Seeing his arch nemesis using someone he secretly still loved as hostage, not to mention he had a pretty bad week before hand, Ben just...kind of snapped. He didn’t go easy on Vilgax for once, switching between multiple aliens rapidly to stomp Vilgax into the ground. (Side Note: I have the headcanon that, while Ben can do rapid transformation, if he does so many in a short amount of time, he does get a mild side affect of his emotions being amplified, due to his brain having tumbled around from the quick transformations.)   By the time the Plumbers and Rook arrived, the two city blocks had been trashed and Vilgax was burred into the road. Due to the side affect of multi  rapid transformations, Ben was protectively holding onto Julie, who had passed out from some injures from Vilgax (Nothing major, but the stress of it did make her lose conscious). They managed to pry Julie away, while Ben was taken away to calm down, needing to give his body and mind for a rest. Julie was taken to a Plumber hospital, and she woke up fairly soon with mild injures that wouldn’t be too much of a hassle to heal over the next few weeks. Many visited her, including Herve, her dad, Gwen and Kevin, along with Ship her stayed by her the entire time. It took a long while for Ben to show up, mostly because he was nervous and felt ashamed by how he acted, but Gwen gave him a good peep talk and convinced him to go.   It started off a little awkward, but simple, Ben checking how she was feeling, with her also making sure he was ok too. They catched up a bit, even laughing over some old memories, which eventually lead into a small discussion about their past relationship, both finally properly apologizing for how they acted, even clearly up a few things that were worried over, like Ben admitting that he had been avoiding Julie because he thought it was better for her, and not because he hated her or anything. Buttt, one thing lead to another and well...the two kissed in the heat of the moment, both going in for it, and for a few seconds it was bliss...until they both realized what they were doing, and understanding that one, Julie was still dating Herve, and second, Ben was still dating Kai. Flustered, Ben rushed out of there, with Julie panicking over what they did.

The two keep it a secret, not wanting people to know what happened between them, and when Julie got out of the hospital, they kind of awkwardly avoided each other, needing to think about things. They clearly still held feelings, but they were both dating other people and were scared to mess up with each other again. Cue them somehow almost always bumping into each other, like the gods themselves were trying to make them suffer, and their feelings becoming more and more obvious, but neither making a move of any kind. Ben confides in Kevin, Gwen and Rook, even admitting to his feelings and the kiss to them, and while they give him advice, they know it’s up to him and Julie to sort things out.

But Ben avoids it again, not ready and unsure in himself. He already messed up many relationships before hand, including with Julie, so what if it all went downhill again...And Julie questioned herself, she had been avoiding space and alien life for so long, thinking it would make her happy, but she starts to realize that no...it’s not making her happy, trying to deny something outside of her bubble just wasn’t working anymore, especially with her feelings towards Ben. However, after some long thinking, Ben decides to at least do one thing. So he organizes a get together with Kai at a cafe, needing to talk to her. The two have a sit down and Ben explains that this relationship isn’t working, and that they shouldn’t keep trying to make something that isn’t there to happen. Kai agrees, both feeling some stress loosen from their shoulders, and they still decide to be friends, feeling much more comfortable with a relationship like that, even sharing a nice hot chocolate together at the cafe. And so while Ben goes to deal with the other problem in his love life, Kai may or may not end up catching up with Ester in the process~ While Ben makes plans on what to do next, he and Rook are ended up being called over to a Plumber Prison base, to make plans to move Vilgax finally. Little did they know, Vilgax prepared for this. You see, a part of him already knew he’d be capture again, sent to this base to await movement, so the last time he was here, he built up some allies on the inside, and eventually the outside. He also knew Ben would show up, so he made a plan to make sure the Omnitrix wouldn’t get in the way. After how Ben stomped him into the streets before, Vilgax was looking for some nasty revenge. Not really kill Ben...but something more traumatic.  So when Ben and Rook show up, surprise surprise, Vilgax isn’t in his cell. While Rook talks to some of the guards, Ben searches Vilgax’s cell for clues, only for it to suddenly turn on, along with it’s defenses, including an electric shock that surprises Ben, and causes the watch to bug out, unable to be used. Rook check on Ben, but next thing anyone knows, alarms start blaring and almost all cells open, and prisoners start running while. Since Ben’s watch is down, and many people here hate him, Rook wants to keep him safe and tries to escort off the base. But Ben being Ben, he wanted to help, and rushed off to try and help some injured guards here and there, with Rook following. However, some prisoners, who were secretly working under Vilgax, skillfully guide Rook and Ben away from each other, and eventually trap Ben in a lone room, but not by himself. There, Vilgax was waiting for him, and since Ben didn’t have the watch to help, he was screwed. Vilgax knocked him around a few times, though being careful enough to not instantly kill Ben with his strength, before deciding finally to make the hero suffer. (Warning here for those who are squeamish) He does so but taking the tip of one of his claws, and dragging it down Ben’s arms, damaging his nerves. He would have done more, if not for Rook, the guards and some Plumber bursting in and chasing him off, saving Ben before he could bleed out, but the boy did pass out and wouldn’t wake up for a long while. People were, of course, scared...particularly Ben’s friends and family, who visited him everyday, mostly Max and surprisingly Azmuth, who also fixed the watch to help in Ben’s recovery. Gwen and Kevin ended up being the ones to inform Julie what happened, when she noticed Ben wasn’t around, and hearing that Ben almost died...it scared Julie. She didn’t want to lose him, of course, but also the idea that he could have died while they still had issues to fix...she didn’t want it to end like that, for things to be so messy and unclear. So when Herve saw her look down and upset, and getting her to explain what happened to Ben, the two talked. Herve admits that for a while he knew Julie still had feelings for Ben, and could tell that things weren’t so cut and dry between them, especially when he got to met Ben himself. He also admits that maybe Julie and Herve are, in a way, maybe a little too perfect for each other. Their relationship is stagnant at times, with not a lot of growth because never healthy challenges the other. So with no hard feelings whatsoever, Herve says that if Julie wants too, the two can break up but still remain friends, and Julie thanks him, agreeing too and even asking that she hopes he can still be her photographer. And for the next few weeks, Julie visits Ben with some of the others from time to time, hoping he’ll be ok so they can talk... Eventually, Ben wakes up, Azmuth having been there when he did so, and helps to catch the young boy up on what happened. Ben notices that, while his arms have been healing finely enough, his nerves are a little slow in the process, having not fully recovered, shown by him unable to keep his arms and hands steady, constantly shaking when moving them. It scares him, even when Azmuth reassures him that they’ll heal thanks to the watch...Ben just can’t help but feel like if they don’t heal, then he may have to give up the hero business in the end, even if that’s just his fears playing tricks on him.  So during his recovery, people come visit him, making sure he’s ok. Until eventually, Julie shows up, wanting to make sure he’s ok, and knowing they had to talk. They couldn’t keep putting it off, especially after something like this, and Ben finally agrees to stop running and to finally clear things out. They discuss a little more about their past relationship, about their insecurities during it, and where they go from here, both mentioning they’ve broken up with Herve and Kai.  They talk some more, relaxing in each other’s company, and admit to their feelings, both deep down knowing they want to give it another go. And since they’ve had time apart, learnt from new experiences, they decide that maybe they can try, taking it slow and see where it will go. And the two kiss, and for once in a very long time...it feels right. As said, they take things slow, and after everything that happened in the past few years, things actually go well for them. There are, of course, hiccups there and here, but they’re matured enough to know how to talk things through, and solve problems together.  Ben does start to recover more and leave the hospital, and while he nerves aren’t fully healed by them, they will eventually. And while the two go one small dates during his healing, catching up and being blissfully happy with each other, they end up bumping into Kai and Ester, who appear to also be dating now. One thing led to another and the four end up going on double dates fairly often, having fun times together, Ben 100% supporting his two exs dating, seeing how happy they are. Julie, Ester and Kai even like to share cheesy stories of when Ben was their boyfriend, and he loves to play alone with it too.   And that, is my take on Ben and Julie’s relationship! 💚💗

[everythingsinred]

Let's Talk About NatsuMikan: The Anime (pt. 1)

I could go on and on about these two and I think I will, just because I don’t often see people talk about the analysis behind them. The meta I have seen about them has included a perspective that equaled the anime and the manga and I don’t think that’s an accurate way of viewing their relationship.

The anime is a different species than the manga, something that frequently happens during the adaptation from page to screen. Since they’re so different, I’ll analyze them separately.

There's going to be many parts to this so I'll keep a table of contents right here so people can more easily navigate (though you can also read through the "let's talk about natsumikan: the anime" tag on my blog):

Anime Analysis

Part 1: Exposition & Episode 7

Part 2: Episodes 8, 9, 10, & 11

Part 3: Episodes 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, & 17

Part 4: Episodes 18 & 19

Part 5: Episodes 20, 21, & 22

Part 6: Episodes 23, 24, 25, & 26 & Conclusion

The anime makes changes, as anime adaptations often do. The most outstanding changes are appearance related, as Natsume now has brown eyes instead of red, in addition to other characters who have hue-shifted eyes and hair. But there are also story changes, and I’ll be focusing on the changes that occur, specifically in regards to Natsume and Mikan and their relationship.

For one, their relationship starts evolving much earlier in the anime. I think it’s pretty undeniable that in the anime, Natsume started liking Mikan at the end of the dodgeball game. That scene never happened in the manga, but in the anime, it’s a crucial step in making sure nothing seems too sudden or forced.

The anime is 26 episodes long. If Natsume only starts liking Mikan after she saves him during the Reo Arc, then we’re already halfway through the show when positive feelings between the two appear. On the other hand, the feelings develop more slowly in the manga because there’s more time to properly develop the relationship in a more drawn out way.

My analysis will start with the anime, because it’s shorter and easier to discuss.

Exposition

It’s impossible to say that the anime was completely loyal to the manga. It very frequently couldn’t be, because it needed to fill in time in episodes or give closure early before the manga even addressed it (Natsume’s backstory in the anime, for instance, is vaguely referred to and implies deviation from the manga).

The most obvious difference between the manga and the anime from the get-go is visual. Not only do they have differing art styles (I don’t dislike the anime style but Higuchi Tachibana’s art style is so distinct and unmistakable while the anime’s isn’t so unique), but the setting is also different.

While the manga started in the depth of winter, the anime starts off in summer/fall. It always struck me as odd that while the first page of the manga has Mikan running after Hotaru in full winter-wear, the anime starts off warm and idyllic. You could almost think of that as a general warning for the difference between the anime and the manga. After all, while the anime has a reputation for being a cutesy and upbeat story about friendship and magical powers, the manga is much darker and discusses many morbid and depressing themes that can and WILL fuck you up. Warm vs. cold seems like an accurate difference, though I don’t think that was intentional.

We see way more of the village life in the anime, including Mikan’s efforts to keep the school from closing. This is a welcome change because Mikan’s passion to keep the school open is nothing compared to her friendship with Hotaru, and even after the school is saved, she runs away to see her friend, even if it means she goes to another school. The manga doesn’t imply that Mikan knew already about the school’s fate, and since she is always so preoccupied with Hotaru anyway, we don’t really get the impression that she cares very much. To Anime!Mikan, Hotaru is more important than saving the school, something she was so passionate about she rallied to get signatures. It’s an extra scene to prove just how much Hotaru matters to Mikan, and to show even more how selfless Hotaru was to go to Alice Academy, since she knew how much the school mattered to Mikan.

“Sign my petition to get a Gakuen Alice anime reboot!!!”

My boy Natsume is only introduced properly in the second episode, when we actually see his face and he speaks. His appearance is different from the manga’s too. I’m not sure if this was to appeal to a younger audience or what, but Natsume’s eyes are changed to brown instead of their iconic red, something that was always my biggest peeve about the anime adaptation. His hair is also somewhat purplish instead of entirely grey/black and, although this does bother me a lot less than the eyes, I wonder why they made this change when other characters have black hair. It might have been to differentiate him from Hotaru, another main character with black hair, though I’ve never had issue in the manga telling them apart.

His first interaction with Mikan is a lot more pleasant in the anime than in the manga, although that’s not really saying anything. Mikan’s skirt simply falls off and Natsume draws attention to it, rather than the unpleasant events that took place in the manga. This different event makes it a lot easier to support a relationship between the two of them right off the bat. They are still antagonistic but it’s not as terrible as it is in the manga. This makes it easier to establish romantic feelings earlier on, and might have been changed in order to achieve just that, or possibly also to appeal to a younger audience. Maybe both? Who knows.

“You can’t sit with us!”

With Natsume presented the way he is in the anime, it’s easier to make the claim that he’s simply a good guy who acts the way he does to protect people. And it’s true! He is! But he is also so much more. In the manga, he’s a more complicated character. Although he is a good person, he still requires character development, which is something he does go through, and something I’ll talk about more in his meta analysis later.

Most of the events at the beginning of the anime parallel the events of the manga. Mikan goes to Alice Academy at the same time of year, Natsume shows up with an explosion, Mikan has to go through the Northern Woods, she discovers her powers in her fight with Natsume, etc. Some of the continuation from episode to episode is different than the transitions between chapter to chapter, there’s extra scenes inserted to fill up time, and some of the exposition seems strangely presented (in the anime, Mikan finds out more about the school when she finds Narumi and Iinchou waiting for her at a tea party, which is…. Super weird…), but all in all the information and events are mainly the same. The big differences start with the dodgeball episode.

“Look how happy she is. Makes me wanna barf.”

Episode 7 vs. Chapter 9

I love the dodgeball episode. I feel like for the most part, the anime does deviation from the manga pretty well. With the last arc as an exception, I generally enjoy their changes and additions to the plot. The anime has to be different, has to progress at a different pace, has to introduce topics at different times. They have an episode to fill, and less time to build relationships. Natsume and Mikan are both different characters in the anime but it’s very subtle and has to happen due to the fact that the anime is shorter and seems more designed for younger audiences, in addition to wrapping up before the manga could explore more of the story.

Anyway, let’s talk about the dodgeball episode. AGAIN THIS DOES NOT HAPPEN IN THE MANGA THE SAME WAY so when discussing NatsuMikan as a concept, the anime events cannot be treated the same as the manga events. A lot of people maybe forget that the manga is very different than the anime when it comes to this episode. I see the two media conflated in plenty of fanfics, where seventeen year old NatsuMikan reflect on the dodgeball game from their youth that changed everything, and I get it because the anime version of the dodgeball game is cute! It's shippy! It's fun! But it doesn't happen in the manga the same way.

There's a similar trope with the sakura tree, which I can only remember from the anime, and yet it's such a fundamental aspect of NM fanfic it might as well have played a vital role in both anime and manga. Nothing wrong with any of this, of course. I'm just making it clear that my analysis will cover the two media as separate for the sake of a cohesive essay. Separating them in fanfic is far less important.

This look could probably kill someone. I’m surprised Mikan is still alive, TBH.

The chapter’s focus is Mikan starting to feel more at home in Class B, making friends with her once-hostile classmates, but the episode is more preoccupied with Natsume and Mikan’s perspectives on each other. While in the manga, the game ends with a tie and Mikan accidentally hits Hotaru in the face with the ball, the anime draws out the game to fill an episode and to introduce an evolution in the way Natsume sees Mikan. The first part of the anime episode is Mikan introducing her friends to her new senpai, Tsubasa. After she invites her friends, we see Natsume glowering at her and promptly ditching the next class, saying to Ruka that he can’t stand being in the same class as her. This addition to the plot already foreshadows that their relationship will change in some way by the end of the episode.

Tsubasa tells a frustrated Mikan that if she wants Natsume to be less unpleasant, he’d need to release some of his toxic energy. Thus, the sporty Mikan introduces the concept of dodgeball to the unwelcoming class. When they finally agree, Natsume gives one condition: that they play with the notorious Alice Ball, which is powered by the thrower’s alice (a detail absent from the manga). This Alice Ball is particularly terrifying with the threat of Natsume’s dangerous fire alice. Mikan also needs to get more people on her team, another aspect absent from the manga. While in the manga, Mikan only had her few friends on her team (including a wandering Ruka) and this ended up playing to her advantage, the anime has a humorous plot of Mikan tracking players down for her team, including a fake mustache she makes with her pigtails (she’s so cute, I love her), paying Hotaru to be on her team, and blackmailing Ruka to participate. This was mainly to fill time, but it makes the dodgeball game more important as well.

In the manga, we don’t see how the game ends, just that the teams tied and that everyone in class is having fun and bonding. In the anime, more emphasis is put on the “Mikan vs. Natsume” aspect, so a tie like the manga’s would be anticlimactic. Thus, the anime concludes the dodgeball game with Mikan and Natsume being the only kids left on the court, and Natsume not using his alice when he throws the Alice Ball. Even Hotaru leaving the game is something she does out of boredom instead of injury, further separating the other characters from the plot. It’s about Natsume and Mikan, and everyone else is mostly a side character. (Though Ruka also plays a vital role to this episode AND chapter, and it’s at this point that I think he started developing real feelings for Mikan as well. So when it comes to the anime, he and Natsume fall for Mikan around the same time, but in the manga, Ruka likes her first and the “he liked her first” argument for Natsume vanishes, though he never had that “advantage” to begin with.)

“Thank you!”

Natsume wins (something that shocked me at twelve years old) and is ready to walk away with his handy “tch” and all but Mikan thanks him for not using his alice and he goes off on her, demanding to know why she’s still smiling despite her loss. She says she’s happy that he had fun and was involved with the rest of class for once, and that in a way that means she wins. For Anime!Natsumikan, this is it. This is the turning point. “I just wanted you to be happy and have fun,” is what Mikan might as well be saying. “Really, this was all for you!” It’s sweet and it’s thoughtful and I don’t think Natsume ever imagined he’d be on the receiving end of her kindness, especially after all their beef. Manga!Mikan would probably not say these things to him, even if she meant them, for the sole reason that Mikan is stubborn and holds onto her pride, especially when it comes to her early relationship with Natsume, but Anime!Mikan is much more forgiving and much more willing to extend an olive branch, like in the dance episode. In any case, Natsume starts falling right then, and it’s obvious too, because he is pissed, and even more angry because he’s not even mad at her. He’s angry with himself for his change of opinion. This is the girl he was fully content to hate forever and yet here he was, starting to like her. Not ideal.

This scene, something so crucial to the development of Anime!Natsumikan, is completely absent from the manga. In the manga, Natsume still dislikes her by the end of the game although he does have fun.

He's not angry, just disappointed. In himself.

I’m not going to say one is better when it comes to starting up NatsuMikan because they’re very different creatures and I actually thoroughly enjoy both.

Anyway, the NatsuMikan after episode 7 is almost the same as in the manga, but the events carry a different weight since we know Natsume likes Mikan now (even if he would never admit it).

Summary

I hope this first part was interesting, and that it introduced the idea of Anime!NatsuMikan as being a little different from the manga's version. Yes, it is more or less the same story, but with so many thematic and plot changes, they take a different form as well, in a perhaps more subtle way, kind of like a slightly canon divergent fanfic. Fanfic where Natsume starts liking Mikan a bit earlier on in the story.

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