#this is really long because I'm shit at being concise

[starcurtain]

I wish everyone collectively understood aventurine’s character like you…things would be so much easier! I genuinely don’t understand how people keep getting his motivations wrong??? Could it be because some of the most popular Aven fanfics were written prior to his release? That could have contributed to some of the takes we tend to see about him…thoughts?

I struggled all day to come up with a concise way to answer this and couldn't think of one, so here, have a long-winded ramble:

I don't think early fic writers have much impact in the situation with Aventurine's character now, since most people can look at when a story was posted and go "Oh, this was before we had ____ information."

I think that Aventurine's problem is being a male character in a gacha game. Gacha game characters are designed to sell. Hoyo can sell female characters very, very easily. Give her huge tits and a visible underwear strap and you're good to go. I love all my guy friends, but I'm not gonna sugarcoat it: straight men are not the hardest audience to please. Hit a particular fetish (feet, spandex, dommy mommy), and you're gucci.

Nah, we all know why Jade's trailer is Like That.™

Male characters in gacha are harder to sell because women as consumers are a little harder to predict. Does every woman want a tall, ripped hunk? Shit, no, small cute boyish models like Aventurine are selling better now? Why?! Would a bad boy be more popular than a nice guy??? It's harder to account for women's tastes, especially because they are often (a little) less visually-oriented.

Hoyo is good at what they do though, and they've figured out that male characters sell very well when they possess at least one of two specific traits:

Endearing vulnerability/helplessness

Gay ship tease

Give a character both, like Aventurine? They might as well be printing money.

That sound you hear is Hoyo's stock prices rising.

So, from the very beginning, Hoyo is incentivized to create a character that appeals to people, a character people will want to crack their wallets open for. And they achieved this, first and foremost, by giving Aventurine traits that female players (in particular, but men too), find especially appealing: emotional and physical vulnerability.

We see Aventurine's pain. We sympathize with his grief. We identify with his struggle to make meaning of his difficult life. He's our woobie, blorbo, babygirl, whatever the hell they're calling it now.

He can't hide his suffering anymore. He's on the very edge. He's a dude in distress. He's surrounded by enemies! He misses his mama! He's been betrayed! No one understands him like you do, dear player!

The ultimate feeling evoked is: He needs to be saved.

When people talk about male power fantasies, I think they forget that women can experience them too, and "Emotionally vulnerable man that only I (or my favorite character) can fix" is actually a female power fantasy.

And from there it's really easy, right: the people who shell out cash to buy warps for their harmed-husbando feel like they've saved him; the people who are into mlm ships look for the nearest hot dude to be the savior Ratio was waiting for his time lol.

Morally and intellectually, this type of deep-down-golden-hearted, emotionally-wounded male character is very easy to digest. There is nothing to dislike about this type of character or role in the story: this character is a good guy who has just gone through so many terrible situations, whose victim status makes him endearing, and whose lack of agency means that any of the questionable or downright bad things he does are always the result of someone else forcing his hand, and never something he would have chosen himself.

His motivations are always clear and consistent: get free, heal, and live happily ever after.

Insert the Wreck-It Ralph meme: "Do people assume all your problems got solved when a big strong man showed up?" But to be fair, a big strong man did kind of solve Aventurine's problem, so--

Anyway, it's simple. It's straightforward. Morally, it's pretty cut and dry, black and white: Aventurine is our hero, which means everyone dictating the course of his miserable life is evil.

Hoyo is not remotely discouraging people from literally buying into this emotional appeal.

And trust me, I get it. I'll be the first to admit that hurt-comfort is its own entire genre in fandom because it is so appealing. People eat up Aventurine's tragic backstory like candy! The idea of watching a character go through hell at the hands of bad guys just to finally find a happy end is like the definition of everyone's favorite story.

In fact... people love Aventurine's suffering so much, they have invented whole new ways for him to suffer that aren't even in the game.

This is where we get all the headcanons that Aventurine was a sex slave, every single person he meets hates him because of his race, the Stonehearts are executioners holding knives to his throat, Jade enslaved him to the IPC with a lifelong contract, his material possessions belong to the company, the IPC is forcing him to take only the most dangerous missions where he is being required by his evil jailers to continually put his life on the line... You name it and I promise you, I can find a fanfic where Aventurine suffers from it. 😂

Bro can't even sleep in on his day off; life is so hard for this man.

Being serious: if the game is telling us that Aventurine is a victim... Why not make him the perfect victim?

Why not envision an Aventurine with no freedom, who bears no responsibility for any of the horrible situations he is in or any of the dubious things he does?

It's so natural to like that version of Aventurine, so appealing to see a totally powerless underdog use his own wits and charms to claw his way up to freedom. Or, if you're the kind who really relishes angst: It's even appealing to see Aventurine lose more. To delight in fics where he loses his wealth, where the IPC punishes him for past crimes while he's powerless to stop them... (I assure you, this is many people's cup of tea and the fanfics prove it!)

Ultimately, there's nothing wrong with liking characters who are exactly this straightforward! It's completely fine to embrace characters that are intentionally written to be morally above-board, whose primary role in the story is to generate angst by being a good person who suffers, or those characters who never show unlikable traits, bad decisions, or contradictory actions.

The problem is that that's just not who the game is telling us Aventurine is.

Hoyo may be capitalizing off people who love to envision poor Aventurine still living his life as a slave... But the game also needs to tell a complicated enough story overall to appeal to people who don't care about this specific husbando--Aventurine's role in the actual game's plot has to be interesting enough for almost everyone to appreciate it, not just Aventurine's simp squad. (Don't get mad, I'm in the simp squad with you.)

So his character doesn't stop at just being a pure-hearted victim who is still waiting to be saved.

Aventurine is not that easy to label, and I think the biggest struggle in this character's fandom right now is between people who prefer the even-more-angsty, still-a-slave Aventurine versus people who want a morally grey, self-destructive character instead.

To me personally, while I greatly understand the appeal of fanon!Aventurine and the joy of a really juicy angst fic where characters lose it all, I think that missing out on the depth that canon is suggesting would be a real loss on the fandom's part.

The character motivations that Aventurine shows in the game are complicated. They cancel each other out. They're basically self-harm! He makes almost every situation he's in worse for himself--on purpose.

He is a good person, but also a person who has done unspeakable things. He does have morals, but he's not above allowing those who don't have them to use him to their advantage.

He's both the victim and the victor. He's his own worst enemy. He's a lost little boy who's been making terrible decisions for himself since he was like eight years old, and a grown ass man who is barely managing to fake his way through an existence that destiny is not letting him quit.

This kind of character is a lot harder to embrace. He's done things that most people would find appalling--like willingly joining up with the organization that let his entire race be massacred. He's invented a whole new peacock persona to frivolously flaunt riches he doesn't even care about (Poison Dart Frog Self-Defense 101). He actively plays into racist stereotypes about his people to manipulate others through their preconceived expectations. He's made a mockery of his mother's and sister's hopes and dreams by endlessly trying to throw his own life away.

He has flaws! He bet everything he had on a ploy without doing his homework to find out if the people he was risking his life for were even still around. (Maybe he already knew, and couldn't bear to admit it, even to himself.) He's intentionally off-putting and obnoxious to everyone he meets (Poison Dart Frog Self-Defense 102). He terrifies everyone who gets close to him by (seemingly) carelessly throwing himself into the jaws of death without the slightest provocation.

He knowingly allows the IPC to exploit his power and talents for profit. Did everyone forget that his role in the Strategic Investment Department is asset liquidation?! Like, his actual day-to-day job is ruining people's lives. Canonically, Aventurine kills people when his deals go bad.

His motivations change off-screen in two lines of story text. We're told in one line that his biggest reason for joining the IPC was to make money to save the Avgin, then in the next line we find out that's impossible. And... then what? What motivations does he even have now? The whole point of his character arc from 2.0-2.1 is that he was on the edge of giving in to utter despair and nihilism because he couldn't even perceive a single reason to stay alive. He has no purpose in life before Penacony, and that didn't start with the Stonehearts at all??

People keep saying Aventurine was held in the IPC by golden handcuffs, but how do you tie down someone for whom profit is meaningless? What can you offer to a man whose only desire is to bring back something already lost forever? How do you imprison someone whose only definition of freedom is, canonically, death?

Working for the Stonehearts is obviously not healthy. But that's why Aventurine was doing it--because taking dangerous missions allowed him to put himself at risk. The job that he originally pursued hoping to save his people became a direct means to self-harm, and the IPC's only real role in that was just happily profiting off the results.

The journal entries for Aventurine's quests are there deliberately to tell the player what is on his mind, and none of it has to do with escaping from his job:

Like... Work is the least of this man's problems.

At really the risk of rambling on too long now, he's also just a massive walking contradiction:

Aventurine is among the most explicitly religious characters in the game, yet he's one of the only people in the entire game that we have ever seen actively question his people's aeon.

You might be tempted to think Aventurine's risky gambles with his life as an adult are a result of giving up after finding out about the Avgin massacre... Butttt no, Hoyo makes sure to tell us that even at knee-high in the Sigonian desert, Kakavasha was already willing to risk himself in a fight to the death against monsters because even back then he found his own life to have less value than a single memento.

He's the "chosen one" who will lead his people to prosperity... except they're all dead.

He's explicitly suicidal... andddd also a pathstrider of Preservation.

He wants to die... He doesn't want to die. He wants to make it end, yet goes to staggering lengths to continually survive. (Every plan risks his life on purpose--but every plan's win condition is also to live.) He life is the chip tossed down, but his hand is trembling beneath the table. When faced with an otherwise unsurvivable situation, Aventurine literally became a winner of the Hunger Games. He beat other innocent people to death with his own chain-bound hands just to come out alive.

He knows the IPC failed the Avgin and left them to die... and he still willingly sought out a position of power in their organization. Maybe he really is after revenge... but maybe not.

He starts his journey in the IPC with a truly noble goal in mind: to help his people using his newfound wealth and power. He's a good guy who did genuinely want to save the Avgin and repay all those who helped him. But once it became clear he was too late, once it was obvious he would have no use at all for that monetary wealth and power he risked his life to get... What did he do with it? Unlike Jade, we don't see him over here donating to orphanages. (I'm not that heartless; I'm sure he does actually do a lot of good things with his money on the side, but the point is that the game does not show us that--it shows us, over and over again, Aventurine putting on a wasteful, over-indulgent persona toward wealth. We've supposed to feel how meaningless money is to him, how meaningless everything is becoming to him.)

He outright refuses to use underhanded tactics or to cheat at gambles, which is meant to show us that's he's more morally upright than his coworkers. There's an entire exchange where he says that he'll never stoop to using manipulation the way Opal does. But... he doesn't have any issue fulfilling Opal's exact agenda. He was never remotely morally conflicted about denying the Penaconians their freedom by dragging Penacony back under IPC control.

He's willing to risk his own life, which is one thing--but he's also willing to risk other people's well-being. Topaz accuses him of constantly egging their clients on into dangerous situations; we've actively seen him shove a gun into Ratio's hands and pull the trigger with no care for how Ratio would feel about that on their very first meeting... Dragging the Astral Express crew into the entire Penacony plan in the first place was exceedingly dangerous...

To me, I just think it's vital to understand his character through the lens of these contradictions because they demonstrate the extreme polarity of Aventurine's life: from rags to riches, from powerless to empowered by multiple aeons, from willing to kill to survive to killing himself... He has quite literally lived a life of "all or nothing," and while he is the victim of many terrible situations out of his control, his arc as a character involves facing the truth of himself and the future his own actions are hurtling him toward.

Frankly, the Aventurine that canon is suggesting is a little annoying. You want to grab him by the shoulders, shake him, and say "Why are you like this?!" And he won't even have an answer for you, because he doesn't even know why he's still alive.

In the end, to me, this is so, so much more interesting. I can read an endless supply of hurt-comfort fics where Aventurine escapes the evil IPC and Ratio is there to fill the void in his life with the power of love and catcakes and be a perfectly happy clam online, but I want canon to continue to serve us this incredible mess of a man who constantly takes one step forward and two steps back.

Who is fully aware of his role as a cog in the grotesque profit-wheel of cosmic capitalism and still manages to say he never changed from the rags-wearing desert rat of the Sigonian wastes.

Who over and over again flirts with nihility but, ultimately, even if he has to wrest it from the grip of the gods themselves with bloody, chain-bound hands, chooses life.

[blossomthepinkbunny]

Vivzepop will always be the biggest issue with her own show if she doesn't change. And i'm not saying that because I desperately want to shit on her but rather because it's so clear that her attitude is what made Hazbin Hotel be so dissapointing after the long wait. The pilot released four years ago and Viv had these characters for much longer than that. One could assume that with this much time on her hands she would have a concise plan for how a series of her story would play out (I can imagine that having an own show is a dream for lots of creative people out there). And I get that that plan might get screwed up by a shorter episode count then expected, but she should be the one who knows her story best and who should know what stuff could also be cut out. The first season of Hazbin Hotel is so incredibly overstuffed with characters and plot that it completely looses the main premise the show was originally pitched with (the idea of a hotel were sinners are redeemed. As it is now the hotel is really not important at all). People have talked endlessly about how Viv can't handle criticism and it really sucks because criticism is one of the best ways to improve your writing, drawings, music etc. Without criticism you won't refine the thing you're working on in a meaningful way. Of course it feels bad when you put something out there you wanted to share and then people critique it, but that's part of pretty much every creative journey, or atleast it should be and Vivzepop shouldn't get a pass from this just because she doesn't like it. And there are great shows, movies or books that are rarely or almost never criticised. But the artists behind these works probably went trough years of honing what they do by being criticised for the stuff they put out. And I don't want to say that Vivzepop didn't work hard to make Hazbin Hotel, but it is hard to claim that she improves in her craft, when everytime someone says they don't like her show she throws a hissy fit. She wants the same reactions that these other amazing pieces of media get without ever listening to criticism. Which she sees as a personal attack rather than a tool that could help her to achieve the same level of writing prowess the creators behind media like that have. She believes she is already on the same level as them, just because she basically shuts anyone out who disagrees with her. There's this clip at the end of a Drew Gooden Video which I think sums up the situation with Viv pretty good (the Video is called "Leaving the YouTube Bubble"). He is talking about Lily Singh and her talk show but I feel like a lot of the stuff he says about handling criticism applies to Vivzepop as well.

(you might have to turn up the audio).

Unprofessional behaviour like that might be excusable when the creator is pretty young or they are interacting with publicity for the first time really. But neither of that applies to Viv. And Hazbin Hotel isn't just an indie animation pilot on youtube anymore. It's now a fully realized show created with a pretty prominent studio on a major streaming network and it should be held to the same standards as other shows or movies alike (not saying indie animation or animation on youtube doesn't have a standard but with more budget and support, there's obviously going to be different expectations for the show now). There have been issues in Helluva Boss and the Hazbin Hotel pilot ever since their release which could've been handled with more time and the new show. But Vivzepop shows time and time again that she isn't willing to listen to people who criticise her, which could actually lead to her show getting better. I don't like Viv or her work a lot. I think she is incredibly unprofessional and she has done her fair share of questionable or problematic stuff, which often leads to issues in her shows. There have been some characters I like, some songs or scenes that were pretty well done, very cool animation and an actually interesting premise on paper in HH and HB. There are things that make me come back to these shows to watch the next episode. And i'm obviously passionate enough about these shows to make whole posts about what I think was done badly and what could be changed. But for the aspects of HH or HB I enjoy, there are soo many more problems I have with it. Problems that won't go away unless Viv stops seeing every criticism as a personal attack. Because if Vivzepop doesn't stop acting like her writing is some unreachable stuff that needs no changes I don't really see a point in assuming that these shows will ever get better.

[bengiyo]

Marahuyo Project Eps 7 & 8 (Finale) Stray Thoughts

Last time, the kids struggled to pick a name for their LGBTQIA+ organization while discussing their strategy before the school board. They eventually decided to focus on connecting their hopes for the island's future with its past, and set about researching. Archie gave Venice some files from the church, Lorie looked through files her dad had, and Ino suggested interviewing people after providing equipment. We learned that Archie is struggling with the path to holy orders (manifested in his neck scratching), Ino said aloud that he was gay and kissed King, and Lili is probably intersex. Each of our our kids is holding confidence about this. Lili read Marco for filth, read him for blood, but unfortunately we left at Marco outing her.

Episode 7: Aswang

You know King isn't the violent type, because some of my people would have curb stomped his ass by now.

Oh, Ino. I understand.

Okay, Lili's story is so sad and lonely. I'm glad she told Lili before this.

Oof, Lorie was not ready for the friends to lovers kiss.

That was difficult, but King is right. He shouldn't ask Ino to come out, but it doesn't stop him from getting hurt.

King's grandmother is great. It's making me sad that Ino has no one else to talk to after that.

Wow, Marco is really doubling down on being an asshole.

I appreciate this show now disguising the kinds of casual homophobia you run into.

It's hard to recognize when you need to give someone you love space when you want to help.

I do like the idea of them reclaiming the balagtasan as a way to present their ideas to the island.

I knew it was Ino who graffitied the mural.

Gay people really will turn their relationship problems into a public spectacle.

This poetry is beautiful.

Oh, Ino, I'm proud of you.

My boy is bleeding!! Marco, it's on sight!!

Man, what a concise breakdown of how it feels to know your truth and have your caregivers try to stifle that in you for the sake of appearances.

Episode 8: Babaylan

Ino and King opening up old wounds.

Yes, King, tell your mom. Shame is learned at home. A kid can face the world if they're safe at home.

I love King so much for not sugarcoating how bad public scorn can get.

Swimming at night is very dangerous, but I'm always happy to receive an underwater kiss BECAUSE IT STILL BELONGS TO THE GAYS.

Oh good. Lorie and Lili are finally talking.

See, this is the thing about doing queer media versus making QL sometimes. Apologizing for loving someone is such a queer experience. Your love isn't something that you should be ashamed of, and you shouldn't have to apologize for caring a lot about someone.

This feels like the right place for these two as friends to possibly more.

Oh shit Lili got me when she held back tears at getting best friends.

It really is exhausting how hard authority works constantly to police and enforce heteronormativity. There are so few of us. Why is it always this constant bullshit?

Oof, I actually like this choice to have Archie vote to impeach Ino, become the new president, and then immediately return to the site where they honored Christina to cry about it. Venice understands that taking care of other queers is a long term project. At least Archie said her name.

Many of my beloved elders have passed. I wish I could talk to them sometimes. Especially Barry.

I love that Venice is eating in almost every scene.

Hey! They finally picked a name!

I love how homophobes talk about history, and then storm out when confronted with uncomfortable truths.

Crying over these outfits. They're so right. Formal acceptance by the status quo doesn't erase our existence, or the bonds between us. We will make space for ourselves and those like us.

Oh, Archie. I understand you, too. I hope you find peace with yourself and others.

I love Sue Prado, but does the mom really deserve to be here? I'll accept them trying to extend grace to struggling parents since Grandma has been with them the whole time.

This march works though. Before it was only three of them. Now look at them.

A post credits scene! Wait, I love the idea of Juvy and Jose going to visit them!

Final Verdict: 9.5, Finally Some Good Fucking Food. I am just so relieved to have another show from JP Habac. It's clear he and his friends have such strong ideas about where queer people fit in our society today, and I love that his work is never about defeating homophobia and is instead about connecting others to queer joy. Despite how this show stirred up all sorts of old hurts in me, I feel so much love for these characters, and I'm so thankful that I can point to a show with a wide spectrum of queer experiences delivered in such a beautiful package. It's so rare to see a show treat the closet seriously, and I will be thinking about this show forever, alongside JP's previous work: Gaya sa Pelikula (aka Like in the Movies).

[galedekarios]

I really appreciate you defending our boy so valiantly and with such well thought out, concise arguments! As someone who has ADHD, and has struggled with depression my whole life, I immediately latched onto Gale bc I see so much of myself in him!! There is SO much to love about him and he's one of those characters that helps me be more compassionate to myself (self recognition through the other for the win!) so seeing fans constantly shit on him is disheartening and really annoying, but to see the actual DEVELOPERS talk about "yeah that guy sucks he's SO annoying everyone would be better off if he had just killed himself" is.....ooof.

BUT thankfully when I start feeling really upset we've got blogs like you to ride to our favorite wizard's defense and help celebrate all the things we love about this beautiful, complex character! I hope one day we won't have to work so hard to push back against this negativity towards Gale (and any character that isn't that one who fans and devs have deemed perfect and flawless and the only one that matters...) but as long as we do I appreciate all the work and passion you put in to raising up Gale of Waterdeep!

(and sorry this went on forever I just get really discouraged in this fandom sometimes but seeing your posts always build me right back up and I wanted to let you know what a bright spot you are in my bg3 experience! ^^)

thank you for sending me this message! 🖤

i normally try to ignore these things because at the end of the day, they are meaningless.

but... not only does this come from the devs, but this hit a bit too close to home for me as well.

i've been struggling a lot with depression myself for the better part of a decade now.

i'll try to put my feelings into words bc how they have chosen to respond here and the message they are sending actually upsets me. i know i'm repeating myself at this point so sorry for sounding like a broken record myself, but:

gale is clearly coming out of a depression & self-isolation & struggles with suicidal ideation.

there is absolutely no sugarcoating that.

despite that, once he has no choice but to travel again after he's been abducted by the nautiloid, or perhaps because of it, he can't help himself. he can't isolate himself again. he's happy to talk and connect with not only the protag, but also the companions. he talks a lot, he cooks for them, and yes, sometimes he can be overbearing. he tends to overexplain. he corrects himself for talking too much, being too much. he's very aware of that perception of him and it's still an insecurity of his by the time the epilogue rolls around. it's in the devnotes. it's in the way he thanks the protag for encouraging him to attend the get-together at all.

i thought (foolishly, apparently) that at least the people who created the game and who are colleagues with gale's writer, had the emotional maturity and intelligence to recognise that and also see how that could be something a part of their player base emphasises and connects with.

gale being described as the one who annoys everyone and him dying as the "right" ending, as making up for being perceived as "annoying" by those around him, "inconveniencing" them by being ill and asking for a treatment, and his death being contextualised as "giving" back "to the world" is just...

it's so fucking disgusting to me.

[genghisthebrain]

ranking things wednesday definitely calls enid (and you should call your significant other)

my sweet potato moonshine - alcohol is good to wednesday, enid is good to wednesday. big fan of the implication wednesday makes alcohol for fun. 8/10.

canine of my heart - bonus points for the tswift reference. maybe a little long for my liking. good over an email. 7/10.

delicate rabies - short, concise, loving term of endearment. 10/10.

scritch scratch - decent, definitely like it extra because of the alliteration and pararhyme. 6.5/10.

dead tree cells - this is a good pun on "bark." and I'm a pun kinda gal. 7/10.

sinclair de lune - as a pianist and, again, a pun gal, I give this points, but as a human being who doesn't really like clair de lune, I'm indifferent. 8.5/10.

ravishing wall rat - yall seen those posts on tiktok about the massive rats that come out of walls? that's what she's comparing enid to. and they're kind of cute. I think this is sweet, a good inside joke and funny. 9/10.

manicured mongrel - pretty much enid in a nutshell. canine and always with some good ass nails. 8/10.

mrs addams - adorable as shit, I love the love, 11/10.

[mickmundy]

spy headcanon thread! just some of my personal thoughts and musings about his character :-) enjoy!

starting off by saying that spy is Absolutely Everything to me.. i've put his thread off for so long because i have SO much to say and im afraid i'll leave stuff out BUT we're going to take a Stab at it (😏) and i guess i'll just add more stuff later if i need! As Usual this is just pasted from my twitter so i'm sorry for any wonky formatting issues!

the most important thing to me about spy's character is that it is Varied and can be Contradictory. i say this about all of the mercs tbh but spy is among the Most important given his role/occupation as a spy. he IS A Spy, but he's also Just Some Guy (gender neutral).

spy is a bit dry; very sarcastic, a bit stoic, but he's definitely not heartless. i think he's very "emotionally in-tune" to those around him and prides himself on being able to read a room exceptionally well!

... but just because he knows what people might be thinking doesn't mean he's going to do anything about it! he likes being in the know but seldom ever enjoys interfering; it's best if he keeps out of the fray, or so he tells himself!

that being said, i Do think spy makes exceptions to this rule (which To Me is what makes his character Interesting!).... as we see in expiration date! he spends his "last living days" helping scout become a worthy date for miss pauling!

if he sees someone Floundering or really stuck in some kind of emotional squander, he'll pass by with a hand on the shoulder and a concise, discreet, kind word of advice in their ear and move on. no need for thanks, he's just Sharing an Observation! if you try to thank him, he'll give you a coy look and be like "for what?" but he knows. he's just letting you know you don't need to thank him <3

loves breaking balls. he'll help you if you ask him, but not before he gives you a LOT of shit for it. he'll volunteer himself to help you (even if you tell him you need his Stinking Help!) and he'll roll his eyes and say "ha! you are So helpless! i know you're glad i'm here to see this through with you uUu" LOL

but he will give you genuine insight and Surprisingly Good advice. huh, you didn't know he knew you so well! despite his job as a spy, he'll tell you to be authentic and will encourage you to listen to your instincts.

is an Observer First and an Action-taker second. prioritizes being in the know and likes being in the background (despite how good he is at being in the spotlight!). always thinks before he speaks, very calculated in everything he does!

got wiser with age. when he was younger i think he was quick to save his own skin and thought only about himself. among his first "selfless" acts were running out on scout and his mom to "protect" them, but with the wisdom of hindsight, that wasn't the smartest idea!

firmly believes in the power of respect. seems to have a positive relationship with all of his teammates (yes, even sniper, engineer and pyro lol) and scout's mom, too (regardless of how u see their relationship). tells scout that he has to earn pauling's respect to be worthy of her!

won't hesitate to stick his neck out for/work with people he appreciates. in the comics, he works with (and even prioritizes the safety of) miss pauling, helps sniper, and obviously comforts scout when he's dying in the way that Scout would want to be comforted. good job pops!

which brings me to dadspy... how i love you... i could make an entire other thread about my dadspy thoughts BUT i'll keep it "brief" here. i don't think he ever "treated scout like shit" nor do i think he was abusive to scout's mom or scout. he's just the world's most mediocre absent father to me... KDSKF

i think scout's mom knew What Spy Was and knew that at some point, he'd have to leave her. i think she's a perfectly capable woman who spy is genuinely still in love with (they have an open, long-distance relationship!) and is quite the deadly catch herself! perhaps i'll make a thread on her if that's something people would want....

i don't think she resents spy for running out and i think spy has complicated feelings about running out. he's convinced himself he did it for everyone involved's safety but in hindsight he Does feel a Bit (emphasis on Bit. it's not Earth Shatteringly Dramatic, just a little demon that sneaks up on him now and then...) guilty and tries to "make up for it" by Trying to get along with scout even if it's... not easy LOL. him turning into tom jones when scout died was to comfort scout the way Scout would want, which i think says a lot about spy's character.

however, once scout finds out the truth, i think he tells spy that he shouldn't have lied to him about it ("what kind of dumbass lies to their son on his deathbed! 🧍") and spy's like "ah... i suppose that... was also a mistake." and they smirk/smile at each other.. Road To Forgiveness begins..

also i personally love the running gag that everyone knows that spy is scout's dad (except for scout), not because i think spy would tell all/even some of the mercs but because it's SO obvious that all of them are like "i mean yeah.. doy". extra points if their knowledge Also surprises spy. "WHO TOLD YOU? HOW DID YOU KNOW?!" and the mercs are like ??? "erm... we have eyes...?" LOL

DESPITE being Stoic and Unknowable and Mysterious, he is also Quite the Doofus. one of my favorite and most important thoughts on his character. i think his authentic laugh is his snort laugh and i think that's what made scout's mom fall in love with him... :') has a great sense of humor.

loves playing pranks, causing mischief and being a Smug Cunt. will hide behind his Carefully Crafted Facade, but those who really know him (heavy, scout's mom) can see right through it! teaches scout some of his "best ones" (though not before pranking HIM with them first! it's okay though. scout's a good sport and gives him props LMAO)

a short list of spy's "best ones":

cleaning a glass door REALLY well and tricking the mercs to run into it at full force

oil on the kitchen floor so that anyone who comes running in will slam into the oven that engineer Just Fixed God Dammit! and destroy it

mentos in soda

scout and spy have the "same laugh" when they REALLY start howling. snorting, wheezing.... they sound almost identical. usually if they're laughing THAT hard, the rest of the mercs are looking at them like this >__> (covered in soda, can't get up from the ground because oil, etc)

obviously enjoys literature! language is one of his favorite things, though. loves learning about different dialects, slang, accents and learning the intricacies of grammar, too! likes studying the other mercs for this reason. the base is a fun, mixed bag for him!

the best secret keeper. contrary to popular belief, spy will NOT air your business if it's Serious. he might "let it slip" to medic that sniper sleeps with a stuffed animal, but he won't let anyone know that heavy has ptsd. he likes giving people shit, but not genuinely causing harm!

ah.. breaking balls as a love language.. this is something that i think is shared between spy, scout, and scout's mom. they LOOOOVE to give you shit, but it comes from a loving place. i think a lot of scout and spy's banter in exp date is like this:

it's not actually Insulting to either of them (spy calling scout a failure, scout telling spy to go to hell, etc) and is in fact more like a thing of Endearment. if you know people like this then you know what i'm talking about. idk how else to describe it KSDFKS

he is very girlfailure that thinks he's a girlboss but is actually a girlfailure and is coming to terms with his girlfailing. as i've said, spy isn't heartless. he knows he's made mistakes and knows his job has costed him a lot and now he's trying to reconcile with it. sometimes it's funny, sometimes its angsty!

is a total foodie and has a LOT of opinions about all kinds of cuisine! loves cooking with engineer and pyro (YES i think pyro is an INCREDIBLE chef. they only burn things because it's fun/funny! for the bit. you understand), and heavy has a perfect palette (just a personal hc of mine heh) so he always gets to tag along and taste test! <3

if spy is involved with any of the other mercs, scout's mom knows about it. they're in an open relationship and spy values her just like he'd value any of the mercs in a romantic relationship. she knows all of them and they're all very polite to her (ala like they are with miss pauling), but she quickly surprises them by being snarky and playful like spy and scout! she also doesn't hesitate to begin telling the mercs the most Humiliating Dirt on spy AND scout! HEHEHE

i don't think he'd cheat on her nor do i think he'd bother cheating on any of his partners. he's very open with communication when it comes to his interpersonal relationships (this is ironic to everyone but him because his relationship with his son is currently in shambles). he's good at it when it comes to romantic relationships though!

his love languages are, well, any and all of them! he loves being in love, he's a huge romantic and is not shy about showing it. will absolutely DROWN his partner in gifts and pretty words (that he really does mean!) and so on... perhaps to the point of it being a little overwhelming! at his partner's request, he'll dial it back... but he still loves to spoil his lovers, and THAT is something he WON'T apologize for! >:)

as i touched on earlier, has a good rapport with all of the mercs and pauling. he's patient with soldier and the other mercs hear him out about the bucket list idea (and are all Quietly Amused by how scout promptly ruins that for him. team dynamic ykwim). i think he's the closest with heavy (i'm a spoovy enjoyer), engineer, pyro, and sniper (BUT in kind of a "unique" way. perhaps i'll elaborate) but he enjoys the company of all of the other mercs as well!

is Informed about engineer's, demoman's and medic's research (though not on the levels they are of course) and likes being in the know about things going on around the base. he mostly shares enemy intelligence with these three over anyone else. they talk frequently and Love to gossip (engineer SWEARS its not gossiping but demo and medic are like "no. its gossip!" SKDFKSDF)!

will absolutely always enable you to treat yourself. scout, spy, medic and demo are the KINGS of "go on!! treat yourself!! :D" no matter what it is. if spy sees you really struggling about whether to get something, he'll slip it in with his own purchases and gift it to you later. "this one is from me, so you don't need to worry about compromise. <3"

in battle, he's a bit more sadistic than his teammates; likes making people squirm and is more than capable of getting under your skin. information extraction is part of his job and he treats it as such: Part Of The Job. he doesn't get a LOT of pleasure from hurting others, but he Does enjoy starring in a good revenge tale!

no, i do NOT think the world's most absent father cares about his 30 year old son's sex life nor do i think he's even "fiercely overprotective" of scout just in general. i think he knows scout is a grown man who has to make (and account for) any failures and fumbles he makes in his life. he'll be there with a kind word (and a few snarky ones!) when shit hits the fan, but he's not running around fighting scout's battles for him. scout loves battling too much to let him anyway! LOL

he teaches him things that Spy Himself values (like respect) because he... values it and since spy IS trying to be a bit more of a Dad to scout, it's also a reflection on him (to spy. scout doesn't care or think of it that way). insists on the value of self improvement! (something he himself didn't learn until he was Much Older... but scout doesn't need to know that!)

[randomvarious]

1970s Punk Rock Playlist

So, like, isn't it kind of ridiculous that I've had this 70s punk rock playlist for a few years now, but I've never once put any UK stuff on it before? Isn't that a very crucial place where punk rock really blew up between its late 60s Detroit/Ann Arbor founding and The Ramones? Like, there's such a rich history from over across the pond that I haven't tapped into at all yet!

But, fortunately, that changes now. At long last, the Brits have arrived to fuck shit up, folks. And no, I didn't bring in any super obvious choices like The Sex Pistols or Buzzcocks or The Clash, because that's not really how I operate 😁. Instead, you're getting awesome tracks from a quartet of bands that you've probably never heard of before, unless you're either a) British or b) happened to read my 1970s power pop playlist post from last week, because there's a tiny bit of crossover there with the pop-punky and super catchy anthem that is Fast Cars' "The Kids Just Wanna Dance," which is by far this update's most popular track, as it's currently sitting at over 100K plays on Spotify.

But the rest of these adds, in spite of how good they are, have not proven nearly as popular as we keep getting nearer to their five-decade anniversary. Songs like the unfortunately oh-so-relevant-again-and-also-quite-salient anti-fascist bop, "They're Back Again" by a band called The Cigarettes, is only nearing 29K plays at this moment. And in true Brit punk fashion, this tune that was calling out a noticeable late 70s far-right rise, and was also released in the same year that Margaret Thatcher became UK prime minister too, really sounds like it pairs well with cracking some skinhead skulls! 🤘

I'm not a violent person, I'll make exception for you

And then "East Coast Kids" by The What?, which only has a little over 2.8K plays, has a bassline on it that's so prominent that, although it's most likely being played by a fretless, it could easily be mistaken for being that of a double. Really cool!

The Cigarettes - "They're Back Again, Here They Come" Fast Cars - "The Kids Just Wanna Dance" Squire - "Livin' in the City" The What? - "East Coast Kids"

And there's, of course, a YouTube version of this playlist too. Normally, I'd have at least one song to add to that one that can't be found on Spotify, but remarkably, this update doesn't actually have any.

And this playlist is also on YouTube Music.

So with this update, our Spotify version of this playlist now stands at 22 songs that run for 54 minutes, but over on YouTube, we now have 27 songs that run for 77 minutes. So if you want a little extra 70s punk rock, like a track from the legendary Stooges that somehow wasn't actually on YouTube until I showed up and somehow only has 28 plays(?) as of this writing, give that one a look.

And if you want something more specific and concise, I've got a punk playlist that's solely focused on 1979 too.

1979 Punk Rock: YouTube / YouTube Music

And here's the list of compilations that were used to build this playlist:

Motor City's Burnin' (1998, Total Energy) Destination Bomp! (1995, Bomp! Records) What? Stuff (1990, Iloki Records) Dangerhouse, Volume 2: Give Me a Little Pain! (1992, Frontier Records) Dangerhouse, Volume One (1991, Frontier Records) The Roots of Powerpop! (1996, Bomp! Records) 100% British Mod (1998, Captain Mod)

Back to some power pop next week 😎.

Enjoy!

More to come, eventually. Stay tuned!

Like what you hear? Follow me on Spotify and YouTube for more cool playlists and uploads!

[foxsarah]

for those who are unaware

the infamous "everyone hates me because i defend an actor nobody likes and therefore am a special little victim despite harassing countless mbav-centric blogs"-blog found her way into me & @/morganweir's discord the other night. this post will serve as information for anybody on discord who happens to be unaware of who she is/uncomfortable with interaction. this will also be a retelling of just??? other strange shit theyve said/done in the server??? so yeah 👍

anything with a * will have proof under the cut for the sake of being concise, alt text not yet provided at the time of posting, server members that are not mods have been scribbled out for the sake of their privacy

this is her discord handle, which used to be completely different when she joined. her first username was "sweetgoldensunflower_67494"*, until she changed it to "bennyweirsgirlfriend_86787". to most of us, this was an immediate red flag/signal that this might've been "the benny anon". to me and mer in particular, we wanted to wait to see if we'd possibly misjudged someone's character before making any attempts to kick or ban. some may consider that too slow of a method for taking action with this person, when really, there are a handful of atticus/benny "defenders" to this day who are more normal about hiding that part of themselves than this person, and it would've looked even worse if we kicked someone for seeming like the benny anon.

and for a minute or so, she too seemed normal, until she made her intro. where she faked her age.

you'll notice that a lot of her messages are edited, and some members brought to my attention that her intro said "20" at first instead of "24". why on earth would a 20something year old have their screen/username as "girlfriend of canonical child"? idk! regardless i hadn't noticed the change in her intro due to being busy irl for the majority of her interactions. speaking of interactions,

i'm never going to fault someone for not knowing how to use discord, newer members to our server most likely haven't been using it as long as older members, but this exchange was in reference to our "rules & roles" channel that is set to "read only" mode for members who aren't mods. i assume the "permission" she was talking about was the ability to write messages in that channel.

bringing discourse into our channels isn't exactly uncommon, as most of us are mature enough to have conversations that don't get into personal absolutes like this, in regards to a member's video essay on radio rebel.

at this point, the language used by her messages were just carbon copies of her anons** as all of them followed the same theme of her "fave" being "hated" or attacked. she would go on to assume the worst** of other members the same way. this was expect of her as anyone who's had the displeasure of the benny anon in their inbox knows how she likes to go on her tangents. what we did not expect was her finding a server member's personal instagram page, going through their following list, and choosing to make unnecessary commentary on it.

this was the last straw for me, as i have no patience for cyberstalking no matter how "small" it may seem. i proceeded to ban & block her.

i suggest that yall reading this do not continue to engage with her, especially those who are members of the mbav server, as i'm pretty sure it would do nothing to protect people from potential harassment, nor would it benefit us as people who just want to partake in enjoying mbav.

that's all 👍

*original username

**personalizing critiques of atticus mitchell as "hate"

[goodluckclove]

I'm almost done with a short story of mines, which is rare because this is the first time ever that I've written long enough to actually finish the piece. Now that I'm on the finish line I've... slowed down. I don't know why, I already know how I want to end it, for the first time it's not writer's block, but physically writing it has gone at a snail pace, one or two lines in the span of a week, still not done. It's like the ending itself doesn't want to be written.

First off - fucking congrats for getting this close to finishing a full short story! I am historically terrible at short-form media as I honed my craft doing NaNoWriMo like four or five times, so now I can only produce in quantities ranging form wow to please stop. It's no small feat to be concise in your storytelling and create an experience that you can digest in a short time and potentially think about for years to come. Impressive work!

But endings are tricky, aren't they? I was tickled by your question and the way you phrased it, so much so that I jumped to answer it now. It's like the ending itself doesn't want to be written. I think about that kind of shit a lot and even though I feel weird talking about it to non-writers I really do think you and I are onto something.

Writing for me has always been a somewhat autonomous process. I hear writers who see themselves as the cruel or benevolent gods of the universes they create, and though I'm sure their viewpoints have backing I have never and will never relate to that mindset. I am not the god of my universe. I am the attendant to a roomful of dogs, all different breeds and sizes, and I am very much at the mercy of a majority of their whims.

Oh, you don't actually want to keep the secret I was planning on having you keep for another two chapters? Uh, okay. You actually have a completely different emotional reaction to this new character than I expected or wanted? Yup. Sure. I can say I have a plan, but a big pillar of my process is being able to see when my characters disagree with my plan and instead insist on pissing all over the floor.

Blind Trust, my novel coming out this Summer, was supposed to be one book. It's now going to be four. My reaction to this is best described as a furrowed brow and a resigned sigh.

What I mean to say is that, if you're struggling with the ending - even just to the extent that it bores you to write, it might be time to check in with the story itself and the people it follows. Maybe the ending isn't exactly what you think it is. Maybe it's not even the ending yet.

Wouldn't it be hilarious if the reason why you got so far with this short story is because it's actually a novella, or even a full-length novel? Maybe even just a longer short story than you originally imagined?

I welcome you to give yourself and your cast of characters a little more creative freedom. The way a story forms in the head is often a lot different from what you actually end up with on paper.

I welcome you to DM me directly if you want to keep talking. I'd love to work with you on this!

[idkfitememate]

i just need to talk about it somewhere so here i am.

TW : i'm french so the class i'm talking about are french class. Idk what are the class in english, and honestly, i'm too bored for searching it.

I was bullied during my middle school, which made me miss my 4th year(4ème) and when I changed places for my 3rd year (3ème), my bully followed me, making me do a blank year.

Now, they want me to do a CAP, problem : with a CAP, I can't do a bac général. I will be forced to do a bac pro, but I DON'T want to do a bac pro, I want a général because all the jobs I want to do need a bac général. But NOBODY listen to me.

They want me to do something I don't want, and I have a problem that prevents me from refusing too much because when people look at me, most of the time I feel oppressed. People talk to me like I have no choice. And I know very well that if I'm made to do something that I don't like, or that I hate like this, I won't go to class and I don't want my parents to pay for something that I know that I will not go.

What to do or to say for them to finally listen ?? (and just so you know, people only listened to me when I do sh. It's the only time people really listened to me, and after being clean for 2 years, I don't want to do it again just to be listened to.)

-🦝anon

Oh dear, I’m so sorry to hear that!! Unfortunately, I’ve had that problem too a lot of my life and found that the only way people in my life listen to me is if I say the most out of pocket shit I can think of, and I don’t think that’ll help in this situation.

Best I can think of is asking them to sit down with you and finally have a long discussion about your wants and desires. Don’t let them talk over you and make your points clear and concise.

I really don’t know how to help in this situation, and I apologize for that as I would love to help you. It is interesting to know that you’re French though! I hope that you’re able to get through this, and know you had support all the way from America!!! I believe in you!!

[red-might-be-dead]

hello.! could you spare some bitb headcanons? i'm planning to start writing some stuff for it in the coming months and you seem like the expert so :3

sorry this took so long to reply to.... jkghksfjhgkjfha

KIAN!! -

i like to think that he was the smartest in the group, he would always do well in tests and classes and shit and he would bunk off most of the time, it would really piss off his teachers because he would fly through school and get As on everything

he left just after finishing highschool, probably before rolan left, his parents didn’t even notice he was gone

he was homeless for a while after music didn’t work out but eventually made money through stocks or whatever the fuck he had going for him lmaoo

his monster is always some kind of tarantula to me, the fur or hair or whatever is the same as the animal pattern on his jacket and he has lots of reds and hot pinks all over :33

ROLAN!! -

he moved to town when he was about 5 or 6 and made friends with rand and kian (they were already friends)

he was the least book smart but he tried really hard in school, unlike the other two, and although he still skipped some classes he was definitely a teachers pet (i feel like he would just seem very trustworthy even if he had just been smoking weed with his friends behind the bleachers)

he left highschool and then stayed with rand after kian left, he didn’t really talk to him he more just stayed in galloway, after rachel died (or went missing) he stayed away from rand but he couldn’t bring himself to leave him behind

when he left he told rand he was going (this was the first proper interaction that they’d had since highschool ended) and rand got so pissed off at him

in college he was quiet but lots of people gravitated towards him, he was a sweet guy with a nice energy so he made lots of friends very fast

he did a lot of sports in highschool, i think he carried on doing some of them until he went back to galloway (probably running)

his bug arm always reminds me of a preying mantis, i think if he had gone full bug-o-mode he would have been some kind of preying mantis creature with whites blacks and blues

RAND!! -

okay so this fucking guy, this guy, this greasy freak is my favourite ever jrwi character and i will NOT be able to get all of the shit down i want to for him because there is SO. MUCH. i’m definitely gonna write this more concisely than i did the shit for the other two

okay, he was smart in highschool, the teachers all hated him so much (he was a less charismatic version of kian) he did well in exams because he actually did study out of class unlike kian BUT he was 10 times more distributive (really he was just doing anything to make his friends laugh)

spent a lot of time IN school writing the d&d campaign and a lot of time OUT of school catching up on the stuff he should’ve been doing IN school

he had a girlfriend for a time, they kissed, he didn’t like it, he realised he liked men, he realised he liked rolan, he repressed all of that and moved on, him and his girlfriend broke up (due to him not spending any time with her, ignoring her in school and spending all the time they did have together talking about rolan or kian, basically him being an overall bad boyfriend), he moves on with life, basically forgets she ever existed

all through all of this time he has also been constantly getting into arguments with his parents and trying to do everything he could to NOT be with his sister (not that he didn’t love her it’s just he didn’t want to spend every waking hour with her)

his parents liked rachel more than him, it wasn’t her fault, rachel was always the most perfect child ever, she admired rand so much she really wanted to be as cool as him (she didn’t understand much about her brother but she loved him anyway)

after rachel was kidnapped rand started to ignore kian and rolan, he started slipping behind in classes and he stopped distracting people in classes, then he stopped coming into school at all, he never graduated

he locked himself in his room during the day and spent all night looking for rachel in the bayou (miracle he didn’t get turned lmao, maybe rach was protecting him in some way) he regretted everything and he would do anything for just another minute with his sister

kian left and didn’t even say goodbye, rand thought he deserved to be ignored for being such a bad friend

it was rolan leaving that broke him, everything was falling apart, he screamed and cried and cursed at rolan as he was driving away, the last thing he said was “i love you” but rolan never heard

he didn’t leave galloway, he couldn’t leave his sister alone again

if he ever went bug-o-mode i think he would be some kind of scorpion creature, or like, idk, a cicada lmao

honestly this is just how i thought the campaign ended canonically but idk anymore: when he talked to his sister he was hallucinating (the same way as when he was talking to dead kian) and he bled out floating in the swamp looking up at the sky

OKAY THATS IT…. BUUUT i do have a shit ton of conflicting headcanons and also smaller character headcanons that i might just drop in your inbox sometimes if that’s okay with you :DD!! sorry this took like one billion years… i didn’t even get everything….

[animehouse-moe]

Well, Tumblr decided to bug out on me and I've now lost the original question that was asked, but someone had asked for my favorite series (be it manga/anime/movies/Tv/etc), and this was my response.

(first of all, so sorry for losing the question! I should have taken a screenshot or something when Tumblr wouldn't let me post)

It's all good, I enjoy getting these types of questions because they make me think about this stuff haha. I'm not one to really do well with the idea of favorites, so having to pin down stuff like this can be interesting for me!

That said, for this one I might just stick with anime for the list to make it a little easier. I can definitely do a top ten of manga or other stuff later on though. Also, this list will be in no particular order because I'd be stuck forever trying to figure out a satisfying order for them.

Sonny Boy

I think it's a very fair point to argue, that at this stage in his career, Sonny Boy is Shingo Natsume's magnum opus. There's just not much else to it. It's a series that he created, from his own mind and talent, and he executed on that. There are very, very few people that work in anime that can manage a feat such as that. In terms of story, I don't have any issue with claiming Sonny Boy is the pinnacle of high school storytelling. It stretches the fabric of reality so far that you might struggle to claim that it's about high school, but the longer that you spend with it, the more undeniable a fact it becomes. Or maybe you could generalize it to the human condition, or how the cracks in society will fester and form no matter the condition, or how authority will always appear in a self-serving manner, or this or that or any concept under the sun.

Terror In Resonance

Call me crazy, but there's quite a few reasons why this is the Shinichiro Watanabe anime for me. Bebop and Champloo have rose colored glasses that adorn every fan in the community, so I feel like it's hard to really take a proper look at it compared to Terror In Resonance (even though it has a similar amount of users on MAL). As a Mappa project, it is simply the best they've ever been from start to finish. As a concept, Watanabe's approach is impeccable as it examines the frustration and sorrow of displaced children in a society that never wanted them. It's powerful, concise, and from start to finish an incredibly focused series filled with some of the crowning achievements of animators in the industry. Seriously. Takashi Hashimoto, the animator for this cut, actually did all the math to calculate the speed of the smoke as it fell and moved. Some of the best work you'll see on an anime.

Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song

I am a big, big fan of Tappei Nagatsuki's work, so being able to experience an anime that is entirely his vision of the work is really impressive. It's one of the biggest struggles with artists, I find. Understanding their work through different mediums. What you see as an anime is not what they created as a manga, or light novel. But this is different, it is Nagatsuki's (and Umehara's) sole vision, the entire intent behind their creativity. And WIT knocked it out of the park to an insane degree. As a post-AoT studio, they showed just how far they can push their creativity and execution on a series beyond human. Incredible story, incredible animation, arguably some of the best hand to hand combat we've seen in an anime in a very long time. It's just that good.

Cyberpunk: Edgerunners

Maybe you see a trend going on with my picks, and while yes it's partly recency bias, it's also a gravitation towards anime originals. I'll add a piece to that at the end, but this is about Edgerunners right now. I was in high school when the video game was first announced. That's a decade ago, now. I played the shit out of 2077 when it dropped, and I'm absolutely eating up Phantom Liberty currently. It is then, absolutely no surprise, that I've placed Edgerunners on a pedestal. But of course, there's also a reason that Edgerunners is in the top 100 anime on MAL, and why it's Trigger's highest rated anime. It's just that damn good. An incredible story revolving around Night City and the themes that Mike Pondsmith laid the groundwork for decades ago. A true tribute to the tabletop game and the genre at large.

The Tatami Galaxy

I don't think there's a way I couldn't put The Tatami Galaxy on this list, truthfully. Of course, that also encompasses the sequel ONA The Time Machine Blues, and spinoffs like The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl. Tomohiko Morimi is a genius, Yusuke Nakamura is an icon, and Masaaki Yuasa is a savant. Incredible work for such an incredible story and message about the pursuit of perfection and the beauty that lies in the present. Arguably, much like titles such as Sonny Boy, these are 100% must watch titles for an anime fan. I'd highly recommend the others still, but these two represent such core and important aspects to how people choose to lead their lives and the frameworks that they do so within, that I strongly believe it's a requirement. I also wrote a review on the novel when I read it in January of this year.

Heike Monogatari

I think history is a very important thing to understand. I also think that history can be presented as obtuse, disinteresting, or too literal - especially in relation to history stories or myths. Heike Monogatari by Science Saru is arguably one of the greatest examples of how to display a modernized version of such a foundational tale to the history of Japan. It's also an incredibly powerful moment for the director, Naoko Yamada, as it was their first real work since the arson attacks on her home studio of Kyoto Animation. Because of the weight of her past, her work beyond words on this anime feels that much more powerful considering its messages about the past and fear of the future. It's wonderfully emotional, and contains one of my favorite closing scenes to a series.

The Saga of Tanya The Evil

Light novel aside, anime quality aside (though both are great), there's a separate reason this title is featured on this list: the adaptation. It is, for lack of a better term, borderline insane as an adaptation. It bears almost no similarity to its source. The tone is different, the scope and scale differ, there's significant changes in terms of narrative, and even the order of large scale events differs. But still, somehow, it remains a fantastic series. Bearing nearly zero resemblance to what it claims to adapt, it is something that I love. It's an incredible feat, and the gold standard of its one-of-a-kind approach to adapting a light novel.

Mononoke

Horror is a very hard thing to do right, at least in my opinion. Many get suckered into thriller territory very quickly, and avoid the psychological nature of horror. The immovable nature of something fearful standing in front of you, the slow descent into madness and despair. Mononoke grasps that incredibly well, and earns a spot on this list because of it's appeal in that manner. Also, the art is just incredible, personifying the more classical style that would be associated with the creatures and myths that pepper the story. I'm incredibly excited to see what comes from the upcoming movie.

Welcome To The N.H.K

While it may differ between its three formats, the core of the story stands strong. Impossible to put into words, it's more of a descent than anything. A descent that turns inwards on each of the characters as they slowly lose their grip on reality, as they continue to fall apart, piece by piece. I have my qualms about how they choose to end it, but I am a very bitter man at my core so it's more a personal difference than a quality one. Regardless, if you want an acid trip down the rabbit hole of depression, mania, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, and all manner of other illness, there's no better story than Welcome To The N.H.K.

Toradora!

There's something special about Toradora to me. Is it the era that the anime comes from? Is it the appeal to a classic style of romance without falling prey to the issues of the layout? I'm unsure. But something about it feels so… comfortable, to me. I could watch it again and again and enjoy each minute. It's probably not the best romance anime out there, but it's one that I'll always be drawn to.

And with that, the list is over. Just to provide some extra context and honorable mentions, I'd love to have put series like Alien 9 or Monogatari on the list, but the challenge with them is the fact that the first is a shorter OVA, and the latter is a much larger series encompasses nearly too much to explain in this sort of context. There's really quite a few series like that that I struggled with when forming this list, but they're still really great titles nonetheless.

Anyways, the anime original point. While it's sort of an unconscious thing, I do realize what I do with it. Anime originals present something that you can't experience elsewhere. They are the end all be all of their creative vision, and that excites me more than a manga adaptation. Following someone else's blueprint vs creating your own, obviously one is more interesting than the other. And that sentiment extends to some of the other titles on the list like Heike Monogatari which approaches a classic story with a radical new viewpoint, or Tanya The Evil which basically forgoes the vast majority of its source material. It's really something I struggle with at large with adaptations. So many people want to leave their marks on the work, but quit just short of doing so in a meaningful manner. Very few go the mile to say that they did something in regards to the work, and instead meddle with it in minor ways which can negatively impact its reception as the original material. A great example of valuable changes is Heavenly Delusion. The team under Hirotaka completely re-arrange the order of events in the anime, and in doing so elevate the series in a way that only they can. Anyways, I digress, a discussion that I should leave for another time. This is my list, it may not be the best list out there, but it is mine.

[postive-rainworld-anarchy-conf]

I came here to defend azriel after a friend told me about this blog of supporters, but like.. after seeing everything here and taking a closer look at the doc fuck There is no grooming in the document, just stray inappropriate messages between two ppl that were clearly familiar with eachother prior to a massive fallout. I'm honestly baffled that I didn't pick up on that. If what happened to azriel counts as grooming, then any conversation that unintentionally sways in an uncomfortable direction is grooming. and that's fucking.. unreasonable. I can't stand behind that.

oh, huh welcome to the club I guess?

but yeah, don't feel bad about being fooled into believing this stuff. like think about and reflect on why you did, but beating yourself up will get you nowhere, and there is already enough suffering in the world.

the most you can really do is well, just do better next time.

personally I'd suggest next time something like this happens, and you feel like you might be getting on a bandwagon, ask yourself these questions.

what actual evidence is there? basically is there anything you can definitely proved actually happened

is this person using intentionally scary language to make me stop thinking? words like "grooming" "zoophile", and "rape" often make people worried that they might've supported someone who's a bad person, and while this might not be a sign that things aren't as they seem, things like using therapy language incorrectly is (though this could also just be someone who doesn't know this kind of stuff, and is trying to express their experience).

why would this person being revealing this. allegations like 'this person groomed me' are very serious. and take a long and arduous time to sort through. so do they want closure, retribution or something else?

how are we getting the information? if you have a good point, the best way to share is is clearly and concisely. so that people know the facts and can decide for themselves. however if you have a point that falls after a bit of scrutiny, it's much better to give it piece by piece, say you'll reveal more later (like for example, saying you're working on a document, that'll show everything, and then not release it for months. even better if you just move on from the situation without releasing it.) but also things like making a big announcement about something and when people ask for proof, sending a video of you quickly scrolling through discord messages is a great way to get people to just not read it or basically just read the highlights. I mean I didn't read it and I think alot of people just assumed it proved something.

now of course this is just some basic suggestions for later allegations that come up, and it's key to remember that just because this one was fake, doesn't mean all of them are. listen to the people who say they are hurt, hear what they have to say.

but don't accept everything they say as gospel. look into it more.

shit like the johnny depp and amber heard situation happens if you just instantly assume someone is lying. (though this was also fueled by sexism) you end up with people getting hurt more than they needed to.

same is true for the opposite.

like before I reached the conclusion that this was a false allegation, I didn't say anything, and instead looked through everything, finding things like pansear's document, and reading through it, and then I drew my own opinion.

hope your having a good day though! I'm glad you can realize that you were wrong, that's alot more than most people can say.

[queenofbaws]

(You hear a sound at your door and eagerly await to see just who your next victim visitor will be, but pause when the knock that comes is the ever iconic and recognizable 'shave and a haircut'. You know what this is, it's your delivery after all. So you wait.

Not long after the knock you hear a muffled "Oh wait that's right, there's a password as well. Think I wrote that down somewhere." followed by what is clearly the sound of a lot of papers being dropped and a rapid flurry of cursing as the poor delivery girl drops everything in her arms in her attempt to fulfill your diabolical request.

"Wait, really? Is she really fucking serious with this? She's really forcing me to say it. Oh my god fine. The things I do for friendship and/or delivery work." And much louder than the angry mumbling from before, but said through what you gleefully and victoriously know is gritted teeth: "Down with Coke and pulp, Pepsi and a pulp free supremacy for all."

There's a loud clatter and thus as something is dropped through your mail slot and you stare in confusion.

I mean, while admittedly very cool that's not what you ordered.

"Wait. Shit, fuck, that's the wrong thing. God fucking dammit. Aha! Here it is!"

Another sound as your mail slot is flipped open once again but this time a stained and oddly damp file folder is passed through and falls on top of what you somehow know to be a trophy of a bathroom couch.

LISA'S SUPER CONCISE AND EASY TO FOLLOW GUIDE THAT LISTS THE ANSWERS TO PUZZLES AND WHAT STEPS CAN BE SKIPPED WHEN SPEEDRUNNING THE SILENT HILL 2 REMAKE SO YOU CAN BEAT IT IN UNDER 10 HOURS FOR THE FASTER THAN FOG TROPHY

Is written in larger bold font on the front of the folder with *note: make the title shorter before delivering* in much smaller font below it. But before you can really sink in how terribly your delivery girl is in not only making titles but also following her own directions when there's a loud and awkward cough as she still stands outside your door.)

"Uh, trick or treat?"

((((god I hope this makes you laugh as much as I did writing it 😂))))

"oh holy shit," the toilet paper creature says, slip-sliding her way on the hardwood as, for the umpteenth time that night, her toilet papery feet fail to find any traction. "that's the iconic shave a haircut knock! my delivery!!!!!"

seized by a sudden wave of social anxiety, she stops in front of the peephole instead of answering the door. like, giving candy to well-meaning trick or treaters all night??? that's one thing, but opening the door and risking making eye contact with someone making a delivery, MID-delivery???? unthinkable, she'd probably end up saying something like "you too!" when they said "here's your package," and that would be the TRUE horror of halloween!!!

so she waits. patient. unwavering. and...and when it clatters to the ground, golden and beautiful, she feels her eyes begin to well with tears. could it...could it be? the bathroom couch? in all of its glory? a reminder of the horrifying interior design decisions the uber wealthy make for no discernible -

and then the folder drops and she throws the trophy aside.

"OH THANK CHRIST," she says, hugging the trophy guide to her papery bosom, "I'M GONNA GET THAT SAD, SAD MAN OUT OF SILENT HILL IN RECORD TIME!" at her outburst, she hears the delivery person outside clear their throat, and, because she isn't a total monster, slips their treat through the mail slot in return.

it's man door hand hook car door!!!!!!!!!

[kuzcoskingdom]

Lovely to see a blog dedicated to one of my favourite Disney movies!

No idea if you've been asked this before, but instead of asking about the comedy I'll ask something harder to pin down: what's your favourite emotional moment from the movie? (Mine is probably the apology that doesn't need to be said scene at the grass meadow)

Oh, and if that isn't a stupid question, what are your thoughts on Kronk's New Groove and Emperor's New School?

hey, glad you like my blog!! i only made it this year, sort of on impulse because i was going through yet another emperor's new groove obsession and there's multiple blogs out there like this for my other favorite disney movies, but any similar blogs for ENG i could find hadn't been active in years. so i thought it'd be fun to start one myself. warning that i tend to ramble so this might get a little long.

this might be a bit of an obvious answer, but i think my favorite emotional moment might just be the scene toward the end when kuzco tells pacha he's decided not to destroy the village! i love how it manages to be both emotional and funny at the same time, with kuzco feeling the need to apologize in this snarky, indirect way and pacha knowing exactly what's up and going along with it, and then indirectly inviting kuzco to be his neighbor for the summer. it's so sweet.

no such thing as a stupid question! it's been a while since i saw kronk's new groove and i probably need to rewatch it. i do remember thinking last time i watched it that it was one of the better disney sequels, but also that kronk didn't need to have a love interest tbh? just because of the setup of kronk's papi wanting him to settle down with a wife and kids and a large house, and him being uninterested in those things and determined to stay true to his own groove. though i do love kronk and remember thinking it was cool how they expanded on his character. and i loved it whenever kuzco interrupted the movie and when he pretended to be kronk's fake wife, lol.

as for the emperor's new school... i actually have a lot more thoughts on it but i don't want to reply with a massive wall of text so i'll try to be as concise as i can here LOL. i'll also say that this is all just my own personal opinion and if anyone disagrees then that's totally cool! but the show kiiind of frustrates me and gives me a lot of mixed feelings because i don't like how kuzco is written in it. i get that people don't completely change overnight, but a lot of the time in the show he's just so mean and selfish and his development often gets reset so he can learn the same lesson again in another episode. he'll also have really sweet moments with malina but then go back to mistreating her. it just bugs me because i love him in the movie and i feel like the show could've handled him better while still having him be flawed.

but, on the other hand, the show is often laugh-out-loud funny and i'm really glad eartha kitt and patrick warburton returned to voice yzma and kronk in it, because they're the source of a lot of great comedy. i also think malina is a great character (she's surprisingly well-developed especially for a 2000s spin-off cartoon imo) and there are certain parts of her romance with kuzco that i find really endearing, plus she's headstrong and takes no shit from him, so i still ship them even though i dislike how he treats her sometimes. i also love the fact that kuzco moves in with pacha and chicha and pretty much becomes a part of their family. some of my favorite episodes of the whole show are the ones that center on that wholesome found family dynamic. i've been thinking of possibly making some gifs of my favorite moments from the series!

[blurglesmurfklaine]

hello/goodbye hugs that linger for javey 💙

Number 18 comin right up!

edit: oops, this got away from me because I don't know the definition of concise apparently

******

"It's just another three weeks, and then I'm home for the entire summer," Davey assures.

"It's too long," Jack whines. "I hate Yale. I hate stupid Boston and their stupid red-sox and their stupid Ivy League schools that have ya away for nine months of the year."

As much as Davey wants to pretend that Jack being all sorts of clingy is a major inconvenience, he can't dismiss the fact that he loves the way Jack always refuses to release them from their final hugs before Davey heads back to school.

It's become a tradition of sorts. They hug goodbye, and Davey makes some comment about being late for his train, and Jack tightens his grip while Davey rolls his eyes and lets his arms go limp at his side.

There's something different this time around, though, and Davey can't quite put his finger on it. The soft, ragged breath Jack takes when he buries his face into the crook of Davey's neck. The way his smile isn't entirely reaching his eyes.

"Hey," Davey's hands settle on Jack's shoulders as he puts enough space between them to get a good look at his best friend. "You okay?"

"Yeah," Jack mutters. Davey can tell by the dimness of his eyes that he's lying. " 'm'fine."

"You don't seem fine."

"I guess," Jack sighs, "In the past year, with you bein' gone and all... I didn't realize how much I was gonna miss ya. I didn't realize a lot of things."

Before Davey can even open his mouth to reply, he's being hauled in again for another bone-crushing hug. Davey's arms dangle by his side in shock as Jack's come up behind his back, gripping the back of Davey's shirt with such force.

Davey blinks himself out of his stupor and slowly brings his arms to clasp around Jack's waist.

"I love you, Dave."

"Love you, too, Jackie."

Davey's on the train, his mind running through their last encounter the way a needle runs over vinyl, when his phone buzzes.

Jackie: i need to tell you something. Jackie: shoulda said it before you left Jackie: i mean, i said it, but i didn't really SAY it ykwim?? Jackie: fuck. i hope you don't have signal rn and we can just wait til u get back for summer

Me: Bad news Me: I have signal

Jackie: well shit

Me: You were saying?

The three dots indicating someone on the other side is texting pop up. They disappear for a moment and return, sending anxiety that rises like the tide shooting through Davey's veins. This is where Jack admits what's been bothering him. This is where Jack says they've grown apart, that keeping up with Davey when he's so far away isn't worth the effort, that their friendship of nearly six years isn't worth the effo--

Jackie: I love you.

Davey squints at the screen.

All that fuss for Jack to tell Davey something he already knows?

Me: That's nice, Jackie. I love you, too!

Jackie: ffs Jackie: you go to an ivy league school Jackie: ain't no way ur really this dense

Me: ??? uncalled for??

Jackie: Dave. Jackie: I'm IN LOVE with you.

Oh. Well. Davey certainly wasn't expecting that.

Jackie: and i feel stupid sayin that over a damn text message but i was too scared to say it earlier and i feel like it'll eat me alive if i don't say anything Jackie: if you don't feel the same i TOTALLY understand btw Jackie: we can also just. pretend this never happened when you come back and it'll be just like old times

He blinks dumbly at the phone, heart hammering in his chest as more frantic messages come in.

Jackie: OR you could continue to ignore me Jackie: you have your read receipts on, you know that?

Jackie: oh my god i'm gonna block you. Jackie: hi hey hello, davey jacobs? jack kelly here, your best friend who just confessed his love for you? yeah it'd be great if you could SAY SOMETHING

Me: That certainly was a sentence.

Jackie: I hate you.

Me: Pretty sure you love me. Source: you.

Jackie: no fr how am *i* the one who gets a rep for being annoying?

Jackie: really though. are we gonna talk about this?

Me: Look who's being dense now.

Jackie: DAVE

Davey laughs at his screen and decides to put Jack out of his misery, chest feeling like it's exploding into a million stars.

Me: JACK Me: Good news. Me: I love you, too.

Jackie: see, was that so hard? Jackie: holy shit, so... Jackie: we're like. properly in love huh? Jackie: whaddya wanna do about that?

Me: We could call when I get back to my dorm? Have a real conversation about it? Me: And maybe talk about it when I get home in May?

Jackie: yeah. i like the sound of both those things

When Davey comes home for summer break, Jack runs to him as soon as he steps off the train, arms so tight around his torso and heart so full that Davey can't imagine either of them ever letting go.