#this scene is so fascinating to me

[hammah-head-shark]

My Roman Empire is Armin with a gun🧡

[bookishjules]

i think the show is playing a smart game of chess here, getting each of our characters in the positions they need to be in. in the arch museum, percy almost tells annabeth that he'd choose her side over his dad's. we know in the books, that this is the sentiment annabeth gives percy in the zoo transport van.. but at the point that percy says this in the show, i don't think annabeth would be prepared to respond in kind. she's too loyal to her mom, to the systems she's learned to abide within. in order to get her to that point, she needs a reason to put percy first.

by making the echidna attack at the arch occur because athena got embarassed and upset about her daughter standing by while another kid made a decision.. and then having percy be the one to stand up and defend annabeth against the monsters that had basically come from athena at this point.. the show is giving annabeth that reason. athena will fight her. percy will fight for her. and now suddenly her character is perfectly positioned to choose percy.

[mobius-m-mobius]

#so unserious 😂💖

[platoapproved]

armand + preparing to tell louis about his past

[seefasterdraws]

from the homumiko mines

[midnightcrows]

Duty & Patience

[multicolour-ink]

Ok but I NEED TO TALK ABOUT MY TWO FAVOURITE FRAMES FROM THE BROS HUG

After the first hug, Mario immediately goes to gently cup and pull Luigi's face towards him. He needs to take in that his brother is right here. He needs to make sure that he's not hurt.

And stars help Bowser if Luigi was!

THE FOREHEAD TOUCH

Oh stars the forehead touch. So much meaning in this one moment ❤💚

Now, forehead touches can have various meanings in many cultures; but in general, touching ones forehead to another person's is a way to get across love, soothe anxiety, and can be seen as a protective gesture.

And that's exactly what's happening here. The Bros are grounding themselves in the moment. And look at the way their eyes meet! In various cultures as well, the eyes are believed to be windows to the soul. The Bros are not just communicating through their physical affection - they are healing each other's hearts.

And given what they have been through, they need it 💗

In this one moment, the Bros can forget about the terror and danger around them.

In this one moment, they are able to focus on the one thing that matters the most to them.

- - -

Also a side note: Luigi doesn't say a word during this exchange (not counting after, when he makes the bear comment 😁). And some will probably think "Oh man that sucks!", but honestly it says a lot about these characters. Luigi chooses to remain silent, because he knows that if he attempted to speak in that moment, he would burst into tears and be unable to stop💧

[katabay]

original thief series basso & garrett :)

ngl, it's about quality over quantity for me. an npc can have a total of three minutes of screen time, but if they have a cool name, they can live rent free in my head and I'll spend several hours trying to decipher drawable features from a blurry screenshot of pixels

there is a vague hint of a story here, and that's because every time I try to play thi4f, I get incredibly frustrated with how Not Fun the game play is. like, is the story good? well. but it has a PLAGUE. that should've given it instant 'I'll replay this once a year' status in my heart, but the game play sucks so bad that I've never finished it. I can't believe Not Fun gameplay beat out my obsession with narrative plagues.

anyway, the idea is basically if the original era had a game with a plague centric narrative and some other stuff I liked out of thi4f thrown into a narrative blender, with a heavy dash of horror thrown in because some parts of the thief games were scarier to me than entire dedicated horror genre games.

⭐ places I’m at! bsky / pixiv / pillowfort /cohost / cara.app

[moxyphinx]

"Am I not what you expected?" - SIUAN SANCHE

[kmesons]

@femslashfortnight day 10: yellow (linda/emma)

I think it'd be interesting if the timelines and locations lined up such that emma encountered some... odd happenings in the witchwood close to perky's buds (i.e., her ex being unwillingly sacrificed to The Hungriest God)

[waitineedaname]

tbh it is incredible how compelling bingge and shen jiu are considering they're characters who ceased to exist as soon as the novel began

[tabbi-mysteries]

Look. I skim through episodes for Ran references. I skip through minutes worth of stuff if I'm confident Ran's not about to change outfit. But I am also only focused on Ran all the time. Which means I'm sorry animator who thought nobody would notice this single second frame of Ran missing her foot. I found it while trying to work out what shoes she was wearing. I was not expecting no feet at all but fair game you caught me out.

[aquickstart]

ok sure i'll talk about farleigh start. i'll talk about his tragedy of never being enough as it were and then having to deal with fucking oliver. sure. disclaimer: it's about class (and race) and the horrible reality of the rich. the horrible reality of living as farleigh.

another disclaimer: i'm white! and poc definitely pick up on everything i'm talking about here as it is, and better. i was and am specifically interested in farleigh vs. oliver but it's impossible to examine without considering race. definitely let me know if anything abt this sucks!

farleigh and oliver are similar. it's annoying because every intruder that is not himself is annoying, partly because felix's attention swaying from farleigh is dangerous; there is always a threat of being discarded, even if no precedent existed. the potential is terrifying.

but you'd think he's seen this before, every summer (if venetia is telling the truth) or at least often enough to learn to recognize it fast, so he should know this will pass. part of it is i think still the deep anxiety, and i think he hated every boy that was there before, and it is sort of routine.

but definitely a huge factor in farleigh's annoyance is the fact that he's a biracial (black for cattons, that's all they see) man in a white rich household. he's alert and exhausted all the time. of course he's angry at oliver, regardless of whether he's the first to crash at saltburn for the summer or the fifty-first.

but the important thing is this.

farleigh is very jealous of and angry and pissed at oliver because farleigh sees all the similarities between them. outsider, in financial trouble, whatever it is, in need of cattons; and yet oliver is preferred. and farleigh seems to be the only one to really consider it. felix does not pick up on the hint when farleigh brings up the birthday party vs. his mother. felix's clumsy "different or... anything like that" is as much about race as it is about class, of course. the "we've done all that we can" bit is felix absolving himself of guilt because surely they had, surely the mysterious collective cattons that he's not really part of had tried all they could do. to him, farleigh is different from oliver, because farleigh has been helped. felix is rich and white and twofold uncomfortable with farleigh, even if he's nice about it, even if he genuinely enjoys his company; he doesn't look too close at farleigh because he feels too guilty to come too close. and farleigh can't do anything about it. he can't nice himself into it. the fucking tragedy of him is that he's never enough in the world of the ultra-rich white, even if (especially because!) he's born into it.

farleigh is very pissed at oliver because farleigh also sees all the differences between them. you know who can be nice poor white enough to fit in? fucking oliver. felix says "just be yourself, they'll love you" when oliver first moves in. farleigh was also probably told the same thing, and felix also probably believed that farleigh could just be himself, but even if the cattons were magically not racist at all (impossible), it wouldn't make a difference to farleigh. he would still self-censor, keep in check, be in dangerous waters (because racism is not just about the individual, but about the system). we see that he'd won himself leeway by years of trial and error by the way he speaks to the family, but it's still within the boundaries of acceptable, built by the cattons. he's part of them because they allow it, and farleigh is very, very aware.

the annoying thing is oliver can be himself. like, truly, genuinely, he can just be. and farleigh can't help but envy that.

as a side note, oliver is obviously jealous of farleigh in the beginning as well, because regardless of the reality of farleigh's situation, he was born into it, and hence, at least in oliver's mind, has his position solidified. oliver's whole thing is unquenchable thirst and hunger for whatever and everything the cattons have (including themselves!). he wishes to have been a catton from birth. to oliver, at first, there's nothing farleigh can really do to lose it. and until he figures out the cattons completely, he can't help but envy that.

but i think farleigh senses something different about oliver early on. at least on the level of the text, we have "you're almost passing [for] a real, human boy", which is so important because farleigh is the first to point out oliver's weirdness. the next to do so is venetia in the bath scene calling him a freak, but it's too late. farleigh is too early.

and i like to think he clocks oliver too early because he sees the jagged edges that he recognizes in himself. i think that one other thing that farleigh envies is oliver's freedom to let go. freedom to let go is very similar to freedom to be, but not quite the same.

to be is about perception: farleigh knows he cannot fall out of line, but would like to, and oliver does not have to worry about it at all (i mean, he does, because oliver also performs for felix, but farleigh doesn't know that).

to let go is about the self: farleigh is too scared to even want what oliver eventually does, to even consider the possibility. oliver can let himself want. oliver can let himself act. oliver just can do things and want things. i'm not sure farleigh can.

and so in this scene, when oliver's wants and actions have landed him nowhere with farleigh, felix, venetia, the cattons, of course farleigh gloats. he can let himself do that, because if the cattons are slowly discarding him, farleigh can allow himself this one small victory. he's relieved because despite the dangerous similarities, oliver is, thankfully, not really the same as farleigh, right?

but like. this movie is a love letter to all things gothic. oliver is a white man. he prevails. the brief performance that oliver put on did eventually end up more effective than farleigh's lifetime of constraint. my heart fucking breaks for him to be honest.

the issue that remains is the fact of farleigh's survival. i like to think that oliver came to respect him. oliver is smart, but farleigh is clever. he picks up on everything oliver does (to refer back to the karaoke scene, farleigh immediately retaliates in the cleverest way, in the moment), and he's the only one to do so consistently (venetia, again, for example, comes close, but too late; oliver doesn't like that, there's nothing to work with). hence, stay with me for a little longer, the paradox: farleigh survives because he was never enough for the cattons, but he is very worthy of oliver's attention. in his own freaky way, oliver wants him. look at that.

so. farleigh. farleigh might come back. he always comes back. and i think oliver wants to try harder next time.

[sysig]

Ellen McLain’s commentary from my trivia playthrough

[bougiebutchbitch]

cannot believe that 'yelling at your boss when he repeatedly almost gets you and your crew killed and lies to manipulate you into staying when you try to leave, is not emotional abuse, actually' and 'there is such a thing as a mutually toxic and unhealthy relationship where both parties are incredibly shitty to each other - and this is obviously where Ed and Izzy stand until S2, when it becomes blatantly abusive' is a controversial take. But as this is Abuse Apologism And Ableism, The FandomTM, I really should not be surprised

Just.

I was deep in physically and mentally abusive relationships in my teens/twenties - including relationships that started out with mutual toxicity and bad decisions on all sides, but which became outright physical & mental & other sorts of abuse with myself as the victim. I know my shit.

I suppose I can see where 'Izzy emotionally abused Ed' comes from IF people give literally the most uncharitable interpretation to Every Single Scene, and assume Izzy shouts angrily at Ed and negs him all the time rather than this being how he acts when he's incredibly stressed by circumstance caused directly by Ed and at the end of his fucking rope? Which, as we see in S2... Is not the case.

It's not freaking emotional abuse when you're shouting at your boss who keeps almost getting you and your crew killed. Even if this is NOT a kind or productive way to help Ed deal with his mental health, considering that Ed's actions have consequences that he repeatedly and blithely ignores, it's pretty fucking justified!

It's not freaking emotional abuse if your boss OPENLY LOVES MAIMING PEOPLE AND IS MORE THAN HAPPY TO BURN THEM ALIVE and you encourage that, while upholding his right to not kill with his own hands. Even if he has private breakdowns after the fact because he suffers from black-and-white thinking, dissociates himself from any wrongdoing, and is afraid of his potential to become 'a monster'.

Are these choices helpful? No. Are they kind? No. Is Izzy demonstrating Model Citizen Behaviour? Definitely not.

But it's sure as hell not emotional abuse. And it doesn't justify the physical and emotional abuse Ed puts Izzy through in S2.

Nothing you say can 'make' him hit you. If he chooses to hit you (or... choke you out then repeatedly mutilate you and pressure you to commit suicide and makes you constantly live in fear for your life and the lives of people you care about) he makes that decision himself. Yes, even if you shouted at him first. Yes, even if you were arguing. Yes, even if you were in the wrong in that argument. Yes, even if he has a Tragic BackstoryTM and mental health issues. This shit shouldn't be controversial.

Signed: one of those actual abuse survivors.

[arthursfuckinghat]

"Why doesn't John talk about Arthur that much in the epilogue?"

He admitted to Mary-Beth that although he doesn't talk about Arthur, he still thinks about him a lot, even eight years later. John was grateful for Arthur's sacrifice and tried to honour that by killing Micah, but he was determined to put the past behind them so they could focus on the new life they had built for themselves. Here, he doesn't say that he wants to forget Arthur, he just doesn't want to dwell on what was a painful time in their lives.