#this turned into a fucking manifesto LMAO apologies

[coredrill]

gravion thots!!!!!!

okay huge spoilers for both this show and bravern below. BUT. so like i said before i’d actually already seen gravion a while ago and decided to revisit for zwei since the possibility of bravern getting a s2 is. not unlikely probably? seems like it prints money in japan so who is to say LMAO. and tbqh i don’t think there are like. very many similarities? or very much to glean abt potential bravern s2 from zwei? like i’d say on some level that bravern itself feels more like zwei due to bravern feeling like a complete story meanwhile the first season of gravion really doesn’t. LMAO. HOWEVER, i could def see s2’s plot being abt finding out Where the deathdrives come from and Why, kinda like the sandman-hugi-lambias plotline in zwei

honestly at first i thought that gravion and zwei must’ve been greenlit at the same time and just paced in a baffling manner cause why else would the actual plot only start like halfway into zwei? but apparently zwei was actually greenlit after gravion was done so idk why all of the Lore Ideas were saved like that LMAO. honestly it’s mostly just interesting perspective to look back at bravern on at it exists without a s2 - i get the feeling that obari wanted to make sure that none of his ideas stayed on the table, in case he didn’t get to make more, hence why it is so fast-paced and there is so MUCH in there. and i ALSO get the feeling that koyanagi did even more of the work to pull a coherent, consistent, evenly-paced plot out of all of obari’s ideas than i had previously thought and everyone owes him a BIG thanks for making sure that bravern is actually a good show. LMFAO. anyways i said it before and i’ll say it again but koyanagi based as fuck!!!!!!!

ANYWAYS. okay. bravern discussions mostly outta the way so now the rest of the post will be mostly just gravion >:)

i think if i am being honest with myself that gravion is probably a 6/10 and zwei is an 8/10 HOWEVER. zwei REALLY comes together quite beautifully in its back half which leaves the whole affair with a very good aftertaste so to speak AND. i know i joke about “2000s digipaint ecchi mecha show” but there is truthfully something so full of heart to me when it comes to shows that fit that description lmao. ttgl and diebuster are very much the pinnacle of that and while i think they are better shows than gravion, and have more to say, gravion has that same soul to it? like there is such a deep-seated love for every single person, and an unwavering belief that in spite of (and sometimes because of) their flaws, they are capable of anything when they work together!!!! and that fucking GETS me about the super robot genre, just that optimism born of refusal to take the world as it is and to forcibly make it better with all of the people around you!!! if we kick and scream and fight like hell, we’ll move forward a little bit!! surprising absolutely no one who knows i am a rossiu enjoyer, the scene where sandman is convinced he needs to die and then all the people who he has genuinely wronged talk him out of it had me ugly sobbing lmao. super robot anime are beautiful!!!!!!

however now for the things that bug me about gravion cause the number is. not insignificant 😭 i feel like there is a truly excellent show buried in here somewhere but it got kinda mangled along the way and not all of it was able to shine and that makes me sad!!! cause tbh a lot of parts DID make it through intact and they deserve to be loved!!!! i will certainly love them with my whole heart forever despite being 20 years late to the party LMAO.

okay so first things first. WHY IS EVERYONE SO SECRETIVE FOR NO REASON 😭 like starting off with ayaka, i get why she didn’t come out to eiji right away due to his whole reasoning for piloting at first being that he is doing so in order to find her. okay cool! but by the end of regular gravion, eiji’s motivation has evolved? he’s finally accepted the need to Do Something about the zeravire due to the way the attack and his hesitancy impacted yumi…………he’s clearly attached enough to touga that touga nearly killing him caused him to angst for a few days…………so why can’t ayaka just tell him now? yeah it’s fun to play with her secret identity some but i think it’d still be fun if eiji got the chance to fully Know that when raven yells at him it’s really his sister and they get to banter back and forth with the Raven of it all LMAO. hell maybe she could’ve ACTUALLY piloted gravion in its other leg after mizuki left, i would’ve gone bonkers if they got to pilot together!! his quick forgiveness of her not telling him is in character for him but it’s a little anticlimactic that he’s all confused once she revealed herself cause she had no reason to keep it secret for so long 😭 especially since i’m pretty sure mizuki knew too after she and eiji had their adventure!!! mizuki coulda told him at some point instead!!! hell ep13 already feels tacked on since the ongoing plotline abt eiji running away due to touga was resolved in ep12 (i guess????? tbh they don’t really talk abt it touga just says “welcome home eiji 🥺” and then they are inseparable besties in the first half of zwei so i assume they worked it out LMAO) so why not work the Ayaka Reveal into that ep too? maybe it’s an artefact of zwei being greenlit by that point and them wanting to sit on it for a while longer, idk.

actually i say that somewhat dismissively but in the entire first half of zwei they take every instance to show that when given the opportunity eiji and touga choose to hang out together and it’s so 🥺 as long as you ignore that one where eiji is dressed as fucking pickle rick lmao. like a strong aspect of eiji as a character imo is that even though he is initially abrasive towards everyone, after he warms up and they grow closer it really does feel like he actually likes these people!!! and he cares for them!!! and he especially likes hanging out with touga which is so 🥺

anyways i think that the show could’ve really benefited from a flashback to luna’s dad’s death, and the passing of the Raven Mask onto ayaka, thus removing her from the Gravion Pilot Equation. and also that perhaps coinciding with sandman’s realization that touga’s a little freak and needs friends, so ayaka suggests eiji in her place since she knows he’ll be able to get through to touga and also likely has the gravity enzyme since she does. i think this would’ve cleared up the motivations of her AND sandman a lot AND given a much stronger foundation to what’s going on with touga…………

this also leads into my second big issue with the secret-keeping which is that. eina’s character gets completely mangled due to her proto-grand-diva nature being a surprise and it hurts the rest of the show too 😭 like why AREN’T we allowed to know that she is a clone(?) of her original self? why was she created? was it specifically to take care of touga? cause it’s also hard to believe that eina and touga are truly That close when touga’s only friend up to that point has been said to be the grand kaiser!!! like i think the grand kaiser betraying him was honestly more impactful than eina’s DEATH due to not knowing either her as a person or her relationship to touga all that well 😭😭 she has the least developed relationship with eiji too imo, which is a shame cause his relations are the strongest………though i WILL say it’s fucking hilarious to me that she represents the maids on gravion 😭 maid representation matters!!! i just wish that she had a plot or a better defined/explained backstory to connect to!!!

secret number 3: sandman. him keeping secrets about his past due to his guilt makes sense and the reveal is well-timed however that reveal is explained so confusingly and also the weird incest thing going on with him and hugi and lufira legitimately confused me as to what tf actually happened LMAO. like are any of these people actually related???? are they all related???? i have no clue 😭 also i said this before but that unnamed couple who died on lambias looking SUSPICIOUSLY like eiji and touga is fucking suspicious as hell LMAO. is sandman’s grief for them specifically what drove him to choose touga over faye from the orphanage and to seek out ayaka then pivot to eiji???? cause they look like eiji and touga if you aged them up and also if eiji was crossdressing WHICH IS NOT UNHEARD OF.

ALSO speaking of touga nearly killing eiji and also eina’s unclear role in touga’s life. i think this show tries to have its cake and eat it too with the “touga is HEARTLESS” thing 😭 which is sad cause i love his character archetype and there’s already a lot of good stuff there and i just!!!! wish it was done better!!!!!! like the scene where touga nearly kills eiji and cecile is so fucking whack cause 1) we have not yet really seen any indication that touga is Like This? no lack of care for nearby civilians that his teammates challenge, no concern for his fellow pilots throwing themselves into danger (sometimes literally with luna and leele and EINA(!!!) and the way their special attacks sometimes launch them solo at the enemy………… and 2) eiji is taking his sweet fucking time saving cecile 😩 like he gets to her and then sits there for a whole ass minute when he coulda been actually getting outta the way and letting touga do his job!!! he has ample time to escape!!!! it really kills the dramatic tension there and the whole episode comes off so weirdly when it’s supposed to be like. the emotional focal point of the season 😭😭😭 ironically it seems like from what i have seen of SRW Z so far that they’re actually trying to remedy this a bit? like eiji has called out touga TWICE already in their very first battle for his personality change. smth smth that one tweet that’s like “they experience the exact same plots as their shows but boss from mazinger z is there” LMAO

also unrelated but that ep also has the scene where eiji’s like “hey eina doesn’t it bother you that luna and touga are so close 🤨” and i’ve been thinking abt it since watching this time around trying to figure out what it is supposed to be saying? and what prompted eiji to ask that? like luna isn’t into touga yet cause that happens while eiji is away. touga sees everyone platonically except eiji. eiji sees everyone platonically except touga and also leele for five seconds (and he thinks “she’d be cute if she smiled” as if touga doesn’t look like a smiley leele 🤨🌈⁉️). eiji and luna are kept pretty strictly platonic and i fucking love them for it. so like. it COULD be eiji’s interest in touga prompting him to ask that but i honestly doubt it? like they had their ep6 date but i genuinely don’t think he realizes how much he cares for touga until touga tries to kill him and hurts him on that personal level LMAO. so it would be weird to have eiji consciously foreshadow/lampshade that here. which just leads me to believe that it’s supposed to be implying that EINA is into touga???? since there was also an earlier scene with her and the other maids where they asked if she liked touga and she got flustered? but like then in zwei she is pretty strictly assigned to being his one and only friend-mom-caretaker who he cares about so much even though he is heartless. IDK 😭😭 this scene just confuses me more the more i think abt it i think. weird ass episode!!!!!!

i think the main thing for me that really holds it back is the just. total lack of desire to do anything interesting with the theme of gravity 😩😭😭 like i guess you could SOMEWHAT say that it exists on an interpersonal level on the protagonists’ side mainly cause eiji manages to stick with the ppl he cares about HOWEVER it has absolutely nothing to do with the zeravire. or hugi. or lambias. or the genocidron. and even the bit about gravion breaking apart when it’s taken too many hits could’ve been explored a lot more imo!!! gravity as a scientific theory has SO much storytelling potential and it’s genuinely disheartening that none of it was used 😭 we never even really see the extent of sol gravion’s power either!!!! which kinda undermines eiji being put there cause he’s Earned It and just kinda makes it seem like the switch is 100% cause touga experienced zwei ep4 and was like “actually i think the only other person who i want to have access to the grand kaiser during battle who could potentially wrap their arms around me from behind is eiji. this is the perfect idea since i think he’s a little too far away from me in the right leg and it freaks me out when we’re in battle and i’m not physically close enough to protect him. i need to tell sandman about this Now” which is cool cause i love them but i would’ve ALSO loved to see a moment where eiji is either tested as the person to pilot the Willpower To Power mecha OR where he is able to use that power in a moment where there is no other solution for them. eiji just got a cool promotion, let’s let him use it!!!!!

anyways the good stuff now!!!! i feel like this section might be shorter but there IS actually more stuff i like in this show than dislike however i just have more notes abt the things that could be improved LMAO. okay so first off i fucking LOVE eiji he is an EXTREMELY good “heart of the team” character. imo. he’s literally the opposite of a deadbeat dad cause he went out one day to go look for touga in the bigass city and came back with mizuki and luna too 😩 best fucking boy!!!!!!!! i love that he’s not naive either, like tbh a character trope that grinds my gears is “too good for this world too pure never has conflict ever” and while that’s usually associated with having a big heart i LOVEEEEEEEEE that eiji gets to be all heart AND be abrasive and angry and fuck up!!!! he’s seen some shitty things about the world and yet is so quick to forgive and love and care!!!! i love his friendship with leele where he’s like a bit of an older brother to her and yet when he runs away SHE’S the one to come call him out on his shit (mirroring his own ethos) and he listens to her!!!! i love his friendship with mizuki where they get to connect over knowing ayaka and even though mizuki doesn’t tell him everything, it feels like they hold high respect for each other through ayaka!!!! i love that when mizuki leaves the EFA that EIJI is her first call cause she knows that even if everyone else has fallen apart that he’ll still be there to scrape the pieces back together, and i love that even though she’s just betrayed them eiji forgives her and trusts what she has to say about where touga is and where they should meet her!!!! i LOVEEEEE his friendship with luna, in that they grind each other’s gears cause they are so similar but grow to really respect each other and in zwei have some of the most genuine and honest conversations together because they trust each other so much!!! like they CAN confide in each other (mostly about touga lmfao) without yelling cause they respect each other, but also their edges don’t get smoothed over and they both still get to be annoyances towards each other too!!! honestly i fucking love luna too, like she and leele kinda got the shaft in s2 for Touga Love Triangle (lmfao) but genuinely when girls are like. THEY think they're the Responsible Mature ones and they are 100% capable and determined meanwhile they have moments where they can be just as childish and abrasive and immature as the guys around them is one of my favorite types of Anime Girl tbh. yoko-core rain-core yknow!!! anyways back to eiji he and SANDMAN have such a good relation too, like i love how eiji at first refuses his responsibility but once he accepts it he becomes someone sandman truly trusts and relies on!!!! eiji’s literally not sandman’s brother-in-law, he’s the brother who stepped up (MORE ON THIS LATER)!!!!!

eiji and touga though. MAN 😭😭😭 i feel like a joke mentioning how much of a Romance Hater i am at this point in the year of bravern but. it literally is true, like the first romance that ever made me actually feel things was kaworu and shinji in large part because i think that the whole “feeling alone all your life but not knowing until you find someone who is Like You and get maybe a little too intense abt it” is like. peak queer teen experience LMAO. like not even necessarily in a romantic sense, my aro ass 100% had friendships like that in my teen years, hence why it appeals to me with kaworu and shinji!! they are me and my friends and the stuff we experienced at 14!! and then smith and isami were the second and THAT one was in large part ALSO because of a highly relatable queer experience, which is the paralyzing fear of being known for who you truly are and how the people around you will perceive that, but the other people Like You love you anyways. even if you are Unconventional and Strange and Bad. and there is also the element of wanting to be more like the people who are Like You, because in doing so you become more Yourself. and also i think it’s cool that the mecha is part of it LMAO.

and now tell me why eiji and touga are ALL of those things AND have a “raised/created to be a Weapon” character AND eiji says that touga looks like an “angel” in the novel apparently AND they were doing this shit in 2004 😭😭😭 i know i have been such a menace abt them and i will probably continue to be and i’m deeply sorry to everyone who has wound up w clips of them in DMs but i’m just. jesus. FINE OBARI YOU GOT ME. I LIKE THEM. I LIKE THEM SO MUCH. their date episode is such a fucking standout cause there is smth really beautiful to me abt how easily eiji coulda dropped touga like dead weight the second his real friends showed up and he absolutely refused to do so? like you can see how uncomfortable and awkward touga is in the way he interacts w eiji’s friends but eiji just makes repeated efforts to involve touga and make sure that he doesn’t feel left out just because he’s never left the castle and it’s. really just so sweet!! and then by the end eiji is genuinely finding joy in introducing touga to new things!!!

and i could go on abt zwei ep9/10 FOREVERRRRR like ep9 being the fulfillment of eiji’s whole “if someone close to you disappears you go after them” ethos but literally for touga. and at the same time touga’s having the worst day ever until eiji literally finds him and shows up on his motorcycle all sweaty and rolls around on the ground with him LMAO. touga’s “i never asked you to worry about me!” line is fucking insane and then eiji having an extra helmet for touga to wear on the ride home is so 🥺 genuinely no wonder touga has EVEN MORE of an Eiji Complex after that moment cause he literally had to hug eiji from behind that whole motorcycle ride home LMAO. and then touga coming around 100% full circle from being like “eiji’s not really good at piloting so we don’t need him 😇” to “eiji is actually so critical to this whole gravion thing and me in particular that i want him right next to me piloting the actual literal heart cause that’s the place that suits him the best”. literally what if i let you change me irreversibly inside and out so that i can no longer exist in this world without carrying you alongside me FROM TOUGA’S MOUTH!!!!!!! touga tenkuuji the fucking Character that you are!!!!!! eiji shigure the fucking Character that YOU are!!!!!!!! fucking cataclysmic yaoi the both of you

also i can’t fucking believe obari outright said they were yaoi LMAO, like i’d say “i didn’t know he was allowed to do that” BUT well uh. we haven’t gotten gravion drei despite his & the VAs’ interest in making it 😭 as recently as last year he still wanted to make it as a web comic too……………i obviously have no clue whether him calling eiji and touga yaoi in one interview 20 years ago impacts that but it DOES stand out to me that he hasn’t yet done so w bravern. but also that just means that if i ever win the lottery i WILL be funding his gravion drei web comic cause i need to know what’s in there after 20 years. timeskip + eiji/touga wedding please!!!!!!!! do it for me and the six other people on the planet who like these dopey looking motherfuckers 😭 they’re the sun!!!!!! ☀️☀️☀️

also also it is hilarious to me that obari got fucking suzuken to be bravern (and he also auditioned for smith??) after watching a few clips of him as eiji. like genuinely do you think obari has suzuken on speed dial for when he needs a character to homoerotically yell his boy bestfriend’s name 😭😭 it does kinda make me want to rewatch in sub HOWEVER i don’t think i could do that cause the english adv dub? FUCKING INSPIRED. luna’s delivery in particular is always SO GOOD i have literally been walking around saying “what is it gonna take for a girl to get the SCOOP around here?” at the smallest confusion for weeks 😭 greg ayres as touga manages the fucking switch between Battle Mode and Silly Mode SO well, AND THEY DUBBED OVER THE MAIDS SINGING THE COMBINATION SONG THANK YOU FOR MY LIFE GRAVION ZWEI!!!!!!!! and i probably don’t need to say it but chris patton and greg ayres absolutely understood the assignment and between their performances and their contributions to the ADR script the show honestly just feels so earnestly excited about eiji and touga’s relationship and it’s. so good!!! i love that queers contributed so much to it!!!! it’s a good ass dub!!!!!!!!

like that’s actually one of the things holding me back from saying that i want a remake of the show lmfao. like on one hand i think this show is kinda prime remake opportunity since the character animation could use a TON of work, the story structure could use another pass or two, we could actually show the zeravire evolving and not just mention it when convenient, the thematic relevance of Gravity could be used a whole lot more and eiji and touga can fuHOWEVER. i don’t think chris patton does anime anymore and it’d be lacking without him to dub over eiji (if the show even got a dub since crunchy roll can not be fucking assed to dub mecha in 2024 apparently. if they even RELEASE it) 😭😭 also one of the other aspects of the show that is truly great is just how weighty gravion himself feels? like that is a HEAVY robot and i don’t think i’ve yet seen that sense of weight conveyed in 3D mech animation as well as it is here. and i don’t want to give that up for gravion cause gravity is his thing!!!! the weight has thematic relevance!!!! i am honestly somewhat tempted to do my own sort of reworking of the show’s plot + extrapolate it to a theoretical “drei” but tbh there’s no way in hell i could write that much LMAO. i just love the show a lot!!!!! and i want to give it the love it deserves!!!!!!!

anyways. i think that’s finally it except for this post-show family tree that i made which is absolutely fucking hilarious to me 😭 granted it DOES assume eiji/touga wedding and eina as touga’s mom-figure and also it ties luna’s dad to ayaka via the raven identity cause it’s funnier that way but that means that 5 of the 6 grand knights are now related in one way or another. LMAO. some highlights:

eiji and sandman are brothers in law

luna and leele are step sisters which is honestly cute as hell

ayaka is now leele and luna’s step mom and EIJI is leele and luna’s step uncle

post eventual eiji/touga wedding touga is ALSO leele and luna’s step uncle. which means those poor girls have to pilot gravion with their gay uncles 😭 also touga is sandman’s brother in law and idk what to even say about that one LMAO. eina now being eiji's aunt is kinda cute as hell tho im afraid

my tiny pea brain may have done this wrong however i’m kind of obsessed w the idea that the grand knights have the most bizarre found family dynamic known to man EXCEPT for mizuki who somehow made it out unscathed LMAO.

[kachimera]

@saratrantoul ok i was going to make this a proper post but all i can get out of my head are these rambles, so apologies for the mess 👉👈

Regarding Leon/Isaac, i dont have a manifesto but rather why i think it'd be fun to see them interact:

it's mostly the similarity of their situations despite their completely opposite beliefs- two guys who lost everything they loved at the hands of someone they considered a friend. They had disaster divorces and are vindictive over it they can bond over that. And also the fact that (mostly going with PtR's Isaac), both have a certain code of honor, and both have gone to war in the name of a higher being, as twisted as both of these things are on Isaac. (This also ties w my funny "Mathias creating friction between Leon n the church hc"). And, assuming they do end up having something instead of instantly killing eachother, Leon (knowing he has issues but dealing w them on his own bc oops friendship failed me) sees part of his own pain on this guy and is like "i can fix him" in a "im gonna give him the support i wish i had" way. Meanwhile Isaac doesn't wants any help nor affection at all and just wants to wallow in his misery but he still ends up feeling attachment. Something something his older brother mentality and just, picking on Leon while also being overprotective of him (he'd also piss him off just enough to get the pretty noble knight to fuck him raw lmao). It end up being a pretty unstable and toxic relationship, with both having incompatible values but also needing eachother bc they got nothing left.

And Celiakado. Ooooh boi Celiakado. This one comes with the context of interpreting Arikado's general shittyness in the sorrow games as legit part of his character instead of just him being ooc. His whole mission all this time was to oppose his father and now he's no more. He's someone who has been chewed up and spit out by the cycle so badly that he ends up trying to control it in return. And this is where Celia comes in. Her goals match with Arikado regarding the need of a new dark lord (except the killing/turning Soma part) and it's implied she knows him or has heard abt him in the beginning of DoS, spends a lot of time offscreen like him during the game, and manages to escape in the neutral ending despite Arikado's stated goal of stopping her. So, why can't they be cooperating behind the curtains, caught in manipulation games between this messed up gal who considers Arikado an extra powerful candidate in denial that she can manipulate, and this fucked up guy who considers Celia a useful tool for his goals, someone extremely amusing to fall into manipulation games with (overconfident girl who is completely out of her level and yet thinks she's winning, we stan), and a bloodbank to snack on, with the potential of funny feelings to sprout between the two which wont matter bc they're in for the grind and have no emotional inteligence. Then something happens w Celia making a move on Soma anyways and pretty much ruining Arikado's previous plans, Soma, Yoko n Julius get involved and welp. Neutral ending gives them the chance to continue being assholes, Worst ending has her mauled by Somacula and Best ending has her crucified (Like a certain someone important to Arikado ya kno ), both in front of him :) (and shoutout to @viralvava for being the smartest person alive ;D)

So yea two funny ships to be normal abt

[daddywarbats]

For those of you who don't want to go digging, a summary (so far):

Client goes to tiktok and explains how a tattoo artist she likes charged her thousands of dollars for a shitty sketch of a half a fox she didn't ask for and tried to gaslight her into thinking she didn't adequately communicate and so now owes her even more money. She doesn't name the artist in question, but does have receipts, which include said artist dunking on the artist of the reference photos she was given by the client (this fact will become hysterical in an "oh my goood, of course it is way" in the context of what this artist actually DID for this sketch).

The prices, btw, are unhinged and this tattoo artist's pricing structure/TOS is a modified and scaled up version of a simple print artist's contract (right down to the revisions clause bit), but grimier, since the pricing scale doesn't make sense for non-commercial, personal use with the only print being a tattoo and the hourly labor for the actual tattooing is apparently not even included in these clown rates. No, that's extra, but you're not going to be told that until you get there, as client 2 revealed.

First client did not get the tattoo but now has a really shit fox sketch that she paid thousands for.

This sketch is traced from another artist, btw (because OF COURSE IT IS LMAO), but that only comes out after another client comes forward and reveals that oh no it's so much worse than that.

The tattoo artist in question not only scammed her out of thousands, she doxxed her, tried to get her banned from every tattoo place she knew of by using the fears of the tattoo artist community of a client walking out on them to get them to block her, and called the police on her, which was useless for the client to even argue that she didn't skip on the bill because it was literally a your word against hers situation, since this tattoo artist used a phone call for all contract stuff so nothing in writing and she could just change it on the fly, which she did.

And then it turns out this tattoo artist got her clownshow pricing scheme and behavior playbook from this guy who is trying to bill himself as the CEO of tattooing and is actually selling this pricing scheme/self-help mlm style manifesto to tattoo artists as some bs wave of the future nonsense. He congratulates this clown car artist for using his program in a post.

After tattoogate breaks, he issues an apology to first client involved that is actually a complete ad for his program, btw, and it is the legitimately most what in the fucking fuck move, because he sounds exactly like one of those upper tier players in an mlm that gets caught doing something shady and it's just short one "it's not a pyramid scheme, those are illegal" to put it over.

I'm sure there's more, too, because as a print artist? There's some stuff in that portfolio that looked reaaaal familiar and not in a "I saw that tattoo before" way but in the "I definitely asked someone to link the actual artist of that print" way.

tattoogate is officially the wildest fucking ride

at the start I was like “…that fox looks familiar, bet it’s stolen” (it was)

and at the Current of It, now there’s a possible pyramid scheme and it just keeps going!

[spike-and-faye]

Hello, I require your infinite wisdom please!! :O So I just finished cowboy bebop and I am so confused like who the fuck was Julia. WHAT was Faye's past. I literally never process tv shows and the bebop was not immune to my stupidity LMAO like... I guess the ending just really confused me, from what I gathered Spike and Vicious were friends? But then they weren't? And Julia dated Vicious but also Spike? And he? Went after Vicious even after Julia had died? I am Confusion. Please help. Thank u...

Oh BABEY I am so glad you asked! :) Be prepared for a long answer and I apologize in advance for how incoherent it will probably be.

ALSO Please note: this show is fucking complicated. I have watched it all the way through several times a year, every single year, for over a decade now, and I am *STILL* finding new shit every time I watch it. It's packed with symbols, motifs, allusions and underlying themes that are just so rich. It is so extraordinarily well-written that it could give a lot of classic literature a run for its money. I'm literally working on an in depth literary/film analysis my husband lovingly calls my Manifesto on the series right now. SO PLEASE don't beat yourself up about not catching everything on the first go round.

HEY BTW for anyone who hasn't finished the show, please know there will be MANY spoilers ahead!

Anyways ~

1.     Spike / Julia / Vicious:

The information we get on Spike's past, including Vicious and Julia, is pretty limited considering how big of an impact they have on the story. We get our first glimpse in Session 1: Asteroid Blues, then again in Session 5: Ballad of Fallen Angels, Sessions 12 + 13: Jupiter Jazz, and Sessions 25 + 26: Real Folk Blues. I recommend reviewing these episodes for you Julia and Vicious fix.

What we know:

Spike and Vicious were both members of an organized crime syndicate called the Red Dragons, which is roughly analogous to the Yakuza or the Mafia. Their positions in the organization are not clear, but there are some images alluding to them being hitmen, and they likely rose up in the ranks as they were close acquaintances of Mao Yenrai, a Capo of the Red Dragon.

Spike and Vicious were close comrades. Spike taught Vicious everything he knew about fighting, and the two had a deep trust in each other. Which Spike fucked up ….

^^Vicious looks hot asf here

Julia was Vicious' lover/girlfriend. One night in 2068 (three years prior to the time we watch in the Bebop) Spike is injured, presumably from a syndicate-related fight and he passes out in front of her door. She takes him in and nurses him back to health and he SIMPS HARD for her. We’re all but told he's in LOVE love with her. They start an affair, and Spike tells her he's ready to abandon the whole life - the syndicate, Vicious, Mao, all of it - and they could run away together.

WELL Vicious finds out about this whole affair, and is DOUBLY betrayed because his literal best friend and girlfriend have been having an affair, and tbh I think he was just as jealous of Spike's attentions as he was of Julia's. (Whether or not it’s a sexual thing for Spike … well … I have my own headcanons about that). SO when he finds out they're going to run away together, he gives Julia an ultimatum: you can either kill him, or I'll just kill you both. Spike had written her a letter about meeting him in the graveyard to start their new life together, which she tears up to hide his location from Vicious. (This is the falling ripped up pieces of paper we see in Spike's flash back in Session 5).

^^ r/gifsyoucanhear

**NOTE: There are those who disagree with this view, (looking at you Cowboy Bebop wiki) instead suggesting Vicious and Spike were buds in the past, but then hated each other once they were both considered as potential successors to Mao. That's why Vicious wanted him dead, and he was enlisting Julia (who he didn't necessarily have a romantic connection to) to help kill Spike since he knew Spike loved her. Personally, I think there is plenty of evidence that Vicious also wanted Julia, and in fact was already with her, when Spike started seeing her. If you want me to cite my sources please send an me an ask about it :)

Spike gets the idea, whether by her just not showing up or word around the syndicate being like YO Vicious wants you dead. Despite Vicious' ultimatum to Julia, he was gunna kill Spike either way. SO he sets up an ambush, and SadBoy™ Spike walks intentionally into their trap. Somehow, he doesn't die, though the entire syndicate thinks he did. (Note Annie's reaction to seeing him alive in Session 5). It’s also implied that this is where he lost his eye.

HIS EYE - possibly the most important symbol in the show so I do have to mention it. In episode 26, he explicitly explains to Faye that one of his eyes only sees the past. (PS this isn't dissimilar to Jet's arm… we can get into that another time). Basically, he's constantly living halfway in the past and halfway in the present, and describes the past like a dream he can never wake up from. Because dysfunctional or not - the syndicate WAS his family. (Again - see his relationship with Annie, Mao, and Vicious (prior to Spike's betrayal)). It's his reminder that Julia didn't run away with him, and that he'd left behind that life for her. (He didn’t know she was being threatened until the final episode). Basically Spike is hyper-fixated on what he had and what could've been.

Not long after this, Spike starts bounty hunting because like? What else is he going to do. He doesn't care if he lives or dies but if he has to be alive, he may as well be able to eat. He joins up with Jet Black on the Bebop.

TL; DR: Spike stole Vicious' lover, Julia, so Vicious made Julia choose between her killing Spike or Vicious killing them both. She instead went into hiding and Spike thought he'd been stood up. He fake died and got the hell outta dodge.

2.     What was Faye's past?

Ok let me start by saying Faye is my wife and my life. HOWEVER I hated her the first time I watched this show circa age 13 because I thought she was annoying/vain/shallow (also because #internalizedmisogyny lol am I right fam). Good news! She is all those things! But she's also very lonely and scared and an amnesiac and secretly a sweetie and she realizes she loves the crew of the Bebop like family.

SO my wife's backstory:

she was born in the 1990s (#only90skidsremember). There's some debate over her race/nationality, but due to the images of her hanging out in Merlion Park in Singapore, my bet is that she's Singaporean. She comes from a wealthy family with a big house, and we see some utterly *adorable* film of her as a child/young adolescent in Session 18: Speak Like a Child. I cry everytime </3

^^ Holla for the representation

In 2014, circa age 20, she and her parents were going into space when the shuttle they were on had some kind of malfunction/accident and it killed an unknown number of people, including her parents. At the time, the technology didn’t exist to be able to save her, so she was put into a cryogenic sleep state. Meanwhile, the Lunar Gate accident occurs, breaking up the moon and causing rock showers on Earth's surface. Most people died, moved to Mars, or settled underground.

She wakes up from her cryogenic sleep in 2068. (Also the year Spike leaves the syndicate.) She's 'woken' by the corrupt Dr. Bacchus who plans on charging her for the years and years of medical debt she's accrued. (See Session 15: My Funny Valentine.) Luckily a lawyer takes interest in her case (Whitney Haggus Matsumoto) and tries to help get rid of her debt. The two fall in love, but turns out Whitney is a Scumbag. He's actually Dr. Bacchus's nephew, and faked his death, writing Faye as the sole inheritor to his will. This means she'll take on all his debts. So baby girl has LOTS of debt at this point.

In the intervening years prior to her joining the Bebop, she gambles, cheats, gains a lot of street smarts, and adopts a very seductive character to get her way. She joins the crew on the Bebop in Session 3: Honky Tonk Women.

TL;DR: Faye is Austin powers

YIKES this is so long I am so sorry. Bitches are obsessed with this show. (I am bitches)

3.     The Ending

Okay I'm going to present this in the way, in my scholarly opinion, would be correct, though there are SO many interpretations other than simply 'Spike died :/".

To understand the plot of the last couple episodes we actually have to go back to Session 5: Mao is instructed* to sign a treaty with a rival syndicate called the White Tigers. (*He's instructed by The Van (Council of identical creepy old men) who are the actual head of the dragon. I think we only see them in Session 26.) Well - Vicious is a Bastard Man and he and his fellow mutineers blow up the White Tiger guys' ship and slit Mao's throat. Before he dies, Mao is like "Gotdamnit if Spike was still here this shit wouldn't have happened." Later in the Cathedral battle, Vicious explains to Spike he killed Mao because Mao 'lost his fangs'. He planned on killing Spike for good her, IMO, so there'd be no rival to take over as Capo for the Dragons.

^^These guys are The Van btw

THEN in Session 25, the Van basically catches Vicious and is like “you killed Mao and now you have to go to Time Out.” The Van also decides to just kill everyone associated with Vicious, just 2 B safe. That's why there's a big ass shootout at the Loser Bar where Jet and Spike are chilling, drinking, (missing Faye and Ed and Ein lol) and Shin (younger brother to Lin, who's helping Vicious overthrow the Dragon) explains all this to Spike. OH and PS JULIA IS ALIVE AND HERE IS HER LOCATION :). (**Notice Spike's reaction at this point is different than his reaction in Jupiter Jazz when he hears there's a Julia on Calisto. Much less excited… hmm…).

SO THEN you know we get some flashbacks of the past as previously explained *and* Julia just happens to run into Faye. She recognizes that Faye is one of Spike's friends from the Bebop (she was keeping tabs on him it seems) and picks her up. Faye doesn't know who Julia is but is like damn bitch I'm a little gay for you. (I mean … that may just be my bi ass projecting, but Faye is REALLY struck with her. Look at how she describes her to Jet, I mean come on.)

 Faye's like, 'we should team up' and Julia says 'no thanks but also tell Spike to meet me at *the place*'. Meanwhile back on the Bebop Spike and Jet are talking and Spike goes on about some dream woman who was his other half. (We assume he means Julia … I have my reasons to doubt this … I have a lot of angry DMs about my opinion here lol but I just do not give a fuck (: I can expand on this in another post or you can refer to the title of my fucking blog haha) Personally, I think Watanabe personally left this specific scene open ended, the same way he does with the ending and various other things.

more like SIMP Spiegel

ANYWAY Faye comes back to the Bebop to tell Spike about Julia, and Jet gets intel from a former cop buddy that there's some shit going down with the Dragons. (Again, the Van is hunting down everyone ever associated with Vicious, including your pal Spike). Bebop is attacked, Faye tells Spike what's up with Julia, and he heads out.

 PAN TO VICIOUS chained up - about to be executed - but what's that!? It's a bird!? It's a pla- no it's just a bird. (With one glowing red eye … hm … reminds me of Spike, also the drug Red Eye. Pls let me know if you have any thoughts on this). Just a bird with a BOMB! Explosion (RIP bird c. 2065 - too soon), Vicious kills the elders, his buddies show up and are ready to go fuck shit up.

this show could not be more of an aesthetic

MMMPhhh okay RAINY CEMETERY. Spike and Julia. She draws a gun, explains why she didn't meet him that day, and then hugs him. Now Spike is not *great* at showing his emotions but he literally just stands there. Maybe it's a stoic expression of how sad he is that he never knew she still cared, when it seemed like she dumped him. Maybe he's finally getting some closure on his past. Maybe the past doesn't mean the same thing it used to. (I'll elaborate later on this).

They go to Annie's to get stocked up on stuff, she lets them know she denied knowing Spike was still alive and hey also the Van was assassinated by Vicious and his guys so. Watch out for that. Then her shop is surrounded by Vicious' guys and she dies :(. Spike and Julia escape to the roof, but she's shot and dies in Spike's arms, and says 'it's all just a dream' :(. (Refer to: Spike living in a dream of the past).

Anyway Jet SAID he wasn't gunna go after Spike but. Jet's parental instincts kick in (oh yeah he was shot in the leg earlier btw) and he goes to Sitting Bull to see if he knows where Spike is. He basically says yeah Spike's about to die somewhere. (I want to do a further analysis on all the Sitting Bull scenes.) Well conveniently Spike returns to the Bebop, eats, tells his story about a tiger-striped cat. (At one point Jet asks if he's going there for her, and Spike is like well she's dead now so whatever). THEN we get to the scene where Faye is like HEY YOU CAN'T GO OFF AND DIE ASSHOLE and he's like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I 've been living in the past so I might as well see if I'm living now. (**This will play heavily into my interpretation of the ending). Faye is pissed, shoots the ceiling and he goes off to the syndicate headquarters to fuck shit up.

He basically John Wicks his way through the building, Shin dies, he and Vicious have the big boss battle and whatnot. He kills Vicious and stumbles back out down the stairs and says "Bang!" and collapses. We pan to the sky and see a star fade away.

Well that explains the plot … now here's what I think happened!!! ALSO may I mention, anon - you picked up on something I feel like a lot of people miss out on. Why *did* Spike go back to kill Vicious if Julia was already dead??

Basically, once it became clear that anyone associated with Vicious was being killed, Spike knew they'd hunt him down, and they weren't beneath Kill-Billing their way to him, (i.e. systematically destroying this companions to get to him). And for all his apparent indifference - he really loves his new found family. Jet is literally like an older brother to him. Ed is a little sister. Ein is well … a very good boy. And Faye? Well the relationship is complicated, and I'm not going to get into the 69,420 reasons I ship them here, but I think it is beyond argument that he really does care for her, even if that just in a filial way. He didn't want the syndicates to kill them for their association to him, or in order to get to him. So he did what he had to do to protect them. *AND NO* I am not saying that he didn't love Julia. But it was clear that his desire was no longer to run away with her. I think he genuinely loved and cared about her, but at some point between Jupiter Jazz Pt 2 and now, he accepted that their time together was over. Now he had a new raison d'etre, which is the Bebop.

I think at this point Spike has 'woken up' to reality (as he implied to Faye in their final conversation in episode 26: "Look at these eyes. One of them is a fake, because I lost it in an accident. Since then, I have been seeing the past in one eye, and the present in the other. I had believed that what I saw was not all of reality...I thought I was watching a dream that I would never awaken from. Before I knew it, the dream was all over." (This is from the sub btw I'm too lazy to look up the dub transcript.) He wasn't going there to die, he's going to find out if he's really alive. This line is fucking cool and everything - but it's implications are multitude. I won't go into them all here but basically : what makes him alive now is that he's free from his past. He's alive because he has this new family and protecting them is all he really wants now. Spike was protecting Jet, Faye, Ed, (and Ein) by going and facing the entire syndicate, knowing that their lives would all be in danger.

SO - did Spike die? Well again - Watanabe has purposely and artfully left this open ended. Well, if we're following the symbolism from Sitting Bull, then yeah, the man is as dead as disco, and wouldn't that be a fitting ending? BUT at the same time, Spike always refers to having 'died' before (meaning when he was ambushed by the syndicate, and they all thought he died, and he pretty much did). Don't forget that in  movie (takes places roughly between episodes 22 + 23, and yes, was made AFTER the series but whatever) he like .. DIES dies. He goes to the afterlife and everything. He wakes up to find he's chilling with Sitting Bull, who's like nah it wasn't your time to die yet. So the fact Sitting Bull confirms Spike will die in the final episode, means yeah, Spike is pretty much dead.

BUT -- okay now hear me out -- could this death in the final episode be a death to his previous life? The person he was in the syndicate? Now that he's extinguished the Red Dragons for good, is it not possible that its merely *that* life which has ended? That's the optimist in me saying that, but if it keeps me from staying up all night crying, I guess it'll have to do. Watanabe definitely wants to leave it up to the viewer, so whatever you think, I feel like there's validity to it.

WELL any anon, sorry for the fucking lecture - and believe me, I could've said MUCH, MUCH more - but I enjoyed this question. I always love talking about this show so please all you fuckers feel free to message me or send an ask about anything any time. I am really slow at replying because #life'sAbitch.

Love you all.

SY,SCB <3

[aclosetfan]

are u still doing the ask game? can i ask for 19 or 20?

for you anon, of course! 20 is actually a really lame two-sentence note that isn't worth anyone's time, so I'll do 19!

19 is a really sad story tbh. I've always really liked the character Sedusa and it kills me that the writers never did more with her. I believe they said the reason why was because they couldn't think of many kid-friendly scenarios to put her in, which is fair lmao.

lol one of my notes for this outline is "this is my dark manifesto to [Sedusa] and it comes off like a bad CW remake," which was written way before the CW show announcement. so not to get a big ego about things, but I totally beat them to the punch. This fic is my only rated M fic (though arguably Acting Normal may also change into M just for its dark themes as well).

This story is adequately tilted "Sedusa" and it follows how a plain jane named Sara became one of Townsville's most notorious villains. The plot's below, though content warning, please don’t read if your triggered by abusive relationships, domestic violence, child abuse, sexual assault/harassment, or gore. The outline won't be detailed (and tbh the actual story won't be heavily detailed either) but i believe that everyone still deserves a fair warning :)

The outline doesn't do the plot justice, but it's all I got so hopefully people just Get It.

CHARACTER NOTES:

Canonically, I believe the Sedusa's character was supposed to represent envy and lust. So, one of the main themes I try to stick with when writing her character is the definition of envy, which is a "feeling of discontented or resentful longing aroused by someone else's possessions, qualities, or luck."

PLOT:

Sara is a sweet and mousy little girl, who tries her best to stay invisible. She's rather plain-looking except for her really beautiful long dark hair. Originally, she's not from Townsville, but somewhere in the "country" where a person could be considered a bumpkin. Sara's a smart young girl, but her intelligence is rather unrefined. She spends most of her time obsessing over greek and Egyptian mythology.

She's from a rather big family, but she's the baby. Her father is abusive. Her mother is neglectful and Sara resents her mother for just standing by while abuse is occurring. To cope, Sara dreams of running away and falls deeper into her mythology obsession--specifically Medusa. Sara feels like Medusa would understand her.

At 16, she runs away to Townsville where she tries to be a hairdresser. With no money, she ends up in a really seedy part of town and the beauty parlor she works for ends up being a front for more illicit activities. She still does hair, but really makes her money as a call-girl of sorts. Just one of those girls who gives handjobs in the back to sad old men. It's easy money (I'm pro-sex work lol so I don't make this a big deal, but she's still a minor and it's wrong), but she's disgusted with herself (and men). At this time, she isn't very good at manipulating men--it's more like they have power over her and it reminds her of her father, only making her angrier and angrier.

It is also of note that while she's working at the Parlor, she encounters Sarah Bellum via tv (Ms. Bellum is just an intern with the Mayor at this point). She's instantly fascinated by this other Sarah and forms an odd (slightly toxic) parasocial relationship with her. Sara thinks it's amazing that Sarah went to school and is just so glamourous. Ms. Bellum is really everything Sara wants to be.

*time skip*

Sara falls in love with some jackass. Still slightly obsessed with Sarah Bellum. Still working at the parlor. Sara feels stagnant and worthless. Her jackass boyfriend and a few of his shitty friends end up attacking Sara and cutting off her hair (which was her prized possession). She gets away, but not totally unscathed.

In the process of running away, she bumps into a mysterious man who promises He can fix whatever is troubling her. The mysterious man manipulates an affirmative answer out of Sara and he "fixes" her problem. The man is HIM and he transforms her into the woman we all know as Sedusa (who goes by Ima when disguised).

“And what is it that you want?” HIM tsked, almost sounding bored.

She looked back at the mirror, at her broken reflection and lipstick smeared down her face. With a sore, croaking voice she sneered, “I want my fu-fucking hair back.”

Behind her, the entity smiled, Its facing splitting wide into two, “Oh, now that I can do.”

She watched through the shattered glass how It—HIM—snapped its odd monstrous claw. HIM’s smile grew more grotesque, as a thin bead of sweat began to break out on her forehead.

“This might hurt a little bit,” the entity giggled as she began to hyperventilate, “but what is that you little humans say?" HIM paused, watching her with a tilt of Its head as pain shot through her temples, "Oh, that’s right—”

She gasped and then screamed, dropping to her knees as she clutched at her head. Something wiggled underneath her scalp, pushing harder and harder to break against the resistance of her skin. It felt as if something was pressing against her brain, trying to carve away at her skull.

“—beauty is pain.” HIM growled, appearing next to her so Its voice—now low and baritone—was right in her ear, and It grasped her by the chin forcing her to watch the mirror as snake-like tendrils sprouted from her skull. She cried out at the sight and her body trembled with the pain.

One black, oily, twisted snake after another shot out of a bloody crater on her head. She tried her best through the pain to shake HIM off—to look away—but It held her still with a twisted laugh. She thrashed and howled in agony as the blood poured down her face in rivets. HIM didn't let go. Instead, HIM forced her still, grabbing her by the chin so she'd peer directly into the broken mirror.

Sara paled right before her very eyes, from a peachy skin tone to a white paste. She tried to blink away the tears that wouldn’t stop welling in her eyes—the green of them becoming more acidic with every passing second.

“The fun should be ending soon.” HIM giggled again, Its voice back to a soprano, but she was too forgone to hear him, as her eyes began to lull into the back of her head.

Eventually, when the transformation is complete, we see this:

Sara had stayed collapsed on her knees after HIM vanished into thin air. She stared with wide eyes as blood, sweat, and tears dripped onto and rolled off her thighs. She hardly paid attention to her surrounding, all she could do was listen. She listened to her hair. She listened to the constant moving, living, mass that slithered around her head, neck, and shoulders. The coils almost seemed to be cooing at her, comforting her through her pain, offering sweet apologies for what they had done. They promised her nothing bad would ever happen again. They were a dangerous shield forged from her own body to protect her.

Her body. A vessel for this odd new life.

“Heh.” A deranged giggle escaped her mouth, “Heh. Heh ha—hahaha!” She laughed until her throat burned and tightened, her tears finally drying.

It was instantaneous. It was powerful. Sara had never known love before, but she loved them. She loved every single one of them.

And here she had thought she'd never be a mother.

Sara becomes Sedusa--taking inspiration from Medusa, her childhood fascination. She wonders if HIM knew, but she wouldn't bother asking. She feels sexy, powerful, and unstoppable. Her hair has instilled a new confidence in her and she's finally able to stand up for herself. Soon, she realizes that she's an "exotic" beauty and has men eating out of her hand. She isn't someone who kills, but if she gets bored (or feels threaten) she will.

Things are going good until the PowerPuff Girls are finally created. When she sees them for the first time, she pities them, especially when they're run out of town. She relates to them for not being loved little girls, but is completely shocked when she finds out they've won the town over. This shock turns into resentment and she decides she'll get even with the girls

Then, cue canon. Sedusa seduces the Professor. We see what happens in that episode plus a little more. Sedusa takes out a lot of her repressed childhood trauma on the girls and is plain awful to them. By the time her stint with the Professor is over, she hates them all.

Then, there's the episode with Bellum. Bellum becomes the Athena to Sedusa's medusa. Bellum is still this elevated person in Sedusa's mind, and it only makes sense to Sedusa that she should become Bellum. To become Bellum, Sedusa seduces Bellum and they end up having a brief relationship. (Sedusa pretends to be an intern at City Hall and the two ladies bond over having the same first name). Eventually, Sedusa reveals her plot and the canon events happen. (Bellum is heartbroken over Sedusa).

I'd like to emphasize that Sedusa's relationship with Bellum almost turns her "good," but her hair coils (HIM's curse) prevents her from taking those steps. Her coils prevent close loving relationships--since they're supposed to be shield that keeps people out, preventing any chance that Sedusa's heart may be broken again. [coils represent her inability to heal from the past]

Then we run through a quick montage of her other appearances.

[throughout all of this, I would write how her hair coils are making her more and more insane]

*time skip to after the events of the og show*

This is where my plot can go anywhere. I think Sedusa becomes sloppy, maybe kills a politican. She's spirialing out of control and mad that she can't find any real happiness in her life. I think it'd be interesting to show her interacting with the rrb, not necessarily to show their relationship, but to show how Sedusa would be infuriated that HIM had sons, especially sons who hurt girls for fun ( i.e. the ppg) (a real 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' moment for her). She's also infuriated at HIM for turning her into a monster, so being mad about his "sons" is just an excuse to get even with the entity.

To hurt HIM, she decides to hurt the boys, but the girls interfere. They won't let innocent live be taken, no matter the person's moral alignment. This infuriates Sedusa even more than HIM ever could. Because again, despite all the shitty things that have happened to the Girls, they are still good as opposed to Sedusa, who ended up bad. She doesn't understand why she had to end up the way she did.

However, the girls aren't the people who finally "defeat" Sedusa. Instead, that honor is left to Ms. Bellum (Sedusa's "Athena"), who Sedusa still very much loves in her own sick twisted way. Paralleling the Sedusa/Bellum episode in the og show, the girls (while protecting the boys) are almost defeated by Sedusa until Bellum intervenes. It's revealed that Bellum had a shitty childhood too (again enforcing the parallels/differences between the two women) and believes that it's not too late for Sedusa to change her ways (it’s a real “I’m rotten work” “no it isn’t. Not if it’s you” moment) In a moment of mental clarity, where the coils (and by extension HIM) cannot affect her judgement, Sedusa releases the boys and the girls. Sedusa doesn't stay though, like Bellum pleads, she gets scared and runs away. (but does tell Bellum she’d always love her, whatever that’s good for)

[also I decide bellum to defeat sedusa to show that the girls are still to young and that adults should be the ones dealing with other adults] [and bellum has a good track record of doing just that]

Idk if she'd be gone forever, but it's implied that she hasn't been seen in Townsville for a long time. What she gets up to is left ambiguous. She can't be good because of her hair coils, but she doesn't want to be bad. idk I don't want it to have a sad ending, but I don't think it can really be happy.

-----

I try hard to play with the concept of beauty, womanhood, purity, love and how negative/positive responses to trauma affect these concepts. Idk it's really rough and needs to be thought out more, especially the end, but I think Sedusa deserves her own story.

[thesearchforspirk]

1 x 9: ‘What Are Little Girls Made Of?’ {Subtext Study}

Please read my manifesto here if you haven’t already- it better explains my beliefs as per the Kirk/Spock dynamic and what I aim to accomplish with this blog.

An episode that barely features any direct K/S reactions yet seems to say a whole lot about them in 50 minutes time, through strategic use of androids. And Lurch. 

So, Chapel’s on the bridge this time around which is a bit of a switch-up. Turns out she’s anxiously awaiting news of her fiance’s whereabouts and whether or not he’s still alive. Kirk is cautiously hopeful; reminding her that said fiance, Dr. Roger Korby, has been missing for 5 years despite several search expeditions to find him. I guess that doesn’t make her love confession to Spock in The Naked Time too terribly awkward then... yikes. Dr. Korby asks that Kirk personally come down to the surface which has ignited Spock’s suspicions, but Kirk is hesitant to refuse given Dr. Korby’s reputation for being a brilliant scientist or something. 

When Spock asks for confirmation that Chapel knows Dr. Korby’s voice beyond any shadow of a doubt (likely because of his increased concern now that Kirk’s wellbeing is on the line) she teasingly asks if he’s ever been engaged. Kirk gets a personal amusement out of his reaction. Yeah what a hilarious thought, there’s NO WAY Spock has ever been engaged hahaha.

(just wait for Amok Time you little shits) 

Kirk and Chapel beam down to the tundra-like planet (apparently impervious to the cold as neither of them seem the slightest bit affected) and, having not seen Dr. Korby anywhere nearby, decide to head down into the cavern to see if he’s somewhere in there. Kirk contacts the Enterprise and asks Spock to beam down two expendable red shirts just in case (Spock of course not neglecting to ask if there’s been any trouble). All for the better, as one ends up falling off a ledge somehow just as Dr. Korby’s assistant, Brown, shows up and Lurch (LURCH NO!!) slinks away. 

Brown’s acting a little weird around Chapel, as it takes him a moment to recognize her. Kirk’s suspicions are being increasingly aroused but Chapel continues to seem hopeful (he’s also super beat up about his red shirt guy dying which isn’t significant to the point of this post but I just like James T Kirk so much and how much he cares about each member of his crew ok). Unfortunately the other red shirt guy gets suffocated or something by Lurch before he can give Kirk’s orders to the Enterprise. 

Brown explains that Dr. Korby’s discovered how the inhabitants of the planet moved underground as the sun dimmed and created a mechanistic type culture, which he hopes to harness and implement everywhere for some reason. When they get into the main living area a sexy lady barely wearing anything shows up and I freaking love the look Kirk gives Chapel- he’s not checking sexy lady out, he’s looking over at Chapel to see how she feels about this super hot, scantily clad woman and the fact that she’s apparently living here. “Girl, can you believe this?” Sure enough, Chapel’s like what the fuck. 

Sexy lady introduces herself, very mechanically, as Andrea. Then Dr. Korby shows up and he and Chapel have some kissy-kissy reunion times and Kirk looks so happy for them because he is perfect. Korby apologizes for Kirk’s lost crewman, Kirk assures him it wasn’t his fault, and then attempts to call his redshirt posted outside. When he doesn’t answer he makes to try the ship, but things escalate quickly when Brown points a phaser at him and says “NO COMMUNICATIONS” 

Geez, y’all aren’t really going for warm and hospitable, are you?

Dr. Korby insists, instructing Andrea to take it from him. Kirk flips her around as a sort of hostage and then does his infamous barrel roll to hide behind the desk. He then presumably attempts to stun Brown, but instead blows open and sizzles his circuits because GASP he’s a robot! Kirk also gets fucking picked up like a toddler by Lurch and thrown against a wall. So far as I can tell these are the same actors, not stunt doubles, so that means Ted Cassidy literally hoisted Shatner up and held him. HELD HIM THERE. LIKE A BABY. 

I just find that hilarious and precious. Anyway. 

Kirk does indeed contact the Enterprise- or rather, his voice does. It turns out Lurch can do excellent, spot on voice impressions so he calls the bridge and gives a pretty level-headed, standard message about the progress of the mission. 99.99999% of people would not have heard anything worth suspicion. I would guess that would even include McCoy. Of course, 99.99999% of people don’t know Kirk as well as Spock (nor are they secretly in love with him) so of course Spock notices something is off and asks as much and says he sounds tired. Very logical and unemotional of you, Spock, A++++ Vulcaning. 

Korby apologizes for being so shady but, y’know, it’s necessary. Because of reasons. Lurch does some more impressions, proving he can do ANYONE’S voice (as a voice actor I’d kill to be as good as him) and Kirk is clever enough to convince Korby to order Lurch not to disobey Chapel’s orders. Because Kirk is such a smarty pants and I love him forever and always. Anyway, Korby attempts to convince Kirk to have an open mind about things so he can help him facilitate this new android technology he’s been working on. Kirk’s not having it. He attempts to escape and is ONCE AGAIN picked up like a baby by Lurch. Whoever had the idea for this to happen not once, but twice, is a hero, honestly. 

(I’d like to thank god and also jesus) 

Meanwhile Andrea is asking Chapel some weird questions like, “How can you love Roger if you don’t trust him” and “Why does it bother you when I call him Roger?”. She seems genuinely confused, but of course Chapel is having a hard time believing that...all things considered. Korby shows up and tells Andrea to call him Dr. Korby since the alternative bothers Chapel and that’s sufficient enough. He then also explains that Andrea is an android, a computer, a machine, and Chapel shouldn’t be jealous because she’s incapable of love. Supposedly. He even has Andrea kiss and then slap Kirk, reiterating that she’s a totally logical computer incapable of feeling, that only responds to orders. 

Huh. Who else has been described in such a way time and time again? What’s more, Kirk doesn’t seem in the least bit convinced. In fact, he seems somewhat angered by this assertion. Certainly that could be because it seems wrong to talk about living things as objects, but given all the familiar descriptors that have just been used I’m going to guess that it’s more than that for him. Much more.   

As if to confirm this, Kirk challenges the assertion, that if these things only act as Korby programs them and have no feeling, then why did Brown turn a phaser on him with an order? Korby doesn’t give a direct answer, he basically just says ‘lmao let’s go give you an android twin, will that help?’ This they do (and Kirk’s laid out like a fucking snack, but I won’t waste time on a visual tour of that this time, I promise) and when it comes time to copy over his mental patterns so that android Kirk is just like real Kirk, Kirk makes a quick decision to instill his thoughts with an openly hostile opinion of Spock to be transferred over to the android. “Mind your own business, Mr. Spock,” Kirk chants. “I’m sick of your halfbreed interference, you hear?” 

While there is something to be said for that fact that no Kirk is a real Kirk if he isn’t enamored with (or at least respectful of) Spock, I think it’s also telling that Kirk knew Spock would inevitably ask concerned questions and so supplied a telling uncharacteristic answer. Perhaps there’s something else in the fact that Kirk had to be so openly hostile to convincingly mask and block any of the strong familiar feelings of affection for his First Officer. Something to think about anyway. 

Chapel sits down to lunch with Kirk, insisting that despite the moral dubiousness of Dr. Korby’s current work she knows him well enough to ensure that he hasn’t lost his mind and that they should trust him. But whoops, this Kirk is the android, so perhaps when he asked her if she’d obey his command to betray Korby he was testing the waters. He has Kirk’s intellect after all. Man, someone writing this show really liked the idea of dual Kirks didn’t they? Can’t say I blame them. 

(a decidedly tastier sandwich than The Enemy Within version, sign me the fuck up) 

The two Kirks verbally spar for a bit and Korby flatters himself that he’s made a perfect duplicate. Kirk says somewhat knowingly, with a slight grin, that there are still certain differences between them. Korby insists that if they exist they are entirely unimportant. Something tells me Korby has never come between a Vulcan and and the object of his (logical) affections before. 

Korby finally pushes his game plan on Kirk, saying he needs his starship to transport them to an Earth colony where he can begin integrating androids into society, to make the perfect immortal society without jealousy or hate or any unpleasant emotions (but also without love, Kirk argues). Not willing to be Korby’s pawn, Kirk takes him as another captive and keeps Lurch at bay as he manages to escape through the cavern. Korby orders Lurch to ‘protect’ though (how he’s protecting by chasing a guy long gone through a cavern I don’t know). 

Thankfully, Chapel orders that Lurch not hurt Kirk so when he has the chance to send him falling off a ledge, he instead has to help him up. And, yes, Kirk gets hold of a dick-shaped rock and poses for the picture that makes it into every tongue-and-cheek write up about Kirk/Spock or anything gay/Trek related so let’s just get that out of the way right now:

(har har penis joke)

Meanwhile android Kirk goes back aboard the Enterprise to get some info for Korby. Spock looks just about beside himself to see him again and bounds after him as Spock is wont to do when Jim makes a surprise appearance. Spock is understandably confused, however, as Kirk wasn’t due back for awhile, so when he pushes for clarification android Kirk busts out the whole halfbreed interference thing. Almost immediately after this he asks Spock why he looks upset, which is...rather hilarious. Spock doesn’t seem upset after that though, rather he appears justifiably suspicious, if not convinced that this is not his Kirk. 

Android Kirk then passes on possible planet settling info to Korby while real Kirk gets Andrea to kiss him again- but not the cold, mechanical kiss, this time he kisses her passionately and invokes in her feelings that confuse her (specifically with that intent). In keeping with this attempt, when Lurch comes in to attack him Kirk starts asking him difficult questions, like what happened to the ‘old ones’ and is it possible to go against his creators if they’re illogical. Kirk essentially pits Lurch’s violent need for logic against the programming given to him and discovers that Lurch can indeed kill his programmers if their orders override his need to survive. As such, he turns on Korby but Korby just kills him with the evaporation phaser or whatever it is.

Neither Kirk nor Chapel can seem to figure out why it is that Korby has such a flagrant disregard for life now, but when Kirk attempts to fight him again they learn why; HE’S AN ANDROID TOO!! He disturbingly assures Chapel he’s the same Roger inside, that he had to make this change to survive, and Chapel wonders how true that it is. 

Meanwhile android Kirk shows up again and Andrea is tasked with intercepting him. She wants to kiss him like she kissed real Kirk before but he says it is “illogical” and so she angrily zaps him away. When she comes back into the main room, however, she realizes it was android Kirk she zapped and not the real one. Kirk challenges Korby, asking him if this is the ‘perfect world’ he envisioned, of androids killing each other off without a second thought. Korby blabbers some more about being the perfect computer or whatever, showing Chapel that this absolutely isn’t him anymore, 

Andrea, however, doesn’t kill without a second thought. She kills to protect, because as she’s discovered through Kirk’s accessing, she has the capacity to love Korby and does. She insists she does but he tells her it’s impossible. She’s not human after all. When she kisses him he presses the phaser she holds between them and kills them both. Obviously, his work has been for naught. 

Spock shows up then (a little too late) with the landing party he’d planned for earlier. He, of course, asks Kirk if he’s alright first even as Chapel is sobbing right beside him. When Spock asks about the Doctor Kirk tells him, solemnly, that he was never there. 

Back on the bridge Chapel says she’ll be staying with the ship, even if her original intent for boarding one died long ago. After she leaves Kirk notices something is off about Spock and asks about it, to which Spock replies that he didn’t really appreciate the use of the term ‘halfbreed’, even if it was implemented in an android’s head for a good reason. He says Kirk has to admit it’s an unsophisticated expression. Kirk assures him he’ll keep that in mind for the next time he’s in a similar situation. Spock all but rolls his eyes but can’t seem to fight a little bit of a smile. Neither can Kirk. 

It is not insignificant that this episode deals with beings of ‘pure logic’ and the feelings each of them has repressed or justified as a means of maintaining said logic. It’s also interesting that the only being among them that could not display morality, feelings of mercy, etc, was the one who had engineered the whole thing and fancied himself more of a human than the rest of them. Lurch could feel anger, Andrea could feel love despite Korby’s insistence otherwise, Brown protected without a direct order. There’s argument to be made that android Kirk could not have felt them either, as when Andrea tried to kiss him he insisted it was ‘illogical’, but perhaps it was only real!Kirk’s effort to drive out his affections for Spock that made this so. Without those affections any Kirk copy has no heart, it would seem. Interesting.  

It’s also not incidental that Kirk is the one who correctly guesses that these supposedly emotionless, logic-driven machines were indeed capable of feeling and knew how to drive that feeling out of each of them. Who better to guess that a robotic entity who insists logic is the only thing that fuels him might be mistaken in that respect? What’s more, Kirk knew the weakness of each android and exactly how to press the right buttons to bring it out. He does this on a daily basis, after all. 

This episode also explored the depths to which Kirk and Spock know each other; Spock can correctly tell there’s something off with Kirk’s voice even when he’s down on a planet, giving a routine order, not sounding off to anyone who wouldn’t have that intrinsic knowledge and concern. Kirk used his knowledge of Spock’s emotional weaknesses to exploit the pitfalls in the android’s engineering. Even if they barely get any screentime in this episode, it’s not hard to see why all of it functions as a thinly veiled metaphor for their dynamic. 

EDIT: I often go back to my predecessor, TOS Commentary, after I’ve finished evaluating an episode just to make sure I’m not missing anything and have put everything in my own words. Something was pointed out there for this episode that I thought might be of interest to anyone reading this evaluation, and it’s something that can easily fly under the radar. In her words, “ Chapel intimates that engaged couples can always tell their lovers' voice. Later, when Android Kirk appears on the Enterprise, Spock is immediately suspicious, and Android Kirk's insult confirms his suspicion.” What’s more, Spock recognized that Lurch’s imitation was NOT Kirk’s actual voice. I found this a VERY interesting coincidence, one of those that makes you really wonder just how intentional all of this was. Bits like this make me think someone has always had it in the back of their mind. 

Hopefully I did this episode justice as that’s about all I have! Join me next time for ‘Dagger of the Mind’!