#though i have been meaning to compile the ones that didn't make it into previous editions!!

[hopeinthebox]

hi lizzy i just wanted to tell u i love ur reductress posts and that they always make me laugh. i love you, have a great 2024 and get some rest! <3

anon dearest you have already made my year with this delicious ask <33 i love you enormously and i hope 2024 treats you well!!

[astonmartingf]

YOU'RE SO REAL FOR THAT! ; F1 GRID

f1 grid x driver!reader . . . gen z f1 driver ranks previous crushes in f1 in a new tiktok video that sends fans in a coma /real

amgf well well well, guess who's back (hopefully) uhm i'm enrolled and officially an intern 😀👍 we love to see that, i made this before hungary i think? but yeah, i have too many drafts and no will to write, i'm blaming the new season in wild rift 😋 and because i've been busy with the internship thingy... a lot of seminars and preparations to do sooooo i hope you enjoy this like always

yourusername uploaded a new video

. . . view 736,937 comments

user73 hello? came running from twt, everyone talking about this

user62 i thought people were making a big deal on twt like usual but this is actual next levels of insane

user32 yn was bored with summer break and decided to break the internet and possibly the team's pr manager

user50 i relate because i too am not immune to blond hair and blued eyed men...

landonorris i think you forgot to message one more driver on the grid...

→ yourusername you're right @/yukitsunoda0511 i had a crush on you before 😌☝️

→ landonorris i meant a british driver on the grid...

→ yourusername alex is already there???

→ landonorris a mclaren driver perhaps.....

→ yourusername oh my gosh you reminded me!!!! i definitely had a really tiny crush on mclaren @/carlossainz 😋🫶

→ yourusername look lando i specifically said in the second slide that if you're not there then i probably hated you, people said you have poor reading comprehension, didn't think it'd be true 🫤

user38 cleared lando fr!!!!!!

user93 no charles leclerc, max verstappen, daniel ricciardo? fraud 🤥

→ user05 wtf not everyone likes them????

→ user17 y'all it's not that deep, this is yn's crush ranking why are y'all projecting////

georgerussell catching strays on a post about you having a crush on alex before????

→ yourusername oh well... i say it the way i see it and i see the way you look at alex 🙄🙏

logansargeant well well well

→ yourusername shut up logan 🙄

→ oscarpiastri no... but this is interesting ✍️ ain't it @/logansargeant?

→ yourusername shut your traps, i didn't give y'all exclusive content for you to run your mouth online

→ user48 honey i fear you're already running your mouth enough 🥹

user72 is no one taking about the mick one???? like??? i'm thinking about their f3 and f2 moments now and i see it

→ user49 OMG!NNN exactly! i get it now, the tension when they're together

jensonbutton reading your message at 2am asking for permission is not something i expected, my question though is... am i p1?

→ yourusername technically you're p-last atm but considering you're my first f1 crush i guess you're p1

→ jensonbutton i see... one rank higher than @/nicorosberg 👍

→ nicorosberg is this what catching strays mean @/yourusername?

→ yourusername yes 😭

dennis_hauger this is not what i said to you, i'm about to sue for defamation

→ yourusername you can't do that, i need a wag to bring for races

→ dennis_hauger i'm racing too?

→ yourusername and?

user85 mr dennis hauger??? did we miss three chapters here?

→ user69 no!!! they've been going at it since the beginning look up the 2022 f2 season

→ user03 there are various compilations in youtube and in yn's youtube channel !!!!

mickshumacher what is this? this is not what you sent me?

→ yourusername is it slander yn day? i'm out here airing my business and y'all say i'm a fraud istg

→ mickshumacher hahahahahaha but i agree with everything you said, i felt the same way

→ yourusername hello? when was this?

→ mickshumacher probably three, four years ago? same year with you, things didn't just work out

→ yourusername dang so you could've been my wag? ngl glad it's not you 😂🫵

→ mickshumacher i agree, who would want to be with you atp

→ yourusername slander and defamation?????

→ mickshumacher well who doesn't have a wag now? exactly, not me

yourusername wow i made this so we could have fun, but now everyone is just making fun of me, might as well delete this before the PR team sees this 😮‍💨

→ user52 noooooo please keep this up

→ user17 this is actually very slayful if you!!! don't ❌❌ let 🫵 the haters 🤡😈💩 stop 🛑✋ you

→ user28 this is actually what we want this summer, i'm begging 🧎‍♀️🧎‍♀️🧎‍♀️

[becauseimanicequeen]

4 Minutes Theories (Ep. 2)

In this post, I've compiled my theories from my initial reaction to the trailer and the teaser (which were kind of sweeping since the trailer and teaser didn't give me much to get super detailed about), the new ones I wrote down after watching the first episode, and some new wild-ass theories I've written in some scattered posts throughout the previous week. Just like last week, I will go through them one by one.

Let's see how wrong I am this time, and how (un)likely the other theories are. Like last time, I might develop some of my theories and add some new ones as well.

Let's go!

Pre-premiere theory: The moments Great sees ahead of time are moments that might help him redeem himself from a past mistake/transgression. (Unconfirmed)

This one is unconfirmed, but, just like in the first episode, there seems to be a pattern where the moments that are reversed seem to be reversed for Great to do them over, do better, to do "the right thing".

In this week's episode, it happened when Great walked away from the situation where Title wanted to kill Dome. He was immediately brought back, chose to escape from Title, and took Dome to the hospital.

I think Great's out-of-body experience and the "4-minutes phenomenon" (which is what Den calls it in his research) is, in a way, teaching him to be a better person and someone more involved with making choices in his life. So far, he seems to only be existing and whatever is just is (his friendship with Title is one of those parts of his life where he seems to not care).

I mean, not choosing is a choice too. But if this (the moments before the 4-minute rewind) was how his real past played out before his cardiac arrest (I still believe that was Great at the beginning of the first ep), not choosing could potentially have been the reason he ended up in that hospital bed. And now this out-of-body experience is giving him a second chance to do things differently (even though it won't change his present). It's nudging him to make an active choice rather than just run away/go with the flow. It's teaching him a lesson, perhaps.

So, I'm keeping this theory until it's proven wrong (or right).

Revised/developed pre-premiere theory: Korn will do some shady shit to prove to his dad that he can take over the family business. (Unconfirmed)

Last week, I revised this theory a bit (from Korn being the bad guy) after watching the first episode. It seems like he wants to prove himself to his dad. The question is how far he's willing to go to prove himself worthy. That could potentially put him on the bad guy list (which, to be fair, could include every single character because that's how the Sammon/BOC collab seems to roll, and I fucking love that).

I've got a feeling Korn's actions will destroy more than one person he cares about, and that's already begun with Tonkla. Not that Tonkla is destroyed, yet (not because of Korn, anyway). I'm sure he'll forgive Korn as soon as Korn shows up. But, the more pressure Korn puts on himself to prove himself to his dad, and the more pressure is added on him from the shady side of the family business, Tonkla will fall further down on Korn's list of priorities. And Tonkla might not be the only one.

It will definitely be interesting to see how far Korn will go to get what he wants. His situationship/relationship with Fasai might be a stepping-stone to what he wants.

(Btw, their situationship/relationship is definitely not a new thing. Their dynamic seemed established, even to the point where they were communicating without words.)

(Also, I found the dynamic between Korn and Fasai in contrast to the dynamic between Korn and Tonkla to be really interesting. I loved how Korn kneeled before Fasai (and I don't blame him). I might write more about this in a separate post because power dynamics in relationships are very fascinating to me. But, you know, it's the Olympics and my focus is elsewhere these days.)

Anyway, I'm keeping this theory.

Pre-premiere theory: Title is involved with Korn. (Unconfirmed)

Before watching the first episode, I thought Title might've been a brother or that they had a boss/minion relationship. I based this solely on the promotional posters of the characters. These two are the only ones shown to look away from the camera and their backgrounds are pretty similar. But, Title is (most likely) not Korn's brother. There's still a possibility he is (or will be) working for Korn.

After seeing more of Title in this week's episode, however, I'm getting the sense that Title might come from an influential family (considering he mentioned his dad helping Great and how he threatened Dome with his status). It also seemed like he thought himself superior to Great (which could be true, but it could also be arrogance). But, if Title is as superior as he seems to think he is, perhaps he has the upper hand?

I also got the feeling that Great doesn't really care that much about Title or their friendship (he seems to not care about most things at this point, so that might not mean anything). Their dynamic gave me "our families are close and, therefore, we have to be close too" kind of vibes (or they're cousins). Title seemed to have helped Great deal with a fight at a bar once and it seemed like Title thought that was leverage enough to get Great to get rid of Dome together with him. So there is an interesting dynamic going on here.

Either way, since I think that these two families are close, I will keep this theory that Title is involved with Korn somehow (since it doesn't seem that far-fetched), at least for now. I will probably develop this in an episode or two if it doesn't prove to be wrong before that.

Pre-premiere theory: Tonkla has a target on his back. (Unconfirmed)

This theory was based on the background of the poster for Fuaiz/Tonkla, and I still believe it's a possibility.

Considering what's going on between Korn and Tonkla and how fragile their situationship seems at this point, betrayal is on the horizon.

I know Korn was careful not to reveal too much to Tonkla when he was talking about getting a new position in his dad's business (in the first episode), probably to keep the cards close to his chest. But, Tonkla overheard Korn dropping names when he was on the phone with his dad (he mentioned Fasai and her having dinner with an uncle Warit, who might be an important person). So Tonkla has at least some information that might bite Korn in the ass and potentially put a target on Tonkla's back (either by Korn, his family, or by Fasai's family).

Also, I wonder how Korn will react when he finds out Tonkla is getting involved with a man working for the police (because Tonkla will get involved with Win, the trailer said so). That could paint an even bigger target on his back, which is why I'm definitely keeping this theory.

(Btw, I'm pretty sure Win will be in trouble as soon as Korn finds out he and Tonkla are close/getting closer. If Korn's dad has a man on the inside of the police force, which these mafia-like families usually seem to have, then they can easily get info on Win and screw with his life.)

Pre-ep. 2 theory: Tonkla will betray Korn. (Unconfirmed)

This is a feeling I got while watching the first episode last week. That was mostly based on Tonkla seeming to want more from his situationship with Korn at the same time as Korn seemed to be keeping his sugar baby hidden.

This feeling didn't lessen after watching this week's episode either considering Korn hung up on Tonkla twice (while being under pressure, to be fair) and even snapped at Tonkla one of those times. There's definitely a rift widening between them.

Additionally, there's Win, who is working for the police, and just happens to have taken an interest in Tonkla. One slip of the tongue or cry for help from Tonkla, and Korn can be royally screwed.

There's also the possibility that Tonkla will beat up/kill Korn in the future.

At the same time, it seems too obvious that he will kill Korn at this point, so it might be someone totally different.

(Btw, there's also the possibility that it's not even a person he beats the shit out of. I mean, they didn't hint that it was a person. The only hint we got was red liquid. But, I digress...)

I will have to think about this theory a bit more before I decide whom I believe Tonkla is beating the shit out of in that scene.

But, one thing is for sure, I'm definitely keeping this theory.

Pre-premiere theory: Win is battling some contrasting, opposing forces (internal and/or external). (Unconfirmed)

This theory was based on the background of the poster for JJay/Win. I solely based it on the red and green contrasting colors.

Last week, after watching the first episode, I spun off on a train of thought that Win might be working for Korn or Korn's family's business and that the battle he had to fight was his attachment/feelings for Tonkla versus his loyalty to his boss. But that was before he was introduced in the show.

Now we know a little bit about him. At least that he's working for the police. (Though, since I'm always sus about the authorities in these shows, I'm keeping my observing eyes on him, lol.)

Knowing that he works for the police, perhaps the contrasting forces he's battling are his attachment/feelings for Tonkla (which will develop, I'm sure), and his duty to uphold the law.

What if he gets involved with Tonkla, Tonkla murders someone, Win investigates the murder, finds out Tonkla is the murderer, and has trouble deciding between protecting Tonkla or arresting him? That could be interesting.

Pre-premiere theory: Den has a situationship with Korn. (Unconfirmed)

I'm keeping this theory only because I want to see Bas and Job together.

Also, I wouldn't mind if Korn is the slut of the show. So, sleeping around to get whatever this quiet man wants to get to prove himself to his dad (or whatever) is definitely approved by me.

In this household, we respect sluts. Just do it, Korn. You have my support.

Though... Poor Den if this happens. He's probably the sweetest character in the show at this point (after Tyme's grandmother, obviously).

Fuck... Now I suddenly don't want this to happen, lol.

Well, it can happen once, just once. As long as Den promises to keep his glasses on so he sees possible bullshit with a clear vision.

This is such a delulu dream of mine, though. But I'm still keeping it.

Pre-premiere theory: Dome is a mystery person operating under the radar without showing his true alliance until the end. (Scrapped)

Dome, Dome, Dome. He's such an enigma for me at this point.

At first, when I only had the trailer, teaser, and posters to go on, I thought he would be killed (since his poster has a basically empty background). At first, I thought he might be the person Great runs over in the teaser and that he would suffer memory loss, which proved to not be true.

He's still very mysterious, but I think I will scrap this theory...

Because I have another one about Dome that might be more interesting and more detailed than this sweeping one.

I'm going off of what was shown in this week's episode as well as the blank background of Mio/Dome's poster. This theory connects with another one I had while watching this week's episode, so I'll start explaining that one first before I get into who I think Dome is.

We all know that the show is playing with time, in several ways (the 4 minutes, the clocks that show 11:00 and now 11:01, etc.). Time also plays a part in my out-of-body experience theory since Great is "reliving" the past. But I also think there might be a parallel timeline that might show the past as it actually played out when Great didn't have the 4 minutes to make a different choice.

If this is true, then we're basically seeing three "timelines" (for the lack of a better term) in each episode, whereas two of them are parallel to each other (the real past and the out-of-body experience past).

(I will start calling "out-of-body experience" OOBE because I'm too lazy to write the whole thing every single time, lol.)

Since Great can't possibly change the past while he's having an OOBE (his present will still be the same), and since we as viewers probably need to know some of the things that happened in the real past that led up to the present, I feel like it would make sense if we get to see events from both timelines.

I haven't had the time to look into the details of which timeline is which (the Olympics is giving me no breaks, lol) but it might have something to do with the colors and/or the numbers (because something is going on with both of those details). I have to look into this further, though. But, I would guess that most of what we've seen of Tonkla so far is the real past.

If this is the case, I think Dome is Tonkla's brother who was killed. Title killed Dome in the real past, as he nearly did in the OOBE past if Great hadn't stopped him.

What purpose does this have if it turns out to be the case, though? I still think Great's OOBE is about gathering information of some sort. Perhaps he needs info to take down his own family business. Perhaps to find out who shot Tyme. Perhaps to stop a murder from happening in the present. Perhaps all, or none, or something else. But I still think it's about getting information more than just learning to do the right thing (which I wrote about above).

Also, doing things differently when he has his 4-minute visions (like saving Dome) might give him vital information he will need later. Perhaps he'll even get the information from the people he helps (for example Manee, whom he ran over, shared that her son committed suicide because he lost everything and was hounded for debt, which might have a connection to the illegal gambling side of Great's dad's business).

Anyway, I will look into this theory as soon as I can pull myself away from the Olympics to see if this is actually plausible and if/how I can distinguish between the timelines.

Pre-premiere theory: Fasai is the other character with a condition similar to Great’s (alternatively, it's Tyme). (Unconfirmed)

This won't happen. At least not the part about Fasai. The only reason I'm keeping this theory is because I need the show to prove to me that Fasai doesn't have precognitive abilities so I can label this as wrong and move on. That might not even happen until the show ends (if it will even be addressed). So, here we are.

I will highlight the part about Tyme, though, and turn that into a headline of its own in the post after next week's episode. Because there's definitely something going on with Tyme. Maybe it's precognition (but of another kind than Great’s), maybe it's intuition. But it’s clear that this man is drawn to Great. The way his eyes just caught Great when Great was sitting there silently in the hospital.

And whatever this sequence was in the teaser:

There's definitely something going on with Tyme other than him looking into illegal gambling and getting close to Great because of his family (both of which I'll turn into separate theories below), and I'm choosing to believe (at least for now since there's still time for this to change, lol) that he has a precognitive ability of his own (or will develop one).

Revised/developed pre-premiere theory: Fasai has a connection with Korn. (Unconfirmed)

Before the first episode, I thought she might be a sister (which was proven wrong by the family photo in the first episode and would be fucked up after this week's episode). As I wrote before, the dynamic of their situationship/relationship seemed established, even to the point where they communicated without words.

I could pass this theory as confirmed and be done with it, but I like to make things hard on myself. So I will take a guess at what kind of connection she has to Korn and only pass it if that's proven to be true (or half-confirm it if it turns out to be wrong).

The obvious guess would be that they're engaged (or even married), considering how Korn spoke about her to his dad on the phone in the first episode. But I don't want it to be that boring (and I definitely don't mind being wrong). So, I will guess this is a purely sexual deal, a situationship no one else knows about.

She gets pleasure (Korn seems more attentive to her pleasure than to Tonkla's, the latter seemed to be an afterthought to Korn, which we saw in the first episode) while he gets access to a higher standing. Perhaps she convinced Korn's dad to give him a new and better position in the family business? Perhaps she's the one who gives Korn direct access to her father (who was a board member or something, right?)? Perhaps she's even his sugar mama?

There's definitely an interesting power dynamic between them. I mean, she (and her dad) was surrounded by golden horse figurines and horses are, among other things, symbols of power (even the nobility).

So, yeah, I'm leaning towards a situationship rather than that they're engaged/married.

Prove me wrong, Sammon.

Revised/developed pre-premiere theory: Great is having an out-of-body experience. (Unconfirmed)

I previously called this theory a "dream world" after watching the trailer and teaser, but an out-of-body experience is a much better description of it.

I'm still keeping this theory because I still believe it even though it might've been odd that they "revealed" this already in the first episode. Perhaps this very obvious theory (to me, right now, at least) is exactly what Sammon wants me to focus on to take attention away from what's really going on.

Either way, I'm keeping this until proven wrong (or right).

Pre-ep. 2 theory: Great's visions of himself and Tyme are his present self's memories of their time together. (Unconfirmed)

This theory goes hand-in-hand with the previous one.

The visions Great had of him and Tyme in these first two episodes are basically his present self's memories (the person who had a cardiac arrest at the beginning of the first episode). The present Great had met, and fucked (good for him), Tyme while the Great we're following (the OOBE version that has "traveled" into the past) hadn't met Tyme until he ran into him at the hospital in the first episode.

If this proves to be true, I think we can also expect Great to have other memory flashes that might involve other characters and events.

Pre-premiere theory: Great’s (Bible’s) tattoos have something to do with the story. (Because I refuse to believe otherwise! lol) (Unconfirmed)

Just like I wrote last week: I swear I'm keeping this theory because it hasn't been confirmed (or denied), yet. That's the only reason I'm keeping this theory.

I swear I'm not keeping this theory to add this image to every post I write...

Pre-premiere theory: Great becomes Korn’s target because he can see ahead of time. (Unconfirmed)

This is highly unlikely to happen considering they're brothers who seem really close. But, I'm keeping this theory because I feel like Korn is a loose cannon. I've previously mentioned the beast I feel is currently sleeping inside Korn. Who knows what's going to happen if/when he releases it? He might turn just as ruthless as Fasai's dad seemed to be.

Will he become so ruthless in his pursuit to prove himself to his dad that he'll turn on Great? We'll have to wait and see.

Pre-ep. 2 theory: Great has a cardiac arrest/near-death experience at 11:01, which is why he sees clocks stopping at that time. (Unconfirmed)

Well, I knew the clocks would turn to 11:01 at some point (since Great mentioned constantly seeing clocks stopping at that time in the teaser).

But, like a comment @whatevenisthishellhole sent into my inbox (that I haven’t had the chance to answer yet because, you know… the Olympics), 11:00 is probably the time Great had his cardiac arrest. I think I'll have to agree with this theory since the clock on the wall as the patient had a cardiac arrest in the first episode showed 11:00, he's been shown to wake up at that time more than once, and the digital numbers on his wall showed 11:00 in this week's episode as well.

So, I agree that this is probably the time he had his cardiac arrest.

Another interesting aspect about 11:00, and about Great's malfunctioning wristwatch in particular, is that near-death experiencers can have issues with technology after their NDE (I've seen it happening with my maternal grandfather).

Maybe I'm staring myself blind on Great's NDE and OOBE, but how could I not when I'm fed clues like this? Maybe Sammon is baiting me so I miss what’s really going on, but I don’t mind. This is so much fun. But, I digress...

We also saw that the clock was counting down in this week's episode. This is where 11:01 will start to show up for Great (which he mentioned in the teaser).

The interesting thing about this, and the 4-minute theme the whole series is based on, is that a quick Google search will tell you that 3-5 minutes after the heart stops, the brain starts to get damaged due to a lack of oxygen. Since Sammon is an actual doctor, I'm pretty sure the 4-minute mark is scientifically supported. And that's what I think is happening here.

Great has 4 minutes (well, now it's only 3) on him to wake up again before his brain gets damaged. My guess is that he needs to find the information he needs/learn whatever he needs to learn/solve whatever he needs to solve before the time runs out so his heart can restart before he suffers major brain damage.

Pre-premiere theory: Someone will die/fake their death. (Unconfirmed)

Well, that was pretty obvious, wasn't it? Look how smart I am, lmfao.

Anyway...

I'm going to wait to confirm this theory until one of the major characters shows up dead. For example, if Tonkla's brother or whomever Tonkla beats the shit out of are characters we already know. I won't confirm this theory after this week's episode because I need to know who Tonkla's brother is first.

If I'm to speculate on who will get axed, I would probably say Dome, Title, and perhaps Korn.

As I mentioned before, I think Dome might be Tonkla's brother. Since Tonkla called his brother Nong, Tonkla is the older sibling. Considering he's working (and has probably already graduated from school), his younger brother may still be in school. Dome is clearly studying, so this could make sense. Therefore, my guess is that Dome is Tonkla's brother and that Dome was killed by Title in the real past.

Tonkla will get his revenge on Title. So, bye-bye asshole. (Too harsh? I think not.)

I also have a feeling that Korn will get killed. It might not be Tonkla who does the killing. What if it's Faisa and/or her dad instead? Her dad has already proven to have the means to kill people he's not pleased with, and Korn seems to be out on thin ice.

(I could add more characters like Great and Tyme as well, but I feel like I want at least some characters to escape this hellhole and continue living their lives, unlike in DFF where I wanted almost everyone to suffer. Well, if Fasai is the last one standing, I won't be mad. I would kneel before her too. But, I digress...)

Maybe I won't pass this theory as confirmed until at least two out of my options above (Dome, Title, and Korn) show up dead.

Either way, I'm keeping this theory for now.

Wild-ass pre-ep. 2 theory: Tyme will have a near-death experience and develop his own precognitive ability. (Unconfirmed)

Wouldn't it be bonkers if both Tyme and Great are having OOBEs and are trying to either help each other or happen to unintentionally get in the way of each other's goals/changes? And that's only if they have their OOBEs in the same timeline.

Anyway, I'm basing this solely on Tyme being shot in the first episode and on the scene from the teaser (which I added images of above) where Tyme seems to have his own precognitive ability.

Come on, show. Prove me wrong.

Wild-ass pre-ep. 2 theory: Great will get Tyme's heart (after Tyme is shot). (This will not happen.) (Unconfirmed)

To be clear, I don't want this to happen. This is not the Transplant I want. But it might be possible?

(Disclaimer: I'm not a medical professional. I have no idea if this is medically possible considering where Tyme was shot and how far he might be from a hospital (since I know a body needs to be hooked up to a ventilator to be able to keep the organs alive if organ donations are to be possible). So, excuse my lively imagination, lol.)

New theories after the 2nd episode:

Here, I'll gather the new theories I have (to make it simpler for myself to find them next week) and add one or two other ones I've come up with.

There might be a parallel timeline that shows the past as it actually played out when Great didn't have the 4 minutes to make different choices. (If I get some time over between all the Olympic sports I'm watching, I will look deeper into this theory and develop it.)

Dome is Tonkla's brother.

Tyme has a precognitive ability similar to Great’s (or might develop one).

Tyme is looking into the illegal gambling sites because his family fell victim to them. (Maybe it was just me, but didn't he look particularly moved by Manee's story about her son? Perhaps that story felt too familiar to him?).

Tyme is getting close to Great because of Great's family and their connection to the illegal gambling sites. (The way I laughed at Tyme fixing his looks and flexing his muscles in the mirror before stitching up Great's wound... I couldn't believe he played that card to get close to Great, but I fucking loved it. And then stalking Great... This man is desperately trying to find out more about Great's family, that's for sure.)

Great has 4 minutes (well, now it's 3 minutes) on him to wake up/get his heart to start beating again in the present before his brain gets damaged.

I'm still thinking about that rock and how it relates to the body they found and the rock Great used on Title but I haven't made up my mind about this yet. I feel like the parallel timelines might be at play here, so I'll have to think a bit more about that and perhaps develop it in a separate post.

Results so far:

Total theories since the trailer: 23

Confirmed theories: 1.5

Unconfirmed theories: 17.5

Wrong/scrapped theories: 4

New theories after ep 2: 6

[inkblackorchid]

What the hell happened with Crow: an autopsy (Part 4)

*Deep breath* Okay, everybody. Let's do this one more time.

First off, hello, or welcome back. Let's get the introductions and disclaimers out of the way, shall we?

This is the fourth and final instalment in my very, very long-winded attempt to analyse the character writing of Crow over the course of the entirety of yugioh 5Ds. For everyone who hasn't read the previous parts of the analysis, you can find part one here, part two here, and part three here.

This post, and my analysis as a whole, is neither meant as a Crow hate post, nor as a manifesto to convince people who don't like him that they're wrong. It's as genuine an attempt to simply look at and dissect what the show gives us about him as I can make, though I admit to personal bias because I do like Crow. That said, I'm trying to stay as neutral as possible, because the aim of this entire post tetralogy is to look at the writing decisions made for this character and how they impact him—and how they possibly influenced the audience's perception of him.

My previous three posts all reference this as well, but since I still see these things parroted all across the internet to this day: Please don't read this post under the assumption that any of the 5Ds production rumours are true, especially not the ones surrounding Crow. Because, to make this as short as possible, every popular theory as to why certain characters were mishandled during the later parts of the show fails to line up with the production timeline of said show. Chiefly among those theories, the idea that Crow was meant to be a dark signer and that his popularity correlated to his cards, and the idea that Aki, specifically, had to give up her screentime for him because her VA got pregnant, which both lack any basis in reality, as you can read in the posts I linked. (One final shoutout to @mbg159 here, who compiled these incredibly comprehensive posts and can also be found here on tumblr. Huge thanks.) So if you can do me one favour, please just let the 5Ds rumours die already and read this analysis without the hope of seeing any of them confirmed. I'm so sick of these crackpot theories at this point that I can hardly find the words for it. And while we're on the topic, I also don't want to see this post used as a means to pit Aki and Crow against each other in any way—both have good reasons to be well-liked and both deserve their spot in the narrative, all right? All right.

And now, at last, let's get down to business. The last time I got on a virtual soapbox and yelled about Crow, I covered the entire WRGP, murder-duel-robot induced break included. That means that for this, final stretch, we'll be looking at everything from episode 137 onwards—the Ark Cradle arc. (A side not for dub aficionados here: Episode 136 was the last episode that got an English dub. In other words, everything I talk about here never even made it into the English version. Because 4Kids, I guess.) As we've done before, we'll take a look at what exactly Crow gets up to during the final stretch of the show (and, notably, the epilogue), then see whether any of it needed improving, and if so, how it could have been improved.

You'll find all further yelling below the readmore, and I'll leave you with the other, usual warning here, as well: This will be long. Even if the Ark Cradle arc, relative to the rest of the show, isn't, this post most certainly will be. So get some snacks and perhaps don't start reading this late at night unless you're good at knowing when to stop and reading stuff in bursts. (I'm not.)

As I concluded at the end of my last post, the WRGP ended up being a bit of a mixed bag for Crow. He's there, he duels, but at the same time, despite being positioned as an equal third of a protagonist trio, he's notably less important and arguably also weaker than Yusei and Jack. Moreover, where the plot is concerned, he sure didn't get too much to do—not to speak of the fact that the writers didn't grace him with any meaningful interactions with a certain character who'll become very relevant here.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. First, the preamble.

With the end of the Team New World duel, the final arc of the show drops the by this point unexpected arrival of the Ark Cradle right on our heads. So, what does Crow do here, at the start, other than be shocked? Well, not much. A lot of the first episode that introduces the Ark Cradle focusses more on the imminent threat said structure poses to New Domino City, and we flash back to our protagonists mostly to ascertain that things are, in fact, going to shit. Even once that focus on the city evacuating shifts again, the episode concerns itself more with Yusei than with Crow. However, meagre as it is, we do get the first interaction between Crow and Sherry during the Ark Cradle arc in this episode.

(Uh.... at least they're technically talking to each other?)

And frankly... It's not much. Unfortunately, up until the duel where he faces her, the Ark Cradle arc continues a trend regarding interactions between Crow and Sherry that we already saw in the WRGP: They barely get to interact, and even when they do, they never have anything so much as resembling a meaningful conversation, mostly because Sherry basically never addresses Crow directly, nor seems very interested in him, while Crow is usually there only to react to what she's saying, rather than actually talk to her. While digging through my mountain of screenshots, I found that latter part to be especially interesting, because as it turns out, this is a trend not just in Crow's interactions with Sherry, specifically. Many moments that probably contribute to the nefarious "screentime" (I've explained my gripes with this term in part two) some people like to accuse Crow of hogging have him only be part of a scene so he can react to what happens in it, to the point of him sometimes feeling like a stand-in for the audience reaction the writers might be hoping for. The above is a perfect example, because as far as character writing is concerned, Crow's "interaction" with Sherry here is utterly devoid of meaning. He's just there to communicate his disbelief over the ominous prediction that Yusei is guaranteed to die if he goes to the Ark Cradle, which feels like exactly the kind of reaction the writers probably wanted from the audience. After all, it's a bold, shocking statement to make. The protagonist, dying? In a card game anime geared towards twelve year-olds? It's downright preposterous. And Crow seems to agree with that, if his dialogue is anything to go by.

This one and other scenes (mostly the kind that contain plot elements that Crow doesn't actually interact with) got me thinking, though, and after having gone through so much of the show with a fine-tooth comb now, I think I've come to a conclusion, so permit me a tangent here: I believe the choice to let Crow, specifically, be a character who often only reacts to events or interactions after the DS arc, rather than contributing much himself, is deliberate. Don't get me wrong, I don't think he's the only character who is frequently put in this position—Aki, the twins, and even Bruno, especially when they're on the sidelines in the WRGP, also often only seem to be there to react or comment on things, perhaps partially to remind us viewers that they still exist, despite not being in a position where they contribute anything to the plot. With how much the twins and Aki got pushed to the side after the pre-WRGP and the Unicorn duel, respectively, and with how toned-down Bruno's entire character is until the very end, as not to spoil his tragic antagonist status too much, Crow in particular ending up as an often reactive, rather than active character stands out a bit more, though. And I think this has everything to do with his personality, because it contrasts that of Jack and Yusei. Think of it. Sure, Crow is shown several times to be just as cool and competent as the other two, but what he has that the other two crucially lack is the ability to freak out like a normal person. I'm being hyperbolic here, of course, but I do genuinely believe this, because when I think back to the show, Jack and Yusei, due to their character writing, only ever seem to be allowed to lose their cool during pretty specific circumstances, and only in very specific ways. Jack, for example, only ever gets to freak out either when a scene paints him as the butt of the joke (like during his infamous, dramatic outburst over cup ramen), or when the freakout is caused by—and expressed as—righteous (or not so righteous) fury (like when he storms off angrily after catching everyone watching his old duel with Dragan). Meanwhile, Yusei is played so straight that we barely ever see him lose his composure at all, outside of intensely dramatic, high-stakes situations (think his dark signer duels with Kiryu, his confrontation with Roman, his initial failure to accel synchro). Hell, the closest we get to ever seeing him be mildly upset about something like a normal person, as far as I can recall, is when he gets embarrased by Martha calling him out on his perceived crush on Aki. That's it.

Crow, though. Crow's allowed to do something the other two aren't: He's allowed to react to the world around him like your average guy. Jack blows through their household money for expensive coffee. Crow gets upset. Understandable. Crow gets injured right before his big debut in a turbo duelling tournament and is upset to the point of snapping at his friends over it. Understandable. Seeing Yaeger's kid cheering his dad on and knowing that this kid will cry if his dad loses makes Crow relent and throw the match. Understandable. Sherry predicts Yusei's imminent death due to hocus pocus and Crow calls bullshit. Understandable.

Do you see what I'm driving at? With how the show treats the other two Satellite boys, I'd argue none of the moments above would have worked anywhere near as well if the writers had tried to make Jack or Yusei take Crow's place in any of them. Because while Yusei and Jack, I feel, were certainly written to be the coolest characters (at least to the target audience), Crow seems like he was written to be the most relatable. He's the guy who takes on a delivery job when they need money. He's the guy who complains about his cranky landlady. And he's the guy who reacts to insane nonsense happening around him a little more realistically than his defeated-an-ancient-devil-to-absorb-its-power brother, his shouldering-the-guilt-of-a-cataclysmic-event-decades-ago other brother, their mutual previously-violent-psychic-who-was-part-of-a-cult friend, and the one-of-us-can-see-spirits-and-we-share-a-weird-kind-of-magical-bond twins. As such, it doesn't feel too out there to me to claim that in many situations, they made Crow the stand-in for the audience, because he has a less iron composure than Jack and Yusei, is readily available in many scenes by virtue of living with the other two, and happens to be the guy who has the arguably most normal backstory out of the signers. (Save, perhaps, for Rua, but I've already addressed before why the writers barely ever pulled Rua centre stage for anything. And they certainly wouldn't have pulled him centre stage for this, either.)

Now, as far as character writing is concerned, assuming I'm at least halfway correct with my hunch above, I feel that whether or not this decision is good or a shot in the foot on the writers' part depends largely on every audience member's individual perception of Crow after the DS arc. If you liked seeing this scrappy guy introduced during the DS arc, of course you would have been happy to see more of him! Even if he's only present in scenes to comment on what's going on and doesn't actually get to do anything meaningful. If you didn't like Crow that much, though, I can see how him popping up so often only to yap a bit and contribute essentially nothing could have grated on you. And as I said, I think this is where the "screentime" discussion comes in again, because yeah, Crow is very much on screen in all these little-bit-of-nothing scenes. He doesn't get to do much and his character isn't fleshed out or reinforced in any way, but he sure is there. For better or for worse.

And this—this is where I can finally get back to him and Sherry. Because in his interactions specifically with her, it is for worse, due to the fact that all the scenes that contain both of them before the Ark Cradle duel are pretty much exclusively these kinds of little-bit-of-nothing, reactive scenes. Crow doesn't get to interact with Sherry meaningfully, and he never—and I need to empathise this—, not once gets to interact with her one on one, not until the end-of-series duel both of them take part in happens. What makes Crow's lack of meaningful interactions with Sherry even worse is that his later duelling partner against her is Aki, of all people, who by contrast gets to interact with Sherry a whole bunch, most notably during her duel against Yusei. Not only that, but Sherry is also shown to actually be interested in Aki, which cannot be said for Crow. Yet, still in the same episode I was describing above, while the Ark Cradle begins its descent, it's not Aki, but Crow who is entrusted with this card by Mizoguchi/Elsworth:

(I'd like to point out that the dialogue following this moment doesn't make it clear whether Crow even knows what Sherry's connection to this card is. For all we know, this could be the first time Crow sees it, without being aware of any of the context surrounding it.)

You know, the card that's essentially a symbol of Sherry's attachment to her parents and her commitment to revenge. The card that basically her entire character revolves around. For a single piece of cardboard, this thing comes with a lot of narrative baggage attached, yet canon doesn't even take the time to assure us that Crow knows what Z-ONE means, other than it being a memento of Sherry's parents, as Mizoguchi explains. And frankly, this all feels like a rather ham-fisted attempt to get some last-minute setup for the later confrontation between Crow and Sherry in. It's like the writers desperately wanted to feel the emotional moment in the duel later to feel earned; they wanted to have their cake and eat it, too. There's only one problem: They didn't even bake the damned thing, the ingredients are just sitting around, untouched, as if staring at them long enough will magically make a cake manifest.

But, well, since I'm already talking about this, I may as well get into the actual meat of the matter, because frankly, it's not like Crow gets much else to do at the start of the arc. Yusei takes off because he at first wants to go to the Ark Cradle alone (like an idiot), leading to the signers coming after him (and telling him he's an idiot). Joining this effort and assuring Yusei that they won't let him die alongside the others is as much as Crow gets to do before the inevitable three-way duel starts.

(That said, while it doesn't accomplish anything, I've always appreciated this little moment while Yusei still tries to pull his stupid kamikaze plan—Crow would know more shortcuts in the BAD area than he does. After all, he lived there for a good while!)

After that, everyone gets up to the Ark Cradle and, as we all know, the signer group is forcibly split up by Z-ONE before deciding to go to a Yusei gear each in order to shut down Ark Cradle's negative Moment. (Top ten sentences that wouldn't make a lick of sense to anyone who isn't up to their neck in 5Ds lore.) And the very first duel on the menu in this final stretch of episodes is also Crow's final duel in the entire show.

(Drumroll please.)

Here's the thing. I love this duel, actually. I get extremely hyped every time I rewatch it. BUT. But. I do not love it so blindly that I couldn't see that it has not one, but several issues. Not only that, but those issues don't just rest on Crow's shoulders, they sadly rest on the shoulders of all three participants in this duel, because frankly? Alongside the four-way Jack/Rua/Ruka/Aporia duel, this duel is one of the Ark Cradle arc's desperate attempts to tie up loose ends. Because as much as I enjoy this arc, that's exactly what it is: A race to the finish line, an attempt to tie as many loose ends as possible up in as little time as the show could get away with. To make clear why I think this, let me just list off all the things this arc resolves or at the very least tries to tie up with a neat bow:

It reintroduces Aki's psychic powers, which we were previously led to believe she'd lost. Notably, we didn't get a reason for why they disappeared and don't get a reason for why they reappear, either. It also turns them into healing powers in an attempt to establish a reason for why she later studies medicine.

It explains what happened to Sherry and what actually drives her revenge. Furthermore, it releases her from her narrative fridge-prison in order to actually let her duel Aki (yes, Aki, specifically), which is a confrontation that was subtextually implied several times previously.

It resolves the question of Bruno's identity by revealing him as an antagonist.

It finally reveals Life Stream Dragon, who was at this point teased over seventy episodes ago.

It also finally rewards Rua, who was teased to possibly become a signer during the DS arc, with an actual signer mark. (As short-lived as it may be.)

It actually explains Iliaster's real plan, which is Z-ONE's hope that the 5Ds gang can actually save the future.

Speaking of which, it actually explains who Z-ONE is and why he's a big deal. (Remember, this guy was first teased a good while ago at this point in time.)

Alongside Sherry, it dusts off several protagonists who didn't get an opportunity to duel on-screen and lets them duel one, final time. (Notably, Aki, Rua, and Ruka, who at this point haven't been seen duelling since the early WRGP or even pre-WRGP.)

You may notice that none of these bullet points contain Crow. They do, however, contain Aki and Sherry, both of whom went into this finale with several unanswered questions as to their characters. Crow, not so much. But let's just put a pin in that for now while we actually jump into the duel.

*Cracks knuckles* Aki & Crow VS Sherry. Here we go at last. Fair warning, the character writing of all three participants of this duel overlaps a fair bit here, so expect to hear a bit of a mishmash about our revenge trio.

So, how does this duel start? Firstly, with Sherry waxing poetic about why she's even opposing Team 5Ds now.

(A dramatic switch of sides that sadly doesn't hold a candle to Bruno turning out to be Antinomy. Which, funnily enough, might be why this duel is front-loaded and Bruno's comes later.)

I won't dig into this too much, but I just want to point out the one thing this moment gives us: It establishes character motivation. Sherry claims she can no longer get revenge and has thus lost her purpose. (The reason why she can no longer get revenge, if you're interested, is because Moment Express, her final lead, vanished in its entirety, as far as canon is concerned.) Thus, she took the bait when Z-ONE offered her a new purpose, and, more importantly, a reward. Now, Aki and Crow at this point in the episode don't get to hear what that reward is, but for our analysis, it's important to keep in mind: Z-ONE promised Sherry he'd alter the timeline so she would get her parents back if she helps him. And I think this is immensely important because this is not only Sherry's goal in the present, I think it's actually the core of her character from the very first moment we meet her. In classic, tragic-avenging-type character fashion, she claims to want revenge when what she's really doing is trying to numb the pain of the awareness that she'll never get her parents back. (Though I'll admit this may also be my generous read of her as a person who likes revenge-obsessed characters.) And then, Z-ONE dangles the actual thing she wanted all along before her. Of course she took the bait.

This brings us to the start of the duel itself. As we know, Sherry employs some tactics that feel quite different from what she previously did in this duel. First and foremost, she messes with the mechanics of the duel itself by using the field spell Ecole de Zone, creating an illusion that confuses Aki and Crow into duelling not her, but each other at first. Sherry, meanwhile, takes a very passive role, clearly intent on letting the two destroy each other while she sporadically activates card effects to accelerate this. What makes all this stand out as even more unusual for her is that she sets this up by lying. At the beginning of the duel, she tells Aki and Crow that there's two of her, and that each duellist will fight one copy of her on a seperate field each, but this is a misdirection to make the two signers duel each other instead of her. And, look. I don't need to tell you this is out of character for Sherry. Canon literally does that for me.

(Case in point.)

It's only after Crow and Aki catch onto the fact that something's wrong and after Aki destroys the field spell that Sherry uses her "real strategy", switching to Soul Binding Gate, which inflicts real damage every time a monster with less attack points than her life points is summoned, in order to whittle away at both other duellists' life points. This is also the point where she reveals to her opponents that she's doing all this to get her parents back. While she does that, we get a bit more back and forth in terms of cardplay, until Aki sets the field up just right so Crow can land a very high-damage hit with Black-Winged Dragon to end the duel. And that is pretty much the gist of it on the duelling side of things.

So what's going on on the narrative side of things, then? Well. Let me front-load something I've noticed on the narrative end: This duel heavily interacts with Crow's and Sherry's characterisation, but barely at all with Aki's. I'll make clear what I mean by that below. For now, let's just get an overview by going through the character moments as they occur in the duel. Why go through all of them? Because most either interact with Crow in some way, or set up a later interaction in the same duel that he's a part of, that's why. I'll get into the nitty-gritty of what this duel did well and what it didn't after that. (Mostly. You may have noticed I like tangents and rambling excessively.)

So.

The first moment belongs to Aki and Crow in equal measure, and happens just as Ecole de Zone is destroyed—which Aki accomplishes by using Crow's monster to synchro summon Black Rose Dragon, as well as prevent that synchro summon from being negated through the same monster's effect, so she can use her dragon's field wipe to get rid of Sherry's field spell. When Sherry is surprised by this, Aki and Crow explain that they memorised each other's cards as part of a strategic effort as a WRGP team.

(Friendship is, in fact, magic.)

Not only does this explanation make perfect sense, it's also an excellent little tidbit to tie Aki and Crow together as a tag-team here, as it strengthens the connection between them. The only gripe I could possibly see with this is that it feels like this didn't necessarily need to be a surprise, end-of-the-show reveal. Frankly, it could have been pretty cool to see this much earlier, to have members of Team 5Ds realise what their teammates were getting up to during the WRGP duels, for example. (Instead of so often having the other signers react just as shocked as the announcer to their teammates' plays—I'm side-eyeing the infamous "a trap from the graveyard"-moment in particular. Like, Aki, sweetie, if you memorised Crow's deck, why are you surprised that he has a trap he can activate from the graveyard? I digress.) Moreover, this could have built anticipation for this particular duel, as viewers would have been excited to see what Aki and Crow would come up with to defeat Sherry as a team. So this moment is not bad, really. Just a bit underutilised, at least to me. (The word "underutilised" might become a trend in this post.)

Every other character-driven moment from here on out is shoved into the second duel episode, 140. Speaking of which, this episode starts with Aki and Crow getting the reveal of why Sherry is helping Z-ONE, where she admits that she joined the bad guys because she wants her parents back. She even goes as far as stating that because Z-ONE showed her the future, she has no hope that it can be saved and thus at least wants her lovely past back so she can have some solace before everything goes to hell for humanity. But we already went over that above.

Next up, albeit this moment should probably be considered more of a running theme than just one self-contained thing, we have Crow's struggle with Soul Binding Gate. Remember, the effect of this field spell causes all players to take damage every time a monster with less ATK than Sherry's LP is summoned. And at this point in the duel, Aki is barely above 1000 life points, so Crow worries about triggering the field spell's effect and hurting her, which leads to him playing suboptimally because he's more concerned about his friend than about winning the duel. Notably, Aki calls him out on this.

(She has a point.)

Outside of providing an internal conflict for Crow to grapple with, this isn't much to write home about. (Side note: I do find it interesting that they introduce the fear of physically hurting someone in a duel specifically in connection to Aki here, though, given that through her psychic powers, she had to grapple with this exact issue many times in the past. I have no idea if this was intentional, though.)

Between this and the next moment, there's a nice bit of interplay between Crow and Aki again, where he activates a card to refill her life points just in time so she doesn't drop to zero through Soul Binding Gate, while Aki uses a defensive trap to protect Crow in return.

(This is just here because it's a money shot to me. The juxtaposition of their faces and their life points, showing that while Aki may have the lowest life points, she still has the coolest head in this duel, and while Sherry technically has the upper hand, she's beginning to falter because she didn't anticipate the other two to work so well together. It's chef's kiss. Mwah.)

What follows after this, is, of course, the Big Moment. Where Sherry tries to convince Crow to forfeit so she can win and have Z-ONE change the past. And this is the one I really need to dig into.

With Sherry's earlier admission that she's on Iliaster's side because she wants her parents back acting as setup, she begins her attempt to sway Crow by telling him that if he had the opportunity to change the past, he would do it, too. And while Crow initially protests, Sherry challenges this, then proceeds to show him what Z-ONE's power could accomplish, and we get a lengthy sequence where Sherry, through weird cyborg-techno-magic-shenanigans that are never explained, takes Aki and Crow to a dreamlike space where Crow sees the orphans he used to take care of being happily reunited with their parents. Sherry also ominously tells him that this is "what he desires deep in his psyche" before promising him that if he surrenders the duel, Z-ONE can give him a world where Zero Reverse never occurred and all the kids can have happy lives with their real families. (I wanted to post most of this sequence in screenshots, but while I have them, I've realised I'm only a few images short of tumblr's limit already, so forgive me because I will need those remaining image spots.) This moment proceeds to introduce some serious doubt on Crow's end. Aki, meanwhile, remains steadfast, telling him not to fall for Sherry's manipulation, which leads to her giving an almost Yusei-style speech. In a moment where Crow wavers, both because he's genuinely considering whether taking Sherry's offer might be the wiser choice, and because he doesn't want to hurt Aki by triggering Sherry's field spell effect, Aki calls out to him and tells him to snap out of it by reminding him of how Yusei reached out to her during their second duel. This speech is a bit, um. Clunky, I feel. (At least if the translation is correct. If it isn't, then that may be the issue.) See, she tells him that Yusei "saved her from the darkness of her psychic powers", that "he wasn't concerned about his own safety and risked his life to persuade her", that, because her psychic powers are now gone, she's "renewed" and that this somehow brought her to the epiphany that as long as she believes in her own potential, she can change the future. This is lifted almost verbatim from the scene, by the way. Leaving aside the fact that half of this feels like a mild to severe misrepresentation of Aki's character arc during the DS arc (don't talk about it, don't talk about it, I need to make this another post of its own, damn it), I, personally, can't exactly follow how she ended up with that final epiphany from the circumstances she listed. But lucky for us, Crow apparently gets what she's driving at, because he quickly echoes her statement and they both conclude that Crow's kids also believe in the future and fight to live, that they're not sad about their lives the way they are right now, even though they don't have parents. Thus, Crow catches himself, echoing Aki's sentiment and telling Sherry that he, too, believes in the future. And through the power of Friendship and Believing in the Future, he manages to use Aki's cards to land the final hit, nicely mirroring how she used his to destroy Ecole de Zone.

...Phew. Okay, look. First off, that above, large section is basically several character beats stacked on top of one another. On Sherry's end, we have the intriguing fact that she's specifically trying to manipulate Crow, not Aki. In fact, she doesn't so much as try to sway Aki, as though she knows it's no use. Then, on Aki's end, we've got her pulling a real Yusei, staying level-headed almost the entire duel and reaching out to make sure Crow stays on track. This moment also ties back to her own conflict with her powers again. (Which, unfortunately, I will talk about, and yes, I'll be chewing drywall the entire time I do it.) Finally, on Crow's end, we've got a nice, proper moment where he doubts himself and, by his own admission, nearly makes a terrible mistake because he wants nothing more than for the kids he used to take care of to have good lives.

Now, before I go over what worked about this moment and what didn't, let me just chew through the rest of the actual duel itself, too, then circle back too highlight some things. In other words, time for me to chew some drywall.

*Sigh*

At the very end of the duel, there are two more character moments that are noteworthy.

First, right before the final hit, we get Sherry desperately defending herself against Aki and Crow's newly strengthened belief that the future can, in fact, still be saved, which she does by (rather heartbreakingly) asking what's so wrong about wanting her parents back, about wanting their love and warmth back. It's at this point that Crow's allowed to get back at Sherry by challenging her beliefs, telling her that people "work hard to live because they only get one chance at life", and that there's no point in trying to go back to do things differently, that the only way to keep going is to believe in the future, regardless of whatever painful and sad events one has had to live through. I'd say this sentiment certainly fits Crow, character-wise, especially given his rough Satellite background. It does partially fall flat because it feels a bit weird for him, specifically, to now be acting like he knows Sherry inside and out, much like she did with him earlier, but again, this is simply a matter of setup and I'll try not to belabour that point again. The horse is already dead, no sense in beating it. It's after this speech and the final attack that Sherry finally realises her error.

Buuut this leads us right into the next character moment. Because as the duel ends, Sould Binding Gate physically falls apart, pelting all three of our duel participants in debris and threatening to crush them under it. While everyone does briefly fall over (and Sherry gets a moment to realise that her father wanted her to live strong, not accept seemingly inevitable doom and die weak), they soon realise they were not, in fact, buried under rubble, though. Because guess what! Black Rose Dragon to the rescue. Black Rose Dragon, who can suddenly physically affect her surroundings again. You know, that thing we were led to believe Aki could no longer make her monsters do because she lost her powers completely out of nowhere. And there's more! Because not only does Black Rose Dragon take care of the debris for the trio, as she disappears, she also heals all three of them, and in response, Crow gets a line that I unfortunately cannot for the life of me discuss without bias because it kills me every time.

(Crow. Crow, please. You're killing me. I beg you.)

This line out of Crow's mouth feels extremely weird to me, and in the process of typing up this post, I've been trying to find the reason why. Here's the conclusion I've come to: Firstly, it feels a bit out of place from him, somehow. A line hypothesising about what psychic powers can or can't do—this is something I would have expected out of Aki's mouth, but not out of Crow's. I believe what makes it feel so out of place, though, isn't necessarily that it seems a bit odd for him, specifically, to theorise about this, but that when I hear it, I don't feel like the character is saying it. Instead, in this moment, moreso than in some others that suffer from the same issue, I hear not Crow, but the writers speaking. I hear them telling me "look, we know we made it seem like Aki's powers are super gone and like they were super, irredeemably bad, and like she and you should be happy that they're gone, but here, see, this is what they're really like. Don't you think we came up with something clever here, to set her becoming a doctor later up nicely? No, this isn't because we needed to backpedal on our decision to make her lose them and be happy about it at the last second, why do you ask?". And yes, I concede this might just be me. (So feel free to disregard this in terms of analysis, I just have some weird kind of vendetta against this line.) But still, even without my personal issues hampering me, this line of dialogue out of Crow's mouth is just plain odd. After all, how would he know what "real" psychic powers are? Since when is he the expert, especially considering we've never so much as seen him comment on Aki's powers before? (And for the record, this line would have seemed just as weird had any other character other than Aki said it imo. It just has that unmistakable "writers trying to justify something at the last second"-tang to me.)

And do not. Do Not get me started on the fact that the writers, despite going to such great pains to paint Aki's psychic powers as an exclusively negative thing especially during the WRGP arc, decide to reintroduce them here, suddenly as a good thing that can also heal people, which directly contradicts every choice they've made when it came to Aki's relationship to her powers ever since the Team Catastrophe duel. While crucially also lacking the one thing this entire duel is practically begging for: Fucking. Setup. But at this point, the handling of Aki's powers, specifically, really needs its own post, so I'll hold off on any further comments here and come back to that another time. I feel like I'm beginning to talk in circles, anyhow. Setup. Setup, setup, setup. This duel wishes it had it, because then the ideas presented here—which, in a vacuum, are compelling—might have worked smoothly.

But, with that. We have finally made it through the duel itself. Sherry, at the very end, gets her change of heart and at last cements herself as a good guy, and that concludes the first duel in the finale, and also both Aki and Crow's last duel in the entire show.

And good lord, was this duel all over the place. Though I think my meandering scene-by-scene breakdown of it showed as much. Now, onto the proper evaluation of what worked and what didn't here. First, let's get the good these two episodes do out of the way, shall we. (Because there is a lot of Bad I need to yell about, unfortunately.)

By virtue of being one of the final duels, this is Aki and Crow's last chance to shine, and shine, they do. Both in the duelling department and in the character department. Aki makes two major plays that upend Sherry's strategy and Crow's perfectly in sync with her, showing that the two truly are teammates, and paying off all the character moments they had specifically in the Team Unicorn to Team Catastrophe section of the WRGP. Their friendship and cooperation is believable and entertaining to watch. Then on the character side, Aki's growth is (somewhat) paid off—where she used to be a character that doubted herself and was afraid of hurting people, she is now the one who can keep a level head and help others fight their self-doubt. Meanwhile, Crow gets to show off his unfailing dedication to community and family again, both by watching out for Aki and by selflessly desiring not for himself to have a better life, but for the kids he used to take care of. And Sherry, who was previously removed from the narrative in such an unsatisfactory way, finally gets to duel again, gets to explain why she actually does what she does, and gets to join the heroes at the end, permanently joining the ranks of the good guys instead of the villains. Happy endings all around.

Ehem. And this is where I'm gonna be less nice about this duel. Because the problem is, due to the specific constellation of characters involved in this duel and how they previously interacted in the show, there's a lot of stuff here that doesn't work nearly as well on a second watch as a first watch would like to make you believe.

First, a broader issue on the card game end of things: The way this duel feels, it's very much more Aki's duel than Crow's, which is also kind of confirmed in the card plays being made. Though it's Crow who's first shown to catch onto the fact that a third party is activating additional card effects out of nowhere, it's Aki who fully solves the mystery, uses Crow's monster to synchro summon Black Rose Dragon, then activates her dragon's effect to get rid of the illusion for good. And while Crow gets to land the final hit, it's Aki's setup and her trap, Synchro Stream, that make it possible for him to win for both of them. And yet. On the dialogue- and character-interaction side of things, this duel is made out to be much more Crow's than Aki's. Because, perhaps surprisingly to some, Aki doesn't waver one bit in this duel. She's got her head in the game the entire time. She's here to do business—that business being defeating Sherry—and by god, does she do it. Moreover, unlike Crow, she has much, much better setup to be duelling Sherry than he does. And this comes right back around to the main thing this duel suffers from, which I've already harped on about: Crow and Sherry, up until this point, have not interacted in a way that would make the connection between them seem in any way significant. Unfortunately for this duel, though, Aki and Sherry have.

From the first episode where we're introduced to Sherry, she's shown to be interested in who Aki is and what she can do. During the duel between her and Yusei, she comments on Aki's powers. Later, when Aki is getting her turbo duelling license, Sherry watches on with interest. At some point while Aki's training, Sherry drops by to speak with her and Yusei again. My point here being, of course, that Aki, unlike Crow, got several scenes where she interacted with Sherry or had Sherry meaningfully take note of her existence before this point. Yet, whatever dynamic the writers may or may not have been aiming for between these two is, at best, underutilised in the final duel, if not completely ignored, at worst. Instead, the writers shift their focus to Crow and try to make us believe that Sherry, a character who has barely acknowledged his existence thus far, would know him well enough to consider him the better target for her attempt at manipulation. (And don't get me started on how the hell Z-ONE's weird robot magic is supposed to expose what Crow "desires deep in his psyche". That is simply a chasm the show expects us to suspend our disbelief over.) And look. The thing is, I don't think the Big Moment where Sherry tries to convince Crow to forfeit is terrible in isolation. Like, they could have made this work, had they given these two setup, had they given us, the audience, reason to believe Crow could be swayed like this (which they, notably, also didn't), and had they given us the impression that Sherry knows Crow well enough to pull something like this. What hurts the scene immensely, however, is that it's preceded by everything before, starting from the WRGP, where there is no setup between these two, no reason to believe Crow could be convinced to forfeit a duel against a major antagonist, and no meaningful interactions to support the belief that Sherry knows who Crow really is at all.

What also stands out to me is that Crow really doesn't feel like the best character to parallel Sherry, here, either. Parallel in the sense that she tries to get to him by expressing a desire she believes they both feel—getting a certain, nicer version of the past they never had back. Because the thing is, Sherry and Crow hardly feel like they have very much in common, and there's certainly no previous hints to make anyone believe they would have this in common. (So for all we know, Sherry could have just been taking a shot in the dark by trying to convince Crow.) You know who could have made for an excellent character to mirror Sherry, though? Yeah. The third person in the room during this scene. Aki.

See, here's the thing about these three as characters, in relation to what this scene tries to accomplish (getting a protagonist to waver by having the antagonist appeal to certain emotional similarities between them): While Crow may perhaps be more relatable to the audience, he isn't all that relatable to Sherry. He comes from dirt poor origins, she from rich ones. He doesn't even remember his parents, she defines herself by the memory of hers. She's a lone wolf, he's incredibly community-focussed. The only parallel you could have drawn between these two, up until this duel, is knowing what it feels like to want revenge. (Sherry with her parents, Crow with his kids back in the DS arc.) But guess what, unfortunately, Aki knows that too, what with her past as the Black Rose Witch and wanting to make people pay for ostracising her. And to make matters worse, she has a lot of other things going for her that parallel Sherry much, much better, too. They both come from well-off families, both have had major, traumatising events in their lives revolve around their parents, both left their initial family structure by way of drastic changes in their life, both are intimately familiar with the desire for vengeance, and, most damningly, Aki knows what it's like to stand on the side of the bad guys—like Sherry is doing in that very scene—because you feel like it's the only place that gives you hope/meaning. Not to speak of the fact that Aki, given her turbulent past with her psychic powers, would probably know exactly what it feels like to want a past you never had back. There would have been so much to work with there, and it makes whatever they were gunning for with Crow look... lacklustre, to put it mildly, by comparison.

The worst part is, I think, that the blame lies neither with the characters nor with the scene concept here. Solely with the execution. Because I truly think they could have made this work. They could have made the entire duel work, big character moments and all. But the keyword is and always has been setup. Setup, which the writers, at least in part, strangely gave to Aki, but not to Crow, which is what hurts particularly his portion of this duel, and, arguably, his character writing in general. Because—and this may be a small thing in the grand scheme of things, but permit me this—while Crow wanting a better future for the kids he used to take care of over a better future for himself feels perfectly on brand, the idea of him forfeiting a duel against a major antagonist, while the threat of the entire city being destroyed is hanging above his head... doesn't. Like, yes, I've talked about the fact that Crow is the only character in 5Ds who ever actually loses duels on purpose. What you may remember, though, is that both occasions we've seen him do this—against Lyndon and Yaeger, respectively—were much lower-stakes duels than this. Not to speak of the fact that it also feels a little odd that Crow, of all people, would buy into the idea that Z-ONE's genuinely powerful enough to just give those kids their parents back, given how liberally he called bullshit on pretty much any and all supernatural mumbo-jumbo claiming that fate is inevitable, or that the gods have this-and-that power, or what have you the entire show. (Also, doesn't he strike you as the guy who'd wonder why Z-ONE's not using his fancy powers for better things, if the extent of them is so great? Or is that just me?) It's a moment of character doubt that tries to sell itself as believable, even though we've never been given any hints that this kind of temptation, specifically, could work on Crow.

Ultimately, Crow & Aki VS Sherry feels like a very hot-and-cold duel. On the cardplay side, the teamwork between Aki and Crow is well done, yet the duel does feel like it skews more towards Aki than towards Crow. Sherry, meanwhile, plays tricky and mean like a proper antagonist, but does so at the expense of sacrificing all her previous tactics and monsters (and, arguably, some of her character, though this is probably on purpose, given her transformation into an antagonist). Then, on the character side, we've got Aki in an interestingly Yusei-ish role, which, while it feels like a good way to show how she's matured and learned, wastes her character dynamic with Sherry. On the other side, Crow and Sherry interact in several personal ways throughout the duel that leave you wondering when exactly these two got to know each other so well, because the show certainly didn't give us a visible progression of their dynamic. The only dynamic that leaves nothing to be desired is that between Aki and Crow (stilted speeches aside), because it excellently showcases their friendship and teamwork. Very weird decisions made in the writing here all around.

We'll get into the nitty-gritty of what changes I would have suggested to improve this duel below, but first: What happens after this duel? Well, two more Yusei gear duels, Aporia briefly standing up to Z-ONE, and then, the final, big clash between Yusei and Z-ONE.

Given that Crow isn't even present for two of these duels and then barely gets more to do than stand on the side and react during the final two, I will dare to skip all that, though. Because really, Crow's occasional comments and the play-by-play he sometimes joins the others in giving when spectating a duel don't exactly contribute anything to his character. They're just there so he gets something to do and doesn't fade into the background entirely when a duel that doesn't involve him is going on. This includes the moment where he, much like the other signers, gets to give Yusei Black-Winged Dragon for the final duel, as well as the later moment when Yusei uses it, chanting in tandem with Crow as BWD arrives. And other than that and the tear-jerking moment when he later reacts to Yusei returning despite all odds, he really doesn't get any noteworthy scenes.

In other words, we are skipping straight to the end. So, where do we find Crow there?

(Oh, y i k e s.)

There's a popular post circulating around this site that goes something like "the worst thing you can do to a character is make them a cop during a timeskip". And, look. I don't think I need to tell anyone that becoming a sector security officer is an extremely jarring character choice for Crow. Crow, of all people! The guy with the face full of markers, who used to be part of a duel gang, who was introduced in the show gleefully stealing from security Robin Hood-style, and who has every reason to despise law enforcement! (Leaving aside the obvious logistical issue that Crow in no country in the world could have completed his police training in the few months between the Ark Cradle debacle and this scene. But given that 5Ds generously brushes realistic concerns like this one aside on multiple occasions, this is, funnily enough, the thing I'm also more willing to overlook here. The character dissonance, however, less so.)

I'll try to be generous and guess that the writers were aiming to convey a message somewhere along the lines of "even someone who's done bad things in the past can become an example for others" or something like it. The problem is just that Crow didn't need any such message because he was already the good guy while he was still actively stealing from security. He was the lovable rogue to a T, damn it! But this, in particular, is a surface scratch hinting at a bigger issue, I think—namely, the issue of the show's complete pivot when it came to the depiction of law enforcement after the DS arc. Because when we think back to that part of 5Ds, good security officers were the exception, rather than the rule. And this is exactly what makes Crow of all characters becoming one even weirder. He would know, would remember how security used to treat him, his kids, his friends, his brothers. And if the idea here was that, well, he's trying to improve sector security by joining it and changing it from the inside, so to speak, then guess what was missing again: Our good, old friend setup. I'm starting to feel like a broken record. So yeah, I don't think a ton of people, whether they like or hate Crow, would disagree that this is a supremely weird position to put his character in.

As we find out through 5Ds' epilogue, however, his sector security job isn't quite what Crow actually wants, though. (And thank god, because that would have been such a bizarre position to leave him in.) Instead, we're shown fairly quickly that several duelling leagues are apparently trying to scout Crow out, and that he's tempted to accept one of the offers and go into pro duelling. This is at first shown in a short scene where something like a league scout follows Crow, then later, when the whole group—sans Jack, at first—is getting together and everyone starts discussing their futures. Aside from complaining a bit about his job and upsetting Aki without meaning to, Crow doesn't get much to do here, either. For what it's worth, at least him feeling tempted to ditch the security job feels more in line with the original Crow we got than with whatever strange twist the writers were going for after this shorter timeskip.

What follows is the very last duel of the show, the long-awaited Yusei VS Jack rematch, of course. And while he doesn't get to participate in this one, Crow, much like Aki and the twins, spectates the duel and ends up having an epiphany about what he wants to do. This epiphany ends up being that he does want to turn to pro duelling, and as a reasoning, canon provides us with this:

(As is known, intense card games are the only way to make children smile.)

Personally, I wouldn't say this is a terrible or out of character reason for Crow to decide to go pro. But there's more to that I'd like to discuss. First, though, let's take a quick look at where we find Crow after the second, bigger timeskip, which is inserted right in the middle of Yusei and Jack's final duel.

(Okay, yeah, I'm a sucker for the bullet earrings.)

The quick scene Crow gets here makes it unmistakably clear that he did go into pro duelling, just like he decided during the duel in the past, and not only that, he went into tag-team duelling and apparently managed to reach world champion status with his teammates. The above scene, however, is the exact same moment he decides to leave said team, so he can instead go solo and (presumably) try to beat Jack.

Now, we can discuss this in a bit more detail. Personally, I'm extremely in two minds about Crow being one of three characters, total, who ends up becoming a pro duellist after canon. Jack seems obvious, especially given the pivot back to his more Fortune Cup-esque persona the writers did around the Red Nova episodes. Rua also makes sense, given that Jack was his idol from the start. Crow, though, feels a little more complicated. The thing is, like so many things surrounding Crow in the Ark Cradle arc, the writers gave us no indication pro duelling is something he's really passionate about before this point. Worse, they didn't even really tell us what reason he saw to participate in the WRGP with his brothers beyond "could be fun". So there isn't really a connection here. The same thing goes for the fact that he specifically talks about teaching his teammates above, which is also something he wasn't associated with all that much previously. Though this one is admittedly less egregious, because at least Crow was seen briefly coaching Aki as she prepared to take his spot during the Unicorn duel. Still, while I wouldn't go as far as saying it's an out of character choice for Crow to go pro, it still feels a little odd that he went down the same route as Jack. Personally speaking, it feels like the writers didn't quite know what to do with him. Because as I said, Jack is obvious and Rua also makes sense, and I'd say the same goes for Yusei. Then there's Ruka, who is treated about as in-depth in the epilogue as she was throughout canon, and Aki, whose "setup" for her timeskip self was done extremely hasty and last-minute, but at least it was there. Between all of them, Crow occupies a weird spot where it doesn't so much feel like he ended up on the wrong trajectory for his life, as it simply feels like there were choices the writers could have made that would have fit him much better. What with his theme of legacy and community, trying to make Pearson's dream of a place where disenfranchised children can learn good life skills a reality would have been a good fit, for example. Especially considering his close ties to the Satellite orphans he used to take care of, which, funnily enough, are reinforced one more time as canon flips back to present day and Crow is seen bidding his kids goodbye.

("Come back"? When, precisely? And what part about "literally saved the world twice" doesn't qualify you as a hero to a bunch of kids ten times over already?)

Considering canon seems hellbent on making sure we know the signers went their separate ways and that they aren't anywhere near each other by the very end of the show, though, my guess is that Crow had to end up doing something like pro duelling, in order to get him out of New Domino City and away from the friend group whose shenanigans we were so accustomed to following by that point. Of course, there's also the argument to be made that Crow staying in NDC and getting a more community-focussed ending would have also been significantly less cool than making him a kickass pro duellist with bullet earrings, which circles back to how the writing interacts with its target audience.

The only thing that follows after this, then, is the big goodbye, and with that, ladies, gentlemen, and other lovely 5ds nerds, we have successfully followed bird boy's path throughout the entire show. And what a ride it was. (I did not think this analysis would end up stretching over a whole four posts.) Time for some closing thoughts before I do my thing and suggest some rewrites that could have made all this feel more coherent one more time.

Crow's character arc, if it can even be called that, feels about as hot and cold as his and Aki's final duel with Sherry over the course of the show. His introduction is fast-paced, he's made to be likable quickly, and his integration into the main protagonist group is as quick as everything else about his narrative. Between the way he shows up out of nowhere, briefly disappears without fanfare, and is then reintroduced with even more importance before slipping into the signer group like he's always been there, it truly feels like his entire inclusion in the narrative was a last-minute decision by the writers to include that one, additional character concept Kazuki Takahashi had originally created after all. If there was one way to describe his whole arc, it would be that it's a rush. At the start, the writers are in a hurry to make him likable, then they're in a hurry to make him a signer, then they're in a hurry to give us a whole backstory for him, then they're in a hurry to give him a believable character dynamic with Aki, and at the end, they're in a hurry to pay off a character dynamic with Sherry they didn't properly set up with him. You may notice that leaves significant gaps, and the lack of balance between those gaps and the rushes surrounding them, I believe, are part of why he's such a polarising character.

Crow is integrated so thoroughly into the signer group at the end of the DS arc that, much like Aki and the twins, he gets stuck in the position of being a character that cannot simply be removed from the narrative for a longer amount of time. And this, I think, ends up biting him in the ass, because in the gaps where the writers don't rush to do something big with him, it often feels like they don't quite know what to do with him at all. So, he instead gets relegated to small side tasks, like inane duels that don't affect the plot, or becomes the person who reacts to unfolding situations in whatever manner wouldn't fit Yusei or Jack. He feels like he's the third portion of the protagonist trifecta only in theory—the status of an equal third player seems to be what the writers had in mind, yet, looking at the show, it feels like an honorary title, at best, because the writing choices made for him don't convey anywhere near the same amount of thought and effort as those of Yusei and Jack. Crow's backstory doesn't intersect significantly with that of his brothers, his dragon is introduced way too late and never given an upgrade, he never gets to clash with Iliaster until the Team New World duel, and throughout the entire WRGP and Ark Cradle arc, there isn't a single duelling victory that's solely his. People who prefer other characters over Crow like to harp on about how much screentime he gets; I argue that this is exactly what showcases how poorly the writers took care of him in many instances. For as much as Crow is plastered onto the screen and given the aesthetics of an equal player in a protagonist trio, his many appearances are as much of a curse as they are a gift, because too many of them aren't spent setting up anything meaningful or developing his character in any way. Speaking of character development: There is none. Crow exits the show pretty much exactly the same as he entered it, brief security stint aside. And, look, this need not necesarily be a bad thing. Static characters exist and they have their place in stories. It's just that in Crow's case, his utter lack of development feels like another damning indicator of the writers' cluelessness when it came to utilising him, given his weird, sort-of-elevated-protagonist. Aki, who is so often weighed against him, gets significantly more development than he does. And though Jack also ends up in almost the same place at the end of the show as he was at the start, at least he had a dip in the middle where his character was somewhat malleable and not set in stone. Crow didn't.

What we end up with, then, is a character whose concept is perfectly fine on paper, but whose execution proceeded to turn him into the one and only favourite for some, and the embodiment of piss poor writing for others. Having now looked at pretty much his entire run in the show with a bloody microscope, I end up somewhere in the middle, myself. He's a good character and much of his writing is confusing at best, utter dogshit at worst. As for what decisions in the writing room led to him turning out like this, I'd still pay good money to know them. For what it's worth, I've tried my very best to make an educated guess as to all of them.

And now, for the final time, allow me to do my very best to suggest how the issues of the Ark Cradle arc could have been addressed in order to make Crow's part in it less messy.

In previous posts, I've split up my rewrite suggestions depending on one circumstance: Whether or not Crow stays a signer. However, this time, I will deliberately forgo this, for one, very simple reason—Crow's status as a signer doesn't matter one bit for the Ark Cradle arc. Regardless of whether he has a mark or not, his duel with Sherry remains unaffected, and so does his later timeskip-self. Thus, pick your favourite, both versions work for the Ark Cradle.

Now. Onto the elephant vengeful Frenchwoman in the room. Let me repeat my favourite word in this post one more time. What the dynamic between Crow and Sherry needed, more than anything else, in order to satisfyingly be paid off during their Ark Cradle duel, was setup. There was so much time Crow spent on screen doing fuck all, and some of that time could have so easily been allocated to him interacting with Sherry in a meaningful manner. (I'm side-eyeing especially his pre-WRGP duels. Those did nothing to add to his character and could have easily been replaced with episodes where he actually gets to talk to Sherry one on one.) And if not that, then the writers could at least have done themselves the favour of letting Aki talk to Crow about Sherry, which would have arguably set up their three-way clash even better. Moreover, show us how the hell these two characters parallel each other and how they differ, damn it! The main issue with the big moment Sherry and Crow had in the duel was that Crow's faltering and his sudden, deep understanding of Sherry came completely out of nowhere. So what if they had shown some of that earlier, then? What if they had shown where the lmits of Crow's resolve lie, what could get him to doubt himself? What if they had drawn the parallel of Sherry and Crow both supposedly being characters that sometimes wistfully think about a past they never had earlier? It would have done so much to make that duel hit exactly the way it was probably meant to. As a bonus, if we had gotten Aki and Crow talking about Sherry, too, the scene of talking Sherry out of helping Z-ONE could have been a team effort, just like their card playing was. Both of them would have reasons to know different aspects of Sherry each, and both could have brought up good arguments. And this is really all this duel woild have needed to be better on the story end, I think: A solid, narrative foundation to make it obvious to us why it has to be these three characters duelling, why it could have only been this setup, why it made the most sense to let these three bounce off each other. Crow only needs that extra step to slot in better with the girls here.

As for the epilogue, I don't think anyone will be surprised to read that I would have never made Crow a cop, not even temporarily. The depiction of law enforcement 5Ds gives us during the DS arc is too damning for that. However, given the way the ending is structured, he does need some sort of occupation that feels like it's not quite the right thing so he can later change his mind about it, of course. Here, though, is where I, purely in service of Crow's character, would suggest a change that probably doesn't work with the ending's final aim of separating the 5Ds gang by hundreds of kilometres each. I would let Crow go into pro duelling first, then let him figure out that's not what he actually wanted. Crow, to me, is a character who is so intrinsically tied to community and family that turning him into a solitary pro duellist—even if he claims to do it to make the kids back home smile—feels off to me. Thus, from a character standpoint, I would let him pivot back to wanting to take care of those kids. Either through what I suggested above, letting him carry on Pearson's dream, or, which also feels fitting to me, by letting him help out Martha again and setting him up as the guy who'll take over when she can no longer run the orphanage. It's not the cool, glamorous end the show gave him, but it's what feels more like the family-focussed guy we first met in the show. It doesn't gel with the idea of permanently separating him from the other signers, though, unfortunately. To do something like that while keeping his community theme, one would probably have to send him away to shack up with Brave or something, to help orphans in other countries. But this, I think, nicely showcases the dissonance between what Crow's character writing would suggest he might do at the end, and what the show demanded he needed to do so he'd no longer be close to the others. Because my focus, as always, is only on character here. And Crow, with his personality and his writing, feels like the character who chafes the most against the idea of striking out solo, abandoning his ties to the community he was so invested in previously. To that extent, the above suggestion is the best I can provide with what we were canonically given. If we wanted to keep the canon ending he gets and actually make it make sense why he suddenly wants to be a lone wolf pro, the only thing I could suggest would be more setup for that. (Ah, there it is again. One final time.) Show Crow having some actual competitive drive, show him enjoying the whole tournament thing more than he thought he would during the WRGP. Just give us something that shows why he would want to go down this path, and why some other things that were previously important to him might not be a priority anymore. It all comes back to setup.

*Deep breath*

So, here we are, then, and this is it. This is all I could make of Crow's character writing in the entire show. To everyone who read this post in its entirety, a heartfelt thank you. To everyone who read the whole series of posts in its entirety, I'm so glad you're as insane about this show as I am, it makes me feel incredibly appreciated. Hope you enjoyed the ride, more meta posts will come eventually, just about different topics. In the meantime, see ya.

[pricechecktranslations]

the heavenly yard blog infomine, part 3: Re_Birthday, making Servant of Evil, more karaoke, surprise Luka

Yada yada, these are not translations, yada yada

Blog link for anyone who missed it the first time

14 December 2008 ~ 30 January 2009

---December 2008---

14th

-mothy is making a Len song for the Kagamine's anniversary but he doesn't think he'll have it done on time.

24th

-he has the song done, but he doesn't think he'll get the video done in time. he's been quite busy

27th

-appropriately, the Len song he uploaded for the Kagamine birthday is Re_Birthday.

-He didn't have time to recruit illustrators for this one so he just made the art and video himself.

29th

-mothy provides a bit more commentary on Re_Birthday, how it's sort of a compilation of the songs he's made until now. The "Re" in the title sort of references Regret Message, making it an answer song to it, in a way (in addition to just plain old "Rebirth").

-He wishes he'd been more prepared, there was a lot more he wanted to do with the song (like add in other VOCALOIDS, something he does do in later editions of the song might I add). It's taking him longer and longer to make songs now, before it used to only take him like 3-4 days.

-He replies to comments. Someone asks if he's going to collaborate with Shimoda from Piapro (Asami Shimoda, I think?), which he isn't sure will happen. Another person brings up how Rin is singing alongside Len at points in Re_Birthday.

-2008's been a good year for him

31st

-mothy does a roundup of all the songs he's uploaded this year, sharing his thoughts on listening to them now.

-10ML he thinks sounds pretty bad, but it's also his first song so he still likes it. Wordplay feels like a "trial and error" type work to him. Clockwork Lullaby is something he was really proud of making so it struck him that it didn't get popular--it was around this point he really wanted to make something that got big on NicoNico. He's made a remake of it that, to him, sounds totally different.

-Daughter of Evil is naturally his big hit, and it sounds very unique among the songs he's made. Servant of Evil he says feels like it's "walking on its own"--he admits he was trying to replicate the success of Daughter of Evil, to an extent, though he had fun making it and he's proud of it with all its ups and downs. He wants to surpass it someday. Regret Message on the other hand he feels he's improved a bit on his VOCALOID voice mixing (or at least he did it better accidentally). It seems to be an audience favorite.

-For Girl of the Miniature Garden he basically says that the Clockwork Lullaby series is to stretch his skills with song types he's not good at, and he doesn't think the instrumentals are as good. Still, he found Miku easy to use and he'd like to use her again. He did remasters of Daughter and Servant of Evil with RinLen act 2, which he didn't hugely care for, but he does think he learned something useful doing it.

-He was originally going to call Tale of Abandonment on a Moonlit Night "Inokori Doubutzuen(Zoo Detention)", and the lyrics were apparently much darker? Then he changed the subject matter to be about Hansel and Gretel (he writes Gretel as GLAY☆TERU, not sure what that means). Someday he'd like to do "Zoo Detention", but milder. As for South North Story, he learned a lot during the collaboration and surprised himself by making something so upbeat and positive.

-Re_Birthday borrows motifs from previous songs, of course. Originally it was going to have the melody for Servant and Daughter of Evil in its interlude. And he thinks he made the low tones in the mix too weak. And, in generally, he'd like to try making something new next year.

-Also replies to some comments, only relevant one is that he does allow iterative works of his songs.

---January 2009---

1st

-mothy wishes his readers a happy new year and expresses his intentions to talk about the making of Servant of Evil in commemoration of his karaoke success.

-he replies to comments, which--again, because I'm not seeing what he's replying to, I can't really summarize them properly. He does, however, discuss his name a bit.

-So, apparently the correct pronounciation of "mothy" is "mocchii" (mo-chee). However, I'm assuming that's because "thi" isn't a syllable in Japanese, so I'm going to continue pronouncing it the American way I do (moth-ee). Apparently a lot of people tend to pronounce it "masshii" or "maashii". He also says that it should probably actually be spelled "motty" (and that it used to be in the past), but for arbitrary reasons he's going by "mothy" instead. Not 100% sure of what to make of this but perhaps his "arbitrary reason" is that it stands for "master of the heavenly yard", which I believe is the reason given at present day.

2nd

-mothy finally begins discussing the making of Servant of Evil, which he essentially was motivated to do to capitalize on the positive reception for Daughter of Evil. There were a lot of people asking to see the perspective of the "blue", "green", and "red" characters, as well as those curious about the servant (or rather, lambasting him for being a "HetaLen", a pun which means "useless Len").

-He wound up focusing on Len for the song because he didn't have any other VOCALOIDS at the time.

-Looking back, he sort of wishes he'd used the word "princess" rather than "daughter" for Rin's song so it would match the title of "Servant" better.

4th Page 1

-mothy uploads a remaster of Clockwork Lullaby onto Piapro, and responds to comments.

-Apparently mothy didn't share Servant's vsq because he had to mess with it so many times that if he did, it would not sound like the finished song at all.

-He addresses how people thought poorly of Len in his songs before Servant of Evil came out because, naturally, it looked like he just abandoned the princess to her fate.

Page 2

-more on Servant of Evil. He made it into a four-part composition (I think? I'm not familiar with this word but basically it's four distinct narrative pieces to the song) to contrast it with Daughter of Evil, saying it's a convenient model for story songs. He also wanted it to be understandable even if you haven't listened to Daughter of Evil. He also wanted to put the chorus in the opening of the song because that's what hit songs do? (again, sliiiightly confused with the musical terminology he's using). Girl of the Minature Garden is the only other song where he's done this.

-He also wanted to put in lines from Len everywhere.

-He went back and forth a little on the tone of the song. Originally, he conceived of the twin switch as having been Rin's idea, but eventually he went with it being Len's, to make it more of a tragic story than a dark one to better fit the melody he'd made.

7th Page 1

-reply to comments. People are finding his posts on his songmaking interesting.

Page 2

-more on Servant of Evil. He began work on the song as soon as he had an idea of what he wanted to do (he also prefaces this by saying that he's by no means on expert on making lyrics and that he may have made mistakes in explaining it).

-So, basic lyric construction--opened with the chorus, introduced Len's relationship to the Princess. There's two meanings in Len saying he'll "even become evil", which we'll get to later. Len gets more explanation in this first section of the song, with his character background in the next stanza (with the "A" melody) and his mindset in the one after (the "B" melody, which was apparently half the length that it is now at first but this made it too hard to work lyrics in). Then back to the chorus.

-He was trying to make sure that everything was explained while using the bare minimum amount of detail.

9th Page 1

-Luka's release has been anounced. He's interested, but he also owns several VOCALOIDs at this point that he hasn't used yet, so he might hold off.

-Mothy replies to comments. Largely inconsequential, but he does laugh with someone over the fact that he wound up buying all the Japanese VOCALOIDs after only having the Kagamines for a while.

Page 2

-Back to Servant of Evil, getting on the second part of the song. He figures that since he said Len would "even become evil", he needed him to do something evil. It's at this point that he started trying to work in the parts he cut from Daughter of Evil, though he couldn't work in the bit with the glass bottle (where Allen kills Leonhart) due to syllable space. (note, this section follows the "A melody equals plot, B melody equals character mindset" pattern from the previous section).

-The "today's snack is brioche" line is to contrast Riliane's "Oh, it's teatime" line, and also reference what he'd learned about Marie Antoinette. And, it shows the main character, who is a servant, doing servant things.

-As a tangent, he brings up how little we know about the Miku character just going off those two songs--we don't know who she loved, whether she actually died or not, or if she was even human to begin with (basically teasing the Michaela reveals in Daughter of White, I think).

-He does state that like the princess and swordswoman, she is modeled after a character in a story, she is not a princess or high status, and she's not the miniature garden girl.

13th Page 1

-More news on when Servant be released on Karaoke, and sharing his remastered Servant of Evil and Wordplay.

-Replies to comments. Again I don't have context but I think he clarifies that some of his concepts on the Miku character that he just shared came about after the fact, but he was picturing a character from a different work when making her during the song's production.

Page 2

-Onto the third section for Servant of Evil, which he says was the most important and so took a lot of trial and error (the twin switch, of course). Eventually what he ended up doing was having the "A melody" section contain both the plot events AND Len's character psychology, and have the "B melody" section consist solely of dialogue. That way he could leave the characters' feelings during the switch up to the imagination of the listener.

-As a small note, Len is using honorifics when he tells the princess to run away wearing his clothes. mothy claims this was inspired by a nursery rhyme (in English it's often called, "The Other Day I Met A Bear"), where in the Japanese version at least the bear tells the girl to run with the same honorifics (despite that being uncharacteristic of a bear), which he liked, so he put it in here. I am not 100% sure I believe him.

16th Page 1

-mothy shares a remastered Regret Message

-he replies to comments. He's not sure what decides the release schedule for JOYSOUND's karaoke, he thinks it's due to song vote ranking. Apparently there are also people saying the "of evil" songs are their first VOCALOID songs, so that makes him happy.

-Again I don't have the original comment but I guess someone asked what the gender is (without specifying whose), so he confusedly replies that the princess is female, the servant is male, and he, mothy, is male.

-mothy makes clear that though he is incorporating a lot of fairytale knowledge into his work, it's not a result of research but rather his own childhood memories, as he read a lot of books when he was young.

Page 2

-Onto the fourth part of Servant of Evil. Here he repeats the lines from the ending of Daughter of Evil, but with an entirely new context behind them and some minor tweaks to match the new subject of the song.

-The first iteration of the chorus shows Len's determination, and this final one shows that he has accomplished his goal. The lines about how the princess ignores the crowd is the people talking in Daughter of Evil, and in Servant of Evil it's Rin talking. And, in general, when Len says "I will even become evil", that includes becoming the "Daughter of Evil" himself, in a sense.

-Basically just lots of repetitions but with the meaning changed.

-Mothy added on the bit with the music box after the song was done, as a final tearjerker.

20th Page 1

-Responding to comments. A lot of it is fans expressing their admiration which is sweet, but not really worth summarizing. Here's some tidbits though.

-Mothy used to use 私 a lot as his personal pronoun, but since he keeps getting mistaken for a woman he's started using 僕.

-The last line in Servant of Evil was meant to kind of bring out the servant's inner childishness.

-Mothy's first encounter with VOCALOID was before Miku was even released, and he was inspired to buy one after hearing a certain song on NicoNico (he may, or may not, explain this later).

-Though he tells a commenter to leave it up to their imagination, he does hint as to having plot reasons why Len's character was made a servant rather than a prince.

Page 2

-He goes in very briefly on the process of making Len sing the lyrics of Servant of Evil after he'd had them written. Apparently it was really hard. The Kagamines are apparently harder to work with than Miku, and Len moreso than Rin. There was a lot of trial and error involved--eventually he just settled on something and went to the tuning stage.

25th Page 1

-Mothy's other songs are now up for voting on JOYSOUND. He encourages people to give South North Story priority in the voting. He's also remastered Tale of Abandonment on a Moonlit Night, though it's not very different.

-Comment replies. Mothy is not very fast at making songs.

-He shares the website he got the stock sound effects for Servant of Evil, and tells someone that he's considering releasing CDs of his work.

Page 2

-(again discussing the production of Servant of Evil) MEANWHILE on Piapro, mothy got carried away chatting about the setting and backstory behind Daughter of Evil in the comments for it, apparently, because it was still getting attention. He finds that funny because then someone correctly guessed the twin switch, so he wound up having to be very noticeably vague and mysterious about it (in a complete 180 from his other comments) to avoid spoiling anything.

29th

-Luka is taking the community by storm, but mothy is making a song with MEIKO instead.

-he's been getting some questions about a collaboration with Asami(I think) Shimoda, but he refuses to comment.

-Other comment replies that I won't summarize because I don't have full context (nothing terribly important, mostly just being humble or asking for patience with his slow speed). Apparently one of the commenters spoke to him in English, though, which is interesting.

30th

-mothy finally finished Servant of Evil (he recounts having dubious impressions of it at the time, such as not being able to understand what's being said, worrying that it's too different from the tune of Daughter of Evil, and being a little moved by it himself.

-He uploaded it onto Piapro and recruited illustrators to make the PV.

[gayofthefae]

Mike's letter from El isn't her entire voiceover. If you pause it, the paper he's holding starts with "It helps that everyone is so nice here" and ends with "I hope my spelling is better this time. Miss You. Love, El."

Was he rereading an old letter from when they first moved? Was her voice over a compilation of multiple letters he received? Did she write the stuff about Will's painting and then take it out?

I'm leaning towards the second one it was just an interesting observation. It could just be a continuity error but why not just write smaller? They can't have been so short on time that they couldn't write the whole thing out for some reason.

In relation to some of his other actions, it makes the most sense that he knew about the painting but it would also explain his obliviousness by something other than just forgetting if he actually didn't and that was only for us.

It makes the most sense to me that it might be a compilation of multiple letters from different days though. That also explains the timeline of Joyce's job because Dustin made a comment about Mike knowing about it but the letter arrived the morning before he left. I assume it's that, then. And that the painting must have been from a previous letter. That would also help explain, though, because it would mean that she wrote about that slightly longer ago and not a few days before.

[literaticat]

Hi Jenn, my editor recently left her imprint at short notice and I've been passed over to a junior editor at the same house. We are a few months out from publication with lots of edits still to make. I'm naturally quite disheartened (especially as the communication hasn't been great throughout) but I wonder what you advise me saying/asking the new editor when we officially communicate? Thanks for your advice.

I'm confused by your being "a few months out from publication" and still have "a lot of edits to make" -- like... what do you mean A LOT? In my experience at regular trade publishers, the book should be pretty much done at this point unless there are peculiar/unusual circumstances afoot. (Like... if you are a celebrity or this book is particularly timely so the book is being "crashed", aka rushed to publication without regard to the ordinary timeline?)

That you say this makes me think PERHAPS you are dealing with a different model of publishing than that to which I am accustomed, so I guess, take my answer with a grain of salt, because I don't know how other kinds of publishers work!

Under normal circumstances, this is what I'd say to anyone who loses their editor mid-stream: I'm sorry. It happens, but it does suck and can make you feel disheartened for sure! I'd suggest that you give the new editor a lot of grace, though -- don't vent at them or get pissy with them, try to give them the benefit of the doubt and think positive, assume this will end up being a good thing (unless/until proven otherwise, which HOPEFULLY you won't be!).

After all, they didn't MAKE their colleague leave them with a lot of work and no notice, and I'm sure they'd rather they HADN'T! Even if they adore your book and working on it will end up being the highlight of their year, it's still work they weren't counting on doing and a project they are coming into mid-stream and have to catch up on in a hurry. (And maybe LOTS of projects, depending on what they inherited!) It may also be a big learning curve for them. If you are feeling disoriented / stressed and a bit 'on the back foot' about this, just remember that they are, too, and probably more so.

So, you know, when you talk to them, be as nice as humanly possible, lavish them with praise, etc. Be a cheerful and amenable and helpful. If there are "bad things" to discuss, like business / money / harassing them for notes or whatever it is, let your agent be Bad Cop, you stay firmly in camp Good Cop.

(As for specific things to discuss or ask them -- I guess that depends on the project? I don't know that there is any One Answer for this. Maybe compile whatever your concerns/questions are and bring them to your agent FIRST to see, hey, what should YOU ask, what should I ask, and what doesn't actually need to be asked bc your agent already knows the answer?)

ANYway, no fretting -- There is good reason for optimism here. After all, if your previous editor was not very communicative -- maybe getting somebody more "young and hungry" will be a big improvement, actually! And if you are cool about the switch and joy to work with, that will probably be a massive relief to this new editor, and hopefully the two of you will forge a great bond together.

Good luck!

[treasureyourfire]

(Eng)

Day 3

27.01.2024

Today's card:

The Hanged Man

I didn't realize that day, only over time, that in my case the Tarot might not necessarily accurately predict an event for the current/asked day in advance or afterwards, but instead draws my attention to my current (mind-)state/situation, which it want me to think about it. This card could also refer to this.

The following list was compiled for my own situation, it does not contain a complete, comprehensive description of the given card.

Thoughts and inspirations from several sources:

"The Hanged Man's superficial meaning is that we are stuck..." "However, upon closer examination, the external immobility of this forced state of rest shows necessity. It is also an opportunity to in-depth analysis of our world view and our entire life. This phase of life that condemns passivity can be characterized by the image of illness, and this is indeed often indicated by the card."

"Signs: Now it becomes possible for you to recognize where you are and which areas of your life are frozen. Nothing needs to be done. The mere fact that you have a clear perception of the reality around you brings the potential for transformation."

"Questions: In which areas of your life are you stuck? Are you ready to recognize and let go of your petrified thoughts and behavior patterns?"

"The seeker must now pass two tests" ... "... the tests of courage and faith (preconceived certainty). In order to progress, you must boldly let go of all your previous knowledge, voluntarily loosen the grip of your intellect and let your deeper inner forces take the reins." - tarrdaniel.com

"You must have noticed that, to put it mildly, compared to the amount of energy you've invested in this matter, you've made almost no progress. It's as if you haven't made any progress (improvement) even though you've been interrupted. Let's examine this question a bit, because basically the sacrifice is a good thing. But have you really worked for a cause that is yours? There is a big difference between duty and service. It is not your job to waste your precious energies that can create just to make others feel good. It is your job, to balance them; while doing your thing. There is nothing more important than what is important to you! This is not selfishness, if one's value judgment is clear. This is simply the creation of living conditions in which the people you love will feel good together with you." - teremtotarot.hu

Wow... this... : D T-T pretty much describes my last couple of years xD I trust in the turnaround, I'll work for make it happen :3

"The young man's face suggests peace, a meditative frenzy..." ... "His face is greeted with a smile, his eyes are open, and although he is visibly looking inward, his gaze is still full of life." ... "The most important thing to say is this: our life's journey is lined with difficulties and trials. During these times, karma puts our ego to the test very seriously: it forces us to give up something important to us, overcome obstacles, or completely sacrifice our current interest." ... "If someone draws the card of the Hanged Man, it may indicate that they are on the verge of a radical change. Your life will soon turn upside down - or it has already happened - you have to part with something or someone, you have to say goodbye. This can be a human relationship that has become empty, does not serve the inner development of the person drawing the card. But of course there can be something else - a job, a place of residence or even our previous world view - the point is that the card is telling us that it is time to let go, even if it can be painful. ... The Hanged Man's final advice is this: if the world turns upside down around us, don't be bitter, but don't close your eyes either! Let's move forward with a calmed mind, healthy courage and curiosity in our hearts..." - Boglárka Kincses

"... he is at the mercy of others, he cannot stand on his feet at the moment and cannot take matters into his own hands - that is, the Questioner needs patience, even if he feels like a victim of the circumstances. The solution is to look at how the case you are in can be looked at differently. The Hanged Man card means that you have to change your point of view. This is the "entrance" to a happier era." - Ágnes Székelyhidi

... "His face does not show suffering, but a traveler deep in thought or in a trance, and his whole figure suggests the suspension of life, but life and not death." ... "...it rather symbolizes the connection with the Divine and the Universe. Despite this, it entered the (occult) public consciousness as a page of the victim, of suspension in every sense, and this is very important to take into account."

"…. a seeker of knowledge, a participant in an initiation ceremony, who sacrifices his own ability to act - his independence, his life - for the coveted knowledge. Physical vision is replaced by spiritual vision…"

"You are not sure of the next step, the next decision. The Hanged reminds you that you don't have to make a decision now; relax and let things unfold and clear themselves."

"In a spiritual context, The Hanged Man reminds you to pay attention to your attitude towards yourself. If you have been thinking negatively lately, you need to stop because it will affect you and the way you see life.” - thelearningwitch.blog.hu

"It's time to look at things from a different perspective - this is the main message of the card. The figure in the picture is light, almost cheerful, without a trace of worry. It is important to be able to rise above our problems at the moment in question and to see ourselves and our given situation from the outside, so that through the steps we take for our internal development, the problems that arise become opportunities. In terms of its essence, the Hanged Man card demands from us a fundamentally changed worldview, a way of thinking and a vision that is completely opposed to what we have had so far. Now is the time to prioritize our spiritual vigilance. The card draws our attention to the blessed effects of devotion, conscious sacrifice and ego surrender. Now we have the opportunity to face life's trials and challenges with a higher level of awareness and understanding." - gyurcsobori.hu

"In all classic tarot depictions, the Hanged Man hangs upside down by his feet. In the Middle Ages, this was the punishment for traitors and traitors. In a sense, it really is a betrayal: a betrayal of our own things, of ourselves."

"The Hanged Man represents the dead end, the trap into which we walked on the wrong path. It symbolizes all crisis situations that want to force us to change our lives."

"If we change 12, the number of the Hanged Man, we get 21. The XXI. card, The World, represents the end of the Hero's journey, the regained paradise; gaining wholeness from a different perspective. If we compare the two cards, we can see that XXI. card shape is the opposite of the Hanged Man. From the upside-down world, we found the way to the real world."

"According to the Rider tarot, the reason for the crisis is that until now we have not noticed the essence, or we have assessed the situation incorrectly. The card wants to lead you to a new way of seeing things."

"The Hanged Man symbolizes forced rest, the feeling of helplessness, and those crisis situations that force us to change direction, and because of their impact, we look at the world from a new perspective. These experiences usually last longer than we think and want. We always have to make sacrifices in order to move from the forced rest point. It does not depend on the card, but only on ourselves, whether we are ready for this, whether we understand the reason for things..." - tgy-magazin.hu

"The Hanged Man is suspended by his leg, bearing his fate with peaceful composure. He has taken the path of voluntary sacrifice - but he gains much more than he loses!"

"According to tradition, this card is associated with the sacrifice, sometimes it is even paralleled with the crucifixion. Sacrifice is an act that means, on the one hand, that we lose something important to us, that we give up something. On the other hand, it often happens that we get something in return, and sometimes it is even more valuable than what we sacrifice."

"... the Hanged Man card is about voluntary sacrifice, but also about acquiring something what has special value to us. It warns us, we are ripe for a decision, we have reached a crossroads: we must decide what is really important to us and what is worth the sacrifice. Our decision can be a milestone on our life's journey, or just for a specific situation. We will need a lot of willpower to make up our minds, to be determined to make the given sacrifice, whatever it costs. The card also means that the upcoming change can increase our uncertainty and - especially if it drags on for a long time - can lead to stagnation or fear. The Hanged Man is a harbinger of change - let's prepare for this change! Change always brings us into motion and momentum, but we definitely have to sacrifice something in order for things to move in a positive direction. - hu.ezo.tv

"... he wants to conform to others, he does not live his own life, he does not follow his own desires, his life is not natural." ... "... impatience and violence cannot solve the situation. It only helps if you leave your previous views and expectations behind and go in a different direction, you need a new way of seeing and a huge willpower, you definitely have to sacrifice something for the sake of change." - neske.hu

"This is a planning phase when passivity is important. You get time to at least plan the route you can follow after the rest period ends." - spirisuli.com

"It is recommended to create a conscious state of rest in order to be able to think."

"You don't have to make an effort, just walk clearly around your life, the affected area..."

"Let go of what hasn't taken you forward so far and let in what wants to enter into your life." - ketosvenytarot.hu

Keywords (mixed, own and non-own):

Freezing, stopping

Forced rest

The end of a stuck situation or relationship

Letting go, giving up, surrendering, making a sacrifice

A new point of view

The need to break through old behavioral patterns

Transformation

A world turned upside down

Better blood supply in the head, increases mental freshness

Inspiration

Compulsion

Captivity, confinement

Inertia

Vulnerability

External factors binds me

Passivity, stagnation

Desire for liberation

Uncertainty

A turnaround based on deep insight

In-depth, thorough analysis

Planning phase

Enlightment initiation, initiate (spiritual)

Spiritual growth

Rebirth

Intuition

Liberation

Courage

Faith

Waiting

Patience, endurance

Complacency, resignation, we accept our situation

Change of direction

Change

(mental, spiritual or physical illnesses)

Inspirations (mixed):

Be patient

You have been given time and opportunity for a comprehensive analysis

Something ends and something new begins

Look inside yourself, ponder

If necessary, ask for help to move forward

Let's mobilize our intuition, practice it

If we have enough courage, we can make a difference

Like the caterpillar in its chrysalis state (intermediate state)

Your old expectations and ideas get you stuck

We can awaken to a higher consciousness

Don't want to suit anyone but yourself!

Learn to say no!

Finding your way back from darkness to light

At the end, ascension awaits, a state of clarity and understanding arrives

[will-o-wips]

Save the Villainess Thoughts by Willow Masterpost Part 1: Jane

So I've decided to be insane. Make a small (lies, it is long, that is why it is divided up into parts) post about the Halloween videos and the lore that they have given us. As well as maybe compile theories/thoughts about these characters. Idk if there is a community for this even, or if anybody's actually obsessed like I am, but I'm having fun thinking about it either way, so... I guess this is for like the 0.0000000000001% of the people (me and only me). Enjoy lmao.

You have been warned: the actual insanity starts under the cut lmao.

So I will start with... Jane. Mostly because her Halloween special video is not as lore-bomb-dropping as the rest. The video itself is mostly about certain aspects of the gameplay so far. It's a neat little thing! Honestly, these are more thoughts/rambles than actual, well, coherent notes, but from what I've noticed (from being insane and watching every single social media post on Tumblr Best Laid Plans Productions ever made about all of them, more or less, even though my memory is spotty and I didn't have time to rewatch them before making this), is that Jane is just unknowingly integrated in this world. I don't notice her having any thoughts about before she was transported into the romance novel she read; it's not like she's thinking about her family home, or that she has any plans of going back. She just knows she doesn't belong in this world as the villainess, which is super interesting to me. She's just... accepted her fate and that she must survive. She's BECOME the villainess, rather than just feeling like an imposter in another person's body. She only knows she's innocent, which is why she's fighting so hard to be freed from such a fate. Another thing that supports this is the fact Jane always says such weird phrases that I'm like 99% sure aren't actual English idioms, but rather phrases that this alternate romance novel universe uses. Such as "By the blood" in the Halloween special specifically, because, what does this mean Jane???? What are you referring to here!!! (Side note: Edmund also uses these odd phrases a lot, so I suppose it's something the nobility of Carcosa are familiar with; some kind of "noble language" to distinguish those of nobility from commoners or whatever. Some kind of pretentious thing that just happens because society is cruel lmao. Either that OR this is just the way Carcosians speak in general and Jane just kinda always knew this ever.)

Another thing, besides just the obvious announcements of how this guideline/tutorial thing works in the gameplay, is the fact that Jane explicitly states that daytime and nighttime are important. Most people would sign this off to, well, gameplay experience. That during the night you can talk to people more intimately and have like rendezvous or whatever with your favourite characters, while at daytime you're solving mysteries mostly. See the thing with that is, is that Servant also somewhat says very similar things in previous instances of videos. And we all know that Servant is like... that one person that gives everyone the creeps, the intrigue and also the insanity. They are, as of now, the most explicit in the fact they are somewhat of a mastermind behind this all. They know what is happening with the lore. They know, but they don't like explicitly telling us what is happening, so... yeah thanks ig Servant? In each case, Jane here is not joking when she says that nighttime and daytime are important; they're probably very much so magically (maybe?) linked to how this story is supposed to progress. Aka gameplay actually impacts lore, and lore impacts gameplay. As to what it is referring to... well, I have my theories about it. But what I'm most confident in is that it is related to some kind of magic about the story. It is relevant to the narrative; relevant to things both Ben and Servant know about this world. And I say Ben because he's also so sus in such a world-altering way but I'll talk about him later... yeah, later lmao.

Now, my notes that I took while watching the videos here are very vague (thank you for that Willow, you are so insane about this you cannot even write in proper English), but there's something about the jewelry and accessories of these characters. Most noticeably, the way they glow. Like Rhythmically Glowing and Shaking. In Jane's case, it's her earrings [her brooch is less important but it still has symbolism on it probably, with how it has a bee etched onto it. Maybe this is her family's like symbol? Like how Renaissance Pope families had different kinds of symbols etched into buildings they funded into existence and all. Who knows]. Maybe this is some kind of glint effect or whatever; but then why is it animated like THAT??? Idk if I'm onto something or not here, I have high suspicions that I am, but maybe I'm also just looking into it too deeply... but there's something wrong with this jewelry. There's something wrong with the way that Servant's Brooch also glows, whenever Edmunds (tie clips? cufflinks for your neck??? what are they I'm not good with fashion, though the game has such good fashion design guys okay) accessories start glowing and shaking, when Izel has his little gem earring (I love that design omg, also + the brooch he has on his tie but like it doesn't shake) shakes and glows as well and how Ben's POCKET WATCH CHAIN (+ the little uhh buttons on his coat but they don't shake the way the other things do) IS GLOWING OKAY (and yes I'm insane enough to pause these videos just to see whether it is true). Something is going on. It's happening (slightly) even during daytime, and I checked this, so there's something fishy with this. There has to be. I'm so convinced there is jfkldsjfks. A possible explanation for this is that because these characters are all main actors in the story, some kind of magic is there to maybe,,, force them to play their part? Maybe they cannot be exempted from the main storyline because of this? Maybe everybody is just here because they have no other choice? Honestly idk. More thoughts on this in the other parts because dude I'm gonna lose my mind if I try to put everything in here. AND MAYBE IT'S JUST AN ARTISTIC CHOICE AND I'M JUST INSANE ABOUT IT??? Who knows.

Anyway, to close off this post, because I know it is long and idk whether there's actually any substance here, I'll try to compile the thoughts about Jane into a few small sentences, without fangirling in between lmao.

She's lovely, and while she is very funny, I find her harder to pin down than the rest of the cast (that we know of as of writing this). She's dead set on surviving, and that's probably because she might have experienced death once already. Either as the Villainess Jane Neville herself, or as the person she (possibly) used to be, that we know absolutely nothing of. She does not show any other hints to her past: just constantly assuring us she desperately needs help. I love her, of course, not only for her character design or the fact that she's funny, but for the fact that she somehow manages to avoid telling us anything concrete about herself. I don't think that this is done because Jane is not a character and is supposed to be a player-insert (that may play a part in it but y'know, that's just the nature of these kinds of games to a degree); she very much so is a character. She knows these phrases and these small courtesy things that no normal person who WASN'T integrated into this fantasy world would know. Maybe she retained only some of the past memories that her villainess self had, but truly... how could she remember those, but not her fiancé? Not the novel she is in? How can she know she is the villainess with certainty, at all, given she does not remember the book, the plot of said book, nor any of the other characters that well? She only knows someone is out to kill her, and that we must save her. Her weird integration with the world as well as the dissonance she presents with it at the same time is suspicious; she's very mysterious in that regard.

Perhaps I'm biased. Maybe I'm not looking hard enough. It might be that I'm missing something entirely. Somehow my suspicion/theory, even to me, feels like it's somewhat misplaced. That something is up is clear, but whether there's evidence to support anything is a whole other thing.

But somehow I'm inclined to believe that... Jane is not as forgetful as she might think she is. And that whatever happens to her by the choice of the player (who you romance, what kind of ending you get, what kind of choices you make, how you survive based on your deductions in the mystery, etc.), it always will tie into something she wanted to be. That us controlling her to a certain kind of destiny, is something she wanted to be, but never got the chance to be.

That we might guide her towards a destiny she actually deserved, rather than the one she has gotten.

[ Lmao I have so many more thoughts about what exactly makes a villainess but like... if the LIs/ROs/MLs or whatever you call them are all deconstructions and reconstructions of their specific tropes... Then isn't Jane also one? Shouldn't she be, at least? If she never was a villainess, then what makes her be one? If she was a villainess, what changes should she undergo in order to become a hero? And if she is neither... Or cannot remember whether she is clearly... What truly discerns her as a villainess?

I have so many more thoughts and theories about these people that I have to cover later because otherwise I'd have been sitting here for 2 hours trying to write all of this down somewhat understandably. If I actually had a plan for like any type of structure I might've not lost so much time on it. Will try to do that when it comes to the rest and all. Might also opt for smaller paragraphs lmao I genuinely hope I'm not overstepping something by doing this??? If the developers see this and go like "okay maybe don't", I'll take it down fjkdsjfklds. It's not like I'm dead set on sharing this if it's for whatever reason not good for business or something. ANYWAY THIS IS GETTING ABSURDLY LONG. Hope you enjoyed my rambles; until next time for the rest of them! ]

[whcrror]

MORE OF DEBUNKING / ADDRESSING CLAIMS MADE BY DJAQ:

just to further call ridiculousness to the entire situation, we already pointed out that Djaq also copied Nova's aesthetic and it was also glossed over. to use the exact word DJAQ used. Djaq also called attention to this, here:

although that changing of aesthetics never happened did it? not that we remember, anyway. but let us bring attention back to the point at hand. Djaq knew that Nova was using church aesthetics, and yet changed all of her aesthetics to religious aesthetic as-well. which in Djaq's logic (i'm only using her own logic here, as far as she's making clear) is especially bad because she used Gaea when the Church Girl aesthetic was applied to Temperance. She could have used any muse, but of course Gaea is her favorite. but what do we know, right? Djaq is conveniently not going to take responsibility for any of her actions anyway.

Regarding the post above, I think it's safe to say Nova has retracted that statement. If you know the characters aren't too similar why does it bother you so much? why keep bringing it up, time and time again? It feels vindictive, and your behavior in the past very much highlights this. (in a situation with another mun who i will not speak about without permission, but everything is still up for you to look at on the blog: sagaiisms). in-fact regarding the aforementioned situation, Djaq was still talking about this particular situation a month after it occurred, and seemed very happy to compile everything into a neat little bow for everyone to read in warning about this individual. and the mun in question took a year long hiatus after this all went down. we do have receipts of all of this in-case the posts are deleted. We also find this situation problematic in regards to Djaq, but we do not wish to put any additional stress on the mun in question so we will not, until further notice. But again, it's all still public record you can research if you'd like. Djaq also went out of her way to tag Nova in a callout post referenced in a receipt we've already posted, and went through enough blogs to find ONE Nova might have forgotten to block.

Besides this not being on Nova's blog, let's just say that they were for a moment. we thought Nova was already called out by Djaq for 'copying' you or reblogging 'similar aesthetics'. If Djaq accusing Nova of copying over, and over - for years - why wouldn't she take some of the fear out of it, if it's going to keep happening anyway? regardless of the quote Nova gave us as a comment on this, where she'd like to prove Djaq is looking in on her, and in fact 'stalking' -- we empathize with the idea of just leaning into it, if it's going to be brought up again, and again, and again. Before I go on a petty example: if Djaq feels as though this is 'stalking' and has wanted to defend herself against the stalking allegations against her (something she's brought up several times) during this debate:

well, just wednesday this happened: does this mean Djaq is 'stalking' Nova?

or do you see how fucking silly this all is? but since it's not silly to Djaq we're going to continue to document. we also have these from the previous post:

we won't talk about the claim of not giving something 'fanfare' while also making an 'entire ass callout blog' (i'm sorry that Djaq has been labelled a danger, however she has literally tried, and in one case, succeeded for a while, to run people off the site. and she makes a big fanfare out of their cancellation because they did something SHE PERSONALLY didn't appreciate.

admittedly, yes. by a year. because you made her in 2018.

no they haven't and neither have the debunking we've done of your own claims.

but Djaq also felt that way. It's again been addressed but we'll crop the screenshot for reference below: so when Nova says it it's wrong, however it seems fine that Djaq seemed to say the same thing. so did she lie about them being similar, or did she just say it as well?

and just going back to this screenshot for a different point: those in the heading are both the same thing. the italics does not change the definition.

doesn't muutos also use that ellipses? wouldn't it make more sense for nova to get that from her fiancé?

just one more point to make. Temperance is a baker, and Djaq wants to say that their two characters aesthetics are 'too similar'. however, has written this in a thread before:

we hate to make such childish points however based on what we're dealing with, we merely wish to point out the hypocrisy of the entire situation. more to come. @whorrcr @thewhorrcrs

[sapropel]

I saw a separate post on my dash just now that makes me think you are referring to the lea-ts callout from a few years ago. For this comment, let's just assume that you are referring to that one. If I remember correctly, she was called out for posting her rape and incest fantasies on a sideblog that she intended to only be viewed invite-only.

I absolutely did reblog that callout post (though I don't see it in my tags anymore so I may have deleted it since then). I don't remember if that callout used her nudes to "prove" that blog was hers; if it did, you're correct, that's a really inappropriate thing to be spreading and I shouldn't have done so. And if what you are saying about people confronting me about reblogging that callout is true, they were also correct. I don't think that kind of post is worth it to spread and I don't think it's helpful. If I could take it back, I would. If I could go back, I never would have reblogged it. I also wouldn't have reblogged the post following that callout (that I mentioned to you in a previous answer of your anon messages) that compiled a list of people defending her.

In the past, I've reblogged callout posts about things I feel complicated about (for example, a kink post with elements of abusive power dynamics or whatever, but without real-life intent to abuse someone) with the intention to "let my followers come to their own conclusions about it." I've come to realize I don't agree with that approach anymore, even in the case of well-documented, well-supported callouts. I think it gives too much power to underlying racist and transmisogynistic prejudices that people have. All I do is add my voice to the mob of people targeting someone who may or may not even deserve that.

I have very mixed feelings on publically posting about or defending your rape and incest roleplay fetishes. To be clear, I don't mean lea-ts here, who had posts she didn't mean to breach containment, though I believe she did defend her posts afterwards. I haven't decided yet how I feel about it--that callout situation is actually what made me reconsider if it's even worth it to call people out for that in the first place, especially with how TME people like me have used it to target trans women unfairly. I've been mulling that over the past few years since then and truly hope that I've taken that time to ease off on my vitriol for it.

I do remember from that situation more clearly (and cared about more then, as I do now), that other people, while they were defending lea-ts, were defending their raceplay and pedophilia kinks (which they used by name as those things. I'm not extrapolating. In addition, I'm not talking about roleplay. I'm talking about actual raceplay and actual pedophilia). My opinion on publically posting about and defending your raceplay and pedophilia kinks has not changed--I don't think that's defensible. To be clear, lea-ts mentioned nothing about raceplay or pedophilia. This is about some of the discourse that spawned from that callout.

While I don't think raceplay or pedophilia kinks are defensible, I don't know the best way to handle it. I used to think it was best to inform everyone so they could "stay safe" but honestly, I haven't really see that work. I do think it's important to warn people of color of racism perpetrated by white people, including raceplay, and I think white people who engage in raceplay really need to be cognizant of how that can negatively impact the people of color they interact with. I still don't know if a callout is the correct approach to that. I haven't made up my mind on that yet, and as a white person, it isn't my wellbeing that's important in that situation, and it isn't my theorizing that's important.

Trans women are more likely to be accused of pedophilia than other people, and even in the cases of a tumblr user admitting to being an actual, real pedophile, like toonimal or the rare callout post I've reblogged, I truly don't know how much good that has done.

Some posts that are circulating on tumblr, as well as me revisiting my callout tag, and receiving these anon messages from you have made me reconsider how valuable a callout post actually is for making this website safer. It is too easy to unfairly target a trans woman, and it seems like it's more common for a harmless trans woman to be harassed than for an actual pedophile to be kept away from minors because of a callout post. It's something I'll have to keep thinking about. Even if I am calling out someone I am 100% certain is a pedophile (e.g. due to their own admission), if the cost of that callout is a perpetuation of the transmisogynistic surveillance culture that alienates and isolates trans women, is it worth it? I don't know. Maybe not. I don't know who is an exception to the rule or what's worth it or anything like that.

While I disagree with how you presented your anon messages to me (specifically that you didn't tell me what callout you were talking about), I want to thank you for sending these messages anyway. Your messages are part of some posts currently making me re-think how I may perpetuate more transmisogyny than I previously thought. It's too late for me to undo what I've done to women like lea-ts who didn't deserve to be run off this site because of how trans women are subjected to unfair scrutiny and held to higher standards of purity with respect to their sex lives. I should never have reblogged her callout post, especially if it really did have her nudes in it, and especially if I was given the opportunity multiple times NOT to double down. I hope that these messages can serve as a stark reminder to me to be very cognizant of how I interact with trans women on here and to devote extra time to thinking about how I can unlearn the transmisogyny I have perpetuated.

you don’t even remember it, lol. how fucking shameful. you know how terrifying that experience is, having secret pictures of yourself get weaponized and publicized to call you out harder? do you know how mortifying, disgusting and invasive it feels having nudes attached for “evidence” to link blogs together, out of your hands and on the open web now? the person im talking about wasn’t guilty of anything more than calling their partner a title in bed that could be bad-faith-read into supporting incest, (of course, she didn’t support or excuse real abuse, not that it mattered to the calloutmonger who painted every other sexual post of hers with malice and predation) and you went right along and nodded your head at it like a good little duck following in a row. i remember you doubling down again and again, that this wasn’t okay and you were blocking people who tried to say that the mob spreading of her nudes couldn’t be justified. no one deserved to be cyberstalked through personal tiny blogs and made into a bloody spectacle, but for some reason this is always allowed to happen to trans women.

do you have any fucking idea how it feels? can you even imagine it? seeing people you thought were your friends, your friends friends, acquaintances, strangers; all of them hear the call that this one is one of the bad ones, and drop you like a stone without even a chance to speak out? you know what that does to trans women, who get constantly excluded and alienated out of irl lgbt shit and wind up online? you know how that feels? getting immediately thrown away and made into ammo for a dumbfuck culture war by people you thought gave even a tiny shit about you, who now call you an incestous danger to minors just like the alt right fucks do? and now, now you have the gall to turn around and try to act like you’re in any way above this when just a couple years ago you were baying for blood like the rest of them? you don’t have a single leg to stand on because you’re too afraid of looking bad to even consider you might’ve done wrong, to even extend the smallest piece of understanding towards women YOU helped get sexually harassed off the site. of course. everyone has bias but you, right? everyone has things to work on except when they’re big mistakes that would require actually doing some work challenging yourself. i dont want shit from you. i just want you to know that there are trans women who see right fucking through you. we can’t forget how we’ve been hurt, even if you get that privilege.

I've been giving you the benefit of the doubt so far but I hope you can see that it's absurd to accuse me of spreading revenge porn and get mad at me when I "don't even remember" but you won't give me any specifics about this situation you're talking about. If what you're accusing me of is true, how am I supposed to be held accountable and actually change myself for the better if you won't even tell me who or what you're talking about?

[michaelmilligan]

Endversetober Day 28: Wound

(explanation post) (compilation post)

In the cold stone halls, every step echoed as Michael made his way towards the innermost chamber. It was eerily silent, as if in the aftermath of a battle, even though he hadn't found his enemy yet.

Well, the bodies strewn all over the floor, the dried blood and slowly rotting guts, may have hinted at a previous battle.

Ya think? Adam reacted to his thoughts, even as he shuddered at the carnage before them. Were these humans, or zombies?

I don't know. Possibly demons. There was still a slight smell of sulphur in the musty air.

No, I mean the victims.

Yeah, I meant them too.

When they came to the end of the hallway, Michael stopped in front of the large wooden doors, which wore streaks of blood and scratch marks in the shape of claws. Possibly from hell hounds, Michael mused.

He grabbed the handle and pulled, and the door swung open with a horrible creaking sound, revealing a sort of make-shift throne room. It clearly hadn't been one before the demons had taken over the place, but there was no mistaking as to what the stone seat was supposed to be, especially because Lucifer was sitting on it with a crown on his head.

It wasn't a very impressive one, as crowns went, little more than a glorified circlet. On the head of the man who had once been an archangel, and who now sported rings under his blood-shot eyes, it looked ridiculous.

“Who dares disturb me?” Lucifer asked, and even his voice was unimpressive, scratchy like he hadn't had enough water. His head was leaning on his hand, with his elbow on one of the throne's arms.

“Hello, brother,” Michael said as he walked into the room, letting the doors fall closed behind him. “It has been a while.”

It was almost a miracle that Michael even recognized him,human-looking as he was.

Lucifer narrowed his eyes at him. As he straightened on his throne, Michael for the first time realized how tall his vessel was, compared to other humans. For an archangel, all humans were tiny creatures, but since his powers had started failing, everything had been put far more into perspective.

Lucifer stood up from his throne, taking only one step towards them before stopping.

“Michael?”

Is that blood? Adam whispered in the back of their head, as if afraid that Lucifer would hear them.

Probably. It was all around Lucifer's mouth, giving him a slightly crazed look.

“It's me,” Michael said aloud.

“What are you doing here?” Lucifer asked, eyes hollow. “Don't tell me you still want to do the grand finale. That's not gonna work anymore. No paradise for this stink hole.”

“I know.” Michael wasn't here to execute the apocalypse, or even necessarily to kill his brother. “Did you kill all these demons?”

Lucifer glanced down at the bodies around him, as if he needed to confirm. “Some of them were nuns,” he then said, with the attitude of a man talking about the weather.

No, actually, people talked about the weather with far more interest and urgency most of the time.

“What are you doing here, Mikey?” Lucifer asked again.

To be honest, Michael wasn't entirely sure what he wanted. Or how this visit would turn out.

“Did they rise up against you?” he asked casually, turning his attention to a spot next to Lucifer's throne that seemed suspiciously empty.

When he focused, Michael could make out a vague, slumped shape – a dead hell hound, perhaps.

“They weren't happy with my leadership style. Weren't happy with me losing my powers, either.” Lucifer took a step towards them, a maniacal grin on his face. “But then, they also weren't happy when I took their blood to regain power. It's like they didn't even know what they wanted.”

“It's hard to find decent personnel these days,” Michael said dryly, and felt a flicker of amusement from Adam.

“Tell me about it,” Lucifer said, just as Michael spotted a blonde woman on the floor, the kind of slim, pretty vessel Lilith had favoured. Its eyes were empty, the neck snapped, and with the way she was almost artfully propped up against a stone pillar, one might think Lucifer had been using the body like a doll.

“Did you kill all of them? Or were some loyal ones left?” Michael asked, dragging out what he now felt would be inevitable.

If he killed even the creatures he himself had created, what hope was there for him to spare any humans?

“Hm,” Lucifer made, looking thoughtfully at the dead body of a dark-haired woman. Her neck had been bitten through, and Adam shuddered again at the sight. “Maybe there were some I could have left alive.”

So he'd killed them all, loyal and disloyal alike.

“You know, I wonder.” Lucifer took another step towards Michael. “This vessel reacts really well to demon blood. Makes you think what it would do with angel blood.”

One of Michael's hands slowly wandered under his jacket, where he'd stashed his knife. “Probably nothing good.”

“Possibly,” Lucifer said, still grinning, “or maybe it'd be extra good.”

Michael pulled out his knife, and Lucifer snarled, moving his hand – and the knife went flying, knocked out of Michael's hand by an invisible force.

Psychic powers. Great.

“Michael, Michael, Michael.” Lucifer clicked his tongue. “Did you really think you could get me that easily?”

“One can hope,” Michael muttered, and took a step back when Lucifer came towards him.

“The mighty Michael – flinching like a weak little human!” Lucifer said gleefully. “Who could have seen this coming?”

“Over the course of the last few weeks? Pretty much everyone.”

Lucifer raised his arm again, sending Michael flying against the wall behind him. He crumpled onto the floor, gasping, and quickly scrambled to get back up.

“You don't stand a chance against me!” Lucifer called, obviously having fun with this.

Except his nose had started bleeding. He didn't seem to notice, though.

“No. I suppose I don't.” Michael raised his chin, his arms limp at his side as he waited for Lucifer to come closer. “But you forgot to consider one thing.”

“What's that?” Lucifer asked, coming to a stop before him, seeming eager to hear what he still had to say.

But Michael didn't have to say anything, as a spear bored into Lucifer from behind, the tip breaking through the front of his chest.

Lucifer gasped, a gurgling sound, as he gripped the spear with trembling fingers and tried to crane his neck enough to see who had done it.

“You forgot to consider,” Gabriel took up Michael's thread, “that he may have back-up.”

Lucifer squinted at him, even while his legs gave out under him.

“Gabriel?” he asked, disbelieving.

“Hey, buddy.”

Lucifer coughed up blood. “Brothers,” he said pleadingly, one hand reaching for Michael's pant leg.

Michael took a step back, shaking his head. “You were our brother once, but not anymore.”

“What am I now?” Lucifer whispered, the light slowly seeping out of his eyes.

“Now you're just a gaping wound in our chests.”

It almost looked as if Lucifer nodded as his head lolled forwards and his body slumped onto the floor, broken and lifeless.

[jjk-anime-horray]

Call of Spirits

Megumi Fushiguro x Reader

Spirited Away Au

Previous

Chapter Two:

The tall spikey black haired boy kept dragging you further into the unknown world ahead of you trying to get you to safety. And while it was only for a couple of minutes it felt like hours that you hand was snagged by his. Looking down to your collection of tendons, bones, and skin that compiled into making your organic mechanism to grab things you gasped, and pulled away from they boy whose face you yet too see as you saw what was happening to your hands. They were fading away, you were becoming the ghost while all of the spirits solidified around you in the darkness of the night.

Seeing your distress, the male turns around to visualized what was happening, his vibrant green eyes snapping open in realization upon noticing your dilemma.

"Dang it" You here him whisper to himself, or you, you couldn't really tell at the moment. You see his slender yet muscular fingers reach into the pocket of his robe, and you take the time to examine the stranger that was saving? dragging? moving? you, you didn't know at this point, but you did know that when you look at him you immediately get sucked into his dazzling green eyes.

Everything about the boy infront of you was out of worldly, but not in the way that he had huge teeth or was shaped like a raddish like some of the spirits in the hotel?.....Gathering you were currently in. He was out of worldy because he seemed so physically close, but distant at the same time, and he was absolutely beautiful.

When he rummaged through his pockets his pale skin practically glowed under the lights of the spirit life around you. His skin however was a stark contrast to his hair which could rival the deep night sky in its darkness, and wildness for that matter. Everything about his appearance contrasted itself in a poetic way that made him stunning. His height even though he seemed barely there. His fierce eyes that seemed to shift from bright green to dark blue based on the lighted fixated in a sharp slanted matter near his nose that only complimented the soft subtle feature of his face.

"You need to eat this." Is all he says curtly before shoving an oddly sweet smelling piece of bread, or was it even bread?..... Into your hands from his pocket.

All you do is give him a look of complete confusion, but then realizing his wording he rephrases his statement:

"Eat it, it will keep you from fading away in this world."

Without having many options, or any other options for that matter you break off a piece of the loaf in between your fingers and bring it too your mouth for consumption. The loaf tasted unknown and out of the ordinary, but you kept eating it because while you did the boy kept to his promise because you body started to reappear again under the night sky.

You had so many questions swirling in your head, but the most prominent three were who are you? what is this place? and why do you seem so familiar? You decide to ask the most important questions first.

"Who are you?"

"My name is Megumi."

"What are you?"

"A spirit."

"You don't look like a spirit."

"There are many type's of spirits in this world, however I don't remember what type I am though."

He isn't very much of a talker you thought to yourself, but luckily you could tell that he was being honest. You just had a feeling about him that he wasn't bad, like a neighbor or someone you've met before, but you were disoriented from your position so you couldn't really tell if it was non-sense or not.

"What is this place?"

"This place is a bathhouse for spirits who need a vacation, it's a part of the spirit world, it's like another reality of earth in away, but that's why you needed to eat something of this world to stay."

"What would have happened if I hadn't eaten it?" You asked worried and curiously.

"I don't exactly know, but you would have left this place in one form of another with out your parents."

Your parents! You needed to get them back, or well, get them back then figure out how to turn them back into humans.

"Yeah, you can't really get them out of hear without doing that first."

Dang it you said that last part out loud.

"How am I going to be able to get them back?" You ask the oddly familiar boy you know as Megumi.

"I don't know exactly, but you are going to need to get a job in this place first, if you want to do that I mean, there isn't many jobs here that spirits will allow you to do most likely, but I do think that the crafts-maker boiler man, Yaga, will help you, you need to listen carefully to the directions I'm about to say because I need to go soon, so I won't be able to repeat them twice. First you need to make your way through the bath house without being detected, so stay out of the way of it's customers and other spirits, then you'll need too..........

You intently listened to the spirit boy speak to you, the tone of his voice almost juxtaposed itself, it was calm, shallow and mellow someone could argue, but it was deep, hurried, and rushing to get all of the needed information about it out. Like a tamed river almost, but not quite a stream, a river that used to roar, but that got dammed up, and stuck in one place, longing to be free from the barrier. You payed attention to the details about staying away from certain types of spirits, places that you shouldn't mix up or go to, not use the elevators because you'll run into other spirits. But you couldn't get past the fact that he seemed so beaten down when he was acting lively.

"Lastly, you'll need to take the set of stares that spirals around the edges of the base too this building, but be very careful, the stones aren't as stable as they used to be and maybe a little bit slippery. "

You noted all of that then started to execute his directions, but before you could quietly run off you arm was tugged, holding you back and pulling you a little bit towards him again.

"One last thing, what is your name?" He acted calm when he said this but you didn't look past the light dusting of pink on his cheeks indicating that he may have been flustered.

"Its (Y/N)."

"(Y/N), remember that, you're going to need to know that for later, and don't forget it, it's the single most important thing you are going to need to remember in this place. Be careful with it, and be carefull."

With the final word left from his mouth he let you go from his grasp, signaling you to sneak off deeper into the bath house, to start your quest to save your parents from their fate. You tipped toe around the corner out of his sight, being careful to not cause a single creak of the floor boards or click of sound, you hurried of to start your journey, not exactly knowing what wonders and dangers lie under the mysterious roof of this house.

[constantlyunlightening]

Convincing

Kinktober Day 4 : Gunplay w/ Chisaki Kai

Other kinks/Trigger warnings: squirting, degradation, submission

This is not the fic I was originally gonna write for Kai. I actually had something a L O T worse in store and it’s an idea I’m throwing on the backburner for either another day of kinktober, or for a fully fleshed out fic after. Not sure yet. I just watched a compilation of Chisaki moments and this scene manifested itself, so here we are. :)

And it may not be as dark as the original fic I wanted to write, but keep in mind, Chisaki is a villain and I do write him as such. My portrayal of his relationships are not healthy ones. This particular one isn’t as bad as it could be, but still.

Disclaimers: Read/interact only if you’re 18+. Characters are all 20+ Keep in mind this is fiction and does include dark content - so stop/take breaks if you need to. This is not something to enjoy in real life but enjoy it as a story if you’re interested. :)

"Convince me, then."

Those words played over and over again in your head. The curse he had put on you now becoming your own personal mantra. You wanted to convince him. You needed to convince him. Every nerve within you pleaded for his touch but your germaphobe of a significant other needed convincing apparently. 

If that had been said to you in years previous, you would have had a fit. Having to convince your so-called lover to touch you was a red flag. Any other man before Chisaki Kai and you wouldn't have so much as entertained the thought. Zero tolerance. 

But for him? Within the last hour since he had told you to persuade him, he had gotten you to undress and fall to your knees before him. Oh but you weren't just sloppily down in front of him - that just wouldn't do. No, you had to have form. As his lover, you were an extension of himself who must keep herself clean, proper and worthy of a yakuza's lover at all times. He made that clear when he had agreed to commit to you. You were to obey every command, every order, every whim. And because it was him, you agreed. 

So, for him, you weren't just on the floor like a dog; you were kneeling- like a proper submissive. Legs tucked straight underneath your body, toes pointed, back straight and your arms folded behind your back. At some point when your position was right, Chisaki had thought it appropriate to pull a gun out from underneath his jacket, which was promptly held in front of you, the muzzle of the gun tapping your lips.

Your newly found mantra rang in your ears as you obediently opened your lips without so much of a word, letting him slowly push the barrel into your waiting mouth. Maybe you should have been more worried,  especially with his finger toying over the trigger. You had seen Chisaki kill people before. But the thing was, if he had wanted to kill you, he already would have. His quirk was scarier than this gun was.

Besides, if he did shoot, poor thing would have a mess all over his office.

 "You must be desperate if you're willing to put a weapon in your mouth," his voice came out slow, calm. As if this were simply another task among his daily objectives. "Are you really willing to risk a bullet through your skull for the sake of me putting my hands on you? Rather pathetic. You don't even know where this gun has been and yet you're putting it in your mouth?" There was that beat of disgust - only a mild disgust but present nonetheless. You felt a little sick for the way your core heated from his words.

You had overheard Kai preaching to one of his subordinates over "the carrot and the stick method" before - find a balance between the reward and the punishment. For someone who sat there and lectured someone about it, Kai was a lot more stick. Oh, but did he do mean so well.

You popped your mouth off of the barrel but only in order to let your tongue lick up the bigger trails of saliva for a response. You may not know where the gun had been, but it was his. You were positive he kept his gun the cleanest around. And even if he didn't…. 

You would do it if you could convince him.

The mask he wore on his face didn't do much to conceal the way his face started to twist at your display. Positively filthy. But, he had been the one to prompt the action, knowing you would follow his command. Filthy as it may be, it was surely within his wishes even though his marigold eyes were boring down on you with something akin to repulsion.

You met his stare head on as he pulled the gun out of your face and instead dropped to a squat in front of you. His knees were spread out a bit while he rested his elbows against his thighs, lazily poking the gun into the skin of your legs. "Get up on your knees more and spread," he stared simply and like you were under a spell, your body obliged. Your body shifted so your weight was brought forward onto your knees and your rear was no longer resting on your calves. A sharp push of the gun into your inner thigh helped urged your legs to space apart. 

"Yes, sir."

His eyes shifted to meet your gaze at your words and he quirked a brow at you, making you wonder if he actually wanted you to speak. He didn't comment though, instead opting to push the barrel of the gun against your folds, watching your slick coat over the metal. The metal was warmed from the heat of your mouth but it still sent a shiver down your spine. "You're sick." In some ways, you agreed. You just didn't care. You already loved a villain. You were sick and he was your disease.

His nose wrinkled again at the way your body seemed to react to the words. He pulled the gun away, only to see the sticky coating connecting the barrel to your heat. "Really sick."

You bit at your lip, deciding against defending yourself and after hearing a sigh, Kai stood up, pinching the handle of the gun between his fingers. He snagged a tissue out of the box on the table of his office and placed the sullied gun on that to put it aside for now. And when his gaze came back to you, you swallowed hard under the intensity. Hard to mistake him for anything other than in control.

"Stand up."

You scrambled to your feet at the words, trying your best to stay poised but the desperation in your movement was obvious. Had you pleased him? Surely he wasn't about to tell you to leave - you were completely naked. 

"Spread your legs." 

Another scramble to get yourself propped open and you could feel the adrenaline course through your veins as he took off his jacket, draping it over the back of the couch before moving in closer to you. Closer. Closer. He stopped inches before reaching your body and your breath got hitched with his simple proximity. You really hoped you had convinced him…

You had convinced him.

Finally you got the fucking carrot to the stick.

Before you had the chance to realize he had moved, his hand had dove between your legs and two gloved fingers were entering your core. You were seeing stars. It had been much too long since you've felt something there other than your own hand. It was still just fingers inside of you, but somehow him scissoring you open felt immensely better. In an effort to get your balance from the sudden intrusion, you were grabbing onto the fabric of his shirt as you focused on keeping your legs open. His nose crinkled again and you almost thought he was going to push you off him, but he kept his fingers stretching out your insides, the fabric gently scratching against you. 

"The more I touch you, the filthier you get," he stated as his motion switched from a stretching sensation to a pumping one, moving in and out of you, causing you to mewl. "And here, I should be your cure. Maybe you're beyond saving, hm?" Cruel words but you were too wrapped up in your victory to care. You struggled to quell the urge to rock your hips - you didn't dare to push your position and ruin your chances. "You claim to be a Yakuza's partner but you're acting more like some common filth standing at a corner somewhere. A whore."

His hand moved to contour around your body like he was grabbing you from the insides, and he punctuated his insult with a yank that made you bounce up onto your toes for a moment as his fingers rammed up deeper inside of you. The sudden speed and strength may have been enough to hurt but when he moved his clothed thumb to your clit, any complaints you may have had died out. It was just gentle grazes of that sweet spot, but combined with the way his fingers curled, pressing up against your walls, it was a killer combination.

 Quiet moans and whines escaped your lips as your legs trembled more and more every time Kai started to pick up speed. Faster, deeper… Your hands were tensing in his shirt and you tugged, earning you a heavy glare. "What happened to all that posture from before? You look like you can hardly stand," he commented and without bothering to actually get a response from you, he managed to find a spongy little spot inside your body and he found a rhythm fucking his fingers into that targeted spot. All you could manage was a cry as your eyes practically rolled back into your skull. 

"I'm starting to get bored with this," he droned on, despite the way he was now jabbing his fingers straight into your g-spot with a force that had you barely able to keep still. "If you're seeking satisfaction from this, you better find it quickly. Otherwise I may just leave you to fend for yourself." He could talk all he wanted but it wasn't going to take you much more. You felt a coil in your stomach ready to snap. Actually, you were starting to feel like you had to pee - which by all means should have been a danger sign for you considering your clean freak partner, but the euphoria of it all was making you forgetful.

Jab. Jab. Jab. When he returned back to your clit with his thumb, this time giving it a more thorough breed of attention, that's when your coil snapped. Your orgasm hit hard. It hit sticky and wet and squirting. Your chance to cum around his fingers was gone because as soon as he heard your wild cry, his eyes widened a fraction and his hand whipped out of you just fast enough to avoid the onslaught of your gush. You hardly even registered your hands being yanked off his clothes, until he released you and stepped back. No sympathy for you or your shaky legs. He let you fall to the floor in your messy pleasure and leveled a glare at you as your afterglow hit you while you sat in your self made puddle.

A whimper rose from your lips, dissatisfied at the loss of touch but a bit too blissed out from the orgasm to form any coherent sort of protest. A click of his tongue had your blurry gaze dragging to meet his visage. He looked annoyed for someone who had just made you squirt - how had he even known how to do that? "You made a mess," he stated bluntly as he used his clean glove to discard the one now covered in traces of you. He plopped it on the same kleenex with the gun before he grabbed his jacket. What was he doing now?

As he started to walk away, that's when you realized he was simply leaving you here. You were sitting in your own filth. Of course he was choosing to leave. You didn't think your legs were prepared to get up and run after him effectively. He took a last glance back at you as he got to the doorway. "Get yourself together and clean up in here. I can't stand looking at such a wreck."

And then he left.

[isolaradiale]

UPDATES + REMINDERS + NEW FAQ

Hello everyone!

It's been a while since we've last had a general update post, so we wanted to touch base quickly to mention a few things that have popped up recently / mention any little changes that have been made. We plan on having a full-blown policy update sometime around the beginning of the summer.

regarding the results of the 18+ poll: we are currently still in discussion about it and regardless of what we do, we will make a dedicated post for it sometime in the next month or so. there were a lot of responses so we'll be taking the time to go through all of them before making a final decision.

we've reverted our drabbles policy to accept one per month for activity. these must be at least 500 words to count, however. we discourage constantly using drabbles for activity though, and if someone is repeatedly doing so it may open you up to hoarding cases.

a bullet point has been added to the activity check section of our rules page as a reminder that passing the ac does not mean your character cannot be reserved if you fall inactive during the month.

we've added that activity checks are not conducted during december or february to the activity rules. we traditionally do not run them for these months due to holidays and the shorter month respectively, but we've added mention so that there isn't any confusion during these periods. this doesn't mean that you aren't responsible for your own activity during these months however!

a minor correction was made to the housing page where it still erroneously said four rooms per housing instead of three, which we changed here back in june.

the previous events page has been updated to crew call. we will not be including reruns on that page for obvious reasons.

if you're using a twitter url for contact, make sure it is all lowercase. if we get an error because you used a capital i in place of an l, we may send your ask back.

make sure to include the date when sending in hiatus / semi-hiatus asks. since these begin the day you send the ask, we require that date!

when submitting your blog or requesting a rank up, make sure all of your links work! especially if it's on a page, tumblr can sometimes make a mess of your hard work.

make sure to include three sentences for your character about and ten sentences for your personality! these are by far the most common issues!

NEW FAQ PAGE Because Tumblr has been making it harder and harder to search tags lately, we have compiled a brand new FAQ page which you can find here with questions that have been asked from as far back as Isola's conception. Everything is neatly sorted on the sidebar so you can quickly access anything you're looking for! We'll try to keep it as current as possible with new questions and correcting any inconsistencies as we find them, but please be patient as this was a big undertaking. Special thanks to mod Caelum for putting it all together!

SUBVERSION 2.0 COMING SOON We will be launching the sequel event to Subversion sometime in April. Because it will involve the AU versions of characters in the group created during the original event in some capacity (albeit optionally), we will be setting aside a week before the event for members who didn't participate in the original event, or have new characters, to create those AU versions and plan relationships with other characters.

There will be a little something else for those who did participate during this week too, but we'll have more information at the time. This is just to reassure anyone that didn't participate in the original that you will be able to participate without any issues.

- the island stars.

[eagles-translated]

Answering questions about Eagles 4x07–4x08 (Part 1) 🌻

Here’s my compiled answers of the questions you guys have sent in about the latest two episodes! I’ve received a few more questions that didn’t fit in this post, so I will answer them in part 2. Hope you enjoy!

Hi @lovelygirlinbleu, I hope you are doing amazing as well!

These last two episodes were definitely something, and the ending to episode 8 was so bittersweet.

It was heartbreaking to see Felicia crying while looking at Ludde in a sea of happy people. That scene was really well done though so I liked it, but I was totally devastated too!

I see what you mean—I also thought that the "plan" they all came up with was pretty silly. I was expecting Felicia to at least have some sort of idea on what to do since she was the one who gathered everybody, but she seemed to be just as clueless as everybody else there.

When Klara asked "so we just surprise Jack with a camera and say 'hey, you shot Andreas'?" I thought they would backtrack and come up with something else, but then they actually decided to do it anyway and the whole thing just felt childish. I know Jack is horrible and all, but they took this thing so seriously and to me the scene just felt comedic. And not in a good way.

Don't even get me started on when Ludde started saying "I'm sorry for kissing you" to Felicia in front of everybody. I almost recoiled in second-hand embarrassment from that one.

During the hockey game when they all called out "Kroon"—that was definitely cheesy, but I still liked it and also got goosebumps from that scene lol. But don't get me wrong, it did feel like Elias's eating disorder was swept aside in order for the Eagles team to have their big moment. It felt kind of weird knowing everything that Elias has gone through behind the scenes, and that made it hard to really root for him because I was just begging for Elias to not faint or risk injuring himself.

I really liked the golf scene between Petra and Amie, if I'm honest! To me it's understandable that Amie still isn't 100% sure about having Michael at her graduation. Graduating from high school is a huge milestone and celebration, so even if Michael did help Amie that still doesn't make him a close relative to her. I'd love to see Michael be invited to the graduation, though!

I agree with you on the fact that it felt weird how it only took one small hint from Petra for Amie to decide that she was going to the hockey game. I would've liked to see something similar to how Mats told Elias "You have to follow your instinct. Go with your gut feeling" earlier in the episode.

Some of the writing was questionable and I can understand why you found the episode disjointed. I have such a soft spot for Eagles so there were still lots of moments I enjoyed, but these two episodes definitely weren't as amazing as they could've been.

You have a very good point. I'm not a huge fan of how Elias has been acting this season—not just towards Amie, but everybody else as well. I keep telling myself that he's so consumed by becoming successful and getting so affected by the eating disorder that he's not acting like himself.

I didn't really like how they made it seem like Amie was the one who did something wrong. I would've liked to see Elias approach Amie instead and be the one to take the first step.

I think that behind his stoic-ish exterior, Elias cares very deeply for Amie. He may not show it in the way we would want him to, but he never stopped loving her even when he was mad at her. He cares about her so much that her "betrayal" (in quotation marks here since Amie did the right thing) hurt Elias deeply, and he covered it up with hostility.

But they're still soulmates, and—as the episode title states—endgame.

It is interesting!

While it would be a shame for Elias to retire from hockey so young, I think it would be the healthiest thing to do. I like the idea of Elias becoming a coach, but at the same time I'm totally in love with a previous theory I had of Elias studying at a film school in the US.

He's expressed an interest in movies before and it would be such a perfect way for him to accompany Amie to the US. I think the whole hockey environment is just stressful and damaging to his well-being, so I'd like to see Elias pursue something else. Something different than the expectations that were set on him the moment he was born.

You could definitely be right about whatever Elias does next is very likely to still be tied to hockey. That speech demonstrated great leadership skills so it wouldn't be coming out of left field if Elias did become a coach. But I'm still holding on to my whole "Elias studies at a film school in the US and directs Amie's future music videos" dream, no matter how unrealistic it may be. 🥲

I agree. It feels like the plan they came up with didn't even matter in the end since Jack decided to show up at Felicia's apartment anyway (also, how did he even know where the apartment was and that Felicia would be there at that time?).

The Plan had a lot of small problems so I understand what you mean. Besides the whole Jack drama, I also found myself not even caring about Naima relapsing and ending up at the hospital. We had so few scenes with Naima and she sort of disappeared from the show after Felicia left rehab, so I didn't really care about Naima that much. I really don't care about their love story at all if I'm perfectly honest.

I would love to see the cut scenes/ideas, if there were any for these episodes! Maybe this could be a question for the upcoming podcast Q&A?

You are definitely right. This storyline should've begun much earlier than it did, and there should've been more scenes of it. Someone mentioned that most of Elias's development was done off-screen rather than on-screen, and that perfectly summed up my biggest problem with how this storyline was handled.

I didn't like the message that was sent out when we saw Elias be rewarded for neglecting his health by refusing to stop playing.

I appreciate the attempt because it's rare to see a male eating disorder storyline on TV, but it definitely could've been done better if it had been developed more. I feel like we never really got into Elias's head properly, so it was hard to understand his thoughts this season.

Mats and Petra are such a guilty pleasure of mine, so I would love to see this happen. Imagine that after like 25 years, they finally get to spend graduation together even if it's not really how either of them planned it. 🥺

I mean, it would be a little weird for them to get together since their kids are dating each other, but I just want to see Petra be happy. And even if Mats hurt her really badly they still have a very special connection to each other.

For all we know Petra could end up with Michael, but I'm rooting for my man Mats here.

You're so right. I feel really bad for Ludde and all the shitty cards he's been dealt with. The only thing he has going for him is London, so he's absolutely going there after graduation because I can't imagine Ludde staying in Oskarshamn. But if it's any consolation, he should have a pretty rad graduation speech after everything he's gone through this season.

Now that we're on the subject, I also feel really bad for Sam who got caught in the middle of the whole Andreas drama. Imagine that your significant other gets randomly shot and tells you an obvious lie about how it happened. A month or so later you find out that he has cancer and he still hasn't told his family, so you're carrying around this huge secret that you know will change everything when it comes out. Oh, and then you find out that your partner was the one who bought the gun that shot him and that he used it to threaten someone else.

And still, Sam manages to be such a loving and supportive boyfriend even if Andreas has treated him like garbage. I know this situation is really traumatic for Ludde and his family, but Sam is definitely going to be suffering after this too. We don't know anything about his family or if he has the same support system that Ludde has. I just wish Sam finds some happiness in the last episode. He totally deserves better. Can Sam go to the US too, please? 🥺

I think your predictions about Ludde and Felicia are pretty solid! I'm hoping they'll stay close friends and maybe rekindle their relationship in the future, if we do end up getting a flashforward scene.

I did enjoy them, but there were glaring problems with the pacing and also the way that some storylines were wrapped up. Lots of things were rushed and some events didn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

I kind of wish that they hadn't packed so much into these two episodes, but I understand that we're nearing the series finale and they probably wanted to go out with a bang.