#though i may be biased which will influence how i interpret things

[i-love-ropes]

BREAKING NEWS!

05-17-2024

Rope MF, infamously known for his obsession with ropes, was walking back home from his aunt’s house when he was hit by the halberd driven by no other than our beloved hero Meta Knight. Many people debate whether this attack was intentional or accidental.

In a interview with Meta Knight, he states, 

“I will not say anything that can be used against me in court, but just so we’re clear, I did not purposely hit Rope MF. I was practicing my driving and lost control. You can ask any of the Meta Knights, they will back up my case.”

Whether Meta Knight’s reputation will be ruined by this is still up in the air, with people like King Dedede and Bandana Waddle Dee cutting ties with Meta Knight until he apologizes. Bandana Waddle Dee’s seriousness about cutting ties is called into question with locals seeing him train with Meta Knight.

(Posted by Chain MOFO, copied from PPP news article)

[classpecting-fevur-archive]

Introduction Post

Howdy hi! I'm Elijah and welcome to my classpecting blog! I've been looking into Homestuck classpects for years, reading and touching up on various resources and looking at the characters to best understand what classes and Aspects are, what they do, and how they influence and are influenced by who they are assigned to. I used to have a classpect analysis going on Wattpad years ago, but had deleted it out of insecurity. Now, thanks to the support of some friends, I'm opening it up fresh and new here on the silly hellsite of Tumblr.com.

Introspection has always been fascinating and important to me. Starting with a vast interest in personality quizzes, it has expanded into a desire to understand the self and the roller-coaster ride that is. But when understanding oneself through their favorite fandom? Well, that's too fun of an opportunity to pass up! Not to mention the applications of it when making characters and stories!

What you can expect to find here are analyses on Classes and Aspects separately, as well as analyses for when they are paired together. You may even find some classpecting over different fandom characters! However, my word is not gospel; you are free to interpret things in a way that makes better sense to you and can differ from what is said here. No one's word is law, after all!

Read more about this blog under the cut!

How Do You Do It?

My method of analyzing follows around a central or core idea of that class or aspect and expanding upon it based on what has been observed. I cross reference many different sources, from what other classpecting blogs think, to enneagrams, source material, and more in order to best study the subject at hand. I do not, however, include the following media in my analyses unless requested otherwise:

-Hiveswap -Friendsim -The Homestuck epilogues -Pesterquest -Any current or future post-canon content after Act 7 of Homestuck.

These sources are considered dubiously canon and thus will not be taken into consideration when profiling each Class, Aspect, and character. However, requests to profile characters from these sources are welcomed.

My takes on classpects may differ from what may be generally accepted as fanon, and additionally may differ from what is considered canon. While I do take canon Homestuck explanations and testimonials into account, Homestuck altogether is a coming of age story and the involved characters' understandings and explanations may be biased or contradictory to their personality, experiences, and actions-- which creates a paradoxical circle between influencing classpect and being influenced by classpect. As such, though a character may say one thing, I may interpret it differently. Exploration isn't about following what has already been laid out and rehearsed 100 times, but is about the experiences and things you learn by acknowledging what has been said while keeping an open mind to find the answers you are personally looking for.

As this blog gets fleshed out, I will be updating my side bar and this post to serve as a directory to various key posts and profiles. If you've made it this far, thank you for reading, and welcome to the blog ya nerd <3

[stargazeraldroth]

Ooohhh, good luck with your schoolwork, then! And don’t push yourself too hard~

I get what you mean! To be honest, I tend to make him lean more towards good, myself- It’s just how I view him, in no small part (like you said) thanks to all of the overly malicious interpretations of him. And honestly, especially with the other Stars, I usually interpret him as “good-leaning chaotic neutral,” so really, I’m probably biased, too! Also, he definitely, absolutely does need therapy- To help recognize and process his own feelings (and validate them), to help him recognize social cues he tends to disregard, etc. If nothing else, he’s lived for so goddamn long and seen so much shit that he could do with talking to A Professional about it and just getting it off of his chest. And that’s just with his canon role as a Protector… If you view anything with, say, Gin as canon, he probably needs it even more. And I’m a sucker for Gin/Ink, so I like taking it into account, heh.

I think I may have read that one, too! I… Also cannot remember the title, though, whoops. But! I could see his abandonment issues (and probable RSD, at least in my opinion (no I’m not projecting hush-) because Look At Him) playing into how he takes all of this- And the entire thing combines with his other issues and the fact that protecting the Multiverse is kind of a Big Deal to him, and it all just. Really, really starts to weigh him down, I think. He’d be trying to go over everything he did- Wondering if he did something to make them think he hated being soulless, like you said, or how he led them to think that he needed saving from the Creators (which, maybe he does, just. Not like this), or how me screwed up so much that two of the people he bases his understanding of morals off of went off the deep end. Did he interfere too much? Is this going to happen to others? Was there a way he could have seen this coming and stopped it? Blue and Dream would probably hate that he’s thinking that way (and maybe it even feeds more into their delusions, because how could he think like that? It couldn’t be their fault, right? They’re in too deep now, they can’t just stop-), but Ink is gonna spiral into self hatred and spiral hard, no matter how you look at it.

Core deserved to go a bit feral and wreck havoc on people who hurt the ones they love. Just a little bit. You know. As a treat. For real though, they’re definitely the sort of threat you regret overlooking, because even if they, physically, cannot do anything to you, kiddo’s got Influence and Knowledge and probably a damn good Scary Face. They’re definitely gonna assemble the squad to get their artistic pal back.

Depending on how badly off Ink is in the moment (both emotionally and physically), Cross might actually start out as a necessary caretaker AND protector for him- No one wants to decide things For Him, given everything that happened, but also, if he’s refusing to take his vials and not letting himself feel or function, someone needs to try and make sure he’s at least semi-healthy, you know? Either way, given time and A Lot of healing, I definitely see it developing into a much healthier, much happier friendship and partnership- With Cross probably acting like a Big Brother sometimes, because you know, Oreo Bros. And by that I mean, once they regained their bond, he gleefully holds having almost an Entire Foot on Ink over his head, and stuff like that (let them tease each other and be goofballs, they need it-).

Core and Cross are just gently giving Ink hugs and head pats while Error is just that one video of the guy awkwardly petting the other guy with a broom. And Fresh, in my mind, has plenty of motive to keep Ink Alive and Kicking because, if the Protector is gone, the chances of his Primary Food Source dying out goes up. Also I just really like the dynamic he’d bring to this particularly chaotic table, it’d be fun.

AHAHAHAHA HES SUCH A FUCKIN MANBABY AND I LOVE IT. Tantrum throwing Error over what would, to other people, be Weird Shit is always just. So funny to me. If Blue and Dream do kidnap Ink, I imagine he’d be a likely source of rescue, because the indignity of Someone Else having the nerve to capture His Rival would drive him insane.

O O F. That’s a tough (and painful) one. My first thought is that, if they wish for Ink to have a soul, and to not be “burdened” with the role of Protector anymore, the Overwrite reconstructs his old soul and locks him back in his old, unfinished AU… With just the sketches and his own thoughts for company. Unless it erases his memories, I don’t imagine he’d cope well with the sudden onslaught of Feeling so much and being in his Worst Nightmare.

My OTHER thought is that they wish to be Ink’s “perfect protectors” or something along those lines, but without any real guidelines, so now everyone has to deal with Shattered Dream and a Much More Deadly Blue running around and refusing to let Ink go anywhere.

Alternately, it goes right… For them. By locking all three Stars in the Doodlesphere and rendering it impossible to breach. Talk about an opportunity to gaslight poor Ink.

YOU KNOW GIN LORE!?

I'm sorry for shouting at you like that- but I have not been able to find a single thing about Gin's lore! Like I have a name, that's all I know. All I know is his name and that he had a close bond with Ink, or something like that. I don't even know where to look for this man's lore, which sucks because he?? Looks cool to me??? And he's Ink's friend???? I genuinely don't even know what Gin's lore is or what AU he's from-

Okay so that either refers to Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy or rejection sensitivity, and honestly? I'm here for both of them (I have looked as their basic definitions and nothing more). I, too, suspect that I may have some problems when it comes to abandonment and rejection... but this isn't a therapy session and I'm trying to be mysterious about myself, so we won't dwell on that. I can get behind Ink spiraling into self-hatred, that's a whole mood. Also, I just feel like if Dream and Blue tried to reassure him that it wasn't his fault (and of course they would, why wouldn't they step in?), Ink wouldn't believe them. There's just no other explanation for it, to him. Especially if they were to try and explain their reasoning to him.

I want you to know that I read "artistic" as "autistic" and didn't bat an eye. That's some self-projection right there.

Ooo yes yes, I understand exactly what you mean! I can see Cross being a necessary caretaker for the time being, if only to keep Ink functioning. Also just to keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn't do anything drastic, just as a precaution.

HJBVHHJBHJGG- Error with the broom?? Trying to comfort Ink by probing him with it?? Splendid imagery. He never learned how to comfort people, he's doing his best. He's improvising for the situation and I think that deserves some credit.

If Dream and Blue were to kidnap Ink, Error would be that one clip of the tank pulling right up to the house's door. I hope you know what I'm talking about, I think it's the perfect example of this. Error being a huge manbaby and having tantrums is something I live for, but it's so rare to find it in fanfics?? At least from my own experience. And I attribute that to the fact that Error's also greatly mischaracterized by a majority of the fandom as some sort of saint, but that's a topic for a different day.

(I will never want to rant about this.)

You know... I'm the one who suggested the hypothetical scenario, but you didn't have to assault me with that first interpretation /lh. My poor baby- especially because I'm pretty sure Ink doesn't actually remember anything from before waking up in the Anti-Void?? So he'd be confused and petrified, with no way of stopping his emotions or processing them. This also means that Broomie's gone for good, how could you do this Anon?

I do love me some Shattered content. Some nice Shattered and Ink interactions, we love to see it, love to see it. Some "nice" interactions. In this case, it's definitely a hostage situation, even before they hypothetically emerge victorious. Since Shattered now has tentacles, he can basically keep Ink restrained at all times, if he were to catch him. I can picture the scene: they use the OVERWRITE on themselves and, as soon as they do, Ink feels it. Something is wrong. So very wrong. The story- stories- they're different now. Something's gone wrong, he needs to fix it, but he's probably too bewildered by what he just witnessed to react properly. And for a little treat, just a little seasoning, imagine that he feels actual pain whenever something major like this- something so extremely off-script- happens. If the pain's great enough, it would render him stunned just long enough for the two to strike.

In the situation where they get locked in the Doodlesphere, I imagine there would be a scene where Ink's just processing everything. He's like "Creators... what the actual fuck?" The Creators really went to get the milk, huh?

Alternatively, Nightmare's probably just somewhere, eating popcorn while watching this whole thing go down from start to finish.

[speeddemon-82]

So I'm currently watching Gangwon 2024, the figure skating youths. I'm watching them out of order, I apologize ;-;. But, I just finished the Ice Dance section and I will say I'm not very happy with how the scoring went.

All of these people still did amazing though, they're doing things far more impressive and amazing then I ever could. I'm very proud of all of them! This is more of a criticism on the judges, music choice, and what the scoring system focuses on.

On a small note, the first pair for the Czech Republic was a bit sad. The girl (I'm so sorry I'm terrible at remembering names) just looked exhausted and her partner kept going way to fast for her if seemed. Like they were out of sync numerous times. So they ended up in last and I just felt really bad.

So scoring itself is very biased and I definitely feel like I felt that a bit with Ukraine when I watched the first half of the Ice Dance section last night. So, I feel like due to a lot of the ongoing political issues occuring right now, scoring is definitely being influenced (which isn't new).

Music choice this time around was extremely hit or miss, but this is again nothing new. The issue though is a good number of pairs kept picking upbeat and energetic songs, when they just couldn't match the energy; I noticed this with South Korea.

The artistry and interpretation of the music definitely isn't being scored too heavily and judges are focusing more on the technical aspects. Which I find a bit annoying because it lead to some slightly boring performances being in first and second (France and the USA). Great Britain definitely deserved to be in third though, they did great.

Anyways, I may reblog this post more with some of my other opinions on the rest of the performances for the other sections. But we'll see. Also just to say it again, all of the pairs did amazing in their own right and they should feel proud!

[lgenvs3000w23]

History & Nature (unit #6

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“There is no peculiar merit in ancient things, but there is merit in integrity, and integrity entails the keeping together of the parts of any whole, and if these parts are scattered throughout time, then the maintenance of integrity entails a knowledge, a memory, of ancient things. …. To think, feel or act as though the past is done with, is equivalent to believing that a railway station through which our train has just passed, only existed for as long as our train was in it.” (Edward Hyams, Chapter 7, The Gifts of Interpretation)

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The interpretation of history and nature interpretation is much more connected than one may think, as nature is just history. Every time we go outside we see trees that have towered over city streets for decades, interact with species that are part of long lineages often with tales of speciation or complex interactions, and endure weather that is part of a complicated narrative of climate trends. However, there are much more subtle connections such as the means we go about both types of interpretation and the values their interpretation holds in society. Notably, history and nature are severely disserviced by poor interpretation; which is an important aspect to note as both are often influenced by beliefs/biases over fact (e.i people's opinions on wars and opinions of climate change).

Hyams conveys the importance of accurately interpreting history and that history has significance in the present day. These two principles are equally as crucial in nature interpretation. In the first part of this quote, Hyams explains that there is no importance in history without accurate context and the full picture. Artifacts of history are like snapshots that can help interpret a full story but they are meaningless without the rest of the story and equally as worthless if the story is falsely conveyed. Thus, it is not the age but the preservation of truth that is attributed to the worth of an artifact or historical event. For anyone who has watched Pawn Stars, Hyams' message is communicated when an item is brought onto the show without any context or story behind it. Without the integrity of a story, the object lacks knowledge as Hyams states, and in turn, there is a blow to the value of the object because “there is no peculiar merit in ancient things” (Edward Hyams, Chapter 7, The Gifts of Interpretation).

(Pawn Stars Youtube, 2022)

Furthermore, I find the second part of Hyams’ quote relates very well to nature interpretation, specifically in arguments about climate trends and conservation. Hyams refers to the fact that history is just as relevant today because past events still have influence, they don't just disappear. Time is a major driver of nature as seen in old-growth trees, corrosion over millions of years creating rock formations, land-locked lakes formed by glaciation, and so much more. It is undeniable that history has shaped the ecosystems and the entire planet we see today. Therefore, nature is history and when we get out into nature we are quite literally basking in a natural history museum. I will never understand how historical buildings can be preserved solely due to age but old trees that house countless species and contribute to ecosystems are cut down. (Beck et al., 2018)

(TJ Watt/Ancient Forest Alliance)

Additionally, writing is a huge component of both nature and historical interpretation as writing style and vocabulary can completely change one’s audience due to terminology barriers, accessibility, and level of engagement (Hooykaas, Unit 06). This quote by Edward Hyams is a prime example of the power of writing. I think this quote it is too convoluted to easily get a point across to many, it requires too much interpretation for the average reader. I think the message would have been lost on me if I had just skimmed over it and not been required to analyze it. (Beck et al., 2018)

References 

Beck, L., Cable, T. T., & Knudson, D. M. (2018). Interpreting cultural and natural heritage : for a better world. Sagamore Venture.

Hooykaas, A. (n.d.). Unit 06: Nature Interpretation through Science [Lecture notes]. ENVS3000 Nature Interpretation. University of Guelph.

[classicaltrav]

Apparition coast

/ Visions / First thing I have to notice while listening to Apparition Coasts’ new album Visions is the amazing production with a crisp acoustic riff and muted background that builds up and explodes into a powerful intro. For me unfortunately something that keeps me from ever giving Alternative and or Pop-Punk bands a chance is a whining voice. It’s just personal taste. However I do enjoy the lead vocals here. A beautiful voice, enough said. Ringtone is a catchy opening song and this is carried throughout the album very nicely! I would mention in passing to Josh and DJ (I had the privilege of playing in CSUCI ensemble with them and worked with Josh for a while) to tell me when they would play live so I could go check them out without having really heard their music. After hearing this album now I really am looking forward to it! Everything about these songs is solid. If you are an Alternative or Pop-Punk fan you will feel right at home here; I am reminded of Four year Strong and Paramore at times. There is so much depth here. You get a short and sweet guitar solo on the second track and the harmonies makes one want to learn the songs and sing along. Listening to the title track Visions one has to appreciate the intricate riff that sound like a Yvette young riff at the beginning. In Vision you get a back and forth between atmospheric soundscape and heavy rock which is jarring but in a good way. The subject matter of visions sounds like things we all go through from time to time so it’s not like the lyrics were just churned out without a thought or feeling. It seems slightly open to interpretation as well in my opinion which will let the listeners look at the same song in different lights. I’m very impressed how modern these songs sound as well, several could honest to god sound natural on a popular radio station. That’s not to say they don’t pay respect to the influences that shine through their playing. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised to see this band blow up! I’m not sure who the main songwriter or writers are but I am extremely impressed. This album may be talking about serious subject matter but it’s lifting me up and energizing me out of my lethargy of staying up too late last night. “Trigger” gives you a classic rock sounding riff hear which just affirms that there’s a little something here for everyone. That has to be DJ the guitar player shredding on his Les Paul because I know he really enjoys classic rock. Some albums I lose interest partway through for various reasons. Here that is definitely not the case. I’m grateful for this album because it’s really showing me how much of a lack of Alternative and Pop-Punk I’ve had these last couple of years. So wholesome, so true. I also heard a twinge of country on one or two of the tracks. This is just a testament to the eclectic music tastes of the members and the result is that they have a lot to say. Don’t get me wrong though this band is unique as any. Speaking of unique: California, PCH (Pacific Coast Highway), and Malibu are mentioned in the song “Getaway” which are beautiful sightseeing areas that you have to see if you’re in California ever. There’s something about a song or band that mentions or represents a place or thing that you love. It makes it more relatable or special I suppose. I may be a bit biased since I know two of these guys who are the nicest musicians you could hope to meet but I don’t care. The production value, songwriting, and instrumentation is just too good; I gotta give this album 10/10 Pizzas

Suggested tracks: Visions, Solve, Your reflection

[bushs-world]

You make an excellent point though I would like to add that it's not lots of subtext but rather total lack of context or contradictory contexts that make Loki so confusing in the MCU.

Like you said, we as viewers have no idea what makes Loki tick and except for a few rare instances where we see Loki's true feelings in the movies, most of what his motivations are, is left to be deciphered by his spoken words which to me have never been reliable coz he lies a lot. Before the series, I could never guess when Loki was lying or telling the truth.

And not just that, in the first three movies, there is often two contradicting motivations and the divide comes from which motivations the viewers choose to believe. But there is so little or rather no proof of Loki's inner thoughts that no one has canonical evidence to prove their characterisation is correct and true. Both the sides have some canonical support but no concrete proof. So, I think the problem isn't people not looking at subtext but rather jumping to two different conclusions by the implied subtext.

For example, take the instance of what was Loki's primary motivation for disrupting Thor's coronation. On one side, the og loki stans will say he wanted to save Asgard from Thor's rule coz he wasn't fit to be king yet and everything he did was for the good of Asgard. On the other side, people will say he did it coz of jealousy. And both of these interpretations are correct in some way, both have some canonical support but there's no proof of either.

The og stans will quote Loki's dialogue to Laufey: "it was just a bit of fun to ruin my brother's big day as well as save the realm of his idiotic rule" as an evidence to support their claim but in that instance Loki was lying to Laufey about other things so how do we know he isn't lying about this as well.

Other people will use Sif's line: "he may speak of the good of Asgard but he's always been jealous of Thor" as evidence along with various hints about Loki's jealousy but Sif's opinion of Loki is biased so we can't totally say Loki was motivated by jealousy as well. So yeah, there's no hard evidence and without one, it turns into a fight of whose interpretation is correct.

Another thing I will like to add is most of what is believed to be subtext is just headcannons that the fandom has accepted as canon even though there's no proof of it in canon.

Like you stated the Thanos coerced Loki to invade New York part. Now we do have proof of Loki being in a bad shape and physically hurt (tho nowhere is it implied it is due to Thanos' torture except for interviews by Tom Hiddleston but I don't consider interviews to be part of canon), we have proof of Loki being threatened and monitored by the Other but there's no proof anywhere in canon that shows Loki didn't want to invade New York but was forced to do so by Thanos or that he was coerced into invading New York. That's all just a headcannon trying to join the three disjointed parts of a)Loki being hurt, b)the other threatening him and c)the influence of the septor into a singular theory (but again no proof).

And there's so many things this headcannon doesn't take into account coz Thanos only wanted the tesseract, he had nothing to do with New York so what does he get by unleashing an army of chitauri on New York and offering Loki to be the king of Midgard. Why would Thanos brainwash him to take over Earth in the first place? If it was truly Thanos forcing Loki, why didn't he just collect the tesseract and leave?

This headcannon also ignores a very important characterisation of Loki that he desired a throne and he was trying to get a throne for himself for 4 movies straight. In Thor, he doesn't want Thor back once Frigga makes him king and even sends the destroyer to kill him (so that Thor doesn't take away his throne). In TDW, he overthrows Odin and rules Asgard for 4 years in disguise. In Ragnarok, he wants to take over Sakaar so it's very unrealistic to me to believe that he wouldn't want to take over Earth in Avengers and only did it coz he was forced.

And then, the deal between Loki and Thanos benefits both of them. Thanos gets the tesseract and in exchange, he gives Loki an army to conquer Earth. This matches Thanos' deal with Ronan the Accuser in GOTG where Ronan gets the power stone for him and in return, Thanos lets Ronan use the power stone to destroy Xandar.

So why was the Other threatening Loki? I think it was to make sure Loki doesn't betray Thanos. After all, he was given the septor and he would be acquiring the tesseract. Both are infinity stones so Thanos would want to be careful that Loki doesn't turn against him. Maybe that's what the torture was as well, making sure he doesn't betray Thanos. Didn't Thanos send Nebula with Ronan to make sure he didn't betray him??

Or maybe the torture was to prepare Loki for the invasion. After all, Thanos made his daughters fight against each other to train them to be better fighters and replaced Nebula's body part with cybernetics each time she lost but again, all this is just my headcannon and I don't have proof to support it just as the 'Loki was coerced' people have no proof to support their claim.

For another thing, when people claim Loki was influenced (not mind controlled coz again no proof) in Avengers, I want to ask do they think Loki wouldn't have attacked earth if it wasn't for the mind stone? Coz he had done far worse things in Thor, sent the destroyer on Earth and committed genocide and there was no mind stone there. Comparing his actions in Thor, he looks less villianous in Avengers (atleast to me). To say Loki only acted the way he did in Avengers was because he was coerced totally ignores the fact that Loki has shown himself capable of doing such a thing and worse in Thor.

The problem (acc to me) is after spending so many years with this headcanon, the Tumblr fans convinced themselves all this was canon and now blame the writers for showing Loki as guilty for the battle of New York and argue he wasn't responsible. When in reality, their opinion is an elaborate headcannon made by mixing pieces of canon, ignoring other things and adding Tom's interview in the middle but the writers won't have the time to go through the entire Tumblr characterisation of Loki nor the time to go through all the bts material or interview, so how they portrayed Loki is pretty consistent acc to what is shown in the movies and it's not the writers who didn't pay attention. That's why the only people who find Loki ooc aren't general viewers but only og loki stans.

I don't think anyone saw Loki as pure evil, many people understood his complexity but for many people he isn't a helpless victim but actively choosing to do wrong. In the end, it becomes a matter of personal choices and morality. Some people can't overlook and excuse all of Loki's wrongdoings while others claim he was not responsible for anything.

One more thing, some people bring in a variety of interviews and deleted scenes to try and justify Loki but casual viewers (who make up the majority of the viewership) don't have the time nor the energy to go through an extra pile of deleted material in order to truly understand Loki and how he isn't evil. That doesn't make their interpretation of Loki wrong or shallow coz Tumblr's characterisation of Loki is very deep in headcannon category.

Who he is should be understood from what is shown in the movies, not by taking into account interviews or extra scenes and headcannons and if we can't explain Loki and his motivations based solely on canon material then either we are trying to twist the canon or it's bad writing (tho I don't think it's bad writing).

With all that out of the way, I will like to say Thor isn't a story of two flawed characters, out of which one got to change while the other never got the chance. Colz to say that, it would mean Loki was helpless in Thor. But Loki was neither helpless nor forced into anything in the movie. Every bad decision he took was his own choice, he was given the throne by Frigga and he chose to use that power to hurt Thor, unleash the destroyer on New Mexico and commit genocide of Jotunhiem and in all this, he wasnt coerced or helpless, he did it out of his own choice. Maybe he was in a bad place which caused him to go berserk but it's important to acknowledge he did wrong out of his own choice.

And that's a problem when start claiming that Loki never did anything wrong, and attack the writers for holding him accountable (which isn't possible coz in canon, Loki has made mistakes and needs to be held accountable for his mistakes).

If anything, Thor is a story of two brothers whose lives spiral in opposite direction where while Thor grows and becomes a hero, Loki falls into a downward spiral and turns bad.

Lastly, I think Kate and Michael did an excellent job of balancing Loki's insecurities and flaws, his turbulent inner thoughts without completely woobifying him. He is held accountable but we also see the broken boy inside him which makes the series Loki so easy to sympathise with for most people. The series showed that Loki's villianous act was an illusion or that he was scared of being alone so he acted out. The series was the first time we really see Loki show any emotion towards Asgard. We get to see Loki scared by seeing Thanos so to say the series spoiled Loki's characterisation when it fleshed out most of what fandom always believed is stupid imo.

So yeah that's my opinion but your post was awesome too.

I finally figured out that the problem with Loki as a character is within the MCU. everything about him is subtext. he lies to his peers and he lies to the viewers and he lies to himself, and the only way to see who he really is and how he really feels and what he really wants is through subtext. and that's great for the people who love his character. the subtext is very plainly there and it builds up such a complicated, nuanced character.

but most people don't look for the subtext. most people don't associate Loki with Thanos and they don't think much into the Other telling Loki that Thanos will make him long for something as sweet as pain. hell, most people see Thor (2011) as the story of a heroic god and his evil jealous brother instead of what it truly is: a flawed man learning to be better and a flawed man who's never given that chance.

and that's where the problem comes from. that's why his characterization changes so much. because by the time Ragnarok came around, it has been four years since we'd seen him, and at that point, all anybody remembered about him was that he was evil and he liked to stab Thor in the back.

[wprowers]

i want to talk about sonic boom characters.

Long post warning.

First of all i would like to say that i really enjoy sonic boom !! I think it has a really healthy and silly humor that for me it's always welcome, so i like this show and its characters. But don't take my opinion as something biased bc i don't really think it is, i can't be biased towards a piece of media that holds little to no value to the true canon mainline games.

I have seen people dragging this show to hell, and at the time it came out it recieved a LOT of criticism for VALID reasons, valid when it comes to comparing them to the actual canon personalities of these characters (which varies from media to media but its mostly the same concept, but you can't say they haven't fucked up in the characterization of certain characters in mainline games but thats for another day).

But neither sonic or amy or tails or whoever in boom actually have any meaning at all, do they have a backstory? a purpose? any serious fight? is eggman even their enemy? Absolutely not!!

BECAUSE THIS SHOW IS NOT MEANT TO TAKEN SERIOUSLY !!

If we are talking about knuckles, he is not smart !! he doesn't have a life mission to protect the emerald !! There's nothing going on for him !! he doesn't even remember anything, in one episode he suddenly realized he didn't have a family and started to look for one, getting manipulated into an "evil" complot and that's he most arc he has ever gotten in boom (found family trope at the end of the ep, rlly cute)

And i did see some worries about the franchise being influenced by the boom! characterization. Mostly for knuckles and amy.

As for knuckles i think that some of you watched the scu shortfilm and immediately thought that they were bringing boom!knux into the mix, i disagree wholeheartedly with this (if s3 comes out and it is like that well then...) i think that scu!knux is just someone who gets represented by his pure heart (as every good representation of knuckles) and lack of knowledge of his surroundings and the people who came into his life. He gets easily manipulated and doesn't know what icecream is, bc he has been a loner for so long !! and he does not know earth, that does not mean he's stupid in any way, and i dont think that's what they would go for in s3.

And for Amy I've seen the discourse that boom! generated around her, some claiming that it was the best amy, for her not overly girly attitude maybe or for the fact that her affection towards sonic was hidden and she didn't show it at all, even though it was stated that she liked him.

So I've seen people saying that due to this amy being well received, it has influenced on how they made her in modern media, which i don't think is that much of a true tbh??? Like besides twitter takeovers, i haven't seen much of boom!amy influence in any other thing, perhaps yes they took a different take for her in frontiers or other modern games, but she has always been true to what really her character is, sonic or not Amy is Amy. Its not about how they made boom! canon suddenly but what is the path they want her character to take while she is still connected to her emotions and love for sonic and everyone.

And no i don't think boom!amy is the best version of amy, i don't think any boom! character is the best version of themselves and they will never be, because there is nothing that conveys their true selves in this interpretation, so it's impossible for these characters to be that.

LETS NOT EVEN TALK ABOUT BOOM!SHADOW because that boy is not shadow at all, then again this is a character that suffered a lot of misinterpretations from his own creators so,,,

So im not making really any point in here?

just simply stating the obvious !! sonic boom is a show that you watch to have fun ! it does not have any action or true emotional moments, never has the team gone through a serious situation. You watch it because it's silly and you don't expect much else from it! Everyone is loveable in their own way if you look at them with the right eyes, so maybe you could enjoy this show without thinking about how out of character most things are.

love you sonic boom i will always defend you

[halseyquinn]

Portrayal of young people dealing with grief/loss in animated films

TW: Mentions of death/loss, trauma and mental illness

Please beware of potential spoilers for the following films: “The Lion King”, “Brother Bear”, “Frozen”, “Big Hero 6″, “Abominable” (2019)

I recently discovered that the animated films “Abominable“ (2019) and „Big Hero 6“ (2014) both focus on the issue of children/teens/young adults and loss as a kind of main topic and wanted to dive a little further into this subject.

There are two main reasons why I find it very important to discuss this: Firstly, because, at least in my opinion, the public awareness of it is relatively low – this also applies to death in general, being a rather “unpleasant“ subject to talk about, but is especially problematic when it comes to young people, whose problems very often go unnoticed. Secondly, animated films, being mainly targeted at a young audience, could support young people going through difficult times by showing them that they are not alone and maybe even what could possibly help them to deal better with their own problems, besides helping to raise public awareness for these issues. That being said, I selected a couple of animated movies (mainly Disney) from the last 30 years where the topic of loss plays a sufficiently big role. I chose the ones that I know well enough to analyze them and also the ones that I personally found the most interesting, so the choice is definitely pretty subjective and maybe a bit “biased“, but it should be informative nevertheless.

The first film that I‘d like to discuss is Disney‘s classic “The Lion King“ (1994). I‘m well aware that this choice isn‘t unproblematic – after all the main (young) protagonist “Simba“ is a lion, not a human. Since the animals in Disney films are almost always pretty humanized, I decided that it was alright, though. I especially wanted to include that film, because it deals with the combination of loss and trauma – Simba not only loses his father, but also witnesses his death and moreover gets guilt-tripped by his uncle into believing that it was his fault. While this may be a very extraordinary situation, the feeling of guilt is very common when it comes to loss. Simba can only leave the feeling of guilt behind at the end of the film when he learns about the true circumstances of his father‘s demise. It also shows how much these experiences influence Simba later in his life – he doesn‘t feel „worthy“ of being king, he runs away from the rest of his family (which could also be interpreted as secluding himself) and just wants to forget about the past. Only when he (literally) confronts his “inner demons“, he is finally able to make some sort of peace with it. All in all, the portrayal of a young “person“ dealing with loss in this film (although it‘s a rather crass situation) seems pretty accurate and includes some helpful pieces of “advice“ on how to deal with guilt.

The next movie I‘d like to analyze is “Brother Bear“ (2003). Once again, this film doesn‘t (exclusively) focus on humans, but is nonetheless informative since it portrays two experiences with loss which are closely interwoven: On the one hand, young adult “Kenai” has to deal with the death of his brother, on the other hand, the little bear “Koda” loses his mother. Kenai‘s situation resembles the one of Simba – both have to deal with guilt. But whereas his father‘s death isn‘t Simba‘s fault at all, it‘s much more difficult for Kenai to clear himself of being the one responsible for his brother‘s death. The interesting thing is that, whereas Simba takes the blame without questioning it further (probably because he is supposed to be still a “child“ when his father dies), Kenai shifts the blame fully onto the bear that his brother tried to protect him from and which he kills in the process. Later, when Kenai learns that the bear he killed was the mother of Koda, he once again feels guilty, but this time takes on responsibility for it. Koda, of course, is shocked when he learns this, but they both are able to come to terms with the past in the end, finding the family they both lost in each other. This film deals with the especially difficult issue of actually being (at least partly) responsible for someone‘s death – in real life this could, for example, be the case in a car accident. While this might not be that relevant for young people, there is another key message: even after the loss of someone, it is possible to find comfort in other people – be it other family members/relatives or, like in that example, friends.

Another film which I was a little hesitant to include here is “Frozen“ (2013) – while the main protagonists are humans, they are both technically already “adults“ (18 and 21 years old). I finally decided to include it because I personally think that an experience with loss at that age is still pretty difficult. People in their early twenties of course still struggle very much when they lose someone, but at the same time are expected to act all “grown-up“. This is exactly what the film shows: Both Anna and Elsa have to grow up pretty quickly, taking on important responsibilities from one day to the next, most likely without having been properly prepared to do so. While Anna tries to mend the bond with her sister, Elsa shuts herself away from everyone – which is also not unusual when people try to deal with loss. “Frozen” especially focuses on the aspect of relatively young people having to deal with a lot of responsibility – this seems pretty relatable for everyone who has lost one parent or both. But the film also shows another important thing: letting others help you instead of trying to get to grips with everything on your own, is a really important resource in difficult times. This message is especially relevant for young adults, who might feel like that they‘re alone and don‘t have anyone who could support them.

“Big Hero 6“ (2014) and “Abominable“ (2019) are the two films that, in my personal opinion, focus the most on the experience of loss itself. In the other films that I discussed previously, the experience of loss per se wasn‘t really the focal point – more often than not it rather served as a topic to help develop the actual plot. In “Big Hero 6“ 14-year-old Hiro has to deal with the loss of his brother – who seems to have been the only one left of his core family. “Abominable“‘s main protagonist is Yi (who might also be around Hiro‘s age), who has recently lost her father. Both films take the experience of loss as a kind of starting point and the topic stays relevant throughout the whole movie. Both Hiro and Yi have to deal with extraordinary situations (helping an escaped Yeti get back to the Himalayas/fighting a masked villain) that could symbolize them trying to come to terms with the definitely extraordinary situation of their personal losses. Hiro is portrayed showing signs of depression, Yi tries to cope by always keeping herself occupied with something. In Hiro‘s case anger also plays an important role, when he finally finds out who really is responsible for his brother‘s death. Yi rather seems to have to deal with grief, regretting that she never got to travel the country with her father, like they had planned. At the same time, both teens struggle with letting others (friends and family) help them.

This is especially prominent in Yi‘s case: During one scene she is talking about her experiences with her friend Jin, telling him that her mother and grandmother don‘t understand her and that she feels as if they were pushing her away. Jin then asks her whether it couldn‘t be possibly her, that is pushing them away. I think that is an extremely relatable scene – especially young people having to deal with things that are way too “heavy“ for them, often feel as if they were alone, because no one can truly understand them. While this often may be the case, isolating oneself is also a pretty common reaction to experiencing loss – wanting to be left alone to come to terms with everything etc. Yi always carries part of a photo with her, that shows her and her father. At the end of the film, the Yeti that she helped rescue, hands her the other part of the photo – showing Yi‘s mother and grandmother – and puts the two pieces together. This way, Yi finally realizes that she still has a family that loves and supports her – if she lets them. In a similar way, the robot “Baymax“ that was built by his brother, helps Hiro to realize the importance of friendship. In my personal opinion “Abominable“ depicts the topic of young people and grief in the most accurate and realistic way, making it especially relatable and possibly the most “helpful“.

To summarize my previous analysis, a varied set of animated films has, so far, portrayed the various aspects of young people dealing with loss. The different films focus each on different aspects of grieve – especially sadness/depression, anger, regret, guilt, having to grow-up quickly, isolating oneself and (not) accepting help/support. What strikes me as both important and interesting is the way these films approach the issue: Older films like “The Lion King“ and “Brother Bear“ only dealt with the topic “in disguise“. Not only that the main protagonists were (partly) animals, but the aspects of loss and grieving weren‘t really the focal point of the plot. This is what, in my opinion, makes the two most recent films “Big Hero 6“ and “Abominable“ special: A quite young protagonist trying to come to terms with their loss is basically the central theme of both films. In contrast to the older films, these two movies approach the topic more openly, depicting things like depression or showing funeral scenes (the latter also applies to “Frozen“). I personally interpret that as a kind of shift in film-making, especially Disney seemingly becoming “bolder“ as time goes by and no longer producing only “feel-good-movies“, but also films dealing with serious topics - not only mentioning them but actually making them a main theme of the plot. This is especially important since animated films are not only ideally suited to portray “difficult“ subjects in a way that is suitable for young people, but also to show them ways to deal with their own problems and therefore help and support them during severe crises, especially when they lack people to support them in real life. Besides, such films can play an important role in awareness raising.

[theydigthecape]

it may not a kind story, but it is a good one.

it’s not a happy or uplifting story, nor is it a story about superheroes superheroing, saving people and/or ‘the world’. some people die, some people live, and it’s mostly up to chance or fate. some people are saved, some people aren’t, some don’t need to be saved, and some choose not to be saved, if one can term it saving. what constitutes the twinned notion of saving and being saved is based on personal biases and values; it differs depending on the person, and this story acknowledges that. it as well acknowledges the world as important both conceptually and in hard scientific fact, given that without a combination there would be no story to tell

Monstress isn’t a story about ‘a’ world or even ‘the’ world, conceptual or terra firma, though its worldbuilding is fantastic. it is, in fact, a story about women. all sorts of women, living all sorts of lives. it’s a story about mothers, and about the daughters of those mothers, and about the importance of mothers to daughters, and vice versa. it’s a story about one particular daughter of one particular mother, along with all of the mothers and daughters stretched back along their line behind them

it’s a story about a daughter who loved her mother, and who still obsessively loves her mother many years after her mother’s death. it’s a story about a daughter whose dead mother is still the driving force in her life. it’s the story of a daughter who hates her dead mother as much as she loves her, and wants to understand how and why that mother did what she did to make her daughter what she is

it’s a story about monsters, of course; monsters of every branding you could possibly imagine, physical, psychological, metaphorical, and so many more. it’s a story about the perception of monstrosity: about what makes a thing or person seem monstrous to another person, and why. it’s a story that tips its reader’s perceptions over like a raccoon with a waste bin, and leaves the contents scattered about, oracle bones to be interpreted anew

it’s a story about people being ineradicably people, no matter what shape or size or genetic variation they come in, and those kinds of stories will always be favourite

this is Maika Halfwolf, and Monstress is her story

she’s an arcanic, a person whose DNA is a blend of human and Ancient, and her genetics have given her some abilities that, to many people of many different cultures and races, even her own, make her seem monstrous

she’s also a survivor of a genocidal war that slaughtered thousands of arcanics, enslaved them, and butchered them for magical and scientific experiments, as well as to harvest the innate properties of their blood and bones

she’s a trained killer, a living weapon in more than one way, and a source of ancient power that pretty much everyone wants. all she wants is a better understanding of her own nature, along with closure for her traumatic childhood, and she’s not swayed by appeals to her better nature. if someone wants something from her, they’d better have something she needs or wants for bargaining, otherwise it’s right out. for every story where a protagonist is swept along on the ‘good of all’ bullshit fed them, Maika is the ultimate antidote. she does have her soft spots, but they are few and far between, and well hidden

also, if you piss her off too much (or even if you don’t), she has an old god who eats people living in her left arm stump so. yeah, she’s disabled, did i mention?

probably don’t piss her off. except that she lives in a state of permanent pissed off and people will keep trying to get their hands on her

her companions are a fox arcanic (Kippa) and a nekomancer (Ren)

idk, if these two don’t make you want to read this story just by existing...?

so yeah, fox people of all permutations (and wolf people, and bear people, and shark people, and basically every Ancient-human hybrid imaginable). and cats. just cats. lots of cats who are cats that look and act like cats but also speak the languages of Ancients and humans, and can walk on their hind legs if they feel like it (which, i mean. It Happens). look up there at Ren. two tails aside, that could be my cat looking at me and saying, ‘We’re fucked’. it’s very cool feline representation, and it makes me very happy :)

Monstress is steampunk fantasy influenced and informed by Chinese and Japanese legends and mythology, with a side dose of general Western fantasy mythology. the writer is Taiwanese-American, the artist Japanese, and they’re both women. Monstress is written by women about women, and the queer is strong with this one. romantic relationships aren’t the focus, the genre is steampunk fantasy/horror, not romance. but if fantasy with acknowledged and accepted queer life woven through it, a lesbian protagonist, and many queer and queer-coded women and nonbinary characters is your thing, Monstress will make your day

it definitely made mine. i started reading the first volume yesterday, and i’m already on the fourth and thanking providence that there’s a fifth volume left to read and a sixth being released in September, with the comic ongoing. i added it to my pull list last night

fair warning, if it hasn’t come across: this is a gory story. there is child death, and that death is often brutal. it is not, as i stated at the top of this post, a kind story. there’s racism, genocide, people being horrible to other people in most every way they can, though no rape so far, either explicit or alluded to. one more indication that an allo cishet dude’s not writing or drawing for this title

don’t get me wrong, there are many good comics being drawn and written by allo cishet dudes, but. historically most comics writers and artists have been allo cishet dudes, even when the characters they create are queer. i’m very glad that isn’t the case this time out

[princesssarisa]

Some more “Little Women” remarks: the problem of Beth

I honestly think most commentary I’ve read about Beth’s character is bad, both academic and from casual readers.

I understand why. She’s a difficult character. Modern readers who love Little Women and want to celebrate it as a proto-feminist work need to contend with the presence of this thoroughly domestic, shy, sweetly self-effacing character, seemingly the opposite of everything a feminist heroine should be. Meanwhile, other readers who despise Little Women and consider it anti-feminist cite Beth as the embodiment of its supposedly outdated morals. Then there’s the fact that she’s based on Louisa May Alcott’s actual sister, Lizzie Alcott, and does show hints of the real young woman’s complexity, and yet she’s much more idealized than the other sisters, which often makes readers view her as more of a symbol (of what they disagree, but definitely a symbol) than a real person.

But even though the various bad takes on her character are understandable, they’re still obnoxious, and in my humble opinion, not founded in the text.

Here are my views on some of the critics’ opinions I least agree with.

“She’s nothing but a bland, boring model of feminine virtue.”

Of course it’s fair to find her bland and boring. Everyone is entitled to feel how they feel about any character. But she’s not just a cardboard cutout of 19th century feminine virtue. So many people seem to dismiss her shyness as just the maidenly modesty that conduct books used to encourage. But it seems blatantly obvious to me that it’s more than just that. Beth’s crippling shyness is actively portrayed as her “burden,” just like Jo’s temper or Meg and Amy’s vanity and materialism. She struggles with it. Her parents have homeschooled her because her anxiety made the classroom unbearable for her – no conduct book has ever encouraged that! In Part 1, she has a character arc of overcoming enough of her shyness to make new friends like Mr. Laurence and Frank Vaughn. Then, in Part 2, she has the arc of struggling to accept her impending death: she doesn’t face it with pure serenity, but goes through a long journey of both physical and emotional pain before she finds peace in the end. Her character arcs might be quieter and subtler than her sisters’, but she’s not the static figure she’s often misremembered as being.

‘She needs to die because her life has no meaning outside of her family and the domestic sphere.”

In all fairness, Beth believes this herself: she says she was “never meant” to live long because she’s just “stupid little Beth,” with no plans for the future and of no use to anyone outside the home. But for readers to agree with that assessment has massive unfortunate implications! The world is full of both women and men who – whether because of physical or mental illness, disability, autism, Down Syndrome, or some other reason – can’t attend regular school, don’t make friends easily, are always “young for their age,” don’t get married or have romantic relationships, aren’t able to hold a regular job, never live apart from their families, and lead quiet, introverted, home-based lives. Should we look at those real people and think they all need to die? I don’t think so! Besides, it seems to me that the book actively refutes Beth’s self-deprecation. During both of her illnesses, it’s made clear how many people love her and how many people’s lives her quiet kindness has touched – not just her family and few close friends, but the neighbors, the Hummels (of course), the local tradespeople she interacts with, and the children she sews gifts for who write her letters of gratitude. Then there’s the last passage written from her viewpoint before her death, where she finds Jo’s poem that describes what a positive influence her memory will always be, and realizes that her short, quiet life hasn’t been the waste she thought it was. How anyone can read that passage and still come away viewing her life as meaningless is beyond me.

“She needs to die because she symbolizes a weak, outdated model of femininity.”

SparkNotes takes this interpretation of Beth and it annoys me to think of how many young readers that study guide has probably taught to view her this way. No matter how feisty and unconventional Louisa May Alcott was, and no mater how much she personally rebelled against passive, domestic femininity, would she really have portrayed her beloved sister Lizzie as “needing to die” because she was “too weak to survive in the modern world”? Would she really have turned Lizzie’s tragic death into a symbol of a toxic old archetype’s welcome death? But even if Beth were a purely fictional character and not based on the author’s sister, within the text she’s much too beloved and too positive an influence on everyone around her for this interpretation to feel right. This seems less like a valid reading of her character and more like wishful thinking on the part of some feminist scholars.

“She's a symbol of pure goodness who needs to die because she’s Too Good For This Sinful Earth™.”

Enough with the reasons why Beth “needs to die”! At least this one isn’t insulting. But I don’t think it’s really supported by the text either. If she were a symbol of goodness too pure for this world, then she wouldn’t forget to feed her pet bird for a week and lose him to starvation. She wouldn’t get snappish when she’s bored, even if she does only vent her frustration on her doll. She wouldn’t struggle with social anxiety, or dislike washing dishes, or be explicitly described as “not an angel” by the narrator because she can’t help but long for a better piano than the one she has. Now of course those flaws (except for accidentally letting her bird die) are minute compared to her sisters’. It’s fair to say that only “lip service” is paid to Beth’s humanity in an otherwise angelic portrayal. But it seems clear that Alcott did try to make her more human than other saintly, doomed young girls from the literature of her day: she’s certainly much more real than little Eva from Uncle Tom’s Cabin, for example.

“She’s destroyed by the oppressive model of femininity she adheres to.”

This argument holds that because Beth’s selfless care for others causes her illness, her story’s purpose is to condemn the expectation that women toil endlessly to serve others. But if Alcott meant to convey that message, I’d think she would have had Beth get sick by doing some unnecessary selfless deed. Helping a desperately poor, single immigrant mother take care of her sick children isn’t unnecessary. That’s not the kind of selflessness to file under “things feminists should rebel against.”

“She’s a symbol of ideal 19th century femininity, whom all three of her sisters – and implicitly all young female readers – are portrayed as needing to learn to be like.”

Whether people take this view positively (e.g. 19th and early 20th century parents who held up Beth as the model of sweet docility they wanted from their daughters) or negatively (e.g. feminists who can’t forgive Alcott for “remaking Jo in Beth’s image” by the end), I honestly think they’re misreading the book. I’ve already outlined the ways in which Beth struggles and grows just like her sisters do. If any character is portrayed as the ideal woman whom our young heroines all need to learn to be like, it’s not Beth, it’s Marmee. She combines aspects of all her daughters’ best selves (Meg and Beth’s nurturing, Jo’s strong will and Amy’s dignity) and she’s their chief source of wise advice and moral support. Yet none of her daughters become exactly like her either. They all maintain their distinct personalties, even as they grow. Admittedly, Beth’s sisters do sometimes put her on a pedestal as the person they should emulate – i.e. Amy during Beth’s first illness and Jo in the months directly after her death. But in both of those cases, their grief-inspired efforts are short-lived and they eventually go back to their natural boldness and ambitions. They just combine them with more of Beth’s kindness and unselfishness than before.

“She wills her own death.”

Of all these interpretations, this one is possibly the most blatantly contradicted by the text. Just because Beth’s fatal illness is vague and undefined beyond “she never recovered her strength after her scarlet fever” doesn’t mean it's caused by a lack of “will to live”; just because she interprets her lack of future plans or desire to leave home to mean that she’s “not meant to live long” doesn’t mean she’s so afraid to grow up that she wants to die. It’s made very clear that Beth wants to get well. Even though she tries to hide her deep depression from her family and face death willingly, she’s still distraught to have her happy life cut short.

I’ll admit that I’m probably biased, because as as a person on the autism spectrum who’s also struggled with social anxiety and led an introverted, home-based life, I personally relate to Beth. If I didn’t find her relatable, these interpretations would probably annoy me less. But I still think they’re based on a shallow overview of Beth’s character, combined with disdain for girls who don’t fit either the tomboyish “Jo” model or the sparkling “Amy” model of lively, outgoing young womanhood, rather than a close reading of the book.

[ramblings-of-a-mad-cat]

I've never met ANYONE who actually likes the Chibnall era. Would you seriously say that it's objectively good?

Brace yourself for unpopular (albeit positive) opinions.

Objectively? I don't know, I tend to feel like media is very much subjective and down to opinion. But on the whole...yeah. I'm gonna say yeah. I think the Chibnall era thus far is every bit as good as the Moffat Era and Davies Era were. It actually blows my mind to see the fandom come together and almost universally agree that the show has gone downhill. It's part of the reason why I kind of stepped away from the Doctor Who fandom because there's something very demoralizing about re-watching clips from Season 12 and seeing literally every comment just talk about how the show is ruined. And if I re-watch old clips, very often I come across comments that talk about how the show "used to" be good, and should have ended with Twelve, etc. I know a little reluctance toward the new Doctor can be part of the transition process, but normally the fans are over it by now.

Things haven't really changed.

I've been re-watching Twelve's era, and found a new appreciation for him. But I re-watched Thirteen's era right beforehand, and you know what? It holds up. Season 11 is remarkably strong. I can't think of a single "bad" episode in that season. It focuses on the characters, and thus it doesn't have nearly as strong ambitions, compared to one of the Moffat seasons, which were clever but often convoluted. They couldn't always stick the landing. (Looking at you, Season 6) But every has it's good parts and it's bad. The same man who wrote The Wedding of River Song and betrayed the entire season's storyline in the process...also wrote The Doctor Falls, which is probably my favorite final episode of any season ever. The Chibnall Era is the same way. The Tsuranga Conundrum isn't really a bad episode, it's just kind of forgettable, apart from the Pting. But then it is immediately followed up by Demons of the Punjab, which is an exceptional story in every way. I want the Thijurians to return for Thirteen's regeneration, I'm saying it.

My point being that even if there are episodes you can't stand in the new era, is that really exclusive to Chibnall? All the way back in Season 1, they had The Long Game, which I remember disliking, but it was sandwiched between Dalek and Father's Day, which are in my opinion, the two best episodes of that season. A lot of people don't like Orphan 55, for example. But it's followed up by Nikola Tesla's Night of Terror. Does anyone really dislike that episode? You're valid if you do, but I think it's really good. Ask me about any episode in the Chibnall Era, and I'll find something to like about it. (Except maybe Arachnids in the UK...and that one's not even bad, just kind of weak.) Because like I said, there is good and bad in every season...and I do think that the fandom has overblown how "bad" the Chibnall Era is...though that may be in part because I think this era is generally good? Incredible companions, solid episodes, a great Doctor, and hey...this era actually made the Daleks scary again. That is impressive. Even most of the hated episodes, like Orphan 55 as I mentioned...I enjoy them.

I stand by that. I think this era is great. If anything, I don't like that they reduced how many episodes we get, because some of these stories, like The Witchfinders and It Takes You Away especially Fugitive of The Judoon, are just begging to be two-parters. Spyfall is the only real two-parter we've had, in my opinion (Ascension of the Cybermen and The Timeless Children feel like two separate stories to me) and the episode was much stronger for having the extra time. If I have one genuine criticism with the Chibnall Era as a whole, it is the stark contrast between Seasons 11 and 12. I love Season 11, I thought it was beautiful. I like it far more than most people. I also truly enjoyed Season 12. But they are worlds apart, with Season 11 feeling so standalone and Season 12 picking up with a big storyline that really hadn't been hinted at all in the previous outing. The tone is also different, with The Doctor and "the fam" having a distance between them that seems to have developed offscreen in between seasons. It was as though Chibnall wanted to give everyone a breather from big overarching plots after the Moffat Era, but then after one season he decided "break's over" because he wanted to tell his story. And that's okay! It is. But it's jarring. Anyway, let's talk about Chibnall's storyline. You know where this is going.

"That" episode.

I meant what I said before. There isn't a single episode that I actively hate as much as say, Listen. Now let's get very controversial, because I know what y'all are thinking. "Not even The Timeless Children?" And I'll just get this out of the way right now: I don't think The Timeless Children, or it's twist, ruins Doctor Who. I don't think it gets anywhere close. I mentioned before that I was demoralized reading the comments on a clip of Doctor Who...to no one's surprise, it was this episode. Now, I may just be biased...after all, I didn't even hate Hell Bent. But while I have my criticisms of Season 12, The Doctor's revised backstory accounts for exactly none of them. You want to know what really bothers me? That we had a seven season buildup to Gallifrey's rescue, a nine season buildup to it's return...only for the show to do nothing with it, and then just destroy it again a couple of seasons later. As someone who loved The Day of The Doctor, I'm mad about that. Among other reasons, destroying Gallifrey is the kind of card you can really only play once.

So no, I don't think The Timeless Children is perfect. The Doctor had a seven season character arc culminating in them learning the lesson that using The Moment would be wrong, and that it was never okay to do something like that. To hear her even consider using The Death Particle, that "Or, a solution" line in response to Ryan appropriately reacting in horror? Yeah, that upset me. I don't like that Gallifrey is gone again, and even if The Doctor wasn't the one to do it, she almost did, and she left someone else to do it in her stead. That bothers me more than The Timeless Child ever could. That being said...the Timeless Child doesn't bother me. Seriously, it blows my mind that people act like this twist ruins Doctor Who. It...really doesn't, guys.

It does not insult the legacy of William Hartnell. He is still The First Doctor. It's not like there isn't a precedent for secret incarnations from The Doctor's past. We didn't start calling Christopher Eccleston The Tenth Doctor after we found out about John Hurt. Nothing can change The First Doctor's status or take it away, nor do I think Chibnall is trying. He is doing what I've actually wanted Doctor Who to do for a while. Give us a story about The Doctor's childhood. (Listen doesn't count, I don't care, that was all kinds of bad.) Let me ask you, what does this really change? I've seen people complain about the revision of The Doctor's history...but there's a precedent for that too. We could play bingo with how many times Clara fundamentally altered or influenced the show's history. She is the reason he started traveling, the reason he chose his Tardis, and the reason he saved Gallifrey. Why doesn't that bother people, if this does?

I also understand it if people dislike this change because they feel as though it makes The Doctor a kind of chosen one, compared to them having just been an average person who wanted to make a difference. I get that. However, this is down to interpretation, and there are so many ways to interpret The Doctor. Some people love it when The Doctor goes dark, other people cannot stand it and view it as out of character. Some people love it when The Doctor is heroic and badass, when they save the day...others would prefer that they take the backseat, teaching the humans how to save the day themselves. "The man who makes people better." And which interpretation you get, where it falls on the spectrum...it will vary from writer to writer. Moffat loved to make everything about The Doctor, and Davies frequently compared him to an angel or a god. This is not the first time that the show has portrayed The Doctor as a godlike being. It's not even close to the first time. And honestly? I don't think this makes The Doctor special or supernatural. I think it makes them a victim, nothing more. A victim of child abuse.

People also disliked this episode for removing the mystery behind The Doctor...but I fail to see how it did that? There are so. Many. Questions. That this finale opens up. Where did The Doctor come from? How and why did they get to our universe? What exactly is The Division? What went down between them and The Doctor? Where is Tecteun? (No, she's not Rassilon...) As the Masters asks, "What did they do to you, Doctor? How many lives have you had?" Amid all of the comments that made me sad, I did see a great one about how the original creator of Doctor Who actually didn't like it when they introduced the Timelords, because she felt that it boxed the show in and removed the mystery behind The Doctor, and how "She would have loved this episode." I agree with that. (Still salty that they destroyed Gallifrey though...) You know, I am genuinely interested in this story and where it's going to go, especially with the sixtieth anniversary approaching. But it depresses me that they might scale it back now, after how much the fandom has risen up against it. Not that I'm saying the fans shouldn't be happy, but...it's clear that a story is trying to be told here, and I think it should have that chance.

To each their own, of course. But I will never understand why this era is so hated.

[sylvies-chen]

Chicago PD's Characters and the Role of Reform: an Analysis (???)

Hi everyone! The finales of One Chicago aired a couple of weeks ago by now but I've been preparing this post in my head ever since PD's finale aired. I wanted to talk/write about each character's (and maybe even the writers') interpretation of police reform and how it affects the plot. This will also talk about police reform in general. Before I start, I'd just like to state that this will be a bit long and probably biased since a lot of it is influenced by my own views on reform. I'm not interested in debating people on the internet, just putting out interesting perspective on an interesting TV show. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this and feel free to add thoughts of your own— as long as they’re respectful!

Chicago PD's handling of reform in this season was far from perfect but I did enjoy a few things they did with it. We had Kevin, a POC, stand up and fight back when even the people closest to him tried to shut him down. I did have some issue with the way they reduced Kevin's entire set of beliefs/morals to something so trivial and disrespectful as a "woke card" but I think the writers chose to do that on purpose to show how blinded white people can be sometimes. It's more the characters using that term, not the writers, which I thought was a good move since in both situations— Kevin v. Voight in 8x02 and Kevin v. Adam in 8x16– they made sure it's clear that Kevin is in the right. Voight may have been frustrated and Adam may have been spiraling over losing Kim (love me some #Burzek), but Kevin was still in the right. If only we could have some more varied representation on this show! That way, Kevin wouldn’t have to be used as the emotional punching bag all the time for these white characters and their misplaced frustrations with the system (added onto their personal frustrations which fluctuate on a episode-to-episode basis).

Now, onto the view on reform because this is where it gets interesting. I'm going to go ahead and say something that might be controversial: I think the majority of conflicts in this season have come from a gross misinterpretation of the concept of reform. This is especially highlighted in the finale when we see Adam saying he should be able to change/bend/break the rules to save someone he loves. It's also shown in the case with Miller's son Darrell and how they need to break the rules to save him, the case in 8x11 that Hailey considers breaking the rules for. It could even be loosely applies to 8x06 when Jay feels the need to break the rules only slightly in order to serve proper justice for their victim's father. Proper justice, in this case for Jay, being mercy towards the father and doing what's right in Jay's mind. Notice a common theme? These characters who are against reform (I know Voight was so good most of the season but he still falls into that category because of the first and last two episodes) all have one thing in common: the way they view reform. Voight, Hailey, and Adam, somewhere along the line (in my opinion), have all come to think of reform as a social push to get police officers to adhere to the proper guidelines when in reality, that's only a small fraction of an otherwise complex concept. Reform isn't all about getting police to follow the rules-- reform in and of itself is recognizing that the rules that are set into place aren't always effective. There are rules that are discriminatory, rules that are bureaucratic nonsense, rules that disproportionately affect specific groups of people, and rules that create roadblocks to solving real problems. Hell, the original police systems in North America especially were created to persecute minorities and maintain military power over citizens. The need for reform is referencing a larger systemic issue and getting police officers to follow the most basic procedures is just the tip of the iceberg. I don't want to get too much into the principles behind reform here because I am no expert. I recognize that because I am white I benefit from these rules/systems put into place so my voice shouldn't matter in the grand scheme of things, but I do think the majority of the tensions in this season of Chicago PD stem from the extreme oversimplification of reform. It surprised me too when I thought about it because they've managed to explore the grey areas/more complex aspects of it, but I think the writers are intentionally making that decision which makes it really interesting.

Throughout the season, I couldn’t help but feel that these characters considered reform as the push from the public to adhere to guidelines-- as they should, obviously-- but while ignoring the more nuanced principles of reform such as asking themselves questions like: is what I'm doing truly helping the communities we've sworn to serve and protect? Are the solutions us cops in Intelligence are offering permanent solutions? Should we be rethinking our principles of justice to be less retributive and more procedural-- or even more restorative?

This is all in reference to the characters, of course, not the writers. We have Voight, Hailey, and Adam resisting reform because they don’t see value in following the rules. But reform, in its purest form, is recognizing that the rules need changing, which is why it’s so interesting to see the “opposing side” against it even though they also believe the rules aren’t helping them. So I think it's really good and interesting how the writers have written these characters as having very complex and layered discussions/arguments about reform and about justice while still doing that. Because their contempt for the rules comes from a place of wanting to carry out justice, just like Kevin and all the others who push for reform, but they’re motivated by ideals closer to retributive justice and using their position of power to exact a more personal form of justice. Because of Hailey, Adam, and Voight’s more personal and intimate views of justice, their solutions always feel short-term. For example, Voight murdering suspects, bashing in cars, etc. This is all stuff that creates a temporary fix but their passion towards justice makes them care more about the personal, emotional release that kind of justice brings than the actual, long-term change. This is especially shown in that one scene where Hailey tells Jay the story about how a clerical error made an offender walk, which she sort of views as a reason why breaking the rules should be allowed whereas Kevin would view that as a reason why the rules need changing. Again, short-term vs. long-term.

This is not to say that Hailey, Voight, and Adam are evil, obviously. They're complicated, but they're far from evil. (Well, the jury’s still out on Voight. Haha!) What this show is portraying, however, is how the ideas of reform can be fleeting and temporary and all-around fickle in the minds of these characters when they reach a certain breaking point. They're able to throw this aside because they're all white, so it doesn't affect them personally. But right off the bat in season 8 we've seen it affect Kevin professionally AND personally in every single way. Others are almost viewing it as a social trend or a push to be a rule-follower though which is why both Adam and Voight, when put under emotional distress, are so easily able to downplay Kevin's push for doing things the right way. (Even though, really, he's asking for the bare minimum here of following the rules and not killing people.) Kevin, ever the conscience of the group, doesn’t put up with it and keeps people in check which can be extremely aggravating when you’re in a very emotional state and want to let your emotions lead you on a rampage. Hence, this is the root cause of the majority of tensions between the unit— in season 8 especially.

Anyway, this is all to say that I think this season of Chicago PD has done quite a lot in terms of portraying reform and the need for systemic change while still staying true to their characters and delving into how their privelege has led to them misinterpreting reform. Which leads to the portraying of some fairly corrupt policing, but never condoning it. At the very least, they show how it's less important for these characters since they all have a breaking point where reform becomes moot whereas for a black man like Kevin, it's more firmly ingrained into him. That’s a concept that is all too common in the real world, and one I appreciated that they represented even though some things weren’t so great.

[beatricebidelaire]

my own opinion, under read more so as not to influence people before voting

anyway, highly biased personal interpretation, ofc. but i think b has a higher body count in murder, e has a higher body count in sex

so, murder first. i am a book canon >>>>> netflix canon person so this will mainly be my thoughts stemming from book canon. that said, even if in netflix the count's death was an accident and the dart was meant for esme, that meant that she was willing to kill esme, even if she didn't end up succeeding, but that's a whole other essay which i've already talked about a lot when s3 came out so not the focus here.

canonically (book canon) we knew beatrice had a hand in the opera night and we knew nothing concrete about ernest (although netflix canon did have a scene of ernest killing larry). for more practical aspects beatrice, before her .... retirement/semi-retirement or whatever, seems like someone who has various missions, taking her to various places. and ernest is stuck at the hotel. if the hotel has a lot of murders, or even just "suspicious accidental deaths" occurring, it would bring suspicion from authorities, probably, and also would have less likely been deemed "the last safe place". it's more of a neutral ground. i'm not saying a murder has never occurred there nor ernest has never done it, but logistically i think the frequency would have been way less. practically speaking. i don't strongly swing either way in "ernest has only ever passed messages and been accomplices and involved in other crimes and has never killed anyone" or "ernest definitely has killed, he has blood on his hands", personally i can see it being either way. i think he possibly could have killed, but also possibly could have never needed to do it himself even if he were ever accomplice. but i do think, just from their respective roles they had to play, beatrice would more likely have been the one who killed more. that said, ernest could very much have killed before, too. or he could have never done it. either way, i don't think he has a higher count than beatrice.

another point is that if she's capable of murdering the parents of her childhood friend, one has to wonder if this is her first (or only) kill, bc if she's capable of even that, how much else is she capable of. and would vfd send a volunteer, even a well-trained one, to murder their friend's parent(s) in their first murder mission, without sending her on some .... other missions as practice, first?

__

sex.

beatrice is popular and in a way sort of, the girl almost everyone has a crush on, but i think for a lot of people she's just, someone they considered out of their league / having no chance, since she's always been in a relationship or another - most primarily lemony and then bertrand. possibly there's a time of both where all three of them were together.

kit and beatrice have some kind of, lowkey mutual pining situation going on which they never talked about (at least, not until it's too late) and might not even be aware of the other person's feelings and in generally only considered / or allowed themselves to consider that the other person merely think of them as a very good friend. they have a line they do not cross.

beatrice and r may possibly have a brief thing going during the period where lemony and beatrice were not together, but possibly they never got to more than kissing; or possibly at a younger age r is more open about her attraction to girls where beatrice is more repressed so even though r had a brief crush (like a lot of people), ultimately she didn't want to be with beatrice if beatrice is not ready for that, and then there's her friendship with lemony, so she moved on. by the time beatrice is perhaps ready for that, they have already missed their chance.

beatrice and esme definitely fucked though like even if im going with the timeline of, beamony being together since teenage years until their breakup, and sometime afterwards bertrand, and there's possibly not a lot of gap in between, i still think beasme happened. not as a relationship, nothing that serious. they may not even liked each other very much at any point, but they fucked.

anyway beatrice is just ...... out of reach for a lot of people, within reach for some but there were lots of lost chances and missed opportunities and unsaid feelings there. and she's more of a public figure in a way ernest isn't - if ernest takes off his uniform he could easily become just another face in the crowd, but beatrice is an actress known by people so getting one night stands or just casual sex is probably easier for him. and if beatrice was ever close enough with anyone else, you'd think we'd get a mention in the beatrice letters.

[i would love you if you marry someone else -- your co-star, perhaps, or Y, or even O, or anyone Z through A, even R] - granted "z through a" is a large range but if she ever truly close enough with someone, i think they'd get a specific mention. like "co-star" (which i interpreted as bertrand), or R. or this "Y" person. i think O is implied to be olaf but since im b&o platonic codependency truther you all know where i stand on that one. so that's, not a lot of people here.

ernest, on the other hand, practically lives at a hotel full of rooms that could easily arrange for hookups if he wanted/needed. and people mostly recognize the managers by their uniform (as they do concierges), so with a few simple disguises and changing into something else he could be just another face in the crowd. and even when he's assuming his manager identity, there's also the ambiguity in it, where he could sleep with someone without them knowing he's just "one of the managers", or sometimes possibly assuming that he is his brother. and we didn't have any canonically known relationships he was ever involved in. for me i just think he would definitely get more chances at casual sex. possibly there will be period where it's more difficult as the schism worsens, and distrust of different sides diminish this possibility, but before that point, i don;t think it would always be so hard. possibly very few serious relationships, but we're not talking about serious relationships here.

[ectonurites]

I don’t think it’s fair to reduce the way tim treated steph to ‘he treats her like a damsel bc he’s worried for her’ when he could be rlly condescending and treated her like she was incompetent a lot of the time. like..writers may frame that as him being worried for her but it’s sexism

I agree with you in general but I want to talk about this more (under the cut) because I don’t think those things need to be considered separate the way it feels like you’re implying. A huge part of the ‘treating her like a damsel in distress’ idea I was talking about is the ‘treating her like she’s incompetent/he knows more than her’ which itself is extremely condescending, and all of that is definitely rooted in sexism and I never meant to imply it wasn’t.

(Detective Comics (2016) #934)

To start I want to clarify that in the answer from last night that I used the ‘damsel’ terminology for (again I was specifically referencing the ‘damsel in distress’ trope/archetype, I guess that may not have been clear since I was just saying ‘damsel’) i was more broadly trying to refer to a common theme in his behavior among several of his canon relationships not just with Steph, because that’s how things often felt with Ariana, Tam, etc, and there are aspects of it at play with Steph among other things because their relationship was fleshed out more and very complicated. I’ve talked about some of this stuff with Tim’s relationships before here. 

Tim has struggled with treating his romantic partners as equals for several reasons I think but some big ones are def internalized sexism and ideas related to heteronormativity (The internalized heteronormativity stuff is something I’ve also talked about with him here a bit when discussing my views on his sexuality/his attraction to women) and with Steph I think you could also argue for a level of classism being involved too. However it can be tricky figuring out exactly how much of these things are ‘biases of the writers that they put into their works and it clearly also effects other characters aside from just him’ vs ‘we are intentionally writing the character to have these as traits’, ya know? Especially with a character who’s been written by so many different people which leads to inconsistency. 

In general though I feel like these internalized biases he definitely has to some extent just by being an upperclass and (in canon, even if we as fans chose to interpret him differently) cishet guy can contribute to what I was talking about with him feeling like he has to ‘protect’ partners ‘for their own good’. Heteronormative ideas about what ‘the guy’ is supposed to do plus some internalized sexism causing him to see himself as inherently more skilled/prepared for things can absolutely connect to him being overprotective and/or controlling. (I do think an aspect of those tendencies comes from his general sense of duty and need to protect people though, as that’s a huge motivator for him being a hero and he’s one of those people that just takes the weight of the world on his shoulders at times. But something like the way he sometimes seems incapable of accepting that someone like Steph can protect herself is definitely rooted in sexism)

And like, the stuff you’re talking about with him being condescending and treating Steph as incompetent is related to that in a lot of ways. He often doesn’t really see her as being cut out for hero life, mainly because Bruce didn’t approve of her as a hero at times due to a mix of fears about her becoming another Jason (in the era before Red Hood stuff happened though, I mean that as in her getting killed in action) and his own sexism. Bruce’s opinion is probably the most prominent justification from Tim’s perspective for why he feels he needs to protect her and tell her what to do early on in their knowing each other, but there’s definitely underlying sexism at play there from him as well because he just has the automatic mentality of ‘ah yes im the superhero guy and she is the inexperienced one who has no idea what she’s doing clearly this is my responsibility now’. 

However I do think his reasoning for this way of thinking shifted later, and by the end of the Robin comic where they have that rooftop fight in #182 he’s seeing her as unfit for the life because of more specific things aside from just ‘sexism and Batman said so’. Like uhhhh the entire last arc of Robin (once FabNic took over the comic so #176-the end), with her going behind his back and nearly getting him killed, etc. Like, he still has no right to try to control her and the way he went about communicating his point to her was wrong and likely influenced once again by internalized sexism (he even admits later that the way he phrased things was ‘mean-spirited’ once he’d cooled off a bit), but there are some pretty clear reasons by that point as to why he’s saying he thinks she shouldn’t be a hero anymore. Again, doesn’t make him right, but I see that scene float around without proper context pretty frequently which definitely misrepresents the situation. You could definitely start to talk about sexism in FabNic’s writing here though and how he literally made all this shit be Steph’s fault basically as soon as she got officially brought back (literally Tim finds out she’s alive again in Robin #174 and by #176 she’s already doing things behind his back it’s ridiculous)

But anyways, the point in all that is that sexism is absolutely a factor in him thinking she’s someone he needs to worry about/protect and him treating her like she’s incompetent and incapable of doing so herself, and that those things are related. In general the combination of all that is what I meant about treating the girls he’s been with as ‘damsels in distress he’s worried about’, if that makes sense. By using the phrasing I did I wasn’t trying to reduce it to being something less than or different from that. I was more just talking about the way the behavior exhibits itself rather than taking a deep dive into where the behavior comes from.

Also side tangent but briefly circling back to part of what I said earlier, I really do think that bringing up the ‘biases of writers’ aspect is important in these conversations, because when a writer is sexist as fuck and thinks certain things are normal those ideas will bleed into their writing through the characters, and like it doesn’t mean we should necessarily just ignore what they wrote because it’s stuff that still happened but like, it should be acknowledged as such. In general there has been so much misogyny/sexism in the handling of Steph, I feel like that’s a pretty commonly understood thing. I mean hell even aside from more recent discussion about it all, you can also look around online and see the kinds of reactions there were to her treatment in War Games and the follow up stuff when it was still new, the end section on Steph in this 2005 (so before the ‘Steph is alive’ retcon) discussion of misogyny in the batbooks for example. And while yes we should hold Tim as a character responsible for his specific actions with her, we should also remember how people in charge at DC decided Steph was “toxic” for years and wouldn’t let her show up anywhere because they just wanted her gone, how they made her Robin to create more interest in her as a character before killing her off, etc etc. 

[scripttorture]

I have no idea if you can help me, but I am working on a short story that starts after a Sami girl is recovering from being tortured by Christian police after her father is put on trial for witchcraft. This is during the witch trials in Norway. I wanted to focus on recovery in the community and her animistic religion. However, I don’t know what kind of torture she could realistically be recovering from and if, aside from punishment, it should religiously motivated. Do you have any English links?

I put this one off for a long time hoping that the virus situation would improve enough for me to a) have less stress at work and b) be able to access the university library in my town. It doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.

 Norwegian history in the 1600s isn’t my strong suit. So my focus here is going to be advice on how to research this. I’ll also include the bits I found and some tortures so common that you can throw them in to virtually any setting without it standing out or being inaccurate.

 Before I get any further I don’t know anything about Sami culture. I’d strongly recommend trying to find Sami sensitivity readers if you haven’t already. Because it can be bloody hard to get accurate information on some of Europe’s oppressed minorities and I’d say the Sami fall squarely into that category.

 Historical research is fraught with pitfalls and when you’re starting out it can be really difficult to figure out which sources to trust. This only becomes worse when you’re working across a language barrier. And when the focus is torture it gets even more difficult.

 Torture has always been a hot button issue.

 The fact that virtually every culture has a history of torture doesn’t change that. Cultural ideas about what was ‘more painful’ or ‘more brutal’ or ‘shaming’ have all played a role in what was deemed ‘acceptable’ cruelty. So has the idea of who is an ‘acceptable’ or ‘deserving’ victim.

 And that means that misrepresenting the typical tortures of different countries, cultures, religious groups or past regimes has been part of political practice for literally hundreds of years. It is a very easy way to direct people’s hate and elicit an emotional response.

 I can’t stress enough how important it is to consider an author’s motivations, biases and abilities when you read historical sources.

 Think about whether an author was actually there for the events they describe. Think about their political and religious positions and what they may have to gain by pushing a particular message.

 Apologies if some of this comes across as teaching you how to suck eggs, but I know a lot of people don’t get this lesson in their history classes. So sources-

 Historical sources can be broadly categorised into primary and secondary sources. A primary source is something produced at the time. A secondary source is something produced later.

 Both can be untrustworthy/biased but a primary source gives you information about how events/practices were interpreted at the time, while a secondary sources tells you how they were remembered later.

 Primary sources can be things like diaries, court records of witch trials and objects produced in areas like Finnmark (northern Norway where most of the witch trials took place) at the time. Secondary sources might be things like how the witch trials are discussed in Norwegian history books and local history or stories about the witch trials that are told today.

 By reading about this in English you’re mostly being limited to secondary sources. The danger here is that secondary sources can misrepresent the time period they’re describing, deliberately or not. Authors make assumptions about how historical people lived, thought, what their actions meant and how their beliefs influenced their actions.

 Primary sources can also misrepresent what happened (deliberately or not) but with primary sources they are at least displaying the biases and concerns of the time.

 Generally historical research is about the collation and interpretation of primary sources. Which is a lot of work, requires a degree of expertise and often demands fluency in several languages.

 That level of work and knowledge appeals to some authors of historical fiction. But it isn’t for everyone. There’s nothing wrong with choosing to rely on history textbooks and the like instead of digging through transcriptions of things written back in the 1600s.

 Here’s the problem when you’re doing that for another country: English language sources are often very very biased in favour of other English language sources.

 This means if some bored academic in the 1930s made up a bunch of fan theories based on very little evidence it will probably still be used as a source today.

 And without having another language (with access to other sources it provides) it can be really difficult to spot that kind of fuckery.

 I am not saying that you need to learn Norwegian and believe me as someone with only one spoken language I understand how tackling a new one can be crazy intimidating.

 But I think you do need to know Norwegians. Particularly Norwegians with an interest in history.

 That’s all general stuff about researching historical periods in different countries.

 For torture in particular… I’m not gonna lie it’s a sack of angry snakes.

 Both primary and secondary often have considerable motivation for lying about torture. Historical accounts routinely downplay or outright lie about the damage different tortures cause. They are heavily judgemental about victims.

 And they run in to exactly the same issues we have trying to study use of different tortures today with the added difficulty that accounts from torturers are preserved far more frequently then accounts from survivors.

 It’s only once you start getting to the 1900s that you really start to see multiple survivor accounts of events. For the 1600s as a general period I can think of witness accounts and multiple accounts from torturers or their bosses in various countries. But the testimony of survivors is very very rare.

 This is an issue because we know from modern research that torturers routinely lie about what they do.

 There were laws in most European countries in this period that cover torture. They tend to define a sort of ‘accepted practice’: what torturers were supposed to do and for how long. And don’t get me wrong these are useful historical sources.

 But we know from comparing similar torture manuals used in the 1930s (and indeed more recently) to multiple accounts from torture survivors that torturers do not follow their own rules. I see no reason why torturers today would be less likely to follow ‘the rules’ then their historical predecessors.

 Looking up the laws of the land at the historical time period you’re interested in is a good place to start. But it won’t actually tell you everything that torturers did and it may not represent the most common tortures.

 It will give you a list of things that were definitely used at the time in that place though. Which isn’t a bad place to start.

 Look for history books that cover crime and punishment. If you can’t find one broad enough to do that (or give you a helpful summary of laws at the time) then I’ve found that accounts of specific historical figures in the relevant area/time often contain some of that information.

 The next major pitfall when researching historical torture is the bane of my existence: euphemisms.

 A lot of historical sources use vague or euphemistic terms for different tortures and then leave it up to the reader to figure out what they mean. This was probably perfectly clear at the time but now… less so.

 To use an example from something I’ve been trying to research for a while now I can tell you that the Ancient Egyptians definitely used torture. They say as much in surviving accounts of their justice system. They used it to punish, force confessions and attempt to gain information.

 They definitely beat people with sticks. They say they did, in multiple accounts. There are also wall carvings and paintings that show prisoners of war and enslaved people being menaced with sticks.

 However, I can’t find any definite suggestion that they used falaka, ie beating the soles of the feet with those sticks.

 Did they just hit people at random? This seems unlikely from a practical viewpoint as that’s a very easy way to kill someone. Did they ignore the feet and concentrate on other areas of the body? Did they use falaka and also beat other areas? Do I bring too much bias into this question because I’d love to find a historical point of origin for a torture that’s common throughout the Middle East today?

 Historical sources often just don’t contain the details we need to be certain about what torture they’re describing. Terminology is often vague. Descriptions can be contradictory. Often the only way to be certain is to come across an illustration or surviving device and even then this does not necessarily represent common practice and either piece of evidence could be contemporary propaganda rather then something that was actually used.

 When you’re talking about historical torture it is essential to find multiple sources and make sure they agree.

 Vague terminology like ‘water torture’ can cover a host of different sins. Finding a vague term or euphemism multiple times doesn’t even tell you if this was the same practice carried out in different areas or different practices with superficial similarities.

 If a source doesn’t give you enough information to be sure don’t use it. If a source suggests the meaning of a euphemism based on no clear evidence from the time period don’t use it.

 What I’ve found in my own small collection of books on witchcraft is very sparse on details.

 One of the older books I have suggests that there were almost no witch hunts or witch trials in Scandinavia which is complete bollocks. The book was published in 1959, so I’d suggest being wary of English language sources from that date and earlier.

 A much more recent (2017) Oxford University Press book on the subject gives an estimated 400-500 executions for witchcraft in Norway during the period of 1601-1670.

 This might seem like a small number compared to the thousands that were executed throughout the Holy Roman Empire but it seems a significant number given that the Norwegian trials were so concentrated in a small, sparsely populated region.

 Unfortunately this book is a very general overview of the perception of witchcraft and magic throughout Europe from the ancient world to the present. So it doesn’t really give any details of the kinds of tortures a Norwegian accused of witchcraft might endure.

 The author of the chapter on the witch trials was Rita Voltmer, University of Trier in case that’s helpful. She has published several papers on witch trials and the use of torture and at least one on witch trials in Norway. However a lot of her work is in German.

 These two papers/chapters in particular may be of interest: the english language document on torture and emotion in witch trials and the German paper on Norwegian and Danish witch trials.

 Several of the books I’ve got access to confirmed that Norway burnt witches and provided stories focused on shapeshifting and causing storms at sea. They also confirmed the use of torture in witch trials but nothing so helpful as the kind of tortures employed.

 I found multiple references to ‘water torture’. One of these implied that the particular torture was waterboarding alla the historical Dutch method. But the same source said this caused vomiting or possibly diarrhoea which seems to imply pumping.

 At a guess I’d say pumping is less likely because waterboarding can cause vomiting and so far as I know pumping wasn’t common anywhere in Europe during this period. However absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

 ‘Water torture’ could also potentially refer to: a temperature torture, near drowning, a method of sleep deprivation or even dehydration. Without more detail it’s really hard to say which of these is being referenced.

 I found one mention of ‘burning torture’ a reference that I think referred to tearing the flesh with hot pincers based on the description of a torn wound. However given I only found this referenced once and I’m unsure of the source I found it in, I would not say this is a good one to pick.

 Which leaves me with common tortures.

 Whatever the time period, whatever the place, beatings the most common torture. Easily.

 If your character gets repeatedly hit, whether it’s clean or not, you are not being historically inaccurate. And I’ve got a lot of posts on beatings generally and clean beatings that can help you write that.

 Starvation and dehydration are also both really common regardless of culture and time period. So are temperature tortures or exposure though I think different countries have favoured different methods at different times.

 Torturous cell conditions were incredibly common across Europe historically. Lack of sanitation, wet cells, inadequate bedding, over crowding and conditions amounting to a temperature torture were all really common. They were also often happening alongside starvation.

 I have a masterpost on starvation and tags covering temperature tortures, exposure and prisons. I think the ‘prisons’ tag should give you most of the posts covering poor cell conditions, ‘historical torture’ and ‘historical fiction’ may also be helpful to you.

 I’m sorry I couldn’t come up with anything more specific.

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Disclaimer

Edit: So this should be my week off the blog but I’ve seen a lot of the responses to this. Most of them are extremely helpful, thank you to everyone who knows Norwegian that is offering to help.

However: if your instinct is to say that any torturer, historical or recent, is ‘honourable’ and follows a code of conduct then this blog is not the place for you. I don’t tolerate that kind of apologia or people using my work to spread it.