#though of course it applies to all forms of narrative really!

[aeide-thea]

#right like. when people make a post about wanting to see whatever and someone recs 1 specific thing #i always feel like the reccer - despite probably feeling real enthusiasm - is missing the point a little

#aside from 'i want more options' (which i DO) #so often i - a person who likes the thing - have read and hated the thing being recced #and i want more and different takes on it! (via elucubrare)

ppl misunderstand me when I say "I want more [thing] in stories". I don't mean "I'm going to love every single one" I mean "I'm very picky and I want more of it in circulation so I can actually choose from a wealth of them and be discerning". I see ppl being like "you say you want more of [this thing] but you don't like [example of it]" YEAH CUZ I'M PICKY!!!!!!!! I have opinions and standards????? not all of them are gonna be the same I wanna be able to look at 100 of them and go "I want these 20" not "I only have 3 to choose from and I don't like any of them" you feel me??????

[raisedbythetv89]

joss's sick obsession with not just causing pain and suffering - but punishment and humiliation to his "pretty popular girl" archetype characters aka Buffy and Cordelia and his favoritism of the most horrible mediocre white men aka riley, xander, and angel is never more apparent than in Into the Woods

The writers opted not for the FANTASTIC call back to season 1 with owen and Never Kill a Boy on the First Date when Buffy says "two days in my world and owen really would get himself killed…. or I'd get him killed… or someone else...."

which set them up perfectly for the road map of Buffy's attempt at a "normal" relationship that angel, her mother, and the scoobies keep trying to push her to have (when she's not normal herself so of course it's gonna be a disaster which is soooooo trying to force a queer person to be straight coded which is why spuffy is inherently queer on top of them both being canonically bisexual because Buffy embracing her love of Spike is embracing her inherent queerness)

But could you IMAGINE how amazing it would have been for season 1 to have foreshadowed riley being turned at the suck house (because literally all that evil in Sunnydale and NO ONE takes the opportunity to turn the slayer's boyfriend into the perfect secret weapon to take her and her whole family out??? PLEASE)

Then vamp riley almost killing Dawn and her mother (because Dawn would be the one tricked into inviting him in as a call back to Dawn accidentally inviting Harmony in and Buffy saying she's gonna get us all killed plus angel tricking his little sister into inviting him in once he was turned)

Buffy is forced to kill him after pleading with him to remember he loves her or any part of who he was (which would further show how exceptional Spike's ability to form a truce with Buffy, keep it, and fall in love with her all without a soul is)

Making riley her second (third if we count ford being left for dead and then having to dust him) turned evil boyfriend she's forced to kill.

Buffy would still be DEVASTATED and it's Buffy so she'd still punish and blame herself even though it'd be all riley's fault (demonstrating how this storyline would still cause immense pain for Buffy and be very high stakes drama for the plot but again joss elected for humiliation having Buffy literally chase after the man who was cheating on her with vampires while she was dealing with a sick mother and a hell god after her sister. Favoring a white man's character over the best plot line)

All while also further setting up her and Spike's relationship because of the "if that's what I wanted I'd be dating Spike" of it all which was her basically saying if I didn't want normal, Spike would be who I'd choose and now she's tried to be normal and he got killed, almost killed her family and then she had to kill him just like season 1 Buffy knew would happen when she broke things off with owen!!

AND the poetic irony of her trying to be “normal” and it ends with the exact same result?? The lesson being that rejecting who you are is not the answer and the only true answer is self acceptance because pain will happen no matter what so might as well love and embrace yourself ???

BUT NOOOOOOO the writers aka joss opted for riley's narrative to be that he's a hero and a good guy always, no matter what because joss has a big fat crush on marc and guys like him, angel and oz all get written off by treating women like shit without being villainized for it at all and then leaving. Getting to go on to live rich and fulfilling lives while Kendra, Tara, Cordy, and Anya are all violently killed off with barely any time spent grieving their deaths by more than one character..... (I haven't ever been able to finish ats so I don't know how much this applies to cordy's but my guess is the pattern didn't change much)

THEY EVEN LOOK THE SAME FOR CHRIST’S SAKE IT WRITES ITSELF

[lliraels]

so I’m thinking about the trials.

they seem to be doing that classic quest narrative trope of “giving the character not what they think they want, but what they need”. or otherwise giving the character what they want, but in an unexpected way.

additionally, the characters seem to be learning their lessons (gaining their prizes) during the course of the trials themselves. it’s the journey, not what’s at the end of it. this makes me think there will be no further prize at the end of the road (except maybe a coven-wide prize?)

or maybe it’s more than the journey - it’s the coven (the friends we made along the way) who actually support each other to overcome the trials and claim their prize

the other theme is - X thinks they want power, but what they actually need is knowledge

but how do the trials look through this lens? and what does this suggest for the upcoming trial(s) - billy’s and/or rio’s?

my ranting under the cut. could be completely obvious and not insightful at all but hey i have to organise my thoughts

jen:

- appeared to overcome a mental/traumatic (rather than actually magickal) block to regain her powers

- her problem wasn’t being bound magickally - it was her lack of confidence

- she wanted power, but what she actually needed was self-knowledge

- the trial (and the coven - particuarly agatha’s pep talk) pushed jen to apply her knowledge and regain faith in her abilities

- i think we will come back to jen once more, to see her fully embrace her potential

alice:

- she thought she wanted to find her mother (or, the audience and other characters did)

- but what she actually needed was to break the curse and overcome her grief and confusion associated with her mother’s death (generational trauma yknow the deal)

- the coven (band) but particularly agatha helped alice to break the curse (it was agatha who pushed alice to confront her memories of and love from her mother, sing like a witch)

- i’m still not convinced that alice is perma-dead, but if she is - breaking the curse and making peace with her mother’s death was the point, and she achieved that

- alice’s trial doesn’t fit as well within the power/knowledge dichotomy. you could argue that alice thought she wanted to bring her mother back (power) but what she actually needed was to accept her mother’s sacrifice and come to terms with her own loss (knowledge?) idk

agatha:

- i still find this trial strange, too short and oddly edited. even with extra scenes, though, i think the core of this trial would remain the same - it is an interesting one that almost seems to break the pattern

- agatha thinks she wants her power back

- but what she actually needs is… to confront the effect of her power on herself and others? to confront her early trauma from the discovery of those powers, her mother and her original coven?

- i suspect that what agatha really needs is a coven itself - and to find her place/value within a coven

- in this trial, she hurt and alienated her coven, by killing one member of it. she chose her own survival over alice

- killing alice was questionably intentional, but i think agatha has at least the capacity to learn how to control her power.

- agatha doesn’t need power. she needs knowledge (about how to control her power).

- OR she needs another form of knowledge - to reach a state of acceptance re her powers, to fully come to terms with her destructive abilities

- agatha helped jen and alice to overcome their trials. nobody helped agatha to overcome hers. alice protected agatha, but this just gave her power - when what she actually needs is knowledge

- this same dilemma will return at the end to test her again, in a similar way (weighing her own survival against someone else she cares about) and perhaps this time her coven will help her and she will make a different choice

- the entire road is agatha’s trial, so i’m not too mad about this one weird ep. her trial is only half-done so far

lillia:

- lillia thought she wanted a return to the glory days, to be a real witch again (power)

- what lillia actually needed was to confront the power she already had, to embrace her sight, to be grateful and proud of the life she’s lived. another form of self-knowledge

- the coven didn’t directly help lillia to overcome her trial (no pep talks from agatha, who was just being kind of annoying godblessher)

- but the coven existing, and needing lillia… the empathy and understanding that lillia received from jen… the familiarity and solidarity between them… pushed lillia to understand that the trial was all about her, her own life and her own abilities

- an aside to say god im obsessed with this episode, i was smiling ear to ear after finishing it. i love lillia!!!!

SO, as of ep 7, im pretty confident that the trials:

- give the witch their prize (the journey, not the destination)

- give the witch what they need, not what they think they want

- are about granting knowledge, particularly self-knowledge (NOT power) (…although there is a question mark over alice, perhaps)

what does this mean for the upcoming trial(s)? billy’s and rio’s, depending on whether either or both of them are considered part of the coven. personally i think they both are. they’re all on lillia’s coven tarot card

billy:

- we thought he wanted power (as he told agatha in ep 2)

- billy thought he wanted to find his brother (power? not really, this is knowledge. but is it the knowledge that billy really needs?)

- i think billy voiced his quest in ep 7: am i billy or am i william? (self-knowledge)

- billy - the youngest, ostensibly the most naive - is actually the only member of the coven to correctly identify his own quest. good for him

rio:

- what does death want? what does death need? arguably, nothing. arguably, everything.

- does she want agatha (because she’s a survivor, because she hid from her, because rio loves her, because rio hates her, because rio wants her little serial killer back)?

- does she want billy (for cheating death, breaking the rules?)

- does she want all of them, one by one, body by body?

- if she wants her bodies, that’s power. but what does she need? is death all-knowing? does death know herself?

- maybe she needs to confront her own nature, and how this has impacted her relationship with agatha

- i literally don’t know but i want to see this play out so badly, i really hope rio gets her own trial.

anyway if anyone else has any thoughts to add to this, or if ive missed anything, pls let me know!

[masochist-marmot]

In defence of "problematic" ships

CW: references to abusive relationships

There seems to be a growing mindset in fandom spaces that a ship is not valid if it's somehow problematic. Interestingly, the criticism towards a ship is rarely formed as "I don't like it"/"it makes me uncomfortable". Instead, they often attack the shipper with a "you must enjoy being abused and will end up being killed by your partner" or whatever.

Can we not?

First of all, and I'm so sorry to break it to you, but these characters are not real people. They have been constructed to serve a narrative. And seeing an interesting dynamic on the screen/page/whatever and thinking it's worth exploring does not mean you want to be inserted into that situation, nor does it mean that you endorse it in real life. It makes me wonder if these people even understand what fiction is for. I've had my share of toxic relationships, and I'd rather not get into another one. So it's a good thing that I can explore these dynamics safely without putting myself in danger.

And before you bring up the danger of romanticising abuse, I get it. There's plenty of media out there that depicts abuse and toxicity as somehow desirable qualities, and I understand that media can reflect and influence the audience's worldview. This is where you pause for a second, put on your media literacy goggles, and try to see what's actually being said. Depiction does not equal endorsement. Also, shippers are usually just existing in their own spaces and not affecting the wider public in any way.

Secondly, I see a lot of variations of "these characters are not in love because they are not good to each other". Hello? Are we seriously going to claim that romantic feelings only exist in their most pure, uncomplicated, healthy form? Interestingly enough, these sentiments are usually applied to queer ships. When Honkai: Star Rail dropped an animated short containing a prolonged and incredibly sapphic dance scene that ended in Black Swan being mentally (though unintentionally?) violated by Acheron, I saw so many comments along the lines of "I thought it was pretty gay until the mental flaying happened". I mean, it's still pretty gay. Just because you don't think it's healthy, doesn't mean it stops being queer. Are we just that afraid of showing problematic queer representation? We are people, and our relationships will be messy, and I think it's okay to show that. Though once again, I'm aware that for a long time it was all that could be shown, and that wasn't great either. I just feel like the pendulum has swung a bit too much towards the other end.

I've also seen a lot of comments to the effect of "he said he hated him so your ship is invalid". I will excuse these comments if you're on the autism spectrum and have difficulty reading past the literal meaning of words, otherwise, let's dig up those media literacy goggles again. In the next paragraph I'm going to vehemently defend my beloved akeshu, so massive spoilers for Persona 5 Royal.

In his confidant rank 8, Akechi says to the protagonist, in no uncertain terms: "I hate you." And the next time you see him alone, he shoots you in the head (it's complicated, okay?). So you could take this and run with it and go bash akeshu shippers over the head with it. Or you could try to analyse his actions and motivations over the course of the entire game and come to the conclusion that his hatred is a shorthand for a bundle of complicated emotions. Morgana even picks up on it after you fight him later in the game: "You don't really hate Joker, do you?" What Akechi actually feels is admiration and jealousy, since he feels that the protagonist has been handed everything he himself had to work so hard for. It's companionship for his first ever friend and respect for a worthy rival who will rise up to all of his challenges. It's regret that he couldn't have met Joker earlier in life when his master plan wasn't already in motion and his only driving force in life. All of this bundles up in something the emotionally stunted teenager can't and probably doesn't want to unpack, and he settles on what's both very simple and familiar to him: hatred. Which he probably latches onto so that he's capable of putting a bullet in the head of the only friend he's ever had. I could (and honestly, probably will) rant about Akechi on other occasions, but I'll leave it here for now. The point is: If the best you can muster for invalidating a ship is this, I honestly don't feel like I have to listen to your opinion.

Just to be clear, I don't think you need to go find the justifications for your ships in the actual text. In this rant I've mostly brought up ships that stem from how the characters interact in canon. (Though oddly enough, queer ships tend to be subjected to this kind of scrutiny way more than straight ones.) But sometimes it's fun to explore the most unlikely relationship dynamics by shipping characters who barely even interact. They're not what I find personally interesting, but go off. You will never find me gatekeeping ships. Even if it's Hisoka/Gon, in which case you're free to do your thing but I hope I'll never see it.

TLDR; I'm sick of people attacking each other over problematic ships. The characters aren't real, you can't hurt their feelings. But I am, as hard as that may be to grasp sometimes.

[yannaryartside]

Okay. I have doubts and theories.

On Sydney's health issues theory.

So, the spoon theory, the 3 swords heart tattoo, the cabinet full of medicines, the fact that her mom died of lupus, which is a condition that has no cure, you can live with it if managed with medication but makes you more in danger of infections, so you have to live with a certain self-restraint. There may be clues on the show about Sydney dealing with something very serious.

In this scene, in 2x10, many of us thought Sydney was actually reflecting on her fluctuating health. I agree with all of the possible evidence of a serious health issue, but I would like to present my doubts on some parts of that narrative, presented in this scene.

Gifs by riickgrimes.

The first time I saw this scene I thought, "OK, she is saying this because she has never found a boost in the industry, and took a solo adventure and failed, so she wonders if she is even made for all of this. She thinks that the Bear, it's people, and Carmy, is the only environment where she can show what she is made of, and, in her own words, "make a difference." So she is willing to go all or nothing in this one. That is an option for thinking outside the aforementioned context.

Now, if this was a scene about a daughter confessing to his father how she thinks about her mortality because she is sick, it doesn't feel right. Foreshadowing can give clues, but the scenes those clues take place still have to make scenes within a context we may not know about. When we figure out the truth in the future, this scene has to make sense looking back.

So, why is Emmanuel not extremely shaken by his daughter's comment? this is a man who also lost his wife to illness, why doesn't he jump off his chair and hug her and say "Don't worry about it darling, it won't happen, the doctor said..." Sydney (in the way we are interpreting the scene) may have as well said, "Yes Dad, I know I could die tomorrow," and that is quite a statement, as I said, people can live long lives with lupus, so why is she assuming that's not her case? that is a particularly terrifying thought.

So if she is dealing with something that she is afraid will kill her tomorrow, and is talking to her dad about it, I really doubt any father would have reacted in such a nonchalant way, he is calm, and we don't see the concern in his face, or a shadow of restrain because he doesn't want to look worried or afraid. There is a possibility of this scene being incomplete, and editing was done to hide Emmanuel's true reactions from the audience, but I think is unlikely.

Won't Emmanuel be understanding of this tendency of "making everything the thing" if is because of a dangerous illness? I don't think he would even dare to question it. I know at the beginning we see him worried about her overworking, but she has described to him her poor eating habits, and explained why she needed to work so hard. Won't he be more firm about asking her to take her of herself if her heath was that fragile?

So, I would like to present some alternative theories, even though some of them are keep me up at night:

She is sick, but she hasn't told anybody, not even her dad. It may be lupus or another thing. This one scares me a lot, especially if we consider the fact that Sydney has displayed a tendency of not asking for help and running away from forms of affection.

The spoon theory may apply to executive dysfunction related to trauma: we don't know what happened to her, so I would like to keep this option open.

She doesn't know that she is sick: she says "I don't know if I could do another one" in the sense of not making it in the industry, but this is actually a foreshadowing of not knowing her time is running short (please no). I definitely believe that she will give us a scare, some issue that makes her go close to death, she pulls through it, of course, but I see it coming. If it happens right after Carmy and Sydney have "the fight" omg...

She may have survived an accident: I like this one because it could explain the cabinet full of meds, maybe she is still recovering from the damage made to her body, muscle pain, heart-related stuff, who knows. But it also explains her being so conscious about how fragile life is even without any dangerous health issues. She lives all day like it's a gift, not a guarantee, this could explain her "sense of urgency" presented since season 1 (she is anxious to make it on the menu, etc.). This is not a healthy mindset, of course, it's a response to trauma, hence his father not pressing about the comment too much. I also like this idea thematically as well, the idea that a person who thinks life is too fragile will find a partner in a man who lost his brother to suicide, and is probably suicidal himself ("You should be dead", echoing in Carmy's flashbacks, we his chef didn't say that, that's all in Carmy's head). It's like they will be screaming to each other, "Please hold on, to life, to me," Carmy will work on his issues because he wants a life with Sydney and their restaurant's family, and Sydney has found in Carmy's company a new direction in her life, and partnership.

[fumifooms]

What do you think of Lamari (Laios and Namari)? Both as a ship and the relationship between the two.

I don’t like it sorry broski 😔 Seeing them interacting in ep 9 again made me see the appeal more, it’s cute how they interact, how they trust each other’s abilities and judgement! But ship wise…… I can’t. I’ve been seeing cute fanart of them around though, and I know a few people on discord that like them too. Like hmmm I guess I can see the appeal in the dynamic even if it doesn’t grab me but I can’t form a narrative for them… Usually I need both to truly get into a ship, a dynamic I find fun or interesting + some sort of progression and impact it’d leave on the characters, I don’t really see the character/relationship arc that’d happen, or at least not one eventful enough for me. When it comes to how I think their relationship is during canon, I see it as being professional and hinting at maybe friends, a neutral rather than negative thing mind you.

With Laios, well I’ve spoken about his character and arc before a bunch, but with Namari the part that interests me most is the whole exile thing, how she works hard to fit in both with keeping a good work reputation and shaving, for example, and how she’s not all that good with it because of presumably her bold personality... Because of this and more, and spoilers but I’ve planning on making a rarepair post about it for a while, I like shipping her with Toshiro mainly. I think that she balances out his doormat tendency but his cool attitude would be soothing and grounding and- Well gdbdgdg you see how it is. And to a certain extent I can see why people would want to apply the same logic to lamari, but… I don’t even think Namari and Laios would be able to bond over both being foreigners much tbh, I feel like Laios would sort of remain an odd mystery to her and though they could connect in a weird roundabout way I don’t think they’d exactly understand each other— and see this is the part of lamari appeal I get, the sort of tentative tension of "oh you actually respect me. That feels… Rare. And nice." Thouuugh like I was saying to be fair, it’s true Laios also tries and fails to fit in so that could be an interesting angle to go at it with. I think Namari wants stability and I just don’t really think it complements Laios well. I think trust’s the most important thing with Laios so on his side him liking her enough to be interested or open to a relationship I could see, though in a kinda mild and dry way imo… Like with Laios especially when defining how he and someone fall in love, there are sort of two modes right, and of course these coexist to some degree, but there’s Laios being his partner’s silly goober, and there’s Laios being very mature, more of his subdued stoic but composed self, all king-like, the more like connecting through meaningful conversations side. And idk how to put it into words but with lamari, I feel like Namari being paired with him doesn’t give a fresh spin on the former, and with the latter I feel like they’d always keep missing each other halfway communication wise, I don’t see them ever getting to that level where they deeply intuitively know and understand each other and how they work, maybe Laios -> Namari yes but Namari -> Laios I don’t see it, like I said I think it’d remain like, a mystery that nags at her and she might feel attracted if anything, but I can’t see them as more than casually dating idkk idk.

Namari has that fun ‘gets fired up about what odd things Laios is doing and reigns him back in’ dynamic but it’s something that literally so many other characters have too. I’m not knee deep into Namari yet so who knows maybe I have a wrong angle, but I did start giving her some thoughts bc I have a fic I have in mind for toshimari I wanna do. But yes it’s cute how protective she can get even if it’s shouty or tough love, like how she looks out for Laios’ equipment and for him not to get scammed, or brings in Toshiro here in the convo because she doesn’t want Toshiro to do his conflict avoidance thing and not stand up for himself & stay in the party even if it sucks hah. That bold borderline rude protective personality of hers with that awkwardness with intimacy/non-professional relationships is what’s unique to her I think, but yeah the laios & namari duo strikes me as strangely distant yet strangely interested coworkers who exhange glances over the cashier desk but personally I can’t see myself doing anything with that.

I’m not here to say it’s a bad ship or anything obviously! It just really doesn’t call to me personally and I don’t see stuff with them that I’d find interesting to analyze, if anything it’d involve the wider party a lot. I do want to make a masterpost on Laios’ career history and the old members of his party so I might analyze how Namari and he interact in those pre-canon comics idk. But yeahh like I find nothing to dig deeper at personally, you could make cute fics of them hinting at interest between the two, if Laios went to get drinks with her at a tavern etc etc, but all I see with them is just what canon straightforwardly showed us and I don’t get the urge to explore the possibility of them at all.

Sorry to disappoint, but yeah I won’t be a good source of lamari content or thoughts. I have wayy too many drafts I actually want to get out so I’ll be storing further Laios & Namari analysis for a big maybe, one day. I feel so bad I really hate to be negative at all and as a fellow rareshipper I send u my best wishes truly, good luck y’all deserve fellow stans and content. Feel free to leave pro-lamari arguments in the comments or reblogs if you want idm but preferably not asks (and just don’t be aggressive & don’t expect me to respond/react 🫶) like truly this post isn’t meant as a diss but anon asked me about my personal thoughts so… I love youuu lamaris hope y’all thrive 🙇🙇

Trying to think of crumbs and it’s true she blushed when she saw him in his cape at the end so y’all got that W. Namari having a thing for tallmen is so real

Edit: oh she went with him for equipment shopping… Ok that’s cute

[exilley]

Hair Symbolism in Utena

Not a very meaty post, but I haven’t found too many people talking about it in an explicit manner, much less point it out at all beyond the Utena/Anthy hair swap + student council design changes in Adolescence, which. Is a shame! Frankly it’s my favorite bit of symbolism from the entire show, along with the cars. Rest of the content under the cut

Long, straight, rigid forms represent masculinity in Ohtori, as curved, rounded, elegant forms represent femininity; this is reflected in the architecture of Ohtori Academy and other various symbols featured throughout the show (namely the swords and the birdcage, but there was also Touga’s masturbatory carrot that one time lol). This also applies to hair.

So far, I have down that:

Long/loose hair = arrogant, short-sighted, self-serving

Short/”done” hair = repression, ignorance, self-imposed suffering

Straight hair = Masculinity

Curly/wavy hair = Femininity

With this in mind, it’s interesting to note that Utena and Akio are the only characters whose designs incorporate aspects of both masculinity and femininity. Utena’s hair curls inwards at its tip, but is otherwise pretty straight. Akio’s hairstyle depends partially on the form he takes, but for the most part, it’s evident that the forefront of his hair is curly while the back hair is straight.

Furthermore, Anthy and Saionji’s hair looks... exactly the same. Which has some fascinating implications about Utena’s deconstruction of gender roles! (too lazy to find a bigger picture for Saionji lol. But it gets the point across). Of course, with themes of repression in the narrative, it’s also interesting to consider what Saionji having his hair tied up in a ponytail during certain scenes could signify. Though, we CAN surmise that, in Anthy’s case, it’s about her hiding the truth about her identity and masking her motives under the guise of a meek, subservient schoolgirl. But again, knowing Utena, I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out there was something deeper than that going on in the writing.

There’s more, of course: Juri sports really, really, really tight curls when she’s just going about her daily life, projecting a cool and unperturbed facade, but when she has her hair down, you get some of the most emotionally charged scenes in the entirety of RGU. Tsuwabuki’s hair resembling Touga’s when he was young. Nanami’s hair hardly ever shown coming undone. 

Anyway that’s the post byyeee

[librarycards]

How’d you discover you were plural? If that’s ok to ask

of course! genuinely, it's less of a discovery that &i is/are plural, and more that plurality is a meaningful conceptual framework to apply to my/our existence.

to dip a bit into coming-out cliché, &i've never felt, like, singular; we've always been iterative. we hardly even share the same body. actually, the iterations we've been are sometimes tied to particular forms of embodimindment, not unrelated to other experiences i've had - disorderly eating/drastic weight changes/puberty/trans medical interventions/elective body modification/lived experiences of trauma. this, like many things, is something for a while we assumed everyone felt (and perhaps everyone would, if we as a society did not tamp down so violently on our inherent systemhood [we're made of systems]).

then, &i learned that not everyone referred to themselves with different pronouns directed toward different iterations, and that this actually offended some trans people &i tried to like, ~build community~ with. people don't like seeing selveshood as periodized, because that disrupts the narrative of linear progress/growing-up we like to ascribe to "being a person."

so we sat with this feeling of having grown sideways or crossways and learned about multiplicity (beyond harmful media/medical discourse) on tumblr. actually, &i think [S]arah learned about it back when she was knee deep in the whole indigo children thing lmao, because there was also soulbonding stuff etc. [don't bother with those types of sites, they're run by new age antisemitic anti-vaxxers, but obviously 9 year old [S]arah didn't know that].

when we began learning about multiplicity on tumblr, we were under the assumption that alters had to be far more clearly defined and transparently mapped than is true, &i think, for most systems. others have commented on the weird proximity to clinical confessional discourse that fixations on system mapping point toward: not because there's an inherent problem with system mapping, but because the idea that everyone/everymany must do this / leave evidence of their collective (and ultimately, legible) existence, is just bullshit, just like the stories we have to tell to receive "gender dysphoria" diagnoses.

i think what really changed our relationship with multiplicity was/is our friendship with @materialisnt. it's difficult to describe the degree to which mix moss have impacted &my life, both through chaim "formal" scholarship (the formal/informal binary is bullshit ofc) and through several years of deep friendship and unwavering solidarity. &i recognize in hindsight that &my longstanding interest in multiplicity - and alterhumanity writ large, because i am not a human and actually don't think any of us are or were? - was really just, you know. being an egg. many such cases. mix. moss's patience with &my questions & collective excitement at my interventions and thoughts gifted us the confidence to, only recently [and partially pursuant to &my dissertation, which includes discussion of alterhuman digital epistemologies and pedagogies] begin identifying with plurality. perhaps even "as", though that preposition has always skeeved &me out when it comes to identity stuff.

ultimately, &my relationship with plurality isn't a concrete object that we eventually dug up and slapped a nametag on. it's a meaningful, collaborative, and community-based signifier that helps us best situate ourselves in conversations about relationships and love and pain and time and all the important parts of. existing, we guess. it's a choice to generate linguistic and spatiotemporal friction be just kinda existing and not being "one human being". it is also something that feels deeply heart-aligned, something that allowed me to let out a breath we'd been holding for a long time, and free up space to think with more creativity and compassion toward those &i value most: that is, those rejected by the existing conditions we call "reality" and "commonsense" and instead think more capaciously, as ourselves, about different ways of being persons and people together.

[thosearentcrimes]

Read Jane Eyre by Currer BeCharlotte Brontë. It's, uh, interesting. Worth reading, for sure? I'm happy I read it, which I can't always say about the classics. Some of them try my patience, while Jane Eyre was a quick and fun read. Whether you think it is good obviously depends on how you assign aesthetic value, though. I mean I know a lot of people are less preoccupied with politics in art, and for them, go ahead, but I think only some of the political problems are separable from the basic content of the book?

Like ok the racism is almost entirely unnecessary, though obviously predictable given the time period. It really starts ramping up towards the end of the book, too? I say almost, because it's obviously connected with the recurring phrenological theme which in turn relates to the main couple of the story not being very physically attractive. Which, to be clear, is a very nice thing for a novel to include, though perhaps less so when it is related explicitly to phrenology. Whatever.

So the thing about phrenology, and racism too, of course, is that obviously Victorians overwhelmingly understood those to be significant material, biological phenomena, right. And they're super not any of those, except insofar as they have the ability to impose themselves onto the material world, and even then not very much. So when you examine reality, including historical reality, from an enlightened point of view, you can see all of that is nonsense. However, assuming we accept the construct of a fictional world, in the fictional world of Jane Eyre, racism and phrenology are super real and material biological features of persons, rather than a pile of nonsense supported by confirmation bias. It's like if you were reading a comic or watching a TV show and it turned out everyone's personalities were actually determined by their blood ty-

ANYWAY, it's funny how gay Jane Eyre looks from a modern perspective, and I'm not just projecting I swear. Like, half the time Jane meets a woman, she becomes instantly obsessed with her, forms a codependent or dependent attachment to her, starts talking about how insanely perfect and good and beautiful she is and how much her male love interest isn't good enough for her, also one time she's given a description of a pretty lady and she starts drawing the most beautiful woman she can think of to imagine what she looks like. She develops what is barely deniably a gay crush on at least three women over the course of the book. Which is two more women than men. But it's important to recognize that this was a different, substantially more homosocial time, and that the way friendship and romance are expressed has changed significantly since the differentiation of homosexuality as its own identity. Why, even quite recently people wouldn't bat an eye over this kind of female friendship. Like, it feels like every other time my mom sees another woman, she'll start talking about how beautiful and talented and great she is and how her husband isn't good enough for her, and my mom isn-

ANYWAY, one of the real strengths of the book is simply in portraying Jane Eyre thinking and responding emotionally to stuff? It feels like such a basic thing, but it turns out a lot of writing novels is about doing the basics really well. If you make your main character emotionally and intellectually comprehensible to the audience, that'll help establish the stakes and sell the narrative. You feel like you know Jane and you can see why she makes all the stupid decisions she makes, you get a sense of why such an independent and proud woman would nonetheless be instinctively submissive the way Jane is. And the narration of an adult looking back over their childhood experiences is really well done I think. Comparing to Dickens is a bit absurd, because Dickens was quite frankly a slop merchant so you have to apply a different standard, but it is crazy how bad Dickens is at pulling that narrative voice off considering it was his whole deal.

Uh, the main couple is fucked up or whatever. She's a teenager and he could be her father, and is also literally her employer. Comes with the territory, obviously, he's a werewolf or whatever, that's the point. The part where he has his wife locked up in the attic probably a bit more of a problem, though it is hilarious how everyone is worried about the whole bigamy thing, and not about the wife being locked in an attic thing. Also he's like a massive misogynist, crazy (read: normal for Victorians) levels of hating women. I'm pretty sure the reason he gets crippled and blinded in the end is so that it's remotely plausible that he doesn't start beating Jane like six months into the marriage. Given all of this, it's a wonder that Brontë genuinely manages to sell the relationship, even with the added difficulty of me shipping Jane with half the female characters in the book. A testament to her skill and my sentimentality.

Who should read this book? I dunno, I think most of you have probably read it already or something. If you want to know the classics, the literary canon, this is one that is good to read, you'll probably have fun. Be aware that there's Surprise Racism and that the main couple is Problematique. If you want to modernize it, just pretend every time they talk about phrenology they're actually talking about astrological signs.

[radiation]

On some level though I feel like I’ve mostly fallen out of love with video games that aren’t either 1. Very short 2. Very unusually good 3. More than likely both. Which sucks because I am so insanely passionate about video games as a medium but the thing is (and keep in mind I’m mostly talking about games following some kind of narrative that’s tied to progression), more than almost any other medium, video games have the potential to just completely waste your time

When comparing games to somewhat similar mediums - because of the gamification they tend to be longer than movies (even if they’re attempting to tell the exact same story), unlike books you can’t necessarily skip through parts you don’t like, and unlike shows you have to be actively engaged with them, you can’t just tune them out a bit and look away when you feel like it. Video games’ inherent interactivity and the deep engagement + commitment that comes with it are both their greatest potential and the piece of the puzzle most likely to ruin the experience when gameplay becomes tedious or meaningless. that alongside the fact that games are a marriage of so many other different mediums that are hard enough to pull off on their own, but the addition of gamification can feel fundamentally at odds with these other art forms and the story being told / ideas being expressed, it’s like … games are just so tremendously easy to fuck up man

And of course this is all subjective but with all of that in mind…Man, I get so much more frustrated when finishing a disappointed video game then when finishing a disappointing movie, or book… maybe not a show, but honestly I always feel like finishing a disappointing show feels more uhhh…on me? Because it doesn’t have the same sunk cost fallacy / tactile-based investment of an interactive medium, and you tend not to buy shows individually like you do with games. Idk. Not to say the panacea is to completely eliminate tedium from games though because that’s not universal, sometimes and even often times it’s an integral part of the gameplay experience. It’s really just about intentionality with everything. Which is a really simple thing to say but the application of it runs so so so fuckin deep. And with that in mind yeah that is more often than not gonna mean trimming unnecessary stuff, decreasing overall playtime, just having a shorter more catered experience and prioritizing quality > quantity. Which again like seems obvious but video games are so Damn complex it is really really goddamn easy to lose sight of this stuff and forget to apply it to every facet of the experience and their points of intersection

[sophieinwonderland]

Something that occurred to us about transautism that had been brewing for a while: late diagnosis.

So like, we understand cis gender to be a matter of identifying with the gender you were assigned at birth, and trans gender to not identify that way. And we also understand that trans people are the gender they identify with right?

If we're applying that same understanding of what "trans" means, doesn't it stand to reason that "tramsautistic" would look pretty identical to late diagnosis?

Yes of course the narrative that all trans folks were born their gender and always knew is a harmful one. Gender can change unlike neuro developmental neurotypes. But that narrative is true for some trans folks. Hell it's true for a lot of trans folks.

So why wouldn't the same be true of someone who wasn't assigned autistic at a young age?

We're both trans and late diagnosed. A lot of the experiences with those identity overlap and have parallels.

We didn't "show signs" of being trans in our youth similar to how we "didn't show signs" of being autistic in our youth. We hid the things about us that others rejected and showed hostility towards because, conforming to social pressure, until we looked like a cis allistic singlet. All without ever understanding what we were doing or why, to the point where we look back and struggle to parse out those signs. There's a whole lot of gaslighting (internal and external) that happens for eggs and undiagnosed kids.

Also I can't help but notice a hint of "sex = gender" that slips into arguments against transabled IDs. Like, "you can't change your neurotype like you can change your gender" makes me wonder if that's talking about gender fluidity, or saying that trans folk are valid only because we have HRT and surgeries now. Cause in a lot of ways, you can change your neurotype if we understand neurotypes to be socially constructed like gender. You can get a diagnosis (like you can get a gender marker change). You can unmask (like you can socially transition). You can do treatments and therapy that helps (like you can do things that alleviate gender dysphoria and bring euphoria).

Anyways, I see a lot of parallels between trans in the gender sense and late diagnosis in the autistic sense. Plenty of kids were presumed to be a gender that they weren't. Plenty of kids were presumed to be a neurotype they weren't. When they seek to rectify one we call it transition and the other late diagnosis.

I know this isn't the universal story of trans gender folk or trans abled folk. But the connections between these two dots is too compelling for us not to bring it up.

-Faye

It's an interesting connection between late diagnosis and transitioning.

I don't think this is really how most transabled people use the word though.

Of course, certainly in some cases, this is going to be true where some transautistics can be cis-autistic all along but repress that.

I would say there are probably 3 general categories we could break transautism into.

The first is what you suggest, undiagnosed/late diagnosed cisautism where signs of ASD always existed but aren't recognized until later. And identifying as transautistic can supply security to someone trying to understand their identity.

The second is similar to the first, but where similar symptoms to ASD don't manifest at all until adulthood. In these cases, this might be a sign of another disorder. There's a lot of overlap between symptoms of ASD and schizophrenia for instance. So much so that ASD was at one time considered a childhood form of schizophrenia.

Then the third is what I consider the more stereotypical transautistic cases where an allistic person feels like they should be autistic for some reason, and sometimes may even feel dysphoria for not being autistic.

(This isn't mentioning trans-severity, where someone with Cis-ASD feels it should be worse.)

...

This is a bit of a side tangent, but...

To be honest, I worry a bit for people who fall into the first two categories.

There are legitimate issues with the healthcare system that would dissuade people from seeking mental help. We, ourselves, aren't seeking any treatment and don't feel it's necessary for us.

At the same time, the first step in healing a problem is recognizing it, and I do worry that identifying as having a trans-disorder may discourage someone from taking that first step of recognizing their symptoms are from an actual disorder they can seek treatment for.

This came up a while ago, with a transkleptomania anon who identified that way because they usually only felt the urge to steal things when they were stressed, and were under the false impression that cis-kleptomania required you to always have that urge.

Nothing against them, but I do have a concern that some people who consider themselves to have transdisorders may actually have those disorders and not be seeking treatment because they decided they don't have them.

...

And as I say this, I realize that this sounds a lot like sysmed arguments about how endogenic spaces supposedly discourage systems from realizing they have dissociative disorders. But the difference is that, from what I've seen of endogenic spaces, that's largely not true and many systems realize they have disorders BECAUSE of these spaces. Even in the tulpamancy community, it's common for people who show symptoms of dissociative disorders to be recommended to investigate further when symptoms of a disorder are mentioned.

I guess, one concern I have with the transabled community is that I'm not seeing as much of this.

To be fair, despite being described by one anti-endo as a radqueer God, I'm not actually part of those communities and these conversations could definitely be happening where I'm not looking.

...

Sorry, I kind of derailed there.

Anyway, while I don't think it completely applies to how I tend to see transabled identities used, I do find the comparison between late diagnosis and being transgender to be a fascinating topic.

[e1ectrostatic]

30 Day Fictionkind Challenge Day 17

Q: Does fictionkinity connect to spirituality for you?

A: Not inherently. But for me, yeah, to an extent.

I guess I'll start off by saying the spiritual vs psychological dichotomy doesn't do much for me personally, so I don't adhere to it very strictly. It's useful as a loose frame of reference, but I prefer to think of my fictionkinity more as a combination of the two, as well as something else entirely.

Still, yes, one could easily connect my fictionkinity to spirituality. For one, I believe in reincarnation and always have for as long as I could remember. I've also always believed in the multiverse theory lol. These beliefs are a framework through which I process my fictionkinity, but do not rule over it or hold any authority, so to speak. If any aspect of these beliefs doesn't sit right with me when applied to my fictionkinity, I prefer to disregard it and find other ways to explain my experience.

Or sometimes, I just don't feel inclined to explain my experiences. I just am, and I'm comfortable enough with that.

But anyway, to elaborate on how my fictionkinity may connect to spirituality, I do believe myself to be a universe-hopper of sorts. Things like why this is, how I came to be, and how long I've truly existed are unknown to me, but I'm comfortable in my beliefs nonetheless. I know this isn't my first life. As such, I don't much connect myself to my body — it can be seen as an extension or representation of me, and it's what tethers me to this world, but my body isn't wholly me. I don't begin and end at my physical form. I've taken other forms, and when I'm done here, I'll take another form still.

What it takes for me to be "done" in a world is a mystery to me still. In this world, it seems to be death, but I'm not sure if that applies to every other life I've lived. Perhaps I once encountered other means through which to begin a new life elsewhere. I doubt I'll ever know the full truth. But I'm going on a tangent again. I'll elaborate on these thoughts another time.

Like I said before, I've always believed in the multiverse theory. My beliefs in reincarnation and infinite universes go hand in hand when conceptualizing my fictionkinity. I believe there are infinite worlds and universes with infinite possibilities, and I've been to a few in other lives, with other forms. Some of the lives I've lived have manifested in this world as fictional stories, crafted by other people. How similar my canon is to the canon of these stories greatly varies from source to source. In some cases, looking at my source is like looking in a mirror. In other cases, I couldn't be more different.

There are still some cases in which my fictionkinity shies away from my spiritual beliefs, though. I'm not entirely comfortable with the "past lives" narrative despite my rationalization sounding very much like it. With most of my kintypes, I feel not like I've died, but rather like I'd been forcibly taken from one reality and plopped into another.

Even if I'm wrong, and I had died, I don't like describing it as such, because to me it sounds like I no longer fully consider myself to be the person that I "was", or that my story as [xyz kintype] ended. There is no "was", there only "is". I didn't die. I'm right here, still utterly and fully my kintype, regardless of the world and body I'm in. I know the "past lives" narrative doesn't have to imply that your previous iterations are no longer you, but that's just how I personally feel about my own experience.

Though I guess "death" is a meaningless concept to an immortal soul, anyway.

This is all I have to say on the topic for now, but this prompt has inspired me and got me thinking. I'd like to revisit these thoughts in the future, and really get into why I feel what I feel. Of course, I'll also be elaborating more in the next prompt about neurodivergence.

Thank you for reading, and take care :]

[emilybrontesghost]

So for the past few years I’ve really been thinking about femininity as well as engaging with it more intentionally. This is something that has been a more recent occurrence for me, and as more time goes on my belief that it is directly correlated to realizing my queer identity has become even more cemented. “Femme” as an identity has likewise become one that really resonates with the person I have become. I know a lot of people have very strong (and also conflicting) definitions of what a “femme” is and who gets to call themselves one. I also know that many queer women are concerned that straight women are co-opting the label of “femme” for their own use and I agree with them that it is problematic. It is also reductive to equate the identity of “femme” as being interchangeable with “feminine.” Femme is more than just a word that denotes femininity of presentation. This might just seem like a matter of semantics to a lot of people but there are more connotations attached to “femme” than simply appearing to conform to society’s ideals of femininity. (The key word here being “seeming.”) And this is where I think the concern comes into play from queer women when straight women start using the word “femme” to apply to themselves. This is because there is an essential difference between straight women and queer women, and that is that straight women fit the paradigm of femininity as defined by our heteropatriarchal society in a way that it is impossible for queer women to do. No matter how feminine a queer woman presents she is still inherently an outlaw, a subversive transgressor to larger society because her femininity is not performative for the benefit of men. Queer women do not center men or their attractions in the way that straight women do. “Femme” then is a distinctive moniker that is separate from just being feminine in appearance. Of course all of this is something I have learned through my exploration of queer studies, it isn’t something I have always known or been aware of, but it really has been a tremendous help to me in terms of recovering and healing my relationship with femininity.

For many years I rejected aspects of femininity because it made me uncomfortable. To me it felt like a performance that I didn’t want to participate in but on some level I was expected to by men and by adults and society at large. I was also fed seemingly contradictory messages on what was and what was not acceptable in terms of being feminine but also what the acceptable amount of femininity to display was and in what circumstances. Femininity seemed like something which other people decided the parameters of, not me. In the same breath I was being sent the message that I should take care of my appearance, I was also being told that I shouldn’t be too high maintenance. It’s not hard to see why all of this felt like a trap. It seemed like a game that was rigged for failure and asked so much of me and then gave nothing in return. Is it any wonder it felt like something to run from? And so run I did. When I was a child femininity had been a source of joy. It was princess dresses and Barbie dolls and tea parties. There was a certain innocence to girlhood because it was femininity, if not entirely devoid of societal expectations, with at least fewer of them. It started to get worse as I got older because adults start expecting things of young women they don’t of children, so the older I got the more I rejected feminine things other girls my age were doing and by extension the types of girls who did those things. I am ashamed to say that I bought into the “not like other girls” narrative and the “pick me narrative.” I thought I deserved a pat on the back for being “cool” for not wearing heels or makeup because I didn’t engage in feminine hobbies or forms of dress in the way other girls did, and when I did have to do it, it was with a begrudging sense of obligation coupled with embarrassment. I was so uncomfortable with myself and I thought it was because I just wasn’t a feminine person and that I just didn’t fit in with girls who were. I also hated how I felt like femininity was expected of me by men, and that to be attractive to them I would be expected to look a certain way. I didn’t like the idea of men viewing me as feminine because it made me feel lesser. I also really had developed a dislike to how feminine looking my body had become as I got older. Curves were popping up all over my once skinny childlike body and by the time I hit puberty my body had started taking on a very different shape and I started to resent it. I wasn’t really comfortable with the idea of men liking my body. I had trouble believing anyone could like my body because I didn’t even like it myself. This went on through my teens until I was in my early twenties.

I got into my first wlw relationship at the age of 21. I’d been questioning my sexuality and I wanted to see if I was as straight as I’d always assumed I was. I met my first gf online and that relationship really taught me a lot about myself. For the first time ever I didn’t feel any sense of embarrassment about my womanhood. I had never felt so understood on an intimate level. My gf and I could talk about everything and shared experiences that I just simply wouldn’t have been able to with a man. We could stay up late into the night talking about everything from body insecurities, to bras, to period cramps. These were things that so many women are made to feel ashamed of but with her it was easy because I knew she wasn’t going to judge me. I started to appreciate aspects of my body because she enjoyed them in ways that I never had before. It was empowering and it didn’t feel like I was being fetishized. I feel so much more comfortable now in dresses and skirts and ribbons and things that before I felt a lingering self-consciousness for liking or the sense I was doing it for other people’s benefit. I also feel more comfortable with my identity as a woman, separate from my presentation. I don’t feel I have to make myself small or diminish my unique experiences as a female person. Identifying as femme and embracing my wlw identity has helped me eliminate my internalized misogyny and be proud of being a woman and enjoying things associated with women. I love being a woman who loves women and getting to finally feel that I can be feminine without feeling like it’s for male consumption. I love being femme!

[dragon-ball-meta]

A thought crossed my mind based on Freeza’s most recent power up.

I’m not sure this power up was really thought out at all. I know there is such a thing as overtraining and marginal gains but I don’t feel like that applies with Freeza.

In RoF, Freeza trains for 4 months and is able to surpass Goku’s newfound power of ssb. This is Freeza training for 10 years. I’m left to think how is Goku supposed to be able to beat that?

I feel like the 10 years was done purely for shock value and it could have been 2 years and still had the same effect given Freeza’s massive potential.

What do you think?

Very hard to say for sure, honestly.

Bear in mind that people actually can hit plateaus in their development. Periods where they can work and work for minimal gains before achieving a breakthrough. Goku's mentioned a few times where he really thought he was getting as strong as he possibly could, only for someone else to show him a new goal to bust his butt to achieve or surpass. Shoot, part of why he left the ROSAT a little early with Gohan was he realized they'd both hit one, and it benefitted their bodies more to rest and settle. For Freeza it may be the same thing. We also don't really know whose idea the "ten years" bit was, or if it's part of the notes or just specifically because of the predicament the manga put them in narratively. Remember: Toriyama did not write the Moro arc. At all. That was all Toyotaro's idea, and Toyo was the one who decided he needed to have Goku Master (but also totally not actually master) Ultra Instinct to face Moro. He also gave Vegeta several abilities for that arc that Vegeta seems to have just forgotten in the next, namely because there's not room for them in said narrative. But this is Toyo having to write this form in for Freeza after having made Granolah and then Gas simply wish themselves to be the strongest in the Universe and then giving Goku and Vegeta whole new levels of power to try to counter it. Freeza's last known level of power was shown in the ToP, and IIRC, his manga showing was actually less impressive than his anime counterpart. That would imply an even larger gap to try to overcome. So it may just be that, in order to convincingly convey it, Toyotaro arbitrarily chose "ten years" as the training time as it seemed a significant enough amount of time to amass that power. The other side of that sword, of course, now being that he had this Freeza one-shot zombie Gas without transforming and then transform to take down a pretty much full-stamina Goku and Vegeta with almost no effort at all. I think, in an effort to try to sell us on a sense of urgency and dread, he overplayed his hand there. But it's hard to say how much thought went into it, or how much was even Toriyama's vs Toyotaro's, without knowing what was in Toriyama's notes. I dunno if it's the form not being thought out as much as its narrative framing though, which clearly wasn't. Then again, Toriyama doesn't seem to be paying TOO much attention to what Toyotaro is even doing, with the manga narrative, if the scripts of his last two movies are any indication.

[msvorderofoperations]

Another dream journal. It's funny that this one happened so soon after the last one given that I went several weeks without any. But I suppose that's just how my subconscious works.

The first dream was about this extremely powerful telekinetic kid at a boarding school for psychics, but who was still in the process of learning how to apply his powers. It started off with him playing baseball against his fellow students. The first inning he gets completely trounced as he tries playing it like a normal human, whereas his opponents know how to apply their abilities. This takes the form of telepathic communication between pitcher and catcher, telekinetic boosts to their movement speed and and so on. The next inning however, he has internalized everything they have done but is doing it better, and has already innovated new applications for his powers such as full-on flight which he was able to do for other people on his team.

The dream then skipped ahead after making it very clear that once he had figured out how to apply himself, he absolutely dominated. The next scene I was shown was when another school showed up to play basketball. As before, they were far and away more adept than him initially, to the point of mounting their hoops directly to the ceiling of the gymnasium to make it at least slightly challenging for themselves. And again, at the start of the second quarter now knowing how to apply his abilities within the rules of the game, it was a complete blowout. Dribbling the ball at such speeds that the ball could barely be seen, and it always found his hand no matter how he moved. Adding such intense sideways spin to shots that it would parabolically go around defenders. And so on.

At this point the dream shifted, both in narrative and style. To this point, it had been photo-realism, but now it looked like an exceptionally well-drawn animation. Stylized, but still carrying a lot of detail.

The new dream was about Earth many thousands or possibly millions of years into the future. There was now very little life left on earth, as the sun had become especially hot. To the point that any organic matter left in direct sunlight would get all but disintegrated, but for some unexplained reason only at dawn. Once the sun was higher in the sky, it could still give you intense burns, but as long as you moved quickly and kept to the shade, it was manageable. The crux of this story seemed to be about these few people trying to find another person of interest. The vibe I got (because none of this was explained, of course) was that the group were cyborgs that were nearly fully robotic, and the woman they were searching for was the last remaining natural-born human. In the the course of their investigations, I saw communities executing prisoners by leaving them tied to fencing overnight, where they would be obliterated by first light. Though strangely, for whatever reason they would be left with their weapons. The way their wrists were bound, they couldn't have used them either to escape or commit suicide, so it must have been either a part of a ritual/tradition or some sick way to break them further by giving them a tiny shred of hope, only to have it be functionally meaningless.

In any case, the search was proving fruitless. And no sign of this woman could be found, but instead of lamenting their impossible goal, these people found meaning in their relationships with each other. Discussions on how best to navigate the world during the day, what materials to use in shelters, and what comforts could be added to even temporary housing brought these people closer together. From there, it became tight-knit friendships where they could talk about anything. Through these discussions, it is revealed that the majority of life in the solar system is now on Mars, which has been deeply terraformed. This is where these cyborgs hail from, and where they one day hope to return. There isn't really interplanetary spaceflight however, most travel is done through unstable wormhole generation which collapse after use, and the process is extremely costly.

Through sheer happenstance however, this group does end up finding the person they're looking for. As they discuss how best to communicate with her that they wish to take her back to Mars, it's revealed that one of the cyborgs return wormhole generators would only have enough energy to take back a single person, and so they would be left stranded. The others find this idea unacceptable and so they activate it while it's still on his person so he is taken back to Mars before they confront this woman. After this happens, the perspective shifts to that of the woman being sought out.

She's on Earth specifically because she is a self-taught historian and archaeologist, and has an intense love of all things from before the Earth had to be mostly abandoned. Because technology has improved incredibly even in the time before the sun became unbearable, all of the things she finds actually still work, despite being millennia or eons old. She knows that people want her to go to Mars, but she doesn't want to go. She knows this because she is maintaining correspondence with someone we never see back on Mars. And because the way they are communicating is through regular radio wave transmissions, they take a not insignificant amount of time to make the round trip. One other interesting detail is that all of the transmissions are being encoded using her voice as the decryption key. Since no one else on Mars has any idea what she sounds like, this effectively makes an unbreakable cipher.

Soon after making a broadcast with her latest find, a couple of the cyborgs make themselves known and start trying to convince her to come to Mars. Because she has been surviving on Earth for so long, and has been raiding all kinds of installations, she is well-armed and defends herself handily. The cyborgs insist that they mean her no harm, but to her mind being taken away from her home is exactly that. She uses her weaponry and keen eye to basically strip the cyborgs of their outer casings. It's by no means fatal or even that harmful, but it takes them out of commission long enough for her to escape.

And it's around here that I woke up.

[night-faye]

The special is cut into 4 episodes called: - a life time of mistakes - the plan man - rip and tear - better than we found it while s3's special was - this imperfect world - the corrupted king - time to be warriors - destiny fulfilled 17) "Yeah! Go, MK, go! Just try not to totally wreck up my stuff, would ya. Oh, right! The scroll!" He is SO cute and silly, and the way he remembers and turns back around perhaps I can squishing those round cheeks. Also "Lieutenant Monkey!" and the fist bump 🥺 that's his wittle monkey family do not separate he was so alone after being born. an endangered species. 18) "Oh, there's nothing mindless about me, friend. That's what you were pretending to be, right? To be my friend? To care about me? When really, you were just using me to get what you wanted! To turn me against my own mentor! Well, put your hand in the monkey cage and expect to get bit, son! Come on! Come on! Come on, Uncy Lion! You're the big hero, right?! Then prove it! Show me!" Macky....good on you for joining the Demon Bull Fam in giving up villainy quick because THIS is how savage MK can get. All of this could apply to you LOL. Gee, MK would get along perfectly with my OC. They snap the same way lmao. 19) Macky's smoke monster is probably like 100 feet smaller than Wukong's war form btw. We always joke about the size difference lol. And LOL at his face when Mei chomps him with her dragon he's all bug eyed. 20) Of course they had to kill Azure while smiling and of course they could only have Wukong be 😔 because he's witnessed so many of his friends die over the centuries. mourning has become second nature. at least they give us SOME kind of break. Wukong's face when Nezha hops in like yeah you got allies still left who care but LOL because he goes 🤨 when Nezha is "Yeah don't worry about it, Wukong. It's fine. I've got this." very sweet of you to care and reassure him, he doesn't got to do everything by himself, he's got people willing to hop in for him despite the history, BUT LMAO bc Wukong doesn't have time to be caught up in more feels, he's probably thinking "oh uh huh, sure you big immortal baby. press F for doubt."

21) I sped through this so much somewhere in these 4 seasons is Macky hiding scared behind Wukong and in this special, the screen slo-mo freezing on Wukong zipping by and Macky's shook expression like sure okay, stare at your super cool determined fierce friend heading into the fight with THAT look on your face. 22) Dwa when Macky steps in and everyone smiles that their domesticated emo villain monkey who probably watches anime is helping <3 <3 <3 AND WUKONGS SMILE WHEN MK IS OKAY. so sunshine and buttercups. 23) *Suspiciously eyes glowing blue flower and vines on the tree in Wukong's room and the weird thing that looks like a marked tomb.* and oh hey, role swap. Now Wukong is joining MK all by his lonesome. One of those moments that feels like the legend of the monkey king is taking back the narrative for things he's not even the main character for lol. just like in jttw. its so focused on him esp all the beginning chapters but Tripitaka is the MC XD 24) "Do you wish things would stay like this forever." "Pssh, where's the fun in that?" *looks at all the promises of forever you made to Macky.* uh huh. 25) BEACH EPISODE. of like 30 seconds for everyone else and 3 minutes of ShadowPeach. Macky and Wukong's clothes are taken from Goku and Vegeta bc they're based off the same legend lol. Wukong yelling about sunscreen to MK is so <3 <3 <3 they're Monkey Dad coding him LOL and its funny to see him talk about modern day products in general. 26) Lmao yes, it's your favorite shadow to block the sun 😉 "Ugh, it's you." "Cute, thanks for the invite by the way." "And thanks for showing up even though you were NOT invited." They always gotta talk like this, I UNDERSTAND the feeling of never being straight with it lol. But then they show what they mean through gestures like the peach popsicle! Like we're getting a redo of the squished peach from earlier ;) not fully perfect, a lil melted, but its a start. a peace offering and unlike last time its accepted also they are under the divorce tree! wonder who invited Macky or if he rlly just showed up LOL. I didn't take you for a beach kind of guy in hot pink but alright! I love his stressed tail flicking too 🥺 he is SO stressed he's not even looking at Wukong you can hear his *hmmm* in brooding thought. and asdfghjkl the way his brows furrow as he processes what Wukong just gave him 😭 "You know this is the calm before the storm...right?" So careful, cautious, it feels safer to ask now. It's like a redo of when he ignored you at the dinner. "Yeah, I know." love that trope of when everyone is goofy but you have the serious characters thinking about the future because they have special secret knowledge unknown to the rest but wanting to protect the joy of the present. "Wherever there's scheming, we can handle it." hello scheming reference but this time not applied to Macky and HELLO saying "we" and Macky being surprised over that. It was INTENTIONAL. 27) here are the storyboards! https://www.tumblr.com/chippedtoons/725767120520200192/faildads https://www.tumblr.com/chippedtoons/725766047465078784/nobody-fucking-tlak-to-me-right-now-pos

So consider me dead :)

(oh and I WILL be keeping your asks with all the links in my inbox so i can find them easilyz!! Bless you anon thank you very very much heheheheh)