#tragic little babies

[furbyqueen69]

Okay but is it true that it was Lenore who shot Annabel? Or did the deans just make that up to separate them from each other??? I think (and hope) it was Lenore...

[blood-and-mud]

Stained with blood, and always will be.

character belongs to @gatobob

Version with a ponytail cause it's cute:

[starry-bi-sky]

DPXDC Idea: Mother of Monsters Dan(yal)

Specifically Fem!Dan because I made this in mind with my Fem Danyal Au bUT. The best part about Dan is that I get to play dress up with her, and Fem Dark Dany is gonna go by Layal (pronounced lae-el) because it means "the nights" and it sounds similar to Danyal, and I think she'd choose that name to mock Dany. ANYWAYS

Mother of Monsters Danyal. She may be evil but she's an Al Ghul at her core (even with vlad's soul merged with hers - however, considering that Layal looks and sounds like Dany, she considers that soul to be the more dominant one.) and loves animals. And she might be heartless, but she adores the monsters of the infinite realms.

Mother of Monsters Layal who hates everyone but utterly dotes and adores on every manner of beast she comes across. Stealing the eggs and infant young beasts of the Infinite Realms to raise as her own because she wanted them. Her own island full of monsters, a monstrous menagerie of her own. She steals most often from poachers or exotic pet keepers and other menageries -- the full grown beasties can keep their young.

And with every monster she raises, she can shapeshift their features onto herself, allowing her to change her shape from humanish to any matter of monster or hybrid creature. She calls herself their mother, and them her children. Her precious little babies, capable of incredible mass destruction and mayhem.

From little griffins the size of kittens, to stymphalian vulture chicks, and leviathan young hatching from eggs the size of her pinkie, to creatures native of the ghost zone that didn't even have names in the living realm. There really wasn't a limit to what or who she would take in and she didn't limit herself to any form of mythology. If they were beasts and they were unwanted, she wanted them. And as such, amassed her own mini army of "children" willing to listen to her any command.

Earth doesn't know what hit it when she attacks them.

There are many monstrous forms she could take on, the first one I've thought of is a combination of various serpentine/reptilian features. The body of a naga -- her lower half long and serpentine, her upper still human -- with spiked fins connecting from the bottom of her arms to her sides, ever seen Sinbad where Eris goes "you might have seen my likeness on the temple walls" and her arms do that fin thingy? Same concept. Her hands are webbed and taloned, perfect for slicing through the skin of the living, and her teeth are needle-sharp and shark like. Her hair can either be spiny and feathery-like like the spines of a lionfish, or frilled like a frilled-neck lizard. It's perfect for dealing and doting on her reptilian and amphibian-inclined darlings.

I'm more of a fan of aus where Dan is a sibling of Danny's rather than their kid, so Layal's redemption(..?? probation?) proceeds with her legally becoming Danyal's "twin" sister, who had been lost to the foster system before the Fentons adopted Dany, and was only recently reunited with her. The two of them look so alike that the lie is easy to take root and spread.

Layal is very indignant to the fact that she's now ten years in the past and has to restart her menagerie all over again. Do you know how much blood and sweat went into raising those children? How dare you separate them from their mummy. Although she'll admit she does miss their juvenile years, so she won't mind (too much) needing to raising them again. Dany is helping her retrieve all of them though, dammit.

long story short: epic the musical's "Scylla" has a CHOKEHOLD on me and this is the result of it

Unlike her Dan counterpart, Layal's voice is dancing and sirenic. It's purposely alluring and motherly, in order to lure people into a false sense of security until she feeds them to her "children." Echidna doesn't have shit on her. She almost seems friendly and reasonable, until you get too close and realize it was all an act and she drops it to metaphorically swallow you whole. She's like an anglerfish that way. She and Dany both sound like Scylla from Epic.

[cupiidzbow]

not sure how much of a spoiler this is bc the game is about two months old but ummm …. phantom thief and his little baby phantom thief ✨💙🧡

[little-meowyao]

Check out this thing I made

[sampilled]

whenever sam brings up his childhood, its always like "awww so cute <3333" followed by "JESUS FUCKING CHRIST" approximately 2 seconds later

like "awww he had an imaginary friend, thats so sweet! i love sully!" and then "oh jesus, his imaginary friend is real and was there to fill in the gaps so that sam didn't fall through them :((("

or "aww sam had a dog friend" followed by "sam lived with his dog friend in an abandoned house cause he ran away for TWO WEEKS, apparently one of his happiest childhood memories wtf"

or "awww dean read to him" and then "oh the whole time he was thinking about how he was dirty and wrong haha 0_0"

[luck-of-the-drawings]

IM SO IN LOVE WITH VAMPIRES!! and boy do i love THE SUCKENING!! VERY excited to see the misadventures of sad wet cat, sharp angry cat, and the COOLEST cat i ever did see

[ruestheday]

jason todd fanfic writers when i tell them if you have to change the way canon events went down then maybe he’s not as much of a victim as you think

[earlgodwin]

RODRIGO BORGIA + his beloved sons

"I remember the joy of holding [Juan] in my arms. A brother for little Cesare at last."

[vaugarde]

havent seen this take in a while thankfully but it popped up in my head and i wanna post this anyways. i think everyone who talks about how siffrin “got off too easy” at the end of isat and his friends should have abandoned him should go read warrior cats if they want an example of a character using their trauma as their god-given jailbreak card to treat their family and peers (a good amount of whom who were completely innocent) like dogshit, and who faces zero consequences from the narrative for it (and in fact bends over to blame their peers). like read all the shit jayfeather does while the narrative sobs over how tragic but awesome and quirky he is and then look me in the eye and tell me siffrin’s ending was poorly written.

[sketchyandsketches]

Young Astarion for the heartbroken

Forgot to mention the og @tadfools eho inspired the young Astarion design

[faaun]

Jack Marsh (2005), Friendship Otherwise - Toward a Levinasian Description of Personal Friendship

[getvalentined]

"Nashi I completely forgot about Nero"

WELL

I

FUCKING

DIDN'T

[ghost-bxrd]

Hello, yes, hi!

I am on a new path of evil and it’s called “A Cage In Search of a Bird” :)))))))

[olivegardenhunter]

The sannin as normal childhood friends who have sleepovers and play games in the forest and bond over liking "gross" animals

anon thank you SO much for this mental image. you have made my very miserable assignment-filled day. I have many thoughts about the sannin and baby sannin being inseparable best friends who were just normal kids make up about 90% of them. here's some hc I have about that (sorry for the massively long post, I'm a yapper at heart)

yes absolutely. I like to think of the sannin as misfits who never fit in anywhere else except with each other. there's so many different reasons for this. we know they became genin at age 6. if this makes them the exception, rather than it being the normal practice for a village in tumultuous times, then this must have meant each of them were prodigies in their own rights in the academy (yes, even Jiraiya I'd say, though I'd suspect his was more a case of recognised potential rather than showing any obvious prodigal talent from the get-go). this is further reinforced by the fact the third hokage became their sensei. I doubt the hokage would've taken up any random group of genin as his students. if this is the case, can you imagine how difficult it must've been for them to make friends with others, their age or otherwise? not only would it be hard to relate to their other peers cause of the age and probably ability gap, but I'd imagine people would've found them downright intimidating! all this, along with all their individual personality which, if their 6 year old selves were anything like their 50 year old selves, would've meant the little baby sannin would not have been anyone's first choice of friends.

so I'd imagine each of them being a bit of loners in the academy. then they get put in a team together. recognise they each stick out like a sore thumb from everyone else, but have all of the above common ground. their personalities are difficult for each to get used to initially, but once they do, these three super super super quickly become absolutely inseperable. to call them family would've been a serious underestimate of their relationship imo.

anyway this is all a long winded way of saying YES they're absolutely those regular childhood best friends who have sleepovers and hang out and play games. I imagine that tsunade grew up with a massive family in a massive loving home. direct contrast to orochimaru who's an orphan and, I imagine jiraiya is an orphan too (hence no canon last name). therefore, the senju compound is typically the designated sleepover venue.

the senju compound has mito, and nawaki, and depending on what your hcs are, would have tsunades parents, and I'd think they'd still effectively live like royalties even if the first and second are dead. (hashirama and tobirama wouldn't be around anymore by the time the three became genin I think, because (and someone correct me if I'm wrong) hiruzen would've already been hokage when he took on the three of them as his students, meaning tobirama would have already passed)

jiraiya and orochimaru just being at awe at the way tsunade lives and just how lively her house is and tsunade is just happy to have kids her age at home with her that just gets her cause her parents always nag her about training and chores, mito still treats her like a baby even though she's already a Shinobi that can take care of herself damn it!, and nawaki is so young he's so boring and sometimes gets annoying. so she always convinces her fellow teammates to come over to her house to practice and train, to babysit nawaki with her, to be the test dummy for try out this new jutsu or technique she's learning, and anything else that she insists she cannot do alone and needs them to be there with her

until suddenly it's already dark and oh her teammates can't possibly walk home all alone at this hour and besides my mum's making dinner and it's your favourite jiraiya and she'd scold me if I didn't offer some to you guys and orochimaru, mito found some sort of old scroll that uncle tobirama wrote about a new jutsu that she wants your thoughts on and besides, we have to meet sensei soooo early tomorrow for our mission and the training ground is closer from my house anyway, and you guys are just trying to get out of the bet we made and that's cheating y'know! and and and suddenly the senju compound just so happen to always have a few sets extra clothes and pyjamas that just so happened to be orochimaru and jiraiya's size and hey oro, raiya, look! it's got toads and snakes! and it matches mine! and the adults always just so happen to have two extra plates set at the table during meals, and the house just so happens to always be stocked up with both her teammate's favourite snacks, and orochimaru and jiraiya can suddenly enter the senju compound at any time of the day, with or without tsunade, and are greeted joyfully by the household's residents who had started nagging at them about training and chores and picking up after themselves, and mito is treating them like babies even though they're fully trained shinobis! and nawaki is being sooo annoying today and damn it, why isn't tsunade home yet? we agreed to train at 3!

(the three of them never quite notice that jiraiya or orochimaru's unannounced visits to the senju compound never trigger any of the seals that are activated by the presence of non-senju, non-family chakra in the compound. they never quite notice that the anbu guards at the front never give jiraiya and orochimaru any of the trouble or scrutiny that any visitors or guests to the senju compound are always subjected to, and the guards merely let them in with a slight bow of their heads, the same way they would to tsunade, or mito, or her parents.)

the only other times the sleepover isn't at tsunade's place is when there's a thunderstorm and orochimaru insists he needs to spend the night at his apartment because he tells them that last time the storm was this bad, lightning had struck a branch that smashed through his apartment that, if he wasn't already there and was even a little slower, would have destroyed the very few things his parents had left him that he so carefully keeps in a chest and he cannot ever take the risk that that would ever happen again he lost his power and his food went bad in his fridge, and c'mon tsu, you know oro not-so-secretly has a fear of thunder! don't you remember what happened last time at that mission where we were camping? we can't possibly let him spend the night alone at his house!

(later on when they're older, they'll come to find that jiraiya's new jonin apartment will become the new designated sleepover venue as jiraiya begins bringing back questionable sake from his missions that they were definitely too young to be having that he could not have possibly obtained that legally, and mito started banning them from playing card games at the senju compound when she noticed her granddaughter's tendency to lose her entire pay packet in a single game was becoming a bit too familiar to her... like a certain husband of hers' gambling habits that she had tried so hard to make sure wouldn't get passed on to the grandchild who the man had unwittingly taught said card games to at the age of 4. jiraiya started to call his apartment the degenerates' club then, much to the other two's dismay. though they couldn't quite protest when he correctly pointed out they were absolutely behaving like degenerates, even if princess tsunade and the leaf's once-in-a-generation prodigy felt like they were above those sort of disreputable behaviour.)

jiraiya and orochimaru fight tooth and nail that the massive forest that makes up the backyard of the compound, created by the shodaime himself of course, is the only reason they choose to hang out with tsunade at the senju compound, because princess tsunade (dammit oro stop calling me that!), the shodaime hokage seemed to have left so many fascinating things in this forest, there's so many secrets to discover. I don't think I've seen any of these species anywhere else in Konoha. I believe the secrets to some of his jutsu or techniques lie in this forest... oro you're such a nerd. and besides, Princess, the snakes here really seem to like oro for some reason and I think the toads are about to make me their king, I'm sure of it! and also, me and oro are the only people who don't find the fact you use the slime from those slugs in your potions or whatever absolutely disgusting, so we're the only friends you have to play in this gigantic forest with in the first place (it's not potions, it's a new medicinal gel I'm creating! and can you two just shut up? hide and seek is supposed to be a SILENT game and right now, you both really suck at it! I can literally locate you without even moving!) ...hey tsu, is mito-sama going to make those cookies she made last time again? she told me yesterday she would cause hiruzen-sensei told her we did a good job on our last mission.

the three of them knew everyone in Konoha had started calling them the 'Hokage's brats' behind their backs. but none of them realised that, particularly among the elders, this didn't seem to just be in reference to their sensei... there were other, more hushed whispers going around that if they had tried to listen to, would've sounded something like the adopted senjus... or lord first and second's legacies...

(these rumours may or may not have started when people started noticing tsunade's parents went from talking about their two children they adored, to their three rascals plus sweet little nawaki. or when mito kept comparing jiraiya's antics and personality to hashirama or orochimaru's brooding nature and hunger for knowledge was like tobirama's, or how tsunade's own hot temper and tenacity but also mischief was like her own's and the many Uzumakis that came before her, and that all three of them together balanced each other the way she, hashirama, and tobirama had. or when hiruzen constantly raves about his students and how much he sees his senseis in each of them and how the will of fire burns so brightly in them that he knew lord first and second would be extremely proud to see. in the end, though tsunade may have been the only one who shared a name with the senju founders, everybody couldn't help but see hashirama and tobirama and everything they had been and everything they had stood for in all three of the legendary sannin.)

[wr1t3w1tm3]

Look, I understand people are upset about the end of Will and Elizabeth's arcs in the original Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy. I won't lie and say I didn't want to see some Will as the Dutchman's captain and some Pirate King Elizabeth BAMF on the high seas. I'm not even saying the writers are right... I'm just saying that the way they set up Will and Elizabeth's arc's, it makes sense.

They're tragic heroes: it's like John Proctor or Reverend Hale in the Crucible or Iron Man during the Infinity Saga or even Thackery Binx from Hocus Pocus. They're heroes working towards a noble goal, but they either can't obtain it or when they can, it doesn't go according to plan, and they have to make some sacrifices.

For Elizabeth it's a little more obvious. She's the girl who's trapped in her social status. In the first movie, her corset, a very real symbol of her status, literally suffocates her. It nearly kills her. Only once she sees the world of piracy and gets swept up in that world and allows herself to be changed by it does she see any smattering of freedom. Her whole goal is to get freedom, for her people (Port Royal) and her love (Will) in CotBP, even at the price of her own freedom (agreeing to marry Norrington if he saved Will). In DMC it's for herself (literally), Will again, and her father. That whole movie she is constantly fighting to keep herself and Will out of prison and danger. In AWE, she's fighting for her own freedom at times, but she soon finds herself the harbinger of freedom for a new golden age of piracy against Cutler Beckett and the East India Trading Co, who in the Pirates universe are canonically slave runners. She is searching for freedom in a very wide scope.

For Will, it's a little less obvious. He is also striving for freedom, but often not his own. He fights to help free Elizabeth during CotBP, and in DMC he's literally fighting to keep his own freedom and win the freedom of Elizabeth. Even when that means turning in a (sort of) friend (Jack). When he meets his father in DMC, his mission of freedom for those he loves expands in two parallel directions, Bootstrap tells Elizabeth as much in the brig of the Dutchman in AWE. The director and writers of AWE made that very clear in Elizabeth and Will's direction. One of my biggest pet peeves with that movie is the lack of a relationship between Will and Elizabeth, but it does make sense. It demonstrates Will's dilemma. His search for freedom is much more tangible, and on a very narrow scope. It also demonstrates Elizabeth's dilemma, where she feels that the freedom Will craves for his father will separate them for good. So, she turns to piracy, because freedom is all she has left by act II of AWE.

Both are searching for freedom, but both are tied down by duty. Elizabeth becomes the Pirate King, Will the Captain of the Dutchman. Both bound by their own duty, although the only duty we see them both bound too tangibly is Will's. Isn't it ironic that in the end, the choice to kill Davy Jones isn't Will's? Sure, it was his intention, but Jack wrapped his hand around the knife and dropped the hand that felled the heart. Jack - the pirate - an embodiment of freedom for both characters in CotBP (he saves Elizabeth from her corset and is the inciting incident into Will beginning his quest for Elizabeth) is the one who chains them to Will's curse? Narratively, it makes sense. Elizabeth has just become the free-est we've seen her in any of the movies (and I will die on this hill) and Will's only just literally been freed from the clutches of the EICo. And even if you did argue that Elizabeth still had her freedom as Pirate King, it can be easily argued that she lost her freedom the day she decided to keep and raise Henry. Both of them end up chained by Will's curse - one to land, one to the sea. All on their search for freedom. And Jack, that symbol of freedom (or rather, a symbol of piracy that for both characters ends up being a symbol of freedom), is the one who chains them to land or sea.

Now I am all for Henry, I actually think he had some great potential pre-Deppo-osition trial, and I think it speaks to Elizabeth's character that she was willing to wait and stayed on land for her child (who she easily could've taken her anger out on, though that doesn't appear to be the case). It can even be argued she stayed on land for Will to, as he gave her his heart to guard, a very fragile heart that if stabbed, ended her husband (this is one of the final demonstrations of their mended relationship, but that's a different topic for another time). Will got a very short stick in this fight, but Elizabeth got an equally short, if not shorter stick. Chained to the sea, destined to see your wife a max of seven more days before her death, and the reverse true for Elizabeth, instead she is arguably forced by society to keep and raise the boy who reminds her of the husband she'll never be sure she'll see again.

That's why William and Elizabeth Turner - The Captain of the Flying Dutchman and the Pirate King - are tragic heroes. In striving for freedom, they became trapped by duties, obligations, and burdens that they didn't even get a say in. In the end, not every happy ending is a good ending. And while the original Pirates trilogy didn't have a happy ending, it had a good one, as far as the narrative was concerned (Do I like this ending? Yes. Personally, I think it works and it gives me that kind-of-icky-kind-of-satisfying pit in my stomach that Hocus Pocus did back when there wasn't a sequel. Maybe it's not the ending everyone wanted, but for the story being told, it's the right one).

Thanks for coming to my little rant! I used to love doing these literary analysis essays in English my junior and senior years of high school. Over analyzing media, especially film and tv, is something I quiet enjoy. Plus, I might do a foray into video essays one day, so I figured I could use some practice. This is something that's been bouncing around in my head since I first watched AWE. The original Pirates Trilogy is just so good at symbolism, I'll probably put more stuff out here eventually raving about it. For now though, this is it.