#value of information
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One of my all time biggest pet peeves with historical(ish) fantasy is when the writer constructs a religion with a clear bias that it's stupid and false and therefore only the Stupid People and/or commoners believe in it and all the smart/elite main characters are like, quasi-atheists or otherwise just routinely flout established religious conventions of orthodoxy and/or orthopraxy because they're Too Smart for it or etc.
It's usually an extension of assumptions that people in the past were just less intelligent than in the contemporary, just being like "I know that the sun is a star millions of miles away that the earth orbits, but this ancient religion describes it as a chariot flying through the sky" and not really bothering to learn the context and just (consciously or subconsciously) settling on 'that's a crazy thing to think and was probably believed in because they were Stupid'.
And that whole attitude pisses me off so much. People were as 'smart' 10,000 years ago as they are today. These beliefs aren't just desperate, random flailing to explain phenomena that could not directly be accounted for either, it's not like people just looked at the sun and went "Uhhh I don't know what the fuck that thing is, actually. I guess it might be a chariot or a boat or something?? Yeah let's go with that." and based entire religious practices on this. Every well-established belief system exists within broader contexts of cultural values/subjective perceptions of reality/knowledge systems/etc, and exist as part of a historical continuum of religious practices that came before. Even when not Materially Correct, they have context and internal logic, they're not always dead literal with zero levels of allegory, and they're never a result of stupidity.
#I think you're failing at good worldbuilding and also just like. Idk failing at being an understanding human being willing to learn about#people different from yourself when you approach writing religion from a 'uhhhh what's some random stupid shit people believed in#2000 years ago' angle#Like make an effort to understand the logic and worldviews and value systems that informed these practices before you synthesize your own
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bro fuck it im workposting. i did illustrations, i storyboarded, i directed. I did many cool things in 2024 and millions of people all over the world saw em. that has to count for something
#brawl stars#marcia#i dont workpost because i am deeply aware nobody here is here for brawl stars but on god i#i work and i create and its real#and there is a part of me thats ashamed because i know that brawls is not. like its not league of legends you know?#league of legends is something you post about#about the skin you helped create or sculpted#or the splash art you painted#its has that... value that is obvious even in the eyes of a person who has never played league#its a very mature visual language that historically calls for respect#meanwhile presenting brawl stars art feels like showing my anime girl oc to an art teacher#even mentioning an illust i created for a skin announcement for brawl stars feels so#so dollar store#so laughable#like noone would take me seriously#it feels like when you say you're an artist and then a person asks to see your art#and you show them and they get that soft soft look in their eyes that informs you that they had an image of who an “artist” is in their hea#and that you did not live up to it but all they'll say is 'oh thats nice'#bro help me im doing art elitism to myself#how can i simultaneously believe that art can be anything and yet only neoclassical realism has real value#i want to be creatively free yet all i do is fear the unimpressed looks of strangers
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I'm going to go off for a minute about the whole tumblr shutting down thing
I see a lot of people talking about how "no one wants to pay for tumblr premium and that's [part of] the reason tumblr is going under" and I'd like to address this specifically.
I remember when Tumblr announced they had badges, a shop, blaze, and premium people were really excited! Including me! We could pay to keep the lights on and maybe this meant we could get porn back! Tumblr generally wouldn't have to be beholden to "advertiser friendly" standards that not only affected nsfw creators but also a lot of just openly queer people on this site whose only crime was existing.
Then, Tumblr didn't keep their end of the bargain. The big visible issue at the time was transfems were being banned from the platform. Did you all forget Matt Mullenweg's harassment campaign against predestrogen? Remember how he FOLLOWED HER TO TWITTER and CONTINUED TO HARRASS HER after she left tumlbr?
Remember all the trans women talking about how they didn't feel safe on tumblr anymore? What about the sex workers who got banned for sharing sfw promos of their content? Or the artists who spoke up when Tumblr stole their work for their merch without asking?
We didn't choose not to give Tumblr money because "hehe tumblr anticapitalist". We chose not to give money to Tumblr and by extension Automatic because even when people were eagerly giving them money Tumblr and Automatic showed complete disregard for the same users they were asking to pay to keep this platform running. We made an informed decision to not give money to a platform that refused to put its users first.
Tl;dr: Tumblr's user base was perfectly happy to pay to keep the lights on until it became obvious Automatic and Tumblr didn't respect it's users enough to keep up their end of the bargain. The founder harassed predestrogen (who was a well known transfem user) off of the site, sexworkers being sfw were banned, and artist's work was stolen and used without their permission for merch. Automatic doesn't respect the users they asked for help.
Obligatory don't harrass staff regarding this, all of this is representative of a problem with Automatic, not the people who work for them and I imagine the meager team working on Tumblr is doing their best with the few tools they have.
#if i see one more 'tumblr users not paying for premium is the problem' im gonna lose it#they had their chance to get help from the users and totally destroyed any trust most of us had in them#because they showed us that looking good to advertisers and upkeeping conservative values were more important than#the people they asked to help them upkeep the site#if you want to blame anyone for tumblr premium going south blame Matt and Automatic#not the users who made the informed decision not to use it#tumblr premium#tumblr shutdown#predestrogen#matt mullenweg#tumblr staff#the queerest place on the internet
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💡Tuesday Tip: When "Shopping in The Aisle," Jack Black has a chance to encounter a "Price and Value!" Just watch out for the "Harley Female Faction!"

#homestuck#hint#amazing facts#information#jack noir#jade harley#fruit gushers#betty crocker#discounts#prices and values#economy
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I think one of the reasons that authors sometimes write characters as too self-aware is that you're writing and you have to have all these deep thinky thoughts about what the motivates the character and why they're acting the way they are. And naturally, you want to share all these cool and smart insights with your readers so they will know what a brilliant and incisive character writer you are. But you can't. Because your blorbo is an idiot. You just have to write them saying the stupidest thing anyone has ever said but in a precisely specific way that your readers will nod sagely and say, clearly, this author is a genius.
#writing#personally i think there's a lot of value in letting your characters be too insightful in your first go-round#then you shake your head say 'he would not say that' and replace three paragraphs of therapy-informed dialogue with 'Fuck you'#i have 2-3 readers who are capable of laser pinpointing the very specific fuckery i constantly make my characters engage in#and i consider myself fantastically lucky to have them
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#republican assholes#maga morons#Muskrat’s AI#trump and musk spread misinformation#traitor trump#crooked donald#Edolph#resist#republican hypocrisy#republican family values#oligarchs control the information pipeline
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I'm really not a villain enjoyer. I love anti-heroes and anti-villains. But I can't see fictional evil separate from real evil. As in not that enjoying dark fiction means you condone it, but that all fiction holds up some kind of mirror to the world as it is. Killing innocent people doesn't make you an iconic lesbian girlboss it just makes you part of the mundane and stultifying black rot of the universe.
"But characters struggling with honour and goodness and the egoism of being good are so boring." Cool well some of us actually struggle with that stuff on the daily because being a good person is complicated and harder than being an edgelord.
Sure you can use fiction to explore the darkness of human nature and learn empathy, but the world doesn't actually suffer from a deficit of empathy for powerful and privileged people who do heinous stuff. You could literally kill a thousand babies in broad daylight and they'll find a way to blame your childhood trauma for it as long as you're white, cisgender, abled and attractive, and you'll be their poor little meow meow by the end of the week. Don't act like you're advocating for Quasimodo when you're just making Elon Musk hot, smart and gay.
#this is one of the reasons why#although i would kill antis in real life if i could#i also don't trust anyone who identifies as 'pro-ship'#it's just an excuse to shut down legitimate ethical questions and engaging in honest self-reflective media consumption and critique#art doesn't exist in a vacuum#it's a flat impossibility for it not to inform nor be informed by real world politics and attitudes#because that's what it means to be created by human hands#we can't even make machine learning thats not just human bias fed into an algorithm#if the way we interact with art truly didn't influence anything then there would be no value in it#just because antis have weaponized those points in the most bad faith ways possible#doesn't mean you can ignore them in good faith#anyway fandom stans villains because society loves to defend and protect abusers#it's not because you get the chance to be free and empathetic and indulge in your darkness and what not#it's just people's normal levels of attachment to shitty people with an added layer of justification for it#this blog is for boring do-gooder enjoyers only#lol#knee of huss#fandom wank#media critique#pop culture#fandom discourse
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Hey know what’s fucked up. The little surge of hope Jonathan gets at trying to get his letters out isn’t even for his own rescue. It’s just for the chance for his fate to be known, and the warning of the danger that will soon be on the way.
He doesn’t want Mina to be left wondering what happened to him forever, and doesn’t want her to be vulnerable and unprepared when the Count arrives. His hope was for her.
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man. imagine if we knew eddie loved dancing before 806. imagine if that came up even once before the risky business scene.
#sorry to the confessions lovers but that episode was kind of . bad#from a storytelling standpoint#all empty calories no real weight to anything with the existing information they gave us prior#im like. mad now. dont tell us about the ballroom dancing NOW??#the risky business scene was SO cute but it meant NOTHING without context#and I know we have it in hindsight and we can give it meaning with our own sandbox but#at face value in the context of the show? it’s so weak without knowing that BEFORE#anyway me and Annie were talking abt this last night and im just getting more and more mad that they wasted such a good concept by giving#it a piss poor setup >:(#iinryer post
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Espio's lose animation / continue screen in Sonic the Fighters.
#espio the chameleon#sth#classic espio#sonic the fighters#gif#animations#informative espio post#so uh... can you guess why this exists? LMAOOOOOO#classic espio is how i feel realizing i have to actually learn how to play this fighting game if i want to get anything of value out of it#that will uh...take actual time#that's gonna have to be like... it's own thing#well his grumpy pose here is still cute#please believe me that classic espio can be cute
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the worst part of taking statistics is thinking about doing statistics and the best part of taking statistics is actually doing statistics.
#the problem is that the coding makes me very nervous and i want to make sure i have all the right information#but doing the actual work? FUN TIMES#i looooooove interpreting values i could interpret values all day#i love understanding what different values mean and why equations work the way they do#my professor said he’s gonna post helper videos for the code going forward which is great#but also i think i was just extra nervous bc it’s the first week and it’s been a couple semesters since i took stats#but this is actually completely fine#my professor possibly thinks that i’m mildly insane now but that is OKAY#my advisor has known that i’m insane for over a year now and he still tolerates me lol
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#I do not want to hustle and some of my most beloved people do not understand this#I was talking to my honorary big sister on the phone today about why I'm taking a gap year#the main reason is that the final semester of the program I was accepted into is around 50 hours per week of unpaid field work#which means you aren't allowed to have a job during that semester. this information was not presented until after the application process#anyway she was like “well that's fairly normal for healthcare professions” which is true#however this is a community college program and I would have expected them to account for people needing to work throughout college#anyway I responded “yeah true but I'm considering that maybe healthcare isn't for me then. I don't want a job that requires that much work.#And I don't! I don't want 50 or 60 hour work weeks! I want to work 40 hours and then leave and live my life!#but she made it seem like any job that requires a college degree is going to require that. And I don't think that's true#but also she is older than I am and has much more job experience so idk.#maybe she's advising based on the fact that as a teenager I was super type A and ambitious and really wanted a career?#whereas in the past couple years...idk I just want a reliable job that I don't hate that pays the bills and leaves time for enjoying life#so. I'm not sure#And now I kind of feel bad for not having that ambition anymore/ not wanting to have to give myself ulcers to get through school#But college is not worth my sanity and I found that out the hard way.#And I also feel bad for not being one of those people who CAN handle that much workload! Like I can certainly learn#to do more than I'm doing currently#but I will never be one of those constantly busy and insanely productive people. And I don't even want to be anymore#and yet that feels like an error.#I am not lazy! I used to think I was but no. I enjoy getting work done and doing personal projects and going to work and improving things.#It's not even as though I don't have things I want to do with my life. I have a lot of short term and long term goals!#I want to contribute to my community and support my family however I can and make art and tell stories and be a safe place for people!#and so much else!#but those ambitions aren't necessarily directly connected to school or a job for me anymore#and I value rest and having a social life too much to completely put my health on hold for years and years#sure college does take up a lot of time and energy but it shouldn't wholly consume your life as far as I can see.#and now I feel very unsure if that approach is realistic.#thinking I should talk with her again and try to explain myself a little better and ask what she meant.#diary
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The Mystery of Aaravos The Banter Lodge
So, recently an account called "The Banter Lodge" has popped up. April 30th, to be precise. You've seen it. I've seen it. We've all seen it. On Twitter, posting various images in the TDP official style.

A few nights ago, it debuted on Tumblr as well. "Coming May 2024" all of the promotional images and the website itself say.
Who is this account? Is it fan made, is it official? It's May, when exactly in "May 2024" is it coming?
Well, me and a few friends took some time to try to piece the mystery together, and so -- while it may still be 'coming', only dropping hints, I am here to tell you what I know now!
History
Website Code ( I love computer programming so I took the time to dive into that!)
Purpose
A. History
Who's Running the Banter Lodge?
To know that, first we need to delve into the history of the Twitter account.
Despite these images and site debuting less than a month ago, the account itself was founded way back in 2022, and originally called @BantherLodge, with an H, as it is in the show.
@BantherLodge is no longer available, and while it initially did not seem to be connected to The Banter Lodge, there are several interactions linked to the current one, Banter Lodge without an H.

In fact, here is the same tweets linked to the current (banter) account version.

Now we've established that @'BantherLodge' and @'BanterLodge' the same account with a changed name and identity, here is the most important past interaction:

@‘bantherlodge’ is mentioned here, and they are on this call. that said, WHO IS REALLY BEHIND BANTER LODGE? well based off the tweet, it seems that it’s 6 members of the cast and then 2 guests, @‘thebantherlodge’ and @‘ladytheebug’. But don’t take my word for it. Here, more confirmation:
Another person in the call happened to tweet about it too, this time with labels.


Now let’s take a closer look at these two guests. Sara @‘ladytheebug’ seems to be the one on the right, and by process of elimination, on the left is ‘bantherlodge’. aka:

Max….
Max the Mystery! ‘Sara’ and ‘Max’ isn’t really enough information to know more along with no connection to other socials so it’s hard to pin down who they are or what connections to previous fandom projects or creative projects in general they might have. However, they are still connected.
Besides the partially deleted various back and forths between these two accounts, this tweet about the Bait screensaver in the background is additional confirmation that this is @‘bantherlodge’ and @‘ladytheebug’: (note use of word ‘our’)

FURTHERMORE:

Said TV embodies this duo: A person who loves Bait (evident from so many of their tweets) and a person who loves the Banther Lodge…
Reminds you of something, doesn’t it?

“but hold on, just because there’s all these coincidences doesn’t mean the account could be passed on to someone else to run this.” Ok, but one last thing. If that was the case, why would they still be following Sara? In fact, it’s the Only person that they’re following besides TDPO?
(and their following has even been recently updated within the last few days as before then it didn’t include Eugene and Boone.) So, in conclusion,
Max of @‘BantherLodge’, and possibly Sara, (with or without TDPO but I’ll get to that later) almost certainly are the people behind the curtain of this Banter Lodge mystery.
Now, about said mystery… what exactly is the trail building up to?
well, to find out more about that, let’s glean what we can from the website.
B. Website Secrets
The website itself is very simple- A background, the image of the Banter House, and some text saying "Coming May 2024." But, beneath the deceptively simple surface, there was more to be found.

On May 1st Caprinae got this from the page. She also tweeted about it, after which the site changed to remove much of the css, including the part about the episodes and subscribe button. I was pretty excited about this as someone with a few years of coding experience, I wanted to mess around in VSC and see what I could find out.
After formatting the code the most noticeable thing is this right?

And when I make an element for it to apply to (since all that code is just formatting for stuff on the page like the title, images, etc, in this case- an audio bar) + adding in an image and an audio file:
We get this
AUDIO and an image. It looks exactly like a podcast episode. It turns out there’s actually a bunch of code for formatting that’s not used in elements in the site (elements that exist: the title or image), but it’s there, so I made some elements it would apply to. technically, it’s supposed to have a parchment paper background too, but I just chose some colors that you could see the text on.
Doing so, we get this!
(Here’s a video version.)
Plus, Original Code and Modified Code if you’re curious
Anyway, so the site (at least at the stage the code was taken from) doesn’t appear to be finished and there was no Java script written (or at least, linked) but there is definitely the makings for a website for a podcast— some sort of nav bar with the episodes, on an episode page, the image and audio, and then a subscribe link at the bottom!
C. Purpose
Time to speculate on the real identity and purpose of the Banter Lodge. So far, we know it used to be called the Banther Lodge. We know it seems to be run by [insert here.] We know it is almost certainly a podcast of some sort. But what, and why?
Here are some possibilites:
1.Official Content to Tide Over Fans Til S6 As we know, to calm the frustration of fans at Netflix/TDP for the delay of S6, the creators have been putting out content every day for the fans to puzzle over and figure out the season six titles.
Based on the current schedule, it’s set to end on May 13.—although it could be ending either May 13 or May 14 (depending when they do the last hint) after these drop, there will likely be a lull in TDP content, which would be the perfect time for the Banter Lodge to launch.
+ The Banter Lodge teaser campaign has already been perfectly timed for when a bunch of fans would be online on Twitter checking in for clues to begin with.

If this is official content, it would doubly make sense—it’d be timed perfectly to tie the fans over until the actual season six campaign starts (ie, trailer). Considering these two fans also somehow got to have a private panel with the cast, it’s not impossible that they’d be working with TDP on this content, additionally the teaser images put out this far have been somewhat reminiscent of TDP official content—ie, Callum’s lodge notebook->Callum’s sketchbook, Refractions->Reflections, Dear Callum letter from Rayla, design style, etc.
However, there is one big reason I don’t think this is the case: it’s a little too sloppy. For example, if they wanted it to be completely anonymous and unclear what was happening, the tweet mentioning @‘BantherLodge’ in the panel would have been deleted and there wouldn’t have been any hints in the code. Of course, these could still just be honest mistakes. However, it also seems like it is building off of the current world in a more derivative, fan-content fashion, not necessarily adding new material the way TDP Official tends to. It’s copying the official style,—but almost too much if that makes sense.
Like altering a shot from the show for a teaser.


x
Don’t get me wrong. I love the way that they’re building off the world, I’m excited to see where it leads, but for whatever reason, to me, it just doesn’t seem official.
So assuming it’s made by fans, what kind of podcast is it? Second possibility—
2. Fan Made Talk Show
This seems like the most obvious conclusion, considering that The Banter House is a play on a location in TDP, and the word banter, which is synonymous with talking, but specifically back and forth, genial interactions.
Maybe it’s dedicated to analyzing the show or a particular aspect,—maybe centric to the lodge, crystals, Bait and Stella—maybe even interviewing cast/crew!
Well, to get a better idea of what niche it might be filling, let’s take a look at what TDP podcasts are already out there.
Hot Brown Morning Potion Podcast [2019-2023] Hosted by Tamika "Kuno" Williams and Hailey from Cartoon Universe. This podcast [is] full of answering fan questions, interviews, theories and all kinds of discussions on everything Dragon Prince.
News from the Breach [2020-2024] Your hosts Ceilidh and Yana are watching The Dragon Prince from start to finish. Each season of the podcast covers one “Book” (or season) of the Netflix series The Dragon Prince. In each episode we discuss two chapters of the series, except for the season finales.
Calm Chaos Club [2023] Join Kevlar and Lou each week as they discuss topics about animation, design, and all things related to The Dragon Prince on Netflix! With special guests brought on for unique topics and insights into the creative process, these bite-sized episodes will ensure you can get your TDP fix in anywhere and anytime.
There’s no harm in another talk show but as there are a few out there already (and for other reasons) I personally think this is not necessarily the niche the banter Lodge is going to fill. I mean, I do think that it’s still possible I mean, it could be centric to particular aspect around the lodge as mentioned.
However, there’s a possibility that excites me a lot more, that I’m hoping for the most….
3.Fan Made Audio Drama in the Saga Setting I have personally always been a huge fan of audio drama podcasts (TMA,TPP,WTNV) and if there was a dragon Prince audio drama podcast, I think I would just die on the spot honestly from joy. I also think it’s most likely because all of the clues so far have been very story/worldbuilding oriented, as well as writings from familiar characters’ perspectives. It seems as though a story is being crafted here, and I am all for it.
Y’know what? While we’re here on the topic of storytelling podcasts, we might as well throw in D&D/TTRPG or even Tales of Xadia as a possibility because yeah sure. Why not? I mean, tabletop role-play games also involve a lot of talking so it would fit the banter theme. Who knows.
That's all! What do you think? Any other thoughts, additions or other speculation? Feel free to add on!
Thanks to @bycaprinae for Twitter screenshots, html, and general inspiration, and to @parroset for other help with the website part and general support!
#tl;dr all evidence points to it being a fanmade podcast! Possibly launching May 15th!#CS Major core;#One of those things where I’m like. Should I post this#Well#I value…I promise the people freedom of information and so freedom of information is what they’re gonna get#This actually helped me learn/remember a lot of web design stuff haha#Yay#the dragon prince#tdp speculation#sort of#tdp meta
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[Tuvok & Janeway: Control, Distance, Duty & Connection.] Sources: St Voyager Transcripts / Mitski 'First Love Late Spring' / Disco Elysium
#web weaving#star trek web weaving#st voyager#Kathryn Janeway#Tuvok#be the change you want to see in the world - make a long post about Tuvok & Janeway's similarities <- angel on my shoulder#I feel like a lot of people see them as 'opposites attract' sort of friends where Janeway is unhinged & Tuvok reigns her in#but in reality I think that while there is that element in there (exacerbated HEAVILY by their delta quad circumstances)#what I see most in their relationship is how they both value loyalty and duty above all and are extremely rigid with themselves#and the people around them. How they both have to maintain distance from others bc of their positions as captain & vulcan#I hate when people dismiss Tuvok as not being remotely interested in Maryana or Noss - it erases an interesting struggle that he and Janewa#both share - their desire to stay loyal to their spouses vs the 70 years of loneliness that that loyalty demands of them#But they BOTH triumph and they BOTH remain loyal (Tuvok until he returns to T'Pel and Janeway until Mark informs her that it's over)#and for both of them it's a little bit insane for them to do that.#Isn't it more interesting that Janeway and Tuvok both have feelings for people other than their spouses but don't give in#to that temptation?#They're both people who live very fastidiously by codes. Either written codes or moral codes - they very rarely if ever do things because#it's what THEY want to do. I'd say they're the least emotion-driven members of the crew and yes I'm including Seven because Seven#has a very...how to describe? It's a blunt and insular selfishness. She does what SHE wants to do and doesn't really care about others.#To me that's emotion-driven. Or...personal desire-driven? Not a bad thing at all but very different from Janeway & Tuvok who#are always more 'this is logical' or 'this is for the crew' rarely do they think 'this is what I want' bc they can't afford to#for different reasons (captain & vulcan)#they both also are in the most 'caretaking' positions on the ship from my POV. Security and Captain - both are directly in charge of#ship and crew safety.#Janeway & Tuvok#star trek voyager#st voy#when I say caretaking I'm NOT saying they're everyone's mom and dad or whatever - I'm saying they're in positions where they always#have to think about the greater good and the crew as a whole and how much danger is acceptable etc etc.#Janeway is always killing herself for the crew but Tuvok is right there beside her
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Man its been weeks and I’m still soured by the conclusion to Fontaine’s main story. I'll just rant here
There were a lot of things I didn’t like about it (Arlecchino's altruism being played straight, Traveler being out of character, the lore exposition ass-pull with the prophecy slates, the weird logic about how destroying a Gnosis could potentially wake up the Heavenly Principles but not fucking destroying an Archon Throne when Celestia forced everyone to fight a GODDAMN WAR TO ESTABLISH THEM-) but the biggest offense to me was how Furina was handled. This was marketed as the grand finale of the arc, the climax with Furina at the center of it all. And she got shafted. Big time. Furina had no agency in the plot whatsoever, nothing she did had any effect on how things turned out, and she didn’t even have the dignity of fully understanding why it all had to happen that way.
(Also I will preface this with yes Furina and Focalors are technically the same person with the same origin, but after the split Furina lost all her memories as Focalors. They are two separate consciousnesses with different experiences, and therefore I will treat their individual choices as their own)
I’ve seen people try to argue that no, she chose to take on this role knowing she would suffer, that she didn't HAVE to go along with it. And she was even working by herself to solve the prophecy without relying on Focalors, she wasn’t a puppet/pawn! But the thing is she was essentially in a hostage situation. If she didn’t do things exactly as dictated by Focalors people would DIE. Like there is a reason why criminal punishments are lighter when it’s found the perpetrator was coerced into it! And her researching how to avoid the prophecy changed nothing about the outcome, she could have sat around eating cake and the story would have word for word turned out exactly the same. All that information served to do was highlight her suffering and draw the audience’s sympathy. That's what I mean about her not having agency, it's not about her ability to act as an individual but how her actions had an effect on the overall plot. None of her choices outside of the role designated by Focalors did anything to change the situation for better or worse.
And to top it all off she didn’t even understand WHY this all had to happen. Why do people dissolve in the Primordial water? How does her pretending to be an Archon play into solving the issue? Why can’t she confide in anyone? What the hell is Focalors even doing? She doesn’t learn the answers to any of these until after everything was over, and not even from Focalors’ own mouth, it was relayed to her by Neuvillette.
Speaking of Neuvillette, I’m not gonna lie I’m sorta annoyed at his existence because it felt like Furina was shafted for him. Everything is very tilted in Neuvillette's favor. He gets his powers back, full control over Pneuma/Ousia, final say in trials, the ability to hand out Visions, and just straight up the ability to manipulate life itself. And okay all these things were his to begin with lore-wise, whatever, but he also becomes the "lore important" character after this at Furina's expense. Furina doesn't have her memories as Focalors, she can't tell us anything about how the world works, about Celestia, about what happened 500 years ago. Even though other Archons didn't give us much either for one reason or another, they at least HAVE that knowledge, and are therefore guaranteed to have involvement in future events with the Abyss and Celestia. Furina at the moment, doesn't. Neuvillette has it now. And all that talk about Focalors judging Celestia? Also Neuvillette's job now. And it feels like it was all stolen from Furina from a story-telling perspective because again, she didn't know of the plan to return his powers. She didn't even get to explicitly agree with her other self that he should have them back. The writers really seemed to go out of their way to place him on a pedestal at Furina's expense, which irks the hell out of me.
There are some opportunity for future interludes to turn the current state around, and they probably will since Furina is still being marketed as an Archon, but as it stands I want Fontaine to be over so we can move on to the next disappointment.
#I'm actually ok with the trial#I thought it was dumb but from the characters perspectives Furina was willingly hiding key information#and they already gave her a chance to come clean with it privately#so they had to corner her#and the writers needed to build up to the climax#so even if it was contrived I give it a pass#It was undoubtedly dramatic and I was very moved by Focalors sacrifice#but I couldn't disagree more when people call it peak writing#maybe it depends greatly on whether you liked Furina before her past was revealed#Bc despite the implications that there was more to her even early on people looked at her act at face value and thought she was insufferabl#and it was after we were shown the extent of her suffering that opinions took a 180#and while I'm glad for that I can't help but be a little bitter that it took THIS for it to happen#amy rambles
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