#we remain enemies to enemies

[thanekrios]

fuck. i hate fondant with a burning passion.

[rainbow-sunshine-unicorn]

This is objectively the funniest frame of season 3 to me, because you have:

Anthony and Newton legitimately having a face off against each other

Anthony is literally draped over his wife while wearing a silk robe and you can see the top of Newton’s fluffy little head, making this the least threatening standoff in history

But there is very real horror in Anthony’s eyes as he looks at this cute little fluffy corgi

Kate, in the background, acting like this is her own personal comedy and giggling away

[ixcaliber]

trying to finish as much as i can off playstation plus before letting my subscription end and one of those things was the bioshock infinite burial at sea dlc and oh my fucking god what an absolutely atrotrious experience. incredibly somehow worse than bioshock infinite (a game i hold no affection for) and may be one of the worst video game experiences i've ever had.

[starbuck]

plans for tomorrow include:

Doing my weekly bird survey (HUGE win for job experience and volunteer hours)

taking a BATH!!!!!!!! i got cool and fun bubble bath stuff that i’m gonna use!!!! very hype!!!!!!

[bonefall]

Joss Whedon can fuck off. Dude saw that the directors and writers were heading towards Hawk/Widow in the MCU and threw in Hulk/Widow and gave Clint a family because fuck Hawk/Widow fans, right? Also fuck what the actors want too.

I DON'T KNOW WHO THESE CHARACTERS ARE BUT I AGREE! FUCK JOSS WHEDON!!

[amelikos]

I wonder how much Liko told the others after the events of HZ065..

We know she told them about the Rakurium and Spinel using it during the episode itself, but I wonder if she told them about being stuck in a cave with Amethio later on or if she just mentioned it in passing.

[tiredassmage]

[whentherewerebicycles]

I cannot survive this day lol

[hextehc]

the timeline and changes from act 1 → post - act 1 into defender of tomorrow aka the talis to giopara pipeline it lived inside of him this entire time and he didnt even know it

( act 1. ) while some things were present in the beginning like being patient, diligent, inventive, persistent, suicidal, reckless, gullible, an absolute unit of a people pleaser, ambitious, insecure, polite, and even held ideas of having relaxed prejudice against those in zaun (arguably you could say almost everyone in piltover has negative ideas of people from the under city so jayce is absolutely no different despite where he came from originally. you can see it in the way he talks to viktor sometimes, completely forgetting that he's from zaun himself; this is an entirely different discussion) these traits vanished as the series went on. hard to actually see what goes on the 7 year time lapse of jayce in and out of the lab especially playing as the councilors lapdog that bids their every command, but you see a little more of a newer jayce and some of old traits that stayed the same. you see he's more proud of his and viktor's work, a lot more bold in his pursuits particularly when he gets more involved with the council, even charming and honest to the point where it's almost manipulative; ambitious and diligence still holds true but the less time he spends in the lab, he becomes more headstrong, demanding, fierce, difficult, and renege; having too much tunnel vision, he goes against his most important persons wishes and being blind to rift drifting between the both of them. guess you could say he's also inattentive with his partner's failing health and quite inability to read the room, until it's too late (even a negotiator with sylco to give zaun its proper freedom).

the foundation really crumbles when the council room explodes and he sees his partner's body broken but barely alive. he decides to play the role of frankenstein, impulsively and desperate with trying to piece viktor's body back together using his schematics.

( defender of tomorrow. ) he starts to lose those values when he was just the creator of hextech. carelessly thrown into politics lead to his downfall and before he knew it, viktor had decided to leave piltover to go back to zaun and fight back jayce's development and the nation as a whole. he begged, pleaded, even giving up his council seat (originally having the mind he wasn't fit to help defend piltover and fight for its citizens, translating into against viktor rather) so they can resume what they originally wanted to do: create hextech to help the common man, in piltover and zaun. it didn't give. this causes him to become panicked, scornful, impatient, hostile, and resentful. it was hard to accept the nature of the present and the future. in the lab he continued to be, doing what he wanted to do but made the promise to himself that no more weapons would be created the exceptions of the ones already made (the mercury hammer, atlas gauntlets (originally made with miners in mind), and the hexrifle). he starts to neglect to his grooming habits, letting his beard and hair grow out; he becomes indifferent to what others think of him.

eventually, as those feelings subside, and having still under the council's eye, he forces himself to only associate hextech with himself and not his old partner (and becomes annoyed at people who make the comment you were so loud about including him before, now what happened?). the golden boy and paragon of progress was no more, even refusing to look at the posters that showed off his face, ones that gave bright hope over piltover and a dark shadow over zaun.

he then becomes arrogant, stubborn, sarcastic, insensitive, disrespectful, regretful, possessive, dismissive, rude, secretive, and insular. he absolutely irritable, upon stopping one of viktor's failed attacks on piltover, does he gain the defender of tomorrow title. one who held so much pride of the beautiful city of piltover now has feelings of shame, but egotistical. if he was going to put into this position, might as well play into it. can we just mention jealous and obsessive, too? just in a private room where he and viktor share, regardless of being enemies.

however, he's all too familiar with masking to make himself to more digestible and approachable. he only feeds into that, his face speaking for him, but even with all that he still remains helpful, hopeful, passionate, disciplined, protective, and empathetic.

[seimei-chsq]

goddamn i never realized most of my darling figure skating mutuals are in european time zones… like i knew. but i didn’t Know. looking around the figure skating tag frantically calling‘mutuals?? beloved mutuals??’ like a kid trying to find their mom in a grocery store.

[waloeders]

I BEAT THE DLC!!!

i have so many ideas for another s/i omg....

[impgall]

A woman talks to her maternal grandmother and the whole world collapses

[faeratil]

D&D tonight from the point of view of the enemy (steampunk-esque setting):

Enemy and his buddies are going on a scavenging trip to collect parts for their inventors, riding on mechanical horses. They find a small passenger train with very few passengers (4 passengers and the engineer). One of the enemies messes with the passenger car, and draws the attention of an egotistical Aasimar “vlogger” and his ethereal “cameraman”.

The other two ride up to a window on the other side of the cart, only to come face to face with what can only be described as a Neanderthal. The Neanderthal grunts and then let’s out the most terrifying roar that scares the two into riding away and abandoning the mission

Last enemy sees a floating hand coming toward him and his mechanical horse with one finger up. Finger goes up the horses ass, and the horse goes quicker.

Enemy is greeted by a very angry dwarf shouting in a foreign language out the engineer’s window. Very short and stick-thin elf woman pops her head up out the same window and very cheerfully yells at the enemy in Draconic. Enemy hisses at the elf because what the fuck was she saying?

Train car detaches from the engineer’s car, and enemy watches as the elf is kicked out of the door of the engineer’s car and immediately gets a javelin (thrown by the dwarf) stuck in her leg, pinning her to the ground. Watches as the elf removes the javelin and throws it back at the dwarf through an open window in the detached train car, stabbing through his leg and pinning him to the ground.

Watches as the Neanderthal struggles to open a hatch, and has the Aasimar “help” by screaming destructive criticism about how he’s doing everything wrong. Watches the elf, with one leg just gushing blood, sprint toward the train car and try to jump up only to fall on her ass because she’s so fucking short and can’t even reach the window.

Enemy gets off his horse and tries to shoot a crossbow in the open window and narrowly misses. Mechanical horse shoots grappling hook and keeps the train car from rolling away any more creating a tightrope between the car and the horse’s mouth.

Watches the dwarf rip the javelin out of his leg and just fucking destroy the hatch door that the Neanderthal still can’t open, and watches as the Neanderthal, the Aasimar, and the dwarf all climb through the hatch onto the roof of the train car.

Loses sight of the elf because she’s on the other side of the car currently healing her bleeding leg.

Watches as the Aasimar tries to walk the “tightrope” (barely 3ft above the ground), makes it barely a few inches, and falls off into a “superhero landing”, and the dwarf follows suit falling almost instantly.

Watches the dwarf try to do fancy tricks with the super bloody javelin that he pulled out of his leg. Sees the elf finally make the jump, just high enough to crawl through a window into the train car. Javelin flies out of the dwarf’s hand, and through the open window, bounces off the ceiling, and stabs the elf’s other leg.

(The entire time, the elf is super cheerful and always looking at the positive.)

Neanderthal uses fireball and destroys the mechanical horse, enemy is dumbfounded by the whole fiasco. Watches the elf yank the javelin out of her leg again, wrap it in a blanket to clean off the blood, and just take a seat in the car watching the rest of the party attempt to battle.

Neanderthal uses fireball and that’s the last thing the enemy sees.

[kuroyuki-kokuyoku]

Remember Lee Chul Min?

You know, the asshole who abandoned everyone at the Shelter to die and go on to found his own Guild?

Yeah, there's no mention of him succeeding in life beyond that.

And knowing how petty and malicious Cale can get, I imagine him waiting until Lee Chul Min has peaked at life.

Maybe he got married, had a kid or two. Maybe he reunited with a surviving relative. I imagine his job as a Head of a Guild gives him a pretty generous paycheck. I also imagine his subordinates greatly respect him.

Then KRS strikes.

Now knowing in canon proper, LCM is a coward with a "survival of the fittest" mentality. In Earth 2, he had to be gaslit into staying and helping with Cale cutting off all matters of escape for him within a conversation. I imagine his counterpart in Earth 1 is no different, but he's worse. He doesn't learn from running away. If anything, he'll probably double down on his toxic "I have the power to do anything I want and everyone else weaker than me is canon fodder" mentality.

And that's what KRS would use against him.

I imagine he flips everything over and exposes LCM for what he truly is and all the shady shit he's, without a doubt, been up to in all these years.

KRS didn't just go after his job. He went after EVERY ASPECT in LCM's life that he has built on the corpses of Central Shelter.

His wife divorced him. His kid(s) are ashamed of him. His relative disowned him. His loyal subordinates, who just days before would have happily died for him, now wants to feed him to the next monster that shows up. And all of Korea wants his head on a pike.

Even after all this, KRS is not yet done with him.

As a last show of "mercy", KRS pays out of his own pocket the best lawyer money could buy, so LCM could avoid the death penalty by the skin of his teeth.

And so, LCM is quietly serving a life sentence in prison.

But not before KRS anonymously spread around the names of the surviving relatives of the prisoners that LCM had allowed to die so he could continue to live his cushy life after the fall of Central Shelter.

His only condition, LCM still needs to pay in blood for the rest of his miserable years, don't kill him.

You try connecting Cale's actions post the transmigration to his past as Kim Roksoo and it gives you more insight into how he might have been as a team leader. Like, take the Golden Plaques thing for example. You know Director Ma gulped and clutched his pocket everytime he had a meeting with the guy because he knew Kim Roksoo was boutta suck him dry.

I love side story 2 because of this particular reason. Choi Han did mention it after getting Choi Jung Soo's memories that his personality is still the same even after transmigrating. But side story 2 shows us how. He wasn't known to the public much but he was famous among the government and guilds and all the power players. And I doubt it'd have been for a different reason then. Even then he was a terrifying bastard whom they couldn't help but listen to because he was the most efficient tactician.

This is why reading the initial chapters of the series, specifically the war with the indomitable alliance, after knowing his past as Kim Roksoo puts so many things into place. Like, no wonder he was so good at understanding the power dynamics between the nations. No wonder his predictions were so on point. Even with the knowledge of TBOAH world it would have been difficult for anyone else to achieve such an overwhelming victory in the war. Their side never lost a single battle and it's in huge part owing to the expert strategising of Cale.

The Church of the Sun God insulted Mary and Cale decided in a heartbeat he'll bring them down for daring to do so. Do you think something like that ever happened on Earth? Someone insulted his subordinate and he instantly started plotting their demise? He lost a subordinate once. If it was due to someone's betrayal, like a colleague, a guild or any other human or organisation, you know they never came out alive from that.

[firefistjaigio]

I wish I could show those dumbass one piece fans who think luffy operates on a basis that if someone like kaido asked for his help then he would join him, LIKE NO HE WOULDN'T

[uisceb]

Okay I want to talk about this moment between Morrible and Glinda for a sec because it adds such a wonderfully sinister layer to a scene that is otherwise a triumphant defining moment for Elphaba, and it sets up the dynamics for Part 2 so perfectly.

At this point, we are in the thick of “Defying Gravity.” Everyone’s attention is on Elphaba - and rightfully so, she’s up there declaring war on the Wizard, displaying incredible feats of magic, of course everyone’s attention is on her.

…Everyone, except Morrible.

Morrible has realized that Plan A was a bust, but rather than panicking, she’s already worked over Plans B through Z in her head and has realized that Glinda, not Elphaba, is actually the key figure here. Glinda is actually the best thing that could have happened to them.

Mind you, Morrible hates Glinda. She thinks Glinda is vapid and attention-seeking and completely without talent. It would be extremely easy for her to brand Glinda as an accomplice to Elphaba, have the guards drag her off, imprison her, never have to deal with her again, nice and neat.

Instead, while everyone else is focused on Elphaba, Morrible only has eyes for Glinda. She zeroes in on her, releases her, and comforts her, because she understands what no one else understands, which is that yes, that’s great that the Wizard now has an enemy to unify his people against, but they also need a symbol of hope, something that is the exact antithesis to Elphaba, something to keep everyone at extremes. 

The Wizard himself can’t really be a symbol of hope, because the key to his success is that he remains shrouded in mystery, and yes people think he’s wonderful, but there’s a level of uncertainty and intimidation to him. He is Oz the Great and Terrible, and everyone’s preeeeeetty sure he’s a good guy, but if you have someone like Elphaba out there - who Morrible knows from experience is very smart, very articulate, and has her own sort of magnetism - there’s a potential that she could turn at least enough people against the Wizard to make things very inconvenient.

So what they need, now that they have an enemy, is to have an equally magnetic figurehead representing the Wizard who embodies all these one-dimensional ideas of goodness, someone for the public to adore and fawn over so the association between Wizard and Goodness is crystal clear.

And by bringing Glinda along, Elphaba has unknowingly served that figurehead up on a platter.

Glinda is everything Elphaba isn’t, from personality, to appearance - Morrible has already set Elphaba up by calling her green skin an “outward manifestorium of her twisted nature,” which paves the way for Glinda, who is the perfect conventional beauty, to be an “outward manifestorium” of pure goodness. 

Morrible realizes they need these two lightning rods of Absolute Evil and Absolute Good in order to manipulate people - fear alone isn’t enough; the only way to effectively radicalize the populace is to make sure there is no gray area whatsoever, no room for question: you're either good, or you’re evil. And the Wizard alone isn’t a strong enough representation of “goodness” when by virtue of existing, he has to remain in the shadows. Glinda on the other hand? With her looks and her charm and her openness and her ability to expertly win over a crowd? Perfect for the role.

Now the tricky part for Morrible is taking into consideration that Glinda and Elphaba love each other. But we also know from earlier scenes that Morrible is a master at manipulating emotions. Right from the start when Elphaba is having trouble with her magic, Morrible casually brings up the “Animals should be seen and not heard” disturbance from class, spoon-feeding her just enough to get Elphaba upset, triggering her magic, after which Morrible makes sure to give her assurance and praise to keep Elphaba optimistic about her power.

She’s also aware that Glinda does have quite a bit of influence over Elphaba, because when Elphaba flees, Morrible immediately tasks her with winning her over, rather than simply relying on the guards or even going after Elphaba herself. She knows if anyone has a chance at roping Elphaba back in, it's Glinda.

Obviously, Glinda isn’t successful in getting her back, but while this puts a dent in Morrible’s plans to get control of Elphaba, it does give her an extra weak spot to exploit in Glinda.

So now, at the height of “Defying Gravity” when Elphaba has officially taken her stand against them, Morrible sees Glinda, and Glinda is at her most vulnerable, her most emotionally fragile. Not only is she heartbroken and in shock, she’s also just witnessed in real time exactly how easy it is to turn an entire nation against someone. She’s scared, she’s powerless. She’s just lost the love of her life her only friend, she has no one to turn to - Morrible has definitely picked up on the fact that even though Glinda has countless people who fawn over her, none of them can be considered a true friend except for Elphaba, which means Glinda is completely isolated. Glinda also has a very limited understanding of the bigger picture of what the Wizard is trying to accomplish, and because she’s never been a victim of the system the way Elphaba has, she is still desperately clinging to the idea that everything will be okay as long as she plays by the rules of the people in power.

She has been perfectly primed for Morrible to begin manipulating, not through violence or intimidation, but by offering her comfort when no one else would - when not even Glinda’s only friend would - when no one else is even paying attention to Glinda, because they have the very real and present threat of Elphaba quite literally hanging over them. In this moment, Morrible chooses Glinda, which Glinda has been striving for since the beginning. Elphaba has chosen her principles, the Wizard has chosen his enemy, but Morrible has chosen Glinda, and in this moment of being so alone and so afraid and so betrayed, that makes all the difference.

We also get kind of a parallel shot too - Elphaba really sealed her fate the second her hand closed around the broom. But here, Glinda seals her fate when she gives in and reciprocates Morrible’s hold on her.

THIS is the moment that sets us up for Part 2, with Elphaba and Glinda as our lightning rods for Absolute Evil and Absolute Good, but more to the point, it makes it clear that they’ve BOTH been used, they’ve BOTH played right into these respective roles Morrible and the Wizard need in order to be successful - even if it wasn’t how Morrible originally planned for things to go.

I just love it, because “Defying Gravity” is Elphaba’s song - it’s triumphant, and it’s heartbreaking, and it’s everything a defining moment should be for a character. But by injecting this little moment between Morrible and Glinda into the scene, we also get an underlying current of dread because we know we’re about to see the consequences of Elphaba’s defiance versus Glinda’s compliance and how both serve to benefit the Wizard/Morrible’s propaganda.

TL;DR - when I said "I want to talk about this scene between Morrible and Glinda for a sec" I clearly meant "I'm gonna write a whole essay. Like a nerd."