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musclesandhammering · 3 years ago

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Loki (2021) Positivity from an Anti

Ok so all of my mutuals know I’m extremely anti-Loki (2021), anti-sylki, and anti-sylvie. But at a certain point, even we antis get tired of all the negativity. So! Here’s some Loki series commentary in the opposite direction! This is a list of all the things about the show that I loved :)

Also adding a disclaimer that all of this is just my opinion and some of my fellow antis (or even people who liked the show) might disagree, and that’s fine! I’ve been planning this post for awhile. I always say in my other posts that I don’t entirely hate the show and I wanted to be a little more specific about what I think are its good aspects. Feel free to leave your thoughts!

• Mobius is a gem (Owen Wilson owns my whole heart) and his relationship with Loki is so so great. He’s not one-dimensional at all, he has conflicted loyalty and is morally complex, and he has the tragic backstory- which makes him a perfect choice for eventually becoming Loki’s first genuine friend.

• The casting was really really great. Lots of women and people of color. Most of the female actresses (as well as the males) are over 30, which isn’t very common and is fantastic!

• Superb acting all around. I can’t think of a single scene where the actors under or oversold it.

• Beautiful set design, incredible cgi, and gorgeous cinematography overall. It looked more like a movie than a tv show, which is really good.

• Kang being the big bad was a huge plus for me. Johnathan Majors was perfect in the role, his vibes were immaculate, and I was honestly pretty worried that the man behind the curtain would end up being another Loki variant, which imo would’ve been boring and predictable and counter-productive, so it was a big relief when that didn’t happen.

• I like that it sets up a bunch of future marvel movies, rather than being contained to its own little world. It gives it more importance and (hopefully) will encourage writers to not just toss Loki’s character aside in future projects.

• All the Loki variants were delightful. All of them except Sylvie. Kid Loki has my heart. Boastful Loki is a fashion icon. Alligator Loki is a savage. President Loki is the superior variant. Classic Loki became my fav character in less than half an episode.

• It showed some more variety in Loki’s magic. A lot of his powers we’ve seen before, but it feels like they were portrayed a bit more blatantly in the show. The energy blasts, the telekinesis, the teleportation… Outstanding.

• It also implied that Loki has the potential to be waaaay more powerful than he knows he is right now, which? Yes.

• Some of the quotes- and the themes behind them- are just profound as hell. Such as:

“I think we’re stronger than we realise.”

“It’s never too late to change.”

“You can be whoever you wanna be, even someone good.”

“We’re Lokis. We survive. It’s what we do.”

“Loki, God of Outcasts.”

“The universe wants to break free, that’s why it manifests chaos.”

• Technically Loki was Marvel’s first canon lgbt (bi) character, which is a win. His genderfluidity is also technically canon, even if it wasn’t really acknowledged on-screen.

• There were a lot of throwback references to Thor 1, Avengers, and Thor The Dark World. Which I loved.

• Sylvie’s so pretty. Her hair and makeup and costume were all perfect.

• Big fan of Loki finally getting Laevateinn.

• Sufficiently slutty imagery, courtesy of a female director (Loki in a collar, kneeling to Sif, President Loki looking down into the bunker, the hair flips)

• The music was Excellent Wonderful and Superb.

• I love that Loki being a good singer is now canon.

• I love that Asgardians having their own language is now canon (even if it’s basically just Icelandic).

• I also love that they disproved all of those “Loki was a shy nerdy wallflower pre-canon” theories in Episode 3. The drinking/eating/singing scene was fun, if a bit wacky.

• There’s a million different reasons why Loki does what he does, especially in regards to the New York attack (I’m literally writing a huge meta on them), but somehow I never considered that Loki being desperate for control was one of them. It makes a lot of sense, and I always love getting new insights into his motivations.

• I love that Loki finally outright acknowledged that he doesn’t enjoy hurting people. We Been Knew™️ but it’s still nice to hear it out loud from his own mouth.

• The TVA outfit wasn’t as hideous as some people make it out to be. It could’ve been A Look, even. You know, if he’d just accessorised a little better. And kept the jacket on. And not gotten sweaty. And not gotten dirty. And maybe had at least one other costume change… But it had potential, though!!

• Even though I despise the Obvious One, I did actually like some of the other romance crumbs they tossed us (sifki, Loki x the flight attendant).

• The whole DB Cooper thing was iconic idc idc.

• Loki’s hyper sort of overly excited puppy attitude in episode 2 was actually pretty refreshing and funny (for awhile). And now I can headcanon him as adhd, yeehaw.

• “We’re all villains here.” That quote was iconic, my favourite one in the show. And the entire theme that it summarised was really great as well. When you think about it, every single main character in this series has been the villain at one point or another. I mean, I know all marvel characters do bad things etc, but none of the Heroes are ever narratively categorised as Bad. This show did just that with all of them, though. . Loki was framed as the psychopath that attacked New York. Sylvie was framed as the murderous fugitive. The TVA/Ravonna/Mobius were framed as the murderous fascists. Kang was framed as the crazy totalitarian. It’s made clear that all the Loki variants were the villains of their stories.

However, every single main character in the series is also framed as the Hero at a certain point. Loki is framed as the main protagonist who throws a wrench in the TVA’s dastardly plans. Sylvie is framed as the persevering freedom fighter who wants to take down the fascists. The TVA/Mobius/Ravonna are framed as the ones who maintain order for the greater good. Kang is framed as the weird but ultimately benevolent wise man who’s just trying to prevent something worse from happening. The Loki variants are framed as generous allies who befriend the main character and help him on his journey.

Everyone in this equation is openly acknowledged by the narrative to be morally corrupt, but not entirely morally bankrupt. There are no Straightforward Hero Figures (like the Avengers) in this entire scenario at all, and that makes for a super interesting dynamic that marvel has never done before. So yes: “We’re all villains here.” But also: “No one bad is ever truly bad, and no one good is ever truly good.” I loved that.

• Even if it wasn’t really enough imo, I still treasure the crumbs we got of Loki being competent and capable (him putting the collar on B-15, him figuring out Sylvie’s hiding place, him teaching himself to enchant on the fly while fighting a giant cloud beast of eldritch proportions).

• I love that B-15 was the one who stepped in and saved the day in Episode 4, when we all thought it was gonna be Mobius. What a queen.

• Marvel usually has a bit of a problem with creating compelling and memorable side characters. But aside from Sylvie, I genuinely got attached to every single character in this show. Like Casey, C-20? I was seriously emotionally invested in them and they were only in like 2 episodes. Wtf.

• Introducing the TVA storyline in the Loki series specifically was a really good move. I’m not saying they executed it well, just that it had a ton of potential. A lot of people have wondered why marvel even thought to put those two (the TVA and Loki) together, when they had literally nothing to do with each other, nothing in common, and essentially no connection at all. But when you think about it, it’s a really interesting twist on both of those stories. Forcing the embodiment of destructive chaos and the pillar of rigid order to interact could make for some seriously entertaining and compelling television. And as far as meshing these two completely unrelated entities together goes, I thought they did it pretty well- at least just the bare bones of the story (loki being arrested by the TVA and being one of their most common variants).

So that’s it! If you guys (fellow antis) wanna add stuff you liked, feel free. If anyone wants to discuss (or debate) my list, feel free to do that too!

#loki series 2021 #loki laufeyson #anti sylvie #loki meta #loki odinson #loki #loki series

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sneakydraws · 4 years ago

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Well, here it is - a lengthy explanation of each card in my mdzs major arcana deck and what I meant to convey/what i would have changed in retrospect/what alternatives i considered! It’s a bit messy and my typing style is lazy but hopefully it will be an interesting read to some of you :)

And so you don’t say I didn’t warn you - jiang cheng’s section (11 justice) is absurdly long lmao

0 the fool I elaborated on this in the post itself but yeah basically jin ling is kind of representative of all the damage and trauma caused by the past, and there’s a kind of danger there of him falling victim to the same vices as the older characters and repeating the same mistakes and perpetuating the cycle of war and misery (the cycle that we already see with how the jin sect became the new wen sect, and later with how jgy became the new wwx) and he has a lot of room to grow! He grows so much over the course of the novel, comes to realise the complexities of the past and gets a harsh life lesson in how nothing is as black and white as it seems. But ill save talking about his progress for the end, for now whats important is that he has room to grow and also a dog. I don’t really have a justification for the sun, i mostly just thought it looked sick? It made its way to the next card as well, where it makes a bit more sense, but then i realised it was a dumb motif to include 1 the magician I still very much like wwx for the role, and that illustration would have probably had him raising a corpse on his left and pointing threateningly to the sun on his right. I considered including the table as well, with some mdzs relevant items replacing the card suits. Anyway, like i said wwx got a few cards to himself already so i went with the alternative wq design, since i think she fits the card as well. Both she and wwx are highly skilled people, extremely driven once they set their mind to something. The card to me symbolises the creative mind as well as a general drive for action, which fits them both - wwx was famously a prolific inventor, and wq came up with a previously unheard of surgery, after all. This card strays pretty far from the rider-waite deck design, largely because i was still figuring out how i wanted to approach this series, but you can still see the influence. 2 the high priestess I was actually going to skip this card at first because I couldn’t think of a fitting character, but once i considered a qings character post death, it all fit pretty well. She was already a highly intuitive person in life, and in sharing her memories with wwx she is, in a way, relaying a kind of secret knowledge. Anyway she’s one of my fav characters so im glad i got a chance to include her. The coffins could be interpreted to be xxc and sl or xxc and xy 3 the empress Theres other mother figures in mdzs who got to be mothers for a longer time, but jyl definitely embodies the positive aspects of this card the best. She’s nurturing, kind, emotionally supportive, she already mothered wwx and jc quite a bit when she was young. Plus i liked that the rw card had both water and flowers, making an easy lotus connection. In retrospect the stars look kind of out of place and i should have replaced them with something more relevant... Also, i should have had her hold a lotus seed pod instead of a flower, haha 4 the emperor Like i said I considered jc for the role but hoching bullied me into admitting that nmj was better… they’re both more of an inverted emperor than an upright one but then again theres hardly any character in mdzs who would fit upright emperor so. Jgs was also considered but he’s even uglier than nmj so i couldn’t bear to draw him 5 the hierophant It was pointed out to me that lqr would have fit this card better and the truth if that statement haunts me to this day. Unfortunately I have no space in my brain for lqr so lxc got the role instead. My main reason was his role during the wen destruction of gusu lan, when he ran away with the contents of the library - this is why there’s bookshelves behind him. The keys, take, from the rider-waite deck, are meant to represent the gusu pendants that allow you to enter 6 the lovers Im sure many people would have chosen wangxian here but I uhh don’t really care abt wangxian personally? And also their love story is so convoluted that jyl and jzx seem idyllic by comparison lol. Also i didnt really have an idea for who to put in the angel’s place for wangxian… mme jin certainly did not get these two together in the end but undeniably she and mme yu did initially give them a chance to fall for each other so. Thats something i guess. Anyway the trees became their sects’ flowers and the mountain became the burial grounds - an omen of their tragic fate, basically 7 the chariot There might have been other characters who fit this card better but i couldn’t really think of another card for lwj and i thought it would be weird to not include him… anyway i don’t really care for current timeline lwj BUT i do like that he was clearly influenced by wwx to walk his own path in life based on his moral convictions rather than follow his sect’s rules blindly. The chariot is to me a card of self control, self determination and focused action, so it seemed fitting. The composition felt kind of empty without the actual chariot so i padded it out with the guqin, the cloud recess in the bg (it doesn’t look great but i tried to replicate the drama design….) and the bunnies which conveniently fit the colour scheme of the sphinxes in the rider-waite design 8 strength Like i said before, my interpretation of this card is more… morally ambiguous than the quote unquote official meaning, so i thought about manipulative or duplicitous characters more than kind characters whose strength is expressed through gentleness (though i did consider jyl briefly for the latter interpretation). As such, i considered both jgy and nhs, but ended up going with jgy largely because i couldn’t pass up the opportunity to put the nie sect’s beast as the lion. 9 the hermit My thoughts immediately went to bssr lol. It may be an overly literal interpretation but whatever, i like it just fine. And i like that i managed to echo the rider-waite silhouette in the mountain and the tree (and even in bssr herself) 10 wheel of fortune God i love the parallels between these 2… this card to me is about how you cant trust your current situation, good or bad, to last forever, and these 2 embody that perfectly imo. Wwx went from son of a well off servant and a powerful cultivator, to street rat orphan, to adopted son of sect leader jiang, to double orphan, to MIA, to terrifying but admired warrior, to terrifying and despised traitor, to dead, to, at the very end, suddenly respected and trusted again. The dishonesty and cheapness of whatever the public’s current opinion of him is is portrayed beautifully as far as im concerned. And jgy of course claws his way up to power only to instantaneously become public enemy number one, to the point that he’s probably blamed for stuff there’s no reason to believe he had a hand in. Wei wuxian’s silent astonishment at how quickly the cultivation world turns against jgy and towards him again is a delicious moment of thematic resonance. 11 justice I settled on this card for jc after he got booted from the emperor seat but i do think it fits, in a somewhat convoluted way. I turned both the sword and the scales into visual representations of the golden core transfer (can you tell im obsessed with it). According to biddy tarot, the justice card is partly about searching for the truth, and the scene where jc finds out about the transfer is of course a big deal. I was also very influenced by the reversed meaning again - which is about being reluctant or unwilling to face or accept the consequences of your actions. I feel on an intuitive level that this fits jc but I’m not sure how well i can explain it - it’s something about how he’s a little too comfortable scapegoating wwx for things that were also, if much less so, influenced by his actions, and also something about the way he keeps wwx at an arm’s length emotionally but still leans on him and accepts his support when he really needs it, and somewhat hypocritically expects wwx to put the needs of him and the jiang sect before the needs of others. And also something about the core exchange is the consequence and proof of wwx’s deep - terrifyingly deep, even - love and care for him, which is something jc doesn’t seem to let himself acknowledge. Maybe even something about how you could argue that the way all of the jiangs acted around wwx - jfm’s favouritism that left him with the feeling of a debt he needs to repay, mme yus insistence that he be a servant more than a brother to jc, prepared to give his life for jc, and jc’s own unwillingness - or inability, he was a child after all - to clearly acknowledge wwx as an equal to himself, enabling wwx’s self sacrificial and protective tendencies - that all of this was what caused wwx’s complete and unquestioning willingness to do whatever it took to protect jc, and therefore paved the way to the golden core transfer. And i don’t mean this to be scapegoating jc - especially considering how young he was when this all went down, it wouldn’t be fair to expect this level of emotional perceptiveness, awareness and maturity of him - but i think adult jc has to grapple with the fact that the chain of cause and effect was not as simple as wwx fucking everyone’s lives up to be a martyr, and that both jc and his parents had a role in that story as well. I don’t even necessarily think this is something that jc only realised in the current timeline - i think it’s something he felt on some level this whole time, and it probably led to a lot of feelings of guilt - but the suibian reveal definitely puts it in sharp focus, and i think he’s now better equipped to handle this introspection than he was as a recently orphaned, traumatised teenager, lol. ANYWAY the window with the fabric is both a nod to the rider-waite design and a reference to the destruction of lanling - i actually did some basic ass research for this, and it seems that in ancient china fabric would indeed be hanged in a window if the normally used paper was damaged. The design of the window, as well as the very idea to use it to imply the reconstruction of lanling, was taken from this great piece of jc angst by my pal moroll1! Oh yeah also the covered window kind of works as a denial of forgiveness for jc because it’s like a halo but covered up... Also I completely forgot to put a blindfold over his eyes which would be perfectttt because blind justice and the core exchange......... ok moving on 12 the hanged man I always have issues with this card because i cant find a satisfactory summary of what it’s really about. Best i can tell it symbolises a need to hit pause, surrender or let go of something… ive also seen it tied to sacrifice? So mo xuanyu doesn’t fit perfectly, but sacrifice is definitely there in a surface level reading kind of way, and the idea that you have to surrender or let go in order to achieve your goal does fit the whole deal of getting revenge but giving up your life in exchange and not being there to see it 13 death This is probably one of my favourite cards, definitely not because I have huge issues with change or anything…. I see this card as signalling the necessity of change or putting an end to something / leaving something in the past in order to start anew? At first i considered putting past wwx, mxy and current wwx here as a kind of transformation and one cycle flowing into the next... But firstly, I’d already used mxy in the very previous card, so putting him in again would feel like overkill, and secondly, the longer I thought about it the less convinced I was that this would even fit with the card’s meaning? Because coming back from the dead doesn’t like... trigger an internal transformation within wwx or anything? Anyway, fun fact: the design I ended up going with was actually originally intended for judgement! I thought I was being very clever with the whole “figure plays an instrument and the dead rise” parallel, but apparently I’d just completely forgotten that the judgement card had a completely different composition... Truly I was boo boo the fool... But yeah anyway at the end of the day I figured the design would kind of work for death as well, with Wen Ning and the theme of transformation, (since in his case coming back as a fierce corpse does actually mark a certain transformation in behaviour) and Wei Wuxian’s protection of the Wen people essentially signifying an attempt to break the cycle of oppression if that makes any sense? Like, wwx is trying to revolutionise the way the world works a bit, if you catch my drift 14 temperance The centrist card! Again this is probably going off track from the “official” interpretation, but to me this card has a certain “don’t commit fully; do everything in moderation; don’t take either side” flavour to it that i personally find infuriating irl and that i very much assign to lxc. It’s entirely possible that I’m misinterpreting his character because i didn’t really pay him (and the 3zun in general) much mind while reading, but hell, I’m allowed to pick favourites and choose who i want to interpret deeply vs shallowly. Again, i wish id chosen lqr for hierophant because its so annoying for a character i don’t care about to get two cards…. But oh well 15 the devil My alternative idea for this was jgy as the devil and lxc plus nmj as the figures, but since all three had been featured already (multiple times, even!) i figured I’d go with xy instead, especially since he’s among my faves lol. I think the devil signifies something along the lines of unhealthy attachment, obsession or addiction, which isn’t 100% accurate in the case of xxc and a-qing, but if i stretch it a bit to cover toxic relationships in general, and especially manipulation or negative influence, i don’t think it’s half bad. My main struggle here was to choose who amongst the xxc/sl/aq trio to choose for the human figures. 16 the tower Arguably jin zixuans death and the following massacre of nightless city were the final and most direct reason for the siege of burial mounds, and the tiger seal is good shorthand for wwx’s loss of control over his powers, which led to the deaths of jzx and jyl. When reimagining major arcana i like to feature some kind of building in this card (spoilers for a possible future project but in my rose of versailles major arcana set the tower is bastille) and even if it’s not a tower, the image of wwx looming over the gathered crowd from atop a rooftop is so good i couldn’t resist 17 the star Struggled with this one - considered both jin ling and lsz for it, as symbolising a hope for the future, but that was kind of covered by the world so it wouldn’t make sense to include here as well... As usual when I struggle with interpreting a card (as opposed to understanding it but struggling with matching a character to it, like with death or moon) I went to biddy tarot and read all the details about its meaning. What i got was that this card signifies an incoming period of introspection and inner peace following a time of turmoil, as well as a general moving on into a new, better phase of one’s life or finding new meaning and purpose. The figure also suggests someone vulnerable, but possessing a keen sense of intuition as well as a good degree of practicality and common sense. Given all those, I settled for mianmian because IM LOVE HER..... I also kind of see her as a prelude to the “just one person is enough” theme present in tgcf!! And i think her decision to abandon her sect because she saw the toxicity and corruption in it is a very inspiring action - even if it didn’t make a large visible impact, i think the appearance of her and her idyllic family at the very end of the novel - paralleling and mirroring wangxian - implies that at the end of the day, it was a meaningful one 18 the moon Another card i ALWAYS fuxking struggle with - this time less because i can’t grasp its meaning and more because I can never find a character that fits it well. I usually get fixated on the “dreams and subconscious” part, but if i lean more on the “disguise, deceit, anxiety and fear” part, i eventually figured the whole yi city arc wouldn’t be a bad fit. I say the entire arc because it really does encompass all those themes if you include both the past and the present - xue yang’s disguise, his tricks with the villagers, a-qing’s lies and even xxc’s reluctance to talk about his past as well as xue yang pretending to be xxc all fit the disguise and deceit angle, and the general mystery and creepiness of the current timeline yi city work well with the anxiety and fear - the mist, the slow uncovering of the past, even a-qing being revealed to be an ally after scaring the shit out of the protags. I definitely struggled with including all the elements and characters, and even moreso with making them vaguely fit the rider-waite composition, but i think it ended up okay ish. OH and i completely forgot to draw mist swirling around them :( 19 the sun I was considering mianmian’s family for this one, but since I used her for star, I ended up with wwx and his parents instead. Once again I’m reinterpreting the card a bit - normally I think it symbolises incoming times of pure happiness and abundance, as well as a connection with the inner child, but I gave it more of a nostalgic or sentimental twist - wwx looking back at the brief glimpse of his happy childhood. 20 judgement another card that i struggle to interpret a bit... Here i actually used the tgcf tarot zine as a reference! In it judgement is summarised as “rebirth, following duty, absolution” SO i figured that nhs, mxy and wwx all together would fit pretty neatly... wwx achieving (public) absolution through clearing his own name after being reborn, and nhs sort of calling on wwx to expose jgy’s crimes... It’s a bit messy but not bad I think! 21 the world This ties very closely to my read on mdzs as a story - which is that it’s, at the end of the day, largely about cycles, and about how hard it is to break them, but how we gotta keep trying and have hope anyway. Or maybe more precisely, that the people directly involved with and influenced by the trauma of the past might not be able to get over said trauma and that the hope for healing from it will be shouldered by the new generation. Or something like that… Basically what i mean is that jc and wwx and lwj and lxc and nhs and jgy and all these people who were in the thick of the sunshot campaign and the siege are so profoundly affected by it that it genuinely feels by the end of the story like there is little hope for them to ever truly overcome that trauma and build a better future without repeating the same old mistakes - but there is a glimmer of hope in the new generation, specifically in jl and lsz. And it’s a bit paradoxical, because they have also been directly impacted by the past tragedies - lsz having his entire clan wiped out after wwx failed to protect them, jl losing both his parents to wwx’s mistakes - but despite that loss, and despite coming from arguably the two opposing sides of the past conflicts, they are both, in the end, capable of moving past that tragedy, of recognising the complicated nature of those conflicts (jl’s moment of clarity at the end is both heartbreaking and hopeful) and forging friendships between clans in the process. I honestly think that the extra where jl is struggling to assert his authority as sect leader, to treat his subjects well and to cooperate with other sects in a truly amicable way is the single hopeful ending note for the larger themes of the novel - it allows us to imagine that maybe these kids can learn from the mistakes of their elders rather than getting sucked in by resentment at those mistakes, and actually build a brighter future for the cultivation world. And sidenote, this is also why i have a soft spot for jin ling and lan sizhui as a ship... speaking of which their poses were directly referenced from the lovers card ehehe

Looking back, I’d like to add some symbol of jin ling’s trauma so that it mirrors baby wen yuan in the tree stump... maybe his father’s sword?

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #tarot

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morwensteelsheen · 3 years ago

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If Faramir went to Rivendell, how would the whole ttt/rohan plot be different?

A good question that I have spent an unreasonable time thinking about! My first LOTR fic was going to be an attempt to answer this, but then I got so wrapped up in not having the answers that I sidelined it and wrote WC instead. So I think instead of giving you one definitive answer I’ll give you a couple scenarios I think are plausible? If that’s not too much of a cop out lmao? Apologies in advance for the inevitable spelling errors, I did this on my phone and my dyslexia is off the charts today.

I think it’s basically unavoidable that he goes via Rohan first, geographically he’s sort of left without an option there. When he’s there, we get into this issue of whether and how he and Éowyn interact. Worth noting, I think, that the Unfinished Tales has Éomer living in Aldburg by the War, but Éomer does seem to imply he’s around for Boromir passing through. Is this because he knows and already is a fan of Boromir? Maybe! Or maybe Éomer goes to Aldburg after.

But I digress. We have to ask the question of whether Faramir falls in love with Éowyn because he was always going to fall in love with Éowyn, or if it’s because the things he’s gone through immediately preceding it primed him for it. I — perhaps quite cheaply — come down on the side of Faramir always having it bad for her on first sight. And contextually I think that comes from his, rather sweet, enunciation of the way his regard/love changes for her. He says that at first he pities her, and then he gets to know her and he doesn’t pity her anymore, he respects and admires her. That’s an interesting dynamic to bring into play in basically every AU, because you get this double barrel characterisation of his attitude to her changing, and his own character maturing/sharp edges softening.

I think he off the bat he sees that she’s beautiful, and immediately is drawn to her for that. Shallow? Maybe! But, to badly paraphrase my ol fav Victor Hugo quote — love always begins with a glance.

I imagine he stays for a short while, maybe a week, two at most. At this point I think that Éowyn’s basically viewing him as an official guest that she has to entertain, and I think Faramir is, in his own, slightly stilted, slightly wanky way, putting the moves on her. This can go, imo, one of two ways. She can either be receptive to it (which is a nice thought!) or she can be aware of it but mostly ignore it because, really, she’s got lots of shit on her plate.

Either way, he leaves Edoras at some point. The big question is where does his go from there?

One thing I toy around with is that, given his pre-existing relationship to Gandalf, maybe he’s willing to trust the Istari a bit more and goes straight for Isengard? Which, and I think I did the math on this once a few months ago, would have him arriving at Isengard around the time Gandalf’s getting his shit kicked in by Saruman lol. I think this could be a really compelling plot point, but I’ll be very honest with you, I 100% don’t have the imagination or writing skills to figure out how it proceeds from there, so I’m not going to try to.

If he goes the normal Boromir route, he still loses his horse at Tharbad and walks (lmao jesus???) to Rivendell. When he gets there, I think he’s immediately going to have everything he knows put to the test in quite jarring ways. First off, he’s going to be infinitely more deferential to Elrond, Aragorn &c when they’re trashing Gondor. He’ll push back a bit, no doubt on that, but he’s going to be starstruck by Aragorn in a way that Boromir just wasn’t.

No real difference I imagine between Rivendell and Lothlórien, except that he’d definitely be laser focused on palling about with Aragorn, and he’d probably spend more of his time being friendly with Frodo than with Merry and Pippin tbh (not in a douchey way, I just think he and Frodo vibe a little better. Though I bet he and Merry had some interesting chats about pipe weed history).

The underlying question here is what sort of relationship does he have to the ring? I don’t buy this idea that he’s not tempted by it, I just think that what the ring offers him is a bit shit. We don’t know what the ring tempts him with, he’s not clear on that in TTT. I can’t really see the ring being like ‘oh I’ll give you a king to follow’ because that is some intensely nerdy shit, but is somehow the one thing I could see Faramir actually being tempted by. Regardless of what it offers him in this AU, he resists it on the basis that he’s got this mythical king he’s been desperate for, and he’s not gonna risk that for anything.

Lothlórien comes next, and oh my god when I tell you this is the part I genuinely have no answer for. I stopped writing my first fic at Lothlórien because I couldn’t cope. Tbh it probably lowkey fries Faramir’s brain, and for so many reasons. The whole godmoding Númenórean stuff he’s got going on probably interests Galadriel a bit, and so that whole conversation is going to be wildly different than it was for Boromir. But what does she say to Faramir? I have no idea. I really don’t. There’s also probably a million and one things also going on psychologically for him at that point, which makes dealing with this bit difficult. Really difficult. So I’m gonna, uh, conveniently smash cut away.

Parth Galen! Again, another two potential splits here. The first, (from here on out I’ll refer to as Plot A) which I find rather endearing, is that he goes off with Frodo and Sam when Frodo makes the decision to split. I don’t know that I believe he’d do it, but it proves for a very delightful interpretation of his character.

Plot B is that when the Orcs show up, Faramir survives not by virtue of his being a ~ better warrior ~ or whatever than Boromir, but by the terrain surrounding Parth Galen being something he’s far more in the habit of dealing with, and by virtue of his having a bow at his disposal. I know there’s room for an interpretation of Faramir as not primarily an archer, but narratively I think that’s less interesting. So he’s an archer. He’s an archer and also his priority is on Aragorn first and foremost, so Merry and Pip still get taken, and Frodo and Sam use the hubbub to GTFO, which is actually slightly more in line with the movie’s chronology, funnily enough. The three hunters become four, and then go on Merry & Pippin’s trails.

In Plot A, they’re hauling ass across the Emyn Muil, bolstered in some ways by Faramir’s experience as a Ranger. The problem is the issue of getting into Mordor and whether or not they pick up Gollum. I think, in a way that frustrates me immensely, they do end up taking Gollum, not because they need a guide, but because Gollum fulfils this deep psychological need for Frodo, and I think he would have argued for keeping Gollum regardless. Faramir is going to be fucked off about this, but will ultimately, I think, be deferential to the ringbearer.

So they go across the Dead Marshes, but they do NOT attempt the Black Gate first because Faramir’s not a fool. Do they go to Henneth Annûn? I say yes, but with the caveat that in all likelihood Boromir is gonna be there, which is gonna complicate stuff tremendously.

Over to Plot B!

The four hunters go to the Mark! They meet Éomer! Hey! Éomer recognises Faramir! (And he’s probably a little fucked off that he lost his horse lol). But whatever, he knows this guy, so he’s probably gonna be like, uhhh, everything you saw before in Edoras is much worse now. Also my cousin's dead and everything is bad. Here’s some horses, sorry for maybe accidentally killing your pals, see ya! And at this point I think Faramir’s probably having a, hmmm, g e n t l e p s y c h i c c r i s i s, because if he’s still very 👅 for Éowyn (which he is, sorry, he has to be) then he’s going to want to go there ASAP. Obviously though that’s not gonna happen, so: Merry and Pip chasing, Gandalf finding, Edoras arriving.

Which means Éowyn. If, at this point, she and Faramir already have something of an arrangement going on (nudge nudge) then she’s really not gonna give a shit about Aragorn. You know how in TTT it’s not even clear that she actually sees Legolas and Gimli? 100% that vibe with Aragorn too. Théoden’s gonna get his house in order, they’re going to head to Helm’s Deep, and Éowyn’s gonna get named head of house. (Faramir, if he starts off just thinking she’s beautiful, is going to have quite the paradigm shift here, because he’s going to have to start reckoning with her as not just a beautiful woman, but as a very, very intense person. This is how his love for her starts to mature.)

Sometimes I dream about him being like, ‘hey! I have some first hand experience of ruling a kingdom, how about I stay and…….. lend you a hand……..’ to Éowyn while she’s keeping watch on Edoras. This is wildly unlikely, but a delightful thought nonetheless. In the more likely case, which is that he goes to the Hornburg, she’s going to start feeling some strain about this whole war shebang, and it’s going to lead to some difficult conversations. Chief among them is that Faramir, as second son, actually has basically nothing to give her, which is not exactly a great position to be in when you’re in love with the niece of a king. I’m of the opinion that Éowyn’s not fussed by that stuff (she agrees to marry him when he’s prepping to give up a shit ton of power anyways), so she’s probably like, 'no, fuck you, we’re getting married.' And then he leaves, and it starts to emotionally unsettle her more and more.

If they don’t already have a thing, then it either begins at this point OR he gets overshadowed by Aragorn. In either case, off to Helm’s Deep he goes.

Helm’s Deep happens, I think Faramir ends up extraordinarily impressed by how the Rohirrim handle the Dunlenders afterwards, which also begins to soften his harsh opinion of them more generally.

They go to Isengard, Pippin looks in the Palantír, and away Pippin and Gandalf go. Both Gandalf and Faramir here would recognise that it would be batshit insane for Faramir to go back to MT now, because Denethor would read him like a picture book and he’d have to admit to the entire mission of the Fellowship.

Over in Plot A, I think we’re going to have some real emotional complexity vis a vis Faramir showing up at Henneth Annûn with two hobbits, a ring, and Boromir in control there. God, it would just be a disaster. My incredibly generous interpretation of this is that Faramir keeps the plan vague enough that Boromir lets them pass unhindered. My less generous interpretation is… yeah I don’t wanna do it tbh. It’s not pretty. It's also, to be clear: not an indictment of Boromir as a character. His response is entirely rational for someone expected to lead a kingdom and for someone put up against the unbelievable power of the One Ring. The reason Faramir continuously gets to pass largely untempted by the ring is because he's a guy with no actual responsibilities once you take the Rangers away. His understanding of his duty to Gondor is almost entirely conceptual in nature. He can think and talk about defending Gondor as it once was because there are several people above him in the hierarchy defending Gondor for what it is. This is also not an indictment of Faramir. He and Boromir just have wildly different realities to contend with.

They are going to go through Cirith Ungol even though Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumbass both speak Sindarin and don’t cotton on to what its name implies lol. This whole scene is much shorter because Faramir’s significantly more cautious, so there is no Orc capture and Sam doesn't take the Ring. This is where things get a bit complex, and where I don’t think I have the imagination to say much more. Sorry!

Back in Plot B, the lads catch up with Éowyn as they prep to go down the Paths of the Dead. If she and Faramir are a thing, this is where the real emotional distress kicks in for her. All of the men in her life have, at one point or another, functionally abandoned her, and here’s Faramir, love of her life, about to do the exact same thing. Faramir inevitably goes with the Grey Company even though she begs him not to. When she tries to convince them not to go down the Paths at all, he is in the fortunate enough position to throw up his hands and say 'not my call, actually. King’s in charge,' which lessens the emotional conflict there somewhat.

No part of me doubts that Éowyn wouldn’t then immediately go over his head to Aragorn. She would, she absolutely does not give a fuck. And she’s going to get knocked back re: joining them in exactly the same way as in the book, because Aragorn’s take here isn’t actually dependent on her personally, it’s dependent on the duty she’s been charged with, which is taking care of her people. (Also going to be an interesting narrative parallel to a later conversation between Faramir and Aragorn after the Pelennor, which I’ll explain in more detail later.)

Faramir will, perhaps somewhat less dismissively, say this to her. He learns much more obviously the way to talk to her on her own terms, and he’s not gonna fall into the trap of letting her be like ‘you just want me to wait and die after all the men are dead.’ He’s going to probably give her some line about her being the last organised line of defence, and he might even invoke Haleth! It’s not going to work, because Éowyn’s very aware of the apocalyptic nature of all of this, but it’s not going to cause such abject hatred and fury as it otherwise would.

If she and Faramir are not a thing, her emotional distress is as it is in the book, except now Faramir’s trying not to pout in the background. He might even step in to try and soften the blow.

Regardless, she ends up as Dernhelm, she rides to the Pelennor.

Boromir is the one responsible for the Osgiliath retreat, and because it’s heavily implied that Faramir only keeps his seat because he’s got this dumbass Númenor garbage going on ('master of man and beast' — king Beregond), Boromir’s going to get killed by the Witch king here.

This is going to send shockwaves through not just Denethor, but Minas Tirith more generally, because Boromir is fucking adored. Denethor’s going to go high holy crackers much quicker, mostly because Gandalf is a shit stirrer and is going to waste no time at all in announcing that Aragorn, The Rightful King, is on his way, and Denethor will — correctly — surmise that Faramir has chosen Aragorn over returning with whatever Isildur’s Bane is to Gondor. This is the end for Denethor.

Éowyn rides from Dunharrow, slays the Witch king. Faramir and Aragorn show up with the Army of Dead, Faramir does not end up injured, but does end up as the Steward (obviously) and (obviously) aware that Éowyn is in the HOH. And also that everybody else he loves is dead. Yeehaw.

Here’s where I think things get really interesting. I think, counter to the way this is portrayed a lot of the time, Faramir doesn’t go to the Black Gate at all. I think he stays in Minas Tirith, not just to organise the wider range defences (esp the Rohirrim dealing w the Druadan) but in this very grim preparation to lead the retreat from Minas Tirith if/when Frodo & Sam fail. I think he's kind of fine with this for two reasons. The first is that him being conscious to process the death of his father, and it coming hours after the death of his brother means that he's going to have a personal-political crisis, and he's going to have to take the defence of Gondor more seriously than he did before. Second, Aragorn's going to tell him to fucking stay put, and he's going to be fine with it because it means he's going to get to spend the last few days of his life with Éowyn.

He and Éowyn reunite in the HOH, there’s still a lot of deeply emotional stuff going on, but, at least now Faramir’s conscience is clear re: marrying her because, well, he’s the Steward now. Also their reunion is going to take on greater significance because she’ll have killed the thing that killed his brother. So, that’s a lot.

If they are not a thing before the Pelennor, she's still going to drag his ass over to the HOH so she can bitch about being stuck there. But this time he's not a fellow hospital-prisoner, he's having to actually do things, and he's going to use that to his advantage in terms of keeping her from doing stupid shit. I think he's going to try to involve her in some of the strategic questions re: the retreat if the Morannon feint fails. I think he's going to make a point of talking to her to get her help on dealing with the Rohir forces that are in and around the City. I think that's going to go a huge way to helping to ease her misery, and it's going to be such a significant vote of trust in her (even after she's done the unthinkable and deserted her people) that she's going to fall in love with him here, as per. And the contrast between him and Aragorn is going to be all the stronger for it.

So yes. Those are just some of the possibilities I think! Sorry for the word dump!!

#asks #faramir /#lotr /#fgtrau #hc

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lizzibennet · 4 years ago

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Honestly, I *DO* like episodes 7, 8, and 9. BUT I would have LOVED if they did everything they did AS PLANNED, and then added the alternatives film (the versions we got) as a bonus. Honestly I hate ROS because Rey is related to HIM. Lbh, NOBODY would have sex with p*alpatine

the problem with episodes 7-9 is that each is a standalone film. that is not a problem in itself since every other star wars trilogy movies could technically be watched as a standalone and with a little context you’d be fine, since they tell an overarching story with three more or less independent characters. episodes 7-9 do not tell an overarching story, they are each chapters to a different telling of rey’s story. ep 7 tells the story of rey nobody, who is both the narrative foil and the in-world counterpart of one of the strongest force users alive, and that’s honestly already a really good premise, buuuuut if we’re going to have a trilogy then that main conflict should be resolved either in the second movie or at the very least in the first half or so of the third because things! need! to! happen! for! a reason! except that they don’t because at the climax of the second film kylo tells rey she’s a nobody, and apparently that changes nothing within her resolve which..... fine, let’s push it and say she’s going to deal with that in the third movie, whatever, but we get to it and actually she’s palpatine’s granddaughter so actually she’s all the jedi which. UGH. the point I’m trying to make is that she is a completely linear character being thrown in three different takes of her story, and I hate to say this because I LOVE her, but after the second movie I totally got it when people said she was a mary sue because her faith in the force and the jedi and her kindness and blahblah NEVER really waivers (except when she gets angry at luke which. saves everyone! how fuckin convenient!) and you could come out and say “lori, if we think like that luke skywalker is also a mary sue”, which, again, don’t get me wrong because he is literally my son but he IS. and in the 80’s that is FINE cause it’s the story we needed - a story about this starry (heh) eyed guy whose unwaivering faith in people and The Magic Around Him™️ may seem a little misguided at first but ends up saving everyone, but that was 40 years ago. and maybe it was silly of me to expect a nuanced take on The Human Specificity Of Empathy from a star wars movie but you know what, I don’t think it was since gareth edwards paved the way with rogue one that is the epitome of analysis of what it really means to be good or bad and I’m not going to rant about how rogue one is the best star wars movie today BUT it set the tone for a less us-vs-them view of the world which was VERY exciting and in line with what I think the 2010-20’s really wants from its heroes in general. so if we want to follow the narrative beats of the first trilogy or at least the first movie (no way of knowing where jj abrams would’ve gone in ep 8) I think that’s fine so as long as you make it your own, and imo jj abrams was, and then rian johnson was like nope lol, and jj abrams tried to fix the narrative 180 rian johnson tried to do, and like. episode 8 is a very fun movie to watch as a star wars fan but narratively it does not make any fuckin sense. I thought so then and now with ep 9 out I think so even more. rian johnson is a very creative guy, he had some REALLY interesting ideas, but WHY give him the creative liberty to do so in the MIDDLEEEEE of the trilogy??? WHY!?!?!? give him a star wars story film! he would KILL it! or you know wait a couple years so the director of the first movie who actually knows what the fuck he’s doing can direct the second, but noooooo the damned fucking mouse wants to wipe his ass with $100 bills so we cannot possibly wait. cohesive storytelling? we don’t give a shit about that in the house of le mouse.

that all to say, there is nothing Fundamentally wrong narratively with either of the three movies. they’re fun to watch. even ep 8, possibly my least fav of the bunch, was a fun experience in cinemas. it’s star wars and disney - they know how to make a blockbuster. the thing is that as a trilogy they simply do not make any sense. if you analyze each movie individually all three seem to have different core themes: ep 7’s is “nobodies are people too actually”, 8 is “maybe space fascists aren’t so bad, actually (also luke is here hey luke)”, and 9 is “I take that back, nobodies aren’t a people actually”. it’s satisfying to watch as a casual spectator who goes to the movies, seems some space gays with one braincell between the three of them and is like coolio and then goes home, but it’s not satisfying to watch as someone even the littlest bit invested in the story because there is no cohesive roundup of everything. the original trilogy was like is luke an idiot for being nice? is vader actually redeemable? is han deserving of trust despite being a space nerf herder? and sometimes u were like what’s happenin!!!! but in the end all your questions are answered quite satisfactorily. luke was right, han is sexy, vader was redeemable. in the prequels: how does anakin skywalker become darth vader? how do he and obi juan become the enemies we see in the death star? what happens to padme? and while the sequels are a beautiful mess that I love they do answer the questions they put out when episode 1 begins, so you know, imagine liking the sequels and hating the prequels when the PREQUELS make more sense, the PREQUELSSSS. anywhomst, point is: the sequels are like here is finn. finn is the first stormtrooper we see the face of! he defects! also the first stormtrooper we se defect. the other defector we know is bodhi from r1, who is very sympathetic despite being imperial, and clearly we’re supposed to feel empathy for finn. finn survives! finn finds rey! go finn I love u! and then. WHAT happens to finn? what furthers his character development into a full fledged person when he starts out with not even a name? where’s his anger? where’s his OBVIOUS narrative direction that should be “ex stormtrooper who shows imperials that fascism is bad actually”? nope, goes almost unmentioned from then on. and again, I love finn, he is literally baby, but he also froze after ep 7 because rian johnson decided to fuck shit up and also because disney is racist. poe? the do-good soldier who is supposed to be the Believer™️? actually he is the only one who was any semblance of a coherent role in ep 8... which is promptly retconned when jj abrams makes him a fucking spice runner in ep 9 lol. who is rey? and they’re like she’s a nobody and that’s why she’s spesh, wait no she is a nobody but she’s spesh because space fascist has the hots for her, oh, no, wait, she’s spesh because PALPATINE. what was the theme of this trilogy? what was the thesis? what questions did they set out to answer and did they answer them at all, never mind well? and it’s unclear, obviously, because three movies with three clearly different views behind them won’t magically make narrative sense just because you are trying to piece them together. they’re not pieces at all, they are three independent takes on the stars and the wars. enjoyable as little snacky treats, not as a three meal course. (also I’m not even going to TOUCH on how what was already a narrative mess was made worse by disney’s NONSTOP fanservice. sw sequels and game of thrones last season are the cautionary tales of why fanservice sucks and while a good, intelligent if cliche or predictable story is always better than a Shocking™️ one that doesn’t make any sense. but if I start on that I will LITERALLY not shut up SO AHEM CONTINUE @LIZZIBENNET)

ALL that to say: I agree w/ u and I LOVE your idea of each movie being an alternative version of the story. honestly, that would make more sense than what we have right now off the bat lol. can you imagine ep 7 being the rose colored version of the story via the heroes’ lenses, and then ep 8 being the “actually space fascism is good if ur kylo ren” version of the story, and then, ep 9 is what actually happened... told by rey nobody, who dances the line between the good and bad until there’s not a line anymore. CHEF’S FUCKIN KISS obviously much more risqué than disney would ever go for, but genius! much better than trying to make us care about these conflicts that they make up in the first 15 mins of each movie. ur mad because episode 7 follows the beats of 4? here’s three movies on why you were wrong when you judged it all true and therefore Bad. HUHU I love that

also the galaxy is a vast place... I am sure there are emperor fuckers out there

#nctxrejects #what is my ask tag again #star wars

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icharchivist · 4 years ago

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I loved watching the anime. It’s honestly pretty good for what it is. The animation is a bit wonky at time, but the characters are always so likeable and sweet and it warms my heart everytime they are on screen.

I also really love everything they’ve added. Every single scenes they added that weren’t in the game felt really in character and it meant spending more time with the characters i know and love, and this is very precious to me.

I also love how they incorporated the rookies in the story. To see all four of them was very cute and organic, even if Guy seemed a bit more tacked on, but i do like that Citron is thinking about him this foundly while he’s with his family. So even if it’s clumsy i love it, after all Guy isn’t supposed to be in Japan before another 5 months.

I have a harder time with everything they *removed* from the game.

I’m rereading currently but i’m still at Spring chapter, nothing too big jumped at me so far, but it gets. Very weird especially regarding Autumn and Winter, both as seasons and as characters (see, Sakyo in the summer episodes).

It was a hard task because those chapters are especially stuffed, Autumn and Winter is when the plot becomes heavier in general, and they have a lot, lot of contents, even more so contents i understand are tricky to adapt (the Portraits for instances).

But it stings how much was actually removed.

And it doesn’t help that for Winter it’s on my favorite characters too so i’m really feeling even sadder than i ought to be.

they may be trying to get away with how much they cut by adapting the events. That’s all i can see. Knowing they had to do cuts and that the events are ways shorter so they may want to fill them in.

Characters i felt had really their plotlines cutdown were parts of are especially Omi, Sakyo, Azuma and Hisoka.

Omi, tho, i felt like what was cut was all the built up to his past before his portrait: the fact he’s recognized as a gang member and all before he mentions it. But i suppose if they adapt The Stranger they can expend plently on this. to a lesser extend i do feel like Taichi got a few cuts and he does have focus in The Stranger but.... idk if that would salvage his cuts... Since what was cut was like, him sabotaging the play by hiding the guns. But yeah if they adapt The Stranger they can try and make up for it.

For Sakyo, i do feel like they mostly cut buildup stuff for him, his hesitation and stuff like that, and while i dislike the fact it’s not early on, i can see those stuff being discussed and tackled in Genji The Wanderer.

For Azuma, well, obviously, Nocturnality. He is supposed to relapse there, fall back into his bad habit and opening up to his troupe about his trauma. Since what they cut was his original relapse and him opening up to Izumi about his trauma, they may not want to do a “redux” of it, but it’s... imo kinda missing the point that it’s something Azuma does a lot... that he *relapses*. He even relapses in the latest Winter Chapter. This is like. A character plot point because he relapses once in the first winter chap, then another time in Nocturnality, then another time in the second winter chap, and you can see specifically from watching Tasuku how each relapse are treated differently in a way to help Azuma heal without magically healing him from relapsing. I do feel like we lose a lot about the fact Azuma mostly does relapse because his pain has been here for ever, while if they just talk about it with Nocturnality, it may seem like a “one time” thing. But. It has an opening to excuse what was removed at least, even if i don’t like the way it paces Azuma’s arc.

For Hisoka what the fuck are they going to do. Are they going to move his August’s dreams and April’s letter to the begining of My Master’s Mesmerized by Mystery? They can’t just skip over it, the looming threat of April is one of the thing that makes the Winter events so chilling and the payoff in Act 2 so good. They can’t have Izumi not know about either, since this is a major plot point she has to know. The fact no one comment on the “maybe Hisoka recovered his memories” bothers me because no!! he’s not supposed to at this point.... It hurts tho from the point of view of how, this incident originally is one of the reasons Hisoka feel at home with his troupe and i find it odd to move it after Hisoka says “this is where i belong”, but i’d rather it to be moved than deleted please this is my favorite arc.....

And there’s also Yukio’s phonecall that is omitted which is a shame bc i’m pretty sure this is built up for Act 3?

But all of that is under the assumption they would adapt the events at all, which we can’t be sure about....

The anime had limited time and it feels like it, and it feels that it was a labor of love, so it’s not like i can be totally mad either. The stuff that are great are very great, the arcs that are well done are very much well done,

but it does feel like they missed time and had to make a lot of cuts and in the end it’s forshadowing and build up that was sacrified... and on one hand i get it because it’s ultimately what can be removed while still keeping the plot coherent, but as someone who’s a sucker for those it makes me sad :(

Anyway i’ll keep rereading the VN for now.

That said the anime is a good “introduction” to the VN if you guys wanna try out - but i’d truly recommand reading the VN at least after for the full experience because man.....

It was still nice to see a few things in motions and it’s a good bonus to watch after reading the VN.

I complain a lot DLKFJDFLKDF but. My favs arcs :(.

#ichablogging a3anime #a3anime spoilers

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ruoyeming · 5 years ago

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My Fav Books, another chaotic list

Another quarantine review fest! I know I ranked my top anime but this is seriously too hard so I’m just going to list them to avoid hours of debate. Enjoy!

1) The Skulduggery Pleasant series

This whopper of a series (now at 15 books jesus christ I didn’t know there were that many I’ve only read about twelve) has a special place in my heart. I was FULLY obsessed with it throughout my tween - and teen - years, and for a reason. This shit just butters my bread like nothing else. The story follows a young girl Valkyrie Cain (who eventually becomes a young woman through the series) and her partner in crime, a fashionable living skeleton called Skulduggery Pleasant. They’re MAGICAL DETECTIVES!!!! Bitch!!! They use elemental magic - water, earth, fire, air - to fight off magic-wielding bad guys and look good doing it. The duo is hilarious and seriously shaped my sense of humour, the dry wit and comedic writing style stuck with me and influenced my own writing style to this day! As the series progresses we get a massive cast of characters but to me they’re all memorable, likable (mostly) and well-developed so that’s not an issue. I have no fukcing clue how Derek Landy comes up with his stories because every book in the series has an absolutely wild (yet unique) plot with its own twists and turns. It gets REALLY dark and depressing at times, gory, brutal etc etc especially in the later books I have no idea why this is labeled as a kids series.

10/10 for badassery, humour, and MAD codependency issues

2) The Feverwake series

This bitch is one hell of a YA series. It’s actually only a 2 book-series which is rare, but that’s not the only thing that sets it apart from other creations of its genre. It’s hard to explain the setup without waffling so I’ll just quote the blurb of the first book: “In the former United States, sixteen-year-old Noam Álvaro wakes up in a hospital bed, the sole survivor of the viral magic that killed his family and made him a technopath. His ability to control technology attracts the attention of the minister of defense and thrusts him into the magical elite of the nation of Carolinia.

The son of undocumented immigrants, Noam has spent his life fighting for the rights of refugees fleeing magical outbreaks—refugees Carolinia routinely deports with vicious efficiency. Sensing a way to make change, Noam accepts the minister’s offer to teach him the science behind his magic, secretly planning to use it against the government. But then he meets the minister’s son—cruel, dangerous, and achingly beautiful—and the way forward becomes less clear.”

As you can tell from this, the series is heavy on its politics but in a grounded, realistic and relevant way which is different to many other YA series. Marxist theory is brought up, and you can make some pretty strong links between the books and real events. The magic also has a semi-scientific explanation which is cool and adds to the realness. Anyways this series is action packed and full of twists, plus there’s a bisexual main character and queer romance at the core!! Wig!!! Very good for moral debate - how far is it acceptable to go to protect the oppressed before you become one of the oppressors? Dark and exciting series.

10/10 queer representation and political themes.

3) Spin the Dawn

It’s probably obvious that I’m biased towards YA books but they’re just so exciting and cool! Anyways this is about a girl living in a kind of alternate universe ancient China where magic exists. Maia Tamarin is a skilled seamstress who dreams of being the Imperial Tailor, a position that can only be held by a man. She poses as her brother to go to the royal palace and enter a competition full of skilled tailors, all vying for the role of imperial tailor. She also meets Edan; a mysterious, annoying, but SEXY mage who seems to know her secret identity? Oho? IMO this would be an elevated book if Edan had been a girl but that’s just me being gay. As the final challenge Maia is tasked with making 3 dresses from the sun, moon, and stars - a mission that takes her to the ends of the world in search of these magical materials (obvs Edan goes with her and they kiss kiss fall in love). It’s a fairly classic YA plot and characters but the combination of Project Runway, Mulan, and kind of Lord of the Rings(??) vibes makes for a very entertaining read. It’s also really fun to imagine what the clothes look like, plus the romance between Maia and Edan is very cute. Second book is yet to be published but sounds lit.

10/10 magic fashion and romance (despite its heterosexuality)

4) Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

Usually I steer clear of angsty gay stories because I’ve consumed too much of the depressing narrative which is all about suffering because of being gay, but fuuuuuuck this book is like the definition of bittersweet. Mostly bitter to be fair but it has a happy ending which was lovely after the emotional torment of the book. It’s about two teen boys - Aristotle is angry and repressed, Dante is eccentric but kind, and the two eventually form a strong friendship after meeting at the local pool. It’s kind of obvious that Ari is in denial about a few things, which leads to some real sad boi hours. There’s also a devastating moment around halfway (not sure) through with a car accident which makes the whole thing 10x heavier. Despite all this, the book has its sweet moments - parents play a big role, but not in the way they usually do in queer stories - and like I said the ending is the bandage for your broken heart. I’m not sure what it is about the writing style, maybe the way it just cuts between scenes randomly or perhaps the way the dialogue and actions are so realistic, but it’s so different to any other book I’ve read that it’s stayed in my mind for a while after reading it.

10/10 really good philosophy plus supportive parents

5) The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue

Okay if this was a ranked list, this bad boy would be on its way to the top spot. It’s got everything: historical setting, gays, pirates, alchemy, humour, adventure, angst, character development, and some healthy second-hand embarrassment. It’s not complicated or philosophical but reading this book all in one go is like taking five shots and diving into a pool. It’s exciting and witty, but deals with darker themes like child abuse too. One of the MCs also has a disability and doesn’t treat it as something to be cured, which is a lesson our protagonist has to learn. Speaking of protagonists, Henry ‘Monty’ Montague is a great main character. He’s obnoxious, oblivious, and hedonistic yet quick-witted and passionate, and he has a good heart. Sometimes you just want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him for being such an ignorant idiot, but throughout the book he grows and learns to open his mind more (as well as becoming more humble). He’s a great example of a flawed yet likable main character. He is also a bisexual icon.

Oof forgot to even talk about the story. Monty embarks on a tour of Europe, usually taken by lads his age to get all cultured before they settle down and inherit the family company or whatever. With him are his younger sister Felicity, a girl with a brilliant mind for science who isn’t taken seriously by anyone because of her gender, and the lovely Percy, Monty’s lifelong best friend (and crush). Monty ends up stealing a very valuable object that turns the Tour into a manhunt across Europe, and drags the trio into a big ol’ conspiracy involving something that may or may not be the philosopher’s stone????

Issues of race, gender, and disability in historical context are really well done, and it’s an absolute banger of a book.

10/10 very exciting adventure, plus GREAT GAY ROMANCE

6) Heaven Official’s Blessing

HOOOOOO BOY. This is probably my absolute fave on this list. It’s a webnovel (originally Chinese but the full translation is online). Set in ancient china in the cultivation world (difficult as shit to explain if ur not into all of that but I’ll try), basically there’s three realms - the heavenly realm, the human/mortal realm, and the ghostly realm. If a mortal reaches a certain point (good deeds, power etc), they ascend to become a god - or if they fall far enough, they become a ghost.

I’ll just quote the author’s description again cause I don’t have the brain cells required:

“Eight hundred years ago, Xie Lian was the Crown Prince of the Xian Le kingdom. He was loved by his citizens and was considered the darling of the world. He ascended to the Heavens at a young age; however, due to unfortunate circumstances, was quickly banished back to the mortal realm. Years later, he ascends again–only to be banished again a few minutes after his ascension. Now, eight hundred years later, Xie Lian ascends to the Heavens for the third time as the laughing stock among all three realms. On his first task as a god thrice ascended, he meets a mysterious demon who rules the ghosts and terrifies the Heavens, yet, unbeknownst to Xie Lian, this demon king has been paying attention to him for a very, very long time.”

It’s hard to describe the enormity of this story and all the emotions it encapsulates, you really have to read it for yourself. But bitch the undying, pure, Hozier-devotion-level LOVE is by far my favourite part of this story. If you’re looking for an epic, god-tier gay romance, then this is it baby!! This story has comedy, action, and downright harrowingly depressing moments, but throughout is this achingly beautiful love between fallen god and last believer.

I don’t wanna give too much away cause there are some big ol’ plot reveals, but oooh this shit made me cry. The protagonist is MY FAVOURITE EVER I didn’t think it was possible to like a protag so much!! He’s legit my fave character! At first he seems oblivious and carefree but he’s just doing his goddamn best after all he’s been through and he’s so fukcing kind and just wants to help everyone for fuckcs sake excuse me I need to go have a breakdown.

Okay I’m back, anyway there’s a great cast of characters, even the background characters are all incredibly memorable and all given their time to shine and develop. My faves include Quan Yizhen, a rowdy himbo who just wants to fight, and Shi Qing Xuan, a friendly genderfluid god who controls the wind. Read this shit I’m not joking it’ll change your life.

10/10 for everything

#book review #book recommendations

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sillyfudgemonkeys · 6 years ago

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Persona 5 Problems pt 2: Anne’s CoOp

Previously on P5P, I started off on a sillier topic of how the MC can’t be crushed by Mona because Mona weighs like nothing (plus a throw away theory about Mona being female, but it was really to play into the weight part).

So now I’ve decided to do a problem post on one of my fav characters, because I don’t want people thinking I’m bias. 8U Cause I am (tho I try not to be), but like you can’t escape even being a little bias. But anyway since it’s my fav character I will put this in her tag cause it’s not like I’m ripping on a character I don’t like.

Anyway today we will be talking about some fundamental mental issues with Anne’s CoOp, mostly with how/why OOC it is to the main story. Now follow me under the cut! 8V

First things first, I love Anne, and I do like her CoOp despite its faults. I like how it tries to wrap up Shiho, showcases how her affections towards Shiho and MC are different towards other people (aka if she gushes about you to others, then she really loves you/you are the most special person to her, aka she does this to the MC talking about Shiho all the time and apparently according to Shiho she talks about the MC all the time), Mika is an interesting person, I love how Anne wants to try to mentally toughen herself (cause 1. that’s pretty much the simple explanation on how you get an Ult Persona, and 2. it’s a great reference as to why she gets Mind Charge I guess), the fact it focuses on modeling (was a little sad we didn’t get a whole lot focused on Rise’s idoling in her SL but hey P4D made up for it), and the fairly clear cause and effect of each decision she makes (wants to be a beacon of hope for people, gets called out by coworker, realizes maybe she should change her path, works on doing that and excelling so she can become a beacon while trying her best in this profession.....maybe it’s not written as well as it could be but it’s still fairly clear).

Now....the issues:

It doesn’t focus more on her life as a hafu in Japan

Not about her reclaiming her sexuality

Makes it seem like it’s bad for her to have modeling be her hobby or just part time job (like really I get y’all love ya job but it’s not like Anne killed a puppy)

Spending a little too much time on the modeling (which imo is fine, but I can understand the complaint, but I will not add Mika not getting her heart stolen cause that situation worked itself out just fine)

Ignores maybe exploring more Kamoshida fallout plot points

But the worst of it all, making her personality OOC.

The thing is, making Anne’s personality OOC like this....it’s the only reason for her stuff to go down with Mika.

Let’s break it down, the crap only went down with Mika because Anne accidentally might’ve insulted her by just “taking this job too lightly” (which is already just.....chill???? She’s in high school, it’s a part time job, it’s not like she’s slacking). The whole issue happened because Anne couldn’t pick up on what Mika was saying, and was kinda rude to Mika. Which makes sense for an airhead as that is what an airhead would do, but it makes no sense for Anne! Anne is not an airhead, maybe she struggles in some subjects at school, but she’s an amazing people person. She’s very intrinsic and is known for being the heart of the group. Remember, this is the same girl who helped talk and emotionally appeal to Futaba, same one who was the first person to pick up on Mona’s change in behavior. Someone who took the initiative to clear the air with Makoto (still have issues with Anne apologizing first but the fact is Anne was the bigger person). Someone who is shown to be kind, and willing to help and cares for her friends. She is very good at reading the atmosphere, unlike say Naoto (bless her soul I love her, but she is in-canon joked by friends or mocked by Arena title for not being able to).

So tell me, why the fudge does she step on Mika’s toes like that? Why is she suddenly unable to read the atmosphere or Mika? Why would she say something that’s pretty....rude? She wouldn’t, but the writers needed her to-to progress their plot.

If this was main story Anne, she might’ve stuck with wanting to be an action star, when Mika asks what she does to work out Anne might say “Uhhhhh gymnastics you could say, stuff at home like flips and handstands” (gymnastics being a cover up for PTing), when asked about her diet she’d probs say “Oh you know a balanced meal, sometimes Western balanced sometimes Japanese, I do indulge in sweets a lot but then again I do work out a lot so I burn it right off. Haha I should probs be careful tho since I’m teetering on the edge! XD” and if asked if she’ll still be modeling in the future she could say “Hmmm maybe, I’m still in high school and I dunno what the future might hold, if it’s modeling I’ll still give it 110% of my effort like usual!” Again she’s a people-person, she might be outcasted cause people are afraid to talk to her, but she does have a good feel for people. The only way anything could go down with Mika is if Mika screws up Anne’s times, but then we’ve already diverged a lot between the game.

Also, while I do like Mika, she’s interesting, and tbh even tho it’s not canon this comic stip is like my fav:

(aklfdj;safj; that last panel always gets me, and Yaaaaas Mika kick Futaba’s ass XD)

Anyway, her bitching, or at least messing with her later, at Anne doesn’t really make sense. I think she wants Anne to quit so she has less competition, but after the first encounter all she does is keep lighting a fire under Anne’s ass....so she’s not doing a very good job. Like she’s doing a good job to help Anne progress, but Mika herself and her motives are a bit confusing. And it’s ironic cause Anne probably wouldn’t have been much of a rival if Mika hadn’t done what she’d done (cause Anne would’ve tried being an actress instead).

So yeah, the events with Mika only went down cause Atlus made Anne OOC....and I’m afraid that P5D also has Anne being slightly OOC too (like in her CoOp aka have her being an airhead in P5D too) for.....reasons....

So yeah that’s my issues with her link, and explains why it’s OOC and how the OOC hurts both her and the main story.

And no Anne was not being an airhead or couldn’t read the situation with Shiho in the first dungeon. Anne could tell something was up but she couldn’t do anything, she wasn’t on the team and she was on the outside looking in through a foggy ass window. Shiho didn’t want to tell her anything either. Dungeon 1 is not airheadedness or not reading the atmosphere. It’s 1) miscommunication, 2) just not communicating, and 3) being unable to communicate cause Kamo is bogarting the both of them when he can. So yeah didn’t really see this as a counter-argument, but in case anyone thought it could be one I’ll stop ya right there. 8U

#persona 5 #p5 #anne takamaki #ann takamaki #takamaki ann #takamaki anne #persona 5 problems #persona problems

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loracarol · 7 years ago

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I may or may not do a Proper Review of the Twisted Tales series at a later date, but here’s my brief summary/review of the first three. This WILL contain spoilers.

Also @fantastic-nonsense, have you heard of/read any of these? I know that fairy tales are kind of your jam. :V

A Whole New World

Easily my favorite of the three by far

Really leans in to the whole “the same Disney Movie You Know but with One Twist” thing they claim to have going on

Jafar gets the lamp

And that’s where it all goes to shit

Everything builds off of this one singular change in the timeline - while things are built up/expanded in the past, frankly it’s nothing that goes against the actual movie.

For example, the King being little more then a man-child ignoring the problems in his city. Not specifically mentioned in the movie but given the King’s personality/the slums we see, it’s not out of the realm of possibility.

Building on Aladdin’s past friendships - again, not something we actually see in movie, but not necessarily ooc either.

Also Jafar kills the Sultan, uses magic to raise the dead (the genie can’t do it, but Jafar uses his newfound power to look for a way around that.)

BUT YEAH there are zombies all of a sudden, including children.

This book was baller, 10/10 would recommend, even if just for the Holy Shit What The Fuck-ness of it.

Once Upon A Dream

Middle of the pack IMO.

I don’t actually have anything against the idea of the plot.

Aurora is highly different from her movie counterpart. It’s not necessarily bad IMO, but it was Distracting.

Aurora and Philip were cute, though.

Aurora’s parent’s get killed before she gets a chance to meet them. :(

But then?? She/the plot seems to agree with Maleficent that it was all their fault for sending their child away??

And, of course, ~Maleficent~ wouldn’t ever do something like that

Ignoring for the moment that they sent her away because Maleficent had put a curse on a fucking baby that was supposed to kill her

and it was only because another fairy intervened that she didn’t die

Maleficent, you don’t get to police how other people deal with that shit when it’s your fault they have to deal with it

And also you killed them and it’s your fault Aurora never got to meet her parents.

I was worried they were going to pull a Maleficent at the beginning with the framing device that Maleficent was the good guy and the three good fairies/the King and Queen were the bad guy, but the twist was nice

Not my fav, and while I did laugh out loud at some parts, I ended up feeling like I was reading about two OC’s who’d snuck into the plot rather then the Disney versions of the characters.

This was especially annoying bc the part where the book “twisted” the tale was around Aurora pricking her finger/Maleficent dying - aka the end of the friggen movie.

6/10 wouldn’t recommend but wouldn’t anti-recommend either.

As Old As Time

This book was very... Yikes

Yikes Yikes Yikes

Okay, maybe I’m overthinking this - I’m not actually Jewish, but it felt like this book appropriated/exploited a lot of Jewish historical suffering?

This one is under a cut bc potential antisemitism

Twist is that Belle’s mother was the Enchantress, but honestly, that didn’t feel like enough of a twist to justify everything that happens in the book

Once upon a time, in a far away land, there was a kingdom. This kingdom had many people within it’s borders, including a number of Jewish people magical folk. Belle’s mother is one of those Jewish people magical folk, only she’s a good Jew magical person with her “Aryan” looks blonde hair and light eyes (tbh I can’t remember if they were green or blue).

Among Maurice’s companions include a man who hates his Jewish heritage magical abilities and thinks of magic as unnecessary/evil.

Belle’s mother settles down with Maurice and has a baby with him, but things are starting to go poorly for the Jewish magical people. A plague arrives and the magical people (you get the point so I’m going to stop now) are blamed for it. Belle’s mom goes to the castle to try and bargain for help and because she is a Good Magical Person she casts a spell of protection on all of the children in the castle.

Meanwhile, magical folk are disappearing, but no one knows where to. To combat this, a series of people - including Mr. Potts - run a smuggling ring to get magical people out of the country. This is Important as things are continuing to go Wrong and the magical people are being blamed for all the countries ills.

In the end, the bad guy is the man who hated his magical abilities. He’s also Monsieur D’Arque - the asylum owner. He experimented on his brain (like, actual brain surgery) to get rid of his powers, and he’s been kidnapping and torturing magical beings since in order to try and figure out how to destroy all magical beings. Let me be clear, he is pretty much a Disney Fanfic Version of Josef Mengele. His experiments were horrible. Belle’s mom was one of those taken*, and she was tortured so badly... It’s horrifying, reading the description.

*As one of her last spells, she had removed everyone’s memories of her connection to Belle & Maurice to protect them, and that’s why D’Arque didn’t go after them at first.

There are other things, too, little bits here and there that really made me feel uncomfortable, like the book was appropriating this historical persecution of Jewish people for it’s own ends, but again, I’m not Jewish, and therefore not qualified to make A Statement on Antisemitism. I’m just noting the things I noticed.

That’s my Number One Big Problem with the book, and why I’d probably give it 1/5 stars, if that. That being said, that wasn’t my only problem with the book. The thing is, it wasn’t a good book that used unfortunate metaphors, it just felt like really really really bad fanfic on top of that. I don’t mention the following because I think they’re equal to what I noted above, I mention the following because these were other things that really annoyed me, and I wanted to rant about it:

Who the fuck are you, and what have you done with the beast?

You know how, in the movie, when the Beast knows that Belle is a chance to break the curse, and he still is an angry asshole to her even though realistically being kind would be more likely to cause her to fall in love with him & to break the spell.

Yeah, forget all that.

Belle touches the rose, learns about the curse, remembers her mother, and knows that she’s unlikely to fall in love with him now that she knows she “has” to.

The Beast, in return, turns into Bad!Fanfic!Draco/Zuko. You know, the kinds that show up in bad Dramaione/Zutara fics. (I’m not saying they’re all bad, but come on, you know what I mean when I refer to Bad Versions Of Those Fics.

You know the archetype.

Despite finding out that he may be Cursed Forever he puts on a tablecloth like an apron and helps Belle cook.

................................Yeah.

I read a Miraculous Ladybug fanfic that was Beauty and the Beast and something similar-ish occurred, but there it made sense. There it was in-character.

Also there’s a scene where the Beast is literally groveling on his hands and knees to get Gaston’s help.

Do you see what I mean about “bad fanfic”?

Anticlimax

The whole mob @ the asylum ends because LeFou recognizes his aunt (?) as one of the patients and that’s pretty much all it takes to turn people’s minds around. Maybe this could have worked with better set-up (LeFou’s POV book?) but... Yeah............

Anticlimactic Gaston

You know all that power he had over people in the village? How he was so well-liked he had his own theme song? How he was able to get everyone to set up a wedding in like... A day? How he had girls swooning over him? How the tavern was his house of worship? How he was able to get a mob going to attack a Dangerous Beast by sheer virtue of Who He Was in the village? How it took him plunging to his death to stop his cruelty?

Yeah, there’s none of that in this book.

People start recognizing the people in the asylum, and that’s just... It. They don’t turn on him, but they do turn away from him, and he just kind of... Takes it. It’s like they gave canon!Gaston valium. Why wasn’t he angry when he lost control? Why didn’t he rage when people betrayed him? Those are canon actions even before Belle meets the Beast! It just doesn’t make any sense that he’d just lie down and take it.

And the Furries Rejoiced

Belle doesn’t break the curse, but her mother has enough power to break part of it. The Beast somehow Stops Losing His Humanity because Luv (??) but that’s not enough to actually break the curse. The Beast asks the enchantress to break the curse on his people instead, and she does, leaving the Beast totally fine with being trapped in an alien, monstrous body. There is hope - if they can gather other fairy tale creatures to his palace*, they might be able to band together to break it. And like, I get it. People seem to have a hard on for the beastly form, but the book totally glosses over his canonical frustration with his inhuman form. See again, the cooking, and turning into LeatherPants!Draco/Zuko. It’s frustrating - again, that’s something that could have genuinely be fascinating, but it just felt like a cop-out so that the book could end with him still a furry.

Like, do that if you want, but actually make it a consequence with some emotion behind it rather then just being kind of... Meh.

* His palace was magically hidden & that part of the curse didn’t break meaning that it has the potential to become a haven for persecuted magical beings.

#disney #twisted tales #beauty and the beast #the sleeping beauty #aladdin #liz braswell #long post #antisemitism

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hidden-otaku-stuff · 4 years ago

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(1) Hello I am back!! I'm sorry it's been long, these past couple of weeks have had me swamped with homework :( and yet I still didn't do it all 🤡 also get ready for a bunch of messages because 1.) responses and 2.) my thoughts on Lockscreens. Spoiler: I am Emotional haha. Aww, thank you :') I used to think it was weird to give yourselves nicknames but I'm past that now haha. Another one I go by sometimes is "Lizard" because I stick my tongue out a lot when I'm talking??

(2) and people think I'm cold blooded because I get really cold easily and like to bask in the sun. I mostly just did traditonal sketches and a lot of screencap redraws. I want to get into art again, but I'm taking it slow for now and focusing more on my writing. And I feel that too LOL. I'm going to start a blog dedicated to reblogging x reader fics that I like because I'm too embarrassed to do so on my main blog (I tell all of your followers 🤡)

hey Honeymoon! as long as you’re taking care of yourself, that’s all I care about 💞 i’m gonna post my responses into two parts. a Lockscreens segment after you send in the rest of your thoughts and a get-to-know-you part for now!

(also I’M FROM CA TOO AND WHY ON EARTH ARE YOU SENDING ME MESSAGES AT 3AM OML)

ngl, i feel like the best person to give you a nickname is yourself! i jokingly gave myself the nickname ‘Daddy’ and that’s literally become my “rave” personality LMAO. but i can understand why some people think it’s weird 🤷 honestly lizard is a bad-ass nickname !! i’m the same way - being in the cold makes me sooo sleepy and i’d rather bask in the sun 😂

i’d love to see your artwork or writing sometime! please feel free to send it over 🥰

(3) Honestly even with all my issues it's kind of nice being a hopeless romantic! Like you said it gives me the chance to day dream haha. Maybe I have my head in the clouds a lot but sometimes it's nice to be there. There's so many, but I think it's a tie between enemies to lovers and friends to lovers. I love the drama and comedy from the former but I'm so Soft for the latter, and that's highkey how I want my relationship to start.

(4) I think building that bond with someone before you even start dating them is really sweet, and having that connection by the time you commit to each other is 💓 I'm sorry you've been having writers block, that's the worst :( if it helps, the past two chapters have turned out amazing, I love them so much!! I think the closest I got to hardcore shipping something that wasn't canon was RinHaru? But there was also a lot of tension and affection in their relationship so I could see it being canon

there’s nothing wrong with having dreams! just so long as you can ground yourself at the end of the day.

enemies to lovers is always the funniest for me to read TBH. because it’s such an inevitable cliche haha. friends to lovers though -- oooo my heart.

the best relationships start with friendship. it’s the most authentic imo. like for me, it’s exhausting bearing my heart open to new people each time i want to get involved with someone romantically. but having someone who already knows you inside out??? swoon. what about a trope you dislike?

ah tyty, i’m glad you enjoyed them! the writers’ block wasn’t too bad for these chapters. i’ve had them typed up for a few weeks now :’)

rinharu is so cute though! but Harukoto (or whatever the ship name is tbh) is super cute too. but maybe i just really like the best friend to lovers trope LMAO

(5) I just looked at their insta and !!!!!!!!!! that's so cute! I like bokuaka but I've never looked into it as much as others, but their art made me have Feelings lol. I think that is a good view to have on family tbh. I've developed a relationship with my blood family and we're close, but there's something special about the relationships and love you have for people you choose to stay with. I love Tiana!! I think she's a really underrated Disney character :(

(6) She really encompasses Disney's message of working hard to achieve your dreams, and she's a strong, independent woman without being closed off and rejecting her feelings. I think it's so cute and cool that she had that much of an impact on you :D Oof, I get that 💀. Men are gross 🤢 I don't get it very often because I live in SoCal and tbh to a lot of other people brown just equals mexican lol. They're right but I really don't look full mexican. Portuguese and Islander people can tell though

bokuaka art makes me have ~ feelings ~ i also really like @/liann1009 and @/maddox_rider on IG! (tbh idk if they have a tumblr whoops) liann1009 does a lot of OiHina whereas maddox_rider does bokuaka which is ridiculously cute too 🥰

DUDE OMG YES!!! Tiana and Kita (from Atlantis) are under-rated QUEENS who deserved better!! we need representation out here in this b*tch!!!

idek why, but some people think i look hispanic 🙃 but yes bby, men are gross and should be better!! i have yet to meet a man who deserves to stand on equal ground to me, imma be real. (2d men don’t count but y’know). does it bother you when people mistake your ethnicity?

(7) Thank you!! Ngl it's kind of scary wondering about what the industry is going to be like because I'm sure I will run into a lot of biased people and sources, but learning to navigate that is just part of the job. Of course there's people who will read biased sources and attack you too, but you can't always escape those people :/ and thank you love, you're so sweet 💕 That's really admirable! It takes a lot of work and creativity to start a business, I'm sure you'll be successful 😊

(8) what kind were you thinking of? and psych is super cool too! Having that understanding of people and the world can be really eye opening and fun :D It's okay, he was one of my favorite teachers but looking back he was an asshole. He had his good/funny moments and did a lot for me, but he also abused some of editors in my journalism class, and some friends of mine :/ He wouldn't appreciate their work, sometimes insult them, and even encouraged my friend to not sleep for the sake of the paper

i’m positive that you’ll do just fine once you get out there! it seems like you have a pretty thick skin :)

i really wanted to open a business to help support under-represented groups receive an education - with major focus on minority groups such as orphans/foster children, veterans, and the homeless. there’s so much logistics that tbh i’m too ~stressed~ to think about so i’m tabling that for awhile :’)

bruhhh fuck that teacher. drop his addy, i just wanna talk real q 💞 if you can’t support all of your students, then there is no point in being a professor!! there is literally 0 reason to be rude when you’re in a position of power, especially when it involves someone’s passion, career, and/or education.

(9) I just remembered that there's a limit to how many asks you can send in a certain amount of time so if these suddenly stop I'm sorry! I'll come back when I can haha. I wouldn't say I'm all that great tbh, but I'm proud of a lot of my works LOL. My favorite part about it is using makeup and tools to just turn into something else. Wounds are always fun, but making yourself a gargoyle or some other creature is what makes it so interesting to me.

(11) I'm OBSESSED with the makeup and costumes from LOTR. It's my biggest inspiration. I can go on about it haha. That's so cool!! Being a part of the whole production, especially all sides to it, sounds so fun. Do you have any favorite memories from your time in high school? I'd love to hear them if you have any :O Confession: I have never seen any of those asdfkljvk. I know I really should though and it's on my to do list ! I've heard really great things about all of them !

imma be real, i didnt know there was a limits on asks LMAO. i did hear that they sometimes get eaten though, so i really hope that doesn’t happen 😅

we all start somewhere. your first step will never look like someone else’s, nor should it. as long as it’s something that you can look back upon and be proud of and know that you’ve grown from, that’s all that matters!

just imagining someone using makeup to turn themselves into a gargoyle has my head spinning 🤣 like ya girl can barely do her eye-makeup, let alone anything as intense as that! what’s been the most difficult project?

DUDE, I LOVE MEDIEVAL-HISTORICAL WORKS! like the dresses from that Mary from Reign wears has my heart so softtttt. dfsnosdf. please!! tell me some of your fav things about LOTR 💖

omg high-school was so long ago, i don’t think i have any favorite memories from it 🙃 i think the opening night of a production would be the best. listening to the audiences reactions as the performers left their hearts on-stage, seeing all the pieces fall together, that was always absolutely incredible. wbu, what did you enjoy about hs?

i have very strong opinions on those musicals LMAO. i can talk about them forever 🤩

#skye's asks #firebonbon

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mdwatchestv · 7 years ago

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Game of Thrones 7x06: Run Joe, Run

Woo boy that was A LOT. Like a lot, a lot. In so many different ways. I would even go so far as to describe some elements as 'extra'. Yes there was excitement, action, and feels. I even admit to screaming bloody murder when the zombie bear came from a direction I didn't expect. But when all was said and done I couldn't help but feel a bit...used. This season, although boasting some great moments, has felt undeniably different than previous years. Instead of focussing on building out a world and the characters that inhabit it, the show is now rocketing towards a foregone conclusion. If the world of Game of Thrones is a chess board and we have spent the past several years watching knights and queens slowly slide around the squares jockeying for position, this season is the equivalent of knocking it all to the ground and letting the pieces literally fall where they may. Alternatively, if the world of Game of Thrones was a high-end Barbie collector's basement, this is the season his eight-year-old niece broke in, ripped 1993 Holiday Barbie out of her box and made her make out with 1960 1st edition Ken. And neither of those things are inherently bad, playing with dolls and knocking a boring game on the floor are both entertaining in and of themselves, but they are also a departure from what we have come to expect.

Before this season I never thought about things like "Wait- how many long miles IS Westeros? What is the land speed of a laden Raven? What's the MPH on a dragon? How long by air? How long by sea?" I wasn't worried about the logistics, the tech specs. We had other things to worry about, like battle strategies, familial strain, and tyrannical kings. But now it feels as if the curtain is starting to be pulled aside and we are for the first time seeing the mechanics at work behind the scenes. While there were thrills to be had in this super-sized penultimate outing of season seven, they came at a price. In the after-episode special Benioff and Weiss openly admitted to essentially reverse-engineering the entire episode in order to get the final shock of zombie dragon, rather than letting it be the consequence of an organic series of events. One of the reasons Game of Thrones works so well is that consequences, even the upsetting ones, feel earned. The Red Wedding, for example, tragic as it was, was ultimately palatable because it made sense in the larger story. It was the tangible result of a series of connectable actions, not a gambit for ratings. Often the killing of beloved characters leads fan to become disillusioned with a show because it's done in the service of shock value, rather than organic storytelling. But as major characters drop on Game of Thrones, it only acts to draw the audience in further because it’s done in a way that rewards previous storytelling. The idea that characters are existing in a real world with real stakes and consequences is compelling and rare. Up until this season Game of Thrones never had characters rendered immortal by their series regular contracts, or even clear-cut heroes and villains. Yes, we root for different characters and houses, but at this point no one has a clean moral conscious. Those qualities are exactly what made Game of Thrones so good, and what it is seemingly starting to lose. It's worth pointing out that up until recently the show has had source material to rely on for guidance, and is now having to pick it's own path to the end. Viewer’s theories about the show’s endgame have become increasingly out there, perhaps in response to a world where outcome is not necessarily determined by prior events. For better or worse, anything is possible.

This episode was some moments of interest strung together with moments of "what?!?!?". Let's begin. ZARTF (Zombie Acquisition and Retrieval Task Force), as well as a few randos clearly marked for death, sally forth into the north. This whole episode gave me greatest hits of Lord of the Rings vibes, including "walking in a straight line across a mountain", "being rescued by a giant winged beast at the last second", and "rolling up half dead on a horse". I really gotta carve out 10 hours to rewatch those. To pass the time tromping through the snow our seven "heroes" try and work through their daddy issues (a little late imo), and Jon makes a half-assed attempt to give Longclaw back to Jorah (conveniently failing to mention it's like the only thing that kills White Walkers). The first sign of trouble comes when the group is set upon by a zombie bear! You hate to see that. Some of the red shirts are killed, Top Knot McGillicutty is wounded, and Jorah saves the day with his dragon glass dagger. Which I guess they all have? Or just Jorah? Unclear. This scene is what we like to call in the biz a foreshadowing.

Meanwhile in Dragonstone Dany is mooning over Jon Snow, even though he is a short stack (he IS super little) and ignores Tyrion who is attempting to invent democracy. In their exchange it's reiterated that Dany can never have babies (beyond her dragon babies), making a potential hold on the Iron Throne tenuous at best (Jon is still the *true* heir, but doesn't seem like Bran is going to tell anyone that anytime soon). Dany would rather not talk about any of that though, and would rather crush/not crush on the King of the Short. Speaking of women on the edge, the Sisters Stark are also failing to see eye to eye. After discovering Arya's BAG OF FACES (I have so many questions about the logistics of face wearing, but I am simply too tired to get into it), Sansa is understandably concerned. These concerns are heightened when creepy-ass Arya pops in to play a decidedly threatening game of questions. Arya seems to think Sansa is out to usurp Jon because she is a Cersei-in-training. Sansa thinks Arya is a terrifying demon child. This is a relationship that has also become frustrating centering around a conflict that doesn't ring true. While it's true that Arya and Sansa have become very different young women, there is more that unites than divides them at this point and Arya's extreme aggression towards her sister feels unwarranted. The core characteristic of the Stark family is that they ARE the Stark family. Arya put aside her dreams of Cersei killing in order to reclaim her heritage, and with the pack dwindling the remaining wolves have to stick together now more than ever. Both of these women have been through extreme trauma, both of them have had to make unthinkable choices in order to survive, and both of them have been continually underestimated by their male cohorts. I'm not saying this is a relationship that should not be without conflict, but their animosity lacks nuance. Granted this show doesn't have a lot of experience with complicated female relationships, but Sansa and Arya attempting to reconnect as complex young women in a time of crisis feels like a real missed opportunity.

And I have seen the Twitter theories that say that the two girls are gaming Littlefinger together, that Sansa sending Brienne away (to an I think prematurely scheduled zombie viewing) right after Littlefinger advised her to use Brienne against Arya is concrete proof. As much as I hope this is all true, it just doesn't seem likely at this point. But maybe Sansa's bizarrely abrupt send off of her last loyal subject really was a clue to a larger plot, or maybe it's just an excuse to put Brienne back in Jaime's path to give him a last second shot of moral obligation. I would love nothing more for my pessimistic theories surrounding two of my long time favs to be proven wrong. These two characters, no matter their ultimate fate, deserve the chance at a final team up.

Back up north, our band of brothers conveniently stumble upon a manageable squadron of zombies led by a White Walker. After dispatching the Walker all the zombies but *one* turn into dust. The plan is going smoothly! However the last zombie calls the rest of the hoard and they are well and truly fucked. The group sends good old Gendry to run back to the Wall (an unknown distance) to raven Dany for help, while the rest of the pack becomes stranded on a rock in the middle of an ice lake surrounded by the entire undead army. Here's where I have questions. Question 1: If Ole One Eye and Top Knot McGee can make fire whenever they want, why cant they have a fire on the island? Or at least gather around one of the swords? Question 2: Can the zombies not use bows? It seems like our group would be pretty easy to take down with a couple dozen arrows. Question 3: How long are they waiting/expecting to wait? How long does it take for the raven to get to Dany? More questions to come later. Anyway Top Knot succumbs to his wounds, meaning that One Eye is now on his final life. The Hound, who was pretty useless most of this episode, continues to be useless by alerting the zombie hoard that the ice is safe to walk on. Our party engages in a seemingly hopeless battle against an untold number of assailants, hoping against hope for a dragony miracle to happen.

And it does! Dany swoops in with her brood in the last second, blasting the zombies with fire, and rocking a seriously fabulous white fur coat, to save the day! Not only is her winter wardrobe literally to die for, it also looks like she may have skinned Ghost to make it, symbolizing her new allegiance (romance?) with Jon. I also have to ask at this point why this wasn't the original plan. Dany made pretty good time getting up there, didn't have to tromp through the snow, and likely could have had Drogon pick up a zombie in his talons- all in seemingly less than a day! But I guess that would have been much less macho than grimly marching through the snow. It looks like the tables have turned in favor of our hereos when suddenly....the Night King picks up an ice spear and takes out Viserion! Nooooo.

This was a genuinely heart-wrenching moment, as an audience we have watched Dany's dragons grow from hatchlings to giant death machines, and seeing one of them ripped out of the sky was just as painful as losing any beloved human character. Again this was a moment that delivered an emotional punch, but the journey to that payoff was not as satisfyingly authentic as it could have been. Jon, realizing the White Walkers are somehow ready for dragon combat, sacrifices himself so Drogon can take off with his payload safely. But it's an empty sacrifice, because Jon is last minute rescued by BENJEN STARK, who is part ice monster, part North of the Wall lifeguard, all Stark all the time. If you recall Benjen, or Cold Hands I guess is his nickname, previously came in for the save with his swinging lantern when he rescued Meera and Bran. But Benjen's last minute saving days are over as he is eaten by zombies in order to allow Jon to escape. Sad.

Back at the wall Dany ignores Daddy Jorah in favor of wistfully staring out over the tundra, hoping for Jon to appear. And appear he does! Jon is more than fine, especially shirtless and wrapped in furs on Dany's pleasure yacht. The two have some weird flirting where Dany reveals she can never have children, and Jon actually refers to her as 'Dany'. Good thing they are both so hot, because that banter wouldn't cut it anywhere else. Also she's his aunt. I simply cannot stress that enough.

As a final coda to this decades long episode, we see the Night Army dragging the corpse of Viserion out of the lake only to reanimate him into an ice zombie dragon! Gah! Shit is most definitely getting real, as the Night King adds some real power to his arsenal. Will zombie dragon still breathe fire? Ice? Freezing rain? Excited to find out. Next week (the season finale???) looks like it will be the zombie summit down in King's Landing. I have zero predictions for this. My only hope is that Euron will be there, I miss him. In a world of uncertainty, Euron brings the party.

Stuff I didn't get to:

Stop shipping Dany/Jon, START shipping Brienne/Beardy

They almost took Beardy from me after I SPECIFICALLY asked them not too.

Beardy learned the word dick <3

Beardy rode a dragon!!!

MVP: Beardy. I don't have to defend myself.

XO MD

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joannalannister · 8 years ago

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Is there any chance of a happy ending for the Lannisters? I know they are awful people but why develop their motivations and give each of them a genuine moment of compassion if they are just going to murder each other? Every other POV gets a moment of truth/redemption why not the children of Tywin/Patriarchy/Aerys and Disability? I'm a bad person myself so I need to believe the Lions can defy themselves and prophesy and overcome their nature or what's the point? Not all of us are born Starks.

Hey! So it’s gonna take me a few minutes to answer your question, but I promise I’m gonna get there.

In one of the other shows I watch, an actor commented on the banality of evil. He said that evil is something commonplace. Given the right circumstances, great acts of evil could be committed by your neighbors, or your friends, or you, or me. Because evil is so easy. “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” You needn’t be a monster like Gregor to commit evil; you need only be human.

As that actor said, it’s very dangerous to think “If they do something evil, they’re a monster, because regular people could never do that.” But regular people could do that, and they have, throughout history. But in fiction, we like to other evil. We like to say, “Those are the bad guys, see their uniforms? They’re not us, they’re not on our side.” It becomes very black and white, and it’s one of the reasons for the enduring popularity of a certain type of movie. “We’re attracted to it because of its moral certainties.” For the record, I really like that genre of movie. But we should be asking ourselves why. We as human beings prefer to simplify and distance ourselves from evil, and to ignore or diminish our own atrocities, which we rarely make movies about. It makes us feel better about ourselves to ignore the bad parts of ourselves, and to play the hero. Even Cersei does this; think about Cersei’s revisionist memories of what happened to Melara Hetherspoon.

GRRM doesn’t want his readers to have an easy time distancing themselves from evil. ASOIAF is never, “Here are the Bad Guys in their Clearly Marked uniforms with their Bad Guy flag flying high.”** In fact, GRRM even said that he deliberately wanted the Night’s Watch, the people fighting on the front lines of the Other invasion, to wear black because he wanted to mix up the color symbolism in fantasy. “Before you can fight the war between good and evil, you need to determine which is which, and that’s not always as easy as some Fantasists would have you believe.”

(Tangent, but an interesting thing about Jaime imo is that he doesn’t always know where he stands in terms of good and evil. Sure, he knows that things like rape are wrong on an individual level, but on an institutional level, he thinks nothing of the institutionalized rape of Sansa Stark or Jeyne Poole, and he legitimately thought Tysha was just a gold digger. He doesn’t think House Lannister as an institution is bad, so he willingly does things like kick the Tullys out of their own home. There’s this narrative going around in fandom that Jaime’s actions during the FeastDance are things he’s done against his will, but Jaime participates willingly, in thought and deed, and he actively wants to keep Tommen on a throne to which the boy has no right. Even in ADWD, Jaime still thinks, like, “Well, massacring a whole family takes care of the problem.” If you’re looking for someone who actively criticizes and rebels against the Lannister regime, both in his thoughts and in his actions, that’s Tyrion.)

SO ANYWAYS, grrm doesn’t want you to be able to say, “Those are the Bad Guys over there. We’re gonna go fight them and kill them.” (He actually says the opposite tbh: “Those are brave men. Let’s go kill them.”)

GRRM wants you to pull those Bad Guys in close and have them put their head on your shoulder as you whisper softly, “I understand. I know this pain you’re in. It’s my own.” And then, after you’ve smoothed their hair and made them a nice cup of hot cocoa and gotten them comfortable and maybe had a good cry together, you’re supposed to look into that character’s eyes and say, “WTF is wrong with you? Look at your life; look at your choices. I’ve dealt with these same issues my whole life and I never became a mass murderer or did any of the other horrible shit that you did. You need to shape up, or else you’re going to be fucking doomed. You don’t get to keep digging this hole deeper for yourself and think it’s gonna come out ok!! You’re literally in a fucking GRRM novel ffs, do you even know how high that guy’s kill count is???”

(This is literally like Sandor Clegane’s story. On the Quiet Isle, he figures out he needs to shape up. He no longer works for the Lannisters. Not everybody’s story needs to be about redemption, though. Some stories are tragedies.)

If the Starks are the characters you should aspire to be (and lbr, the Starks are who you should aspire to be; there’s a reason everybody in canon wants to be a Stark, from Robert to Theon to Barbrey etc)

then the Lannisters are the warning against who you could become, if you aren’t careful. You came to me saying, “I’m a bad person myself.” idk if you wanted me to tell you, “That’s ok, it’s all going to work out” but I’m not gonna do that. That’s not how it works, in either fiction or real life.

I see a lot of myself in House Lannister. Selfishness. Avarice. Pride. Shame. Perfectionism. These things resonated with me when GRRM wrote about them in the Lannisters, precisely because he made the Lannisters so real. In other fantasy stories, sure, the villains are proud or selfish or whatever, but they’re so clearly the Evil Bad Guys that they were never relatable to me.

GRRM brought so many of his antiheroes / anitvillains / villains so close to home that I couldn’t ignore them. I couldn’t other them and dismiss them. The Lannisters called to me. They demanded I read and write fanfiction, even, to explore these issues further. The Lannisters showed me who I could be, and what terrible, terrible things I might be capable of, in the right scenario. GRRM turns it up to 11, but still. The Lannisters warn me: don’t be that person.

That’s why I get so happy at the idea of the Lannisters being brought down. It’s a very personal victory; that ugly, horrible person I could have been was defeated.

Cersei has her moments of truth in the narrative where people tell her she needs to shape up, and she ignores them. Outside the sept of Baelor, the people tell her they don’t want vengeance; they just want to live their lives in peace. And Cersei doesn’t listen. If you’re heading for a trainwreck and you don’t heed any of the warning signs, I’m sorry but it’s not going to be okay in the end. For Jaime and Cersei, I think their story is about existential tragedy - they will ultimately be unable to rise above their Lannister ideology, and for that the narrative will demand their deaths. And that’s ok. The Bad Guy characters can crash and burn, but you don’t have to if you heed the warnings they ignored.

The other thing I will say, after reading other works written by GRRM and getting a feel for his endings … it’s not about whether you live or die. We all die. Every single person who reads this is going to die. It’s not about the happy ending, either. Winter – the bad times – come for us all. Maybe the bad times will come again only after 10 years, or 20, but they will come. (lol at theories that the seasons will be “normal” in ASOIAF at the end.)

What matters in GRRM’s stories is whether the character took a stand. Did they fight for what was right? Did they do that good thing when they had the chance? Did they achieve that existential victory? I think this is the part that applies to Tyrion especially.

Tyrion is GRRM’s fav and he’s one of the greyest of the greys. He does horrible unforgivable things in the books. But there’s going to come a pivotal moment when Tyrion has to choose, and I think that he will make the Good choice, even if it kills him. (Perhaps especially if it kills him, in the ultimate self-sacrifice.) Because it doesn’t matter if he dies. Like I said, we all die. What matters is what you did with your life. Were you victorious in that moment when you had to make a choice between Good and Evil?

And that’s something that I love about ASOIAF tbh, that GRRM brings the War for the Dawn home. It’s a war inside each of his characters (#body as battleground, im gonna keep saying it), it’s in the conflicts of the human heart, in the choice between good and evil.

“The war has been waged since time began, and before it is done, all men must choose where they will stand.”

“It hurts, boy,” he said softly. “Oh, yes. Choosing … it has always hurt. And always will. I know.”

The point of art isn’t necessarily the art itself but how we respond to it. How did it make you feel? What did it make you think about? What did you do, after you put the book down and went out again into the real world?

As we ride around in these characters’ heads, the War for the Dawn becomes our war too. It’s our fight between good and evil. It’s a war that’s more real than a battle against orcs and monsters. (Think about Jon Snow’s choice to let wildling refugees in through the Wall, and how many senior Night’s Watch officials oppose what he’s doing. Think about it.)

Like I said above, not every story is a redemption arc. I don’t think Jaime’s story is a redemption arc, for example. Some stories are tragedies, where the character dies in the end, because they couldn’t overcome their nature (like Jaime as the valonqar). It’s not the death that’s the point, but the journey you went on with that character. How did it make you feel?

I mean, GRRM is literally making you feel empathy for murderers.

Would you be half so concerned with what’s going to happen to the Lannisters at the end if GRRM wrote them as Pure Evil™, without any of those sympathetic moments? In other words, how do you feel about Gregor? Will you care when Gregor dies? I know I won’t. GRRM wrote the Lannisters the way he did, with complex motivations and heartbreaking moments and compelling backstories, because he wanted to breathe life into them and make them real.

GRRM wanted to make you care before he kills them, so that their deaths will affect you more strongly, so that these feelings, these critical thoughts, these lessons you learned will linger looooong after you turn the final page. (Have I told y’all how much Fevre Dream and With Morning Comes Mistfall HAUNT me??? Oh god do GRRM’s stories linger. Y’all think this is all gonna be over and done with after we turn the final page of ADOS and Blood of Dragons and D&E. Heh. I know better. I know better. ASOIAF is for life.)

If the thesis of ASOIAF is to recognize our common humanity and to understand that dehumanizing people is wrong, your sympathetic emotions toward the villainous Lannisters go a long way toward supporting GRRM’s thesis on a meta-level.

**The Others are clearly evil eldritch slavers, but the focus of the story is never on them. We’re almost exclusively focused on what humanity is doing, for 5 books now.

***Also, I’m not sure why Aerys is included here when referencing Tywin’s children, but I’m going to overlook that and point you here: #A plus J does not equal T

EDIT: I think I said this better over here so I’m just gonna paste it below:

GRRM brings the war home when he writes about the conflicts of the human heart. It implies a personal battlefield inside each of us, a perpetual fight of Good versus Evil, consisting of all those choices we make, each and every day. (Even the choices you make about ASOIAF. Doesn’t that make you feel … idk … bigger … more important … more involved … as a reader, that one of the great battlefronts of the War for the Dawn is located inside your head, in terms of your opinions about and reactions to ASOIAF?)

#asoiaf #asoiaf meta #house lannister #heatherlanntheclever #replies #the meaning of asoiaf #lannister thoughts #endgame

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vidoxi · 8 years ago

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just finished mystic messenger and i just wanna write down my thoughts. major spoiler warning + i-might-talk-shit-about-your-fav warning. if you want to discuss with me any of the points i bring up here, go for it.

Jaehee “No Homo” Kang

so when i first heard that her route was just a friendship route i was hella disappointed and thought that sounded like a total bullshit cop out, but after playing it i feel a little differently. i think it makes sense for jaehee’s character and narrative that she would value a friend over a relationship at that point in her life, but also its pretty clearly said that she does have romantic feelings for you but she needs time to process them, which is especially understandable since you can infer that before she met you she thought she was straight and also she’s catholic. her after ending was the perfect time for her to confess or for there to be the implication that you two are in a relationship, but instead it’s the only after ending where we DONT get to see interaction between you and your partner, which is a bullshit cop out. i do like that in the christmas DLC things got a little more romantic but i’m still wanting more. jaehee and the fans deserve what the male characters get, a CG of a kiss on the lips and a confession of romantic love. i hope that if more DLC gets released, cheritz will push the envelope a little a lot more. but i have heard that korea is still really conservative and for all i know making it more explicit could be illegal so i might be being unnecessarily harsh there lol;;

about her actual route though... it was good. nothing really exciting happened. it was definitely the chillest route i thought, but it was really sweet and she’s absolutely adorable and it warmed me to her a lot. her bad ending 1 (the one where you end up with zen) is so depressing, fucking hell. it feels like you betray her. it’s so ugly. ;_; i never want to do that ending and i’m glad there isnt a unique CG to tempt me into it either. her bad ending 2 (where you push her to work so hard that she ends up in the hospital) is pretty terrible too. after ending was hella cute though, i love the thought of mc and jaehee having their little coffee shop together and jaehee getting to actually work on something she’s interested in and being with her “best friend” all the time. oh and yoosung becoming jumin’s new assistant was interesting and i need me some fics, u feel?

something i also feel a little robbed about is that jaehee never blew up at jumin. she drags yoosung like theres no tomorrow and you just know she could say some venomous shit about jumin so i was hoping there’d be a big confrontation between them where she gets a dramatic The Reason You Suck-type speech but there wasnt really a moment like that.

however, seeing jumin all bitter about it at the end was a little gratifying (sorry jumin)

i love their emojis and you cant stop me from using them

also on this route where 707 has yoosung hunting for the LOLOL expansion pack (how is this boy so naive? im worried) and he finds a buried picture of rika’s dog sally instead, i at first thought that he had dug up sally’s corpse and i was like “wtf the fuck seven”

also wtf @ v saying he has terminal cancer. this is presumably a lie, right? before reading the secret endings i thought he was going to commit suicide but now im thinking that (seriously if you havent played the whole game you need to stop reading this rn) maybe he knew that rika was going to dispose of him soon and he didnt want jumin to investigate his disappearance? iirc yoosung’s good ending is the only one that he’s present in, so is it meant to be assumed that he’s killed off camera in every route possibly?

everyone else under the cut

Zen

the worst tbh. i dont like saying it but there it is. possibly this depends on who you are as a person but to me it didnt really feel like MC and zen had much chemistry except during that scene where youre on his roof together. most of your interactions are just you praising him and fellating his already huge ego. and jaehee was exceptionally annoying with all her “muh zens reputation” shit and feeling like i was taking zen from her was really awkward and unpleasant because it does seem like she has repressed feelings for him. fuck and the whole story with echo girl was super predictable and generic and feels like something i’ve seen 100 times before and probably have. my overall feeling about this route can be summed up by this emoji.

i feel like it could have been improved by either removing the echo girl stuff or at least putting an interesting spin on it. i think they should have made zens’ childhood abuse and family problems and maybe his past as a gang member as well an actual conflict instead of it just being a thing of happenstance. it’s an interesting backstory that as far as i can recall didnt end up having an impact on the current day situation. it would have been interesting if he had some sort of emotional issue you had to help him through like jumin, like secret crippling insecurities due to his family telling him for years that he’s ugly and inadequate, and thats why he tries so hard to be perfect so that people will give him the love his parents didnt. also his elementary school teacher was implied to be a pedophile(??? i dont remember what was actually said in the conversation i just remember the pedo-vibes) so they could have made him a CSA survivor but maybe thats too dark even for mysme lol.

also his bad ending 1 confuses me. the first time i saw it it felt really rapey but rewatching it now, MC does seem to consent but its after being cold and refuting his advances so it seems really weird. MC seemed genuinely disinterested, but i guess she was just playing games, testing him to see what he’d do? since theyre in a relationship a year later. and his bad ending 3 (the one where youre both kidnapped by saeran) is pretty bizarre lol.

so yeah this is the weakest route imo. maybe its different for people who are zen fangirls but i personally felt like i was being super fake the whole route, which was especially jarring coming off of yoosung’s route where the dialogue choices felt very organic to me. also his responses to mean things arent even interesting lol so thats frustrating too. and this route felt weirdly short. all the others felt like 11 days but this one felt more like 5? and when i missed chats on this route i just let it go most of the time instead of spending hourglasses. i wasnt feeling it, mr krabs. by far the best part of his route for me was the relationship development between zen and jumin.

now that ive spent 4 paragraphs just complaining you probably think that i dont like zen but actually i think he’s is a fantastic supporting character and i do like him a lot. that picture of him sneezing was my phone wallpaper for quite a while lol.

Jumin

me at the beginning: i fucking hate jumin han. fuck him. fuck his cat. i hate this type of asshole love interest.

me after zens route: i guess he has some hidden depths... i’m curious...

me after jumins route: *loves jumin han so much i cant breathe*

this guy... this cat man...... where to start? i’ve had a while to think about this route and i’m still not totally sure how i feel. “i feel complicated” is a term i’m going to start using because its just too handy for situations like this.

i guess i dont like that to get the good end you had to be passive and compliant and act like you were walking on eggshells. your relationship with him is undeniably a little scary and abusive. i think jumin needs more in his life than just you. but mysme is an otome game so of course youre the one that “fixes” him but thinking about it more realistically its worrying and jumin should be in therapy cuz the dude undeniably has some issues.

winning his heart by being understanding and with gradual, slow-growing trust was pretty touching. something i really appreciate was him opening up and his true self actually being hard to accept sometimes, instead of whats expected which is “oh youre secretly a perfect, beautiful soul”.

i do really wish they would have opened him up further though. there isnt ever a point where he completely loses control of his emotions. not to be gross but i’d do anything to see him crying, honestly.

i hope people are joking when they say that his bad end (you know the one i mean) is a good end. just because its hot doesnt mean that its good lol. its actually really tragic and shows the deterioration of his mental state and how he’s just accepted that he’s a fucked up/defective person.

“I was worried that the loneliness inside me would pile up and explode some day.” FUCK. dont do this to me jumin. ;_; this line is heart breaking.

something thats kind of interesting and worth noting maybe is that even though the other rfa members arent privy to the VNMs and you can give them little indication that he’s acting so worryingly theyre all still alarmed and concerned and thinks that jumin is going to hold you hostage/abuse you, which makes me wonder if youre meant to infer from that that theyve noticed red flags in his personality that he’s potentially kinda crazy.

and man, zen is always complaining about how jumin seems to have no emotions, but jumin finally opens up about his feelings and zen calls you laughing hysterically about how pathetic he is for being emotional. i was kinda hurt on jumin’s behalf during that call lol. he is so supportive to zen on zen’s route. just... shut the fuck up you albino freak. dont make me whip out yoosung’s “hyung, what’s wrong with you?” emoji. i wont hesitate, bitch.

there. you asked for it. feel those judging purple oblongs pierce your soul.

man, just reading the dialogue options that treat him like a psycho make me cringe. usually i’m tempted by mean dialogue options but not this time. i want to protect jumin han. ;_; i want to untangle his threads. i dont want him to feel like a mutant ever again. i want to love and accept him. i am now the president of the jumin han protection squad. jumin han did nothing wrong. shameless jumin apologist. that’s me. no but seriously he did a lot wrong and is pretty morally grey but thats one of the reasons that i love him. if you love jumin for pure reasons (that arent just “daddy~”) then youre automatically my friend and i love and appreciate you.

just to love on him for a minute: he is so damn funny, for real. he’s such a sass master, its great. him being terrible with technology is funny. his social awkwardness is funny. his shitty jokes are funny because theyre not funny. he should be the poster child for gap moe cuz goddamn. he’s such a ham. an absolute goofball dressed as a billionaire CEO, and i dont think he even knows it.

also every time elizabeth meows i fucking lol. its literally just a woman saying “meow”. every time jumin says “elizabeth is just a cat, she’s not human” i’m like “ARE YOU SURE?”

Yoosung

this is the first route i got and i assumed that i had already peaked at the beginning and no one was ever going to top yoosung for me, and that assumption was correct. i love this boy. do you hear me? i love him. “perfect” has seven letters in it. “yoosung” has seven letters in it. coincidence? i dont think so. i have feeeeeeelings over this character. he is so darling. i just adore him. i’ve opened the app many times just to look at his album. his voice is like a choir of angels. i have so many screenshots of conversations with him on my phone. he is so selfless and caring and adorable and kinky and pure and i want him to be real so i can marry him irl.

i’m not even sure how to give a critique on his route because i feel so emotionally close to the situation lol. i was very, very invested. ah. gosh. this boy. his good ending is absolutely beautiful. you know youre playing a weird otome game when the good ending has your boyfriend tortured and disfigured. he really earned his happy ending, not quite as much as seven but its up there.

i really love how for better or worse, this boy is like putty in your hands to be molded and what you say to him effects him so deeply in a way that doesnt quite get as extreme as with the other characters. obviously your words majorly influence the other characters but i feel never to the extent where theyre hanging on to every little thing youre saying like yoosung does. which makes sense because he’s young and impressionable and doesnt know what to do with himself and he says he wants to be controlled lol.

MAN, speaking of that, i love his bad ending 3 so much. it’s so twisted that he’s technically getting what he wants in a lot of ways. he’s a masochist that loves the idea of being kept as a pet and controlled, and he gets all that and more with saeran. that ending is so fucking hot, slkdfljsf. i might write a fic. i have a couple ideas.

oh shit, using that seven gif just reminded me. there’s a chat thats on the first few days of common route that ive always participated in before, but when you dont participate in it and yoosung has time to ramble, it gets really kinky. he says “i wonder what it would feel like to be locked up? just a bit.... curious lolol” which i think is what he says when youre in the chat too BUT THEN HE STARTS GETTING OFF ON THE IDEA OF SEVEN BEING LOCKED UP TOO. “Imagine the super smart Seven all flustered. and not knowing what to do.” AND I’M JUST LIKE BOIIII;;; HOW YOU GONNA JUST TALK ABOUT THAT IN FRONT OF ZEN AND JAEHEE LIKE ITS NOTHING? if he would take the obvious hints that seven hits on him he’d probably be willing to roleplay that scenario. 707 strikes me as a fetish friendly person lolol.

ummm... well, to get back back on track, ahem.... him confusing you with rika was creepy and interesting and they didnt take it far enough. even on the yandere bad ending he’s still fully aware that you arent rika. it seemed like it was building towards him having some kind of psychosis where if you feed into his desire for you to be rika he’ll really think youre rika but that doesnt happen so theres no real pay off, and he doesnt have time to do anything yandere-y to you before the bomb goes off so i found that ending to be pretty disappointing and unsatisfying. it felt like someone waving a delicious cake in front of my face but only giving me a crumb of it in the end, do you know what i mean? aaa. maybe i can find a fic that runs with the ideas set up here. when youre desperate, turn to fanfiction lol.

speaking of disappointments, i’m not over the last line of his good ending being “youre not rika, are you?” like... at this point we’re past this arent we omg stoppp. this line is a blight on my happiness. fuck rika and fuck whoever thought that was a good last line.

i noticed that yoosung is the only rfa member including v and rika that doesnt have childhood trauma. his trauma all happened recently. i think that lends to him being the most fragile and child-like character. the other rfa members are so strong because their pasts molded them that way, but yoosung has no such constitution and rika’s death is undoubtedly the worst thing thats ever happened to him.

something thats been on my mind concerning bad ending 3: does rika know that saeran is torturing yoosung? saeran must know that yoosung is his savior’s cousin because he’s hacked the chat and presumably has read messages where yoosung mentions being her cousin, correct? therefor wouldnt that make him hesitant to harm him? i think rika must have consented to yoosung being tortured then. maybe his ultimate fate at the end of bad end 3 is that he’ll be brainwashed and become part of mint eye.

man he’s such a bad judge of character lol. he hero worships rika, loves echo girl, thinks that jumin isnt potentially dangerous, and even you can fall into this category if you choose to play it that way. the one person he really dislikes is v, and v has nothing but the rfa’s best interests at heart lol.

something i love about him is how quick he is to call everyone out on their shit. like, his finger is always on the “whats wrong with you? :>” emoji, just waiting for someone to say something he doesnt approve of lolol. he’s so empathetic and naive but he still has such a strong sense of right and wrong and isnt afraid of standing up to his older friends and i think thats great.

ahh. this boy. he might be ranked #2 on LOLOL but he’s ranked #1 in my heart.

707

before playing his route i thought seven was an obnoxious tryhard and that jumin was way funnier, and after playing his route i still think that he’s an obnoxious tryhard and that jumin is way funnier.

HOWEVER.

however. i can definitely see why he’s the most popular character. that hot and cold drama, i-cant-be-with-you-because-it’d-put-you-in-danger, dark childhood backstory, sad clown type shit is a recipe for a lot of fans to be in love with you. he personally doesnt make my kokoro go doki doki like i kind of expected because of the fan response but i do really like him as a character.

he’s similar to zen in the beginning in that you have to constantly stroke his ego and i was like uuuuggghhghghghghg nooooo. “god seven” kill me lol. at least that only lasts for the first few days though.

i liked his bad end 2 where youre really sexually forward with him and he keeps snubbing you until you just snap and push him down lol. (“why arent you pushing me away?” “...i dont know. the floor is comfy.”) seeing him finally just give in and be hedonistic and decide to run away with you was nice. god i want fanfics based on like every bad end, theyre just so interesting

the chat where he tells yoosung that their friendship doesnt matter was paaaainful. also that part on day 10 when youre leaving mint eye and he says horrible shit to v. what was it, “if this is what youre really like i can see why rika blinded you”? like... goddamn, dude. i would never want seven mad at me lol.

one of the moments on this route that got me the most was in the flashback when saeran is being brainwashed and is speaking of or thinking about seven and says something like “please come back. we dont even have to be happy. just as long as we’re together i can endure anything” and then he’s crying about how he misses him and.... augh... *clutches at chest like the heart attack guy meme* i want to give saeran 52 hugs and a box of cupcakes and a puppy. i want to adopt him even though he’s older than me and be his mom. saeran.... saeran...... ;_;

THE ZEN AND YOOSUNG DRUNK PHONE CALL AT THE END OF DAY 10 IS THE BEST FUCKING PHONE CALL IN THE GAME. i called yoosung again after they hang up and he answers and its so great too. i need fanfiction R I G H T N O W about that night. nsfw or sfw, i just need more drunk yoosung antics and zen trying to handle him. oh and if you also call seven at this time he picks up and its really sweet and i think it should have been an incoming call so more people would hear it. the fact that the first time he tells you he loves you is in an optional phone call kinda sucks.

oh fuck his fucking after ending. at first where mc and saeyoung are in bed and talking about going to rescue saeran i was like “GDI CHERTIZ” thinking they were going to leave it open ended, and then in the chat where saeran joins in i fucking s c re a med i was so happy and relieved omfg. seeing the rfa being so inclusive and nice to him warmed my fucking heart. and when they asked him if he has the same taste as saeyoung and he says “ive never been interested in women” and zen is like “oh? where is jumin lololol” i fucking died. i can see now why ive been seeing yoosung/saeran shipping stuff and its romantic and not the abusive stuff based off of yoosung’s bad end 3 like i was expecting. but of course it turns out to be a fucking dream and ruins everything. the second that creepy music box music started playing i was like “fuck you cheritz”.

707′s voice actor in the free talk part is great. saying all these cheesy romantic lines makes him want to “rub sandpaper all over my skin” lmao. and he hopes that it becomes a series with new titles like “Strange Messenger and Thankful Messenger”? fuck yes mate, fuck yes.

does seven not actually open a toy store? :c i kind of want this to be an actual thing. its a good fit for him. maybe the fact that he dreamt about it means that it’s something he’d been thinking about.

oh and BI THE WAY, SEVEN IS BISEXUAL. this makes me so happy. bi visibility is so important to me and the fact that he’s the face of the game, the fan favorite, the canon route, etc, is so delicious. thank you cheritz.

on the subject of the secret endings.... man. i knew it was going to be crazy but i still wasnt prepared. these were a trip and a half and genuinely had me feeling shook up emotionally. if there’s ever a time in my life when i’m too happy i’ll just think about v. definitely the most tragic character in the story. he’s not an angel and he’s pretty much culpable for his own suffering but he did not deserve that.

something of note is that jumin was in love with rika but after learning what she did to v, he has such a grudge against her that he wants her arrested even when she’s completely lost her mind and he even thinks about chasing her down to alaska. he loves v so, so much, augh. it hurts. i’m in pain.

it’s pretty fucked up that jumin (and yoosung and zen and the rest of the world) are still being lied to about v’s “suicide”. jumin spent a lot of money and went to a lot of trouble to get help for saeran, who is his best friend’s murderer and he just doesnt know it.

the fact that yoosung in particular never knows the truth about the cult and drugs and brainwashing and everything is a good thing though. just seeing his hero come back from the dead and be reduced to someone so mentally ill that she cant communicate and needs 24/7 care would be extremely distressing and i imagine would worsen his depression. knowing the truth would be too much i think.

i think this game fucked up v and rika’s VA’s too because both of their free talks quickly derail into too-serious territory. v is like “i once hurt my wife so badly and the guilt was unbearable” and rika is like “im going to die some day and i have no idea when...” and im sitting there like “i need a fucking hug, oh my god”

it’s amazing how quickly the secret endings shot saeran up to being one of my favorite characters. he’s so good. ;_;

okay but what was mint eye’s plan? i know they wanted to end the world’s suffering but like, how exactly? through brainwashing + drugs? rika could clearly see that saeran was miserable though, couldnt she? also some of the things saeran said made me feel like they were going to do some sort of ritual group suicide or something. maybe thats how everyone is going to be happy. and the doctor says that saeran was on peyote, shrooms, AND meth? god damn, what a cocktail lmao rika doesnt fuck around.

i love rika. she’s thoroughly disturbing and a sickening person and i can see why she’s so hated now in the fandom but even she is deserving of sympathy (abused adopted child with severe mental illness) and also has good qualities (high emotional and social intelligence, genuinely sweet, and extremely empathetic). one of my favorite villains from anything in recent memory. she’s terrifying and i absolutely love her.

we never learn her real name, which i thought was intriguing. i get the feeling that she’s meant to be mysterious and unknowable, even with all her power stripped from her as it is at the end.

im so happy that the game ended on a hopeful note, with saeran seeming like he's starting to recover and he's either grown out his hair or dyed it back. he still has literal mint eyes though, which makes me wonder if theyre not contacts like i was thinking and are actually some permanent body mod he had done. he got a tattoo of the mint eye logo, so i wouldnt be surprised if that was the case.

stray thoughts (this part is super disjointed and im just saying things as i think of them)

with the exception of 707 (if you count the secret endings as being part of his route), sometimes i get the feeling of these characters being like big fish in a small pond. mysme is already head and shoulders above what i thought a mobile game could ever be, but that doesnt change that i still feel hungry for something more. i want to see this cast in more situations, under different circumstances. they all feel like fleshed out characters full of potential that are just waiting for something more and bigger to do, like maybe something thats not restricted by being a mobile otome game. but maybe thats one for the fic writers, i dont know. maybe cheritz could work them into another project somehow since mysme got so popular.

i love that the characters have actual flaws. all of them have unattractive qualities that really make them seem human. and all of their relationships with each other are entertaining too. they are all multi-faceted and interesting and i really do adore this cast.

so 707 is the canon route but i hate the thought of any of them being canon because that means the others arent canon. all of them needed you. i want a harem route. give me all of them at the same time.

i feel a spiritual connection with vanderwood. he just constantly looks so done. his gender confused the hell out of me at first. i thought maybe he was a trans woman at first because of the hair and name but then he responds to seven referring to him as a woman with things like “i’m going to taze you”, so i was like “okay, he’s just a dude with a girls name and haircut for some reason” but then seven tripped me up again with the fact that even when the scene is really serious and seven isnt in a joking around mood, he still refers to him with female pronouns. but i guess this could be explained as this is just what seven’s used to. @aouba brought up a really good headcanon that i believe actually is canon because it makes too much sense which is that “mary vanderwood” is just the identity that he’s assuming at the moment, like saeyoung being “707″. its even noted by one of the other RFA members (yoosung?) that the name is weird and sounds fake.

i’m never more thankful to be a pale girl with long brown hair and bangs than when i’m playing this game lol

also i love this game because it feeds into my pathological need to help people without me actually having to do anything lolol

is it just me or do the full portraits of the characters look weird? like when you look at them on the wiki and you can see their legs. i cant tell if it looks bizarre because you just never see their legs in the game or if their legs are drawn weird or both lol.

i love the character designs. 707 in particular is very nicely put together and distinctive. and i love how angelic rika looks. that one taylor swift song thats like “darling i’m a nightmare dressed like a daydream” is totally her theme song.

... okay now that im listening to that song it really does fit rika a lot.

oh and Take Me To Church is def v’s song for rika.

the two guests i was unable to get throughout all the routes is @god and @star. star’s is just so counter-intuitive and god’s seemed like such a crapshoot that with two chances for both i made the same mistake on their first email both times lol.

it surprises me that religion is mentioned so frequently and openly. maybe its not as big of a deal in korea or something? i’m thinking thats the case since two of the VAs mention their religion in their free talk (i forget who but one said they were an atheist and another said they were christian). it just seems like an oddly serious and potentially alienating topic to bring up in a dating sim. also jumin and yoosung are so inconsistent with what they believe. jumin says that he’s christian on one route and then firmly says that there’s no god on another. yoosung says he doesnt believe in god multiple times and that he has no interest in having any religion but he also talks about praying and refers to rika as being “up there” and watching over the rfa. i think zen is actually the only character that doesnt ever say where he aligns.

was anyone else suspecting that rika was the one that blinded the dog, sally? i’m glad that turned out to not be the case.

i love the voice acting so much. i think quality of voice acting is sometimes harder to discern when its not a language you speak, but the quality of the voice acting here shines even to my english-only ears. yoosung’s voice is straight up one of my favorite sounds, 707 has an impressive range and is overall just always entertaining to listen to, i love the way zen’s VA delivers his lines when zen is surprised and his howls lol (which were apparently ad-libbed by his VA), jaehee’s voice sounds so sweet and lovely, and jumin is so very... jumin-y and nice and relaxing to listen to.

zen and the twins were so fucking cute in the flashbacks i want to scream. i know we get to see yoosung as a teenager but im not satisfied and i want to see jumin and jaehee as little children so bad too, augh.

rika and yoosung are the only two characters that get the creepy ass yandere eyes where their eyes get all dull and flat when theyre being crazy.

i never cried but i got pretty close on yoosung’s good end and during the secret endings. i still feel shook from the secret endings lol.

why are there still bad end relationship endings for 707 and zen and jumin that no one has found? its almost february of 2017. its surprising considering the games popularity and how long its been out. is datamining not a thing with mobile games? or does the fandom not have anyone who knows how to datamine, or what?

ships im particularly interested in: jumin/v, jumin/zen, jumin/yoosung, yoosung/seven, yoosung/jaehee, yoosung/zen, yoosung/saeran, seven/saeran because i have no shame, mc/everyone, like literally just every ship tbh because i love every character hnnng

i had no idea that buying the christmas DLC gets you another free talk with the VAs. yoosung’s VA is so cute. “please get your flu shots if you havent already”.

not sure what to do now. i definitely want to replay yoosung. and i want to hunt for all the CGs and phone calls too, but i dont want to spend $20 on the calling cards lol. would buying them even be a better deal than just spending the same money on hourglasses? $26 gets you 1000 hourglasses which is more than you’d ever need, right? it seems like the better deal, unless youre not using a phone call guide for some reason and want to try to just discover them all on your own.

i’m super excited for more DLC. i definitely think there will be more because when you open the DLC folder, the christmas DLC is shoved off to the left, making room for at least one more. also just the nature of it being a DLC folder and not a direct button to the christmas DLC.

... i guess thats all i have to say lol;;; bless cheritz. this game is fantastic and has consumed my life and ruined my sleep for the past almost three months and i had so much fun and i hope they get even more ambitious with their future projects.

#vidoxi talksy #mystic messenger #mysme #mystic messenger spoilers #mysme spoilers

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