#when the sibling failmarriage hits >>>

[maxanor]

"I think we see why Aegon's respect for Helaena grows, because she's the only other person in this environment that really knows what this pain is. And seeing that look in Helaena's eyes when they cross on the stairs, they don't say much to each other, but they communicate through pain." – Tom Glynn-Carney

[pochapal]

I know you don't know the characters a lot yet but. please assign classpects to umineko characters? any you'd like!

not quite fully sure of everyone's relation to how they shape their subjective realities (aka the most important part of classpecting for me) but i'll try!

(longpost because of course it is lmao - 3500 words long you have been warned)

first one i feel semi-confident on doing is saying maria could be a mage of light. this is going by the definition of mage as "one who receives a boon of knowledge they don't quite grasp the full implications of but still use it to their benefit anyway" and the definition of light as "fortune, the mystical, and narratively Significant symbols and imagery". i think a good example of this is the way that maria becomes a harbinger of "beatrice", utilising her unique "knowledge" of the golden witch to self-serve her belief that this mystical figure exists and is on the move. this also fulfils that other quirk with light players sometimes shadowing the void aspect (ie light players falling into false beliefs, into obscurity, into literal and metaphorical darkness) but the twist of course is that maria, while not understanding, is hitting way closer to a truth with her insistence on "beatrice gave me the letter". (also sad to report maria is not in fact a witch by classpect standards).

a little shakier on this one but i think battler can be read as an heir. he's very much a passive force who is a vehicle to a lot of the narrative happening To Him and these various factors shape and influence his thinking and approach (a good example here would be kyrie's chessboard logic deeply influencing his own way of thinking). also he's kind of a goof which is perhaps the most important feature of the heir class. as for aspect maybe something like time? in that battler's passively shoved into this situation while being very temporally displaced (his remarks that 6 years feel paradoxically like so much time and yet no time at all) and aware of this disadvantage this puts him at but still pushing through it anyway. that said heirs have a habit of being imprinted on by their influences (think john's vriskafication in homestuck act 5) so i think battler's kind of been channelling some mind aspect stuff after being influenced by kyrie.

george i think is a page. pages have their whole Deal being that they are quite often ineffective Losers who never take the steps to actually reach their potential of being a good and tolerable person, an individual who refuses the call all of the time no matter what. if there's one thing about george it's that he is consistently denying himself the chance to become the person he wants to be instead falling back into a self-destructive fantasy self that only succeeds at being offputting. his class i think might be space in that the few glimpses of The Real George indicate someone who is both knowledgeable with a desire for human relationships - he is very much struggling against the space aspect's whole "destiny of the lonely" thing. and just like another certain space player he's throwing himself into a failmarriage just to feel appreciated. sad!

to round off the cousins i'll go with jessica next. i think a good aspect fit for her could be breath. breath's whole thing is agency, freedom, and the ability to make choices that defy conformity. jessica is very much about asserting a nonconformist self and a desire for personal liberation (also she expresses herself through her mode of speech aka with her voice aka with her Breath. i see the pattern) particularly and especially when it grants her the chance to escape a stagnant tradition. a class i think might work for her is maid - a lot of her self is in service to this desire for nonconformity even as she risks subservience to the opposite thing she truly desires (as the direct successor to the ushiromiya line there's a whole bunch of tension right there).

for the siblings i have a much less certain grasp on who they are and what they do as people but i'll keep trying. one i think i am mostly comfortable with is reading natsuhi as a maid of blood. like i outlined previously maid is all about dedicating yourself to the desires of your aspect, and natsuhi is very dedicated to serving her desire to be truly worthy of being an ushiromiya and upholding the ushiromiya household's values (family, bonds, obligation, all of which are hardcore blood traits). this classpecting also creates an interesting explanation for the strained dynamic between herself and jessica - both of them are equally strong in their desires and commitment to their goals, but their goals are in such polar opposite directions that there will always be this tension.

i'll say kyrie's aspect is mind. she's all about modes of logic and thought patterns and her whole Thing is questioning whether it's better to be a Detective or a Romantic when approaching mysteries. she's a very passive presence who mostly keeps to herself but she has remarkable insight in understanding how to get people to act how she wants them to in order to ascertain key facts and information for herself. unfortunately she died before we could get a sense of what she would do once she obtained this information so i can't drill much further than saying her class is either rogue or thief. rogue arguments would be her bestowing battler with the ability to chessboard think. thief arguments would be that a lot of what she says and does is a subtle manipulation of others to secure information. ultimately it depends on how selfish kyrie as an individual is and i don't think i can say for sure on that score. leaning towards rogue though because she is very much a behind the scenes kind of actor.

next sibling i feel confident in assigning a classpect to is rosa, who i think could be a mage of space. i decided while writing this that it makes sense for there to be a kind of classpect overlap between parents and kids so rosa is a mage just like maria except a Worst version. where maria is surrounded by Omens and absorbs them to her personal benefit rosa is tormented by the worst excesses of space (control issues, isolation, abandonment) - she's a deeply isolated individual who, through the conditions thrown upon her psyche at all times, has little to show for herself and no means of exerting her will. maria's father isn't in the picture. she has no sway over her siblings. her business is in ruin. she can't even maintain a relationship with her daughter. wettest most pathetic failure of a classpect wielder in existence.

for krauss this one's a little tenuous but given what we've seen of him and how he operates i feel like thief of void is a good fit for him. thief in that he Literally Embezzles Kinzo's Fortune, and also thief in that he is the successor to the ushiromiya line and thus (excluding kinzo) the most important problematic figure in the room at any time. void in that he's very vested in secrets and conspiracies - he is able to sus out the plot his other siblings are trying to use against him while also very succinctly keeping the secret of the gold ingot to himself, only divesting when and to whom he sees fit. so thief of void as in "one who steals secrecy/obscurity for their own gain" works quite appropriately i think.

eva's the last one i have a vague inkling towards. i think you could make the case that you could read her as a prince of breath. prince in that she is very destructive and hostile, and wields that destruction both unto others and unto herself. breath in that a lot of her choices have to do with agency and will and the ability to decide for yourself. eva, in her desire to continue to be freely part of the ushiromiya register, forces hideyoshi to abandon his family name and take hers. eva also tears down natsuhi for thinking she has the right to exert any kind of will as a member of the ushiromiya household, or the right to make any decision as regards kinzo's will. so here we have "one who destroys free will/agency and destroys through free will/agency" making a decent fit.

final two siblings are super shaky and done more as a Pattern Fitting exercise (the siblings would in theory form a complementary sburb group with no classpect overlaps, and at least one parent must share a class/aspect with their child) but i think i can argue that it works. first up is rudolf who i'm calling as an heir of heart. heir in that he very passively has things go his way without much trying (he got a second wife and battler reconciled with him without seemingly much effort) and that he has the potential to be highly powerful in various situations (eva on multiple occasions remarks how kinzo-like rudolf is) - also battler is an heir, so the parent/child classpect link works here too. heart as an aspect because a lot of what happens to rudolf involves others acting based upon his heart - kyrie who puzzles over detectives and romantics knows rudolf's heart well enough to predict with several degrees of accuracy what he wants and why he acts the way he acts. the identity he wields is often used against him by people who know his true self in order to get him to bend to their will - seen often with eva who cuts through the bullshit front he puts up around battler/the family to humiliate him. so again, kind of like rosa, rudolf fails very hard at making his classpect work for him.

hideyoshi i'm assigning page of light. he's page to match with george but i think there's something to it. pages are weak-willed individuals who often fail to act on their own and who are trampled over by people better at playing the game than him. hideyoshi is nice but he's essentially useless in all ushiromiya conflicts - he acts as eva's yes man with no agenda or will of his own. light in that one facet of light is truth/honesty and here that burns hideyoshi a lot. hideyoshi, who is very bad at asserting his will, is also comically prone to almost accidentally blurting out the truth time and time again (he almost spills the beans on his and eva's scheme right there in the airport, and again after the first twilight eva has to do a hell of a lot of deft maneuvering to keep him from making them look sus as hell) - he cannot wield the truth/light for his own gain because he never reached his potential and is thus always forced to play second fiddle to someone else.

next set of people to consider are the servants. because a bunch of them are hard to read i am again treating them like a collected set of sburb players with no classpect overlap in order to make this a touch easier for me.

that said let's start with one who i think is easy to pin down and whose classpect is kind of funny to me: shannon. she's a witch of heart i think. witch in that she is always shat on by the universe, held back, and forced to suffer needlessly in the sake of a greater scheme. also witch in that she has the crucial witch aspects of Desperate To Be Loved And Belong and also Simmering All The Time With Barely Controlled Murderous Fury and more important than all that the trait of Deserves So Much Better. heart in that of all the umineko characters with Identity Problems shannon's is the most identity problems of them all. at this point you could basically argue sayo is a splinter self that she wields with the innate expertise of a homestuck witch - witches are very good at using/manipulating their aspects, perhaps even moreso than any other class, and the way that shannon uses both shannon and sayo in order to regulate her Ultimate Self is super witch of heart-like. this also means that in a sburb au there is every chance she could have a jade harley-esque grimdark break in which sayo finally snaps and takes out all her vengeance and frustration on the people who've wronged her instead of just dying right at the start (i would like to see it.jpg).

kanon, or the version of kanon i have interpreted into existence, is a knight of blood. knight of blood in that he is a Grumpy Short Dude and therefore peak karkat-like. also in the sense that knights are fiercely selfless and devoted to acts of protection when at their best. knights are also known for putting on fronts/personas in order to guard their true selves/feelings and in order to further their own aims (dave as coolkid, karkat as unapproachable grump, kanon as furniture/"beatrice"). blood as in bonds/connections/family - everything kanon does he does in the service of shannon, his family. one reading of knight of blood is "one who manipulates/exploits family/bonds for their own protective goals" and i think that that succinctly describes the idea of kanon using "beatrice"/kinzo's headship ring to tear at the seams of the ushiromiya family in order to save shannon. btw none of this works if my read of kanon is wrong but this is my 2000+ word long classpect post and i get to pick the interpretations.

other servants are much less solid because they've not done as much in the story yet but i'll start with gohda who i have the least to say about. i think he works as a thief of breath in that he steals the agency of other servants (ie his petty ordering around of shannon, his total snubbing of kanon) in order to make himself look better as the centre of attention. also pretty sure someone described his cooking as "breathtaking" at some point and what is a thief of breath if not "one who takes breath".

next is genji who i'm putting down as the maid of doom. maid in that he is total in his subservience to his aspect's ideal, doom in that he is honour-bound by arbitrary rules and restrictions which spell out misfortune for a lot of people. genji is contractually obligated to serve the head of the ushiromiya household unconditionally. first this is kinzo and all the atrocities genji likely oversaw over the years, then comes "beatrice" simply because "beatrice" happens to now be in possession of the ring (genji accomplice theory is real for the sake of this post i am deciding). maids also can at times use their abilities to engage in the creation of their aspect, and you could say that genji creates "doom" by upholding and enforcing the vile rule of law on rokkenjima even when nobody seems to care about it (he reinforces kanon's notion of furniture to him despite there being no material point to such a horrible form of identity degradation). who knows what genji really thinks about this because he is so bound to service i don't think he is capable of acting outside of that directive.

kumasawa works as a seer of rage. seer in that she passively demonstrates her in-depth knowledge of things (her tendency to narrate from the shadows people's turmoil). rage in that she is very bound up with gossip, discord, and the absurd. the tales she spouts could very easily tear people apart if the right person heard them. what she says often forecasts a disruptive chaotic future for those she is discussion. she is also frustrating on a metatextual level by holding a lot of answers but then always going "but alas i can do nothing but watch from a distance". also you can make the argument that if a lot of what kumasawa says is Complete Bullshit she also carries on with the rage-player trend of clouding people's judgements with falsehoods and misinformation that fits their biases (gamzee making terezi think everything was vriska's fault because terezi was already biased against vriska, kumasawa making the reader think there's a certain depth and complexity to the cast because we're already biased to seek these out these kinds of character depths). or maybe kumasawa's just a silly little clown. who can say!

last servant of the set is nanjo. he's another super shaky one but i think maybe based on what we've seen of him heir of life works. heir in that he is very passively guided by what everyone else says and does and is almost entirely reactive as a presence in the story. life in that he is a medical professional, but also life in that he is one of the ones who has a modicum of control over the narrative of How Long Kinzo Has To Live. the few things he does have authority over he has pretty absolute authority over. not even kinzo outright challenges/denies nanjo's assertion that his death is long-overdue, so in this one domain nanjo is at the peak and is something he could in theory manipulate massively to his benefit were he not spineless and out of his depth.

final two are the two masters of rokkenjima. thinking like that you would assume master classes but i have to say that kinzo is actually a bard of life and not a lord. he's a bard because his unique brand of destruction/self-immolation is done through passive abstraction - he spins the "demon's roulette" and lets fate/fortune dictate whose lives get destroyed, rather than actively going around and killing people. he gets into people's heads and forces the most life-ruining versions of themselves to the forefront - all of the ushiromiya siblings have a tiny kinzo in their brains that reminds of them of their trauma and reinforces their desire to be horrible people. he's also a bard in that despite it all, there's an element of a farce to his operation - silly old man who drinks absinthe lusts after a witch and refuses to die is funny right up until you remember the Atrocities. life aspect in that he's very obsessed with life/death/resurrection - everything is about ruining lives, about killing people, about bringing beatrice back from the dead. life also in the more obscure reading of "life = riches" - the fate of the gold/fortune rests in the hands of his schemes as much as anyone's direct mortality. so to use the threefold "one who self-destroys/passively enables the destruction of/inspires [aspect]" reading of bard, you get kinzo's whole deal as "one who self-destroys his wealth in order to passively enable the destruction of his family's lives in order to inspire the resurrection of beatrice".

finally we come to the bonus round: beatrice the golden witch. who is not a witch as per classpect rules unfortunately (she has not suffered enough and she is not serving enough of an active narrative presence to earn that title). however, unlike rokkenjima's other ruler beatrice does in fact get to claim a master class for herself. to me i think a solid read of beatrice is a muse of light. muse in that she is an extremely passive off-hand presence in the story - so off-hands in fact that her existence is wholly disputed - but her influence is so crucial as to compose every square inch of the narrative. beatrice is the witch myth. beatrice is the persona used to set the first domino of murder. beatrice is the metaphor for ill-gotten gold. beatrice exists as metaphor. a muse "exists". the light aspect is also one of the more narratologically aligned aspects dealing with truth relevance essentiality and fortune. beatrice being multiple foundational narratives affixes herself tightly to the pillars of umineko's canon, while her own manifestation/resurrection is being brought about through an epitaph and the demon's roulette - the truth behind a linguistic obscurity, and a random chance happening. canon light players also have a severe vicious streak to them and as a murderwitch waiting to start killing people the moment she is able to, beatrice also fits that criteria. basically she's the Big Bitch who is in a position to deftly pull a number of puppetstrings via her narrative abstractions and nested metaphors. to go even further she actually also fits with the one textual weakness of a super-powered muse - their powers fall apart when the validity of their constructive narrative is denied/destroyed. calliope in the epilogues risks losing everything when dirk declares her story bullshit. beatrice likely depends on others believing in her in order to perpetuate her own "existence" - if the narrative of the golden witch is not believed, there is no golden witch. the muse of light is all-powerful, yet all-fragile.

to sum up:

maria - mage of light battler - heir of time george - page of space jessica - maid of breath natsuhi - maid of blood kyrie - rogue of mind rosa - mage of space krauss - thief of void eva - prince of breath rudolf - heir of heart hideyoshi - page of light shannon - witch of heart kanon - knight of blood gohda - thief of breath genji - maid of doom kumasawa - seer of rage nanjo - heir of life kinzo - bard of life beatrice - muse of light

there you go. a semi-comprehensive classpecting of all 18 people (plus beatrice) on rokkenjima. have fun looking at these and laughing at how Off The Mark i am. i will also look back on this and laugh at myself once i gain a proper understanding of the cast.

[thechildofstark]

succession watch followup: finale edition

im stressed so im dot-pointing as i go

 kendalls okay?? good

logan you piece of shit be nice to your poor grandson

MONOPOLY!!! and everyones smiling 

awww the #failmarriage is failing upward. good for them :)

oh god oh no did dasharedscarecomfreypellets find kendall? seriously? oh well. you cant win everything. 

okay so thats a fucking stunning visual

is logan attempting a conversation?? oh wait no, its just homophobia

figures

honestly this is a really nice garden. pretty to look at while they talk

oh honey, you cant take the roy out of royco. many have tried. all have failed

HAH. peter is a bowl of porridge, isnt he

i spy with my liitle eye, something that smells like an intervention

ken also smells an intervention and he is Not Happy

you go Willa! fuck it!!

shivs dress is Really Pretty

okay that was jsut sweet. nervous greg and teasing tom is nice. tom is so nice when he;s not having a breakdown. 

huh. caroline’s...........garment is also quite nice. pretty pattern

oooh, the talented mr greg, playing both sides. story of his life, really

did. did shiv just marriage burn them in her toast?? did she wish her mother also has an epic failmarrige?? #girlboss #feminism #relationships

the last thing i needed was to hear about logan’s..........bleugghhhh

but to be fair this would be something con would know about, weirdo

okay this episode has actually been really nice so far? with the siblings and the personal moments? obviously they are all still monumentally fucked as people but it feels almost like the slightest glimpse into a world where they are capable of human empathy, etc.   it’s nice

the fact that roman and greg are in a minor pissing contest to win the probably highly temporary affection of a contessa is nothing if not amusing

and also: greenpeace lmao

...that maybe they buy us” and then shiv’s eyes went to slits

yasss. self-awaerness. trauma. dissociative depression. hitting all those classic markers baby. god ken’s had a crazy arc this season

okay i promise not to be mean to jeremy strong for taking things to seriously for at least 24 hours. this shits insane. good job bro. 

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK

dream team. we stan slightly more healthy sibling communication

mr incredulous tomwamb. checking the involvement

okay greg you need to chill.

toms face here is art. ART

oh shit oh shit ITS THE SCENE FROM THE PROMOS

oh shit

aww, greg wants a greg

their faces are so close and they are smiling and the FUCKING CAMERA ANGLES I AM PROCESSING THIS IN REAL TIME FOLKS

and we have the handshake

HUG!!!!!!!!!!!

not to make this too big a deal but whenever greg tries to hug anyone its pretty much him just trying to curl his long long body around them bc everyone is so short and repressed. the only person who is tall enough to even consider a proper hug is tom “did you touch me?” “fight me like a chicken” wamsgans. but this? this was a real, proper, solid, emotional mutual Hug. i felt it in my soul. 

thats all folks

thats not all theres still like 11 minutes left

more positive sibling riffing. gah i <3 them. i dont know why. they suck :)

ROMAN ROY, GROWING A SPINE

but seriously. this is like. growth

oh Caroline noooooooooooo

oh Roman. sweetie....

....................fuck

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, WHO IS THE FAVOURITE SON OF LOGAN ROY? THE ANSWER MAY SURPRISE YOU!!!!!

but seriously. holy shit. but im almost surprised i didnt see this one coming? but also not. 

oh yeah. #failmarriage 

THE END

holy shit guys. im so glad i avoided spoilers that was INSANE. oh my god. but yeah toms really been stoking the long game all season hasn’t he huh. and i was thinking somthing might be up when Logan called him “son” during the bathroom scene (so like. seven hours ago - see my previous post for details) but i guess i forgot a little? but honestly this is just tom and greg’s world and we’re just living in it. 

fuck yeah. hopefully we get some solid roman + shiv + kendall sibling bonding next season, and even continue tradition of having a wedding for the finale? Willa and Connor maybe? (actually willa leaves at the alter and then tomgreg get married instead). I was kinda disapointed by the lack of romangerri but looking back Gerri has been very heavy on the plausible deniability and the limited involvement, and most of their scenes have leaned towards Roman POV so that may have clouded things a little. but honestly that final moment between them was absolutely heartbreaking. gah. now i have roman feels. specifically roman abandoned by all else in the world feels. honestly next season i want it all:

tomshiv faildivorce

tomgreg toxiclovemarriage

roman and kendall being Supportive and Getting Help

Gerri and Marcia winning like the queens they are 

Logan dying. 

Willa writing a play that goes really well and Connor being nice about it

idk Caroline gaining one (1) human emotion

honestly thats just what the finale seemed to be. most of the characters seems to be gaining access to one (1) brand new Feeling and it really screwed them over. 

thats all for now. i,m still not sure what other people think, i havent looked at anything yet. 

time to check out the memes!!!

ps. he did it. Nero has killed Poppaea. and now it is time to marry Sporus. lets just hope she doesn’t kill him back first