#which ultimately fails

[youcantdateosmosisjones]

I really feel like Sparrow losing 10 years to the Spire irreversibly shaped them going forward, and they really do live life like an ex-convict.

Losing so many people due to coming back home changed, not being able to adjust, and never being able to return to the person you once were are all obvious--but Ex-cons have stated that after getting out of a controlled environment, and returning to a world where they have freedom again, they end up overcompensating.

Atonement for their actions, catching up with the world, indulging in things they longed for in confinement... it feels like a must--an obligation--and we already know that Sparrow has a complicated relationship with duty.

But all those achievements? All the heroics? Taking Albion's future in their hands as a ruler? It's likely an internal struggle to make up for all that was lost (especially if their wish was to save all the other lives the spire took).

But here's the thing... it never feels like enough. They're always going to be weighed down by the guilt, shame, and loss of agency. What time you have left is going to feel so precious, and they can't fuck it up. Life spent in the past is life wasted. They didn't stop moving forward when Rose died, and they didn't stop after losing everything else.

If they "fail", they fall apart... and that's not something they feel they can afford, knowing what it cost them before. So... they keep doing things. Keep building, keep their hands busy, and keep telling them self to live up to every promise they made. It's the only way they know how to live.

They must be the hero Albion needs. They must ensure its future. When Theresa tells them their kid is a part of that legacy, it feels like another obligation.

It's tragic, I think, that they probably never broke out of that mentality.

(check tags for thoughts on HoBW + Logan)

[unfortunatelymerlin]

a recurring and central theme we see in bbc merlin is the exploration of being dissuaded or kept from one's nature.

merlin is naturally a kind character, with a backbone enough to abide by his own moral code rather than the law (ie. what he is told to do) when necessary. throughout the show, however, we see him constantly battling against — and being persuaded away from — his natural disposition and instincts in order to fulfil the prophecy, and at almost every turn, it is this that leads to his failures.

morgana, in much the same way, starts the series an exceptionally compassionate person whose nature becomes twisted and cruel due to her own pressures and fear, not least including the smothering of her powers

arthur's temperament is one he is constantly battling against, often to appease his father or the pressures of the crown. in particular, he struggles against his natural sense of fairness with regards to magic; time and time again something happens to seemingly push him from this path, which ofc also helps lead him to his death

frequently, plot lines involve people having some part of their fundamental selves changed via force in some way; lancelot's nobility when he is a shade, gwen and merlin's love for arthur when they are enchanted to harm him, the knight's code to protect with the lamia, others being forced to give up information due to threats or torture etc,

and this, of course, ultimately all echoes the way in which the natural order of things is being disrupted by the destruction of magic. magic citizens in camelot have to turn away from their very nature in order to survive, and in turn, their persecution has twisted some of them in ways they never would have been otherwise

[epiphainie]

i'd put these on bucktommy screenshots if i wasn't lazy but jsyk this is established bucktommy-core to me

[ganondoodle]

okay now, im a little pissed off- i wont be reblogging the post bc its and old shitpost and i dont want to attract more notes on it but

i am so fucking, and i mean FUCKING, tired of all the shit ass excuses some people try to make to defend ganondorf being a nothing burger character

this dumb ass comment really goes all in too, and here i painfully see how much damage skyward sword has done to him bc people cant fuking think i guess "as of skysw he doesnt have an true motivation of his own- hes evil just bc he is there nothing else to it" shut the fuck up man oh my god, you dont think thats a problem? you just accept that? no no OOT also already showed hes nothing but evil tm uwu he doesnt have a reason - AND THATS A PROBLEM YOU ABSOLUTE BUFFOON

if you think that giving ganondorf a miniscule amount of ANY sort of sensical reason to do what he does, a backstory, fucking anything 'changes him into a different character'- HOW in the FUCK do you not see the problem here

and my favorite (refernceing a different character) "If hes evil, like ganondorf, which means an absolute evil, then his backstory wouldn't matter a lick" HELLO??? HELL FUCKING O???? "absolute evil" do you know how you sound like??? also EVERYTHING MATTERS oh my god, but no no of course it wouldnt matter and make no difference if you knew more about a character, no, actually, knowing less of a character is better even! why even write anything tbh? you just give them a label of good or evil and then you dont need anythign else heehoo i cannot believe this shit is now hanging on one of my posts, im struggeling to even dismantle it bc its just so goddamn stupid what do you mean it woudnt matter???????? if i knew ganondorf had a personality (especially totk bc its the worst case), if i knew he had loved ones once upon a time, he laughed and was allowed to feel like a person, whatever made him go down a bad path to end up making you defeat him would mAKE IT ALL HAVE MORE OF AN IMPACT (this is assuming that whatever path it is leads him to oppose you but also .. it doesnt have to mean hes evil or done all bad deeds, guess what, you the player could also be playing the real "villain", wouldnt that be a change of pace .. or it wouldnt, depending on how you look at it (oh NO shift of perspective???) it already is, even if i personally prefer it ALL being a spectrum and not just a label of good and bad and just rolling with this badly definable bunch of words)

do you know why i didnt give a flying fuck about the final battle in totk?? bc its all fucking NOTHING, ganondorf is a goal post with a face that got "BAD GUY" written on it in big red letters stapled on it and nothign more, you cant care about nothing and the point of any story at all is to fucking CARE

honestly a reason why i hate both "redeemable" and the good and evil descriptor is that its so ... limiting, redeemable, what does that even mean really?? it just sounds like you are applying some weirdo christian sins to make up for with good deeds shit onto characters that are, or should be, meant to make you feel something and be a pinnacle of jesus instead, like a checkbox, a scoreboard, and now its being mainly used as a negative word to dismiss legitimate criticism of boring or shitty writing bc giving any character any depth at all now automatically means you want to redeem them and thus absolve them of their sins or some shit, make them uwu perfect little good guys which is not the point (even if there are people like that, sicne guess what, theres lots of different ideas of things all around, inlcuding this hellhole- and yes there are shitty ways to give a character depth! the problem then isnt the motivation to give them depth, its the WRITING of it)

the whole good and evil thing also is just so darn limiting, what does evil even mean, who defines it matters alot, what does good mean, the definition is also really really bendable- link kills more living things than ganondorf ever has yet he isnt evil (bc hes on the side of hyrule, the designated good gouys uwu which means anythign they do is okay), the royal family having a torture dungeon and persecuting the shiekah into submission doesnt make them evil uwu but the gerudo have to suffer for the "crime" of having birthed ganondorf at some point for all eternity i guess

(as well as the very very obviously stupid turns and things ganondorf does and doesnt do literally just bc they needed him to do soemthign you could call bad even if it makes no sense at all, why would he attack his own fucking people out of nowhere, why destroy everything, literally what for, why give himself up if he wants to rule its jsut as stupidly nonsensical as the dumb magic pebbles that just gives random powers out just to force the outcome they wanted to happen)

redeemable, saveable, whatever, giving a character depth doesnt have to mean you want them to join the good tm guys either and im so fucking tired of this way of thinking, EVEN considering that hey ... it would be cool actually to have a ganondorf as the main guy, but we all should know that would only happen if he is a servant of hyrule, which i would consider to be more out of character than ... GIVIING HIM ANY SORT OF DEPTH??? to sympthaize, be conflicted or see the guy you need to defeat has a point is like, not a bad thing?? you can make someone be the most sympathetic guy of all time and still make you fight him ??? and i will repeat again, ganondorf being a nothing burger (espeically in totk) hurts EVERYTHING, everything suffers from shitty writing and lack of writing, the thing that link and zelda are almost just as flat istn .. isnt good either?? its also bad but hes got it way worse (and the racism oh bOI)!!! (there is a reason why ww ganondorf is widely seen as the best one and itse literally bc he says ONE or two lines that may make you think omg .. he is person.... he might FEEL OoO- man the bar really is below the ground isnt it)

and they dont even care to try to make him actually be dislikable, he doesnt tease zelda with killing her father or soemthing, he doesnt have any sort of connection to any of them, every line he says (in totk) is like a prepackaged microwave villain line, you could apply it to anyone, even rauru and it wouldnt seem out of place tbh (which is BAD), more depth would have connected him to the story, the world the literal everything which means people care which means a better story i dont know how to explain to you that you should be able to care about characters??????? he gets the stamp of "evil guy" on his head and they expect you to be happy with that, accept any stupid thing they make him do and others say about him without question? do you NOT feel at least a little insulted???

and like, this is still written, this is a piece of fiction, they had to sit down and write all that, or .. well, NOT write it, they decided to do it like this, despite the ocean of potential in front of them, you could do so many itneresting thigns with this world and they jsut dont and then theres people like this that are so entrechned into this boring ass writing they think that its the point, liek the point is its bad hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

"but hes not meant to be a person he jsut ev-" SHUT the hell up, nevermind the whole curse thing is an englsih trnaslation thing and also perhaps not meant to be taken literally, you think that makes it ok? that well there was a demon once (who also doesnt get any sort of depth btw!!! problem shoved one place over but still the same problem!) so that means hes not actually a person but idk a demon puppet or soemthing- doesnt change anything imo, are you not bored? are you not tired? are you happy with not thinking? not being engaged with at all? to see chaarcters to utterly flavorless you fall asleep and choke on them? i am not, i love thinking, im addicted to it even, i think every day even, right now too, they got a convenient excuse to put not even the barest fucking minimum of writing care into a character and you are jsut going with it!! where are your tastebuds buddy??

[critter-wizard]

ep 43 had me tearing up in a fucking shopping centre ‼️‼️

b+w alt version that I truly couldn't decide if I liked it more . Also I included a lot of thoughts in the tags but they're somewhat incoherent<3

[fluentisonus]

sorry this is just a running thought process so very unedited but one of the big failures I feel like with the whole situation in montreuil sur mer -- and this is not really jean valjean's fault bc like. he's just some guy who has been outside of society for nearly twenty years and was making this up as he went along & learning & making mistakes as he went -- is that it was all based around charity rather than much actual systematic or solid structural change. which like again I don't really think as a small town mayor in the early 19th century he was really in a position to wholesale restructure anything, so he really was just working with what he had to hand, but I do keep thinking that part of his whole dilemma in 'a tempest in skull' -- i.e. if he turns himself in then the whole system of schools & hospitals & pensions for old people & support for the poor he's set up will essentially collapse -- really shows the failure of charity on its own to accomplish any lasting change. like even if champmathieu hadn't turned up what would have happened to the town if/when he died? the same thing quite probably I'd imagine. tbh I think you could potentially make an argument in fact that the book's position on charity in many ways is that it really does help in the moment individually or in communities but it does nothing really to get at or change the root causes of poverty, & m sur m is to me an example of that -- although I'm not entirely sure how much hugo himself saw the situation in m-sur-m as a flaw (well. he obviously saw valjean's situation re champmathieu itself as a genuinely sticky moral problem, but whether he saw the fundamental basis for the system valjean set up in m sur m as a problem I can't really tell). but anyways I've just been thinking this one over as I reread the champmathieu bit

[dykedvonte]

I was rewatching mouthwashing, and I ended up thinking of the different reactions that Curly and Jimmy had in doing their tasks. How during the scene of Anya evaluating Jimmy and showing dread towards the idea of doing his evaluation, Curly was the one that offered to take it off her hands. He had no issue with adding more to his plate, because he knew - or well, thought, he knew that Jimmy wasn't going to "bullshit" with him since he's known him for a long time. When Anya hands Curly a note from Swansea, Curly goes to check out what the issue is and he takes care of it without a complaint, the only "complaint" he has is how this incident could have damaged the pods. Which is reasonable, those pods are their only way to be saved if anything tragic happens on the ship. However, in comparison to Jimmy being asked to do things, he's passive-aggressive about it. When Anya asks Jimmy if he could help her out with Curly's painkillers, he tells her that people should be worth their titles, specifically using her title as a nurse when she asked him for help and then when she says forget it, since he made her feel insecure, he still goes "Oh no, I'LL take care of it" as if he was doing a chore, a favor for her. Then, there's that part where he blows up at her for things that she didn't even ask him to do - more so the others asked him about it, like the code scanner, him deciding he needed to find the axe for the foam, and then, there's the medicine part (which when she does ask, and she reconsiders - going to do it herself, he takes that away from her). Jimmy complains about the tasks he has to do and he treats it like a big issue, a "woes me" that he has to do this and that - wanting the praise of the capital without actually doing any work. While Curly doesn't complain about it, in fact, he even mentions that he's aware of how well he is doing at his job as a Captain during that cockpit scene with him and Jimmy. If Jimmy only had to do a small amount of tasks to get irritated and annoyed at being captain, while Curly didn't which I feel like encapsulates their personalities. Curly understands what he's doing is a job, it's a responsibility, why would he complain at any point for doing what he's suppose too? Why would he be upset at people asking him to do tasks? While Jimmy on the other hand, isn't used to it at all and it's different to what he's had before and he's realizing that he doesn't actually like doing the work he has too. I just wanted to ramble about it even if it seemed kind of obvious xd

It’s obvious but it is a thing people miss or understate when trying to find parallels in Curly’s and Jimmy’s relationship/personalities.

Like the way people portray it as neither taking responsibility when it is almost split down the middle of Curly taking responsibilities and faults that shouldn’t be his and making himself unequipped to handle the ones that are while Jimmy refuses to handle the responsibilities he has because he wasn’t expecting the work that comes with them.

Not a lot to say but people forget that another thing the game comments on is prioritization of issues and responsibilities and how the guys fail at it in one way or another in the situation.

[merrysithmas]

when ppl see this & this, directed by the same person, and think the narrative is "anakin is evil" not "anakin is a steward of the balance, a force demi god, as was foretold on Mortis" 😂

[doberbutts]

ACTUALLY tbh in 2-4 years when Fenris has (hopefully) accomplished something sportwise I'll be looking for a puppy of his or his siblings most likely. Like why get a puppy from Someone Else when I know I have exactly what I was looking for in the form of one (1) floppy curly boy and can just reproduce that

[stonesense]

walking into redcliffe castle and saying cutely “you wouldn’t deprive me of my attachés, would you?” while blackwall and cassandra stand behind me bristling with armour

[gayestcowboy]

guy who gets scared by a rat and jumps into gale’s arms, crushing him

[gothicrepetitions]

Feminist Perspectives on 9/11, J. Ann Tickner

[anaer]

I feel like it doesn't matter how thematically appropriate something in a story is if the narrative doesn't do a good job of executing the themes in question, and if people en masse turn on a story then likely the narrative has failed to get them to buy into it which is always a problem of the writing, and implying that other readers just don't get it or aren't smart enough to see misses the point that the entire purpose of a narrative is to get readers to suspend their disbelief enough to buy into the story

[gymleaderwally]

luckiest guy on the planet, I sure hope this doesn't cause him problems later (it will)

[shoyowo]

long-ish rambling about farewell shinsengumi and joui war gintoki and hijikata parallels under the cut

there's a direct parallel that's acknowledged in canon about ginhiji's situations in the joui war and the farewell shinsengumi arcs but their situations have key differences

gintoki talks abt the impossible "choice" he was given - neither "choice" being in any way favorable. and ultimately by "choosing" he says he lost both his precious things - his friend and his sensei

the main thing that is different is the trust & support that sogo has for hijikata and his leadership. despite all the bad blood between them - he still cares for, or at the very least, respects hijikata enough to wait for him to make the call on what to do. sogo could have easily rebelled against the bakufu without hijikata but it's a matter of principle and a matter of trust

and idk man there's something to be said about hijikata & okito not falling into the gintaka trap despite the circumstances easily calling for it ... mainly because of their reciprocated trust in each other + mutual love for their taishou

and i (admittedly) have not watched further and can't speak/dissect takasugi as readily, it's still very interesting to think that ultimately he loved shoyo more than he loved gintoki. whereas gintoki, despite everything, loved shoyo's teachings & his friends more. this isn't to throw stones at either character but merely the tragedy of their relationship..

[thelaurenshippen]

next up in our phantom pulse intro round:

the "elusive" Bremmer, as Ash wrote he/him born July 17th, 1973 Music: Lead guitar, songwriting. Actual job: Works at the bar with Monty. Power: Sensing spirits and being sensed in return-a few strums of the right chords will have spirits rising and coming toward him.