#who else gets to kill belos but the person created in the likeness of the one that made belos reach such lows to begin with?

[cherrymoonvol6]

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[owl-house-6-3]

Owl House different plot

In season one i had a complete different idea of how things would go but never posted it because i kind of new the chance of it actually happening where slim. Now i actually want to share it to see which of the completely different outcomes should have been better. Keep in mind this is without the knowledge of season 2,3 made so points of season 1 are different explained in later seasons than there are here. But i added characters of these seasons. The focus now is only on Luz, Hunter and Belos story because i don’t want it to get to long, but the story’s of everyone else gets changed as well.

First how the word issues looked like in season so that we know what Luz mission would be:

The world Luz enters is the demon realm or hell. For which it is surprisingly nice. No torture, there exits laws, community, protection and no public allowed eating of others. The person who wanted to hurt luz had to do it by contacting edar ( a known criminal ) first and than send here outside of city’s. Meaning the government was locking out for things like that not happening. The school are build on the concept of learning the different magic systems and than choosing one where you get stronger in. The only exception the emperors coven where you need really good notes for and end up which privileges and responsibility’s. The government is build on the coven heads ruling their own people and the emperors coven has its own head and even the control if everything is going as it should in kikimora. Belos is kind of a decision maker if the heads come to no agreement or oversear if the use their privileges correctly. The system is not bad. The people can actually get high positions to talent, they control each other and the power is shared. The only people who have the chance of hurting others more are technically the police, which has more people in it who control what is going on and what the are allowed to do. Magic is like guns. Everyone could technically have one but only the once who made a special training get the allowance of using it. Meaning in hell is not the one right who has the most power but a following of laws with the police stepping in and stopping fights. It makes sense of sealing powers of which are not needed to decrease the change of fight breaking out the police wouldn’t be able to stop. The power you keep is the one you need for your job but it doesn’t define you. You could be in a coven and be a baker or merchant. Edar could had been in the emperors coven but stayed a merchant, who is now under more strict supervailance but has the privilege of using her powers. This all makes sense on paper. The demon realm is hard to govern and it is easily to imagen what evil people like the wizard would do if they were allowed full power or no rules where given.

The bad thing is that:

1. No exception are made

A System should have exceptions for people. The show showed us the group of teenagers who used two covens which is a good idea. Bump didn’t change the intire school concept but made adjustments for those people. This should be a more common option.

2. Misusing of power

There are no true overseers. Not even Belos does his job right. Meaning people can misuse their given power. Like the warden. We doesn’t even know if the people who were captured where actually by breaking laws of Belos in there or if the warden just decides that were crimes. I go by the later since i cant imagen Belos creating laws build on what fanfiction can entail. Meaning the warden was clearly misusing his power ( he tried to force eda into a date so it is clear he has done power misusing before ).

3. To hard punishments

The killing of wild witches is to hard a punishment.

All these points are bad but doesn’t scream of a destroying of the system but of an improving. The bad things happen because Belos isn’t bothering with it and the punishment makes sense with his upbringing in mind. A new ruler is needed but Belos doesn’t deserve a punishment for not fixing these mistakes. His treatment of Eda was bad but understandable in the sense that she refused to join a coven and got a death sentence beforehand. Fixing her if the sentence is death would be pointless. We dont know if he would have fixed her, If she actually excepted.

Story:

Luz sees these bad things and decides to destroy the system. She is a person who is trapped in her own world and doesn’t see the point of others. Like bringing snakes or spiders into school which no understanding she could harm others. She isn’t a bad person but this is something she should learn. In episode one she learned she is not the chosen one but which how the story goes she never actually learned it and was even proven to be the one in the end. She saw Amity as hetake the rival to her hero. But never thought Amity was Asura and her the bully. Her intire friendship started with her seeing her live as a hero Journey, where she has to befriend the evil rival. The idea of her actually being the bully or the villain from other people perspective because she exedently hurts others is only used once and never brought back up again.

Her story could be that she wants to defeat the evil Belos. We follow her point of view so only in the aftermath do we get the view of the the situation from others. She learns that people actually like Belos and it wasn’t some evil mind control or stupidity going on. But the system Belos build is flawed but much better than what came before. By getting rid of him she actually harmed the world she loves. She learns she was the villain by not thinking everything throw nor knowing everything. This is normal she is only a kid in a new world where she doesn’t know the story nore has she seen everything. The idea that she automatically knows what is better for everyone is absurd.

She defeats Belos by tricking him into going into the human world and closing the portal after him. There he is arrested by the human Government.

After her Realisation that Belos rule wasn’t evil and that he is necessary for the survival of the demon real ( i explain later ). She has to emotionally confront her mistakes, which is an actually huge mistake instead of giving Belos the glyph. Her plan of getting him back is the main event. She is important because Luz is the only one who knows the human realm. The witches dont know guns, where everything is or how to blend in. Luz becomes the hero because she is human and can lead everyone to victory. Not because she suddenly gets more magic. Her speciallity is her knowledge of both places and the people, building up the army of witches in such a way that their power fit to the task. She cant even use glyph in this world but she decently takes the lead because of her personality. She isn’t chosen to fight but end up here because she of her actions. learning of other people strenges and making a Mistake by judging Belos.

Belos story is actually more about his past.

In this vision he is actually the chosen one by the titan. The Titan is a corpse and all the people living one him are technically orgasm who are dependent of him. If he completely rots they all die as well. His Magic is keeping the place alive and everyone is constantly using up magic. What if the witches are connected to the titan Magic and are using up the Magic he needs to remain. Since he is death he can’t replenish his Magic reserves. He need to connect to something alive so it can replenish is reserves for him. No witches where an option since they have Buile sacks already. So he chose to open a portal to the human world and connect to a human. ( we even saw in Luz story a human and a portal ). This is belos who now can do the most powerful magic but being connected with something death is hurting him. Explaining his pain and plan. He planned to mix the worlds together so that the witches could live on earth and he doesn’t have to keep the titan going any longer, choosing to die. His creation Hunter would rule once he died and make sure the witches settle into the new world.

Belos decision to rule is build opon the fact he can make sure people use lass Magic, get everything better together for his plan to mix the worlds and his want to make the place better. He saw in his long live much abuses and thought he could install laws. He is in this version someone who tried and partly succided in making a better world. His flaw is that as the chosen one he did the opposite Luz did. He never talked to others giving him no change of improving or explains his reasoning. He just thought he knowed best and has to do everything alone. Mixing this flaws with his uprising, horrible experience, constant pain and thinking of having to fix everything as chosen one, in one package. Making him not a villain but someone who needs a break.

When Luz saves him from the human government he actually is charing his mind with someone else. She decides that the human world is not ready to be mixed and if belos is in pain because of his connection to the titan she can share his connection because she is human as well.

Luz becomes part of the titan and her new job is to find people in the human world who would want to be part of the demon realm. Choosing people who get connected to the power of the Titan. Giving them Magic powers but by sharing lessening the pain. Everyone she chooses becomes part of the chosen one concept, being the reason for the titan existing. She does this because Belos sees her as the only one who has a good enough personality to make such a decision.

The end is Luz being special because of her Jugment of people where she made a mistake once and her ability to connect to others. Given her a part in both worlds as chosen one finder. Hunter improves the System with Edas help and Belos decides to go into rent instead of dying. Which this much sharing going on he is no longer in pain and can actually injoy his live for once, even teach other humans how to use titan power.

Everyone who actually read this what do you think. Is this a good Story based on what we were given in Season one.

[let-us-cultivate-our-garden]

Envy was the most sadistic of the Homunculi in Fullmetal Alchemist, bragging about things such as starting the Ishvalan Civil War, indirectly creating Scar, and killing fan favorite Maes Hughes, but Arakawa gave them a bit of complexity and the best villain death ever

When dealing the final blow with major villains/antagonists, you actually have to defeat them twice; the first is the actual physical defeat and the second is the defeat of their ideals or beliefs.

Envy's driving force was how superior they thought they were to "weak" humans; the irony of course (and as their name indicates) they are envious of humans for their inner strength and morality. So you have a character that is secretly deeply insecure and they commit atrocities to mask that insecurity. So how do you truly defeat this type of villain?

Unmask them. Reveal the inner weakness. How pathetic they truly they are. Make them realize the enormity of their actions.

This is why Envy's death resonates: we have the catharsis of watching the haughty character be broken down, to reveal the rot underneath yet at the same time there is a sense of pity because Envy's fears are relatable. It does not make Envy a "good" person by any stretch of the imagination but (ironically) a more human character. The defeat of the Homunculi also rebukes Father's goal of achieving perfection with his artificial humans; by exposing the frailties of his creations, you expose the frailties of the main villain.

The Owl House does not do this with Belos; he is killed but his ideology is not, he dies thinking himself in the right. This could work but only if you show why Belos is so committed to his cause to the bitter end and while the show has hints of this, it's so vague that it's practically meaningless and is his backstory is never paid off. There's no final confrontation between Luz and Belos about the roles they have played in shaping the isles and how Luz let go of her childish fantasies while Belos did not and how it destroyed him.

The show also never gets into the forces that made Belos; he's just always been like that and having him be the cause of all the problems on the BI seems to say that if you remove the One Bad Man then everything will be ok. No one else who supported Belos ever gets any kind of comeuppance, none of the Coven Heads, not Odalia, and we only see Kiki in one shot helping rebuild the school so I guess we're okay with her now?

Belos' death is just disappointing all around; Luz's silence would be amazing as it would indicate that she no longer allows him to control her, except that Belos never had any influence over her. She's always rebuked his advances at commonality and her main angst in season 3 over "helping" him is so narratively weak and so lacking in tension that it's laughable.

When you have a character like Belos, especially after building up how delusional he is and the circumstances as to what made him, there needs to be a proper conclusion in which he is confronted with his delusions and lies, that he wasted his life for nothing. That his goals were childish and stupid and it all could have been avoided. Instead we get a pithy one-liner and an anti-climactic foot stomping. How bold.

(and also, don't tell me that Belos can't bounce back from his apparent "death." The man reformed himself from a single droplet and a little acid rain and some boots aren't going to do squat).

[eldritch-spouse]

HELLO YOU BEAUTIFUL HUMAN BEING

first, i just wanna say, love your art so so so so much and your characters are so GREAT AND YOUR WORLD BUILDING IS SO BIG BRAIN. Can't wait so see what else you'll come up with in the future!

I do have a 2 questions:

is y/n or "darling" a rebound for Ludwig after admin? Or is it more like, "Ludwig took some time getting over Admin and is now with y/n"? Or is it just depends on the "universe"

And second, about Belo, would Belo still worship his obsession and think of them as a deity even after meeting Krulu?

Anyway, thank you ahead for answering and have a great day/night!!! 🖤🖤

[Ahdjaewjed t-thenk ye. ///// I would like to slow down at some point and start creating longer oneshots at some point. I have some unfinished things sitting around.]

What are you to Ludwig?

Two settings have been discussed wherein you can meet Ludwig, and you get to pick the one that's more appealing to your tastes.

The darker path is one where Ludwig is still immensely troubled by what he just lived through. Losing the supposed "love of his life" to an unfathomably cruel and selfish god who wil traumatize anyone they can to attain their goals. He feels the future will be bleak, and he can't forgive himself for letting it all happen, for starting this, for not fighting for Admin, for helping it all come to fruition. He feels hopeless, frustrated and invalid, emotions that crush his sanity each passing day. With a lot of unresolved turmoil and a burning desire to "do things right", Ludwig will first look at you as a rebound, and after swiftly fucking up time and time again, there's other two branches this can go:

One: You continue to be nothing more than Admin 2.0 in his mind and he refuses to see things any other way or acknowledge that what he's doing is only hurting everyone more.

Two: He falls in love with you as person but is still a deeply damaged individual who very clearly needs help (a very specific type of help he's not likely to get any time soon), and has to walk on a tightrope to prove his love.

The lighter path is already one where Ludwig acquires enough lucidity to start distancing himself from The Clergy's Eye little by little. The key to this path is waiting for the moment where Miara and Krulu have a confrontation, and thus all Clergy staff as well as associates discover Mother. Although Ludwig deeply despises siadar as a whole, he will have no choice but to deal with Miara, as once Mother is given permission to directly interact with Admin (her shard), Admin will request the creator help Lud get over his feelings. And in truth, he does require help from a siadar, because Ludwig will never grow past this on his own.

He's infected. Remnants of Krulu remain inside him from the time where the siadar used him as a clumsy vessel. Those remnants keep Ludwig sick, stuck in a time capsule of his trauma, letting the world pass him by. They need to be removed. Only then can he move on and resume his life.

Hope and pray that you meet him after he undergoes this treatment from Mother. In which case you will not be associated with Admin in any way by Ludwig, and while things still won't be perfect by any means, he's no longer as mentally stilted as he once was.

Belo, Krulu and you

After a bit of reflection, I'm willing to humor three scenarios here.

1) One where you're Admin, and indeed Belo will diefy you along with Krulu.

2) Another where Belo sees you as a charge to be protected. In which case, he still worships Krulu, but you're essentially seen as a lesser who must be protected at all costs.

You cannot be deified at the same time as Krulu without being their vessel, the higher won't allow such nonsense. Belo would be killed for his betrayal. Furthermore, after Belo encounters Krulu, he cannot be swayed into worshipping someone else.

3) Finally, he can stumble upon in the period of time where he's still searching for purpose on Earth, in which case he doesn't work at The Clergy's Eye at all, knows nothing of Krulu, and has latched onto you for dear life.

Why are things so confusing?

As stated before, it was my initial idea that most people would identify with the role of Admin. And as such, a scenario would be created wherein the whole team, through various interactions wherein you have to win them over as workers and then get to know them, is hopelessly taken with you. Like pawns in your hands.

In my mind, this is the ideal, and this is where I was taking everything. It's still my preference- And if I ever make something more... ""Official"', that's the path I'm taking. Because it's the most fun for me.

As I began exploring the individual damage each character could do as a yandere, I discovered more and more people didn't see themselves in the role of Admin and would rather deal with just one of the staff members, which has spawned a near infinite amount of possibilities for a non!Admin obsession.

I'm not terribly invested in the ways you meet any of the staff when you're not Admin, so I leave that to your decree.

[hsal]

CLONES

A brief drabble about their tragic nature.

I've been sitting on these thoughts for a hot minute, but it definitely plays into why I love them so much.

To begin with, a simple question must be asked. Why is cloning necessary/ beneficial to the cloners. Is it for population? A specific set of skills that individual possessed? Convenience? Sentimentality?

Regardless, these are people who are created with alterior motives. You don't 'just make a clone', they are made to serve a purpose.

A couple of case studies in media showcase their tragic nature, and why I'm absolutely obsessed with these goobers. Specifically, I will be talking about Hunter from the owl house, the clones from starwars, and Sam from Moon (2009). I am writing this from my phone, and refuse to run this through word or the like. If there are any typos or poor grammar I apologize in advance LOL

drum roll please 🥁🥁🥁 CLONE NUMBER 1

1. Hunter (TOH)

Alright, spoilers for the owl house I guess for seasons 2 and 3. Keep scrolling if u wanna watch, just keep going till you see the next set of clones.

A recreation of a brother, Hunter was meant to fill a void in his 'uncle', Belo's past. While Belos motives remain unclear, it's certain that he couldn't live without his brother. He could never let go. He couldn't move on from his old beliefs, that witches are vile and the magic they use an affront to God, and he couldn't accept Caleb's newfound life in the Iles.

Was Hunter made to replace Caleb and groom him into a better version of his brother? Or perhaps it was revenge for his betrayal.

Either way, Belos needed his brother. Hunter wasn't made to serve a purpose in the traditional sense. It's arguable that the majority of the boiling iles would serve better as the Golden Gaurd. But the tasks undertaken by the Golden Gaurd are meaningless, and dont really matter. It's an empty tittle that Hunter could never live up to, as the ideal Golden Gaurd would literally be Caleb. He was designed to fail.

To Belos, he and his brother should have worked together to save humanity from the witches, and like everything else, he couldn't let that dream go. Instead, he used magic to bring his brother back, corrupting himself, and becoming the world's biggest hypocrit in the process.

My man literally made a clone farm, harvesting the grimwalkers when he deemed them right for the picking and moulded them into what he wanted. If they were faulty and didn't resemble his brother, he discarded them. If they betrayed him again, into the pit. Belos saw the grimwalkers as disposable, cheap mockeries of his brother. And no matter how many times they failed, he always tried again.

2. Clones from starwars

The clones from starwars served a 'singular' purpose as soldiers of the Republic. Assured quality and quantity, they faced the front lines for civilians who viewed them as little more than property: meat droids.

The kaminoians prioritized efficiency. How better to get high quality soldiers to the front lines than breeding them to fight. Their engineered genetics, accelerated ageing, constant training, yielded the greatest army the galaxy had ever seen.

Or so the Jedi thought.

A grand deception, the clones were always meant to fulfill a secondary purpose. One that removed all their agency, personality, and emotions to execute the Jedi.

People who they worked closely with for the last 3 years, nearly a quarter of their lives with, they were designed to betray. The clones viewed themselves as disposable, and some of the few people who challenged their perspectives, who cared for them, they were forced to murder.

The clones were always designed to kill and remain steadfast in the gruellest situations. However what made them unique was their individuality, independence, and ability to adapt. In such conditions, it was no wonder why they values loyalty above all else. Loyalty to their cause, and to their brothers. And even these few values were stripped away in favour of a grand scheme.

Each one of the paragraphs could have an entire post dedicated to the completexities, and is truly just the surface level of the tragedy of the clones. Perhaps another time. Lmao

Sam (moon 2009)

Ok this is a bit of a niche one. I watched this movie a little girl and it really stuck with me for some reason. For those who Havnt watched it, here's a bit of background.

(Spoilers) basically, a corporation that mines helium on the moon is manned by 1 man, Sam, and an AI GERTY. Receiving calls from his daughter and wife, Sam is excited to soon be returning to earth. However, Sam was never meant to go back, for he was a clone of the original man who operated the mining facility. Clones were used as disposable men on the facility to ensure that the mines would constantly be manned.

There were many clones before him, his wife and daughter simply a means to keep the clones sane. The industry's usage of clones is of convenience, a simple and cost effective means to maintain operations at a lower cost.

CONCLUSIONS

Holy sh*t I love clones. A common theme is their disposable nature, as they are often seen as 'less than their origonals', as their humanity is called into question. While the chip arc is the most blantent with this, another key element of the clones is their individuality. Nature vs Nurture. Purpose vs independence. Individuality vs collectivism.

At the end of the day, they are fiction. However the wide range of stories and themes that can be told based off their tragic conception is why I love them so much.

[sociopath-analysis]

Sociopath Profile: Emperor Belos

Real name: Philip Wittebane From the animated series The Owl House (2020-2023) Voiced by Matthew Rhys (main form), Alex Lawther (Philip), and Fryda Wolf (child)

The main antagonist of the show and responsible for many of the conflicts of the show. Considering the tyranny of the Boiling Isles he holds, he shows a lot of traits of a sociopathic dictator. And it only gets worse with the more that is revealed about him.

[SPOILERS BELOW]

From the beginning, he was dedicated to witch-hunting and would do anything he could to make sure they'd all be exterminated. He's been going through the long game for over four centuries and was willing to work with a horrible monster to do exactly that. And through all this time, he has never developed a sense of empathy for anyone else. As Philip, he was willing to throw his exploration companions under the bus when trying to find a way back to the human realm while writing them as unfortunate accidents that he had nothing to do with. Despite creating Grimwalkers to replicate his brother Caleb, he is the one responsible for his death because he found out Caleb fell in love with a witch. With all the hallucinations he has about it, he ignores them as if he has no guilt about it.

To ensure his rise to power, Belos had to be very manipulative as well. As Philip, he had enough superficial charm to look like a friendly man just looking to get home. This is how he convinces people to fall into his traps to get what he wants. It doesn't exactly work on people once the residents of the Boiling Isles catch on to his tricks, but it manages to trick Luz and Lilith when they time-travel to the time of his journals. As she continued to go through the Isles, he built his profile as Belos to begin the crusade against wild magic by pretending to speak to the spirit of the titan. All to set up his extermination plan. Despite being very oppressive, he still held enough power to keep people under his thumb. Lying to Hunter about his goals and gaslighting him shows the extent of his manipulations on a personal level.

The Collector was also one of his pawns. He promised to release them for the Day of Unity, but he ended up betraying them when his goal was just within his grasp. And when that fails, he resorts to possession to trick others into getting his goals. He did so to Hunter to torment him and his friends. He also possesses the doll of Rain to trick the Collector into seeing King supposedly betraying him. Even at the end, he tries to trick Luz into believing he was cursed into being as horrific as he was. However, Luz sees right through it and shows him absolutely no mercy.

All of this was for his own gratification to be the heroic witch hunter. All to come back to the human realm and become decorated as a legendary man who stopped the evils of witches - despite his views being several centuries out of date. His belief that he will be the one to save people is one that persisted throughout his exile. Despite what he says about needing to eliminate them for the greater good, there is no further ambition than making himself look better. Even if he needs to kill the people he is supposedly close to, like his brother. Even the fact that he recreates replicas of him out of Grimwalkers doesn't really show that he is all that empathetic toward him.

"That man doesn't care about anything but his need to be the hero in his own delusion. And because of that, he fears what he can't control." - King's father

And because of this belief that he is the hero of the story, he will do everything he can to justify the things he does to others. Stepping over his subjects is justified to him because they're witches anyway and they'll be destroyed soon. He seems to feel guilty about killing his brother, but because he can't be in the wrong, he rewrites the memories in his mind to make it seem like he deserved to die for being on the wrong side. Even when humans point out how messed up his plans are, such as when Luz points this out inside his own mind, he shrugs it off and says that she is the crazy one.

Belos: I'll do anything to save humanity from evil. Luz: No. You're evil! Belos: [shrugs] Can't reason with crazy.

And it's safe to say that Belos completely lacks remorse for everything he has done. None of his conspirators are in on the full extent of the plan and those that are want nothing to do with it. Since he thinks he's done nothing wrong, he feels that he shouldn't have remorse. The Collector trying to empathize with him after fusing with the Titan only ended with Belos blasting a beam at them for their genuine efforts. Even at the very end when he is powerless, he still tries to weasel his way out of responsibility by claiming that he was cursed to act the way he did.

Disney Sociopath List

[noxthesleepymoodyoverthinker]

The Collector & The Great Titan: The Owl House (Theory: Possibly Past Allies?)

OK, I completely get that The Collector, despite the extremely brief appearance, is absolutely terrifying.

Not because of anything he does so far, but because of what he can do (and has no qualms about doing).

Never mind that he makes monster Philip, AKA Belos, go splat without a smidge of effort.

Or that he MOVES the moon to end the eclipse!

But, I seriously hope he doesn't become something to be put down or trapped again in Season 3. Because he seriously feels just like a mini-child-god who has no concept of how terrifying he is and the difference between playthings and people. It does not feel malicious in the slightest. And I was honestly horrified for him at how giddily happy he was to get out of that mirror and have a playmate/friend.

Sure, I might also be grasping at straws here, but he also never actually destroyed Belos, just basically flicked him away with zero effort, despite the betrayal. And the moment King reminded The Collector of their promise, he did actually, immediately, hold up his end of the bargain and stop the draining spell.

On another tangent, is there perhaps a chance that -- like Belos made everyone believe over decades that wild magic was what the Titan was against -- The Titan and The Collector might have actually been friends, or at least allies, in the far past? But then, after they disappeared, some people, like the Titan Trackers, came to believe that The Collector hunted Titans?

I admit, that, after the episode "Echoes to the Past", after theories abounded that what the Titan could be fighting here in the mural was something The Collector made or did -- or The Collector himself -- I was sure too that The Titan and The Collector were natural enemies.

Not to mention, The Collector's appearance in Eda's dream in "Knock, Knock, Knockin' on Hooty's Door".

Who'd ever think he was anything but a Big Bad after this episode? As in, the person who likely trapped The Owl Beast into a curse, or created the curse in the first place.

And after "Edge of the World", with the Titan Trappers saying their entire purpose was hunting and killing Titans, apparently in the footsteps of "The Great Huntsman" (who we all figure was The Collector), it definitely feels like The Collector could be nothing but a villain -- and possibly the reason that The Great Titan even died?

And I was aaaaaaalllllllll aboard this theory -- until The Collector was freed by King from the mirror and I saw the way he behaved. He was terrifying, sure -- but in the way you'd be terrified of a toddler if he got hold of a very sharp knife and ran like the wind with it (except here, you're not really worried for The Collector's personal safety. That "knife" of his is definitely more dangerous to others. And he knows how to use it).

But, when I was checking out screenshots and images from "Echoes to the Past", I noticed this:

This is the entrance to where King was born. Look at the stars -- or sun, even -- around the symbol King wears as a necklace. And the moons, while full instead of crescents, could also be related to The Collector (as stars and crescent moons seem to be his motif). Besides, look at the motif on one half of The Collector's robe in Eda's dream...

(I don't know about you, but that seems to be the sun on one side, a motif that looks a lot like that multi-pointed sun or star on the dome of the entrance to King's birth-cave/lair.)

Now, why would this motif be on King's birth-lair if The Collector and The Great Titan were enemies? And for that matter, Lilith proved that this island was nowhere on the map, and she's a historian and explorer who's scoured most of The Boiling Isles both out of interest and to complete whatever Belos told her to do while she was working for them.

However, Eda just accidentally stumbled upon this place when she needed shelter. And it doesn't appear that anyone else has ever found this place since -- or before -- either. And the second time they go there, it's only because of King that they find the island at all.

Now, King finding the place is logical -- his blood probably allowed him entrance. And the others could follow because they were with him. But Eda? She was alone. She should have no way to find this island. What possible connection could she have had to King before she'd even met him?

Well, how about her Owl Beast curse? And what's connected to her Owl Beast form that's established from her dreams? The Collector! And allowing someone or something with a connection to The Collector to enter your child's cave if you were sworn enemies seems sus, don't you think? But what if they weren't enemies, but friends? Makes a lot more sense then, doesn't it?

(Now, as with any theory, this could totally be off. But I do think it's a possibility.  😄  What do you think?)

[traggalicious]

OKAY. so, first: thank you so much i love you. Second! Lazarus! Here’s a thingy I made for him somewhere else ^^

Character’s full name: Lazarus

Reason or meaning of name: Stole it from Lazarus (of the bible) who was a jesus type and died 4 like 3 days b4 jesus came n got him.

Character’s nickname(s): Laz, The Monster (as like. A title)

Birth date: I honestly didn’t think abt it cos it made my brain hurt

Gender: he/they dude! He’s fine w/ it/its but not 4 gender reasons.

Music for the mood: creature - half-alive, the nowhere king frm centaurworld, me and my husband - mitski

Basic rundown is he was made at a time where belos rlly wanted his curse *gone*, and had been researching ways to get rid of it. He came across that thing (the thing eda and Lilith did) to share the curse, and he’s like. Might as well try it. So he creates lazarus, and laz is a pretty loyal guy, like. Belos raises him w/ traits of selflessness and obedience, and ofc plays up the curse so when he finally tells him to do the curse sharey thing, Laz is all for it. It works well! Fortunately for belos and unfortunately for Laz. Laz is suffering, he nearly dies but the curse doesn’t let him, despite the fact that belos refuses to share palismen, and when he does (which is once) laz refuses for morality reasons. This is how he realizes “oh shit i was only made to die wasn’t i”, confronts belos, belos tries to kill him. But Lazarus is goopy. And we all know that belos being goopy means he’s still alive. And uhhh yeah he nearly dies, makes it out narrowly, and he lives in the woods on the isles, fuckin belos shit up, and experiencing a weird love-hate relationship w/ the bat queen and the locals!

Another thing that contributes to that is when he finds a scout afraid after they didn't do too well in training, and he decides to help, and he ends up having a mentor- like relationship w/ them-and one day they see his face. And at this point he's already got the rot creeping up his face, and. And they look terrified. They ask what happened. And he. He realizes. He scares them. He says it's okay, nothing's wrong- and even when they return to 'normal' he can't help but notice the glances they cast at the right side of his face, at the growing pink glow behind the mask he never takes off anvmore. <- He's so nice to the scouts bc he went thru it too. But younger. With higher expectations. And he doesn't quite get that not everyone has to deal w/ that. So he's just. Yeah. He mother hens them be he doesn't quite understand that many of them are the age he is now rather than the age he was. And they don't know he's their age physically. Like. Based on actual years he's like fuckin. He's like 5 or 6. And so basically that stress and emotional abandonment coupled with his experiences with the Curse and Belos leads to the Confrontation.

Palisman: His palisman is a jackalope named buck <333

On the topic of backstory n shit! I think that he’d have a frenemy relationship w/ Lorelei, in which she sees that he was also a victim but still resents him for her husband’s death, so its a very fragile relationship, mostly transactional in the beginning. Alas, she is a compassionate person, and over time they become…. Friends? Its an odd thing really. Also! Eda and Laz have a tentative friendship based on shitty curses and learning to deal with them. Laz helps protect the Owl House when he can, befriends Hooty (he finds Hooty So Interesting), and Eda takes the fall sometimes when Laz makes an oopsie. Also teaches him magic sometimes. ALSO. on the Eda x Laz thing, he’s around before Eda, but he ages slower and spends a lot of time regenerating after. Events. So yeah. He also ends up being the Fun Uncle of the HexSquad! Sad but funny thing is that Laz is so used to being called mean things that he hears Any Derogatory Term and his ears twitch like heh? Me? Poor guy. He does get a happy ending though! He is forever changed but he gets better.

Really wanna write smth for him at sm point -.- ANYWAY yeah that’s Laz!!! Sorry this is so long ahdgshdhddh. Here! Are some images (couldn’t find others i didnt feel like scrolling forever sorry <333)

[childlikegoblinqueen]

Writing Notes

I have ONE more chapter planned before I go on vacation but I am sooooooo spent from the last one I wrote. I have a bit of the next chapter mapped out and know where I want it to end, but I feel like I need to unload a bit about the last one, how I wrote it and why I head canon Bard Hunter.

Don't read anymore unless you have read Chapter 26 of Sweet Child O' Mine, and if you haven't read it yet, check it out :D It nearly killed me.

Spoilers below!

First, Why Bard Hunter? I will write another post later on regarding writing the actual fight scene and how music choices played into it.

So, while Hunter was in the Human Realm we pretty much see that he is creative. The sewing has been often noted as a way for Hunter to stay "close to Darius" since his "father figure" is far away and/or possibly dead, but he goes beyond learning how to "neatly sew".

After Camila shows Hunter how to use the sewing machine, he creates! His shirts and curtains etc. are chaotic! Patches every where! Very grunge/punk! We know that in the castle he had expressed curiosity which was constantly stamped out because he had a purpose and a path that he was not supposed to stray from or else ....

So being a music person myself I imagined that all the children would need MUSIC in order to heal fro their trauma, and there are likely a slew of popular bands/artists from the BI, but I would imagine that Hunter had not been permitted anything but whatever was Belos approved, which coming from a Puritan, was likely not great. Maybe some somber hymns to the Titan or to the emperor himself? Especially since Belos seemed to want to mold the grimwalkers into his ideal version of Caleb ("better version of an old frend". What an ass thing to say about a literal child!)

It has also been noted by some that when Raine seems to look back at Hunter during the scene in the castle where Hunter is ignored by the other Coven Heads, Raine seems low key concerned that this kid needs to get out of that place.

I do hope that Raine survives WAD. Part of my inspiration for Raine teaching Hunter how to mold Bard music is that not only are they both creative, but they are also the only two that have been possessed by Belos. In writing this scene and building their relationship, I thought about a simple way two people with shared trauma could communicate and heel without actually talking about the trauma. Music is perfect for that.

Eventually we will see how Hunter uses music to communicate in other ways, but we've already seen how he and Willow play a game where they try to guess the band and song based on a small portion of lyrics. They communicate non-verbally, but Willow realizes that Hunter is deeply depressed living with Darius, while living through the trials and dealing with the press. Likely Hunter doesn't realize this himself. Willow notes that Hunter is only playing while using Nirvana lyrics and having lived with him for months in the human realm, she’s aware that he listens to Nirvana when he’s depressed. Really, he's going through the motions and trying to appease someone he looks up to.

A lot of this story is about Hunter's own anxieties about becoming a parent, as well as the figures in his life who have parented him for better or for worse -- as well as parental figures like Odalia who are toxic, and Alador who knows that he messed up.

That was a flashback to the past. In the current timeline we know that Hunter and Willow have developed a healthy romantic relationship. He has strong bonds to his adoptive family of Camila, Luz, and Vee (his guitar belonged to Manny). He enjoys a good relationship with others in the Owl House universe. He has accomplished a lot, but prefers to stay out of the spotlight due to many things that took place both during his tenure in the castle and how he was treated by the public in the aftermath.

The thread about Perry's supposed protege, who alerted Hunter to other students trying to exploit a relationship with him during his first weeks at Hexside will be picked up again. I really try to leave bread crumbs without revealing too much upfront.

We also know that Dell has mentored him in palisman carving, and that he has somehow developed a healthy working relationship with Lilith who still works at the Supernatural History Museum.

I would hope that post Belos, the idea of "the savage ages" and "wild magic is evil" is a thing of the past as would be tracks at Hexside. So having Raine -- again being the only other one who hopefully survived possession -- teach Hunter to use the guitar he was gifted from his chosen family (Camila, Luz, and Vee) to generate magic was something I wanted to explore!

Which leads me to writing that dang scene.

[sergeantsporks]

As someone who isn't white I find it very odd thay people are insisting Hunter is only liked because he's white. He's liked because he's an incredibly complex character, who represents a good person working on the wrong side.

As someone who has been through many fandoms and has liked many sympathetic villains, I've noticed this seems to be a crit trend with villains specifically. I even saw a post once saying that writers should "stop making their villains children cause people will like them and excuse their actions" as if making a villain a child isn't an intentional narrative tool by the writer to specifically have the audience react that way on purpose. Some people just want to feel like they have the moral high ground, I guess.

I think a lot of people forget that characters like this are no longer a classic Disney morality of "good guy bad guy", but stories are now much more theme driven than they used to be. This character doesn't represent a specific moral standpoint, they represent a theme, an ideal, a unique type of conflict. Villains are no longer just obstacles for the heroes to stop, they're narrative tools, meant to represent something, generally a theme of some sort, and dismissing them as "this guy is a villain so I must hate them" is dismissing all the effort thay the writer put into the character, and is just generally poor literary analysis.

Oh! I actually read an interesting book about this a while back called "the witch must die." It was about how in fairy tales (and by extension, classic Disney) the bad guy, the witch, whatever, was often killed AS a theme. The bad guy represented a part of the protagonist, a flawed part. For instance, in Grimm's Snow White, Snow White is tricked first by allure of laces to put on her dress, then by an ornamental comb laced with poison. She is vain, which is, of course, ALSO the main trait of her evil stepmother. The villain in a fairy tale often must die because they reflect a flaw in the hero, a flaw the hero must overcome in order to grow. By killing the villain, they are killing their own vices. Ergo, the witch must die.

BUT! Like you said, themes have shifted over time. Heroes are no longer paragons but with one glaring flaw, stock characters easily projected onto by a majority, but more complex characters. In the case of the owl house, Luz's flaws are usually good things taken too far. A caring for her friends that leads to self destructive behaviors, an imagination that often causes her to go too far for the fantasy. Imagination and selflessness are not bad traits, but Luz takes them to an extreme that is unhealthy for her and those around her. They're too much of a good thing. And a lot of more modern heroes follow this path, where they don't have an obvious glaring flaw that needs to be "fixed." Ergo, the villains have ALSO changed. And killing them isn't the same option! We don't want Luz to stop being imaginative or selfless, we just want her to tone those traits down so that it's not unhealthy! So Hunter, the secondary villain who cares too much about Belos to his own undoing, is a villain we don't want to see die! Because that would be thematically a close to Luz caring so much! If you have a more 3D hero, you need a more 3D villain to match, or it's just comical. Villains are often the hero consumed by their flaws (like Belos going MUCH too far for "protecting humanity" and his witch hunter fantasy) or else are dynamic opposites that clash against the heroes. Thus we end up with more sympathetic villains.

Villains are created to make you look inwards, or sometimes outwards at your world. Even 2D "pure evil" villains usually had something to make you think, in their insistence that they're right, or that they deserve to rule, they often point at some facet of society OR they showcase just how ugly character flaws can get if left unchecked. Nothing wrong with being a LITTLE vain, Snow White isn't evil for wanting to put a pretty ornament in her hair, but if you're going to kill your stepdaughter over it, that's a problem. More 3D, sympathetic villains allow you to look in at how there often aren't "good" choices to be made, that people are just people: every bad person had a childhood, and while you shouldn't support bad actions, you should root for people to get better.

Which is the thing with child villains, isn't it? We WANT them to get better. We WANT them to get to experience a better life, to be a better person, because we know that's how it SHOULD be. Most of us know that kids (and everyone, but especially kids) should be treated with kindness. That it's never too late. I was working with a kid at summer camp who tended to hit and name call other kids and by god do I want her to grow up better than that and I want to help her do so. I'm not going to let her hit the other kids, that's not okay, but I'm not going to dismiss her as a lost cause and just hope she quits coming to camp, either. Like you said, that's the POINT of child villains. We're supposed to want them to be better, because we know they can. Feeling sympathy for villains is GOOD, it means we're probably capable of sympathy towards REAL people.

TL:DR: Villains have always been thematic devices rather than an obstacle to overcome, but as heroes grow in complexity, so do the villains, making more sympathetic villains than used to be the case, and that's a GOOD thing.

[eda-au]

Evil Dadrius Adoption Au

Golden Cage

Darius and Eberwolf kidnap Hunter by luring him to their home disguised as celebrating his promotion to Golden Guard then refuses to let Hunter leave. They eventually successfully manage to manipulate Hunter into willingly staying with them and Hunter develops stockhome syndrome.

Darius starts off as a dark rebel but once Belos is overthrown he makes himself the new ruler of the Boiling Isles and keeps Raine brainwashed to be on his side figuring it better for them to be brainwashed then Darius having to kill them if they turn against him.

Unhinged

Everything is good in the beginning, Darius is your typical doting protective loving father to Hunter and Hunter enjoys every bit of it. Then Hunter dies and Darius is desperate to have his son back to revives him. Darius is frazzled at losing his son but nothing more and they continue having a happy father son relationship.

Then Hunter dies again... And again... And again... Each time Hunter dies, Darius loses more of his sanity and becomes more obsessed and controlling, willing to do anything to keep his son safe and taking care of anything he views as a threat. Hunter begins to long for the time when his father was normal, the good times but he knows it's his fault for not listening to Darius in the beginning and dying so many time.

Cycle of Abuse

Where the previous GG never realized Belos for the horrible person and parent he is and it changes more then you think. Previous GG sees the abuse he suffered as something he deserved to happen to him and what happens to children who are naughty, that's just how things are.

When he adopts a dark skinned baby who appears on his doorstep, Belos goes ballistic and so Prev GG kills him for the sake of his new adopted son. Unfortunately for Darius and later Hunter, that switch of Belos being a bad person and parent was never flicked on and Prev GG chalked it up to him just being too traditional. Prev GG raised Darius much in the same way Belos raised him and so Darius learned to be cruel and cold to most.

When the Prev GG died, Darius got lonely and came across Belos' old instructions on a grimwalker and so Darius creates his own child in the image of his late father to love and adore. With his own child now though he holds similar belief to the Prev GG on child raising he finds he can't bear to do half those things that were done to him to his beloved baby boy so Hunter was saved from most terrors but not all of them. Darius may not be able to bring himself to hurt Hunter in any way but that doesn't mean he won't manipulate Hunter into behaving like a good son should.

Mostly Evil Family

The most fluffy version where Eberwolf and Darius are evil and Hunter's his normal sun Bean self that's absolutely adored by his new father and new uncle. No manipulation or kidnapping took place. Darius just started early and showed Hunter what true love was so when it came time, Hunter chose Darius over Belos.

Darius and Eberwolf are perfectly normal to Hunter, doting, protective but just the right amount. Everyone else? Well that's a different story... Hunter knows how they treat everyone else and though he encourages Darius and Eberwolf to be more lenient or relaxed, he figures that's just how things should be.

Multiple Hunters

Darius has adopted three children, Hunter (16), William (13) and Jasper (8), he originally planned to only adopt Hunter but after coming across uncompleted grimwalkers, he felt obligated to adopt the others. The brothers don't like eachother, Hunter thinks Jasper is too childish while William is too uptight, William is tired of having to take care of Jasper and seeing Hunter getting all of their father's love and Jasper sees William as the bossy mean older brother and Hunter as someone pompous and smug asshole. Doesn't help they are jealous of eachother as well. Hunter envies his brothers freedom and no rules, his brothers envy the love he gets.

William and Jasper look like the beta designs of Hunter but with the trademark magenta eyes and pointy ears.

Have questions? Feel free to send some asks in! They are open! Just make sure to specify which AUs you want talked about!

[lollytea]

The worst thing for Hunter is probably not knowing. He will never find out if Caleb's personality was similar to his, because Caleb's been dead for 400 slutty, slutty years and the only person who could tell Hunter what's up is currently stuck to the sole of his shoes. Hunter needs to make peace with the ghosts that haunt him and everyone else (Darius, Flapjack), bc he will never know who he was supposed to be exactly, but it's so important that doesn't matter, no matter the grief around Caleb.

YEAH YEAH YEAH

I mean I assume he's being set up to learn about Caleb in season 3 though I have no idea how. Magic maybe. Some kind of projector fuckery like the echo mouse diary, or another time pool or being told by Flapjack or Belos. I wouldn't rule any of them out. But yeah at the same time it's also possible he never learns.

Also yeah absolutely I think the uncertainty of who this man was is gonna eat at him. After learning the grimwalker thing, Hunter proceeded to read every book on the species he could get his hands on. He's the kind of kid who needs answers. Does that mean he'll be happy if he does learn? Most likely not. It's a huge damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. Both learning about Caleb and never learning present their own unique internal conflicts.

Cuz like. Say he never learns. All the information Hunter has on Caleb is a name, a past palisman and a photograph in his own reflection. He knows that this whole time his own face has never truly belonged to him. He knows that there was a person who Philip killed and then centuries later Hunter was created as a replacement and has spent years being the version of Caleb that Philip wanted him to be. Maybe he feels guilt over that. Maybe it makes him feel gross in his own skin. This idea that he was a pawn to this man's killer and wore his appearance all the while, which feels twisted in itself.

And its like...what can he do about it? How can he make it right? He was the version of Caleb that Belos wanted but who was the person Caleb wanted to be? What kind of life did he want to live? Maybe Hunter wonders if he can try to live out that life for him. Which is hard because everything about Caleb remains a mystery, yet Hunter still feels some underlying responsibility to uphold a legacy. A legacy he doesn't even understand but he's spent his whole life upholding legacies that it can be a difficult mindset to break out of.

It's just another thing that snags at his progress. Hunter's arc began with the desire to decide for himself who he wanted to be and that is how it should end. He can make peace with Caleb's existence, maybe embrace the person from the past as a part of himself without letting it consume him. Ultimately Hunter will need to realize that he's just doing the same thing all over again. He thought he was free from the pressure Belos put on him but it turns out he just transfered it into something else. He just keeps trying to exist for the sake of someone else's benefit because he doesn't know how else to live. But it needs to stop. He needs to make it stop. Might be an uphill battle to do so but I'm sure he can manage it.

[astrolavas]

Do you think there's a chance hunter is going to be killed off since he's a grimwalker? I don't think so but I've seen some people say that he can be killed because he can always just be created again

.........okay, another hunter analysis time let's go lmao

short answer: no, he's not going to be killed off.

long answer:

him being finally confirmed as a grimwalker doesn't change anything. so what if he "can be replaced with another version of himself anytime" or if he "isn't an actual witch", THAT'S THE POINT.

hunter being a grimwalker (one of many, at that) actually works really really well with just.. his character at its very core; it perfectly contrasts his previous opinions and plays with his fears and dreams and challenges him, and it's painful but will only make it good in the end.

because the point is that he IS a person, he's just as important and individual and meaningful as everyone else, despite being an "easily replaceable clone", and the point of his character arc is him seeing that and being able to become his own person, on his own terms; to become who he actually IS and not who belos wanted him to be.

like, let's look at the present situation; after being told that he's "special" throughout his whole life (but still feeling replaceable because of how belos was treating him), he now found out that he actually was replaceable, that he could be replaced at ANY moment, that he isn't even "his own person". he found out that when he'd always thought he was doing a good thing (because he WANTS to do good, he has always wanted to do good; he'd always thought he was doing good), he was actually helping belos'... not-so-good plans all along. he found out that he had been lied to about everything throughout his entire life...... and now he has nothing.

so it's gonna hit him... hard. it's gonna hit him a lot. the identity crisis is gonna be big, but then he's gonna learn self-worth and finally learn how to just... be himself, and get to be free; construct a new life, construct new views, based on the truth this time, with ppl who care about him supporting him.

and it's gonna be NICE. they wouldn't have written his arc the way they had written it so far, hinting at his entire journey since the very start, if there wasn't gonna be a good, satisfying conclusion to it. sure, the road to it is.... definitely gonna be rocky, but he IS going to find real happiness in the end.

so........ yeah lol

tl;dr: they're not going to kill him off, most definitely. the very POINT of hunter's arc is breaking free from abuse and finding self-worth and happiness and people who care about him, despite him being "replaceable". killing him off doesn't even work narration-wise. and also there's no way they would kill off an abused 16 year old, like...... lol yeah. so he's 100% getting happiness, we just gotta wait for it. he's on a good path already

[pyroclastic727]

Owl House said fuck capitalism

So this episode was interesting. Lilith pretty much killed her sister. Why the fuck would she do that?

Even more interesting: why is Belos like that? How did Hooty put his head through one of those guards? Who the fuck is the Titan, and why does everyone like him? And how are these all tied together?

This episode was a metaphor for capitalism

...and another delicious step towards radicalizing the youth into dismantling this fucked-up neo-feudal system.

We’ll start with Belos. 

Emperor Belos is a weird name, don’t you think? We all thought it was spelled “Bellows,” but it wasn’t. In fact, it’s five letters, starts with Be, ends with os, and describes a megalomaniac emperor that restricts people’s freedom in order to accumulate wealth for himself.

Sound familiar?

Emperor Bezos Belos created capitalism. He saw the beauty of magic and decided to make himself the most powerful.

Belos created a system that destroys the masses and boosts his power.

 I’m dipping into fan theory a little, because the fan theory fits. We know that people get branded with coven magic that makes it so they can only specialize in one area. We know that Belos is the most powerful witch in the Boiling Isles. We know that the excess magic, magic created by restrictions, has to go somewhere.

It’s the same system that many viewers see all the time. A job takes up all your day and tires you for the night, so you can only do one skill for the rest of your life. Jeff Bezos is the most powerful man in the United States. Excess money, money taken by restrictions, has to go somewhere.

The magic goes to Belos, like how the money goes to Bezos. Belos created capitalism, and he won it.

The guards aren’t real. 

Look, we’ve never seen their faces. They’re all the same. Why would you work so hard to get to the top, just to become a nameless, faceless killing machine?

Oh, also Hooty stuck his face through one. There is nothing under the armor.

Why? Well, it’s the same reason you see all those celebrities going around flaunting their wealth and bragging about how hard they worked. Like all those songs about how they grind every day and work harder than everyone else while you’re out clubbing, and that makes them dope. And then you take a closer look at them and see that they had a small loan of a million dollars fueling them, or an entire talent agency behind them, or their dad was a famous country star in the 80′s. 

They’re fake. They’re hollow. They’re a ploy created by the capitalist emperor to try to delude you into working harder. 

Let me put this into perspective. I guarantee that every single one of you has heard stuff like this: “Hard work makes you successful.” “I put in the work, and that’s why I’m successful.” “If you work hard enough, then you can be as successful as Mark Zuckerberg.” 

And unless you’re a robot or really lucky, I’m sure all of you have failed at this. Maybe they told you that hard work would make you good at math, so you spent 22 hours a week working on calculus, only to pass it by 3 percentage points and have it destroy your perfect 4.0 GPA. Maybe they told you that if you talked to people enough, then you would make friends, so you spent a lot of time talking to people, only to end up lonely and friendless. Maybe they told you that if you did well in school, you would get a good job, so you spent all your time working hard to be a good student, and then ended up in a soulless, dead-end job.

The guards are there to delude you. Look, who really gains from you being productive? The answer is the ruling class, the CEOs, the government, the bourgeoisie. It has always been that. All you get from working is a paycheck that lets you survive. They get a paycheck that lets them get rich. Just like Belos gets the magic and productivity of the specialized coven witches.

The guards are there to trick you. The truth is that nobody can join the Emperor’s Coven. It’s just there to make you think that hard work will make you successful. Then you spend your entire life working hard, trying to prove to the person in charge that you’re worthwhile. You give your whole life to the Coven, and they give you nothing. 

Magic is supposed to be something you pursue for fun. Being skilled at things, being good at something beautiful...that’s supposed to be something you do because you want to. But they took that and made it into a source of productivity. It doesn’t matter if you make good content. All people fucking care about is if you upload the day of premiere, if you make a lot of content quickly, if you maintain a million different conversations with strangers who expect you to be the most interesting person in the room. They don’t care how it hurts you. They don’t care how you crack from the stress. How you cry when you think no one can see you, and then you check your phone and someone can see you, someone did see you, and you have to put on your face and be the charming, magnetic person they want you to be. (oh by the way that’s why I wasn’t online much last week)

And it ruins it. Suddenly you can’t watch The Owl House without being stressed. You can’t make any content. You can’t make spells as powerfully as you want to. Your passion is replaced by perfectionism and insecurity, a voice telling you to keep being the best at what you do, or else they’ll forget you and let you die.

There’s also the Titan. 

So nobody has mentioned him before, because in addition to the Boiling Isles being a hellscape full of witchcraft and queerness, it’s also full of atheists. 

But suddenly we have people saying all this shit about him? Shit like, he gave witches the gift of magic, and then they learned to use it in a civilized manner, since being uncivilized was disrespectful?

I mean, first off, that’s fucking wrong. The island gives people magic. The island, which just so happened to be shaped like a titan-sized human. But the island/titan gives everyone all types of magic. Hell, even Luz gets to use magic, and she’s human. 

It sounds really fucking familiar. (tw for discussion of homophobia and colonialism and misogyny). It sounds like when the news is on and they show some Tr*mp supporter talking about how fetuses have more rights than people and it is their holy duty to take away a woman’s control over her body and force her through unbearable pain and into an 18-year commitment she didn’t want to make. It sounds like all the times people tried to say homosexuality should be illegal, citing a single line in a book written two thousand years ago and heavily edited by a European king. It sounds like all the times people said God wanted them to conquer, to own the entire earth, to force the other races into pain to support them.

This is that bullshit thing people do where they commit awful sins and justify it by citing the will of God. 

Or, it’s the Coven using religion as an excuse for evil.

Look, the Emperor’s Coven is clearly colonizer-coded. Saying that people’s original form of magic was wild (and showing a picture with the same joyous, rowdy energy of an 18th or 19th -century Black or indigenous party), and that it was God’s will for them to be “civilized?” Sounds like that thing that powerful white people did where they went and murdered people and forced them into their twisted capitalist system. God, gold, and glory, is what they said, because history books just love to omit the gore.

Lilith is passing the abuse cycle along. 

You know, like a good little colonizer. God I fucking hate her. She’s a MILF, in the sense that she’s a Mother I’d Like to Fling off a cliff. 

Ah, enough screaming about how much I want to drown Lilith in a tub of Hooty’s mucus. Let’s go into why I want to do that, and how she took the evils of capitalism and just...adopted those.

So, Lilith is sick and twisted for what she did to her sister. But, uhh, that’s the point. You see, there are so many other people out there like Lilith who would do the exact same thing, if given the chance. These are the people who do mean things when the teacher isn’t looking, and then act nice and try to frame you. These are the people who will hate you if you’re better than them. These are people who would do anything to bring you down, if you dare outperform them.

It’s greed, my friends. The mental illness that capitalism blesses us all with.

Lilith herself said it: she dedicated her entire life to the Coven. What she wanted was to be the best. And she almost was...except for her own sister. Someone who lived with her, annoyed her at home, bested her at school. Someone she could never beat, no matter how hard she worked. And her sister was younger than her, too! How insulting was that? Lilith wanted to be the best, and someone in her exact situation did better than her.

Lilith was insecure. And it consumed her.

But why? Why does insecurity consume her? I mean, no one can be motivated by insecurity forever. Well, not unless someone conditions it into you.

The lovely thing about the capitalist system is the morals it teaches you. Things like: “You’re only useful if you’re the best.” “Being school smart makes you smart, while being social smart or sports smart or creative smart or fandom smart is worthless.” “Your worth can be quantified by numbers and is based off arbitrary measures like your income or your grades.” Things that can and will drive us crazy if we let ourselves believe them.

And it did drive Lilith crazy. She got so twisted by a society that said being good at magic is her only worth. Look, Lilith used to be good at things, probably. She was good at sports. At times, she slips up and does an okay job of being Eda’s sister. She has a powerful presence when she’s in a room. And she’s wicked good at manipulating people. 

But that didn’t matter. Lilith bought into the lies. She let herself believe that magical skill was the only way to measure her worth. And since she needed to be the best, she hurt Eda for it.

The beautiful thing is, Eda didn’t buy that. "It’s my power, kid. And before you showed up, I spent my whole life wasting it.” Is what Eda said, as she used up the last of her power, the last of her life, to save Luz. In her final moments, she proved that she’s not like them. She’s stronger than them.

None of this matters. Not magical prowess. Not the hierarchy. Not the promise of joining the Coven and having more power than anyone else.

The only thing that matters to Eda is her family. Her real family. Her Luz, King, and Hooty. And by extension, Willow, Gus, and Amity. Those are Eda’s real reason for fighting, for dying: to protect them. Look, there’s no way she would’ve come out of that fight alive. She has a family, and her love for them is stronger than greed or jealousy or capitalism. 

Lilith never understood that. She thought the water of the womb was thicker than the blood of the covenant. Or, that the water of the womb and the blood of the covenant are stronger than the bonds of found family. She thought it didn’t matter if Eda loved, her, only if the Emperor loved her. Fucking bitch.

And now, a little something to worry about, before we go. Amity Blight. The girl who wanted to join the Emperor’s Coven more than anything, who dedicated her whole life to doing well in school, to being the best, to being perfect.

And then she met Luz. She fell for Luz. Now she’s in a tricky place, where habit and conditioning want her to join the Emperor’s Coven, but her heart wants her to do the impossible and destroy capitalism.

She wasn’t in this episode. Funny that being injured and unable to work ended up saving her from watching her future mother-in-law die. So she bought some time.

But Luz’s true mom is dead. This is the second mom she has lost, and she’s only fourteen. As powerful as King and Hooty are, Luz needs Amity. Luz needs Amity to support her and help her get back her mom.

So Amity has to make a choice. Fear and insecurity, or love and a high chance of death? 

She’ll probably choose death. Because that’s the message that this family-friendly show is giving us kids. Fuck capitalism. All you need in life is to do what makes you happy and be with the ones you love.

[perpetual-bad-guy-shipper]

I like your ortet au!! What else have you gotten down for it so far?

hey thanks for showing interest, this thing's all I've been thinking about for a week so i hope you like reading ;)

so this au is about Belos and how he tried to assuage decades (perhaps centuries) of soul crushing loneliness and isolation by creating an artificial child of his own. against all odds, and in none of the ways he thought, this plan actually works out. through a long, arduous process he will be transformed from an unflappable badass monarch to the most Tired yet weirdly fulfilled parent between the Human or Demon realms...who still projects the image of unflappable badass monarch

here is our star, read about him + some plot under the cut

some facts about ortet!belos

he murdered his entire family a long time ago when in cursed form and remembers every moment of it. he has terrible nightmares about it. (ortet!belos is the ultimate Bad but Sad Boy, only the Bad heavily outweighs the Sad). he refuses to speak of it and can barely even think about it.

he hate hate hates wild magic and blames it for everything that's happened to him. Hunter is not allowed to practice it under any circumstance, he's allowed to read about it only because that way he'll know what to avoid.

the only thing he hates more than wild magic is himself  

regarding himself and his curse, he's in a perpetual cycle of disgust and jaded resignation

if he feels one (1) Emotion he'll want to lie down for the rest of the day. (too bad for him he's gonna feel a lot more than one (1) over the course of this story). downright allergic to (read: absolutely terrified of) emotional intimacy, probably why he calls himself Hunter’s uncle rather than father. 

magic-speaking he is an absolute jack of all trades powerhouse, physically speaking he is a garbage fire. his curse has left him in extremely poor health, further exacerbated by the fact that he refuses to sleep and consume anything except Palismen Essence (ie. no food or liquids). because of this lack of a diet, he is emaciated and has a pallor more like a corpse than a living person. the only healthy part of him is his hair, which has been going strong for 100 or so years now

because of his palismen eating habits he’s developed the ability to telepathically speak to all palismen (like the bat queen but he’s totally unnatural) he refuses to acknowledge this ((this is a surprise tool that will help us later))

on the surface he appears patient and calculating but he has a crazy impulsive streak underneath it all (man literally made himself a nephew to raise knowing he has no idea how to even talk to children)

he seems stoic and cold but the truth is he purposefully keeps a straight face to lessen the pain the decay on his face causes (a side effect of his curse). he actually feels very strongly but hides it (bottles it up) like a professional

his sense of humour is acerbic, bone dry and sarcastic as hell. after acclimatizing to being more gentle around Hunter he unearthed a more playful, teasing side

he doesn't like wearing his mask and hood because he has to squish all that hair under and it gets stuffy as hell but he doesn't like being perceived (unless it’s by Hunter) even more.

he is actually 9 feet tall (unlike canon where he lost like 4 feet unmasked what) though he sometimes utilizes some simple shrinking spells to bring himself down to a more manageable 7.5 feet. side effect of being able to turn into a giant monster.      

important Plot points (we’ll build on these later) 

Hunter searching high and low for a permanent cure for his uncle, putting himself in extreme danger in the process (cue desperate, emotional monster-man rescue)

Boiling Isles danger in general (including their strangely casual attitude towards killing children) and other reasons Belos won’t let Hunter go outside

Belos learning to separate ruling despotically from everyday parenting

Hunter suffering some existential angst over the fact that he’s a clone and not a ‘real’ person + Belos and him dealing with that together

Despite Belos’ warnings about wild magic, Hunter is going to get Little Rascal and Belos is going to find out. 

[edalynn]

How are you hoping that things go for Hunter in For the Future come January?

AAAA honestly, I have no idea. I've been trying to think abt the response for this ask and all I can come up with is god I hope we're right about Flapjack still being in his mindscape. I think the most likely scenario will either be Hunter has Flap's magic now, he carves himself a new palisman (with Dell's help bc I am 99% sure of where they came out of that portal and who Hunter is about to meet), or the out there option that Fox and I had joked about for a year that everyone else is jumping on board with now- Harpy Hunter. No matter what happens, I want to see Hunter kinda burst out of his own shell (ON HIS OWN, THANKS.) and maybe make a final stand against Belos. Or at least be there (obviously) when he's taken down. In regards to a new Palisman, I can't decide whether I like the idea of Hunter carving an egg a la Luz and maybe Flapjack's spirit imbuing himself/his love for Hunter into it thus creating Gen 2 Flap lmao (Name him Pancake!!) or a wolf, or even a phoenix signifying Hunter being razed and reborn/brought back via Flapjack. I am un undecided voter.

I also really want Hunter to hear the true story of Caleb in the BI, not Philip. Probably coming from an old Clawthorne journal or a story told by a certain descendent... I want Hunter to learn who Caleb really was and what really happened to come to an understanding and appreciation of the person he was created from. To maybe feel like oh, being a grimwalker might not be so bad knowing that the person he came from wasn't this evil witch hunter like Belos, but actively rejected the lifestyle and most likely stood up to Belos, thus getting himself killed. Idk, but honestly I just want Hunter to be able to come to terms with his forced history with everything in a way that doesn't fucking destroy him for once, thanks.