#who else is psyched for season 3

[crazychicke]

moodboards: Sanditon season 3

[ardentpoop]

anyway s2 will always have a place in my heart

[moonlit-void-to-the-far-unknown]

The itch

An: so I’ve never written for TUA, I think, I haven’t written anything in like a long time cause my brain is made of worms most days, but the new season and mostly five in his new attitude? Personality? His almost soft tired of it all way, gives me the feelings. As a 28 year old women it’s odd that a 68 year old trapped in a 18 year old body works for me like it does but hey, I’ve liked weirder (cough I was in the Hamilton fandom cough) so enjoy this sort of bonding with Lila over the new mundane life and the exhausting reality of having to live it, because I love Lila and hate what they did to her and fives characters with the whole 7 year time line romance. Like why make her a mum of 3 and married to Fives brother just to ruin it like that. But anyway enjoy this weird fic.

Readers power: molecular manipulation, think piper from charmed, overhaul from my hero, uhhh it’s hard to explain but basically it means you can make things explode, freeze people and things by fucking with the molecular structure of said thing.

——————————————————————-

You wanted to scream, to smash things, to burn yours and fives apartment down, it had been six years of calm, six years of learning to enjoy ‘normal’. Six years of working at dead end jobs because you didn’t pass the god damn psych evaluation for the CIA, somehow you are far more ‘unhinged’ than your husband.

You and five spent 30 years together, a decade in an apocalyptic wasteland when you ended up teleported there by mistake, and then 20 years at the commission becoming trained and ruthless assassins. Now, now Five worked doing CIA investigations and you got stuck working at a grocery store gas station. It was calm, it was normal, it was absolute hell on earth and made your skin itch.

So sitting in the parking lot of the play place for your nieces 6th birthday, you didn’t know why you couldn’t make yourself leave your car, five was already here, he had texted you as much, everyone else minus Viktor who was in Canada, and Allison who hasn’t shown her face irl to any of her siblings in the 6 years, you just needed to get out of the car and walk in with the gift you signed from both you and five for Gracie. It was a set of toy weapons, knives like her dads old ones, and a few other random ‘play pretend’ things.

Closing your eyes you leaned your head back against the head rest, taking a deep breath. Almost hitting the gas when the passenger side door opened and slammed closed. Turning eyes wide you saw Lila, the exhausted mothers face blank staring forward

“I just needed a minute, just needed” you nodded

“Take all the minutes you need. I assume it’s like pulling teeth in there with Diego?” Lila nodded sighing loudly

“Fives the same way, just on other stuff, like deciding if he wants to go out to dinner or stay in and order pizza, or if he needs new underwear because the ones he has have so many holes in surprised they still count as underwear, or just simple things like the dishes, like how hard is it to wash a cup, it shouldn’t be as hard as it is, how hard is it to just tell me when you need a quiet night cause work was stressful, and you are exhausted from stupid people all day, i work retail, he acts like I don’t understand being tired of idiots…I just…” you paused looking back out the windshield

“It’s like your skin is on fire and nothing stops the itch of being a once highly skilled assassin who could fuck with peoples molecules and freeze them in time or make them explode?” You nodded looking at her

“I find myself flicking my hands out and remembering I can’t just blow up or freeze people anymore, it’s like an itch and anytime I explain it to five he just…”

“Doesn’t listen? Or doesn’t understand that you are used to how your life was and now that it’s different, it’s not bad but it’s eye burning mundane clock ticking by slower then ever reality?”

Nodding you sighed

“Diego, he wants to listen, he just, from what five always told me he had a hard time understanding others because his brain is just, frazzled and he feels inadequate, how they grew up I guess shaped them in every timeline. Five is just used to being alone he was alone for 30 years before we met, then I popped up and it’s just. I don’t think he gets that sometimes I just need him to..”

“Let you Help with the itching”

You nodded smiling at her

“He just, it’s been a lot, and we haven’t quite got the ‘normal life’ down just yet.” Lila nodded

“It’s not easy in normal marriage land either, 3 kids and a chunky husband who, doesn’t make it easier is….”

“Not helping the itching. Well how about me and you, when the itch gets too bad, we help each other? Maybe find a way to do something, go to a rage room? Do a fighting class something to feel the….rush? Of what we did before. Have Klaus or someone babysit the kids, be me and you and just….”

“Fighting each other like the before days?” You laughed nodding

“Yeah…I miss getting to kick your ass and having you kick mine…”

Lila laughed looking around

“We could start a fight club, you, me, Ben when he gets out of prison. Just….maybe we’ll get used to normal eventually….” You frowned nodding

“You know if you ever need anything, help with the kids, a friend to vent to when Diego is being Diego…I’m not to far from your guys place. I can always swing by, let the munchkin tornados beat up on auntie Y/N.” You smiled at her for all the mess you and her had been in against each other, she had become one of your closest friends and family members through it all.

Soon enough you finally made your way into the building, the screams of children everywhere, the smell of sugar and something faintly child everywhere. You spotted five by the ball pit, speaking with Ben, walking over you hugged five from behind sighing as you rested your forehead against his back

“Hello, love.” You squeezed him in response before looking up and over to Ben

“Ahh Benjamin, free from jail, good to see you didn’t die, love that you still look like you want to murder us all” Ben didn’t laugh, just glared at you before sighing

“Not in the snark mood got it.” You felt five squeeze your arm a bit pulling away from you, making you groan

Turning to fully look at you, he looked you over smiling softly

“How was work?” You looked at him blinking slowly before sighing and planting your forehead on his chest, groaning

“Ahh I see” his hand rubbed your back softly, his other lifting the beer to his lips.

“People are stupid. How hard is it to put a gas nozzle in a car….”

“Apparently impossible if what you tell me says anything” you looked at him nodding before turning to look around

“10 bucks says Diego forgets to put up the piñata like Lila asked him” five laughed slightly

“Nah 20 says Lila has a mental breakdown before cake is served” you looked over to where Lila stood with Gracie helping the young girl fix her party hat,

“Nah I think she has a breakdown after presents when she sees what we got Gracie” five laughed looking down at you, brushing the stray hair from your face, smiling at him you sighed softly again,

it seemed even if you wanted to rip your hair out from the new ‘normal’ reality you all had to live in, even if your skin itched from the need to return back to what life was before somehow, it was nice that you still had small moments, where normal wasn’t so bad, normal birthday parties for your nieces and nephews, seemingly normal holidays, and normal, non murder happy work. As much as you loathed admitting it, sometimes it was nice. Like now, now was nice.

[abitcaughtinthemiddle]

The Hypocrisy of Vex'ahlia

Before you all come for me, I am a Vex stan and I will defend her until I die - she is my favorite Critical Role character and I'm so glad we're getting a deeper dive into her psyche.

The complexities of her character cannot be overstated. She has a lot going on under the surface, and the breadcrumbs of her deep-seated insecurities have been there the whole time.

I'm really excited we get to explore those in season 3 through her relationship with Percy, in a way different than what we've seen in the actual play streams. I want to commend the writers for being able to convey so much in so little time.

We are introduced to Vex as a sexy, confident woman who uses her looks and charisma to her advantage. She takes charge most of the time, being the unofficial "leader" of Vox Machina. She presents herself as someone who doesn't really need anyone else and does not care about anyone outside of her brother. Keyleth even comments on this in the first episode, "Vex and Vax only care about themselves".

This, of course, is a complete fabrication, a mask she wears to hide her insecurities. A mask, she wants no one to see through. The irony here is that she can so easily see behind Percy's mask - "Darling, take off the mask". It takes one to know one, after all.

She so badly wants to get underneath Percy's mask, for him to show himself to her fully. There's something inside of her that sees the guilt and shame inside of him and that resonates with her belief that she is deeply broken. Vex truly believes that something must truly be wrong with her. And why wouldn't she? Saundor, who said he knew everything about her, saw this, too, after all.

Saundor says plainly, "you will never be enough."

So it must be true, right?

Why wouldn't something be so wrong with her? It would make sense. Her father carries no love for her, her mother died, and Vax had to sacrifice his life for hers. She knows Vax loves her, and she believes he is the only one who does. Even Kamaljiori, an ancient and all-knowing Sphinx, fed into this during their test when Vax fell: "you have no family left who cares for you".

Her hypocrisy lies in the facade she built as a woman who does not need anyone or anything. She presents herself as someone who does not need the love of others, when in reality, she desperately wants to be loved.

Saundor saw this as well.

Vex longs to love and be loved. And yet, she cannot allow herself to give up her facade and let Percy love her and admit her love for him.

The last person to see through her walls was Saundor, and we know how that went.

What he said really cut her deep, as we see after the Kevdak fight when she brushes off Pike's inquiries about her experience in the fey realm.

As we see her relationship with Percy move from harmless flirting to physical intimacy at the beginning of season 3, we see her embrace the physical closeness to Percy but starts to block him out the moment he wants to cement their relationship. But she can't let herself tell him how she feels because that would mean admitting her heart is his - and that would be doomed to end in tragedy, as Vex admits later in the cave.

Putting up this emotional wall between her and Percy will not give Vex what she wants: love.

Love is that emotional intimacy. Vex loves to point out the importance of love between other people- in season 2, pushing Keyleth to tell Vax how she feels ("it always matters"), assuring Allura that Kima's love for her will help her endure after Vorugal's attack, and putting faith in the rest of Vox Machina.

Vex understands what makes love so special, and how important truth and intimacy are to real, lasting love.

And while she comforts others and pushes them to be vulnerable and embrace love, her own fears prevent her from fully doing the same. It's ironic and sad, how one of the only people who can see through her mask is the one she's pushing away.

Trauma makes hypocrites of us all.

Image credits @blorbologist @aq2003

[the-last-thread-of-my-sanity]

I’ve been thinking lately about how much the ‘curse of Ymir’ really does affect the psyche of each of the nine shifters and how it impacts the ending of the story.

Up until the end of Season 3/Chapter 87-88, the reader and the viewer have no idea that the shifters have a limited amount of time to live. They seem to possess this god-like power and they can rejuvenate and survive almost any injury. They seem unstoppable.

This is what motivates Erwin to create a plan to take one of the nine shifter powers with the serum- having another Titan in your arsenal would make a difference in winning the war.

But what the Paradisians don’t know is how holding the power of the Nine just perpetuates a cycle of violence and cruelty. It’s a curse as much as it is a power. No matter how brilliant or grand your scope is for what you can do with this near limitless power, you have to contend with the fact that you will only have thirteen years to do it.

This revelation to me is the what colors the entire last arc of the story leading into and after the time skip.

For Zeke, it amps up the level of desperation he has for accomplishing the euthanization plan- relying on Eren was still a variable that was largely unpredictable, and he trusted him more than he probably would have if he weren’t running out of time.

Going back further in the story, it retroactively explains why Ymir (of the cadet corps) would go back with Reiner and Bertholdt at all- a seemingly nonsensical choice when it seems she has something to live for in her relationship with Krista/Historia. But Ymir knows she has little time left. She has no future. So she chooses to surrender.

For Annie, it shows her desperation to get back to her father, a man who showed her very little affection, and yet if she could just make it back maybe she could live at least a year or two with him and make at least one happy memory with the man who raised her to kill.

Armin, I honestly feel the most for, because what he and everyone else thought of as his salvation, was actually just saddling him with a curse. And heaps of responsibility to try and be grateful for it. He went from a character with a singular and wholesome conviction, to someone wracked with guilt and forced to solve the world’s problems with limited time and resources.

In Reiner’s case, I actually think the fact that he knows he is going to die is the only thing actually keeping him alive in the tail end of the story. He wants so badly to face retribution for his deeds, and he can only find the strength to keep towing the line because he knows his violent demise is guaranteed.

Characters like Pieck and Bertholdt seem to accept their lot in life- but deal with this internally and develop their own sense of morals despite it- albeit in different ways and in Pieck’s case with a shade of pessimism. Falco and Marcel stand out as a characters who see the farce for what it is- but still want to subject themselves to it in order to prevent someone they love from suffering through it in their place.

Eren, though, it’s easy to see how discovering he has already lived more of his life in powerless ignorance than what he has left is what ultimately causes the collapse in his character. Combine that with the way that he sees ‘future memories’ and doesn’t see any future beyond his own, and suddenly you have a naturally impulsive and violent person living in the most fatalistic reality ever. It makes perfect sense that his fall from grace is near immediate and precipitous.

What difference does all that power make if all it means is that you become a tool for destruction with no future? That you will be forced to curse someone else so that this cruel power will continue to exist? That is the true legacy of Ymir and the Eldian Empire- you can have near limitless power, but you will never have true control over your own life.

And it makes for such interesting discussions and questions about power and mortality and agency- and all the seemingly ‘correct’ and ‘incorrect’ ways to respond to their dilemma.

Anyway, it is always ‘thinking about the moral quandary of the titan shifters’ hours around here…

[iridiss]

I think because Aphmau is a self-insert character, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what her personality is, because her personality is just…Jess’s personality. If a little different. Which makes it hard for me to get into Aphmau’s head, to see exactly how she works, what makes her tick—it doesn’t come naturally to me at all, and I wouldn’t be surprised if I wasn’t alone in that regard

Now that I’m finally working on my MCD rewrite, I really want to make sure I get Aphmau’s personality right, especially since she’s literally the protagonist character and likely the most common POV I’ll be using. I want to find a way to copy how watching her POV in-game felt, and make it so that it feels the same when I’m writing the fic. Lately, it hasn’t been feeling the same at all, and that’s mostly intentional, since I want her to evolve into the “unintentionally badass” woman that she is in the canon series. I want her to start off as kind of bright-eyed and naive, similar to Mystreet!Aphmau, as a newcomer to the world whose never seen a lick of war and violence in her life. Mainly because I know she’s going to be exposed to all of that later and fundamentally changed by it. But as I’m studying canon MCD Aphmau and trying to break down everything she does, how she thinks, the choices she makes and the patterns therein that define her, what choices she doesn’t make and what that says about her as a person… I think I have already strayed too far from the original in places.

Additionally, though Aphmau was still significantly emotionally affected by every little heinous thing that happened to her and her people, throughout season 1 she didn’t experience any sudden shift in who she was as a person. I’ve yet to finish rewatching season 2, so I could be wrong, but to me, it more seems like she held herself together and stayed largely the same person. But she was being slowly chipped away emotionally by everything that got added to the pile. From Brendan getting shot to Aaron’s death, it’s like there’s a million different little nicks and cuts in her mental health and psyche that have simply built up over time. Some of those scars are larger than others, like the 15 year timeskip and losing Aaron/Garroth/Laurance, but they all weigh on her psyche and make her progressively more anxious, more careful, more…traumatized? She’s traumatized and she’s not. I’d like to at least headcanon her as traumatized, probably severely by season 3. I’d like to think she’s a woman with the whole entire world on her shoulders and a million ghosts haunting her wherever she goes, and all of this leads to a great deal of stress and anxiety in her day-to-day life that she’s just kinda… Living With. She muscles through it. She keeps going. There are even moments I’m noticing in canon where she doesn’t allow herself to fully dwell on her grief and stress, saying it’s “selfish” to let them consume her, and then moving on to check on literally everyone else in the village and make sure they’re okay first.

Aphmau is a character that’s hard to understand in the broad strokes, like how you can see Laurance’s broad strokes of “Casanova” and “fiercely loyal” and “in love with Aphmau” and make a pretty easy surface mold of what he’s like. It’s like every other character has at least one or two giant, broad strokes of paint on the wall that distinguish them as unique.

Garroth is a gentleman, Kiki loves her animals and can be stubbornly gullible. Donna is sassy, Dale is an alcoholic, Katelyn is fierce, Travis is playful and flirtatious, Aaron is brooding and guarded, Logan has a stick up his ass, so on and so forth. But they all have really easy to find smaller pieces that you can find and study as well. MCD!Katelyn is much more calm and reserved and proper than her Mystreet counterpart, and on occasion waxes philosophical and drinks tea. Kiki has always wanted to be a mother. Brendan is a horse girl. Garroth is terrible at being ~romantically forward~ like Laurance is, and instead he gets flustered and stuttery and shy and struggles to talk about his feelings with others. Laurance is gentle and caring and will tenderly take care of you and nurse you back to health with a mature, gentle warmth that puts his cocky Casanova personality aside, still flirting and teasing every now and then, but only for the purpose of cracking a joke that would make you smile. And then he reminds you right after how fondly he loves you and how he will never, not ever, leave your side.

Laurance grew up not knowing how to talk to girls, and Sasha was the only female friend he could actually speak to and connect with. Garroth checks on Aphmau in the mornings, asking how she slept and reporting back to her on all the duties she has to tend to for the day. Dale is a brilliant accountant, and that’s his calling in life. Zoey used to regularly prepare tea for Aphmau at night to help her sleep. Logan helped Zoey raise Levin and Malachi during the 15 year timeskip and “secretly” very much loves children. You can find all the little kernels of character and personality and heart in all of them.

But for MCD!Aphmau, it’s like she has one single broad stroke. “Helps others, kind, caring.” And everything else is invisible to me. Mystreet!Aphmau might have a second broad stroke, of “silly and childish and whimsical,” a stroke that MCD!Aphmau has much less of. It’s still there, she still teases and cracks dumb jokes on occasion, but it’s dwarfed in comparison by MCD’s more serious, mature tone and the sheer emotional weight of everything she keeps going through. It’s hard to be silly and have stupid fun when you’re fighting for your life, so in a way, MCD!Aphmau had to grow up in a way that Mystreet!Aphmau never had to. Mystreet!Aphmau’s worst problem (before emerald secret) is “oh no! which cute boy am I gonna date?! Gene is so mean to me in highschool!! Gawd, I wish my mom would let me bring boys home without making it weird, jeez.” She gets to keep her innocence. She doesn’t have to grow up and face the brutality of killers and monsters and the cruelty of the gods, and even after When Angels Fall, I don’t see her heavily maturing and growing as serious as MCD!Aphmau already is on main.

So if MCD!Aphmau has one single broad stroke that, for a protagonist, is actually vague as hell to work with, then maybe she’s a character who is revealed by all the little things that slip through the cracks. Maybe I can paint a picture of what she’s truly, really like (not what I want her to be like) by looking at all the little things, and then working inwards from there,,,

I know she’s at the very least a good person. A very good person. Better than canon Garroth, who has far too many asshole tendencies for my liking after the whole Incel Hell Irene Dimension fiasco (also why the FUCK is he racist—) Better than canon Laurance, better than most people honestly. Which is kind of the point, as an Irene. She’s supposed to be inherently a good, pure-hearted soul, whose destiny and sole calling in life is to help everyone around her. She seems to display a great fear and distress over violence and war. She’s always anxious and freaking the fuck out when she’s in combat (during S1), and building up to the Phoenix War, she was absolutely mortified by the idea of going to war, and yet that distress NEVER boiled over into cowardice. She always chose what was right and stuck to it, stubbornly. Even when faced with the worst of dilemmas, she refuses to succumb to her fear and run away, or pick the easy (and scummy) way out. She cares a great deal about the greater good, even if it comes at a devastating cost to achieve, and by god, she’ll achieve it. When presented with the option of fight or flight, she NEVER picks flight. So she’s brave? Has a strong natural sense of justice? Would she ever make cruel sacrifices, if it was for a greater good? I think I at least know that if I presented her with the option of “kill Garroth and Laurance, or save the entire world,” she would refuse the dilemma entirely and go to EXTREME lengths to forge a third option where she gets to keep the world AND her boys, and everyone comes out unharmed. (And in my mind, this is what distinguishes her from the old Irene…)

She is a herald for peace, above anything else. When Scaleswind destroyed her home as an act of violent rage, she didn’t seek revenge or even allow herself to feel vitriol or resentment for the man that attacked her people. Instead, she (cautiously and hesitantly) accepted his pleas for forgiveness if it meant she could have peace for Phoenix Drop. She held him accountable for his crimes, yes, but she forgave him, trusted him with the Phoenix Drop Alliance, and even trusted him with her people. All the while reiterating to him that she is an agent working for peace, and he needs to get on her level if he wants her forgiveness. She even offers care and aid to all of the rotten O’khasis knights that still swear their fealty to Zane. She brings them to court for their crimes, but she also offers them her care and a place to stay if they need it. She believes in justice, but not cruel retribution. The moral high ground isn’t a weapon she uses to bludgeon others with. She draws her strength by pulling others up with her. Even putting her trust in those unworthy of it at times, but that then inspires them to make better choices and pledge themselves to her cause. Even if you were a horrible, terrible person, she refuses to be downright cruel. It’s very rare to see her anger get the best of her (not that I don’t doubt that has happened at least once or twice in the series, I’m just saying it’s not her go-to choice when resolving any conflict). She will always give people the benefit of the doubt.

I know she struggles with sleeping problems, mainly due to her stress. She did for most of the latter quarter of S1 and when I skipped ahead and watched a few snippets of S2, she was STILL bringing up how poorly she slept last night, so like. You could make a case that she has insomnia. She could have insomnia. And PTSD but that’s a given

She finds babies absolutely adorable and has strong maternal instincts. (a connection between this and her great care for Phoenix Drop as a whole could possibly be strung… I don’t think “maternal instincts” is at all why she helps PD though. I think she just does that…because…you should. Because it’s the right thing to do. Obviously. If given the choice to be kind and help someone, she will always pick that choice, because,,,she just does)

you could make an argument that she has dyslexia. if you made a drinking game out of every time she flubbed reading the lines on the screen you would keel over and die by episode 15 I think.

you could make an argument that she needs glasses because Jess wears glasses for the first little while of S1 before she seems to have switched to contacts for the rest of the aphverse

She loves animals and has more animals than she has children

She seems very slow to develop romantic feelings for anyone. I think she only really started to develop little bits of romantic feelings for Garroth come late S1, and for Laurance probably like. around episode 95ish if you’re pushing it early, but honestly she probably only developed feelings for him after the entirety of season 1. after Laurance and her had already become very close and intimate on a platonic level. And any of his flirtatious advances prior to that she CONSISTENTLY responded to with flat out rejection, disgust, exasperation and annoyance with zero romance in sight. meanwhile she’s been very affectionate with Zoey from the beginning and is much more sweet and domestic with her than any of the boys, so like. I can definitely see where all the aroace spectrum aphmau headcanons in the fandom are coming from now and I wouldn’t be surprised if she was some form of demiromantic as well, but that’s straying out of canon aphmau territory and into headcanon land

Her worst fear, confirmed by Malachi, is seeing the entire village be burned to the ground with everyone she loves inside. Seeing Garroth and Laurance and every single villager murdered before she can do anything to stop it. She’s scared of losing them (and wow guess exactly what ends up happening… Garroth gets lost in the Irene dimension…Laurance becomes a cold and cruel shadow knight and she loses him to the nether… Aaron dies and becomes the shadow lord… girlie can just not win. and I’d like to explore more of the deep emotional impact that could’ve had on her—your worst fear is losing everyone you loved, seeing them get torn out of your hands brutally and violently, and..that happens. that happens to her anyway. to all of her boys, individually. there’s no way that’s not traumatic and emotional as hell for her) maybe you could even play into the idea that she has abandonment issues…

Every now and then she shows a few signs of toxic positivity and emotional repression. “Smile and be happy, focus on the work that’s important right now instead of completely and utterly crumbling under the weight of my grief and trauma” type shit. I feel like I can’t help but notice a running pattern that she keeps being presented with dialogue options that are emotionally vulnerable and intimate in some way, usually ones that progress her relationships with others (both romantically and platonically) and express a great deal of care or feeling…and then there’s the exposition dump dialogue option that continues her constant search for information that furthers the plot, and she often chooses that instead. Like for example, in one dialogue option with Aaron, she doesn’t say, “I really care about you, please, can’t you trust me?” Instead, she chooses to say, “What will you do?” Which is much more business talk as opposed to spilling her heart out to people. She seems to apologize for herself whenever she expresses a heightened amount of emotion, especially if it’s sadness or grief or anger, and again, I’d like to point to her taking 90+ fucking episodes to allow herself to feel any sort of intimacy with Laurance, the very man who has been constantly showering her with affection, and not just the dumb flirty stuff!! But like deep, sincere proclamations of ��you matter to me,” and “I’ll never leave your side” and “you are my world, aphmau”!!! Bro I would have MELTED into his arms 70 fucking episodes ago if I met a man that talked to me like he does!! But she doesn’t!! SHE KEEPS HIM AT ARMS LENGTH!! THATS NOT NORMAL!!! Especially when EVERY OTHER character in the cast keeps falling in love at first sight. (so intimacy issues? trust issues? probably not trust issues. fear? too much on her mind? demiromantic ?? or probably a mix of all of the above + a dash of headcanon for the sexuality part)

And it’s so fascinating to see what she could say, but doesn’t. And sometimes you’ll even see her hesitate over the other, more intimate dialogue options, and then decide otherwise. It’s utterly fascinating to think that a character hugely defined by her heart might struggle with vulnerability.

She also hesitates over funny options a lot but decides against them because the serious, emotionally mature options are more appropriate and polite for the situation at hand lol. Laurance is a frequent exception to this rule, she will tease him no matter how serious their conversation is lmao (Laurance brings out her more forgotten whimsical side…?)

So on and so forth while I continue my binge rewatch of the entire series and collect more. So far, she seems to be overall: Kind. Gentle. Soft, warm, friendly, forgiving, understanding, merciful, patient. Playful and whimsical, though that’s become more forgotten with time and hardship. Serious, very emotionally mature, very much a source of wisdom among her peers. Inherently strong sense of justice, will always fight for the right thing. Brave and persistent. Refuses to ever back down from a challenge. Probably at least a little emotionally avoidant and I would not be surprised if she struggled with a particularly harsh inner critic. Optimistic. Never lets go of her heart, led by her heart much more than her brain, though that isn’t to say she isn’t smart, she’s not an idiot. Loves animals. Natural leader. Maternal. Insomniac. Probably neurodivergent, possibly aroace, possibly dyslexic, most likely needs glasses. Traumatized, very much so. Very stressed and anxious (please god someone give her a break). Carries the weight of the world on her shoulders but refuses to let herself crumble, even if she is exhausted and worn down and at her limit. you also cannot look at Zoey and Aphmau’s daily interactions and tell me there isn’t at least a little bit of sapphicism going on there. they love each other so much <3 and if not, she is a single mother going through literal actual hell and hanging on by a string but through the force of necessity and probably at least a little bit of toxic positivity and emotional avoidance she will persevere whether she wants to or not

and I will continue to learn more as we go along 👍

[charliewinter60]

Charlie and Elle's identity arc - Heartstopper Season 3

Both characters have conversations with people who "don't mean any harm or ill intent", but say things that are very ignorant or offensive towards Charlie and Elle. Elle has that fucking interviewer going on about the "trans debate" (And like Elle said, trans people aren't a debate, they are human beings), reducing her whole person to just being "the trans girl", completely ignoring the fact they were gonna talk about Elle's art and rise to fame: and Charlie has a conversation with his uncle at Christmas, and while Charlie has had a shit ton of things going on in his life (His new boyfriend, him playing the drums, Uni being soon, his french trip, etc.), the only thing his uncle asked him was him going to the psych ward and nothing else (And then the cousins chiming in and the unnecessary comments early that day about his weight from his grandparents.)

First of all, this does amazing commentary and presents how people who don't even have bad intentions, can still cause harm to others even if they don't mean it. Not meaning to do something doesn't mean you didn't do anything. That fucking interviewer may have just wanted to be an Ally and try to defend trans people, and Charlie's family may have just wanted to get to know Charlie and genuinely ask how he is doing, but there's a time, place and language for that.

And if you don't know some things about certain topics, there's this cool thing called Google, because the other (ex. Charlie and Elle) don't have to numb their pains so you (ex. Charlie's family, that fucking interviewer.) can understand a topic. Only if they are okay with it, they are not mandated to be your encyclopedia's in topics you don't understand just because they do.

If you really love or care about someone, you would do the effort to be respectful. Isaac literally told Charlie he didn't want to give a vocab lessons about aromanticism to all his friends and when Charlie asked what aromanticism was, Isaac told him to google it and he did. It's a very tiny scene, but Charlie researching what aromanticism is shows how much he loves and cares for his friend. Isaac showed his boundaries and Charlie respected them. Charlie's family should've asked if it was okay for him to talk about it. (Especially since they keep asking if there were straight jackets and all that? Like? They are all shits and giggles about that, but wouldn't Charlie be traumatized if he did have an experience as they describe it? Why would he talk about it like it's the gossip of the week? Fucking hell.) And well, that fucking interviewer is just evil. Why would this 16 year old be pleased to talk about her sole existence making bigots pissed, wishing she didn't exist? Huuuh? Manipulative fuck.

Charlie is not just "a boy with anoxeria and OCD.". He is a very smart boy who loves astronomy, Greek literature, plays the drums and Mario Kart, loves scary movies and dislikes Marvel movies, and more.

Elle is not just "a trans girl." She is a very creative girl who loves to paint and draw, as it lets her express feelings she can't really put into words; a girl who can make her own clothes, a girl who wants to see the world and see what's out there, a girl who deep down is a very silly and goofy but still stylish and loves to party and more.

And yes, Elle is trans and Charlie does have anorexia and OCD, but you don't just simply ignore those facts, but you also don't reduce them to that. People are so much more than the one thing they are "known" for. if we loved and care for those people, we will do our research and respect their boundaries. 🍂

[9lives2mics]

What are your thoughts on how to support Melissa going forward?

The Book of Carol has been an absolute disaster for Carol and Melissa fans, and season 3 filming is already underway. Melissa wants to play Carol and she wants to work with Norman, so I want to support her. But I actively don't want to support everything else about what this show is doing to her.

It feels like most fans who are left vocalising their views are the ones who still feel positive about the spin-off. I really want to know more about the thoughts of those of us who are more critical of it, because I just don't know what the best thing is to do here.

Mental health wise, it's probably easier to withdraw from the future of TWDU entirely - to not watch season 3 and to not be invested in it anymore. But again, Melissa is still there, and she needs allies, and she needs people who genuinely respect her to see her for her work. It makes me so sad to think how hard she works and nobody is watching - all because her colleagues have pushed us away.

I just want to hear from more people who care about Melissa about how we're responding, and how we can support her.

Hello, dear Anon. I'm sorry this is affecting your mental health. You're right that Melissa deserves our support. I answered this question in the latest podcast episode.

The condensed version of what I said is that your voice matters. It's easy to feel discouraged sometimes, especially when you're speaking up about something important to you. But if you have the capacity to speak up, now is the time.

The teaser + David Zabel's latest comments continue to show us that he has no intention of giving Daryl and Carol a compelling story. Worse, his writing for Daryl and (especially) Carol is downright disrespectful to the characters.

When you're sharing feedback online, remember to be very specific about what changes need to happen for you to stick around. Center your posts around Melissa and Carol. Talk about why her character is important to you. Here are some pointers to keep in mind.

Please remember to take care of yourself too.

For us, it's important that the leadership changes. It's also important that Melissa McBride gets equal billing, an inclusive title, and a showrunner who respects her character and doesn't write her to be a piece in the male protagonist's story or, worse, doesn't make her pick up the pieces of the male protagonist's story.

Carol Peletier broke stereotypes and gender norms. She was the central focus of some of the highest-rated episodes of TWD. She can draw in audiences from different demographics. She's consistently proven to be one of the most resourceful female characters of the flagship show and beyond. And all of this is because Melissa McBride is an intuitive actress with a rare talent and ability to effortlessly tap into the depths of Carol's psyche. She's also a PR person's dream because she's an eloquent and charming speaker. She has a spotless reputation and the ability to garner audience loyalty that builds the audience base for the creative projects she is a part of.

She deserves respect on her own fucking show.

A showrunner who elevates her and writes compelling stories for Daryl and Carol is the only way to ensure the show's ROI and audience retention. We have no interest in investing in S3 otherwise.

— Shalaka

[bonzos-number-1-fan]

TMAGP 28 Thoughts: Spooky Scary Skeleton

We're in the final stretch now. I'm curious to see exactly how things will wrap up but I have a feeling we might see it all unfold in the same night now. As an episode though I've got mixed feelings. Mostly because I'm not really sure I needed to hear much of what happened in this episode's statement. It'll be an episode that will either get better or worse with context for me. If there is a compelling point to this beyond exposition that will shape my feelings on it more than the episode in isolation.

Spoilers for episode 28 below the cut.

This will be a short one, I think. There truly isn't much to comment on IMO. Very explicit and mostly pay offs to a few bits that have happened before.

Trevor is exactly what I was expecting him to be. I've seen some comments about how shockingly different he is but I'm not sure I see it. Sure, his background is different. He's well off now. He's not a better person though, he's still just a ruthless grouchy old man. A treat to have him back. His issue with the contract is a little interesting though. Because, if anything, that proves the opposite of his claim. Presumably Ink5oul didn't actually sign that contract and so isn't actually employed in any capacity but the OIAR. It's not a good look certainly but it's not actually

The data processing and amalgamation tools are locked into a 24-hour cycle

This isn't quite the explanation I was expecting but it makes about as much sense as anything else does really.

It's nice to see Gwen selling out Lena and fulfilling part of her character's promise. Her introduction is basically "I'm going to take your job, Lena" and it's nice to see that's not been forgotten in all the trauma. Personally, I'm most interested in how it all relates to Klaus. He's not likely her major source for all the dirt she's got but he is a character I'm very interested in. He was a large part of the ARG and some of the more interesting background detail of the show.

Sam's run in the not one and only Archivist is pretty straightforward. There aren't really many details in the encounter nor the statement itself I think need picking apart. The bits I think are interesting are mostly things I've covered before too so I won't re-tread much of that. Firstly, the tests Sam talks about are a series of developmental and ethical surveys. We're actually fortunate enough to not only know what tests he was subjected to but how he did on them thanks to the ARG. During that we found CHDB which is a spreadsheet of exactly that. Test results from a lot of kids that the Magnus Institute was conducting. I have the whole thing on my masterdoc which can be found here and each column contains and explanation of what the tests are. Gerry and maybe Alice is on there too. Although I hope Alice isn't.

Next up it's Dr. Welling. A character who's shown up a fair bit but we know very little about. He was first mentioned in episode 17 as the namesake of the Welling Mutare Materia research centre that Darrien 3 got locked up in. In episode 21 he's mentioned through as the PoV character complains a lot about him. We don't really know much more beyond this though and I'm expecting he'll play more of a role in season 2.

Finally, it's just the yellow light to talk about really. This is one of those classic alchemical things that we know very little about these days, most source for it are terribly cited, and extant documentation from the era is either vague or treats it as common knowledge so little rigorous explanation exists. There are basically two things this could be, if it's anything, and that's a reference to sulphur or to citrinitas/yellowing. Sulphur is, well, sulphur. In the alchemical context it's part of the tria prima and as such represents the soul. The soul in this context is the Greek psyche rather than an Abrahamic conception. So it's more about emotion and desire. Citrinitas is one of those bits we know incredibly little about. What we do know is that it's one of the classical 4 steps to create the magnum opus, AKA the great work, AKA the philosopher's stone. Often you'll see people talk about a solar light, or a light from the soul, in this context but, again, we don't really know much about it and I'm not sure I've ever seen someone cite a historical source for that.

Outside of that I'm pretty sure everything is pretty clear. Sam's got some fucked up skellington trauma. What's interesting is what this implies about the other compelled statements we've seen. This one is undeniably Sam's own experiences from his own PoV. That didn't appear to the case with Drowning Victim, as the PoV character seemed to die and then they died. It was hard to tell with the autopsy statement but it didn't seem to be the case as they were, y'know, dead. Which seemed to make the inference that when Gwen had her run in that what she was talking about were someone else's experience. Especially when the context of that statement didn't seem to really match her upbringing. With this one being obviously and undeniably Sam's experiences that one could have been Gwen's and might warrant a little more examination.

Also, just to throw this one out there. I wonder if this Archivist represents the rebis.

leaving the tape recorder to flounder in the rain and stop.

That's a fun, albeit strange, visual.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Incident/CAT#R#DPHW Master Sheet and Terminology Sheet

DPHW Theory: 2578 is a fairly uninteresting set for this incident. Which is good but there is little to comment on.

CAT# Theory: I've still not sat down and worked through a few of my ideas on these. CAT2 is another of those very strange picks if it's Person/Place/Object. Even if the place itself is supernatural in some capacity there are some more obvious things it could be and so that makes this another mostly useless data point.

R# Theory: B seems about right for my ideas.

Header talk: Transmutation (Human) -/- Ceremony (Academic). They're doing it on purpose. I can feel the malice on these now. I'm attuned to the negative vibes. However, this—even more than Gwen's encounter with Ink5oul—raises the question of how this was filed. Metatextually we've had Alex talk about how the headings are written by these characters but this one doesn't seem to be the case. So this is either meta information or there is someone else filing these.

[terapsina]

And those rarest of creatures...

My Top 10 Favorite Canon ENDGAME OTPs

(and I realize some of these will be a surprise because I haven't posted that much about them but... well, when everything is perfect and nothing hurts there's less need for venting... also a bunch of them don't align with my Tumblr heavy periods or precede them entirely, so...)

1. Parker and Hardison - Leverage

The absolute sweetest couple maybe ever. The way Hardison just... loves Parker, without ultimatums or impatience. Just there once she's ready to meet his feelings with her own. And Parker, knowing she's developed feelings for... 'pretzels' and admitting it in the only way she can initially. So good.

---

2. Aneela and Kendry - Killjoys

You give me two amoral queens, have them be evil and immortal, and have them fall in love? I was a goner from the word go. Giving them a sci-fi kid just added fuel to the fire.

---

3. Jo and Zane - Eureka

I shipped the 1.0 version too. But when they accidentally erased the original timeline and had Jo remembering being in love and nearly engaged and having Zane not? Damn. Talk about angsty ship bait.

---

4. Kensi and Deeks - NCIS: Los Angeles

Sunshine and gunpowder. Freaking made for each other and doing a proper piney slow burn. My jam.

---

5. Magnus and Alec - Shadowhunters

I mean. Do you think I could resist a grand wedding crash with a 'if your son wants me gone he's going to have to say it to me himself' with the widely grinning sister of the miserable groom going 'I invited him'? What am I, made of stone? (War of Hearts is tattooed on the inside of my eardrums).

---

6. Nico and Karolina - Runaways

Okay. But like, even beyond the flawless imagery of Gothic Witch Queen and Royal Heir of Sunshine and Rainbows... they were so captivating. So ready to sacrifice anything for each other's happiness. I love them your honor.

---

7. Xiao Lanhua and Dongfang Qingcang - Love Between Fairy and Devil

"Everything in this world is fate. Only love is not fate."

Talk about ripping out my heart. In a story built around two people more trapped by fate than anyone, they save each other by doing the one thing fate has no say over.

(I usually prefer my romances to be the B and C plots, but these two? They are the exception that proves the rule. This whole show is their love story and I was spellbound for 36 episodes straight).

---

8. Shawn and Jules - Psych

So. Much. Pining. And the inclusion of the cruelest 'I love you' known to man, because who doesn't love a good 'I've been shot, and the guy who shot me just let me call my girlfriend but I'm using the call to give out clues about how to find me, so I'm pretending you're Abigail, but he's listening and he wants me to tell you that I love you and I know... think... suspect... that saying it will hurt you, but I don't have a choice and I'm so sorry'.

---

9. Nikita and Michael - Nikita

They both know what it feels like to lose someone you love. Which is why the way them kinda having at least a scene a season where one of them thinks the other just got killed is brutal. But I live for the looks on their faces when they figure out they're wrong.

---

10. Korra and Asami - Legend of Korra

What's more fun than falling in love with the ex boyfriend's ex girlfriend? Nothing. They got me to stand up and pay attention right quick once I realized where this was going (and the finale was how I started watching reaction videos... it made me so happy watching everyone else cry, cheer and squee too)

[wrenwinchester]

Reasons Psych and Supernatural should have a crossover:

1. Woody (the coroner from Psych) being Zachariah’s vessel.

2. Shawn and Cas talking about cats, possibly talking to cats/interrogating them

3. There are so many shared actors between Psych and Supernatural (Woody/Zachariah, Lassiter/Cain and many more)

4. Just the fact that there are literally so many “references” to Supernatural in Psych and the fact that Shawn and Gus are essentially a slightly less codependent version of Sam and Dean (anything can be a supernatural reference if you try hard enough.)

5. It would mean Metatron occasionally works part time as a security guard at an old folks home as a guy named Jervis.

6. Shawn and Gus could meet the ghost facers who got lost in their way to LA and ended up in Santa Barbara.

7. It would mean at some point Cain decided to go to the Police academy and join the Santa Barbara police department. (Alternatively one of his descendants looks just like him) (However I’m going with the first option because it definitely explains Lassiter’s fascination with the Civil War.

8. Fake FBI/Fake Psychic hijinks

9. Shawn would be a role model/older brother figure for Dean (he’s two years older than him).

10. Both Shawn and Gus and Sam and Dean get mistaken as a couple occasionally.

11. Shawn likes Bees, Cas likes Bees, and Cain (thereby Lassiter) likes Bees.

12. Shawn and Dean fangirling over cowboys.

13. The dual ADHD hijinks of Dean and Shawn, mixed with Sam and Gus being over their shit.

14. Dean hitting on Juliet only to get shit from Shawn even thought they aren’t dating yet.

15. Juliet flirting back with Dean to mess with Shawn

16. Lassiter recognizing Sam and Dean from the FBI’s most wanted from 2006-2007ish and trying to prove it’s actually them but failing.

17. Shawn Spencer, Psych season 5 episode 2, “nothing shuts my pie hole but pie.” Just another reason Shawn and Dean would be best friends.

18. Shawn and Dean both have an obsession with scooby doo.

Just Please.

P.S. I love the idea of Shawn and Dean being best friends for many reasons, however, Shawn being a passenger Princess, and Dean not allowing anyone else to drive is just too perfect.

P.P.S. Also Woody being Zachariah’s vessel is just hilarious to me.

Edit: added #16+

[foundfam2754]

S17e7 live reactions!

spoilers...obviously

am i the only one who's always nervous before a new episode? i just might too invested in this show after all

i have avoided spoilers all day, let's do this thing

why hasn't this FBI director ever come back into the storyline? i feel like it means a big twist might come back in the season finale...

is this unsub connected to gold star???

oh my god his skin jfc

man you know the quiet unsubs are the scariest

WHAT THE FUCK HIS SKULL

this guy is just saying what he needs to isn't he to get out

holy crap okay what a start to this episode

i'm closing my eyes omg

how do you even build something like that in your apartment - WITHOUT getting hurt

OMG WHAT. THE. FUCK. holy crap aisha did you direct this to scare the bejeesus out of me THAT IS HIS ACTUAL SKULL

OH I JUST SAW FELICITY'S NAME COME UP - welcome, dr. jill gideon!!

damn damn damn PG's outfits this ep!! damn

where are tara and dave? and tyler? and everyone else lol

wait also is my favorite friendship group - penelope, her best friends, and her boyfriend

HAHA emily, poor tyler

ok I kinda love tyler the profiler

"flex" lol why did that sound so wrong coming out of paget's mouth

"mr. sensitive" lol buddy's getting hit left and right

i feel like....that's not a lot of files for 4 years

anyone getting "don't 'Emily' me" vibes

not sure you can say that dave - emily "died", and you were buried underground

lol "that's adorable!"

"i don't have asthma" "you will in a minute" lmao i love their friendship

that's an incredible shot omg (of them turned back from each other, holding hands in bed)

okay as a psych major, this whitepaper stuff is really intellectually interesting

OH THE STARE TO MR GREEN

"of course I am, but not with this" lol i love chaotic emily

"Garcia" ah so he's not so in love anymore is he

aww i never really connected with gideon, but I do miss him <3

EMILY YOU WERE FORBIDDEN

aww road trip!

ergh... smarmy lawyer

elias does love a good contingency

man sicarius is a good profiler

holy crap elias you are straight up horrifyingly evil

"polite. nonviolent" lol i love how funny this season is

YOU ARE NOT FRIENDS YOU LOVE HIM HE LOVES YOU PENELOPE YOU ARE KILLING ME

also don't tell me "it's why you and i are finally friends" ISN'T flirting

"thanks, friend!" "you're welcome, friend!" okay they are straight up flirting, listen to the tone, her facial expression, his facial expression, THEY ARE FLIRTING

also calm down kids, jj's right there

"how's hotch?" "what about derek morgan?" "spencer?" lol they're really honing in that our bois are gone :(

AW BB JASON IN THE CORNER IN THE PHOTO FRAME

oh there's a difference between fiancé and fianceé? i didn't think there was

"has a goatee he thinks makes him look very distinguished" lmao

oh my god he slept with her didn't he

HOW WERE GIDEON AND HE FRIENDS AFTER THAT

lol rossi was such a player

HAHA omg EMILY YOU ARE SO BAD. i love how chaotic she's being

why do i have a feeling emma may be a figment of his imagination?

sir, she's bleeding

damn luke's so hot as he's profiling

WHAT? Okay I did not see that coming

BRO I KNEW IT EMMA'S A FIGMENT

luke and the megaphone!! i repeat, luke and the megaphone!!

lol i just realized this show is always sending luke and jj into very dangerous situations

wait this ep is so good man, the plot's amazing and heartbreaking at the same time, we got garvez nuggets, em's hilarious, and aisha's directing is goddamn incredible

NO WAY, THERE'S ANOTHER KIT?

elias is such a good villain, damn

lawyer man, maybe listen to the scary man? don't open it?

and as jill walks in, we continue the trend in this show of david rossi's ex-girlfriends showing up years later to shock him (oh god they’re gonna get married, aren’t they)

tara and luke be like "who's this lady?"

OKAY I'M SO EXCITED FOR NEXT WEEK LFG

[bluedalahorse]

August for the character breakdown game!

Or if someone else already named him, how about [one secondary character of your choice] from YR?

August you asked for, and August you shall receive! I was hoping someone would ask me about him, and I’m really glad you did.

How I feel about this character: Good lord. The absolute perfect storm of what this character did to my psyche. I am not going to lie that I spent a lot of first season (and significant parts of second and third) screaming at him. And sometimes he makes me really mad at him even now! At the same time, he’s well-written and well-acted and terribly interesting, and I have wanted him to be able to figure stuff out and fix his life from the moment I learned that his father died by suicide and he’s dealing with traumatic grief. I have wanted to climb through the TV screen and pluck him out of an environment like Hillerska. August is such a fascinating example of the way the system fails even those it’s supposed to protect. I just want to break him out of the system, and write him into new situations. In conclusion, what a tragic blorbo I seem to have acquired. (Totally valid if he isn’t other people’s but I see why he’s mine.)

All the people I ship romantically with this character: First and foremost, Sara. I have a weakness for them as two weirdos who see a similar sort of loneliness and want in one another, who get drawn together even though there are plenty of reasons that that’s a bad idea. There are so many stories that can be written about them still. I think Sara breaking up with August was where their relationship needed to be at the end of season three, but I’m not ruling out futures-with-growth-and-therapy or alternate universes. They have the potential to be just as epic as any other pairing on the show! Outside of Sara… well, in my Nils post I talked about how much I ship August/Nils, and how there’s so much there that is currently untapped by fandom. And then Simon/August and Alexander/August are ideas that intrigue me, even though those are more in the realm of deliberate disaster fics.

My non-romantic OTP for this character: I came out of season 3 really enjoying the terrible preppy boy friendship trio so August and Nils and Vincent’s friendship dynamic fascinates me. As someone who went to an odd little college with a lot of traditions, I could relate to it a lot. The people who’ve been in close quarters with you, who you’ve had fun with, but who you’ve also been jealous of and you’re constantly on one another’s nerves… man. I really felt seen by that kind of complexity! I also have to admit I have a soft spot for August and Wille’s relationship, since Malte and Edvin have a lot of chemistry together, and because it seems like August and Wille’s healing is so interdependent. I could talk about that for ages, really.

My unpopular opinion about this character: I cannot even pick one to share because I’m fairly sure most of my opinions about August are unpopular. Liking August itself, in a way a fan does where you want to write fanfic focused on him or ship him with other characters or envision a more healed future for him—even if you repeatedly write multiple paragraph disclaimers about the harm that he did—kind of feels unpopular. And I wish it was a little less unpopular. And maybe my unpopular opinion is that the unpopularity of this opinion (August is indeed worthy of our fannishness) is not wholly by accident. I have no beef with the portion of fandom that just doesn’t particularly like him and doesn’t care to explore him in fanworks. Sometimes you don’t like the dark-haired Byronic asshole and that’s a valid personal preference! And for some people, engaging with August as a character isn’t something they can do with full emotional safety, and I would never want people to have to engage with him if that’s the case for them. He does do legitimate harm. At the same time, there is also a second current in fandom that is actively hostile to fans engaging with August in a fannish way, that uses language in a way that reduces him to his absolute worst deeds and does bad faith readings of any post that dares to explore him beyond the harm he does. I’ve heard stories of sargust edits on TikTok getting endless hate comments, and talked to writers who’ve wanted to write August-centric fic but figured it wouldn’t be worth not getting many hits. I’ve watched an adorable video where Edvin and Malte get interviewed together, only to see that the comments section was full of fans demanding Omar be in the video and not Malte. And I’m just thinking… why are people tearing stuff like this down? Why get angry about there being the bare minimum of nuanced August content out there? It’s not erasing any of the tens of thousands of Wilmon fics and edits. It’s not giving August more screentime in the show or having him take over as main character because the show is already finished. The way that Sara (and by extension Frida) gets caught in the crossfire is doubly upsetting. The lack of August and sargust and nilgust fanworks may be partially due to lack of interest on the part of some fans, but I can’t ignore that active hostility on the part of other fans has also played a role in who sticks around fandom and what they create. And that makes me terribly terribly sad. Because I look at other fandoms and it looks like they have more room for nuanced approaches. Like Interview with the Vampire fandom is having so much fun with Devil’s Minion and I don’t think we have anything like that.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: I wish August and Simon had more of a chance to interact in season 3 without Wille there. I’ve talked before about how Wille and Simon have fundamentally different issues with August, and that they aren’t actually as united against him as Wille seems to think when he gets all hypermasculine and protective. I don’t actually think Simon and August could have resolved all their issues in one season, and they might not be able to period. But they might benefit from some kind of restorative conversations, even if those end in a place of non-closure. And there’s a lot that’s similar in their experiences that they don’t even know about. The worst thing is, it feels like the show is aware of this, and maybe had some moments in mind, but then cut them. Like why have that scene in 2.3 where August tells Vincent to shut up when Vincent’s being awful to Simon? Why have Simon be the one who names August’s eating disorder? I feel like they were meant to have more, and maybe it got cut because it didn’t involve Wilhelm. And honestly that makes me so sad, too.

This got horrendously long-winded and I apologize. But hopefully my answers were worth reading!

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s3 episode 24 thoughts

here we are. the s3 finale. i am so excited!!! and after such a fantastic last episode, my expectations are high. also, having now seen 3 season finales, i have the sneaking suspicion that this one will also be a cliffhanger, which will get on my nerves a bit i’m sure as i get all my s3 stuff around before beginning s4, but again i extend my retroactive sympathies to the people who had to wait like a year to actually see what happened next back when it was airing. 

(author's note: since this one involved a lot of shape shifting, writing a play-by-play description of what was going on was quite tricky. just know i did my best and hopefully that is what matters <3)

this episode description makes it sounds like i’m gonna cry from some mulder family angst. i am preparing myself mentally. 

we shall begin.

we open at a food court sort of situation, which makes me once again mourn the fact that i missed the golden age of malls, as i would have devoured that. oh, it actually seems to just be a restaurant. well, my own wishful thinking, i suppose.

this man is very upset and making others uncomfortable with his loud yelling slash crying. so he pulls out a gun which makes people even more uncomfortable. he says the kids can leave but everyone else has to stay which seems like it will make things much worse for those kids?? but i digress.

a second man emerges from the back, asking the fellow with the gun to please not shoot. this second man is in a suit and tie, and has a very calming presence. to me, he shall be calming man. calming man talks him out of shooting, and i’m thinking yes!! what a save!!!

... until the gunman sees the police arrive, and then he DOES start shooting into the crowed. this is so sad to see happening. shooter has a bullet wound to the chest from the snipers outside sent to stop him, but calming man says he is not going to die, and heals him by placing his hand on him????

WOAH….. calming man….. you have powers…… get him in a hospital STAT, we need him to lay hands on a LOT of people... like a priest with a 100% success rate

mulder and scully are rolling up to the scene. scully is baffled because there is no one that needs medical attention, despite hearing that a bunch of people got shot!!

so she talks to one of the guys that was shot, and he only has a little hole in his shirt, which she simply lifts up and looks under. and i was laughing because she was in Doctor Mode but it is lowkey weird as hell to just lift some dude’s shirt up and analyze his tummy LMAO. oh she is so endearing to me. this man explains that even though he was shot, calming man touched him and said everything would be okay, and it was! that's suspicious. that's weird.

mulder is peeking his head into the car where the shooter is being held (typical mulder activities, peeking his head into places and whatnot) then he gets right in there with him. the shooter’s name is mr. muntz, and mulder wants to know what happened. mulder has some messy hair going on, but he is speaking very calmly and professionally... that oxford psych degree is showing!

mr. muntz says god spared his life, assuming that calming man must have been sent by god OR is god himself. which i suppose is a logical conclusion to draw.

somehow, calming man just DISAPPEARED from the scene. which is not what you want a guy to do in such a situation!!! unless, perhaps, he has fled to do some more miracle working, in which case i hope he teleports far and wide.

cutscene to rhode island. this lady is approaching a house, which is filled with plastic covering all of the furniture.

(author's note: i literally had no idea that "this lady" was mrs. mulder. and honestly given how much attention i pay to all the details- from the exact episode mulder mentioned jimi hendrix that one time to knowing scully did her residency in forensic medicine- i have no excuse for this. it is deeply humbling to realize the limits of my memory, which so often i think is close to fool-proof. i apologize to mrs. mulder but i, for some reason, thought she had brown hair. please accept my heartfelt apology, mrs. mulder. i have only seen you briefly before, which is a reason, but not an excuse for such a careless mistake)

she walks in, and sees a door is open to the outside. so she (author's note: mrs. mulder) follows along, and who does she see but CANCER MAN??? he remarks that everything changes but the sea. well the sea is constantly changing so take that, cancer man.

this woman (MRS. MULDER, god i'm cringing at my past self) wants to know what exactly he wants from her, and he says “we used to have so much to say to each other” ???? “SO MANY GOOD TIMES AT THE MULDERS’ SUMMER PLACE” HUH???

he makes a jab about how bill wasn’t as good at water skiing as he was, but that could be said about so many thing, couldn’t it? and WHERE DOES THIS DUDE GET OFF? 

(this is funny because cancer man lowkey sucks at his job and i won't let him forget that. like at the big UN council meeting everyone was pissed at him for losing the tape and trying to kill skinner and being generally just Fucking Bad at his work, so for him to say all this is quite comical)

the woman says she has repressed it all and i don’t blame her because i would also want to repress any moments with this man, but he says he came her to make her remember something. they’re fighting as a camera takes pictures. WHO IS TAKING PICTURES OF THIS?

okay, back to the virginia crime scene with our agents. calming man has given his name as “jeremiah smith”, but left a fake P.O. box and has no driver’s license. suspicious!!!!

mulder gets a call from skinner- one that “might cause him some alarm”. it’s his mother!!! she has been admitted to the hospital in rhode island, in serious condition!!! skinner stumbles on the pronunciation of the town she's in, but clearly it means something to mulder, because he knows where she is!! he says he is on his way

next thing we see is him bursting in into the room, with scully waiting behind him. something so lovely about scully coming along to be with him at such a terrible moment.

OMG IT’S HIS MOM….. why did i forget what his mom looked like?? am i actually the worst at this?? (<- the moment i Realized)

he grabs her hand and puts his hand on her forehead (i’m going to cry) and scully comes in and explains that she had a stroke. he notices that she is cold and puts another blanket over her (oh my gosh... such an attentive and caring son) and scully tries to reassure him not to think the worst, that people recover from these situations all of the time. i paused to write this down and he has this big sad eyes and i’m gonna CRY. he’s touching her hair and whispering “mom” and AUGHHHH. his only remaining family member...

apparently a 911 call came in… i guess that it was probably cancer man who called. and who probably did this somehow.

OH! she opens her eyes! he smiles at her and tells her everything is going to be okay. ohhh, sweet man...

scully realizes mrs. mulder wants something to write on, and busts out a pen and paper because she is always prepared!!!! and i love that about her!!!

so mrs. mulder writes on the paper “PALM”, which he looks at and repeats, but it’s not clear if he gets what that means or not. here i am thinking that it means some sort of treasure will be hidden beneath a palm tree

he’s watching her being taken away to another hospital as scully looks at some paperwork to figure out what exactly happened to her. and she uses her doctoral skills to tell him that they are optimistic on her recovery. it’s so sweet 😭😭😭 she does everything she can to ease his worries. i love her!!!!!!

but mulder thinks there is a correlation between what went down at the shooting in virginia and here- because she wrote the word “palm”, which is what calming man used to heal the victims of the gunman. and that seems like a stretch to me and to scully, but a grieving mind works in intricate ways, and we already know that mulder has the most intricate of minds, so maybe he's onto something.

he senses that it’s a bit of a leap, and she tries to very gently explain that it might not mean anything, that her brain has been radically changed. she says she is gonna drive him to the nearest motel (😭😭😭) and he says no, we’re going to DC and finding out who this calming man "jeremiah smith" is. omg buddy let her book you a motel and get some rest... but no, for he has entered his bloodhound mode, and there is no stopping him in such a situation

so now it’s 8:25 am the next day, and they are watching some tapes from the news footage while she sits on his desk. and sure enough, they find the guy on the newsreel- calming man jeremiah smith- and they even see that he vanished! it seems like someone else took his place, wearing the same clothes??? now how would that work….

mulder decides he must leave, and where to? “if i told you, you’d never let me go” <- okay well at least he’s sort of honest? scully reminds him he hasn’t slept in 24 hours, but he goes on anyway, telling her to give him a call if she finds anything on the tapes. a sigh from scully as she wonders what the hell he is up to.

now we’re at the social security administration, which is frankly pretty dystopian- so very aggressively white, with spaced out desks, giving extreme retro futurism in that special 90's kind of way. but here is the calming man at a desk, as tons of people in suits and with microphones come in! calming man jeremiah smith walks out the back door and is snagged… under the watchful eye of CANCER MAN??????

seriously, what does this dude even DO beyond be mysterious and nosy?!!!

so they put calming man jeremiah smith in a full body restraint and bring him into some sort of jail cell???? i just KNOW he was not read his rights, too...

mulder, meanwhile, has driven all the way BACK to rhode island, to the house covered in plastic. it is very quiet and dark. he makes his way outside, where we see someone watching him. it’s X!!!!!

X opens the door and tells mulder that cancer man was HERE WITH HER. IT WAS ON HIS ORDERS THE PHOTOS OF THEM FIGHTING WERE TAKEN!!! or maybe it was him hiding in the bushes snapping the pics?? that option is funnier to imagine, so i shall.

X is shocked that mulder didn’t know his mother and cancer man knew each other, but he very seriously says that he has no idea. and X clarifies that he didn’t hurt her, she collapsed AFTER he left- it was X that made the phone call to 911!

ah, that makes more sense than cancer man doing the calling, as i had suspected. although, clearly cancer man WANTS something from her, so maybe he would want to save her life. but then i had assumed he was the one who somehow made her have a stroke- but if he wanted something from her, nearly killing her would make that hard, right? unless he just comes close enough in killing her to scare her... hmm, i'm theorizing, and it feels like some sort of sick chess game.

OH! it seems cancer man wants something in this house. and mulder is surprised because on the day his parents divorced, she promised to never set foot here again. in the "SUMMER HOUSE"- yes, that was the wording he used. bro... how much money were they paying his dad to mess with aliens for them to live in martha’s vineyard AND have a summer house? 😭😭 that was blood money they were paying him fr and it must have been a hell of a paycheck. i have student loans, maybe i should get into the alien secrets business.

so whatever is here has to be important. but mulder tells X he has no idea what it is. xXseems to be hiding something, but maybe that is just his face.

back at the FBI, scully is heading out- or possibly heading back into work? as she does this, “jeremiah smith” arrives! she is very taken aback but jumps into work immediately. he says he is here to turn himself in, because it was claimed he fled a crime scene.

SO WAS THAT NOT HIM IN THE FULL BODY RESTRAINT?? or are we dealing with teleportation here? i mean we have healing already, teleportation isn’t much of a jump i suppose. 

(i was so damn confused lol)

now we are with calming man jeremiah smith in skinner’s office, where he claims that everything seemed like a dream from the moment he told the man to put his gun down forward. he claims he doesn’t remember anything, not even giving a false address. he only remembers showing up for work the next day. so... was his body like possessed or something?

he’s like “what did i do wrong :(“ and scully says he didn’t do anything wrong!!!!! skinner says that he can go, but to let them know if he leaves town. she shrugs her shoulders at skinner, not knowing what happened. scully is so kind...

back to rhode island, where mulder has a flashlight. the house is covered with children’s artwork and whimsical chickens. he’s looking through all of the stuff for anything of interest. it’s a fascinating walk through of how they must have lived, with her sewing kits tucked in drawers and toys in boxes. something about seeing their childhood makes my heart want to melt. poor kids, they had no idea what was to come...

he’s getting angry at not finding anything of use, tossing things around, before sitting on the now non-plastic covered couch, when he pulls her note out- and realizes that “palm” is an anagram for “lamp”! is this a clue??? must we inspect the lamps??? of which there are many???

yes, we must. he’s throwing this first one into the wall like link when he sees a pot that might have a rupee in it. but it doesn’t seem to have anything useful in the first one, so it becomes a lamp tossing session. and in the second one, he finds a metal tube thing!!! 

when he presses the side of the metal tube thing, a giant needle emerges!! is this one of those needles they used in s2 to vanquish the nearly indestructible aliens?? are there more in any other lamps??

now cancer man is back in the jail cell with the dude he took hostage that i thought was calming man jeremiah smith. well, whoever it is, he has jeremiah smith’s face. cancer man very dramatically sits in front of him and lights up. jeremiah says he isn’t ashamed of his actions, but cancer man says he isn’t “allowed to put your indulgences ahead of the greater purpose”. OH! so this must be a real life alien. that takes people’s shapes? i suppose?

YES! like that hit man did in the s2 arc that wound up with mulder nearly dead after the battle of that strange submarine!! whose blood induced the virus that led him to be soaked in an ice bath! i’m recalling!!

so, calming man jeremiah smith says he no longer believes in the "greater purpose", to which cancer man replies “then your fate is just”.

now hold on. what are you going to do to this man? there might be some intergalactic diplomatic repercussions for acting unwisely here, bucko.

they’re having a poetry off as they talk about duty and the terror of jeremiah smith giving the people hope. cancer man says men can never be free because they are “weak, corrupt, worthless, and restless”, some of my favorite adjectives . so he sees himself as this authority figure adjacent to god in this world in which man no longer believes.

well he's wrong on many accounts for 1. he is not god, just a guy who lowkey sucks at his alien job, and 2. scully is very much a believer of god and science, so take your stupid dichotomies and ego and smoke on THAT, cancer man

oh, but the tables are turning. “how many must die at your hand to preserve your stake in the project?” ooooh read him, calming man jeremiah smith!!! get him for me and again for missy.

cancer man seems deeply unsettled and tries to get out because calming man jeremiah smith is no longer calming man… HE HAS A NEW FACE?? IS THAT DEEP THROAT! he seems deeply scared… was cancer man scared of deep throat??? what was their power dynamic?!? oh, the things we will likely never know...

i have missed seeing deep throat around. but cancer man basically says that this alien’s execution date is coming. damn. they kill you for saving others. we really live in a society...

back to mulder, who is barging into skinner’s office. he tells his secretary to hold his calls, and it is appearing evident that he has not slept in a long time. he walks right into a meeting between skinner and scully, and says he wants his name and everything about "him"! which "him", you ask? you know the one!

“i want the smoking man smoked out; i want him exposed to be the murdering son of a bitch that he is” he says, and YAAAAS i have been wanting to say these lines for 3 seasons now!!!

skinner is not pleased with this, and reveals that he doesn’t even KNOW his name, nor how he can find it, and they are yelllling. mulder says to scully that cancer man is trying to kill calming man jeremiah smith, but she says that he had JUST been there, and he works for the social security administration, which sets mulder off on another quest. in which she joins!!

(skinner says something really interesting here- that there might have been a time when he could have been able to find out cancer man's identity, but that time has since passed. very interesting, i'd love to know what that means...)

off to the faraway and magical land of the social security administration, where mulder apprehends jeremiah smith. he looks to scully asking what is going on, and she also has no answers. 

so they get to the FBI and he starts to bolt!!! he falls down and comes up… with a new face?!! and then he disappears into the crowd!!! 

SO WHAT IS GOING ON??? are there TWO ALIENS?? are they TELEPORTING?? are they shapeshifting?? HUH??

cancer man goes back to the individual i shall now refer to as the “jail cell alien” because he no longer bears the face of calming man. damn, this is really confusing to write out, and very much tied to visual media as a storytelling vessel. i hope that you are familiar with what i’m talking about so you have any idea what i’m even saying, because i realize it sounds deeply incomprehensible.

alien asks why cancer man is so afraid of him, and claims that he knows everything about him. OH! “you think you’re god- you’re a drone, a cataloguer, chattel”, says cancer man, to which he is met with the reply “what you’re afraid of is they’ll believe i am god”

HEY WHAT! so what exactly is this dude’s job description?? like, either of them.

they’re talking about god and belief and fear and rule- “they don’t believe in Him, but they still fear Him” <- ooooh banger line on part of the cancer man.

(it seems that there is probably some very intentional real-world commentary on the illusion of freedom under democracy, the nature of the surveillance state, and how people are satiated under capitalism with all this talk to appeasement and there not being a god, but i’m not trying to crack that right now. i’m trying to figure out what this alien dude does beyond heal people and be cryptic. he says that humans have love, which makes them “better than us- better than you” SO WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? can he feel no love?)

they’re referring to some sort of process, and how cancer man wants to be involved when it begins, which i’m guessing is referring to some sort of alien-human joint conquest or hybridization or something?

GASP! alien changes his face again and proclaims that cancer man is… DYING OF LUNG CANCER!

fork spotted in kitchen. however, cancer man is sincerely gagged and doesn’t believe it. the absolute buffoonery going on…

now the alien from before that had escaped from the clutches of our agents has shape shifter again?? into the hit man we saw in s2! with the special alien killing needle!

so my memory is foggy… these aliens that the hit men are hunting are dissenters from the overall alien regime, right? they’re not different species of alien entirely? 

but then what/who are the little grey ones…. are we witnessing intergalactic warfare here…?

(i gotta be so honest, i come here for the lingering tension between mulder and scully, so i’m a little fuzzy on how the actual alien stuff works)

anyway, the cronies of cancer man are bringing the hit man and his lethal needle into the cell where they’re holding the alien formerly known as calming man jeremiah smith, but… he isn’t in there!!!!! where did he go!!?!

so we have two aliens, both shapeshifters, taking the same face at times, one trying to kill the other. also cancer man is here and mulder’s mom is in the hospital, and for some reason she had one of those needles in her house. okay, i’ve got it.

back to the hospital- his mom isn’t getting better, and he is struggling to hear that, pulling a chair next to her while his eyes fill with tears. he’s crying as he holds her hand to his cheek. poor mulder :( losing all of his family :( it’s so sad honestly to see him cry :(

he leaves the room, attempts to compose himself, and sees cancer man in the hall!!!! uh oh! so mulder GRABS him, throws him against the wall, and pulls out his gun, saying “you gonna smoke that, or you want to smoke on this?” <- WHEW!!!!!!! he was not playing around before but now he is a NEW level of locked in… but careful… if you kill him, what he knows goes with him….

he even offers to give him brain damage but not kill him, so he can suffer like his mother does (DAMN!), which prompts the reveal that cancer man has known his mother since before he was born. he thinks about this and decides that he does NOT give a fuck.

he claims that SHE contacted HIM, (which isn’t what happened because we SAW what happened at the start of the episode?? he wanted her to remember something??) and also that he has possible information on his sister’s location. how many people are going to use this line on our guy...?

mulder puts the gun down as a nurse walks in, pivoting to asking where his sister is- but the man who might have that information has disappeared, according to cancer man. so he must be referring to the alien formerly known as calming man jeremiah smith.

mulder keeps saying that he has what he wants, presumably referring to the lethal needles, but cancer man denies wanting anything except to see how his mother is doing. he furiously puts his gun away. 

back to scully cam!!! it’s late at night, but she is still at work, and she has her glasses on because she’s on the computer <3 she seems… puzzled. for the social security administration has records on SIX different jeremiah smiths, all from different locations, but with the SAME FACE!!! this is weird enough to prompt a call to mulder, who has no service, but is very angry in an empty parking lot. 

X emerges into the parking lot- he is always emerging from places- and asks if he has “it”. he demands mulder give it to him, but he refuses. 

mulder (correctly) points out that it is a weapon used to pierce the back of an alien's neck, which is the only way we can kill “them”. and X says it’s value will soar when the truth is revealed, so i’m wondering if we can get a rough time frame on when that will be so i can get my things in order before then. X says they will kill him for it, even if it risks making him a martyr and his research coming to light. oh, they must want it really bad... maybe it's a special kind of needle you just can't get on earth.

mulder says to X, so you’re talking about colonization, and you have a date, don’t you? but he refuses to give the weapon over. prompting a battle! they seem pretty evenly matched, and they both pull their guns out. 

“if you shoot me, you’ll never find it” “i ought to shoot you anyway, after everything i’ve given you” says X, and WELL! X, you didn’t really do all that distribution of clues to mulder out of the goodness of your heart, did you… you’re leading him on a little quest on cancer man’s order’s, aren’t you???? I THINK YOU ARE!! but i don’t KNOW, because why then would he SNITCH on cancer man with those photos??!!!!

(not super clear on why exactly mulder wants to keep this thing other than keeping it out of the hands of evil, but maybe that is enough of a reason for him)

so they both have guns pointed at each other, and they’re limping away, and X announces that mulder is a dead man one way or the other. ????!!!!! i do not want him to be a dead man...

scully comes home to her place at 1 am… but someone is at the door. someone claiming to be jeremiah smith!!!! chat... do we believe it? and how did he even find where she lives...

he asks to be let in… and she is gonna let him in…? with only 3 minutes left in the episode….?! seems a risky move!

he says he has information on her partner and his sister. and scully says, well why didn’t you bring that up before!!! a very valid question! but get this- it's because he’s never SPOKEN to her before- that other man was an imposter, sent there to kill him!!!

OOOOH okay. so now the dual shape shifting aliens thing makes sense. one sent to hunt the other for breaking the rules... got it.

her phone is ringing as this goes down. it’s mulder, saying that “they” are looking for jeremiah smith, and to meet up off the I-95. so it’s very dark and creepy as they go to the rendez vous point.

mulder makes scully get behind him, getting between her and the alien formerly known as jeremiah smith (🩷) as he pulls out the alien killing needle. and this guy claims to be the OG calming man that healed those people, but that’s not really enough evidence for a guy like mulder. despite mulder's suspicious, the alien keeps saying he can explain everything. but first, mulder orders that he must come to see his mother.

OMG! so he wants to use the alien's powers to heal his mother! do you think it could work? i mean, a stroke and a bullet are different kinds of hurt... but maybe he could pull it off?

OH NO!!! who rolls up to this dark and creepy scene, but the hit man!!! a loud crescendo of music is playing and we get a TO BE CONTINUED

DAMN YOU, CHRIS CARTER!

i mean, i knew a cliffhanger ending was coming, but STILL.

okay, so what am i thinking about this episode… i am thinking that i don’t really know what is going on or where the loyalties lie. but it seems that alien colonization is eminent? and where does X fall on all of this? i assume he wanted the needle killer tool so HE could kill the REAL alien formerly known as calming man jeremiah smith, like cancer man wanted, for rebelling against their alien treaty and healing someone. but if that is what he wanted it for, and he is aligned with cancer man, why did he go behind his back to do the snooping on him with mulder’s mom?? was he trying to get mulder as an ally to do cancer man’s bidding through sneaky tricks??? or was he going to keep the needle out of cancer man's hands, and felt he could do it better than mulder could, so that by asking him to give up the needle, he would be saving mulder's life and risking his own? does he actually give a damn about mulder? also, how many different kinds of aliens are there??? and are they all lying about samantha?

so huh. umm. that was a lot of questions and not a lot of answers.

as interesting as this episode was plot-wise, and as much as i love angst, and how it pains me to see mulder mourn the potential loss of his mother, something in this episode just didn’t quite compel me. and then i realized: not enough scully. a criminal mistake, imo. takes what could be an amazing episode into an inherently mediocre one. 

but, what we did see of her was her kindness, using her doctorly knowledge to try and lift mulder’s spirits, risking a lot of danger to try and get the answers for him, even if it means getting involved with alien bullshit. maybe she thinks it’ll bring her answers about her sister and her own abduction… yes, that has to be it. still, a grave sin to omit her. it just feels fundamentally Off.

so, that was the end of s3! well, as i have done twice before now, i’ll make my season wrap up posts before i get onto s4- even if it does end with a cliffhanger that is honestly SO rude. i’ll have to go over all my notes again to find the best moments and compile them, which is always a task (even if it is a major treat). and i have a feeling there will be a LOT of favorite moments this time around. plus i'll update the masterpost.

thank you to everyone who read this far, and reads this blog at all. i can't believe i am on season 4! it really makes my day to see people's reactions to the episode, learn fun facts, and experience the community in this fandom that i am otherwise denied by my persistence in avoiding spoilers. please feel free to go back and interact with old posts, too- it makes me so happy when i get notifications from that.

until next time, you agents in a dangerous back alley with some skirmishing aliens!

[in1-nutshell]

Okay okay, enough torturing Ophelia. How about we bully one of Megatron's other kids from across the multiverse, eh?

And I have just the one in mind.

Ironhold (that's G1 Megatron's kid, right?)

First off, I was curious if you may have also had an idea for Ironheld's alt-mode?

Now, to the main course!

So, in a nutshell: during the events of the '86 movie, was Ironhold there during the battle of Autobot City, or were they elsewhere on some other Decepticon operation when they received the news of their father's "death". And going from their to season 3, what's their relationship like with their reborn father, Galvatron, as well as Cyclonus, Scourge and the Sweeps. Considering how different as people Megs and Galvatron are (despite being the same person, technically). Megatron was sadistic, megalomaniacal, and an all-round psychopathic lunatic. But Galvatron is absolute raving lunatic, impulsive with anger-managment issues to boot (lest we forget the episode in which the Decepticons sign their leader into the literal psych ward).

I was tearing up watching that movie. I want justice for how they did everyone who died dirty in that movie.

In a nutshell...

Ironhold was there on the front lines of the attack on Autobot city with their father.

They had been traveling on another ship of their own to Autobot city when they heard the massacre that happened on board the other ship.

It was horrifying to hear as they shakily landed the ship.

This wasn't how the war was supposed to end...

They found themselves once again in front of Prime ready to shoot.

Megatron saw them and was ordering them to shoot.

This wasn't how the war was supposed to end...

They don't know how, they don't know why they did it, but they dropped their weapon and helped Optimus up.

No one believes what has just happened.

Ironhold tries to persuade Megatron to hold his fire, to talk this out with them and Prime...

Ironhold didn't know what hurt more.

The look on their father's face or the pain in their fuel tank when he fired his canon.

They black out to only wake up inside Astrotrain with everyone but their father present.

Rumble has their helm on his lap with Soundwave and the minis guarding their body.

The news of Optimus and Megatron's death shook them to the core.

This wasn't how the war was supposed to end...

...

As for Galvatron, he is the reason Ironhold quits the Decepticons.

They cannot stand this version of their father.

They try to everyone else to see that this is a bad idea, but no one would listen.

Not even Rumble.

It physically pains them to leave in secret to warn the Autobots on what's to come.

It takes some time for the bots to get used to their newest member, but they have to admit, having Ironhold to the fold is one of the biggest advantages they have had so far.

This wasn't how the war was supposed to end and Ironhold was going to make sure a better ending would happen.

For Megatron.

For Optimus.

For Rumble.

[imperfectnothing]

Inspiration Chart for my sona, Kay (pronounced kye), for the alnst sona season. Below I will explain them :3

I didn't include myself but he's literally me but if I was in Alien Stage so like be nice to me i am just a little guy

Pearl from Steven Universe - the separation of different "lives," the compulsive secret keeping, the strict internal logic, and the neuroticism. His personality has a lot of similarities to hers.

Lapis Lazuli from Steven Universe - seems probably weird to incorporate the self-punishment (both when it comes to Jasper and her self isolation right before the climax of the story), the broken psyche, the separation of identity and the way that she has been identified for so long by other people but not by herself. Also she's just my favorite Steven Universe character and one of the songs that inspired Kay I actually learned from a Lapis Lazuli animatic. so you know

Herta (4 star) from Honkai: Star Rail - specifically this form of her because she's an automaton. Mostly she's just here because of the fact that her consciousness comes from a person separate from her, her physical form is based on a version of that person, and she's permanently detached from that person, the same person but never truly the same person. No personality or anything carries over it's literally just because of the circumstances around Herta as a character. Maybe except the detachment . . . but (shrugs)

Hikaru from the Summer that Hikaru Died - the plot of Kay's character is not actually based on the Summer that Hikaru died but some of his relationship with Aoki, his boyfriend (@bluemoonscape), is heavily inspired by the relationship between Hikaru and Yoshiki. But yeah ironically enough Kay is someone who died and then was replaced by a being that is the same "person" but also they are distinctly a different person and the some of the people in their life have noticed but like at the same time, Kay (and Hikaru) are both trying to play the part of the person they used to be.

Jensen from the Prince of Southland (on Webtoon) - direct inspiration for Kay being an android insofar as being a human with an robot/android brain. Also being very secretive around that fact, being standoffish and kind of cagey, but at the same time, very sincere and earnest when you get to know him (technically also a me trait but like i can say it's character inspired right?? right??

Sad Machine by Porter Robinson . . . "I don't know much about your life beyond these walls, the fleeting sense of love within these godforsaken walls, but I can hear it in his voice, in every call, this girl who's slept a hundred years has something after all" if that doesn't explain it to you i don't know what else to say

tagging @zerostyrant & @apple8ees & @junebluues because they requested it <3 love you all