#who knows maybe im back on my character analysis bullshit

[dogin8]

I'm ngl, and I know that it's said jokingly, in regards to Arcane 2 discourse, a lot of people are hugely minimizing Ekko's intents and impacts. People saying stuff like "Everyone is involved in extreme politics and war meanwhile Ekko just cares about his tree" "Ekko is the lorax" "Ekko just wants his tree to be okay"

As if Ekko hasn't been CLEARLY engaged with the politics and war the whole time.

He's a revolutionary, he built a community, he doesn't turn people away, he directly challenges Jayce's Pilltover-centric mindset literally the whole time they are talking, There's so much to talk about!!

The idea that Ekko only cares about his tree and isn't engaged in politics does a MASSIVE disservice to his character.

[bonesandthebees]

And then thirdly and finally, there’s Wilbur getting the chance to run and staying. There are a few important things to note 1. Wilbur's first instinct is to go find Tommy and his second one is going to the temple. We’re adding new irony to the opening sentence of the chapter : [ ].

Then Wilbur realises he could escape. Operation 2. Wilbur from a few weeks ago would have ran the second he realised. Current Wilbur, who, in his defense, is very drunk, needs a little longer to process. Bless his soul he does lay put an entire plan, but he doesn’t leave. Which again shows a lot of progress because that’s what he’s wanted for ages. He wants to have a purpose and be where he belongs. He wants Clara to like him.

But he’s also finally gotten the opportunity to speak his mind and in doing so, has finally admitted to himself how shit his life was. Just a little but, cuz there’s so much he’s still in denial about. And he did literally vent about how frustrating it is that Schlatt doesn’t listen. He knows that won’t change. So what’s the difference between being there or staying at the temple? At the temple he has Tommy. At the temple he can laugh and joke with Niki and Jack. At the temple he’s allowed to be a person, even if he still won’t let himself accept that he is one.

So Wilbur stays. Even if he can’t wrap his head around why he stays. Or around the fact that he wants to stay. His body makes him stay, but his mind wants to leave. Again not because he wants to, but because he thinks that’s what he’s supposed to do. That’s what Clara would want him to do. But it’s not what he wants. So even if he still wanted to force himself to follow Clara’s will, he ended up doing what he wanted. And that’s a victory. But I except it’s going to sit in his mind a bit because he doesn’t know why he couldn’t leave.

And then Tommy comes back and rightfully has a freakout. Because if Wilbur had run, Tommy would be in a lot of trouble. But Wilbur didn’t run and I think Tommy has a better idea of why. Or maybe he thinks he does. I don’t know how obvious it is to Tommy that Wilbur doesn’t want to go back because he’s (subconsciously) starting to realise that he’s better of here. Tommy does want to know why Wilbur didn’t leave, and he knows to push past the bullshit, but takes the [“I don’t know,”].

(3/3)

-🌲

lmao fun fact that irony of the first sentence was completely unintentional

he's so in denial about so many things still, but he's started to admit to himself how much he hated being in the palace. he's been shown a different kind of life he didn't know was possible, and even if he's not thinking of it consciously, subconsciously he wants that. badly. nothing's going to change if he goes back because schlatt won't listen, so even though it's the selfish choice in his mind, why shouldn't he stay with his friends?

he wants to leave but he doesn't. he tells himself he wants to leave because he knows that's what he should be thinking, but it's not the truth. he made a choice for himself even if he wasn't fully admitting it. he didn't want to leave, so he didn't.

oh tommy definitely knows. something I feel is often overlooked with tommy as a character is how emotionally intelligent he is. he's really good at reading wilbur's emotions so tommy can fully tell that wilbur didn't want to leave. of course he doesn't know that for sure and is aware it could be wishful thinking on his end, but he knows that wilbur's excuse about clara was bullshit so what other reason is there? that's why he takes the 'I don't know' because even if wilbur doesn't know, tommy knows. and he's so, so relieved.

tysm for all your thoughts spruce!! as always i love hearing your analysis :D sorry if some of these answers felt rushed my smoke alarm is beeping bc of low battery so im trying to answer these before i go out to buy a new one so my dog stops panicking lol

[star-mum]

How Ep 7 should’ve actually happened if not for Plot™

OKAY– so I was going to write this as like a scene rewrite BUT i don't want to sksksksks soooorry :D EITHER WAY LET'S GET TO IT BABIES

posting this specially for my angels @pinkchubbiebunnie and @trice-divergent thank you so much for letting me take so much of y'alls time with my bullshit :3

For the purpose of this, I’m going to assume the accusation scene happens somewhat similarly, but the only one who's actually suspicious of Jason is Rachel, cause her thing is directly linked to him and she's more angry and upset than anything. The others will bring the stuff that happened to them but more as in a “huh… something hinky is going on here” and maybe try to investigate it properly

A day after Jason almost dies NO ONE has talked to him until Dawn asks Dick to do it, neither her or Kory seem sure he’s okay enough to do a good job at it – he's obviously distracted with something else. Which leads me to my first 2 points: 1. at least one of them would take that as a clue someone should do a follow up with Jason after Dick talks to him and 2. it's crazy to think that NO ONE ELSE in the entire team didn't even try to check up on Jason – specially Gar or Dawn – that’s stupid at the least and INCREDIBLY out of character at most.

So with that in mind, I'm going to do a character by character “analysis” to show what I think really happened, in an AU where events aren't controlled by Plot™. I'm so glad this is what I'm currently using my psychology education for !! hooray !!

Dick Grayson

i can't say for sure how much of this is an accurate read on Dick’s personality or and how much is just wishful thinking on my part but let's get to it

Even though Dick is – clearly – going through some stuff I think he’d try to be a little more honest with Jason, like actually talk in complete sentences for one, but also actually make sure Jason at least heard him before he bolts out the building. He could've done more, this whole episode Dick is so worried about the past and its implications on him now that he completely ignores pretty obvious warning signs. There's I think 2 things he says that IF FOLLOWED UP BY ACTUAL SENTENCES could have actually meant something:

“Good thing Conner was there -> “Im sorry” SORRY FOR WHAT?????? BE CLEARER PLEASE !!!! Dick does feel responsible for Jason’s kidnapping AND the fall, he knows Conner being there was pure luck, he knows what would've happened if he wasn't – they both do – so apologize like you mean it, say where you failed and what you are sorry for, you can't just hope the other person is going to guess what you meant, SPECIALLY Jason, he doesn't feel cared for, he thinks you're apologizing just to say it, HELP HIM BELIEVE YOU

“All of this is my fault for going alone” -> “No. I don't think that” This ties into the other paragraph but FINISH YOUR SENTENCES !!! SAY WHAT YOU MEAN !!! You could just be saying that to make Jason feel better, thats what hes gonna think anyways, say the words, tell him “I'm sorry I wasn't there for you” “I'm sorry I let you go” “I'm sorry I let you go alone” HE KNOWS Jason is impulsive, he really thought if he let the teens unattended nothing would’ve happen? And YES Jason is grown enough to make his own decisions this isn't ONLY on Dick BUT he could have tried to be a better mentor to him before all this happened, he should tell Jason that

“Rest up” at the risk of sounding repetitive I'm just gonna say, Dick knows Jason is training like that to keep his mind of the bad thing that happened, he’s done it too – probably still does – tell him it that even tho it can help now it won't solve everything forever, connect with him, share your failures and bad experiences with him BEFORE he’s standing on a fucking ledge.

Hank Hall

I fell in love with Hank while writing his part, I'm so sorry

I think Hank would be the 2nd to talk to Jason. First I thought he’d go with Dawn or because she asked BUT !! ACTUALLY !! It makes more sense for it to come from him.

His whole job before coming back to the tower was helping at-risk youth was it not? I know it focused more on addiction but suicidal ideation – and life risking behavior in general – is very linked to people who suffer from any substance abuse, not to mention emotional distress/trauma can be the leading cause for developing it as a coping mechanism (look at me and my professional lingo)

He would recognize the signs, is what I'm saying here. Hank and Jason might not be super tight friends but he cares for the kid, that's clear. I can’t decide how he would approach Jason tho, it could go one of two ways: 1. he uses the training room as an excuse – either during sparring or some other training thing (?) like holding the punching bag for Jason or something, idk im not athletic – so it feels more like a conversation than an intervention AND it would be a good bonding moment for them, to show that even tho they find each other UNBEARABLE, they can still be there for one another OR 2. i did say two ways huh well the second way could be the next morning before everything blows up, he tries – although a little emotionally constipated, cause bro dudes – to have an honest conversation with Jason about the risks of isolating himself after a traumatic experience, THAT approach however – like being more direct – might “scare” Jason a little and make him lash out

Dawn Granger

At first, I had Dawn as the second person who’d talk to Jason, but now I think she’d be third. She's really good at reading people and social situations/cues, so obviously would notice Dick was acting very weird and probably didn’t talk to Jason as well as he could have BUT Hank did go to Jason first, so she’s gonna trust him to do the right thing and talk to the kid when she sees him in the morning – that is, if Hank goes right after dinner, when Jason is still training, which makes the most sense to me.

I think she’d probably talk to Hank first, to see how it went, so she has a better sense of what Jason needs to hear right now. Even if there wasn’t anything to add, she would still wait for him to show up in the common areas — I don’t think she’d go look for him, just wait until “he wants to be found” kinda deal — and the very least tell him she’s glad he’s safe, and offer him a space to talk about what happened. I don’t know how positive of an interaction this would be, but I think anyone — even Jason, in his current emotional state — would find it very hard to snap at Dawn, and IF he did she seems like the person to keep her cool and try and understand their side while still setting down boundaries (she’s so calm when speaking that you’d feel silly for raising your voice, you know?)

Kory Anders

“You're making me feel helpless and I hate feeling helpless” you cannot tell me this woman wouldn't even THINK to check on her number 1 problem child, like that's stupid. HOWEVER I can’t just ignore her reaction to Jason’s death “he made a mistake and didn't learn from it, now he's dead” which is,,, well accurate BUT the problem isn't that Jason “didn't learn his lesson” after Deathstroke, he did, just not the right one – he learned not to trust anyone but himself, people betray him, leave him for dead, accuse him without proof -> instead of learning to lean on and trust others.

So because of that I think she would talk to Jason at some point but not be very nice and sweet about it, she’d be very direct, to make sure this doesn't happen again. Like not mean either, don’t get me wrong, just direct. I think after all the weird inspirational speech vibes from Dick, Hank and Dawn, Jason would appreciate someone talking to him normally and not “babying him”. I'm assuming things don’t escalate so fast at breakfast, so Kory has time after that scene to talk to him

Like I think Kory would also wait until she sees him, instead of seeking him out, and I can definitely hear her saying something like what she said in season 3 -> “you made a mistake, now you have to learn from it, make sure you’re picking up the right lesson”. Probably the most efficient out of everyone, cause she is still holding Jason accountable for his own actions BUT she’s also letting him know he isn’t a lost cause, so even tho he might still say something annoying or even mean back, he WILL think about what she said for the rest of the day

Donna Troy

Donna follows the same like as Kory, very straightforward, although I do think she’d check up on Jason for a more “basic” line, like checking how he’s taking care of himself — if he’s eaten, drank water, also warning him about overworking himself — almost in a casual or even “acidic” way tho —> “there's leftovers in the fridge” instead of asking if he’s eaten, demanding to have the gym to herself when she notices him way too long in there, wordlessly pouring him a glass of water if she’s already getting herself some — she’s more actions than words, to me at least

Garfield Logan

OKAY SO— I realize now I should’ve probably put Gar before Dick for what I'm about to say but idk do that right now. Gar would be the first person to check on Jason after they get back AND it’d go so bad, he’s also the reason dude’s training himself half to death— I'LL EXPLAIN !!!

So Gar is an angel who cares too much for his friends, yes? Of course. AND because of that he feels INCREDIBLY responsible for what happened to Jason: he agreed to go with him check the thing out, didn’t call Dick or tell anyone else where they’d be, agreed to get separated AND didn’t fight harder to go with the older Titans — “maybe with his powers, they’d have a better chance”.

And, unlike Dick, Gar would make that abundantly clear to Jason. But it wouldn’t be well received because Jason isn’t taking Gar’s apology as “I’m sorry I didn’t do more to help you”, he’s hearing it as “sorry I didn’t save you from yourself” WHICH would make him really mad at Gar for “implying” that AND even more mad at himself for doing what he did —> arguing with Gar and then go to the training room to let off some steam from the terrible day/evening he just had

Rachel Roth

I don't know how to say this without making her seem like an asshole but I don't think she would actively check on Jason. There is already so much on her plate because of her powers, she’s still resenting him a bit for what he said, and the mirror thing happens so soon she doesn’t even HAVE time to go and talk to him. I can’t remember now when she argues with Gar but it’d definitely make her even more mad at the whole situation, even if she’s not completely aware she’s projecting that stuff onto her feeling about Jason.

Extra - Zephyr

I wasn't going to, but I love to talk about self inserts/OCs SO if my self insert Zephyr – hero name – was part of this shit show, this is the role I’d want her to play !! : D

Little context: she's my on going self insert for just about anything, literally just me but with powers – if the universe demands – and cooler hair – I missed the days of having fantasy colored hair. She always has some version of “air bending” as her power, cause I noticed that a lot of main casts don't have an air bender in their groups

I imagined her having a kinda bickering rivalry with Jason, nothing too serious but also not super buddy buddy, she doesn't go with him and Gar to check out the thing – she’s not aware they left, until Gar gets back – and when Dick leaves with the older Titans, she follows him after he told her to stay in the tower, cause her powers could be useful – and they are :3 – long story short, instead of Dick catching and then dropping Jason, she manages to stop/catch him with her powers, but before she can start either pulling him back up or lowering him to the ground, Slade sneaks up behind her and knocks her tf out and Jason free falls again. (I HAVE THIS SCENE SO CLEAR IN MY BRAIN !! ITS LIKE REALLY GRUESOME AND EVEN MORE TRAUMATIC FOR JASON :D PLZ LMK IF YOU I SHOULD EXPAND ON THIS !!)

SO— because she got her shits absolutely rocked, she would ALSO be in the medical area, in a different room from Conner, I think either Kory and Dawn would switch places to watch them both OR they would stick to Conner and Rachel would be the one keeping an eye on Zephyr. Considering that the two people who did the most to help Jason got fucking wrecked because of it, I think it’s safe to say he’d feel too guilty to visit any of them.

If we go with Rachel on Z watch duty, I think she’d maybe try and use her powers to heal her, not completely tho cause she’s still unsure about them but enough for Z to be able to at least get up next morning, so after helping Kory out with Conner, Rachel would update Z on most of what happened last night: Conner saving Jason, Dick just leaving in the middle of the night, how Jason is doing, etc.

Now Jason doesn’t really goes to breakfast, and the whole thing with Rachel happens pretty early (everyone is still in the kitchen) SO I think the time Z actually goes downstairs (??? I have no clue what the fucking layout of this tower is like) is when all the yelling starts. Like I said in the beginning, the other guys aren’t gonna accuse Jason cause,,, it doesn’t make sense, so there’s not much to defend him from — maybe just help Rachel calm down “you said he was barely leaving his room for anything other than training, what would he do that,,, now specially?”

And only after everyone else starts sharing the weird things/messages they got she tries to talk to Jason, asking him if he’s okay, if he’s eaten, the basics — in their bickering way like “when’s the last time you drank some water ? your lips look chapped as hell” “why are you looking? 👀” — and then after diffusing some of the tenseness, getting a bit more serious with the questions and genuinely apologizing for dropping him (if he tries to change subject/dismiss her/even walk from her, she’s gonna play the “i'm pretty sure I’m concussed” card so he’ll at least stay put)

[theyarebothgunshot]

this is exactly how it went down in my head.

misha: hey, everything okay? do you need me to do something?

jensen: no, lay low. we’re figuring it out.

misha: got it.

— the next day —

misha: things settled. should i say anything? draw attention? stay neutral?

jensen: you don’t have to, but if you want, tread lightly. we’ve had enough chaos.

misha: say no more.

when nobody got your back you KNOW dmitri got your back.

ANYWAYS i turned my back for TWO MINUTES and y'all went the fuck off in my inbox so, you know the drill: more under the cut

NO BUT JENSEN’S RESPONSE LMAAAAAO honestly fallout theory is so on oh my God I can’t stop-

on god they are so loud like-

Worst damage control i've ever seen. god bles.

so true bestie

I think Jensen probably just wants to be done with this petty little drama, so if he has to pretend everything between them is okay he is going to be the bigger man and lay it to rest. Whatever is going on between them he definitely doesn't want to sort that out on social media and the earlier he pretends everything is sorted out the earlier people will forget about it again.

Also it's kinda funny how J*red Tweet was like implying they had a misunderstanding but still talk to each other regularly, while Jensen went full on the we grow apart a little bit, because we were busy, let's catch back up. Makes me wonder if they actually talked or if there managers just said hey that's not good pr, let's put that to rest. Also did J*red know before yesterday that they had a falling out or did he just not realize.

- 🐌 anon

literally jensen went out of his way to say 'uhhh we never talk, worstie' god if pr management is involved then they did a bad job. also j*red still does not realise they have fallen out. jshfjdsfh

Jackles was like God bless but we ain’t talking like this worstie

good for her.gif

csdsc heeft gevraagd:

All I need now is for Misha to tweet “ is it safe to come out now?” And I’ll be complete lmfao 😂😂😂

that would have been better than what we got lmfao

I have one fear and it's Jensen being forced to add j*red to his show and his other projects because he couldn't stop whining like a baby,,, ugh i hate him

i pretend i do not see

Kinda selfish of me tbh but i don't want them to be "friends" again, Jensen sweetie run as fast as you can

co-signed

Ok Jensen's answer to Jared tweet made me feel so bad for him. Like, I can see it's damage control and public relations (obviously) but there's stuff behind it. I can't name it, but idk, I felt terrible for texas man this time, I don't think that reply was written with a "love and light energy" or even without much care. I felt some heavy vibes.

- 🌻, who is now a fortune teller and a prophet apparently

yeah i feel hella bad for him to, for having to deal with this shit. nonnie please if you ever have anything to predict, lemme know sjdfhs

You know Jensen's tweet has the energy of like kindergarten wenn an other kid started a fight with you and the kindergarten teacher wants you to forgive each other and hung it out and you really don't want to, but your kindergarten teacher is being annoying and he isn't worth the annoyance either.

- 🐌 anon

you are not wrong

Incredibly thankful that I have the day off from work 😂 I'm with hatching chick anon, the 3 dots read as passive aggressive/insincere to me, and I love it! I haven't spent this many hours on tumblr since I first discovered cockles! (On a side note, the lack of fimmf posts today has me feeling like it's not friday lol) -🐢

i, too, miss fimmf but alas things happen, they do they do they do

I was right. :(

It got almost romantic...

👀

nonnie you know i love you but this is really not the case, like, at all??? idk how you could look at those tweets and think it was almost romantic. it was THEE most scripted, pr bullshit ever. it was staged and fake. idk what else to tell ya

Danneel liked Jensen's tweet

i saw

That is so so awkward I feel so sorry for all of us being exposed to this and so happy I chose to leave the Internet for half a day - tea anon

god bless your stance on that cause i would have hated missing out on this lmao

You know what? I think it’s okay being a 38 year old moron if you’re bringing us this type of content

im happy with the food but still think its not okay tbh

pspspsps Misha this is the perfect day for you to drop the gay Cas essay pspspspsp it is still pride month pspspsps

you know you want to king pspsps

So that JIB6 link (I think it was from your post, right?). I went and watched that bit, and a little more.

Jensen makes a comment about Jared being first on the call sheet because Sam was supposed to be the main focal character.

And that him nor Misha cared about what number they were, so in all that time it never changed.

And I’ll be… if that just doesn’t perfectly sum them up and their feelings on things. And how a certain someone can be petty… 🦚

idk if it was from my post? but maybe? my analysis probably? but yeah things are making more and more sense huh

Ohh that's also an alien? Welcome to the extraterrestial family then, purple alien anon!

Also it's probably because I'm coming off the high this drama gave me but I'm not looking forward to them trying so hard to convince us everything is normal between them. Even though we now Know, they will have to keep pretending. Today (yesterday?) was a shitshow but some masks fell off, at least for a moment and I kinda wish Jensen was less professional 😂

👽

oh for real, fallout theory IS confirmed and nothing they said today will change my mind, it only made me believe in it even more lmfao and with that in mind i am just gonna sip my tea if they try to be buddy buddy on main again

I THINK MISHA UNRETWEETED BUT HE TWEETED "LOVE AND MISS YOU BOTH" I'M LOSING MY DIGNITY HERE - tea anon

yeah he now answered them sjdfhsjfhsf instead of rt

MISHA COLLINS IS A KING I STAN THE RIGHT MAN

YOU SURE DO

I just know Misha’s process was oh crap I have to let people know I’m supporting them and I can’t choose sides. Ok. Retweet. NO. Delete. I love both of you. Yes, good.

sjdfsdfh this makes me think of that post that dissected jackles' birthday post for misha where he used the heart. 'call him bro, that makes it less obvious. nailed it.'

Lol I'm off for a few days and come back to total chaos... God I missed it here

Like the "et tu... #bravo" tweet? Made my day! Frikking hilarious (every time I see it I picture J*red with a pissy frech accent saying it out loud lol) it's just such an incredibly petty hissy fit he threw (I know he tweeted more later on but... Really all that stuff coming afterwards just sounds like damage control)

Missed you Rose

-🐻

LOVE the french accent detail im gonna do this too sdjfhsjfh missed you toooo!!!!

Oh man Misha is really gonna get hate for that I KNOW IT

sigh well. nothing he isnt used to by now, unfortunately

i mean i believe they feel like brothers, but constantly falling back on the “brother” thing to keep up appearances is really starting to feel like “#spnfamily” at this point.

honestly brothers can be very annoying, or so i have heard, so it fits with the fallout theory lmao

They actually said if we’re gonna make this gay we cannot have Jar*d Pad*lecki involved

oh my God this is the funniest timeline to ever exist God bless I’m just waiting to canon bi Mary

king shit tbh

[you-cant-spell-subtext-without]

I’m back on my bullshit and we have GOT TO TALK about 13x08 The Scorpion and the Frog; which serves as a good example of why you should not ONLY watch spn episodes with Cas (partially because of that scene I shamefully blogged about earlier - no I will not link that cursed post here).  The episode title comes from a fable in which the villain is the scorpion.  Interpretations of this fable note its uniqueness lies in the concept that “the scorpion is irrationally self destructive and fully aware of it.”

To quote the scorpion, buddies -  “it’s in my nature.”

Anyway, this episode is subtextually predicated on exploring Dean Winchester’s nature and specifically - his bisexuality, and I’m not only saying that because it opens with Dean in his Bi Colors Plaid (that also he wore on his burger date with Cas).

Let’s get started, after the cut!

Season 13 on its face gives me absolute whiplash because it starts widow arc-reunion-TOMBSTONE and then Jack yeets himself off to Chuck knows where so Cas can go out Looking For Him Because Otherwise He Will Definitely Kiss Dean there is no other option for the writers at this point.  Sigh.  Here, have another shot of Dean anxiously cleaning his gun as he always does when Cas has Gone Off For Reasons -

Anyway, this feels like a filler episode at first, but as always they bury the ENTIRE damn world in it and I am here with my dossier to Unearth It.

Lets start with Bart (demon of terrible nicknames and microagressions) meeting the brothers at Smile Diner to talk about some spell or whatever. 

(I am not thinking about the Cherry Pie meta I AM NOT)

THEY HAVE THE AUDACITY to start with these lines immediately introducing the theme of duality, a thread throughout this episode.

BARTHAMUS

Everything. I've been following your careers a long time. You're a real pain in the pitchfork. And the halo. Natural disrupters. We have that in common, you and I. DEAN

Mm. Yeah, we're twinsies.

***MORE DUALITY!  But as we know, Dean does not like Bart because He Is A Freakin’ Demon

DEAN

Well, see, here's the thing. When a demon tells us to jump, we don't ask how high. We just ice their ass.

UMMM excuse me Barting Bacting Boices?  What is that sexual gaze?  

Then we find out that Bart has 1/2 of the spell.  They need the other 1/2.  Oh, a spell with two parts, you say? [ I am going to scream :) ]

***Also, Dean eats the pie Bart ordered.  I cannot begin to explain to you the state of unwellness that I am in regarding how important this is. DEAN NEVER GETS TO EAT THE PIE, remember?  But in This Filler Episode, Dean eats the pie. While Sam looks at him with a very quizzical expression.  Pie -> what Dean wants but never actually gets -> Dean actively eating this pie.  Dean is coming to terms that maybe he can have what he wants.

***I am reminding you again that this is post widower-arc, post-reunion, and especially post-Tombstone.  Anyway-

Now we get to Smash and Grab.  Not literally even though I want to Commit Such Conduct at this point.  We are introduced to two one off characters named 

Smash (human/female presenting) -  can crack any safe built by man 

and Grab (demon/male presenting)-  expert in bypassing supernatural security.

Reaching or no, you can’t disagree that when spn introduces one off characters - it is almost always a Narrative Parallel or Mirror.

So we have a human and a demon (and Dean Winchester, a human who has been a demon)

who are experts in cracking open/bypassing something that has been secured and guarded (breaking down walls, if you will).  

They also use fake names identifying them as Tools to be Used ( Dean Winchester, the Michael Sword/daddys blunt little instrument)

BONUS:

Dean himself is literally used as a tool in this episode.

So yeah.  Smash and Grab are physical representations of Dean’s duality.  Human/Demon.  Femininity/Masculinity.  Dare we say something else, too?

Anyway, Dean is paired with Smash and Grab; Sam is off to idk negotiate weird artifact purchases lawboy style with Luther Shrike, a man who cannot die so long as he never leaves his house (I cannot even begin to unpack this shit; please just sit there and think about it.  I’m not even going there here.  I CANNOT DISCUSS Luther Shrike RN).

Speaking of things I cannot discuss without halgdhsag;lsa - Smash has very Specific boots (a look overall, really).

DEAN

Hey, Winona. The '90s called. They'd like their shoes back. SMASH

Shh.

***That’s right girl - do not take his shit; he actually LOVES them and is therefore Overcompensating for it with this little jab.

***Dean’s pop culture references and particular attention to the details here Should Not Be Overlooked.  90s! Winona! Ryder!

ANYWAY, then Dean and Smash bond over a caffeinated beverage -

[While Dean is doing a spell, Smash opens a can of drink, takes a mouthful and burps loudly. ] SMASH

Ahh. DEAN

You're weird.

***This scene makes me literally insane. (even aside from Dean living on something named NERVE DAMAGE as a KID.  They could have called it anything. You’re saying this wasn’t a Choice)  

She chugs a swallow of the drink and burps.  Something stereotypically associated with masculinity.  Not feminine.  Dean’s reaction is that she is “weird” - because she is not acting in a way stereotypically, J*hn Winchester brain-rot patriarchy bullshit-tily associated with Being Female.  But also, says the stupid show, they like the same soda.  They are The Same.  She shares the soda with Dean.  HIS FACE WHEN SHE DOES -

Other similarities are addressed throughout the episode (they are working for demons because they have no choice; they don’t discuss feelings/emotions, they both sold their soul, they both This Thing - 

DEAN

You know, we could help you. SMASH

No, you can't. I gotta take care of me.

etc. etc.) Smash is absolutely dean-coded.

****Also it’s textually established that Smash thinks Dean is attractive -

GRAB

[looking at Smash] Oh. You said he was just a pretty face. SMASH 

Shh.

***But Grab flirts with him too.

DEAN

I will kill you. GRAB

I bet you say that to all the girls.

***sorry, Grab - you won’t get far with Dean, but only because as he mentioned in the beginning of this episode - 

Drowley rights.

Now Dean has to put his hand in the mouth of this stone lion thing and all of a sudden he is acting....very-not-like-Dean.

[Dean looks again and takes a deep breath.] DEAN

I… how about this? What if I cut myself, put it on, like, a little piece of paper? We'll just wad it up and throw it in the mouth, okay? Okay. 

***Dean Winchester, who has been to Literal HELL, who has been torn apart by hellhounds, who has battled the devil and angels and God’s sister - all at the expense of his own life is now - afraid of spiders.  Well, technically he has always been afraid of spiders, but why isn’t ‘he being performative about it At This Time??

***Come to think of it, this sends me right back to how Jackles was playing Dean in 12x11 Regarding Dean THE episode dissecting Dean’s performative masculinity [one day I will clean up and post that analysis sitting in my drafts like a sad hamster]. That makes sense actually, because -> -> ->

that episode and this one are both written by Meredith Glynn.  Girl get in I want to torture you affectionately with a barrage of questions.

So here we have Dean and he���s not performing for Reasons, and he’s scared he’s genuinely scared of putting his hand in this stone lion-gargoyle-pig-creature’s mouth and then -

Smash gives him a push.

She gives him a push.  I cannot stop thinking about how she gives him a push.  A push to go do this thing that he is scared of; his fear being something he was hiding under his performative masculinity. Smash - dean coded dean mirror who does not perform femininity and is ‘weird’ -  she   gives   him   a     p u s h.

***linking here for the jackting joices that follow.

Now, let’s circle back to Smash’s story; why she is working for Bart in the first place -

SMASH

You think I wanna be here? Like I have a choice? SAM

You made a deal. SMASH

Wow! You think? SAM

You sold your soul. SMASH

And if I could take it back, I would. 

there is no reason for this picture here other than I needed you to see the jackting again

***How does the story end for Smash?

DEAN

Take care of you. [Dean glances down at the box, and then at Smash. She sees that Dean has put a lighter on top of the bones.]  BARTHAMUS

Alice, chop chop! 

[Bart indicates she should get his bones]. SMASH

Yeah. [She grabs the lighter and sets Bart's bones alight. Bart screams as he bursts into flames. ] 

***She accepts help and breaks free from the narrative, literally burning it down. The female presenting but not female-performing “weird” ooc representing a side of Dean breaks FREE because she makes a choice.  The lighter Dean drops? It’s a push.  And she goes with it.

Alice reclaims her story.

(Also, Grab gets ganked.  The male presenting ooc; the performative masculinity side; the demon; the darkness; the not-humanity - gets ganked).

Guess what Dean says to Alice when they say goodbye?

DEAN

Hey, Alice. Stay weird.

[I know the peace sign is probably just a Charlie throwback but I’d still like to say duality.  Two. ]

Dean’s not just talking to Alice.  He’s talking to himself; because the walls have been breached and for once Dean isn’t as scared of being different.  Maybe, just maybe, he’s going along with the push.  That’s exactly how the episode ends - with Dean feeling a little more hopeful, a little more at peace; a little more Considering he is capable of not only loving Cas but also not hating himself for it. 

[until the knowledge that Mary is still alive and the guilt of allowing himself ANY happy thoughts instead of looking for her miserably rears its ugly head in 13x09 and round and round we go but for NOW at least -> ]

DEAN

I'll drink to that.

(oh look Dean is just wearing his henley.  It’s almost as if a layer has been peeled back).

tagging @im-shaking-like-milk​ and @deanwasalwaysbi​ for letting me ramble on to them while writing this; and @lilac-void​ because you are always so kind about my stuff :)

[eu1a1awrence]

Release the Harpocrates!George analysis??

😳👉👈

OOOOOH ANON U HAVE UNLEASHED THE FLOOD GATES YES. YES I SHALL.

im kinda copy-pasting this from google docs so sorry if any formatting fucks up, and its incredibly selfserving and specific in an attempt to find any and all possible links (do i really believe that they investigated this hard into the mythology? no. would this still be cool as shit? yes!)

so anyway disclaimer i am no mythology historian so if any of this is wrong uh...... artistic license.?. also its kinda long. sorry in advance lmao

okay so harpocrates is a greek interpretation of horus (the ancient egyptian god of the sun). hes the greek god of silence/secrets, but the greeks sorta misinterpreted the egyptian symbol for child (because horus was often depicted as a child/child god) as a symbol for silence, and i kind of relate this to fanon mis/interpretations of georges character being naive (''Naive and weak, George usually doesn't know what to do'' via dsmp wiki.) when he's just as much a seasoned warrior as the others, he just doesnt get involved with it much.

additional meanings/symbols of harpocrates is that he was ‘the distant one’ or ‘the one who is above’, which i think relates directly to georges apathy (regardless of its fanon or canon misinterpretations). also possibly something about his developing relationship with dreamxd & his developing lore to being /more than/ human so to say.

so if we accept that george really IS harpocrates, there are several links - and here is where it becomes distinctly intricate in an attempt to find as many similarities as possible, and youll have to forgive me for it - one may draw between harpocrates, george, and their symbolism.

like that Horus is the form of the first sun, and george is one of the founding members of DSMP.

harpocrates is commonly represented by a sheaf of corn. George was desperate to get back to his wheat farming during the loreman streams

bad told george in those streams to 'ask the sky' if he should take bad's items' when dreamxd killed him. horus>sun god>the sun & moon are commonly referred to as his eyes. this could also be some sort of hint to dreamxd being an omniscient sort of being tho. or both. who knows

Harpocrates (at least, his egyptian form as the young horus) was often depicted on a lotus flower. Lotus flower symbolism seems incredibly relevant to DSMP. they symbolise purity (innocence, childishness, naivety; bad referred to his items as ‘infected’, and george has never been to visit the egg - perhaps he’s pure of it?), enlightenment (there is a lot of emphasis and continued references to knowledge, curiosity, and ‘knowing the truth’. Karl, dream, quackity, and fundy seem to currently be the main purveyors of this and ¾ of them have relations to george), self regeneration and rebirth (resurrection book).

like idk maybe its a huge reach (probably is tbh) but theres a lot of underlying symbolism???

lotus flowers are also used as symbols of the union of higher/lower egypt and the union of two kingdoms, which makes me think of, like, the inbetween and the other-side, or life/death, and sleep/awake, greater dsmp/lmanberg, i could probably go on.

in egyptian mythology, young horus’s parents were osiris (the god of the underworld/death) and isis (goddess of death/magic/healing). There are a few moments where george tries to make amends/healings (like telling dreamxd to apologise after being excessively violent, ‘we’ll make amends’ in his lorestream). also (this part is bullshit and selfserving because i just think its cool) but wilbur playing loreman, being georges dad, and wilburs canonical character being an omen of death and destruction and the fact that (young) horus’s father was osiris.

the fact that egyptian pharoahs were seen as reincarnations of horus to the king george arc but maybe this is pushing it a bit (as if the rest of it hasnt been)

SO. horus is commonly depicted with a falcon or a sparrowhawk head. falcons symbolise freedom and victory, and were also often related to war gods in egypt. Spiritually, a falcon symbolises wisdom and protection (again, another mention to knowledge/wisdom, and george is presumably desperate for protection as seen in his desperation for netherite armour from dreamXD). Sparrowhawks symbolise the need to tap into a warrior at any time; like george calling/inviting dreamXD to the SMP whenever he's online which im fairly sure was discussed in georges lore stream too?

also roses are sometimes symbolic of harpocrates. they are sometimes used to show guests that any topic discussed in the room receiving them is not to be repeated or discussed elsewhere: where have we seen roses recently? the syndicate. (also the in-between and the quackity art, if you want to pull it into other lore avenues. All of these thrive on secrecy; karl keeping his time travel a secret; the syndicate remaining secret; and quackity not telling anyone about much of what goes on las nevadas/his prison visits with dream).

anyway: this was like all just for fun and i dont think it’s going to come true at all, it would just be cool as anything :> apologies again if any of my facts are wrong im just trying to tie knots in the lore with wet spaghetti

also a lot of this was aided by help from @insert-cleverurl bc we spent like. a while brainrotting this on discord. :D maybe one day ill make more lore theory/analysis posts because i have a cool dream/dreamxd one bubbling away

[cherryronpa]

i don’t tend to post stuff like this here - i try to keep my art blog a happy environment. but i do feel like i do need to talk about my burnout somewhere where it’s more difficult to ignore. if you’re just here for the pretty picture, here it is. the talk about my burnout and mental health, however, is under the cut (be warned, there’s talk of burnout, depression, and suicide)

i hold a pretty privileged position not really bestowed upon many danganronpa fans - i have an audience of 22.5k subscribers that grows steadily by dozens every day, near-guaranteed 10k+ views on new videos so long as youtube censorship isn’t throwing one of its characteristic shitfits, and dozens of die-hard fans. i should be at the top of my game.

and yet i feel burned out. 

i feel like i’ve only produced 5 “real” videos over the course of the year. youtube’s algorithm demands constant uploads, however i cannot sustainably upload analysis videos every week; it’s quite literally impossible. scripting takes time, voiceover takes time, editing takes a LOT of time (like, 60-70% of a video’s creation time is the editing). i can’t put out my videos weekly, and the youtube algorithm doesn’t appreciate that and shunts my videos if i disappear for more than a week - so i tend to intercut giant videos with tiny little memes that take maybe an hour to produce. they do cause the main video to take a little longer to produce, but miniscule amounts (like, maybe an extra 3-5 hours per large video). 

however i’m starting to become more known for these little cursed skit videos that i put zero thought and maybe one effort into, rather than the analysis or rewrite videos i pour my heart and soul into for several weeks at a time. every single analysis video i’ve put out has turned up less and less views, even if it’s a video that the algorithm and youtube should be promoting to high hell (eg. i feel like a video where I rank every trial in Danganronpa should be a video Youtube promotes the hell out of to anyone with danganronpa as a recommended topic). it makes me wonder why i even bother at all to analyse this series i love and to share that love with the world, when simply making surface-level tithes that return the same 6 comments over and over again seems to be the appeal. 

even with a description talking about the burnout and my frustration with the situation, most people didn’t even read it. even some of my own friends didn’t until i pointed it out. 224 comments, and maybe 3-4 actually talk about the description and what i described. the rest are the same jokes everyone else already said 30 times, and even i don’t find them funny anymore.

people’s advice doesn’t seem to work either; “i appreciate your analyses!” and “you should focus on what you want to make!” are indeed people trying their best to make me feel better. but the truth is, when i do make what i want, i don’t see the results i want. trying to get an analysis video to break the views in a week that a dumb little meme video gets over two days is consistently heart-wrenching to watch. ‘i appreciate your analyses’ is a very much minority opinion - the majority of people who watch my content do not care about them. and to watch weeks of your work essentially go to waste over and over again, once again, makes me wonder why i’m even bothering. 

it’s very clear i’m at a stage where i can no longer relate to my general audience. the advice provided is rarely from the standpoint of someone who actually goes through what I do. it’s a very much privileged problem to go through, i don’t deny that - but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a problem. no amount of “oh, the youtube algorithm/the fandom is just horrible, you keep being you!” is going to actually FIX the issues. i know the youtube algorithm is horrible, i have to actually deal with it censoring my videos constantly. telling me that youtube or the fandom are screwed up just annoys me now - despite my atrocious memory problems, it’s one of the few things i do actually remember.

i’ve watched my mental health take a nosedive over the course of the year, and i’m sure this would’ve happened even without COVID-19. where i was once almost completely able to cope with my depression and anxiety and it was rarely ever a problem, where i once believed i did in fact have worth, the recent months have caused me to spiral right back into that depression. even though im at the most successful i’ve ever been, i feel completely worthless because that success is built on the literal scraps i throw off the cutting room floor rather than the videos that receive my honest love, my honest thoughts, and the time that i wanted to give them. i wanted the fandom to see just how amazing these things either were or could have been. instead the fandom is more interested in exclusively characters swearing or whatever cursed bullshit my manic-depression-addled brain decides to create when it opens vegas pro and slams its fists against the keyboard.

that mental health slip has not only put me back in severe risks for depression, anxiety, and stress, worse than they’ve ever been, but it’s returned me to suicidal thoughts. the anxiety of the future of my channel, the anxiety of losing interest in danganronpa over this and this entire year having built up to absolutely nothing, have made me seriously question if i might take my own life. i do have something that will likely stop me from doing so, but i’m not comfortable revealing what it is, and i likely never will be.

i apologise if anything harsh or harmful was said - i really am grateful for what i have, and that’s why this all feels so selfish. i’m not grateful enough for what i already have - despite knowing i should be.

[macklives]

homestuck recap

i hated this so fucking much bc my 2 am bitch-ass didnt want to read a recap thats probably longer than any slowburn out there

anyways here it is

also, uhhH sorry im using this as a end of session discussion bc that shit gets explained in her as well. and im not writing up more recaps of a recap so this is where im done for the day. (by done for the day i mean last nights session, im still doing a liveblog soon. i just wrote this yesterday)

also that this is long

you dont have to read it, theres nothing of importance

ive been coping with humor to get me through it

neato.

have fun with what i suffered through:

why was “beta” the only thing unhighlighted?

like did i miss a page???

OH its the beta version of HS thats why

damn its like 5 pages and thats it

mmh

well youll all be happy to know im clicking every single one of these links again bc i like looking back like ahh i remember that. good times. also in case i forgot some shit existed.

do you think andrew had fun writing this? or was he like “fuck”

thats a lot of fucking package talk. good thing im not confused as of now and remember it pretty clearly. of else, this early on in the recap, id be screwed.

god remember when i did an analysis on each item and what it did

i feel as if i have the technology engrained inside my head right now

cruxite, alchemeter, all that jazz

flashbacks are starting up already

yeah, that was the good part in homestuck where i knew 100% that i probably would continue on this liveblog in its entirety, ngl

that one explosion scene. bc it kept me going.

OH W A IT SHIT

i just realized how the intermission spades probably fucking foreshadowed the whole jack revolts thing and gains the ring, which was also technically JOHNS fault considering he slashed up the doll in the first place

my god, i guess thats the only good aspect of the recap. looking back at things and realizing the missing pieces.

oh that makes sense for the whole “this prototyping had no effect on the enemies, since he was already in the medium” i didnt actually think about that

little did rose know where that would get her right now

oh yeah

there’s still the whole entire lab terminal thing and how mom basically knows the place exists. i guess we’re still venturing onto that and itll come up later when we find out how mom knows SO MUCH about the game.

still think shes some weird spy or secret agent

i kinda love her ngl

anyways, theres literally no reason for skaia to produce a cloning machine. so technically, they only sent the meteors in, right? so who put the cloning machine in if not mom?

oh yeah that impact was nerve wrecking asf

and still at this point in the comic i called dave fuckboy red

huh, how times change

i hated reading that whole paragraph ngl, the frustration just kicked me in the boobs again

yeah nobody else got tornadoes, huh?

OH that makes also much more sense

bc she did prototyped them before she entered the medium.

i gotcha

man one of my favorite edits i made, rose hitting that meteor with a bat

are you

telling me

the exiles structures they arrived on were in the form of the items the kids used to enter the medium?

THE EGG

THAT EXPLAINS “EGG”

of course it was 413 years ago. that was never explained. simply vague “many years in the future....” but i expected no less from this

man serenity is the most wholesome character in hs no doubt

damn thought andy here was really gonna spoil us jade’s planet

okay cool, im glad i now have the layout to the whole “their stations went to the coordinates of the home button” shindig

man i honestly dont know what else to say besides “yeah cool recap” when i already pretty much know what went down? ofc im looking into each link and shit and adding in things when i see fit, but otherwise its just me going “ah good times” yknow

the whole meteor thing kinda makes sense now?

we’re still missing a few pieces of info but we’re getting there, folks

oh yeah that reveal

god jade and dave have it in the shits for parents huh

bro isnt the best and jade has a fucking dog

who lowkey

is doing better than bro

who knew a fucking dog is a better guardian than bro lmfao

dreambot = terminator. im telling you.

sorry im still on that idea and it will never leave unless i have the actual proof in front of me that its not going to become a thing. meaning, ive finished hs and theres still no terminator dreambot or either andrew himself gives me a canon letter with “the robot is not arnold, mackenzie, pls just let it be”

why is the entire game session highlighted

i swear to god if this is like to a second recap or smth of the whole game session i may fucking CRY

okay thank god its just a design of the skaia layout

which is honestly cool

idk why its blurry tho but i can at least see the layout now. which is honestly how i pictured it anyways.

yeah, john did make a huge impact in his friends’ life and i find that so fucking touching

yep. got that. everything loops around. cool.

especially when the trolls come in. god we havent even gotten to that recap portion yet, we havent even gotten to the INTERMISSION

pls can this be the halfway point to the recap

AT LEAST

so they were exiled after the whole jack: ascend thing, right? considering theyre way in the future. man no fucking wonder.

speaking of jack

man that whole dad and jack interaction was gold, ngl

OH THAT EXPLAINS THE RING THEN

and wow, andrew’s really giving us the best female content huh. andrew is the true god of equality and diversity.

also hey, i didnt realize that wow. so PM tricked the queen in showing the parking ticket to be able to take the present from jack. she’s a smart cookie, that one..

she and PM basically snitched on jack and it was the best thing that has happened to me so far

oh yeah okay

but why did AR panic over bec? bc thats something we havent learned yet, right?

anyways

exile town, the only town which should exist. facts. i dont make the rules.

noice

i love PM being queen. like.. thats canon now. shes an actual queen.

yeah that was a fun game and the consorts were cute

fuck yeah the dick head

hate them even more now that i know john was killed because of them

anyways, i wonder what dick move dave’s denizen did? maybe thats why its filled with lava bc the denizen was like “fuck it. make the land red. kill them all”

UH WHAT

WHAT

OH MY GOD HOW DID I JUST FORGET NANNAS LETTER LIKE THAT LMFAO

THEIR TITLES WERE THERE THE WHOLE TIME!

so i still dont know what they mean but i can gather it has something to do with the game giving them abilities. considering dave is the “knight of time” and he can go back in time. whack.

which means john can either control someones breathing or simply wind. and rose is... like that one girl in the winx club who does the sun shit. bc whenever i think of light powers, i think of stella.

and jade is space. witch of space.

nice

i have no idea what that means ngl

okay finally

we’re at the trolls

maybe this recap will end soon

i remember when i thought they were internet bullies

yesss

someone asked if i basically knew the trolls were on a different veil than the kids, so not presently with them, and i know lol. i was making a joke before btw. jsyk. dont think im incompetent to forget these things when sometimes i choose to forget it so i can add in a joke

it be like that, i annoy many

then again, pls dont assume im trying to say im not incompetent bc im also a fucking dumbass and DO forget shit and i have no excuse

imagine being so bored on the meteor, your last resort is speaking to aliens

ngl me if i was ever trapped on a meteor and could potentially do that

nah ik its bc its their only hope at helping with their session or whatever tf CG said to john. but there was BOUND to be a conference meeting between them like “okay guys. humans. that needs to be sorted out” and you just hear CG screaming in the background

i cant wait to meet them honestly bc im growing on all 4 of the ones we’ve seen already. and on top of that, i know what they look like and i know theyre not THAT bad, just a little on the crayy zee side sometimes

but theyre trying

OH MY GOD

I GET IT

FUCK

DOES THAT MEAN THE INTERMISSION IS *APART* OF THE MAIN FUCKING STORY??

AND SPADES IS WV FOR THE TROLLS

GOD D A M N

wow

i didnt expect that. but maybe the signs were there and i was just willingly choosing to ignore it or smth bc “haha couldnt be, right”

flashbacks to how i thought the trolls were humans

anyways, i guess he got his revenge on the kids version of “snowman” ie the black queen. but really

he did not have to do that. he could have cut off the finger and fled. but he decided “nah, lets implode her” so the loml is dead and all i got was a catchy song

i knew they were different types of “bullies” but now i just have to replace bullies with uhh

trolling strategies

anyways, this is cute. i love how they’ve come to be friends through mutual frustration. good part in the comic.

i wonder why it explodes

more importantly

....

terminator time?

this was my favourite sequences of dialogues in the whole entirety of homestuck. that is to say the back and forth thing that the kids went through to become a sort of wingman for the other.

absolutely gold.

all except AT’s rap.

GC was the only smart one with the linear shit

anyways fuck he still has to kill the denizen now but apparently its hard to beat for a sleeping dick head so

that will be fun for the future

john will probably need to kill A LOT of imps to get there

yeah rose is a badass bc she slayed that thing with needles of all things

OH and the white queen was the cursive

damn did AR ever do the whole guide process to a kid yet? maybe he will with dave, idk

oHHH

i fucking SEE

thats why he said DNA

to use it and replace all the life forms in the ocean

fucking neat wow

man that sounded sarcastic but im genuinely impressed bc all i got was bullshit as i read jaspersprites log

so thats the secret. it was “meow” bc that somehow translates to the genetic code she needs then. and that code apparently took fucking years to write as well. sick. whack. oh man.

derse is very pretty, ngl

and wow shit

“dave had already been awake in his tower all along without realizing it” how tf does someone just

do that, awake in both places at once

i didnt even fucking realize that fact as i read that pesterlog wow

ah yes, around the time things got confusing

okay so the capsule makes sense bc at first i didnt know it was a fucking time capsule so i got confused as to how it just apparated the game lmfao

the more you know i guess *twinkle*

i find that a neat concept tho

like the whole whatever you prototype affects the imps and shit

yeah so that whole “he had no advice” basically impacted his future

no shit dave wanted to reset things bc he probably thought he caused some sort of bad butterfly effect and killed his best friend

fuck calsprite thats all im gonna say

i read that first sentence and i think i got an aneurysm

and then everything else just made me sad again

i mean good thing he fucking did amirite?

we got pain at first but now we got cool shit like idk

fucking DAVESPRITE

damn idk how that works

will rose have like two minds now? or will this be some steven universe fusion shit?

“and understood their meaning” course well i fucking didnt so could you pls elaborate, rose?

okay but then what the fuck did he use that was inside the fucking box

bc i thought he used his knife?

im only every going to refer him as that now, thank you andrew

alright okay..

god that was a lot

i dont know what will happen once i click on those links but i am going to see that for myself bc i refuse to add ANYTHING ELSE

[gil-notskajla]

I know it's 2020 but I rewatched [prototype] gameplay because i remmembered that it was cool and angsty af but did not really remmember what happened in it except Alex turning evil in sequel for some reason and it seemed weird.

Soo im watching this shit for 3 hours because im professional time waster and i still don't get it. Viruses, i mean the viruses viruses, rewrite genetic code of attacked cells, they can't create hiveminds or any minds in fact, viruses aren't built to do such complicated tasks - virus is just some RNA (not even DNA) closed in protein and sent off to the world to cause maychem in animal, fungal, protista and floral kingdoms. In this situation - animal kingdom. Dr.Alex Mercer 1.0 steals the virus and smashes the container, gets infected and murdered by guys sent to catch him. Some fans speculate that that's the point where Alex Mercer has died including some in game characters and Zeus (Alex Mercer 2.0), unaware of not being Alex, took his place. But that's bullshit my dudes. Alex Mercer is still Alex Mercer but mutated and amnesiac (probably because he was braindead and memories are stored by continiuos bio-electrical reactions, neuro transmitters and ionic concentration on neuron membrane). Why Alex is Alex and not Zeus? Because conciousness is stored in organ, not genetic material (not to mention our cells mutate all the time, thats why we have moles and cancers). If conciousness was stored in genetic material, than twins would share conciousness, clones would share conciousness and those whoose genome would change would lose conciousness, not to mention that our cells get replaced several times durring our lives - the body you are in is not the body you were born in, yet, you are still you (of course neurons live really really long). We could argue that other infected were agressive and cannibalistic but that's not conciouss behaviour, these are instincts, there was no goal in their doing. Other infected were like: holy shit, prey animal, food! Of course some were controled by Greene but she was, like Mercer, an anomaly and her will was hers, not virus'. She just hated everyone and was evil as fuck. But back to Mercer, we could also argue that he died back there when his brain got destroyed by lack of oxygen - but than every new conciousness gets deleted every single time he gets shot in the head durring the game. My hipothesis is that there is one conciousness per one brain and is a series of biochemical processes on neurons in one specific body, uncopiable and irreplacable. By that hipothesis (which is very bold but way more specific than anything the game offers us, or better put, doesnt offer) Alex Mercer got infected, torn appart by bullets, his brain got damaged but did not die entirely because if it did he would have a way worse amnesia than just not knowing anything and he didnt get shot in the head

, virus already has infected him and probably kept his brain alive-enaugh soo that he would at least know english when he wakes up, virus managed to work on what alive cells were left (yes, when you die, your cells in several places in the body still live off of the reserves and substances in cytoplasm for a while) the virus, unlike most viruses, had ability to... (basing on my knowledge im trying to imagine how this would work) manages to reanicate dead cells and with, at this point, sheer willpower fix the damage caused by bullets and give Alex's heart a kick from the God themself to start working and that's when he wakes up durring the autopsy.

Giving that analysis, Alex Mercer is still Alex Mercer because he is technicaly same organism but modified, amnesiac because of brain damage caused by lack of oxygen between moment of getting mass-shot and fixed by the virus and i have no idea who gave him the doctor title if he really believed that guy that some Zeus replaced him. Like, Alex sweetie, viruses are fucking dead matter, ok? You are a mutant but not a new being. But he has amnesia soo I guess we can forgive.

Edit: Dunno where to put memory stealing aspect, here is good enaugh spot. I have no goddamned idea how this would work: maybe he doesnt damage the brain of the victim, somehow connects the brain to his own, transfers knowledge and than disposes it (however the hell this would work)? There was this one dude who killed himself soo Alex wouldn't consume him and get his knowledge, destroyed his harddrive basicaly soo he can't read it, and that's really cool of game creators to think about it. Respect. This also kinda prooves that Alex didn't actually die the first time he died, when he was still 'human'.

And the very end? He got caught in explosion but he must have created some form of safe box for his brain alone and got rebuilt from this and some other leftovers of him and a crow because it was already stated by doctors suicide that destroyed brain or something resembling a brain whatever he has at this point bust be preserved to keep memories. And he knows what happened at the end of the game. Period.

But than second part happens and holy shit i'm soo angry, you have no idea. I mean, ok, the story itself was fine but Mercer aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaicant why why why who allowed this plot disaster to happen!?!? In part one Alex did his absolute best to prevent the virus, to stop infection, to stop gentek and to bring peace. A beautiful, beautiful ending, a satisfying ending. Finnish the task and boom! He can live in peace, potential immortality before him, a world to see, a knowledge to gain, a life to live and no danger in sight or at least no real danger for him in particular. Perfect situation to start over. But what do they decide to do? Well we need to make sequel because first game sold. Soo we will ruin this whole character we have build instead of, i dont know, giving him new objective, expanding his character, and we will turn him into another evil guy dissapointed in life who lost faith in humanity and destroys his work from the previous game because we need something absolutelly devastating to happen soo new protagonist will have something to fight for AND also we will make those already a bit fucked up and evil bio engeneering corporations come back even more evil soo that making Mercer not only evil but genarally badly written character will have NO SENSE WHAT-SO-EVER and just, I'M JUST----!!!!!!!

[intearsaboutrobots]

:)

1. you’re so smart!! which is kind of a vague thing to say, but what i mean for you is that you talk about things in such a perceptive, insightful way. i can say Any weird bullshit to u (and i often do) and you’ll answer and like, probably have a really interesting fact or an analysis that i never would have thought of. you speak (i know we’re typing but i think there’s still a clear voice you know!) in such an articulate and thoughtful way. i would read any essay you wrote, even the ones about things im not familiar with, because i like hearing how u talk and think!

2. i lov telling stories w u, whether thats chatficcing or dnd or anything else. i feel like you bring out the things i like best about myself and my storytelling when we talk - the vibrancy of your storytelling and your characters and your worlds make my stories brighter too, and im always happy looking back at stories i told w u bc i think they’re some of my best c:

3. i feel like you’ve done so many different things? i dont know how to phrase it better, but you’ll talk about having gone to ren faires or made chainmail or like, worked in a national park, or all these other things! and it gives the impression of someone who has like, lived a life where they went and did the things they wanted to do! pursued the things they wanted to pursue! im not sure how to quantify this better, and maybe its a weird thing to hear bc to you it might not feel that exciting? but its a thing i admire, when i talk to you it makes me want to go Do the things i Care about in a way i dont always hav the push to do!!!!

[luminisvii]

okay im gonna go black out and write some bullshit about my Thoughts on Literary Analysis and Character Writing bc i love writing and i love trying to figure out what works and what doesn’t. i am an unfortunate fan of fire emblem, so the real joke is on me, but let’s do this anyway. using a lot of bold as always! it makes me feel special.

Why is Leonie such a divisive character? 

as per usual, here is my disclaimer that it’s okay to like Leonie. it’s also okay to dislike her, as long as you’re not being a massive dick about it. lord knows people are rude to me about lorenz and i didn’t ask for their opinions. if you like leonie, i am not out to get you, i’m not going to tell you that you shouldn’t, i’m not even mad at you. Neat! you like a character i don’t! and that’s just fine. i honestly don’t care! go have fun! 

so let’s talk. theres a TL;DR at the end so be ready.

i’ll make no bones about it: i’m in the camp that dislikes her. i don’t have the energy to hate her as i do for faye, but leonie is pretty obnoxious as a character and it’s an uphill battle to like her. i’ve played VW like three times since i’m a self professed GD stan so i’ve dealt with her a lot, read most of her supports, and seen her as a character in actual cutscenes and stuff.

the short answer: making a character obsessed with another one and having that be most of their personality is really annoying. 

the long answer: let’s start on that now! these are my personal thoughts and analysis, so you’re free to disagree with me if you think i’m falling short.

one statement i will make right away is that i’m not offended by leonie being mean to the player. a lot of people who stan leonie like to argue that people dislike her because she’s one of the few characters who doesn’t kiss byleth’s ass immediately. that’s fine. that doesn’t bother me. after all, seteth and hapi are mean to byleth at first too, and those two are far more beloved… in fact, it’s funny that they’re mean to byleth. i would also argue that my favorite lord claude is not buddy buddy with byleth at first either, but if these popular opinion threads have proven anything to me, people love taking claude’s lying ass at face value. that’s besides the point—it’s okay that leonie isn’t immediately friendly to byleth. that is not an objective character flaw. characters need something to conflict over in the narrative, and not being instantly friendly to a player insert is not a problem in the slightest.

the major flaw in leonie’s character, imo, is that the writers decided it was a brilliant idea to make her obsessed with a man who barely seems to acknowledge her. this is an extremely unfortunate reoccurring character trope in fire emblem. notable other victims that more modern fe fans may recognize are faye and cordelia, faye being the worst offender. luckily, leonie isn’t as bad as faye. but it really is irritating that leonie, along with these other women, seem entirely driven by men who cannot acknowledge them. within three houses, you have similar traits in male characters as well: cyril is another notable offender, and to a lesser extent, dedue’s fixation on dimitri. now, we do see jeralt talking to leonie at the very least, and he does speak about her at least once in my memory, and positively at that. so it’s not as pathetic as the likes of faye. 

outside of that, leonie cannot stop fucking reminding everyone she comes across: she loves captain jeralt. she’s his only apprentice. and you, dear player, who is his child, are not good enough, because you don’t love him as much as she does. practically all her convos with byleth are about how they don’t love jeralt enough, save for a slight turn around in the A support where she talks about her promise to protect byleth in jeralt’s place. to be honest, i usually ditch her in any run i’m forced to take her (hello sylvain, the superior idiot redhead cavalier) so this promise is just cute.

the arrogance in this attitude is insensitive at best, and as seen in her B support with byleth, potentially malicious and self centered at worst. 

let’s not beat around the bush. the main point of contention for leonie is her B support with byleth, which is locked to jeralt’s death. you cannot get this support until jeralt has kicked it. and if you’re on GD, chances are you have gotten enough support points with leonie to get it immediately upon his death. the man’s grave is still fresh. what does she have the gall to say to her beloved mentor’s child?

“I've spent my whole life working to become a great mercenary like your father. There were so many times when I wanted to ask his advice, but I couldn't. I just had to make do. That's how I've made it this far. Just hard work, all on my own. But then you come along... And it's like you don't appreciate Captain Jeralt at all, or how lucky you were to have him around your whole life! Ugh! It still really bothers me! You might be his kid, but I'm still his best apprentice! Got it?!”

YIKES.

no matter how you dice it, saying that to someone whos father just died? NOT GOOD. it doesn’t matter what her reasoning is. a lot of people argue that this is realistic, that she’s acting out of grief. maybe so. however, if the game wants me to like her, they’re failing, no matter how realistic her reaction is. if this was supposed to be seen as a moment of weakness, that would be one thing, but it’s clear leonie never learns anything from this. she never gets better. she spends the rest of her life constantly centered on jeralt, and sees byleth as a competitor and obstacle to his affections, even after he’s dead. 

i don’t want to entirely make this about byleth, because let’s be real, byleth is only one of her many supports. but it is the most easily noticeable, and the least charitable to her character. 

also fun fact i did a basic search for jeralt in her supports and thats 37 times hes mentioned lmao this isn’t even accounting for her non support dialogue! which is still a lot! 

so a decent chunk of her supports still involve her talking about how great jeralt is as if the man is jesus. her better supports don’t involve him at all. i don’t have easy access to a lot of her dialogue by chapter, but quite a bit of her regular dialogue references jeralt too, be it by name or title, and a good chunk of her endings, especially her solo one, have her just taking up his title and job and drinking habits. it’s supposed to be seen as cute.

this woman is in her 20s at the beginning of the game. she’s my age. this kind of behavior is worrying. 

so you’re thinking “tell, you’ve spent a LOT of time talking about how leonie won’t shut the fuck up about jeralt. what about the rest of her character? unlike faye, she actually has one!” right you are! i will concede that. leonie does have things going on for her outside of her constant screeching about jeralt! what are they?

we see that her personality has her as a hard worker and frugal person because she’s grown up in a life that has less than many of her peers. she’s rational and rather keen, capable of assessing her opponents correctly and outsmarting them. she likes to help others. her supports with claude are fairly interesting as they talk about their own perspectives on the world to each other in a friendly manner. she talks to bernadetta and praises her skill in craft and manages to befriend her. in fact, all her supports where she doesn’t mention jeralt at all are pretty good. she can be headstrong and sometimes quick to jump to conclusions, but leonie isn’t one to be too beholden to preset ideas and shows a capability to learn and change.

wait, this sounds like a pretty well rounded and likeable character i’m describing! what happened here? this kind of portrayal is almost contradictory to the side of her that only thinks of jeralt. 

a lot of people who like leonie like her for these aspects. at first, i had thought her to be interesting, since she’s the poorest student in the entire school, here on money raised by her entire village, which must have been extremely difficult for them to do. she doesn’t understand how nobles can be so frivolous, and butts heads with the likes of hilda, who has been raised in luxury her whole life and she clashes even harder with lorenz, who is obsessed with nobility. in a way, leonie is the slap from reality that many of the rich students from garreg mach need. and she also serves an important function in the dynamic of the deer—she’s a bit of a hapless straight man to all their bullshit. they always need one of those! in the lions, that role falls to ingrid, while edelgard plays that to her own house. 

so yes, there is merit in leonie’s character. there’s a lot to like about her here. however, in my opinion, it’s not enough to make up for the incredibly abrasive aspects of her fixation on jeralt. it really just comes back to that—that someone decided that it would be a fantastic character trait to have her never stop thinking about a man, and flaunt this to the man’s child. constantly. almost all her dialogue directed at byleth is about jeralt. post skip, a lot more of her lines become about jeralt and making him proud. it’s like she thinks that he’s her dad. she’s a grown ass woman! leonie is one of the older students! she is an adult by the time the game starts! an adult with some actual worldly experience, unlike her peers! what went wrong? why is she like this? why did they make her so fucking annoying when it comes to jeralt?

so yes, that’s what i think is the major flaw of her character. a flaw that is not easily overcome. cyril is a largely derided character for similar reasons. another simple control+f tells me that rhea is mentioned in cyril’s supports 59 times so uh, woo! he has leonie beat there.

worst of all this is a flaw that narratively, she does not overcome. she never grows and gets better from it. she never changes her single minded determination to impress jeralt, even long after he’s dead. a good chunk of her endings have her taking up his business and acting just like him, taking his title too. somehow lorenz is the more likeable character, and lorenz starts off as a much worse person than her! he starts as a stinky incel classist and somehow, especially over the course of verdant wind, manages to learn and grow and change into a much better person, while leonie remains stagnant in who she is. her own peers outdo her in almost every aspect, in that they appear to be capable of growing up while leonie, already an adult, never seems to show any signs of maturing over the course of the game. we see ignatz turn from a meek nerd to someone who’s willing to do what it takes to protect what he cares about. marianne grows from suicidal and depressed to finding the will to live because it means she’ll be able to spend more time with things she enjoys and people she loves. lorenz goes from snobbish and distant over his complex about nobility to being one of the kindest members of the deer, willing to go against his father for the greater good. even hilda matures! hilda starts the game lazy and unambitious, trying to avoid work, saying she’d never risk her life for her friends, to fighting against some of the strongest forces in the continent and ESPECIALLY on CF we see her refusing to abandon claude in his time of need, no matter how bad it gets, even if it costs her life. what does leonie do? leonie seems to forever be stuck in the mindset that she has to impress jeralt, no matter how far she goes.

this is incredibly nitpicky, i’ll admit, this isn’t really part of the character analysis, but i find she under performs as a unit too. she may have ungodly speed and no weaknesses in her skills, but damage output wise she’s easily outdone in house by the other canon paladin of lorenz and his wonky statline, and out of house sylvain has basically the same ability as her, the same color hair, and a crest + relic that make him way more effective. the man has bulk, too. so, that’s a small ding to leonie as well. i had the same problem with sully in awakening. for all the talk about how these women are just as good as the men, they appear to under perform quite a bit.

and i’m gonna talk real quick in a basic list format of arguments i’ve seen for people defending leonie, since i’m running out of like, a coherent way to talk about some of this stuff.

-She’s realistic.

maybe so, but the game intends for me to find her as likeable and sympathetic, as it is for all recruitable characters. her reactions to byleth and sometimes others may be realistic, but don’t paint a charitable image of her. again, the moment in her B support with byleth is so bad, it makes her seem like she’s acting towards them with cruel intent. while i don’t care about byleth’s feelings since byleth isn’t a real person, what it does is it paints leonie as malicious, no matter what her intent was or how realistic it is. yes, she’s in grief, she’s lost someone important to her, but in what context is telling someone who just lost their dad that they didn’t love him enough supposed to garner anything but hatred? even if she apologizes for it in their A support, that means she basically took years to do so and still seems to think of byleth as an obstacle to her being like jeralt.

although as i have said before, the rest of her personality is fine. i find her non jeralt stuff is much more well written. she’s a down to earth person amidst a sea of lunatics. that’s not a problem.

-People don’t like her because she’s mean to Byleth. 

this is probably true in some regards although i can’t say for certain. because byleth is a player insert and some might take it personally, but otherwise i find this isn’t much of a good universal claim since there’s more to the disdain to that. personally, i think it’s hilarious when video game characters are mean to me, but that’s just My Opinion, so no, i’m really not offended by leonie being mean to me. other characters are also mean to byleth, and that leads into the next point...

-Other characters act similarly towards Byleth and they’re popular.

one, look at those stupid unpopular opinions threads on twitter. they’re not as loved as you think. two, a lot of the characters who are listed for these things are often the likes of seteth and felix, and let’s talk about the context of their actions there. seteth is indeed mean to byleth at first, but his intent is wildly different from leonie’s—he’s suspicious, and rightfully so, of this mercenary who came out of nowhere and rhea is suddenly showing a lot of interest in and is giving a position of power to. seteth is not acting out of malintent or jealousy, he’s acting out of concern for the students and his daughter as well as rhea. because his core intent is “protect everyone around me” it comes off as far more palatable and dare i say, endearing. this is vastly different than “i’m jealous towards byleth because i love their dad and hate that they’re getting attention i can’t.” with a character like felix, this is outright incorrect—felix is not necessarily more rude to byleth more than he would be anyone else. felix is angry with the faerghus four in particular, but everyone else gets the same level of vague disrespect from him otherwise, so his behavior is not centralized to byleth. again, i don’t care about byleth’s feelings. there is also cyril, who is similarly obsessed with rhea, and is just as irritating as leonie for it, if not worse because he gets an extra layer of being a poc character obsessed with a white one who saved him. 

tl;dr: context and intent matters. a lot. i know this is a ton to ask of the fe fandom to consider taking things beyond face value, but please consider the context of characters actions and their intent behind them.

-People who don’t like Leonie are misogynistic.

i won’t discount that there are bad actors who are likely extra critical of leonie because she’s a female character. it could be and has been argued that the reasons that characters like edelgard and ingrid are so controversial is because they are female. but not everyone who raises criticisms is strictly doing so in bad faith. most people i’ve seen criticizing leonie do it for the same reasons i am, which is that she’s an abrasive character. these traits would not be any better on a male character and in some regards could be worse. so for this one, it’s better to take it as a case by case situation, and pay attention to how people are talking. those doing so for less savory reasons often let it slip eventually, somehow. i’ve been avoiding using the word “bitch” in this entire thing for this exact reason.

-Her non-Byleth supports are good.

this is highly subjective imo and comes down to what you personally like in a character. i do like some of her non byleth supports, but she still has an unfortunate habit of bringing up jeralt in non byleth supports, so the only ones that are truly good are the ones where she doesn’t talk about him at all. even then, some like her one with marianne can do the same accidental portrayal of her seeming like a pretty unpleasant person. this isn’t saying that leonie can’t be flawed or short tempered, after all i adore felix and he’s got Some Fuckin Issues, but her portrayal as a kind and bright person clashes with how she’s portrayed surrounding byleth and jeralt. far too much. i like her supports with claude, i like her line with bernadetta, and her seteth one is good too, but i’d also argue that as a personality she doesn’t bring much to the table. she’s a perfectly serviceable character when she’s not dealing with byleth, but i personally fail to see more appeal to her. she isn’t particularly enrapturing like some of the others, and unlike someone like ingrid who has a similar role in BL, doesn’t have the shared history and integration with the deer that grants ingrid a unique perspective on her peers. although again, this is highly subjective, so it’s tough to argue about this. i’ll grant that yes, the writing that doesn’t surround jeralt is WAY better and almost makes leonie a redeemable character.

-Other characters are worse.

very true! i’ll cite faye again as the bottom line for “this is how abysmal this character could be” and in feth itself there is, as stated many times before, cyril. however it doesn’t mean that leonie is better by association. and i also often see people citing seteth as an example over the rudeness to the player too, but once again that’s about context and intent. hapi is a lesser example, due to a similar mistrusting nature, and there’s quite a bit of the cast who are cold and rude because that’s just who they are. now, thank fucking god that leonie actually talks about things that aren’t jeralt. like, seriously, i’d die. she still talks about him too much, but i really should go through all of faye’s dialogue to do a proper count. 

so now you’re probably thinking—if you even got this far—“gee tell, you sure do like running your fuckin mouth, eh? so what’s the point of all this?” let’s wrap it up. 

the TL;DR:

what this all boils down to is that leonie’s got a serious problem in her writing where her entire life revolves around a man, and the way it’s dealt with isn’t particularly great. she doesn’t have a dynamic character arc like some others that redeem them from their problems, and the personality she has outside of her relationship to jeralt and byleth often clashes with the one she has with them, particularly centering on byleth. when dealing with byleth, the image it paints of her is extremely negative, and not one easily shaken—again, the B support moment is just THAT BAD. that is the most cited moment for why people hate her. it just seems like for all the flaws she has, they are not compensated for or grown out of like other characters in the game do for theirs.

theres also that tweet about how we put more thought into these characters than intsys does, so. yeah. definitely doing that right now. thanks, intsys, you did it again.

i will also point to the argument that we should hold the writers accountable, not the fictional characters who aren’t real and don’t have feelings. i don’t think leonie needs to be held accountable for her bullshit. i just wish the writers could have treated her better.

this is personally why i find leonie so difficult, and hopefully if you didn’t understand why people don’t like leonie, this can help enlighten you. i’m willing to hear people out if they have something to say, and as always, if you are a leonie stan, please go enjoy yourself, have fun, and don’t let me ruin your parade. i just enjoy trying to figure things out and talking a lot along the way! so that’s all, here’s hoping that in the future they do better, and remember that GD is the best house okay bye take this picture of me typing up this whole ass thing

[unordinary-analysis]

Episode 152

Honorable mentions:

Arlo’s gonna get his ass beat after this episode lmao

Okay okay I know this might sound whiney, but I refuse to believe that Remi never noticed low-tiers being bullied, but suddenly she walks into one being bullied in an empty hallway and being loud af. Like… what happened before? Would she just have walked right past them not noticing. It bothers me when things like this happen because no she wouldn’t, but it’s written like that idk iksduhjdsf

I love how oblivious Sera is

Lmao she only becomes suspicious of Arlo and John because Arlo was protecting her 

But why does she have the eyebags though… like lol im sorry does being powerless mean you sleep worse? She lives in a dorm with Elaine. She has nothing to be scared of at night haha

It really bothers me that the only reason that Seraphina finally believes Arlo is because Arlo beat up John like of all the things---

Even though I’m making this, I still love the way I’ve been running this blog recently. Please send in more asks! It makes me so happy to answer questions people actually have :)))

Also I’m just pretty trash at writing these.

I had to do an analysis for this episode. I just… had to.

Arlo:

    You know how recently literally every character has been telling Arlo that he can’t give up? That he’s weak for submitting to John? Yeah, well that’s bullshit. Elaine is stupid, I’m just going to say it. She lives in a world where problems can be solved by talking it out, like the girl is delusional. Remi, well Remi used to live in a world similar to Elaine’s, but now she’s more woke I would say. She still thinks that every problem has a solution and that the only way to win is to beat the competition. She’s a friendlier version of who Seraphina used to be. Blyke? He’s like Remi. Too caught up with winning. Blyke and Remi don’t stop to consider that sometimes the best solutions require giving in a little bit. I’m not even talking about compromises, just, I don’t know, accepting that you’ve lost and can’t win because if you don’t accept that, you’ll keep failing forever. They don’t realize that. Arlo does.

    But yeah. Arlo isn’t weak or defeated (though he is in the literal sense). By choosing to step down and submit to John, Arlo is securing the best outcome for Wellston as a whole, not just himself. He recognizes that by giving John the victory, he will resolve more problems than by just fighting back. Arlo knows that he should be striving for peace, not war. Arlo knows that the hierarchy can’t just disappear overnight, regardless of what John thinks. Hierarchy is natural. People follow those with more power. It’s not a set of rules, it’s instinct. 

    For time’s sake, I’m just going to use what Arlo said in this episode for evidence. He says (to Elaine), “I can’t keep dragging people into this. I’m the one who pushed John… So I’ll take responsibility for it. If dethroning me will put an end to his rampage… That’s fine.”

    Perfect. Well said. Wise. That last bit? Facts. Now there’s a good leader.

    I can’t stand Elaine in general (sorry guys), and this episode made me hate her more. She thinks Arlo is broken after he says this. Like… This is one of the wisest things that Arlo has said in such a long time, and you won’t even listen. Some of these characters seem to only hear the “I’ll let John dethrone me” and let all of Arlo’s reasons wash over their heads.

    When Arlo lets Joker dethrone him, the hierarchy isn’t going to end. Like I said in recent posts and actually in this one, people naturally follow people who are more powerful. I think Arlo knows this because I mean even old Arlo would know this. His whole thing is order. I don’t know. Not important. What is important is that John can’t actually get rid of the hierarchy. I still don’t understand how Rei did it. Like, yeah I understand the principles, but I don’t get how it worked. The ones who have more power can overpower others. Only an idiot would fight a battle they know they cannot win. Obviously, by siding with the more powerful, someone would have the most success. Obviously, being on the winning side is better. That’s why people follow those more powerful. That’s why the UnOrdinary world will never be rid of the hierarchy. I don’t know. My brain isn’t working right now.

    Also, other Arlo things: he’s become such a more thoughtful person because of John. Not like nice, though I suppose some would say he has been nicer. I just mean that he is now more aware of the consequences his actions have (actually every character has maybe i’ll make another post about that hm) and how his actions impact others. He’s not only understanding this now, but he’s also acting on it. Ksudjfbjsfwskwjfsf. Sorry, I’m just lowkey the president of the Arlo fanclub right now. 

    I’ve said all of this before lmao ssodfhskjdfn.

John and Seraphina:

    Okay, first of all, John is a great actor. Like, hpeter1 (hi :)) commented on my recent post saying they like John less because he told Seraphina a straight lie. That before, it was just deception through omission. Sorry, but I really can’t take this seriously. John’s whole character is lying to Sera. Like the whole not having abilities thing? Yeah. even if John didn’t lie to Sera a bunch, I mean… What was he supposed to say? ‘Yes, I’m joker’? I just… don’t get this. I don’t mean anything by disagreeing with you btw, you’re great :). But like I said. John is a great actor lmao (sorry I get off topic). I just wanted to address this.

    I said this in the honorable mentions and I will say this again: the way that Seraphina started to piece things together is… stupid. Like… She goes to herself ‘hm why is Arlo so mean to John’ then somehow that leads her to ‘aRLo muSt THiNk thAt jOHn CAN fighT bAck!” I just… I can’t… 

    As it is with most of these intense scenes, there’s not much for me to add R.I.P.

(send me more asks)

(also the handful of you who like and comment on my posts regularly, there’s a special place in my heart for you)

[ad1thi]

captain america vs steve rogers

this is written on mobile so im sorry for any typos

--

i feel like i will always be writing analysis on this character and find it lacking, and i should point out that i do love steve rogers; which is why i have so much analysis on him- because i feel like the mcu did him dirty

--

okay so this is something that ive been thinking about for a while

and

Captain America: The First Avenger did this brilliant job of introducing "Steve" and "Cap" as two seperate people. Steve Rogers was the 2 bit nothing that got into fights in alleys and jumped on a live grenade to save people's lives, Cap was the guy who paraded around in tights

i feel like this distinction is really important because Cap is a figurehead, he's an ideal- but Steve was the guy behind the mask

And CA:TFA did a really good job of addressing that and establishing two seperate, personalities almost; which is why i initially fell in love with the chatacter (because you can draw many parallels between cep v steve and tony v ironman)

and its brilliant set up that ends with Steve winning as the dominant personality and displaying his unflinching loyalty to people but penultimately dying when he pilots the plane into the oceans, and simultaneously immortalising Cap

there's a lot of ways to look at the ending of TFA, but thats my take on it

and its a really brilliant set up that just abruptly hits a wall

because its one thing for the mcu verse to immortalise Cap and not look beyond the cowl, but its another thing entirely for writers in our very real world to do the same

every single arc after ca: tfa follows the overture and overeaching idea of challenging ideals that belong to Captain America, not Steve Rogers

unflinching loyalty to the "system", to superiors, to SHIELD: im sorry but WHAT THE FUCK. Steve Rogers spent most of his adult life faking enlistment forms and getting into fights in back alleys and memorably, signing himself up for a freak experiment that he didnt even know was legal. There is literally no scene in TFA where Steve blindly follows rules and listens to his superiors his fucking origin story is running away from his responsibilities and getting on a plane to storm a HYDRA base and save his bestfriend. Captain America on the other hand played a dancing monkey on the word of his superiors for years. Loyalty and belief in the system was never a Steve chatacteristic- yet most of his character arc in CA:TWS and CA:CW is about his realisation that the system isn't always right and "the safest hands are our own" like bitch steve already knew that, thats why he got on a plane with howard and took matters into his own hands this ain't new

his love for peggy: now im not saying that steve didn't love Peggy, because he did. but the idea of immortalising this love affair between him and peggy, is another Captain America thing. I stg every kid in mcu! america was raised on the love story of agent carter and captain america who broke barriers and defied all odds to be together, while all steve rogers did was kiss her once and flirt a lil (badly). the idea that peggy was the only one for steve- to the extent that the only other woman he tried with was her niece, is another cap trait

persistence: this i think, is one of the biggest ones. one of his most famous lines in endgame is "some people move on, but not us". which is absolute bullSHIT because thats such a cap line. In CA:TFA after Bucky's death, Steve is ready to throw in the towel because he's so sure that his foolhardiness got Bucky killed and he's not able to live with the loss of his bestfriend. He recklessly takes on a HYDRA base with little to no backup, lets himself get kidnapped and is ready to die. But Captain America ™ saves the day by valiantly fighting on despite the loss of his bestfriend because he knows his patriotic duty is towards the american people and he can't sit still when HYDRA is still out there. Idc what you say that final mission was nothing but revenge for Steve, and a slim chance that maybe HYDRA will kill him too and he won't have to live in a world without Bucky. Steve Rogers doesnt cope well with loss, but Captain America shoulders through it and keeps fighting the good fight

its one thing for people in the mcu to not differentiate between steve and cap. its another thing entirely for the writers to completely forgo the person for the persona and refuse to develop both simultaneously and i will never shut up about this because the mcu did steve so fkn dirty

anyway

90% of all steve fics i read have some version of a scene where steve tells the avengers to stop calling him Cap because he isn't fucking Captain America thats just his day job he's so much more he's Steve mf Rogers from Brooklyn fucking recognise that

honestly, after tfa- the only scene that perfectly captures the constant inner struggle between his cap person and his actual personality is the endgame scene where he literally fights his past self and his past self says " i can do this all day" and he goes "yeah i know" in really really exasperated voice

like

same

we're really tired and annoyed with cap too steve dw we get it

[cruddyborderlandstheories]

Sanctuary-III: Demo Analysis

Hi again! I’m here to do my full Sanctuary-III analysis. (im back on my bullshit of actually structuring posts like a functioning human. holy mother of g-)

Tl;Dr: So from what I’ve gathered so far, Sanctuary-III looks like a Maliwan-inspired ship, but was actually built by a company named <SUPAMAX MFG>. I do think the ship we go on in the demo is taken from another part of the game, probably the time period when we’ve reached the Maliwan/Monastery planet of which I don’t know the name (the one we see Maya on). I understand that we can see Pandora in the demo, but it’d be easy to travel back there and simply remove the option for the monastery planet when we go to Promethea. I have a couple reasons for thinking this, so I’ll go over it when we get there.

For now, let’s get started :D

So, even though we’re going to be doing a full analysis of the demo, I did want to start with our previous sightings of the ship.

Ellie hanging onto a smaller version of the ship.

Lorelei resting her foot on a larger model

one hiding behind Zane near the car

better view below:

and a ship as we see it on the cover art:

notice I say A ship because there are definitely differences between this one and the Sanctuary-III we meet in the demo.

Most notably the colors/design, but also the back engines are missing from below the spoiler and the fins on the front are different shapes. Additionally, the one in the cover has windows that are significantly different from the demo and the engines in demo have fins coming off the tops that we don’t see here. I’ve been yelled at before that this isn’t a noticeable enough difference to think about, that the developers just decided to roll with it, but honestly I believe if the designers put that much time into ensuring the cover art has a dozen easter eggs to solve, why would they look at the ship and decide “eh, that’s good enough”? I wanna believe they’re not that laidback about this.

So I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt for now and provide a handful of theories as to what this cover art ship could be:

1. Sanctuary-II or an earlier model of Sanc-III (or both)

2. A shuttle used to move people to-and-from places Sanctuary-III is too large to access and the drop pods are too violent to hit (I’m thinking meteors/asteroids here) annnd hopefully we get to putz around space in one

3. A fully separate ship from Sanctuary-III that we’ll have to use later on in the game, either due to Sanctuary-III being destroyed, or other weird circumstances that would render it unavailable. Could possibly be used to reach Elpis?

Anyway, enough of that. Let’s get right into the thick of things with the actual ship from the demo!

This hit me right in the heart. I love that u can see Pandora in the background, too.

The actual ship! Do you see what I mean by those minor differences to the cover art ship? Moving on.

The reason I thought this ship was mainly because of the huge swaths of orange and the blue engines/bridge. I had thought it was Atlas as well at one point, but retracted both those statements when I saw the name of the manufacturer printed everywhere inside lol

It is possible it was made specifically for either of those companies. I am leaning towards Maliwan, so I’ll point out my reasons why as we move through this.

Also, check out the docking bay on the bottom there. That door leads to the large room we see Ellie in. I think the fins on the front of the ship are to hold it up when it’s landed so we can drive vehicles out the bottom. I am hoping for a scene near endgame where the ship is shielding us from huge attacks from above as we drive out of the bottom and, right as we escape, it collapses behind us. Fingers crossed.

the back of the ship. And the engines I mention you can’t see protruding out the back on the cover art.

Oh, and say hi to the CoV!

that’s where Troy’s sword gets launched from orbit

as we zoom in, we can see a whole bunch of things

to start, looks like Hyperion got some nice rebranding. I hope Blake took over tbh

a poster of moxxxi’s. I love the feather in her hat; I wonder if that means her a mordy got back together...

also im going to take the time to point out

how much I love that each Vault Hunter gets something that glows. Amara has her tattoos (and she can customize the color!), Fl4k has their eye, Moze has Iron Bear’s digistruct pack, and Zane has a cool jacket. Rock on my babies, you’re all beautiful. Oh, and the whole teleporting animation for this, I don’t know if its like a “first time” only thing or what, but I love it, I love it so much. I’m so glad we’re going to be able to see our Vault Hunters in the third person.

okay moving on

so right away you notice the guide telling you where places are, with arrows point in different directions. It’s quite hard to read at the moment, but we do see it again later. 

We all know about the quick change station and the lost-and-found, so I don’t think I ought to go over those right now. 

claptrap seems to have his own little cereal or something, not sure if that’s been sighted anywhere else, but im afraid for anyone who eats it

player quarters! holy balls im so excited for these

We can see the display cases everywhere, but there’s also a vault (not that kind) in the back left. I imagine that’s the bank. Hoooopefully we get a larger storage capacity or my mule characters are gonna have a ton of new buddies to talk to lol

better look at the cereals.

also apparently that water bottle we see in the Game of Thrones joke the twitter posted is an actual asset in the game.

While we have singular display cases for guns, it looks like items get their own display cases

it can show off rarity color and on the bottom left, you get to see exactly what you’re looking at. no more confusing grenade mods for shields in this house

a non-holographic poster for the Typhon Deleon movie. I think this is the first we’ve seen outside of Promethea. I guess Amara’s a fan.

A vault symbol rug, and the symbol spray painted onto her punching bag. I think that poster in the back is a Monty Python reference? I didn’t get quite a good look at it, we might see another one later on.

Amara has a window seat, I’m actually hoping we’ll be able to hang out in our rooms and look out the window at space. I would honestly spend so much time here. Also, regarding the bed (not pictured, that’s the window seat), I’m wondering if that will have any gameplay effects or if it's just aesthetics. I hope it’s at least bouncy...

she does have some jakobs crates holding up the plants. Don’t know if that has anything to do with her backstory or if its just to fit the aesthetic of her room.

we’re also told “again, you can modify your player quarters to how you want to play” which... I don’t know if I’m looking too deeply into that, but it seems like we’ll be able to pick and choose things like furniture or overall layout. I wonder if they’d let us cycle between the other VH’s rooms. Not sure exactly what it’s supposed to imply, but it is something to point out.

Our first look at the SUPAMAX MFG logo. “Ships made Quick”

We also get our first look at Ellie’s cargo bay. More on this later

behind the curtains to the left of here

a poster of Jack and some lootable washing machines. We’ve seen the poster before, from what I’ve heard it's a movie poster starring timothy doppleman. Which... What a legend. 

Now, I do want to point out we see this logo next to the cargo bay

this is one of the reasons I thought the ship was Atlas at first, however you can tell there’s no gap on the right of the triangle and the bottom edges don’t match. I definitely think the new Atlas logo is a delta to signify change, though, cause Rhys is a big ol nerd.

some blueprints of the ship and a bunch of reused posters from BL2 thrown in for decor purposes. There’s another poster of Typhon to the left of that, but since we’ve already seen it, fuck ‘em

We also see a buttload of Maliwan crates hanging around the ship, matching the color design of the one we saw floating around space 

here’s one of them!

a better look at the blueprints as a standalone poster. It looks like ‘Sanctuary’ was written over with something, but I can’t make out what. also checkout how the paint on top doesn’t match the paint on the cover art’s ship. Nor does the cover art have the fins coming off the engines like we see here. I actually just noticed that even the spoilers are different shapes.

Moving on before I go off on another tangent

a poster for Marcus’s shop

the new golden chest as Randy called it. I believe we’ve seen the animation already, where the guns splay upwards like a peacock or smth

a cowgirl hangin out on more Maliwan chests

Marcus’s new sign. Honestly? He’s rocking the bun.

this dude we find walking out of the store. Don’t know what his deal is, but I’m digging it.

this Amara already has 5/8 Pistol SDUs unlocked! (Also, there are 8 max SDUs) Makes me think she’s a high level character. That’ll come into play later lol

5/8 Backpack SDUS. I didn’t show it but she also had 1/8 Shotgun SDUs. Also only +3 to backpack space each. Considering Amara already has 5 unlocked, that means we get the regular 12 backpack space to start. D:

bank space only gets +2. Amara already has 2, meaning the bank can only hold 8 items without upgrades. F in chat for the big bank dreams. Max amount the bank can hold is 24. Somebody comfort me... hopefully these SDUs increase exponentially 😭

the mystery SDU. It looks like a box with a question mark on it, giving out guns and grenades. Makes me worry this is some form of loot box, but considering it can be bought with cash in-game, that’s probably a good sign. Maybe you can buy golden keys in game to open the gold chest now? Randy said no microtransactions and, while he is Randy, I want to believe him (disregarding the skins fiasco because we all knew that was coming).

since i’ve also seen speculation that it’s the upgrade for the capacity of the Lost-And-Found, I think that’s probably what this actually is.

the shooting range we can see from here. Doesn’t appear to have any targets yet, but it may be like the one in BL2 where they only appear when we enter.

more Maliwan boxes to the left of the shooting range.

Crew Quarters sign!

some very big (tm) Maliwan crates

tannis’s sign!

this NPC actually seems important, I’m wondering if she’ll give us a side quest or something

what i’m guessing is the power core to the ship. It’s in such a great place to get shot... i wonder if perhaps... we’re going to have to do that at some point...

“ain’t no place like space” I love this place.

also looks like there’s a shortcut here. You can see the planks across the pipes, the balcony, and the railing here that’s gonna be easy to get over. Excitement!

looks like a control panel right in front of the core. Yeah, there’s definitely going to be something related to it. Maybe we’ll get attacked and we have to go stabilize it. Maybe our ship will get hijacked and we’ll have to blow it up from the inside. I can’t be the only one who thinks this place is wayyy too grand to not get destroyed...

better look at that bad boy

the opening to moxxi’s bar

actual bar

i have no idea what this is, but i dig it. Also the zer0 for the O is making me go  🤔 i don’t THINK Zer0 would get involved, but then again, they are doing missions for Moxxi in Tales, so maybe the two got together to make something

this door seems different enough and detailed enough (red glowing light) to make me think we’re going to be unlocking this and going through it at some point. Then it shall glow green and make me happy instead of frustrated. the minimap, unfortunately, does not agree with me, but I want to believe. or that’s gonna bother me to no end. Maybe some sort of “we just escaped control core angel” situation, idk.

some slot machines. Ca$hTrap! and Tinx’s Hijinx. Looks like an NPC is using the latter though so idk if it will be available to use. 

scoring system. Looks like the ??x row will give us a new character skin!! hype.

the uhhh... Lava Lamp column... will give us...? ???

A devil fruit?? A grenade? wtf is that???

3 bananas gives us new colors! Crowns = head

the... Eridium...? That seems way too pink to be Eridium tbqh. It reminds me more of Seraph crystals, but maybe its a reference to the ‘Eridium’ growing out of the ground on Promethea? ...... Maybe that’s growing because Atlas/Typhon actually DID open the Vault on Promethea

uh anyway

The last column is about more crystals and then cash and then the last one... I assume the icons are Claptrap’s eye (considering the game), but the reward? i think that’s the grenade the demo player gets in the demo 

we’ve also got Loot Boxer (also taken by an NPC) and Vault Line. I’m wondering if the NPCs using the machines are just a gameplay mechanic and they’ll disappear after a certain level/event. Maybe those ones give us better loot. idk.

for Vault Line, i think that says “Knockout Prizes” but I could be wrong. More importantly, it looks like we can get legendaries from this one! First column shows a green/purple/yellow (legendary?) gun. I can’t tell what the other icons are meant to be, though. i think the next 3 are shields, then maybe class mods? or... grenade mods? i don’t know. The last one is a total blob for me, no ideas on that. Also wondering if that machine costs Eridium to play or something, 1) because of its design and 2) because the rewards seem sooo much better than Claptrap’s.

outside we see the Crew Quarters sign for the first time and, interestingly enough, a TV broadcasting the same symbol we see being broadcasted all across the CoV camps. What’s up with that?

infirmary and crew quarters signs on the wall this time

more Maliwan crap. even says it right on the tin. Why is there a pokeball on there?

a map of the ship. We see this on a bunch of monitors, even ones on Promethea, for some reason. This one is mirrored. dunno why.

more signs. Left top to bottom: “Cargo Bay” “Armory” “Infirmary”

Right top to bottom: “Engine Room” (OwO) “Crew Quarters” “Cargo Bay” “Armory” annnd nothing on the last line this bend around. when they turn the corner, you can see that it, too, says “infirmary”

Also, the Heatant and Coolant Pipes lmao

“LAB/SICK BAY” pointing to the left towards Tannis’s corner

so, here’s where we get our first glance at something very very interesting

now, the crew makes us think this is our first time visiting Promethea in the demo. But if it is, why are there Promethea civilians wandering around the ship? I believe i go over this some in an older post, but I’ll recap:

1) It could be that Sanctuary III was already in the air before the game starts and had already visited Promethea to take some Civilians off Rhys’s hands so he had less to worry about. That would mean that we’d need a shuttle or something to reach the ship in order to activate the fast travel station, which is (possibly) where the ship on the cover art could come in. Because in the borderlands universe, you need to reach a Fast Travel station first before you’re able to teleport to it and if Sanc III is flying and Lilith doesn’t have her powers, we’re stranded on Pandora. (Alternatively, the ship could come down from space, but... I kinda doubt it can without not being able to take off again. Maybe borderlands just has cooler spaceships... idk. They were able to make a caravan space capable). Unfortunately, this would mean those screencaps from the new trailer that looks like Sanctuary III being infested with wildlife would not take place on early-game Pandora/that we wouldn’t rescue the ship and claim it as our own. (We could possibly get Sanctuary III in the air in the new BL2 DLC if this is the case.) The ship getting infested then could take place above the Maliwan planet or Promethea or soon after we join the crew and we’re sent down there to clean it up as a side quest. Or there’s a time skip and the ship gets overrun and we have to fix it. Now that’d be rad... 

2) gearbox is being sneaky beaky about the demo time. We do see Maya later on, which leads me to believe this takes place after we meet her. Where does it look like she’ll be? On the Maliwan/Monastery planet. It could be possible that the devs took the ship back to Pandora and simply removed the Maliwan planet from the list of places to take our ship. That would leave Promethea as an option while also explaining why there are both Promethean citizens and Maya on board. Could also explain Lilith having her tattoos back, since we don’t know the events of the story that lead to us going to find Maya. Though, I think I have an idea... I’ll leave that for my Maya masterpost though. Lilith also says “We arrived in one piece... that’s a first” when we travel to Promethea, leading me to believe either that’s where Sanctuary-II warped and got destroyed (maybe explaining why there are Promethea Civilians with us now), possibly in the asteroid fields, also maybe due to a mechanical failure, or Sanctuary-III, when it first went to Promethea with us, got a bit damaged by the rocks floating around Promethea or some other thing like the CoV attacking, idk. What are those rocks for, anyway? ....... I gotta make a post on that, don’t I? oi oi oi...

Moving on

the front of the Infirmary

....

this kinda looks like a baby T-Rex. There are T-Rexes on the swamp planet, which we now are assuming is Promethea, aren’t there? Oh hell yeah. If the swamp planet ISN’T Promethea I’m gonna be all like [shocked pikachu face]. that outskirts area was really making me believe. 

anyway, see above lol

we also get another glimpse at the SUPAMAX logo

some lootables in the back

not sure if these are Maliwan or not.

Zed also has a machine in the back here. We haven’t seen him around yet, but odds are he’s still kicking because of this. And hopefully still friendly with the crimson raiders. Maybe Tannis locked him in a closet or something, idk.

oooo i haven’t seen this screen before

i want to know what it isssss

this also looks eerily familiar. brb, gonna go find what this reminds me of

okay, so

not sure if its exactly the same material/type of symbol, but this location, what i have dubbed the “temple” cuz i got no better name for it, does have square emblems across the floor with borders.

so, interestingly, this one has what looks like an eye with beams shooting out of it. if that description sounds familiar to you, it should, because

EYEBALL

now i got no idea if these are related aside from being in the same game, but it does interest me that they’ve both got eyeballs and streaky beams.

Oh and Tannis’s Vault symbol doesn’t have the writing (?) across the edges, but I will say, it does kinda look like cuneiform and eridian writing had a baby. Like, if you super heavily pixelate the Watcher’s name on her title card...

tbh I’ve theorized a lot about this place, but haven’t found anything I particularly like. From the place where the first Vault Atlas ever opened is (meaning its on Promethea and could explain why Tannis has that slab), the Great Vault’s holding place (where the skeleton on the ground is Typhon and his final journal) (perhaps the Great Vault is the entryway to the Eridian homeworld... that could explain why the CoV are trying to find it... might be a reason why they’re being manipulated by new aliens to find it. god please let them be the Seraphs...) uh, anyway, I also had an idea that it was someplace on the Maliwan planet, and maybe that it was in the archives area that was taken over by Maliwan and that the skeleton was of a Siren. That would explain why Maya is shown handing the book to Little Blue in the MoM. I go over that in an old post though, so moving on.

 oh, there’s also a frame of Tannis’s animation where the dinosaur she was inside stands up and clips through the table:

there’s a small room over here we don’t get to see, and I’m wondering if there’s another NPC joining us on Sanctuary-III that isn’t showcased. god I hope if its pickle he got more bearable as he got older because dear god i hated him in tps. I can’t see Athena nor Janey with a desk like that. Maybe Vaughn? Though would he really want to go back to being an accountant after everything...?

more maliwan boxes btw. looks like someone scribbled on this one lol

now we head to the bridge!!!

looks like an arcade game lol

but possibly a control mechanism for shuttles coming in???  👀 👀 👀

Crew Quarters and the SUPAMAX logo

oh yeah, and in case you were doubtful that this was a borderlands game:

“Caution: Excessive Farts Detected”

the Bridge!!!

We’ve got a holo-projector thing up front like we’ve seen Rhys use, as well as a mini one used as a digistructer during Lorelei’s hamburger quest. Most interesting, Lily has her tattoos! Definitely wondering if this takes place later on in the story or if they swapped her early game model in. either way, they’re definitely there. 

some cool art of Sanctuary III zooming away

just have to say

i love this so much

its great

okay moving on

I wish they’d be more specific. do ruins = vault? Typhon says he discovers the Vault and the Key in one fell swoop. if Typhon DID give atlas the Vault key and the location to the Vault (and we’re not just listening to an ARG for the movie or smth) then why didn’t Atlas open it immediately?! I mean, in TFTBL Cassius says Gortys is their last ditch attempt at opening a Vault! So what the heck?? I can’t believe that it would be less than 200 years from the first Vault being discovered to the Eridians abandoning everything. like vault keys take 200 years to naturally charge so there’s no reason why it wouldn’t be already charged and available (Unless its more of a cycle thing where it charges and then discharges after a while for safety’s sake??). 

And another thing, if that IS Eridium growing out of the ground on Promethea, then they totally DID open the first Vault. Or at least Typhon did. Unless there was something stopping them... like... Maybe in the temple those demon-looking-things stopped them from getting through and that’s why we find a bunch of skeletons around the place? Or maybe the Guardians got to them, or some other Eridian protection scheme. i don’t know... im so confused... brain hurt...

anyway

why the fuck does Elpis look like this

is that the light side of the moon? dear god im blind.

hhhh at least we can still see the crackening

lowkey wondering if the ship is based off of Eridian tech. I could totally see a slip-space drive being based off Lilith’s phasewalking

when we finish travelling, Lily says “We’ve arrived in one piece. that’s a first” and yeeah, i can see whyyy

rocks. rocks everywhere. tbh i think these rocks are 1) why lilith says that (we’ve either been to Promethea before in Sanc-III or Sanc-II got decimated slip jumping here) and 2) why the VH’s entry into Promethea is apparently so awful Lilith needs to ask if they’re actually still alive. also, we get to see just how much of Promethea is cities and goddamn. that’s a lot for a borderworld.

sorry for the youtube bar. 

Deck A: Hammerlock - Infirmary/Tannis - Deck B: Marcus - Moxxi Deck C: Cargo Bay

I am honestly so curious how they got this ship with that lettering on it. I guess they could’ve made it themselves, but... you gotta wonder... maybe we get the ship built on Pandora by Ellie. Or she helps us fix it up after we remove all gross rat things from it.

MAYAAAAA

better look at the Monty poster plus some other stuff, like a clock, dartboard, and a gas mask. Also if anyone knows what that says up top there, please let me know, im super curious!

Hammerlock’s quarters!

this guy has the same facial hair as Zane. I swear to god if I hear “Oh, that’s me fourth brother” im gonna lose my absolute shit

something to the far left outside of Hammerlock’s quarters we’re not allowed to see yet :(

there’s also graffiti of “Charge port here” around the ship and i think that’s hilarious. It’s like an airport

put your ports in, damn it!

Ellie!!!

More maliwan boxes to her left, btw

the actual cargo bay. remember how i said to look at the bottom of sanctuary III to find the door? I’m like 90% sure that’s it right there. Randy also says “down here we can check out the vehicles we’ve collected AND this is how/where we get access to the planets while we’re in orbit”.

Crazy Earl’s black market! dunno how he’s actually, like, connected to the black market from here, but, hey, who knows what he’s got in there.

veteran rewards, apparently drawn over one of Marcus’s machines lol

“Inter-Galactic” a little drawing of Sanc-III and another Maliwan box (you can see why I think this ship is Maliwan, right?)

Clappy and his GF... yeah...

one very big digistruct pad. listen... im praying for a space shuttle. i really am.

finally:

the drop pod

god this looks awesome. I bet we’re gonna have many a fun time in there lol

I finally get to live out my dream of being an ODST in borderlands. what badasses they are.

[terramythos]

My thoughts on October Daye #12 “Night and Silence” oooor “Dammit, Janet!” (suggestion courtesy of @mistressofmuses ).

And with this I am officially all caught up! Well, I haven’t read all the novellas and short stories, but caught up on the main series. Now I have to wait for #13 this year like a normal person! Gah! 

-So, leading off from all the horrible shit that happened last book, things aren't going.. great.

-You know that intense, extreme trauma 2 members of the main cast experienced @ the end of last book? Yeah that. Didnt go away

-There's a line about how Tybalt keeps seeing Toby as her mother Amandine... the person who kidnapped and basically tortured him last book. And he's basically terrified of shapeshifting at all and has just stayed in his humanoid form. And he's refusing help from anyone and disappearing for long stretches. And maybe going just a little bit Fuckening Crazy. G-great start, guys!

-And there's a flashback where he's just MEAN and like you can understand why but MAJOR YIKES and also pain.

Ok unexpected May feels ;-;

-Gillian Is Missing Again but I have a feeling this is not gonna be much of a retread...

-And.. boy this sure is a callback huh? May and Quentin being the found family, Gillian is missing, Tybalt is antagonistic...

-ok Jocelyn is a creepy fangirl character

-ok I'm 5 chapters in and wondering where this is going. Apparently there's Quite The Twist in this one or at least that's what I suspect is going to happen

-oooohkay they find like this weird pocket dimension with like. A miniature house that is also a chicken (and no one even mentions Baba Yaga). And idk what it is about the scene but it is fucking eerie and creepy as hell somehow.

Shade appeared in like book 6 as a Literal Cat so.. here she is showing up and being relevant for 5 minutes

-but what the FUCK is with this place. I got nothing and that exposition just raises more questions. There's no magic scent at all (except MAYBE cinammon), a bunch of rare fucking plants, and a fucking miniature baba yaga hut just wandering around

-that opens another rabbit hole because Golden Gate Park is ALSO completely unclaimed for no particular reason 🤔

This might be a waste of picture and might get deleted later but like, that's fucking creepy, right???

-god I know there HAS to be someone with cinnamon in their magical signature who we've MET but... it's been 12 books, dog. I dont fuckin remember

-The closest I can think is Simon with "mulled cider" because that's cinnamony... BUT it's pretty unlikely he did this, and that part of his magical signature is PRE corruption and we have the corrupted version running around.

-We just found a SECOND creepy unexplainable house hidden in plain sight so that's starting to feel Thematic.

-And she smells the false Queen's magic in this house :) someone supposedly asleep for 100 years in Silences. So that's great.

-Aaand there's Gillain! Not even halfway through the book. Way too easy.

-It's not Gillian. It's a Baoban Sith which is apparently *googling* a.. vampire. Ok

-My crack theory is pretty much dead in the water lol 

There's more than this bit but ;---; fuck dude

-But yeah! After a book and a half of hiatus, Tybalt's back! A little.. broken and suffering from severe PTSD, but you know.

-They go to Goldengreen based on a hint and Marcia is there baking cinnamon rolls. It really stresses the fact that she's making cinnamon rolls.

UM.

-.... holy shit.

-Ok. Ok ok. Assuming that's the truth that means Amandine's mother was.. a human? Making her a fucking CHANGELING Firstborn? What the fuuuuuck

-Oh that is fucking hysterical with what a fucking blood purist Amandine is. She looks down upon changelings and the beast races SO MUCH. Janet implies Amandine has no idea her mother was human, or at least never knew Janet. I'd bet she figured out she was part human because the Dochas Sidhe's whole deal is messing with one's heritage for fun results. Gosh. Hmm.

-And this mirrors everyone hiding October's heritage from her BEAUTIFULLY.

-I don't remember quite when "Miranda" was introduced but it was pretty early on. And now that I think of it there was NO REASON for her to fucking exist! What the fuck! The story would have made just as much sense with Cliff being a single dad raising Gillian. Miranda was just an antagonistic extra detail who didn’t... really do much. God damn it. 

-Cliff “accidentally” marrying Toby's maternal grandmother who is somehow Human and also like, alive, in order to help raise Toby's daughter is. Fucking Something, huh.

Oh lore??? (Oberon, King of Faerie, kinda a nice guy it turns out, accidentally knocks up a human. Uh... whoops?)

-Fuck dude, that was the blood memory flashback we had in book 9. The Luidaeg begging her mom not to leave on The Ride. Oof.

-So Janet is, yes indeed human and YES INDEED Toby’s grandmother. She’s cursed with immortality because of all that shit she pulled. 

-And BOY does that lore regarding Janet make the whole "Amandine was doted on and given everything she ever asked for" make sense cause... THAT'S WHAT THEY DID WITH HUMANS. And here we have a fucking FIRSTBORN born from a fucking HUMAN. Gosh. Jeez.

-and Katy pointed out to me that that's a big book 3 reference because Toby's family holds her down when THEY try to remove her from Blind Michael's version of the Ride, and SHE wildly shapeshifts through dozens of forms.It was a Tam Lin retelling only I don’t think I ever expected the actual thing to be relevant. 

-And FUCK Evening/Eira, by the way. I think that goes without saying at this point.

-So is Blind Michael's Ride supposed to be a replacement of the old one? 500 years ago the fae used The Ride to sacrifice a human every 7 years--until Tam Lin and Janet fucked it up. Fast forward to the present and we had Blind Michael showing up every couple years stealing children for what HE called The Ride.

-soooo Toby killing Blind Michael might have not been a great thing if you follow that line of reasoning. I mean, he was a fucking monster, BUT... Because The Ride is supposedly to maintain balance, hence the sacrifices. Whatever the fuck that ultimately means. And by stopping it...

-Add that on to all the stuff last book about how Blind Michael wasn't always such a shitty person, and... uh hmmm.

-OK this part might be a stretch but: the Dochas Sidhe are the only descendants we know of that are just... one hundred percent descended from one of the Three. The human part is largely irrelevant in fae terms. They’re directly Oberon’s, not some mix of Maeve/Oberon or Titania/Oberon. Would that mean Oberon is actually Dochas Sidhe? He did, after all, create the hope chests, and the Dochas Sidhe are literally living, breathing hope chests. IDK MAN. 

Tybalt, PLEASE.

-So it is, predictably, the false Queen behind this whole situation, helped by Jocelyn. And I just FUCKING REMEMBERED that it was that dickbag Dugan who had cinnamon in his magical signature .-.

-The Baoban Sith just be like "yeah sorry about almost eating you I uh straight up hadn't eaten in 40 years lol. Anyway I'm Kennis, what's up?"

OH FUCK! I FUCKING *CALLED* THIS SHIT OUT IN BOOK SIX! I remember it being mentioned offhand as something that could happen. I fucking KNEW we were going to turn a character into a Selkie for plot reasons. But I gotta say I didn't expect it to be Gillian!

FUCK DUDE ;___; in this house we stan The Luidaeg. Best character. I'm not crying. (I am.) 

-She has a line a few pages later about anxiety and catastrophic thinking, and how what you THINK will happen is never as bad as what actually happens. She compares it to "chasing the tide" and honestly that's such a useful metaphor, as someone often caught in that trap...

-They take down Dugan, yay, he was a loose end. He's not DEAD, but.. This is another one where the villain felt pretty secondary to the big plot revelations. 

-And Tybalt stepped down (temporarily) as King. Jolgeir's daughter is apparently going to temporarily take things over so I expect we will be introduced to her later?? 

---

-And, like the last few books, theres a novella epilogue at the end. This one is "Suffer a Sea-Change" and looks to be from Gillian's perspective.

-ok so Gillian has this whole scene where she TALKS to Firtha (whose skin she's wearing now) and I can't help but wonder if all selkies have this weird scene with the Roane whose skin they inherit when they ascend or whatever?

-The Answer Is "No", The Story Explicitly Says 

-Gillian is honestly pretty funny. She's up to here with this bullshit.

-The Luidaeg would like to remind everyone that she’s nice to October and Quentin but she’s not actually all that nice to most other people and Definitely Has Her Own Agenda. Although she seems to have taken in Poppy as an apprentice of sorts so... *vague shrugging* 

-And The Luidaeg speaking fondly about her "little brother Michael" who liked interior decorating despite being entirely blind. This is my uncomfortable face based on all my Analysis earlier.

-So Gillian is a Selkie now! That's not a twist I expected. And the next book (not out until September) is about The Luidaeg finally calling in their debts. So uh. That was one hell of a way to make the stakes personal on that.

-Im probably gonna make a master post overview of the series now that I read the whole thing in relatively short order. I'm glad I'll have a chance to read other books, but I'm anxious for the next one too based on the recent developments...

[heckolve]

heres my thoughts on the cursed vld season ;alskdjf

- im writing a lot i guess but im not as passionate lmao, when i was finishing the season i was kinda,,,,,, uninterested

- ezor and zethrid?? bad...... i thought it was weird?? to just bring them in and make them villians for one episode and then murder them? i guess they wanted to make sure we werent like “what happened to them?” but idk that was lame and the whole “homicidal lesbians!!” tweet was fucking gross and they murdered them so!! 

- axca having feelings for keith? bitch where.... MAYBE shes had a crush on keith this whole time... why does she have a crush on him?? who fucking knows theyve been. enemies the whole time they dont have any chemistry. and then she was only in a few episodes before just going and coming back in the end. like. i see no reason to address and tease axca abt her crush at this point unless her and keith are endgame and that makes me super fuckin mad!! i hate rushed and shallow relationships!! 

- i heard keith was ooc and mean this season but personally i didnt think it was that bad and it wasnt as bad as i thought itd be. him being mean when they were stranded in space?? i felt like that was... a little over the top but that situation was super stressful and all the characters were sorta ooc. the two main parts i thought were weird and unusually rude of keith were when he was like “i chose lance bc i dont want to spend eternity w/ him” instead of like... telling lance that hes valuable to the team like hes done in the past, and when keith said “dont miss” to lance on earth?? that felt.... weird.. like keith just suddenly didnt have faith in his abilities 

- not a fan of how they picked on lance again with the whole “the dumb paladin” stuff and never really resolved it again?? lance is?? smart?? he can be a bit of an airhead but no one even reassured him that they didnt think he was ‘the dumb one’ and lance was obviously upset about it hmm

- i thought the story delivered this time?? the season 6 story was shitty and i really didnt like it, but the story this season felt a lot better and less random n stuff. im really into griffins team?? or idk if youd call them veronica’s team since shes their handler--- but i really love them!! idk they were... refreshing

- uhhh so i felt like they put james and keith together a lot? even though they didnt actually end up interacting or talking that much? i hope they interact more in season 8 and like... resolve their conflict with each other, cause i felt like it was there?? theyre not really ignoring that keith and james are indifferent to each other or showing that theyve let go of their conflict so i think that means they want to show them resolving but.... who knows im shitty at analysis stuff

- adam. my thoughts? gross! killing him for like, no reason was bad enough but when i started watching it i was only aware of the plaque or whatever honoring adam?? i didnt know that they fucking showed him die and that made me super upset!!!! that was!! so fucking shitty!!! uhg i fucking. hate that. and then shiro was barley shown grieving?? just a bit after he saw the plaque and then in the last ep..... barley...... idk it was just. ick. 

- i just really didnt like how they killed adam and then all the het relationships are?? okay?? and new het relationships were introduced and developed like lance and allura and keith and axca!! fuck those relationships lmao, hunk even saw shay fucking hell, like, thats great!! i missed seeing them interact but holy shit, they really couldnt even keep adam alive?? they didnt even have to have adam fucking get back together w/ shiro but i just. cant believe they killed him and destroyed even the idea of them making up and becoming lovers again?? they cant even be friends now or anything and thats just. idk i still feel so gross about this lmao! oh and..... yeah you would never ever guess that shiro and adam were anything more than friends if you werent told they were lovers outside of the show thats fucking. bullshit. 

- i hate.... allura and lance.... i really really hate that theyre def gonna be endgame, theres no doubt in my mind that theyre gonna become a couple but!! i hate it!! theyre supposed to be crushing on each other this season actually but you cant fucking tell lmao, they didnt have any in depth scenes or were behaving differently towards each other except for when allura said goodbye to lance and they both were blushing or whatever-- and then obviously i dont like the whole ‘keep pursuing a woman until she says yes’ trope going on. idk, i def think that allurance and kaxca are going to become canon but both of them are so rushed and shallow?? i thought allurance was random and rushed but.... kaxca is even fucking worse holy shit 

- i thought it was weird that iverson was kinda brought up to be the bad guy at the garrison but then it was pushed onto sandra? mm

- idk i dont really feel like vld delivered on reunions yet again lmao. like, loving and missing his family has been part of lance’s character since s1 and we barley got to see them interacting? idk hopefully theres more family stuff for all of them in s8. 

- i loved that we actually got hunk content i just wish it was....... more.......... 

- i really liked romelle a;lsdkfj i really liked her and hunk interacting too and i wish ed there was more of that hmm

- idk how i feel about the time skipping, like, it partially felt unnecessary and it feels weird again to have it right after keith jumped 2 years so

- idk theres probs more but i cant even remember right now whoops! anyways my thoughts are pretty similar to a lot of other ppls so a;lskjfd