#with the way they portray him

[saying-odd-shit]

im going to eat daniel molloy like a hamburger

[catihere]

Considering his upbringing as a Greek demigod with a relatively present godly parent and an apparently open-minded mortal mother, with only a brief part of his childhood spent in fascist Italy, Nico is not very likely to have what we call “religious trauma” or “catholic guilt”.

Will, born and raised in the south of the USA in the early 2000s, on the other hand…

[bruciemilf]

Zack Snyder is the Elon Musk of DC I believe

[crescentfool]

reunion 🌸

[a-random-allison]

Just wanna point out that it looks like Stolas leans into Blitz after some time sitting on the couch. Just letting himself grieve with Blitz near him

[laniidae-passerine]

There’s a very easy way to get around the fact that Assad is unable to pass for a teeenager if the show wants to adapt TVA and that’s to rely on the theme of unreliable narration. Armand begins retelling his history and according to him, he looked like he was in his early adulthood. No older than twenty four, for sure, but also not any younger than twenty. And then, just when the audience has bought it, just when this version of events has been presented as the truth for long enough, someone questions it. Asks if he really looked like that. Asks if he’s being honest with himself. And for the briefest moment, we flashback to Amadeo, the age he was when Marius first saw him. Beaten, shackled, afraid. And undeniably a child.

[sotc]

lucanis giving himself nosebleeds and struggling in pain from trying so hard not to let spite take over to talk to rook. lucanis "I don't need time - I need a target" dellamorte. spite with its absolute gremlin energies. spite with "[rook] doesn't want to hurt you. how rare. everyone else does." as it twists lucanis' inner-most feelings while no one else can see that inner fight he's dealing with. i am SO here for all of this, all of him, all of that angst.

[thesummerestsolstice]

Elvish art genre that definitely exists in Middle-Earth: the captivity of Elrond and Elros (mostly just Elrond, especially after Elros dies)

The paintings– done mostly, but not always, by Sindarin and anti-Feanorian Noldor artists– are usually studies in contrast– Elrond as the bright, innocent child dressed in white; often portrayed as a small, frightened elfling, frozen at the moment he was taken from Sirion. Sometimes he is shown bravely resisting the cruelty of the Feanorians, other times he mourns for Sirion, or bows and prays to the gods for deliverance. Sometimes, he's given wings, both to stress his connection with Luthien and Elwing and to make him look more angelic and pure in comparison to the fallen Feanorians.

Maedhros and Maglor are the dark monsters the oath made them, with teeth, and claws, and harsh armor. Some of the more daring artists just portray Maedhros as an actual orc. While few of the paintings actually show the Feanorians' crimes, they're often portrayed with blood on their hands or swords, or simply surrounded by fire and destruction. They often demand, or threaten in the pictures, towering over Elrond and casting long shadows on him.

There's a few different sub-genres of these paintings. The ones that explicitly compare Elrond's situation to Luthien's kidnapping by Celegorm. The ones that feature a grateful Elrond being saved from the horrible Feanorians by whoever the artist is looking to valorize– Gil-Galad, Galadriel, Oropher, Eonwe, etc. The ones that show Elrond, locked in a dark cell, staring longingly out at Gil-Estel rising in the night sky. Some of the strangest are the ones that draw connections between the Silmarils being kept in Morgoth's crown and the twins– often with Maedhros playing the role of Morgoth.

Elrond hates almost all of these paintings. He feels like they take away his ability to define his past the way he wants to– to tell his own story. Most of them are grossly inaccurate, but most people don't know that, and dredging up all those really painful memories to try and correct people's assumption is hard. Sometimes, even when he does, people won't listen. Some of the paintings also seem... weirdly gleeful about the idea that Elrond suffered because of the Feanorians? Like they're trying to martyr him even though he's alive, and doesn't want to be martyred. It all makes him really, really uncomfortable.

There is one exception. It's not a very traditional example of captivity paintings. Elrond is at the center of the frame, shown not as a small child but as a young adult. Maglor and Maedhros are mostly unseen in the background, each with a bloody hand on one of Elrond's shoulders. Unlike the other paintings, instead of looking off into the distance or staring demurely at the ground, Elrond is looking straight out at the viewer His expression is hard to place. Anger? Acceptance? Defiance? Pity? Accusation? It's a very odd picture that unsettles almost everyone that look at it.

Elrond insists on hanging it in Rivendell.

[precious-little-bhaalbabe]

One of my favorite Astarion lines when you select him has to be the “More like Drizzt DON’T’Urden!” one. Not because it’s actually funny, but because there’s never anything Drizzt Do’Urden related happening whenever he says it. He’s just Thinking About Him.

[edwinisms]

you know. I think the reasons it feels so literally narratively wrong when people refer to charles as being straight (such as in interviews where his love life comes up and so on) are that A) he’s never deemed outright straight in the show, so it’s just an assumption that he must be straight by default (which is silly in a show like this), and B) what he says following edwin’s confession. I know I’m biased, but even when I try to look at it as neutrally as possible, the way he reacts in general and the specific words he uses just don’t sound right when you imagine them being said by a Totally Definitely Straight guy.

first of all if you actually listen to it instead of absorbing the scene superficially it’s not particularly a rejection at all, and the actors have stated that themselves– it’s not him saying no, it’s him saying “I can’t give you an answer right now, but I will eventually”. that’s not an interpretation, that’s literally just the truth of what he said (and again, the actors agree). can you imagine a straight guy saying that, or possibly even more damning, “we have literally forever to figure out the rest [“the rest” meaning anything that goes beyond the kind of love charles already solidly has for him]”.

imagine you’re a straight man who’s unwaveringly confident in his orientation and your gay best friend confesses his feelings for you. you would not respond with the implication there is a “the rest” to figure out. since the main, obvious obstacle would be your solid lack of attraction to men, that’d probably be essential to your response– it wouldn’t be a “I can’t say–“ it’d be a “I can’t be–“. and on top of all that, I feel like the whole thing would have to sound far more apologetic– “I’m sorry, I love you and that’ll never change, but I just can’t love you the way that you love me.” something like that, right?

tldr: this is a rare instance in television where assuming a character is straight by default makes Less sense than the alternative. and charles’ choice of words in the confession overtly suggest that he is, at the very least, unsure of his orientation.

[trchrswtrs]

I had a dream about Sebek and a fly.

Sebek was going about his normal business, when he noticed a fly sitting on his hand. He casually brushed the fly off, before lifting his gaze to resume his duties. However, out of the corner of his vision, he caught sight of the fly, back on his hand. He swatted at it again. But somehow, it remained where it was. He shook his hand, twisted it about, swiped at it multiple times but no matter how hard he tried to get rid of it, the fly remained on his hand. Growing increasingly frustrated, he even tried to crush the fly in his hand. But the fly still remained. He couldn't help but let out a cry of anger and upset as tears began to stream down his face, for he was desperate to be rid of this fly. This fly that would not release its hold on him. This fly that clung to the back of his mind every second of the day. And there was nothing he could do but despair.

[exar547]

i can't express enough how much i LOVE this gif this is literally everything they are to me

the father/son duo ever (+ bonus evilness)

[tiniest-hands-in-all-the-land]

Reach

[allforthegayphase]

TW: rape

Something I really appreciated about The Sunshine Court was its nauseatingly realistic depiction of rape culture.

Jean’s (repeated, violent) sexual assault isn’t treated as something horrific; in the toxic environment of The Nest, it’s normalized. The real story — Riko ordering 5 male players to rape Jean as a sadistic way to ‘break him in’ — is quickly twisted by his abusers; Jean is seen as a calculating vixen who slept his way to the top, for a Perfect Court number:

They continuously mock and taunt Jean with senseless jokes about it. There is an element of jealousy at play; Jean is a prodigy player, and, as he says himself at some point in the book, his older teammates didn’t enjoy being shown up by a child. They certainly enjoyed knocking him down a peg, though, by humiliating him and creating an illusion that he only got his spot on the team for sleeping around, not his talent:

Even one of his rapists, Grayson, continues this false narrative despite knowing the truth (or maybe he even convinced himself this narrative is the truth; that Jean ‘seduced’ him for a spot on the starting lineup):

Other ravens who don’t know the truth seem to quickly believe the narrative that a 16 yo chose to sleep with a bunch of his superiors for a personal gain; that is certainly easier than entertaining the thought that your teammates (friends?) are capable of something this horrific. Or maybe they simply don’t question it too hard; after all, Jean can’t tell his side of the story.

The rumors eventually spread outside the Nest. Jean’s reputation is tarnished to the point that this is one of the first things strangers on the internet learn about him:

The most heartbreaking detail about it all is Jean’s age. He was a 16 boy on the college team, the youngest player on the lineup; a foreigner who couldn’t even speak English when he arrived; an outsider. Despite the fact that his young age is something that even the ravens find particularly scandalous about the whole situation, Jean’s agency is never questioned. He’s not seen as a minor who was taken advantage of by older, superior men — and most of them are quite significantly older, having already graduated by the time Jean’s 19; Grayson seems to be the youngest of them and he’s at least three years older than Jean.

As many victims of SA, Jean had no choice but to continue living with his abusers side by side, pretending like nothing happened. Knowing there’s absolutely nothing he can do.

The first time someone voices concern over the questionable circumstances surrounding the whole situation happens in this conversation with Jeremy (to be fair, it seems like Jean's age isn't public knowledge but the ravens obviously know):

And as many victims, Jean internalized his experience as something he deserved on some level:

TLDR: Sexual assault is, unfortunately, a very big part of our culture; it’s not just something that happens in the dark alleys; rapists aren't just scary strangers. They're also your friends, peers, teammates. The way the Nest (and the general public as a whole) turns a blind eye at best and mocks and humiliates the victim at worst is a microcosm of how SA is largely treated in real life. It was genuinely fascinating to see it depicted so realistically, even though it made for a heavy read at several points. I hope Nora keeps up the good work, and we'll see further exploration of the topic and Jean dealing with his trauma in the next book.

[butchvamp]

it is really wild how much they ignore about the crows & the fact we know that one of their main training methods is just straight up torture, supposedly to build endurance and strengthen crows to ensure they don't leak secrets/names/etc. and then you literally have a crow character that is imprisoned and tortured for an entire year and somehow he has Nothing to say about how either experiences may have overlapped and if the crows' training really mattered (it didn't, that's not how torture works) or if he just suffered for a year because there was nothing else to do-- there was no name to give up or secret to spill. he was just wrong and spite came out wrong and there was no way to get it to stop, nothing to do but endure. how would that experience change his perception of the crows, of Caterina, of himself? clearly he feels that he's failed her, that he fell short of the expectations placed on him as Caterina's favorite-- god knows what she did to him to make him feel this way. god knows what she did to Illario to make him think killing Lucanis was the only way out. and sure maybe it's just because Lucanis got caught in the first place and then what happened at the Ossuary, becoming joined with Spite... but then he only survives because of Spite. not because of Caterina, not because she "prepared" him with her abuse. and so he's failed her, so much so that he'd rather lock himself back up than face her or Illario again. and then when he does finally come home, expecting punishment, to feel Caterina's cane again, he's met with the humiliation of Illario in his place, with "my sweet boy" and the role of First Talon-- a role he has never wanted to play.

[lotus-pear]

rewatched madoka magica again today bc i fucking hate myself and to absolutely no one’s surprise i went through all five stages of grief in a single evening