#work: the lion the witch and the wanderer

[kaysungshine]

݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ .☽ fae trap ☾. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖

{ Pairing } - Elf!Felix x Witch.afab!Reader

{ Genre } - Smut, Dark, Fantasy

{ Synopsis } - It is said, that if you ever find yourself inside of a fairy ring. The fae will punish you, by making you dance until you are passing out from exhaustion. But when you find yourself doing a different kind of 'dance' on the ground, in the middle of one, with the most beautiful creature you've ever seen you might add, you wonder; is this truly a punishment?

{ WC } - 7.7k

{ Warnings & Tags } - 18+ MDNI, DEAD DOVE: DO NOT EAT, dubcon, aphrodisiac effects, oral (f&m receiving), unprotected sex (piv; do as I say, not as I write & pee after sex!), rough/hard sex, overstimulation, big dick felix, dacryphilia, talk of breeding & mating, talking of mating rituals, please don't touch fly agaric mushrooms, srsly they're toxic and deadly, possible incorrect french usage.

{ Disclaimer } - This work is in no way associated or depicting the actual life of the members of SKZ. It is a fictional piece of work, and I do not own Stray Kids. All works of fiction are loosely inspired by SKZ, and in no way am I saying it is true to their character.

{ A/N } - For the love of all things skz. DO NOT EVER TOUCH FLY AGARIC/AMANITA MUSCARIA MUSHROOMS. THEY ARE TOXIC. DEADLY. This is also probably the darkest thing I've written on this account so far. But it doesn't feel inherently evil to me personally??? But it is enough to warrant a TW! This started off as a birthday oneshot for Felix. I'm starting to think I'm no good at oneshots. This could be left alone, but it could also be a series... I have so many world building thoughts, but idk if I wanna do that. What do you think?

Dusk was approaching as you made your way home from your walk. 

You were blessed to own a cute little home, right on the edge of a beautiful and mysterious forest. Every day you were able to take nature walks, wandering through the treeline, exploring the vegetation. Collecting materials, making sure never to take too much of what the woodland had to offer. And caring for as much as you could, though you knew you were not essential to the survival of wilderness itself. 

That didn't stop you from befriending the little critters who made their home there, or from essentially finding your own second home there. 

You never brought anything with you to permanently invade nature. Instead you wrapped your daily essentials in a little bindle. It usually contained a hearty snack, a book or two, endless vials and jars, your cell, and a small emergency kit. Homemade salves, balms, and tonics included. 

You always had some new shiny objects for your crow friends, making sure to exchange the gifts they left for you at your designated spot. And you always made sure to leave some nuts and seeds for the various rodents who liked to stuff their cheeks. Again, you didn't need to, but they really liked sweet black walnuts and salty peanuts in the shells. Who were you to deny them that treat! 

Some days you brought select crystals with you, cleaning and recharging them in the streams of spring water. Other days you'd use that same water, sealing it in jars and leaving it nearby to make moon water overnight. Those were about the only two things you ever left in the forest, always making sure to come back the next day and retrieve them. 

You always carry a little basket with you too. The forest was abundant in ingredients for many different things. Your favorite is mushrooms and fungi. 

There were many times you'd find a log of an oak tree, fallen over and resting on the ground. A bunch of chicken of the woods growing on it. You'd collect them, taking them home to cook for dinner or other meals.

Other days you'd find lion's mane, and make sure to gather some for your favorite tincture to make and take. It did wonders for your anxiety. 

You were a green witch through and through, and you were raised this way. You drew your energy and essence from nature, always taking little bits of it home. 

Today was no different. Forgoing mushrooms, you instead had bundles of mugwort and a jar full of mulberries in your wicker basket. Wrapped in a little cloth were a bunch of spicebush berries.

You were nearing the last clearing within the woods, your house was about a ten minute walk away at this point. 

The soft moss against your bare feet was grounding, and you were listening to the buzz and crackle of nightlife within the forest. Your white skirt ended at your knees, flaring out. The chiffon is blowing in the cool breeze. It was still tshirt weather, and that's exactly what you wore on top. A fitted one, pale and muted ivy green. You gave up on bras long ago, you were a solitary creature anyways. The friends who did visit never cared about your attire.

You were in your own world, playing a balancing game on a stump and humming to yourself, when flashes of red caught your eye. 

In the clearing, scattered in a broken circle, was fly agaric. 

Your heart fluttered at this rare find. You walk past this clearing daily, and never noticed any of the red mushrooms with white speckles there before. 

Eagerly, you approach. In the back of your mind, warning bells are going off. Thinking back to childhood, of the stories your mom once told you of the fae folk. You'd encountered fairy rings before, but never of this type of mushroom, and never broken ones. Certainly never one so big. You never breached the little white rings in the past, not wanting to mess with entities so possibly mischievous. 

But it would be fine right? This might not even be considered a fairy ring. It was sort of... circle-ish? But not really. There were so many gaps in between them, it wasn't a perfect circle like you'd seen in the past. And these mushrooms were so rare and so powerful, in so many ways. You could feel their energy radiating around you.

You glanced around, searching for any signs of immortal creatures lurking near. You saw and heard nothing, but that would be typical. They never willingly reveal themselves, in fact... You've never seen one. You've never seen any kind of fae folk. It's not that you didn't believe in them, you were sure some form of them existed. Afterall, you practice a form of magick. Your own form, and that exists. 

You were convinced all mythical creatures either exist or had existed, the idea of them couldn't come from nothing. Not when they were in so many stories across all different cultures. 

You paused for a few more moments, really trying to feel any negative energy. There was none, there was never any in your little forest. 

So, tentatively, you took a few steps forward. Then you paused again, waiting for something to pop out. 

Nothing.

You giggled to yourself happily, and then bent down to pluck the mushrooms from the marshy earth. 

They all varied in size, some were large with bulbous caps. Some were shorter, and had flatter caps. Each mushroom, you made sure to pick with a cloth barrier between them and your fingers. These could be deadly if used the wrong way or taken in excess. You had no idea what would happen if you came into direct contact with it, on your bare skin. 

You really should start carrying gloves with you.

You made your way around the broken circle, humming in between giggles, and unconsciously dancing. You were nearly prancing each bare step to the next. 

If you had paid more attention to your mothers tales, you'd realize the consequences of stepping inside a fairy ring were already taking effect.

You were collecting more than you needed now, your basket was overflowing. But still, you didn't want to stop. You felt strangely overcome with merriment. You never felt more at home in these woods than this moment. 

You mindlessly set your basket down, your humming growing in volume. You looked to the sky, as you allowed your body to sway back and forth. Arms stretched out towards the waning moon, coming to life in the dark sky surrounding you. 

Your eyes closed, soaking in the moonlight. And you brought your arms back down, letting them float at your sides as you twirled, and twirled. Your skirt flutters up to reveal your thighs even more, hair whipping in your face. You revelled in the feeling of the squishy dirt beneath your feet. You felt grounded, but as if you were flying all at the same time.

You don't know when your solitude was breached, or if you were ever truly alone in the first place, but you finally noticed his presence when his hands intertwined with yours. 

He was twirling with you, spinning you in circles. 

He was nearly glowing, strawberry colored lips revealing the sweetest smile you'd ever seen. His long, straight white hair framed his face stunningly, tendrils of it outlining his strong jaw line. And his face... so, perfect. He had hundreds of freckles splashed across his cheeks, nose and eyes. Even some scattering up to his hairline, and down to his chin. You'd imagine you could create many constellations with them, like the stars that twinkle in the night sky. He adorned various jewelry, all silver. In his ears, and a cuff across the bridge of his nose. He even wore a gorgeous crown that laid across his forehead as a head piece. It was thin, and wiry, made up of gorgeous silver filigree that shone in the moonlight. You knew that the rings you felt in between your fingers would be silver too. 

He wore all white. You couldn't be sure exactly what his outfit was, but his shirt was a flowing lace up top. Revealing delicate collar bones and toned chest. It was mostly a blur in the midst of his movements. 

Your gasp was delayed, only coming out when he pulled you closer to him. Your hand remains in his, while his arm is wrapped around your waist. You were nearly flush with him, feeling the rest of his chiseled torso against your plush body. But he kept your face at some distance to maintain eye contact. The smile never slipped from his lips. 

He has you captivated, and the two of you don't falter in your melodic movements once. His eyes bore into you, dark and sharp. Yet he exuded a certain softness, and you found yourself lost in the moment. It didn't seem real. 

But it was. 

You were seeing him. In all his glory, ever mysterious and breathtaking. The most handsome man you've ever laid eyes on. 

You were hearing him. He was humming the same tune you were, an old lullaby your mom used to sing to you. His voice was deep, and even, harmonizing with your breathy high pitched voice beautifully. 

You were feeling him. He was touching you, his hand interlocked with yours. His grip around your waist is gentle but possessive. He held you like he didn't want to break you, but knew if he was too loose, you'd go running. 

Though you weren't so sure you would run. 

Your mind was racing. There's no way you could stumble across a perfect stranger, who was immediately dancing with you, so close to the edge of the forest. So close to your house. Maybe this was some sort of hallucination. A side effect of being surrounded by so many toxic mushrooms. 

The mushrooms. 

That was it, it all clicked. Too late did the rest of your mother's words ring in your ears. 

His aura, his energy, his perfect pixie-like features. You noticed the point of his ears now, the glittery sheen to his skin. His smile is full of white pointed teeth, dull now, but you could tell they were once sharper in the past. His slight cat-like eyes, giving them that sharp look even though everything else about him screamed delicate.

Your humming stopped, but his didn't. Your mother's voice is filling your head, and you were repeating the words she once told you so long ago. 

'and if you're caught, the fae folk will punish you. You'll be dancing within the ring until you faint from exhaustion.' you whispered quietly. 

His smile only grew, a glint lighting up his eyes. 

He finally spoke, his chest vibrating against yours, "Wise words, from a magnificent young lady."

He had an accent, you couldn't quite place it. Something between old english and australian. It made you want to melt. 

He started laughing, and you were sure that if he didn't have a grip on you, you would've slid to the ground. 

You've both stopped twirling, but he's still moving you, moving with you. Swaying back and forth. 

"Who are you?" You ask curiously. 

"Who?" He chuckles, "Usually it's 'what are you', that people ask me. Though it's been almost a century since I have revealed myself to a mortal."

A century? Your mouth dries, and you feel something akin to fear course through your veins. But you aren't scared of him for some reason. Wary, suspicious, but not scared. 

"You're different though, you seem to have at least a diminutive amount of knowledge of my realm." 

You want to get angry at that comment. You'd like to consider yourself well informed and educated on all supernatural and magickal subjects. There'd always be more to learn though, and the human brain simply could not grasp it in its entirety. So he wasn't wrong. 

You're still saying nothing, dazed from his presence. So he continues. 

"You were right when you said fae folk." He assures. 

"You're a fairy?" You whisper, wonder dazzling in your voice.

At that he laughs again, and you swear you hear small chimes behind it.

"An elf. I believe that is the universal name humans gave us. Not all fae are fairies, there are others too." 

As he speaks, he lets go of your hand, bringing his fingers up to brush strands of hair from your face. His touch is warm, for some reason that shocks you. 

"Elf." You repeat, not a question, but a statement.

He hums, in agreement and starts to twirl you around again. His hand resting on your cheek, thumb brushing featherlight touches against it. 

You're trying very hard to wrap your head around the entire scenario. You shouldn't be surprised. You've dealt with other worldly things in the past. Spiritual realms are completely different from anything having to do with the fae world though. 

Worry floods through you again once you realize what's happening. 

"Am I being punished?" You lip quivers as you speak, "I-I was just trying to collec-"

He's bringing his head down, his forehead meeting yours. You feel the cold bite of the silver headpiece touching your skin. It's enough to shut you up.

"Shhh, darling. Don't view it as a punishment." 

"I don't want to dance until I pass out." You slowly say, even though your body feels otherwise.

Underneath the initial shock and caution, you still felt that overwhelming happiness. It was borderline euphoric... and strangely arousing. 

Everything happening inside your mind and body right now was so confusing. You were feeling lost, and found yourself clinging to the man--the elf, before you. 

"You pretty creature, don't worry. Danser dans le ronds de sorcières... that's for children." 

French? This being was a riddle. 

"I don't understand." You force out. 

He leans back a bit, so he can look into your eyes and your thighs clench, "We tell the kids, fae and human, that if a mortal is caught within our rings. They dance to exhaustion. The humans carried this myth with them into adulthood, while our kind later learned the truth of these special rings." 

He's still dancing with you, moving your body elegantly to a now imaginary song. Leading you in something reminiscent of a waltz, but you can barely focus on that when his touches are electric against your skin. 

"The truth?" You ask. 

He's dipping you down now, bending with your body as he once again is peering into your eyes. At first you think it's part of the dance. Until your back meets the land that was underneath your feet. The mixture of smells was potent. The scent of damp moss, and semi-sweet foliage filling your nose. 

He hums again, "It was never an entire lie, it always started off with dancing." 

The timbre of his voice was pooling wetness in your panties. You felt beads of sweat forming on your brow, and you were bewildered at how your body was reacting right now. It didn't make sense. 

His body is hovering over you now, his face coming close to yours. His nose is brushing along yours before he speaks again. 

"What better way to set the mood than a passionate dance, and in this case, under the moonlight?"

You whimpered, feeling disoriented and needing his touch. 

"I don't even know your name.", was the only thing you managed to mumble. 

He chuckled, and you felt his breath puff against your lips, "It's unimportant darling, but since you're so... alluring. You can call me Felix... I'd love to hear it rolling off your tongue when I make you cum."

You were mewling at the thought of fucking this mystical being, when you felt his lips against yours.

He was almost lazy in the way he kissed you. Seemingly in no rush at all. And it's not that you were complaining, but you wanted more. So you wrapped your arms around his neck, forcing his body flush with yours. 

He was smiling against your lips now, and you took the opportunity to swipe your tongue across his bottom lip, begging for access. 

"So eager. Patience little dove. You'll get what you desire and more." 

You knew it was absurd to lust after a man--an elf, gods how could you keep forgetting that, that you just met. But your body was burning and it felt like he was your only rescue. 

His hands wandered your body, groping and massaging every inch. 

He had your leg wrapped around him, his hand trailing down the back of your thigh and his lips attached to your neck. He was marking you with what you imagined to be the most beautiful bruises. You were panting at this point, and it felt ridiculous to be this turned on by so little. By a stranger. But it didn't make you want to stop.

His fingers reached the edge of your panties, and you gasped. You felt his smile again, he was enjoying every bit of this. You felt powerless to his strokes against you. Your hips were bucking up, chasing for friction.

His hand gripped your hip tightly, fingers squeezing into your flesh, pinning you further into the dirt. 

You hissed before whining, begging "Please."

"I said be patient." His voice was stern as he spoke against your ear.

It still didn't stop you from squirming beneath him, your mind wasn't registering anything beyond wanting to feel him filling you up. 

He brought his face back to yours, eyes gleaming and the most naughty expression written across it. 

"Fine. As you wish, little dove. But don't forget, I was trying to ease you into this." 

He tore your panties off of you, and his fingers were rubbing against you harshly, sending jolts of pleasure through you. 

"A-aaah!" You were moaning loudly, his movements jarring.

"This is what you wanted darling, isn't it?" He's muttering against your lips now, slipping his fingers into you. 

Your body feels more alive than ever, waves of pleasure washing over you. His fingers skillfully curl inside you, while his thumb works your sensitive bud. Swipe after swipe, eliciting more and more of your arousal onto his hand. 

His kiss is searing, and feels like the only thing currently keeping you anchored to your body. You felt your orgasm building quickly, the band growing tighter and tighter in your stomach. It felt like you'd float away when it snapped. 

You can't contain the lewd noises you're making. Between the moans he's swallowing from your lips, and the loud squelching from between your thighs, it was deafening. Or maybe it was just that your ears were ringing. 

It felt like only seconds later when he brought you over the edge, his movements slowing but never stopping. You're whining, and your legs are trembling but you don't want him to stop. You're nearing over sensitivity and when you close your eyes, you see nothing but stars.

All you can think of are the freckled constellations on his cheek. 

You feel drunk on this moment, and you don't want it to end. It's as if he knows exactly where your mind is when he speaks again.

"You're not done little dove, don't you worry your pretty little head." 

When you open your eyes, and tilt your head up, his shirt and pants are discarded. Revealing a dizzying body. He was lithe yet chiseled. His body is almost dainty, but each muscle is carved in the most irresistible way. His abs were glorious, your eyes trail lower, following the v cut. You notice the faint spattering of a happy trail, and your eyes follow it. 

And fuck.

You've never been one to view someones cock as pretty but... his was. The tip was so swollen and pink, and leaking generous amounts of precum. Faint blue veins prominent along the shaft, and he stood tall and proud. His girth made you wonder if you could handle the stretch. It had been a while since you'd last been intimate. 

He brought his hand, covered in your slick, to his member. Spreading it all over in a mixture with his precum, making it glisten. Your mouth started to water, and your legs spread wider for him. You pulled your skirt completely up, presenting yourself to him. 

His jaw was slack, mouth hung open as he watched you, fist pumping himself slowly. 

"Such a good girl for me darling, aren't you?" He said with that charming smile. 

There was something about the way he looked at you, while doing such a perverse act that had your juices dripping down you. 

Then he was on top of you again, cock sliding into you. Your entire body tensed at the intrusion and you wailed, a mix of pain and pleasure. But it was so satisfying, you couldn't get enough. Your arms wrapped around his neck again, and he was thrusting into you at a brutal pace. 

Your back was digging into the ground, and you started to feel bits of grass and dirt against your skin. You pulled against him, trying to adjust yourself so you could lose yourself in the dance you two were now performing. 

He pulled out of you, and sat back on his knees, that's when you noticed his clothes underneath him. You had no idea he was wearing a cape earlier. It was sprawled out, creating a barrier between him and the ground. 

He picked you up, and positioned you to straddle his lap, facing him. Then he slid back into you, your eyes rolled back, and you let out a filthy moan. 

This position felt more intimate but still desperate, he was reaching deeper into you. The head of his cock pistoning against your g-spot. It felt so good you could cry. 

You were crying, you realized. 

"Shhh, little dove, you're taking it so well. It feels so good, doesn't it?" 

"Yes!" You sob. 

He's wiping the tears from your eyes with his fingers, and smiling at you like you're the most precious thing on this planet. 

"That's right, pretty. So pretty when you cry." He groans out, and his pace grows faster, rougher.

His hand dips down between you, and he's toying with your clit now. In any other circumstance, you'd be embarrassed by the way your body uncontrollably trembles. Your muscles are spasming at his touch. You just couldn't bring yourself to care, he was making you feel too good. 

"Darling," He purred, as he slowed his thrusts and pinched your clit between two fingers, rolling it, "I want you to look me in the eyes when you cum for me, can you do that?" 

You were mewling as you nodded your head frantically, feeling your peak rush towards you. 

At that he started fucking into you harshly, almost painfully, and you were coming undone with a loud cry on top of him. Your body tensed, nails digging into his shoulders, struggling not to throw your head back. His hand that was playing with you, gripped your jaw, smearing your own arousal on your face.

He was making sure you kept your word, maintaining your gaze on his while you clenched around him. Your eyes were fluttering as you tried to keep them open. He was biting his lip, eyebrows scrunched together as he fucked you through your orgasm. Watching your face contorted in pleasure. 

"So tight." He grunted.

You were scratching at him now, nails dragging down his shoulders. And your mouth was hung open in a silent scream, your voice having given up on you. 

It was becoming overwhelming. 

You still didn't want it to stop.

"I know you can take it darling, take it." He growled, gripping both your hips now to steady you.

So you did, until you were limp in his arms, and he was releasing into you with a groan. 

Your head was resting on his shoulder. Sweaty skin sticking to each other, and he was soothing you. Humming and stroking your hair gently. You were breathing heavily, trying to come down from this mind blowing experience. But you weren't descending, not mentally. You were still riding that high, stuck in a lust filled haze. 

He started to roll his hips tantalizingly slow, and you hissed at it, feeling slight pain. Mostly you were shocked he was still hard. 

His chest vibrated while he quietly laughed, "Did you forget the 'more' part, darling. I keep telling you, we're not done yet." 

You whined at the sensation of his gentle movements. 

"Shhh, there there." He's teasing you, "Are we a little sore?"

"Yes." You breathed.

"I can fix that." 

You gasped when he slid out of you, hating the fact that you felt so empty. 

He was positioning you to lay down on his clothes, taking care that no part of you touched the ground. You just let him handle you, molding your pliant body however he wanted it.

His hands were rubbing down your arms, and he was smiling down at you. When you met his eyes, you couldn't explain the exact emotions you were feeling. You'd let this man take your soul if he asked right now. 

He was licking his lips as his hand trailed back to your core. You gasped again, then whined when he dragged his fingers through your swollen folds. His touch was almost massaging, yet sensual. He was touching everywhere, teasingly avoiding your sensitive bud. 

The more he touched you, the more you writhed. And sensing another comment about how you can't be still or patient, you yanked him down to you so you could kiss him. 

You were tired of just laying there, you wanted to start giving. To start touching.

You didn't know where all this stamina came from, but you were determined to use it. You jerked your hips up, leaning more into his touch. 

It wasn't until you reached down to wrap your fingers around his length that he paused his movements. 

He was still slick with your cum. And you used that to give him slow strokes.

He let out a hoarse moan against your lips, before pressing his fingers directly on your clit, rubbing in small circles. He was matching your tempo directly. You whined into the kiss, your hand picking up pace. Pumping him faster now, and he followed your lead. 

Or so you thought, just as you felt your climax starting to build, his fingers were being pulled away. 

He took your hand off him, and then crawled down your body, coming face to face with your core. 

"So pretty, even here darling." 

You were blushing at his words, but you couldn't take your eyes off of his, as he stared at you from between your thighs. 

"Still sore? Let me make it feel better, little dove." 

And you felt his tongue lave through your folds. It was gentle and it felt hot, and it drove you crazy. The flicks of his tongue against your clit were maddening, and you wanted more. 

Your hips started slowly moving against his face, and this time he let you. He lets you roll your hips, and grind against his face. His tongue flattened against you, and you slid your hand into his blindingly white locks. You started grinding against him harshly, losing all sense and control of your body and just focusing on climaxing. 

He let himself be used by you, and as your grip in his hair tightened, so did that feeling in your stomach. You felt another orgasm come over you, and he let you ride it out, quite literally.  

You expected to start feeling spent by now, but you didn't. So before he could climb back up your body to kiss you, you were sitting up and pushing him onto his back.

He landed on it with a thud, puffing out air and looking at you incredulously. 

You let the primal urges take over as you lowered yourself onto your stomach, and took his member in your hand. You licked up the underside of his cock, your eyes never leaving his. He groaned as you watched his eyes roll into the back of his head. 

You placed a soft kiss on the tip, and licked the strings of precum off your lips. 

"Fuck..." He whispered.

"Let me return the favor." You mumbled before you took his tip between your lips.

You let your tongue swirl over it a few times, savoring his taste. He brought his hand down to your face, and pushed your hair back for you. 

You let your tongue run down the underside of his cock, and you sunk your mouth onto him. You had completely engulfed him, and were struggling not to gag. Still, you never intended to stop. 

He was grunting as your head bobbed up and down on him, saliva collecting at the corners of your mouth and dripping down to pool at his pelvis. 

"Making--ah fuck--such a mess for me, darling." He groaned. 

He lets you keep at your own pace for a while longer before he starts thrusting into you. He kept your head in place, and you gagged and tears started running down your cheeks. Each stroke became more and more erratic, until ropes of his hot cum were shooting down your throat. 

He pulled you off of him and you gulped down breaths of air. He was caressing your cheek, swiping a mix of tears, spit and cum from your lips before kissing you. 

That's how you both continued throughout the night. Pleasuring each other, nearly non-stop, under the moonlight. Your mind was fractured, nothing else but him existed inside of it. He'd touched, fondled, massaged, and embraced you, until you could only respond with breathy whispers of his name. 

"Felix..." You sighed, when he was bringing feeling back to your numb legs by massaging them.

"Felix..." You moaned, as he slowly took you as you both laid on your sides.

"Felix..." You screamed as you came undone on top of him, riding him roughly.

He took you in many different positions, and you indulge yourself in each one. When he wasn't fucking you, you were whining in complaint and going down on him. If he wasn't going down on you, he was edging you with his fingers. Your hands never left each other's bodies, always needing connection. You were sure he was just as familiar with your body as you were by this point. 

The exhaustion finally hit when he had you on your back in a mating press. The last thing you remember, is staring up into the twilight sky. Dawn was approaching, the stars were disappearing before your eyes, as the golden glow of the sun started to peek through. 

Your eyes were fluttering as you fought unconsciousness, determined to finish fucking this completely ethereal creature. Felix was barely putting in an effort to fuck you, but he still slid in and out of you at an agonizingly slow pace, as if he wanted to keep your orgasm at bay. You both wanted to extend this moment in time, but your body wouldn't have that.

When you finally let go, cumming on his cock for what felt like the hundredth time. That's when your eyes shut and you gave into the exhaustion. 

The familiar scent of nag champa incense filled your nostrils as you started to come to. 

Your bedroom, permanently infused with your favorite scent to burn, that's where you were. The familiar feel of your sheets beneath you, and your heavy comforter confirmed that.  

Your mind still felt a little cloudy as you started to recall how you got to your bed from the forest. 

That's when you feel a body next to you and your eyes shot open.

"Felix?" You croaked, your voice dry and hoarse.

He was laying next to you on his side, in your bed, in your house. 

He had the blankets pulled up to his waist, and was resting his head on his hand. Elbow propped up, so he could see you better. He was shirtless and he wore that same smile on his face, like he was so fond of you.

"Is that still the only thing you can say, little dove?" He whispered teasingly. 

"How- I mean, why-?" You stutter as you attempt to sit up in bed, but your entire body aches. 

You hiss at the burning sensation you felt between your legs. And your legs, gods, you don't think that they've ever felt so sore. 

"Easy darling, you need to rest." He said as he helped you sit up. 

He reached over to his side of the bed and handed you a glass of water, motioning for you to drink. 

You eyed him curiously as you sipped your water, finishing it rather quickly when you realized how thirsty you were. 

"I ran you a bath and kept it hot, when you're ready we should wash you up more." 

"More?" You questioned him.

"I did clean you up last night, I'm not a monster. The bath will help ease your muscles." He chuckled.

"How did you even know where I live?" 

"It's not hard to figure out, we weren't that far from it. Your house is the only one for miles." 

You still felt guarded around him, even after the night you shared. If the stories your mother told you turned out to be partially true, you could only imagine what other lore could turn out to be true. 

Now this mischievous creature knew where you lived, he was in your home.

"I know this is your sacred space little dove, I don't intend to intrude. However, I couldn't exactly leave you in the state you were in. How are you feeling? Is your head a little clearer?" He spoke softly as he brushed his fingers through your hair. 

It is. Almost all of that dazed feeling was gone, you felt more lucid. In that clarity though, a rush of embarrassment hit you. You felt your skin heat up at the more clear memories of last night. 

You were never the type for hookups or one night stands, yet the things you did with this perfect stranger... This perfect magickal stranger... they felt unspeakable. You'd never lost yourself so completely in someone else's presence, much less with your own... sessions. 

You hide your face in your hands and rub at your temples, trying to make sense of this entire situation. Of your own feelings. You didn't exactly regret it or hate it. Something still felt off. Not only was the entire act abnormal in general, and downright questionable. But it was so out of character for you. Did he use... compulsions? Did he have that type of magick?

"Thinking too hard will just exhaust you more." He said.

"Look..." You sigh, as you turn to face him, "I'm a little lost here, I don't know what to make of this all." 

Next thing you know, he's off the bed. He's picking you up in his arms, and you notice you're both still nude. Your face flushes again at that, and you struggle a bit in his arms.

"Be calm darling, I'm just taking you to the tub. We can talk about it all." 

You let him place you in the tub, and then he's sliding in behind you. Slotting you between his legs. He's pulling you back towards him, so you lay against his chest. You both sit like that for a few moments, absorbing the heat from the bath and getting used to each other in a new type of intimate way.

You should be kicking him out of your house. You should be cussing him out. Defending yourself, but why didn't you feel the need to defend yourself against him? Why were you drawn to him? 

When you think about the facts, some would say you were attacked last night. I mean there's a reason the Fae call it a punishment You didn't feel attacked though. You enjoyed yourself, as crazy as that is to say. 

You always knew you were an adventurous soul, but you never thought to this extent. 

How do you come to terms with actually feeling okay with this whole thing, when you knew you shouldn't be?

"You're a witch, right?" He suddenly asks you, breaking your train of thought. 

"I am... though I'm beginning to question the validity of that title, seeing as I have an actual magical creature behind me." You mumble. 

You knew the magick you practiced was real. You could feel it. It's not like you could create fire though, or move things, or transfigure things in front of you. You weren't even sure Felix could do any of that as an elf. You weren't sure of anything anymore. 

You felt like you were entering an existential crisis. Panic was starting to settle within you when you felt his chest vibrate with laughter, it was an oddly soothing sensation that you know you've felt before.

"No, you are. I can sense it, it's in your blood. It took me a while to piece it together, but you are a witch through and through. Sometimes humans don't know of their tie to the magickal world, but I figured... from your altar, among other objects and ingredients I've noticed here, that you knew." 

You hummed, your mother always told you that you were a part of a long line of witches. She raised you heavily within her practice. You never doubted her, but somehow this new revelation made it so much more real. You realize this was opening a whole new aspect in your own practice. A hidden world, seemingly waiting for your return.

"Is that why you came to me? Because you sensed a witch was near?" You questioned him, your hands playing with the water. 

"No, you stepped inside my fairy ring. I have to say I was shocked. I placed it in, what I thought was, an inconspicuous area. I hadn't realized your home was nearby."

"Okay, I'm going to need you to explain." You sighed. 

"Well... you already know what I told you yesterday. The stories you were told, were passed down by your ancestors and other mortals in general. You don't really just dance in fairy rings, that's a small fib we tell the children. As more human children found the rings, when we'd find them dancing. We'd send them off, warning them if they came in again that we would have them dancing until they faint. When our own children wandered into them curiously, we'd tell them the same thing until it became time for them to learn. It's just something stupid the ancestors came up with, I don't know... It does always start out with a courting dance though, but the main reason for them is, inside a fairy ring... you mate. They're essentially a part of an ancient mating ritual."

At that you nearly jumped up to smack him, but he was a step ahead of you. His arms tightened around your body, pinning your arms to your chest. 

"MATING?!" You screamed at him, trying to turn your head and make eye contact, "I don't fucking wan-" 

"Please, calm down little dove. It's not possible for me to actually breed you. That requires an entirely different ritual, one that hasn't been performed in centuries. I'm not even sure anyone would know how to perform it these days..." He trails off. 

"So then why even lay these stupid Fae traps for humans anyways?!" You screech. 

"They're not traps, and they're not meant for humans." He says defensively, and you can hear the pouting in his tone, "Think of it like this. You know how some penguins build big and pretty nests to attract a mate? It's kind of like that. It's a lot to explain in detail, and I had to create one. Now that I'm of age, it's expected of me to find a partner. Even if I don't find the need to." 

"And why do they exist in this realm if they're not meant for us?"

"Well, a long time ago, back when there was only this realm, and there were more Fae than humans, they came across one. That fairy was so angry at the human for intruding on something so intimate of his, and he threatened the human with a punishment. Before any of the other Fae could stop him, he entered the ring. When they both were inside of it, they were overcome with the magic of the ring. The courting dance had started, and no one else was able to enter. The desire for each other grew. In his anger he must've forgotten what the ring's intention was, and was only focused on punishing the human. But he never got that far. They ended up... mating. They never separated from that night, spending their lives together. It was millenia ago. It created an uproar though. Our kinds had never joined before that way."

You sat and listened, calming down a bit as he told you this story.

"There were battles, not an outright war but there might as well have been. They grew to love each other, and they led the winnings of those battles to stay together. They opened the door for Fae and humans to be together, but it has always been frowned upon from both sides."

There was an entire history of this world that you had never known. One that you could never even imagine to be true. But it is. Before your mind let you delve into it though, you thought back to something he said.

"Overcome with magic? These rings hold compulsions over beings?" You questioned hastily, needing to confirm your suspicions. 

"No. It's not like that..." He sighed, "Didn't you feel different last night?" He continues, "The mushrooms release something like a pheromone. An aphrodisiac, to enhance your sexual stamina. Among other mood boosting and energy boosting properties. It starts by uplifting your mood, making you feel the happiest you've ever been. Then you start dancing, your energy building up in preparation for what's to come. It's not until your partner enters that the aphrodisiacs start releasing. But it doesn't just take away your consent like that. Both parties have to be willing... it needs to be mutual. Though that's not to say that's not how every instance turns out. Evil exists in all realms." 

You shivered at his words, trying to process everything. You could clearly remember the primal urges taking over, the need to constantly be filled. It explained that off feeling, why you were acting so out of character. But you couldn't deny that you had wanted it. 

Craved it. 

You never tried to stop it, never wanted to stop it... In fact you initiated it to an extent. 

He started talking again, "That's why I couldn't just leave you there. Especially not in that forest, where other creatures lurk and might find you. I never felt anything dark there, but that doesn't mean it won't come along. I brought you home. I cleaned you up, I made you drink because you were getting dehydrated. I cared for you."

He was loosening his grip around you to rub your shoulders. It made you think back to the skilled massages he gave you last night, in between all of the sex. He made sure to take care of you the whole night it seemed.

"But none of this answers my question from earlier, why not place the rings in your own realm now? Why would any of the Fae place them here?" You asked.

"There are many different reasons..." He mumbled, "Some of them do it because they want to experience sex with a willing human. Some of them do use them as traps for humans, and those Fae are disgraceful, downright evil. Most of those types have been banished from the realm I come from. But some are like me. We try to hide them, from everyone. Because even though we're required to have them, we don't want to use them."

Then you thought back to his previous words, "Wait... 'find your partner' you said? Are we- do we have some sort of bond now?"

The silence was thick in the air. You waited for him to speak, but he didn't, so you turned around in the tub to face him. Your legs spread out on top of his, as you half straddled his lap. 

His eyes stared into yours, expressionless. It was much colder than his usual warm aura, so you grabbed his hand to hold it, and asked again in a softer tone, "Do we?" 

"We don't have to. It's not permanent. Most Fae who get humans within their rings leave them there once they've passed out anyways. Humans don't have the same stamina as we do, even with their boosted energy from the ring. The first woman passed out, that's where the ancestors got their silly tale from." He spoke tightly, like he was debating even revealing this bond at all. 

"I see." You replied, even though you had many more questions and didn't have a full grasp on it all. 

Not much made sense. In a span of hours you found out the true existence of a hidden realm, and these magickal creatures. You met one, you slept with him, then you actually slept with him, and now you bathe with him. You talk with him, as if all of this is a normal day.

It should all unsettle you more than it actually does. You should be freaking out, 100% meltdown level. This is the story of fairy tales, and maybe not a good one. This could be the big bad wolf and you could be little red riding hood. But somehow, you were comfortable in his presence. Comfortable enough to want to spend more time with him. To learn more, about him, his world, and this new bond. 

So you leaned forward and wrapped your arms around his neck, giving his lips a small peck. 

"Maybe we could... figure it out together? See what happens next, if you explain more to me, that is." 

His eyes lit up with hope, and his charming smile returned to his face. The thought that you could wake up every day to that smile entered your head quicker than you could blink.

You'd figure something out. You had to. He couldn't leave your life now. Not when it seemed like it was just getting started thanks to him.

Taglist:

@eczlipse @sailor--sun @maisyyyyyy @jupire @prettiichocolateprincess

@meowmeowminnie @joyofbebbanburg @adieu-lisette @sleeping-beau-tay @staytinyluv

@lookitsjess @majorlymismanaged @kpopsstuffs @helloimacalumgirl @bbokarimenu

@bubblepop-stay @mauvemelon @ohhlittlegirl @ang4lheart @spnwinchestersd

@adieu-lisette @loud-minhoe @juwire @anylady-fics @antisocialties

@nebugalaxy @wowitsafemale @irrevocable-exposure

As always, please let me know if you'd like to join the taglist. And if you do, pretty please interact with my fics besides liking (ie; replying/commenting/reblogging). Although I will always appreciate liking as well! Feedback is always cherished! ♡

But again, please be gentle in your criticism! I am but a sensitive soul.

[discordiansamba]

I guess I should discuss the AU that's been rattling around in my brain in a little more detail, rather than just making shitposts about it. So here's the basic gist of it:

We all know there was one surviving universe at the end of Honerva's rampage in VLD's (pretty bad) finale before everything was restored to normal- but could it really survive everything that happened around it unscathed?

The answer is no. Of course it's no.

In a twist of irony, given Honerva's goals, Lotor is deleted from a universe that would have otherwise been very close to the canon universe as we know it- which is... kind of a problem, actually. As in 'the universe could fall apart if this event doesn't happen' problem. But don't worry. The cosmic forces of the universe has a stopgap measure of its own in place to protect itself.

After all, what could go wrong with the universe using one half-Galra to replace another?

Keith is born to Zarkon and Honerva in Lotor's place. He's always felt out of place in a way that simply only being half-Galra can't quite explain. He has a strong sensitivity to quintessence, and knows from a young age that his father and the witch that stands by his side are corrupted.

He knows he's corrupted too. he can hear things that are not him whispering in his head sometimes, telling him things. he ignores them.

(this is sometimes harder than he would like)

(on very rare occasions he hears a different voice from the rabble- one that calmly tells him not to do things. he listens to this one a little more.)

He grows up loathing his father- it's a mutual feeling. He knows that even before he was born, his mother loathed him as well. He grows up with no strong connection to their either side of his heritage.

(perhaps honerva subconsciously realized the child she was carrying was not her own)

He breaks away from the Empire on his own at an early age- he knows in his bones this is wrong, and wants no part in it. He ends up safeguarding a pocket of space from the Empire, but his motives remain erratic and he stays aloof from the other forces against the Empire, so he's not exactly trusted by them.

After all, he's not exactly not still a part of the Empire himself. Zarkon's not going to let his only heir walk away that easily.

He still ends up meeting Acxa, Narti, Ezor and Zethrid.

He's born with the Altean talent of shapeshifting- though he's better at it than most. He wears three faces- the Galran prince, the Altean wanderer, and then a third face, one of a race he has never seen before, yet feels oddly familiar to him.

(Sometimes it feels more natural than the one he was born with.)

He later learns of a planet called Earth, and its people known as humans, who so resemble his third face- and the blue lion with them. He decides to keep an eye on the planet with the excuse of trying to protect the lion... which is surely the only reason he feels such a strong draw to this otherwise backwater planet.

Which is great, because it turns out replacing Lotor with Keith created another problem the universe has to deal with- there isn't a Keith anymore to pilot the red lion.

He just kind of gets swept up in everything when the blue lion awakens, and before he knows it, he's on the Castle of Lions, and Princess Allura of all people is telling him he's a paladin. They all seem to think he's human.

Somehow, he senses it would be a very, very bad idea to tell them all he's actually Zarkon's son.

Great job Keith. You signed up for the universe's most stressful double life. I'm sure this is going to work out real well.

(I am lying.)

[theladydame]

TEA FOR MY D&D PARTY:

One person... one person mentioned drinking tea, so naturally I had to go into tea witch mode and find just the right tea for everyone in the party. I may not be able to get character art for any of my party, but I sure as heck can pick their tea options. And naturally, they're all from my most favorite Tea Witch shop, Friday Afternoon!

Laucian: High elf divination wizard, loves books and research. Her tea would include rose and citrus, and is caffeinated.

Introducing: The Clockmaker! "If you love to solve puzzles while you sip, this cozy cuppa is just the right fit for you!"

Kathvan: Dwarven Battle Master fighter, former mercenary, grew up in the mountains and brews their own beer. Likes it simple and earthy.

Introducing: Lao Cha Tuo Shou Puer! "forms naturally under the intense heat and pressure of the Shou Puer fermentation pile"

Archera: Tiefling Beastmaster ranger/rogue. Lion companion, "grew up in a forest" according to her. Tea should taste like dirt.

Introducing: Tree-Herder! Tastes less like dirt and more like hiking in the PNW when it's a little drizzly, but the vibe is right.

Sylfina: High elf Glamour bard/ Fae warlock. She's our pretty pretty princess. Jasmine, with light spice requested.

Introducing: Untamed! "Chaotic flowerstorm with bitter center, sharp-tongued and sparkly-eyed."

Belieze: Tiefling Grave cleric/Stars druid. The witchy big sister who hides her trauma by taking care of other people (yes this is mine).

Introducing: Grey Wanderer! "Just the right amount of warmth and body to carry you through your wonderful tales..."

Fola: High elven Shadow Sorceror/Warlock? She's trying to take down the gods. We hate her. She's cool and terrible, and has excellent taste. If you couldn't tell, this is one of the DM's baddies.

Introducing: IX: For the Tomb! "Dark and layered, precisely crafted with intention and intended for a different destiny."

[fwuitfwog]

Interests

This is just a list of all the media I'm interested in in case you want to make art requests or just chat. (My blog specifically for chatting is @fwuitierfwogier) Also, these are just the ones I've had moderate interest in at some point or another

Games:

Pokémon

Genshin Impact

Twisted Wonderland

Animal Crossing

Minecraft

Anime:

Naruto

Yona of The Dawn

Snow White with the Red Hair

Cells at Work

Haikyuu!!

Fairy Tail

Inuyasha

Seven Deadly Sins

Fire Force

Blue Exorcist

Black Clover

The Forest of Piano

Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood

Kono Oto Tomare!: Sounds of Life

Prince of Tennise

Fruits Basket

Tsurune

Kakuriyo-Bed and Breakfast for Spirits

Amagi Brilliant Park

One Punch Man

Food Wars

The Disastrous Life of Saiki K.

Soul Eater

Hikaru no Go

Kino's Journey - the Beautiful World

Barakamon

Horimiya

Heaven Official's Blessing

Wandering Witch: The Journey of Elaina

Sleepy Princess in the Demon Castle

Kamisama Kiss

Sk8 the Infinity

Bungo Stray Dogs (+ wan)

Sasaki and Miyano

Spy x Family

Jujutsu Kaisen

The Apothecary Diaries

Maid-Sama

Buddy Fight

Cardcaptor Sakura

The Ancient Magus Bride

The Royal Tutor

Rising of the Shield Hero

My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom

That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime

Sailor Moon

Tokyo Mew Mew

Glitter Force

Little Witch Academia

I'm in Love with the Villainess

Pokemon

Digimon

Books:

Nichijou

The Vampire Dies in No Time

Greenglass House Series

Twilight Saga

Squire

Wild Blue Wonder

Animated Series:

Avatar the Last Airbender

Gravity Falls

Over the Garden Wall

Phineas and Ferb

Miraculous Ladybug

Animated Movies:

Alice in Wonderland

Lion King

Princess and the Frog

Sleeping Beauty

Snow White

Aristocats

Musicians:

KISS

Fleetwood Mac

Noah Kahan

The Lumineers

Hosier

The Crane Wives

The Oh Hellos

[velvet-vox]

My top 30 favourite female villains of all time (30-21)

"It was never about the money.

It was about

" * * " " * * "

The Lion".

-Captain Chantel DuBois, Madagascar 3 (2012).

If there is one thing that I love more than villains, is Villainesses.

You know, the gaslight gatekeep girlbosses.

A while ago I made a top 10 where I ranked all of my personal favourite male villains ever, and I promised myself that eventually I would also make one exclusive to the female antagonists, not because I don't have any favourite villainesses, far from it: my number 1 spot for this list is in my top 3 all time favourite bad guys, together with the top antagonists of my previous list; simply put, I wanted to make these rankings as varied as possible, since I know that people will be able to read them and be surprised only once, so that first time had to matter and be special.

Speaking of which... I'm actually not all that happy with how that first ranking turned out. I had way less experience at that point, and from the way I had written some of the entries, it looked like I was just simply gushing about the characters nonsensically without actually providing any understandable reasons as to why one entry was above or below the others or why I liked one character more than another one.

This time though, not only am I more organised, but I am also increasing the amount of writing I have to do, by ranking not just 10, but 30 of my favourite female villains of all time.

The reason why I increased the number of entries is due to the fact that I really wanted to rant extensively about some characters, but I could not include into the top 10 because those spots were already taken, nor did I want to relegate them to simple honourable mentions, so instead, I just prolonged the amount of work I had to do and turned it into a top 30.

In this first part, I'll go through my favourites from number 30 to number 11, and at the end of this read there'll be a link to the second part, while here's instead the link to the male villains ranking, if you want to check it out.

The bad guys

By the way, "villains" is a generalisation, as the word "antagonists" doesn't make for a captivating title; I can totally put anti villainesses, anti heroines or more general antagonists in this list; I'm actually more excited to talk about this then I was with the bad guys, because, due to my bizarre personal taste, and the lack of truly popular and noticeable female antagonists that aren't from old school Disney, this ranking will be so much more unpredictable and weird than the previous one.

Even if this list is entirely subjective, the main criteria that I'll use to explain why I put a certain character above another is how much that baddie stimulates my autism; like, there'll be so many instances of a villainess clearly deserving to be put above another one purely out of execution alone, but because I don't fawn over her in the same way I fawn over the other, they remain in their place.

Also, for villains/enemies turned good (there are a few redeemed antagonists in here), I'll be judging them on a number of things, like how good of a character/threat they were when they were evil, how good of a character they remained once they turned to the protagonist's side, how smooth the transition went and how it was executed, and all of these things combined.

Finally I'd like to remind all of you that I haven't seen every single piece of fiction ever made, so if you don't see some popular or noteworthy entries in this list, such as Shego (Kim Possible), Makima (Chainsaw Man), Junko Enoshima (Danganronpa), Julia Salisbury (Not For Broadcast), Lord Dominator (Wander Over Yonder), Catra (She-Ra), Regina George (Mean Girls), Homura Akemi (Puella Magi Madoka Magica, ), Croix Meridies (Little Witch Academia), it's likely because I've never consumed the stories where they came from;

Otherwise, I probably don't really care about them.

But first, some honourable mentions:

Xana (Code Lyoko): Ok, so, Xana is a non-binary character. I actually always considered them to be a feminine AI because... seemed cooler, and also tied with Aelita's childhood trauma of her missing mother manifesting in AI form.

I doubt that I'm ever going to make a non-binary villain list, so I'm giving Xana the recognition that they deserve here, since I think that, for the stuff that they pull out, are both an amazing and insane villain at the same time, maybe my favourite rogue AI antagonist of all time.

Zira (The Lion King 2): The Lion King 2 is not a particularly great movie and it's by far the worst entry of the trilogy, and yet, just like the first movie, it also has one of the most ruthless villains to ever come out of the studio's animated movie franchises.

What Zira lacks in intelligence compared to Scar, she makes up for in sheer ferocity and bloodthirst alone.

Everything that you need to know about Zira can be best summarised in her own villain song, which I'm going to put the link here, along with a Metal and a Orchestral version of it, out of respect for her.

My Lullaby (original)

My Lullaby (metal) (Jonathan Young)

My Lullaby (orchestral) (RafScrap)

Queen Chrysalis (My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic): Queen Chrysalis shares the same problem that I had with Bill Cypher in the previous list, that being that I haven't watched MLP:fim in so long that I might as well have never seen it, though I do remember Chrysalis being my favourite female villain of that show, Nightmare Moon is a close second but had less screen time, Cozy Glow irks me in a lot of ways, and I don't want to talk about the other female baddies because this honourable mention isn't about them.

That wedding. Those episodes. This Day Aria. You know what I'm talking about. Great story arc, great villain.

Cyn (Murder Drones): I've come a really long way around Cyn. At first, I straight up hated her, but after the release of episode 7, I started to warm up to her, and she became a character I really enjoyed in episode 8.

That said, she's still not one of my favourites. She kinda grosses me out and not in a fun way like Mohg and the Loathsome Dung Eater do, and I'm not as creeped out by her as, say, Alice from that same show. However, Cyn is definitely a very unique character, especially in the context of the modern mainstream landscape, and she Absolutely deserves all the praise that she gets.

I consider her to be Murder Drone's Beetlejuice, where she's not the main character of the show, but the series technically revolves around her. I think this title suits her right.

Praxina (Lolirock): If I secretly possessed something, like a neglected personality type whose entire existence I've completely forgotten about, that secret personality type would definitely be Lolirock.

I really loved this show, and I can't wait for that fated and long awaited season 3, and of course, the twins were the best part of the whole thing.

Their dynamic literally carried the series, and while I don't really have a favourite between the two, I must say, Praxina was really fun, and I can't wait to see how her arc plays out in the future.

Maybe I'll talk more about her at a later time.

Jinx (Arcane): Listen I really love Arcane and I really like Jinx, my problem with her is... Well, this Arcane! There are dozens upon dozens of other amazing characters in this show, so while I think Jinx is an amazing female character definitely worthy of her own hype, I'm not as enamored by her as some of the other members of the cast.

Also, while (again) I really like Jinx as a character... I don't particularly like her as an antagonist. This might change depending on how the upcoming season 2 is going to play out, but the thing is that most of the candidates in these lists are entries that I enjoy both as characters and as antagonists, but Jinx is someone that I love as a character but don't particularly enjoy as an opponent.

This isn't to say that I hate her or that I think she's not a good antagonist, I'm just not as enamored by her as some other people are.

Poison Ivy (DC): Out of all the female rogues in Batman's gallery, Poison Ivy is the one that I like the most... Which isn't saying a lot.

Now, don't get me wrong, Batman has a lot of pretty good female antagonists, like Baby Doll, some versions of Harley Quinn, Talia Al Ghul and Catwoman (if you even wanna count them), and I guess Lady Shiva, Magpie, Sugar and Red Claw are there too.

My problem is... that I don't particularly care about any of them.

I won't get into the problems that I have with each individual character, or why I don't personally like them as much as some of their male contemporaries, it's just a matter of personal preference

Punchline had great potential to become my personal favourite, but as of right now, I think she's more miss than hit unfortunately.

Which leads into my default pick of the bunch: Poison Ivy, a character that, at least in my opinion, deserves as much love and respect as the rest of the Gotham Sirens. I love my redhead psychotic plant freak.

One thing I really want to say about her... her design kinda slayed in that iteration where she had pink hairs and was minute, hello!?! More tiny a## gremlin Poison Ivy, please?

And now, with that out of the way, let's finally start with the ranking of my personal favourite female antagonists of all time.

Major spoilers down below:

Number 30: Evelyn Deavor (The Incredibles 2)

Starting off with a banger,

The Incredibles 2, in many ways, is not only a downgrade to the original movie, but a downgrade to the Pixar mark as a whole, in fact, many could argue that this movie bookmarked the start of Pixar's noticeable decline in quality and boldness.

Unfortunately, these same flaws carry over to the main "twist" villain of the motion picture, Evelyn Deavor, who, despite having a cool introduction and design as the Screenslaver (who I count as an extension of her character), has, in many ways, not only failed to live up to the audience's hype, but also the expectations of a well written antagonist in general.

Many videos have already been made on why she doesn't work as an antagonist, let alone a character, in fact, many of you who already saw the movie would even question what is she doing in a list like this, at number 30 no less, when some of those honourable mentions look far more worthy of this spot.

And the answer to that is simple:

She isn't.

At least not this iteration of her.

Roll in:

Number 30: Evelyn Deavor (LEGO The Incredibles)

In my modest opinion, LEGO The Incredibles is the definitive way to consume The Incredibles franchise in its entirety.

The videogame does an amazing job recreating the stories of both movies in a playable format, and outside of a handful of cutscenes during the first movie section of the game, that I hoped the developers would have kept the emotional impact of the original motion picture, I genuinely believe perfects the experience of not only the second, but also the first movie, making it a must play for fans of the franchise.

The improvements that this game makes to the story of The Incredibles 2 also carry over to Evelyn, in a lot of different ways:

1: Thanks to the game's more comedic tone, Evelyn's personality, twist, and plans become much more enjoyable, because now, we are no longer supposed to take her 100% seriously and we can just enjoy her jokes and how bats##t insane she is (she brainwashes all of the Supers using a device powered by a bicycle and simultaneously calls Bob to tell him that her wife is in danger, all the while running on said bicycle and pressing the honk).

2: Removes the subzero interrogation sequence from the movie and minimizes her backstory and motivations to a quick, one line mention. This may seem like a detriment on paper, but in practice, it unironically improves Evelyn's character and takes out many of her issues, because now, the focus is no longer her sympathetic backstory and motivations, instead, the focus now is how psychotic and crazy she is; the game focuses on the parts of her that worked in the source material and leaves out the parts that didn't, heck, Winston doesn't mention his backstory and motivations for helping the Supers at the beginning of the game, so for all we know, the death of their parents is an Evelyn exclusive problem, and she's just messed up like that.

3: Reduces the amount of scenes that she's in. Again, this may look like a detriment, but it actually works to create a sense of intrigue behind her actions: since she has fewer scenes, there's no risk that she overstays her welcome, and it leaves you wondering what her whole deal was when all is set and done.

This game was my first time experiencing the story of The Incredibles 2, and when playing it, I genuinely thought that Evelyn was a cool, interesting antagonist, and I was left wondering if she was even better in the actual source material (nope).

It's thanks to this game that I became an Evelyn fan, let alone an Evelyn enjoyer; yet with all of that said

she

still

Sucks.

Sure, the game patched out some of the most confusing parts of her original characterisation, but it's not like it reinvented the wheel or "salvaged" the character, it only made her more enjoyable to the players and watchers.

So why then?

Why go on an entire rant for this niche triple A game if it wasn't to reveal the first villain entry?

Well, you see, LEGO writers might have not reinvented the wheel with their adaptation of Evelyn, but as a bonus, they straight up created a new female villain to compensate for how lacking the main antagonist of The Incredibles 2 was.

An icy round of applause for...

Number 30: Brainfreezer (LEGO The Incredibles)

Meet Shelly Sundae, twin sister of Sally Sundae (both of them have cooler names in the Italian translation), ex-owner of the Ice Cream Parlor, and now renowned super villain known as Brainfreezer (which is not a ripoff of the Johnny Test character, as her wiki page likes to precise).

When it comes to the side content present inside of this game, the crime waves definitely stand out as one of the most unique additions to the LEGO formula in a while.

In order to get the player excited to play these side missions, the developers thought well to make them go through one of these crime waves right after the tutorial level.

But the true spark of genius came by putting the first part of the Brainfreezer side quest as the initial overworld mission, since they have by far the strongest hook out of all of these quests, and it's not even close.

Not only do both missions have the best atmosphere and screen filter out of all these waves, but they also do an amazing job at surprising the player and getting them invested.

The first one literally comes out of nowhere and shocks the player with the amount of new information they are getting, especially since the culprit behind it is an OC created for the game, blowing away movie fans who didn't expect them to be inside this game.

The second one is also pretty good, though nowhere near as special as the first, however it has the added bonus of culminating with the Brainfreezer boss fight, who, despite not being as good or mechanically interesting as some of the other battles in the game, I still really like it for a different reason:

Nostalgia.

The atmosphere, setup, and appearance of Brainfreezer and her boss chamber all heavily remind me of the Mister Freeze boss fight and level in LEGO Batman: The Videogame, my introduction to the Batman universe, and an undying childhood classic of mine.

The level in question is also one of the most unique levels from that game, even if it wasn't quite my favourite, so it's really difficult for me to not point out the similarities between that mission and the Brainfreezer ordeal when they both have the same, similar unique look to them.

What I like the most about Brainfreezer is her potential, not just the level of freedom inherent to a character who is given little to no explanation for her actions, but also the interesting bits of information that the game provides to us.

Shelly's sister, Sally, is a character who the player becomes invested in throughout the side quest, so when you learn the true identity of Brainfreezer (in case you hadn't figured it out already), you feel bad for the poor Sally, as her missing sister not only turned out to have become a horrendous ice cream monstrosity, but she now also is a dangerous supervillain who plans to mind control the entire city.

Plus, Shelly even starts to melt at the end of her boss fight! That's subtly horrifying if you reflect about the implications.

Brainfreezer, to me, is a character that's just really fun to think about, she's very "cool" and has a pretty design and storyline, and with this unexpected starting entry out of the way, it's time to move forward to the next unlikely candidate for this (entirely subjective) list.

Number 29: Malenia, Blade of Miquella (Elden Ring):

Despite enjoying both Lady Maria of the Astral Clocktower and Sister Frida more as bosses and liking Lady Maria more as a character, as an antagonist, Malenia is my favourite female "villain" in all of the Soulsborne genre.

I don't know why, but I truly click with her so much as an antagonist, even when truthfully she, like a lot of From Software's characters, tends to lean more in a morally grey area, not truly evil but not exactly good.

Malenia is an optional boss in Elden Ring, the smash hit GOTY of 2022, she's a demigod, daughter of the game's final Boss, and sister of Miquella, an important character in the Shadow of the Erdtree DLC.

I think that has to do with the myth surrounding her Boss fight; while it may not objectively be the best Boss fight of all time, the crazy amount of stories and legends that it spawned within the community do more than enough for me to consider her someone worth praising as one of gaming's greatest opponents.

I also just like how weird she is, she is the female boss with the most overtly sexualised design in the entire series, despite also being one of the humanoid women with the least amount of feminine traits in all of the Souls games.

In particular, I enjoy her disability and her sickness as an important part of her character, it makes her extremely cool to a lot of people who are also struggling with similar difficulties in real life, and I appreciate her for that.

I could go on and talk about the lore (which I've seen, don't worry) but honestly, I'm pretty confident in leaving this entry as vague as it is, to keep it in line with the game's way of storytelling.

In conclusion: go play Elden Ring.

It may take you more than a year if you actually plan to just beat it, but it'll be a truly special experience.

Number 28: Jaina Hudson/White Rabbit (DC)

Jaina Hudson has been flip-flopping in and out of my mind for a long time now, but you know what? Screw me, I love missed potential so much.

Ideally, I would prefer if the villains/characters who had their potential wasted were always well-written to begin with, but since we don't live in perfect world, I guess the second best alternative is to get the consumer interested into the character, so that at least someone else could give them the love and attention that they deserved.

And while some ideas were always made without the intention of making the consumer interested in them, this doesn't stop them from gaining a fanbase, even if it's a rather small one.

I'm talking about me, by the way, with the character of White Rabbit/Jaina Hudson, one of the newest members of Batman's rogue's gallery, and currently(?) the newest member of the Gotham Sirens, a female group of non-heroes containing Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn and Catwoman.

Jaina Hudson is the daughter of Tom Hudson, a U.S. diplomat, and an Indian Bollywood actress. She first appeared in Batman: The Dark Knight #1 (2011) and she's a high socialite in Gotham who hides a mysterious secret: she has the ability to create an imperfect clone of herself who she uses to commit her crimes.

I've always been fascinated by Jaina/White Rabbit, particularly in her original run (yes, I know about the controversies, I will get into them later), but I think the reasons as to why that is aren't all that clear even to me, even if the most likely idea is that I really like how much of a blank slate she is.

I personally believe it's because she has so many different characteristics and traits that when put together, create a bizarre, yet very unique package of villainy;

Mysterious setup, motivations and backstory?

Check.

Evil woman of colour who's into politics?

Check.

Weird and unique gimmick that I vibe with?

Check, check.

This all seems very cool, but if that's the case, why is she considered a forgettable/forgotten villain by some Batman fans?

The answer to that is simple.

Her story arc was never finished.

I'm not kidding: White Rabbit never did anything wrong, she got the title of a bad character/villain not because her writing sucked, but because her original arc was cancelled just as it was about to start.

I hope one day she gets The Spot treatment, and I don't just mean copy and paste Spot's arc from ATSV, I more so intend a redemption story in the public's eye, because I really can't give any good reasons as to why she deserves a place in this list, nor can I encourage you to read her debut comic run or the new Gotham Sirens run because you still wouldn't understand the things that make this character click so much with me.

I'm the only person that I know who sees her true potential, but until said potential gets brought out, I want to put down my foot and proclaim myself as an original fan of White Rabbit/Jaina Hudson, one that was there from the very beginning and always saw a spark in her.

And now it's time to talk about the controversies. Skip to number 28 if you aren't a Comic book Batman fan.

Death of the Author is a good thing that exists for a reason, and that reason is to differentiate the art from the artist.

Was White Rabbit conceived as a fetish fantasy by his writer? There's a 99.9% possibility of it being a yes.

Was her original arc going to end up in a disappointing mess? Judging by the general quality of the modern comic book industry, yes, there's a high probability of that being the case.

Is the whole skin swap ability of the clone a blatant excuse to lust over a race swapped version of the character, making Jaina a racist character from the get-go due to concept alone? If the main intentions behind the character were these, then yes, Jaina Hudson/White Rabbit is conceptually racist.

But even with all these controversies in mind, I still can't dislike Jaina as a character, nor do I hate the way her cloning powers work.

*I actually was going to describe how I thought her race swap gimmick could have worked on a practical, psychological, and thematic level in this section, but I ultimately scrapped it because it was out of context with the rest of the list. If you still wanna hear my thoughts on her, ask me in the comments, and I'll make a separate analysis post for her eventually*

I also have my own fair share of unpopular opinions regarding White Rabbit (for example, I disagree with the idea that she should be related to the Mad Hatter in some way, and I despise the idea of turning her into his hench woman or her Harley Quinn, I believe Jaina has much more potential as a "solo" villain, especially with her powers, status, money, and cunning) but it's better to not dwell any longer on this spot and move on.

Number 27: Scarlet Overkill (Minions)

Scarlet Overkill is the one and only reason to ever watch the Minions movie. Greatest female supervillain of her time, Scarlet has everything a woman of her status could ever want, except for one thing: the crown of Queen Elizabeth, who she has always dreamed of having ever since she was a child.

She is a delightful character from start to finish, a pure evil villain with a lot of interesting dialogue and a surprising amount of tender moments, making her someone who never runs into the troubles that some of the antagonists of her type run into, aka becoming stale and uninteresting.

Her design is also very cool, as it manages to strike this weird, perfect balance between being very feminine but also stereotypically evil.

Balance is definitly the right word for Scarlet, since, despite being completely evil throughout the entire movie, she's not an active antagonist for a whole lot of it. Her status as the ultimate goal and ultimate threat constantly changes during the Minion's runtime, making her a surprisingly dynamic antagonist.

Her duality is best represented in her relationship with his husband Herb, one of the most healthy and supportive villainous power couples in all of mainstream media.

There's also much to be said about how she obsesses over Bob's teddy bear: a lot of the time, she acts like a child who never grew up, which is very interesting when compared to Gru's arc in the other movies, and it makes me wish that she and Gru would have battled against each other eventually, especially since she's technically the very first villain that Gru captured for the A.V.L.

Funny, psychotic, menacing and clever, she has a great screen presence, and is, in my humble opinion, not only the best villain in the whole Despicable Me franchise, but also the greatest antagonist in the entirety of Illumination, as little as that may mean to you.

However, there's something else that I wanted to talk about with her.

You see, originally, I had Scarlet placed higher, and the next entry placed lower.

However, upon rewatching both movies, I was surprised to find out that I actually like the next baddie a little bit more than Scarlet, which is something I was not expecting.

I think the main reason as to why I enjoy the next character more than Scarlet has to do with the fact that although both villains carry their respective movies very hard, the next character does a lot more to ensure that her own respective story gets rated in the good movie category, which isn't something that I unfortunately can't say about Scarlet and the Minions.

Scarlet is still a great antagonist overall, and she definitly has my vote for the next elections (after all, the queen title is only decorative, she doesn't actually get much political power from it).

Number 26: Agatha Trunchbull (Matilda)

(Imagine taken from clown energy compilation video, please, check it out on the above link, it's actually hilarious)

Agatha Trunchbull is just perfect.

The movie literally wouldn't work without her.

I could try to detail exactly what about her I enjoy so much, but the simple reality is that I really like the Trunchbull because of how funny she is, both when she's punishing others, and when she's being punished and ridiculed.

She's a bonified, 100% pure evil villain done right, one that, thankfully doesn't die at the end of the movie, because personally, that's always something that makes me slightly sympathize with these types of villains, since, due to the type of person that I am in real life, I view killing and death as inherently evil things, both when they are done by the good guys and by the bad guys.

Plus, I believe the ending that Agatha gets (at least in the movie) is much more satisfying, and since she doesn't even go to prison by the end of the whole thing, you are left with a very valid reason to keep hating on her long after she left the screen, even if running and hiding away forever is a very satisfying defeat for a character of her archetype.

Now, I read the original book from Roal Dahl a long time ago, and didn't want to reread it all over again for this list, so instead, I just took into consideration only the movie version of Agatha Trunchbull, movie that, at the time of writing this, I just finished watching on TV (sorry Dahl), and I have to say, Matilda is such a charming and timeless movie, one that I never mind watching every time it pops up on TV.

It's a very simple, hilarious, power fantasy for children (unless I'm missing some deeper meaning, sorry Matilda fans), and one with a lot of heart for that matter.

When I sat down for a rewatch, I expected to still like the movie after all this time, but what I did not expect was for the Trunchbull to be as solid as I remembered her to be.

I had written all of the entries in advance, and while the Trunchbull was always around this position, I expected her exact placement to diminish when I would have eventually watched the movie again for this occasion.

But no, if anything she ranked up due to how good her writing was even this time around.

She's funny, she's threatening, she has a great design, good music, amazing scenes, hard carries the rest of the movie after the ending of the first third and she's a great opponent for Matilda to defeat.

However, I don't really have a lot to analyse with her, it's not that there isn't much more to her besides how comedic and threatening she is, I particularly like to reflect on the fact that she wears pigtails when we see her in the flashback but doesn't have them anymore during the time in which the rest of the movie takes place, and how she specifically targets a little girl who still wears them, and ridicules her for it.

Other interesting things are her relationship with Magnus, her sporting career, her fear of the supernatural... And actually a lot more stuff now that I think about it.

It's just that I don't want to focus much of my attention on her.

She's a jewelry relic of a different time, a simpler one, and one that doesn't need to be picked apart and deconstructed for my own, sadistic pleasure.

Just a little pearl of a character who can be enjoyed for what she has to offer to the overall narrative of the movie, one who eats up every single second of screen time with grace and the thing that truly elevates this movie from a nice, occasional watch, to a timeless classic.

(There were a lot of different frames that I chose for Goldie, but I thought this one was just right)

Number 25: Goldilocks (Puss in Boots The Last Wish):

Previously, I've put Death and Big Jack Horner in the honourable mentions of the last top 10, therefore, it only made sense that Goldilocks would have a spot inside this top 30 to compensate for the great treachery that I've committed.

In all seriousness, out of all the antagonists inside Puss In Boots The Last Wish, Goldilocks was the one character that I was hyper fixated on once I left the theatre for the first time.

Unlike some of my other obsessions, this one didn't last for long, but regardless, she and her family still managed to carve a place in my heart, where they'd hopefully remain for a long time still.

Goldilocks and her crime family of bears are an interpretation of their homonymous fairy tale, "Goldilocks and the three Bears". They are one of the many antagonists present in Puss In Boots: The Last Wish, and they have a found family storyline that's meant to parallel the journey that our protagonists take in order to become a team.

Goldilocks is the character at the centre of this storyline, as she's the one who really wants to take the wishing star (the movie's main macguffin) in order to get what she really wants: a real family.

Even if Goldilocks isn't as threatening of an antagonist as the movie's other two main villains, she still manages to steal the spotlight in her own right, by having a very touching and incredibly heartfelt story arc.

She's a sympathetic antagonist done right, she has just enough screen time to not overstay her welcome, but more than enough to make the eventual conclusion of her arc satisfying and impactful.

My take on The Last Wish villains though is that they work better as a package, rather than as a single unit; Goldilocks, despite how good she is, wouldn't have the same impact that she does without Jack and the Wolf carrying the parts of the movie that she and her family can't carry by themselves, and that's okay;

As for analyses, I encourage you to check out StoryStreet Puss In Boots video, as they do a way better job at analysing Goldie in further depth than I ever could.

As for me, I'll just say that Goldilocks is just right (very good), I like her design, her arc flows seamlessly, and her story is just very cozy and heartwarming.

This movie's character balance is truly immaculate; you have a terrifying force of nature/rival/personal foil as your protagonist greatest opponent, an amazing and hilarious pure evil villain who brilliantly showcases the worst possible outcome that granting every wish can have, and then you have an unexpectedly sympathetic and likable gang of morally grey antagonists who expand upon the themes of found family and leave the story on good terms with the main characters.

All of this, and the movie not only manages to be an enjoyable watch, but a complete and utter masterpiece capable of measuring up to the standards of DreamWork's finest works.

I encourage you all to check out Puss In Boots: The Last Wish if you haven't already; it has gorgeous animation, a rich story with deep themes of mortality, and impressive character work all the way around.

A massive round of applause to my favourite studio for this unforgettable experience; I hope they'll cook some new amazing stories anytime soon.

(One final note, while in the regular dub of the movie the family talks with extremely British accents, in the Italian dub they talk with a heavy Italian dialect from a region named Abruzzo, famous for having bears in its natural parks. Do with this information whatever you want.)

Number 24: Yzma (Emperor's New Groove)

Yzma is a very funny antagonist.

She's the ex-counsellor of Emperor Kuzco, from the Disney movie Emperor's New Groove (2000), and wants revenge on her old boss after he fired her for abusing her power behind his back.

After rewatching the movie recently, I managed to finally pick up on the parallels between the Yzma and Kronk duo and the Kuzco and Pacha squad: both Kuzco and Yzma are straight up villains at the start of the movie, but while Kuzco manages to get better throughout the story thanks to Pacha's help, Yzma supposedly only gets a shot at bettering her ways by the end of it thanks to Kronk, who stopped being an evil doormat and has finally become the Pacha to Yzma's Kuzco.

As far as Disney movies go, Emperor's New Groove is very subversive in a lot of ways, from his tone, to his story, to just how good it is despite his rushed development; it's very impressive how this movie managed to turn out as good as it did considering its prior two years in development hell, and while a modest success didn't save the movie from falling into obscurity, I'm glad it eventually ended up finding a permanent footing in modern meme culture.

Unlike many other villains in this list, Yzma is not my favourite part of the movie, and I don't think she carries the story all that much, but that isn't to say that she's not a needed nor an important part of the story in the slightest.

Quite simply, it's just that Kuzco is that entertaining of a protagonist that I end up overlooking how much Yzma is funny in her own right.

But of course, it isn't all Kuzco's fault.

We need to talk about the big man in the room:

Kronk is the peak of fictional comedic sidekicks for villains, and half of what makes Yzma as great of a character as she is can be attributed to him playing off his part in the comedic duo.

Which is not all that bad, considering I can say the same thing about Kuzco and how much his relationship with Pacha does for his character. It just makes it hilarious to think about how, in the larger picture of internet culture, Yzma is the sidekick to Kronk's popularity.

"Pull the lever, Kronk!" is still a masterpiece, but I also enjoy some of her less talked about jokes, like the one she makes after Kronk wakes her up in the middle of the night, as well as the entirety of the restaurant scene.

(ok, so, side note, apparently the joke exists only in the Italian dub of the movie, in the original English dub, after Yzma gets woken up by Kronk in the middle of the night, she says "This will better be good" as opposed to the Italian dub, where she says "Guarda che ho ucciso per molto meno!" which, in English, is translated as "Look that I have killed for far less", which may not carry the same impact to those who don't understand Italian, but I, native speaker of the language, can confidently say that it's a genuinely funny line due to voice delivery of Anna Marchesini, Italian voice actress of Yzma, and I'm glad that I could hear it in my language.)

The scene in question is this one.

I still would have wished for the movie to make space for Yzma's cut song "Snuff out the light", but at least it wasn't lost to time, and got a pretty good metal cover by Jonathan Young, which featured in my favourite Snatcher AMV.

I also think Yzma's design works perfectly for what the story was going for, and while I'd prefer for her to be a little bit more intimidating, I'm not going to fault her or the movie all that much for it.

Number 23: Spinel (Steven Universe)

At first, I was really unsure if I actually really wanted to have Spinel inside of my list. While I was indeed hyper fixated on her when the movie first came out, she softly dwindled out of my mind over time.

As such, when I decided to check out the movie again for the purposes of this ranking, I expected her to ultimately land in the honourable mentions and to not

Over And Over And Over And Over And Over And Over And Over And Over Over Again And

Golly, so, Spinel is actually both an amazing character and antagonist, but for the sake of originality, I'm actually going to focus less on her individually, and instead focus more on her role as Steven Universe's greatest rival.

Sorry if I end up misinterpreting Steven's character by accident, I'm trying to focus on Spinel, but the main thing I want to talk about is how the two mirror and contrast each other by virtue of simply existing in the same Universe.

Spinel is one of the latest villains in the Steven Universe series who made her first appearance in the movie, where she acted as the main source of conflict for the protagonist.

In the grand scheme of Steven Universe's story, I'm extremely confident in saying that, on a thematic level, Spinel is Steven's ultimate foil, his de facto arch nemesis, who, like many other characters in the show, doesn't limit herself to a stationary role of villain, and is indeed a deeply nuanced individual in many ways.

She, in fact, does NOT exist just for the viewers to sympathise over and to overlook how her sob story is there only to cover up the movie lazily rehearsing the character arcs of the main cast without any deeper reason besides inducing new viewers to watch the original show.

The repetition of the Gems' arc is a very important narrative and thematic element of Spinel, and it serves to build up her role as the antithesis of the show's themes of change and growth, which also happens to be at the center of Steven's entire journey throughout the series.

Thanks to Steven, over a long period of time, all the Crystal Gems managed to grow, overcome their original struggles and become even more mature individuals by the end of the show, while thanks to Spinel, over a matter of seconds, all of the Crystal Gems had their arcs undone and devolved as people, coming back as individuals even less mature than at the start of the show.

Spinel, as a character, represents a dark, twisted version of Steven and his journey throughout the series.

They both looked up to Rose Quartz, in different ways, and they both...(SU fans, fill in the gaps yourselves, I'm not going to spoil this plot point of the show).

They both are, by a combination of nature and nurture, people pleasers/stress toys; Steven wants to help everyone to be happy (overcome their struggles), both because he's kind at heart and because he feels responsible for their wellbeing, while Spinel wants to help everyone to be happy (have fun), both because she's happy-go-lucky at heart and because she's responsible to, due to being a literal sentient doll.

They both want some things to change and others to stay the same (Steven is obvious, Spinel was actually excited when Steven's mom got what she always wanted, indicating that she actually doesn't mind new things and breaking the status quo), but at opposite times and in different ways, which makes it even more hilarious how Spinel is all about undoing and rejecting change when she arrives on Earth, but before, she coped with Rose's abandonment, went through a villain and insanity arc/changed her design (interchangeable), got weapons/formulated a plan (also interchangeable) and travelled to Steven's location to ruin his life all under 15 minutes and after practically staying the same for thousands of years.

Spinel's personality is very similar to Steven's at the start of the show: she's childish and always wants people to spend time with her, just like Steven was a kid and always wanted the Gems to do activities with him, and they both used to view things as games, but while Steven changed and stopped doing so after repeated trauma, Spinel, after her one defying trauma, changed, but never stopped doing so even by the time of the movie's final battle.

They both struggle with picking up social cues, both remind the Diamonds of Pink, both end up spiralling and hating themselves when they can't make other people happy, eccetera eccetera...

I could go on and on for a while, in general, I really love when villains have a lot of parallels with their heroes, it's very fun listing all of the similarities and differences with them and their stories, it makes the conflict deeply personal, which is always a plus in my book.

It also explains why, in the past, a kid I knew wanted them to be siblings: as the child told me, they are so similar, that it would have been awesome for them to grow up together, and for Steven to have someone he can truly vent out his problems to.

Ultimately, what brings Spinel down a little bit for me, is the way her role in the story plays out overall, I don't inherently despise the movie's narrative and what it decides to do, but I think it could have been executed better.

She has a killer design, and even two more killer songs: Other Friends and Drift Away are incredible compositions, all of the songs in the movie are a banger, but these two stand out a lot more for me.

Even if you have zero interest in checking out either Steven Universe or his Movie, here's the link to all of Spinel's songs and respectively my favourite cover for each one, as well as an added extra that deserves far more views than it already has.

Other Friends (original)

Other Friends (Kyle Allen Music)

Drift Away (original)

Drift Away (annapantsu)

Change (Spinel version) (carimelle)

Number 22: Ursula (The Little Mermaid)

The Little Mermaid is a movie that grew up a lot on me over time, as his villain did.

Ursula is the very first villain of the Renaissance era of Disney, and although others after her took the centre spot of the conversation when it comes to who's the best of the bunch, Ursula, still holds her weight (the pun was not intended, please, don't think ill of me) as the one who introduced the standards and customs that most other villains from this era would strive for.

So while you may personally prefer the likes of Scar and Jafar over Ursula, you can't deny that they probably wouldn't have been the same, have villain songs, or probably exist without Ursula and the impact that The Little Mermaid had for the Walt Disney company.

I'll admit though that out of the triad of the studio's most popular female villains (which is in my opinion made out of Maleficent, Cruella De Vil, and Ursula, and I'll stick by my gun for this statement) she's the one with the most consistent track record (excluding the live action Little Mermaid), as Maleficent has never been characterised quite as well as her original appearance in Sleeping Beauty, at least in my opinion, and Cruella De Vil is a wild ride of various levels of quality.

Ursula instead is only noticeably bad in the remake, and I struggle to find many other versions of her who suck as much as the worst renditions of Maleficent and Cruella's characters;

Admittedly, that might just be because I have consumed way less stories where Ursula is the main focus, but from what I saw, she's the best written member of the aforementioned triad in "Once Upon A Time", and I like how she's just this mysterious figure inside Descendants 2 where she never shows up but it's important regardless because of how her existence impacts her daugther.

Even if Ursula is still not one of my favourite villainesses, I appreciate her a lot more these days; she's actually very different from many other female villains to be honest, in that she's basically a per###ted Cthulhu Mob Boss who makes people sign unfair contracts in order to become the queen of the sea, I don't think the unique aspects of her character are appreciated quite as much as her best moments or her role in the story to be honest.

One of my favourite things about Ursula in the movie is her washed up salesman persona: she's literally the Spamton G. Spamton of the ocean, I unironically wanna see Ursula say the Baltimore speech so much.

Her Divine inspired design is also peak, once again, it's extremely different from that of any other female antagonist... heck, it's extremely different from the design of any other villain I ever saw at the time, and it still remains as distinct as it once was to this very day; once again, nobody talks about how unique Ursula actually is.

I still listen to Poor Unfortunate Souls from time to time, even if it's not my favourite villain song, and I enjoy listening to whatever cover of it I see when it comes up.

Edit: this part has been added a while after publication, some new things:

First of all, I no longer fully believe in a set in stone formation for the studio's greatest female antagonists, as the Evil Queen from Snow White also is a very strong contender for Ursula's place, as well as Lady Tremaine (for some reason), and in general, I no longer truly believe in this statement.

Second of all, one thing that I want to point out about Ursula that I didn't realise until this retrospective by Colin LooksBack is that she is a villain surprisingly flexible to change; like, before this video, I always considered Cruella to be the Disney villain most suited to drastically different interpretations, and she still is, don't get me wrong, but this video made me realise that Ursula is also very suited to have her character changed in some way, shape or form (doesn't mean that's mostly pulled off well), and I think that's pretty neat.

Number 21: Mother Gothel (Tangled)

Mother Gothel is the main villain of Tangled (movie).

She's the fake mother of Rapunzel, and a criminal too.

The most disturbing thing about Mother Gothel is that child me couldn't understand why she was treated as the bad guy by the narrative when, despite kidnapping Rapunzel, she was clearly shown to care for her, then, once I grew up, I finally realised what was happening on the screen, and to this day I'm still horrified that child me could easily fall for her words; truly messed up when I think about it.

However.... her manipulation seems way too obvious now. Like, I struggle to believe that this is the way she acted when Rapunzel was growing up, she's way too nervous and controlling for me, the audience, to buy the fact that this was the status quo Rapunzel was living in inside the tower.

More than anything, this demeanor from Gothel feels like her struggling to maintain a grip on her victim's life now that said victim is now a rebellious teenager that wants to fulfill her dreams and be free.

In general, out of all the female villains of Disney's major movies, I consider Mother Gothel to be the one with the most outward level of complexity, as, despite being pretty evil... she also tries not to be, at various turns.

She's selfishly keeping the magic flower for herself, but she didn't harm anyone for it.

When she decides to sneak into the royal palace, it's pretty clear by the framing of the events that her original plan wasn't to kidnap the child, even if that's what she ended up doing; heck, throwing aside her choice to let Rapunzel save Eugene during the climax of the film which leads to her undoing, before deciding to chain up her "daughter", she's like: "You want me to be the bad guy? Fine. Now I'm the bad guy" as if she was trying not to be.

Like, comparatively, Mother Gothel at the start of the story is as evil as Eugene at the start of the movie: they are both fixated on their own gain and are willing to rob the royals in order to get it, both manipulate and backstab the twins once they have served their use, but while Eugene manages to become a better person thanks to Rapunzel's positive influence and accepts the notion of dying in order to free her, Gothel, despite having spent more time with her, remains as selfish as she always was and refuses to give up her own life in order for Rapunzel to be happy.

Honestly the Tangled franchise is amongst the angstiest things Disney has ever done, and that's without even getting into the TV show.

Now, I have never seen the Rapunzel TV series, despite knowing some of its spoilers like the Cassandra ordeal and a few other things, so I can't give you my opinions on her character in that show, but I know someone who has, therefore, this next section in yellow is that person's thoughts, not written by me, but by him/her/them.

🇮🇹: "Madre Gothel non lo definirei mai il cattivo principale della serie. Per quanto mi piaccia nel film, nella serie la trovo molto svalutata e deludente. I suoi primi accenni alla comparsa negli episodi erano molto interessanti visto che entra nella storia solo nella stagione finale e quindi pensavo che forse poteva essere lei la cattiva principale. Dopo la rivelazione che lei era la madre di Cassandra il mio cervello era esploso perché era un vero colpo di scena che mi era piaciuto tantissimo, ma mi aspettavo molto di più. Nella serie non compare (o almeno non in carne e ossa), ma solo come ricordo della figlia e negli specchi magici che mostravano il passato di Gothel. Nulla di serio, non infligge e non fa nulla per rendere Cassandra cattiva, anzi è il demone Zhan Tiri che usa questo a suo favore per mettere Cassandra e Rapunzel una contro l' altra. Perciò mi delude che si risolve anche abbastanza velocemente la parte degli abusi che ha causato alla figlia. So che forse non tutti la pensano come me, ma crescendo con Rapunzel ad essere il mio film Disney preferito mi sento fin troppo delusa che non ci sia nulla a riguardo di Gothel veramente entusiasmante. Questa è una mia idea, ma mi sarebbe piaciuto vedere magari Zhan Tiri che facesse qualche suo incantesimo (anche perché credo che ne sarebbe in grado) di riportare in vita madre Gothel. Magari faceva il lavaggio del cervello a Cassandra così da farle uccidere Rapunzel per vendicarsi facendo fare così il lavoro sporco alla figlia. Anche perché primo, madre Gothel manipola, ma fa il lavoro sporco solo quando non ha altre opzioni, secondo sé ritorna in vita non credo che l'eterna giovinezza era un problema. O magari la storia poteva essere diversa come ad esempio Gothel finge di essere un buono per sconfiggere Zhan per poi tradire tutti e avere oltre all' eterna giovinezza il potere assoluto. Si forse era un po' troppo complesso per una serie come quella di Rapunzel per un target di bambini, ma penso che Gothel avrebbe fatto di tutto per ritornare in vita e giovane per sempre. Inoltre una cosa terribile è pensare... GOTHEL HA DAVVERO DECISO DI AVERE UNA FIGLIA? Perché devo ammetterlo, che madre del cavolo, è peggio quello che ha fatto a Cassandra che a Rapunzel. Con la prima nemmeno la calcolava, la seconda invece le faceva tutti i regali che voleva (sempre per i suoi fini), ma non l'ha mai fatta sentire meno amata. Inoltre sarei curiosa di sapere chi era il padre di Cassandra e quindi il fidanzato (?) di Gothel. Perché non credo che Gothel si era sposata sapendo che nella serie le due vivono da sole oltre che a Gothel le importa solo di se stessa."

🇬🇧(translated by me):

"I would never define Mother Gothel as the main villain of the series. Despite how much I like her in the film, in the series I find her very devalued and disappointing. The first hints to her appearence in the episodes were very interesting, since she enters the story only in the final season and therefore I thought that maybe she could have been the main villain. After the revelation that she was Cassandra's mother my brain blew up, because it was a true plot twist that I liked very much, but I was expecting a lot more. She doesn't appear in the series (at least not in flesh and bone), she remains as a memory inside her daugther and the magic mirrors who reveal her past.

Nothing serious, she doesn't inflict much pain nor does she do anything to turn Cassandra evil, on the contrary, it's the demon Zhan Tiri who uses this to his advantage to put Cassandra and Rapunzel against each other. So it upsets me that even the part of the abuses caused to her daugther gets resolved very quickly. I know that not everyone is going to think it like me, but growing up with Rapunzel as my favourite Disney movie I feel way too upset that there is nothing too exciting in regards to Gothel in this adaptation. This is just my idea, but I would have liked to see maybe Zhan Tiri cast some spell (since I believe he would be capable of) to bring back to life Mother Gothel. Maybe he could brainwash Cassandra so that she tries to kill Rapunzel... (I decided to not translate this part, since it's just their/her/his idea for a rewrite.

Also, another terrible thing to think... GOTHEL REALLY CHOSE TO HAVE A DAUGTHER? Because I must admit, what a shitty mother, what she did to Cassandra is way worse than what she did to Rapunzel. She never noticed the first one, the second one instead got all of the gifts that she wanted (for her ulterior motives), but she never made her feel less loved. Also I'll be curious to learn who is Cassandra's real father and therefore Gothel's boyfriend (?). Because I don't believe Gothel would have married knowing that in the series the two of them live alone, and also considering that Gothel only cares about herself."

Maybe not the overall best person to ask for an opinion on fiction, but I trust him/her/them, they are a good person, even if they are a little bit misguided sometimes.

Next part>>>>

[larsisfrommars]

Wild Wild Reviews

The Night of The Inferno

Overall Score:

Story: 3/5

Dame: 4/5

Villain: 2/5

Gadgets: 5/5

Disguises: 2.5/5

Bonus Points: Gay Subtext: 1/5

The Yikes Dated Factor: -3/-5

Score: 14.5/25 (58%)

Tier: D

Next Review

FULL REVIEW UNDER CUT

The Story

It’s a pretty straight forward plot that introduces most of the core elements of the show fairly well. We’ve got our inflable and courageous James West, our over the top villains, our femme fatale and our gadgets but it feels as though the story is missing a limb. That limb of course is Artemus Gordon. Yes Ross Martin is there playing counterpart to Robert Conrad but he doesn’t really seem like the Artie we know and love yet. He’s less intelligent marvels at inventions that given the later context of the show he could’ve (and probably did) build himself, and lets Jim do the detective work. His disguises aren’t a big focus, and he’s noticeably more of a coward than he is later on. Luckily they fix all this almost immediately but between this and the casual early 60s racism this episode suffers a bit.

The Dame

Our woman of the week is Suzanne Pleshette!

Most of us young’uns know her as the witch Yubaba from Spirited Away and/or Zira from Lion King 2. However she was a very accomplished TV actress before that! I think she does a fantastic job as Lydia Monteran!

She and Jim have history which is always a fun gimmick, and certainly way more fleshed out than the parade of other women in this series. She’s got her own illegal business and lots of personality, a classic femme fatale. She just doesn’t have a lot in the way of complex/personal motivations and doesn’t really affect the plot with her direct actions, which is why she isn’t a perfect score.

The Villain

Our villains of the week are Nehemiah Persoff and Victor Buono!

Now I don’t know Persoff from anything other than Papa from American Tail. His character bordered on caricature/hammy but I am honestly shocked to say that he was WAY more entertaining to watch than Victor Buono of all people?! He was very animated and had a lot of fun lines. Meanwhile Buono (who I know as the unhinged King Tut from Batman) was both chronically underutilized and the crux of the more dated and problematic aspects of this installation of the series. Generally though these villains lacked the camp and ridiculous plans/motivations that I love the series for. So I’d say they’re a little subpar overall

The Gadgets

The gadgets were PHENOMENAL in this episode. If it has a real saving grace it’s the gizmos, a cornerstone of what makes this show work. We get an introduction to The Wanderer, West’s notorious toolbox boot heels, and a really fun Chekhov’s Gun scenario with the self-defense measures built into the billiards table! Excellent visuals and gimmicks that will carry on throughout the series.

The Disguises

The disguises were… eh. Which makes sense for the pilot but also it’s a shame, considering just how much it becomes an integral part of Ross Martin’s multi-faceted performance as Artemus Gordon. We get him as some sorta grave robber/carpet bagger that seems to exclusively exist to be silly at Jim’s expense, and a brief appearance as a Mexican beggar. Only one really makes sense for the story and we see it for all of two seconds.

The Gay Subtext

(Don’t ship it? Skip it!)

So long as Artemus and Jim are in an episode together the Gay score will never be 0. That being said they haven’t established a rapport, or even Artemus as a solid character yet. So is absolutely bottom rung for subtext in a given episode to me. Artemus frets over Jim a little and musters up his courage in spooky environs but that’s about it.

The Yikes Dated Factor

I’m giving this a solid -3 because yes there are more sexist/racist episodes than this but there are also LESS racist/sexist episodes of this show than this one. The only reason this doesn’t get a worse score for the yellow face is because it was part of the villain’s ploy, so they technically didn’t have a white man playing a Chinese guy. It was a white guy pretending to be Mexican pretending to be Chinese, which is almost funny, almost. But then, we got a couple white guys playing Mexicans which (there are plenty of people in the Latine diaspora who are white.) still runs into caricature and colorism issues. The baddies are all foreigners sometimes pretending to be different foreigners with some casual orientalism. But hey! At least the Spanish wasn’t gibberish!

[disneyvillainbracket]

Disney Villain Bracket

basically how this works is we have brackets a, b, and c. c is a tricky one, hopefully ill explain right

it’s basically a bracket and a half, and the villains in the half bracket will go across and meet in the middle, and the winner of that goes against the two villains on the bracket above

once we get to the middle two in a and b and have that vote, and once the double elimination in bracket c happens, the three villains will all go head to head… to head. it’ll be the three winners of each bracket in one final poll

am i explaining correctly? oh well, y’all will see what i mean when we get there

im sure a lot of y’all have opinions on how this was put together but keep in mind ive never done this before and i did my best. so

also! voting criteria is you picking your favorite of the villains in each poll. not the movies or shows or whatever they’re from, im talking about the characters themselves

i will be posting the polls on the left side of bracket A first, on Monday, April 17 at 12 PM CST! after that, i will post the left side of bracket B the following day at the same time. then the left side of bracket C the next day. the day after that, i will post the right side of bracket A, then B, then C. you get it

hope y’all have fun with this poll!!!

here’s a breakdown of the brackets below the cut, with the names and fandoms of each villain:

Bracket A:

LOVEMUFFIN (Phineas and Ferb) VS Randall Boggs (Monsters Inc)

Derek (Milo Murphy’s Law) VS The Core/Darcy (Amphibia)

Dr. Drakken (Kim Possible) VS Lady Tremaine (Cinderella)

Magica de Spell (Ducktales) VS Malleus Draconia (Twisted Wonderland)

Bill Cipher (Gravity Falls) VS Prince John (Robin Hood)

Professor Z (Cars 2) VS Oogie Boogie (Nightmare Before Christmas)

Prince Hans (Frozen) VS Governor Ratcliffe (Pocahontas)

Professor Ratigan (The Great Mouse Detective) VS Shan Yu (Mulan)

The Sanderson Sisters (Hocus Pocus) VS The White Witch (Chronicles of Narnia)

Emperor Belos (The Owl House) VS Zira (The Lion King 2: Simba’s Pride)

Mother Gothel (Tangled) VS Assistant Mayor Bellwether (Zootopia)

Charles Muntz (Up) VS Constance Hatchaway (The Haunted Mansion - Disney Parks)

Due (PKNA) VS Kalabar (Halloweentown)

The Walt Disney Company VS The Fairy Godmother (Shrek 2)

Tusk (Club Penguin) VS Edgar Balthazar (The Aristocats)

Ursula (The Little Mermaid) VS Morgana (The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea)

Bracket B:

Cruella deVil (101 Dalmatians) VS Man/The Hunter (Bambi)

Turbo “King Candy” (Wreck it Ralph) VS Hopper (A Bug’s Life)

Queen Narissa (Enchanted) VS Clayton (Tarzan)

The Queen of Hearts (Alice in Wonderland) VS Lotso Bear (Toy Story 3)

Madame Medusa (The Rescuers) VS Lord Hater (Wander over Yonder)

Maestro Forte (Beauty and the Beast: An Enchanted Christmas) VS The Horned King (The Black Cauldron)

Tamatoa (Moana) VS Second Dimension Doofenshmirtz (Phineas and Ferb: Across the Second Dimension)

Captain Hook (Peter Pan) VS Captain Hook (Hook)

Scar (The Lion King) VS Chick Hicks (Cars)

The Underminer (Incredibles 2) VS Gaston (Beauty and the Beast)

Hades (Hercules) VS Captain Gantu (Lilo and Stitch)

Madam Mim (Sword in the Stone) VS Dr. Facilier (Princess and the Frog)

Villain Recruiters (Disney Parks) VS Tina Harwood (Ice Princess)

Harrison Hightower III (Tower of Terror - Disney Parks) VS Professor Parenthesis (The OWCA Files)

The Sea Witches (Festival of Mystique - Disney Parks) VS Marina Del Ray (The Little Mermaid: Ariel’s Beginning)

Janet Smythe (Best Friends Whenever) VS Meredith Blake (The Parent Trap)

Bracket C:

The Evil Queen (Snow White and the Seven Dwarves) VS Scroop (Treasure Planet)

Chernabog (Fantasia) VS Jafar (Aladdin)

Toffee (Star VS the Forces of Evil) VS The Blot (Epic Mickey)

Syndrome (The Incredibles) VS Stinky Pete (Toy Story 2)

Phantom Blot (Disney Comics) VS Sa’luk (Aladdin and the King of Thieves)

Trauma (PKNA) VS The Beagle Boys (Disney Comics)

Royal Pain (Sky High) VS Demona (Gargoyles)

Yzma (Emperor’s New Groove) VS Judge Claude Frollo (The Hunchback of Notre Dame)

Maleficent (Sleeping Beauty) VS Ernesto de la Cruz (Coco)

Commander Rourke (Atlantis: The Lost Empire) VS The Headless Horseman (The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad)

Emperor Zurg (Toy Story) VS Miles McDermott (The Even Stevens Movie)

Professor JT Wu (The Nightmare Experiment - Disney Parks) VS Henry Ravenswood (Big Thunder Mountain Railroad - Disney Parks)

[where-dreamers-go]

Reading and rambling: The Fork, the Witch, and the Worm

(Tales from Alagaësia VOLUME 1: ERAGON)

~~~

PART ONE: THE FORK

II. A Fork in the Road

~~~

.... Where the blazes is this?

WHO'S point of view is this??

AND WHY do I feel like it's passed their curfew???

Umm. Essie, sweetie, should you be home? I feel like you're a child. Where were you and is it late?

Wharves. Uh. I need the dictionary again.

Is this a winter-y place by the sea or waterway? Girl, hurry up and go home.

Great, I'm still thinking about getting Eragon more protein rich foods and now there's this one!

"I see. Does that make her important?"

Essie shook her head. "It makes her think she's important."

Oooh. We're getting the tea!!! And this "unknown" man has an excellent vocabulary. Uh-huh. I know who you are, pal. "Tornac" ... nice name. 👀🧐

"Essie Siglingsdaughter."

*closes book*

"Who named your mother??"

... All this children drama is intense. Like: been there with dealing with 'miss all-that's'. Do you need help, sweetie?

"Then maybe they weren't really your friends."

Speak the truth! 👏 Give her a head start in learning that. Just because you're social with someone, even for years, it doesn't mean their a friend.

A snort escaped Tornac. "If you don't count being shot at by arrows, then yes."

A young girl who has her sights set high. You know, Beor Mountains high. It's nice to see humans saying something positive about the dwarves and not watching the elves from a distance as if they were wise, mysterious, rude, hunters. Anyway...

"That . . . is a very impressive scar. You should be proud of it." And --> "Because a scar means you survived."

Love it. Love yourself!

"... the big oaf."

A new scar for Tornac from a friend? Hmmm.

"A long, long way from here."

Okay, now with the war and battles over with, I'm curious as to where other people live. Because the only ones native to Alagaësia are dragons and dwarves, right? So what are other human cultures like? Have they traded with other dwarves? Are there advancements in the far north? Do they have eye glasses?

Also, can we just appreciate "Tornac" just being truthful and leveling with Essie on a person to person level?? Trying to bestow wisdom.

And first hand learning apparently if Essie continues to watch everything.

"A whole field scattered with stones."

"Black and burnt?"

"As if seared by fire, but with no sign of flame or smoke."

Hello, mystery. And they smell really really bad...

"... Hand over the rest of your gold, or the youngling here will pay with blood."

Ooooh. Things should get interesting. It's building the tension.

Hold on a minute, folks, we have a development.

Tornac used magic, but it didn't work because all these smelly and armed guys have charmed necklaces. Who's witch-woman Bachel? And how come they don't call it magic?? Ooooh. Different places, different names, different beliefs.

Anyway...

And then he spoke a Word, and such a word it was.

Oooooooh!!! Snap, here we go!

Oh, guess they're under Nasuada's magic laws too. Thanks for clarification, Essie.

Uhhh. The Word didn't change anything. This is a disturbing sign. Yup yup.

*reading fight scene be right back*

"You do not know what you seek, Wanderer. You're moon-addled and nose-blind. The sleeper stirs, and you and me--we're all ants waiting to be crushed."

I feel like this is important along with where the nasty stone is from.

Uh, who are "The Dreamers" and why do I feel like there's a scary plot hidden.

Essie, darling, this is your first step into a wider world. Use the fork well and learn much more.

MISTER STABBY!!!! All the love to Essie, goodness.

. . . Murtagh lifted his head and took a deep breath of night air.

Murtagh, you softie.

Always more mysteries . . .

That's what I'm saying! Let's get down to business~

So again he wondered if perhaps the time had come to turn and face his past.

Someone was watching The Lion King.

Yeah! Go find the witch-woman Bachel and be careful.

Oh my goodness. What a fascinating chapter. I hope we will get an update on Essie in the future. That would be neat. I mean, why would we go from the dragons showing Eragon the world to a complete different point of view.

Was there another purpose for such a view or just because she was closest to Murtagh at that point?

Hmmm

[queenlucythevaliant]

An Autobiography in Books

We made a list, my mom and I, of all the picture books we loved best

All the Places to Love, which made my mom and my aunt cry together on a summer day once and I didn't understand why

Miss Rumphius

Miss Fanny's Hats

Doctor Suess's books - all of them. We used to have Suess-a-thons on snow days, all curled up together under covers in my parent's bed.

The Best Place, which was probably our favorite

(I would still like to have a screen porch someday, like the Old Wolf)

We had only just moved when we listened to Mr. Revere and I in the car on cassette tape. My parents had to pause it every few chapters to answer our questions, but after we finished with it I played Sons of Liberty with my dolls for years.

And over the years, my parents must have read the Laura and Mary books (so I called them) aloud to me twenty or thirty times. Silver Lake was my favorite. I didn't much mind which parent read them to me, except for Farmer Boy. That book belonged exclusively to my dad.

Pages and pages. I'm in my pajamas with a glass of chocolate milk. My mom or my dad sits on the edge of my bed. Ramona and Avonlea and Where the Red Fern Grows.

My first grade teacher read us a picture book that had a witch in it. I told my mom when I got home. "Can you write me a note to sit out?" I asked, thinking of the previous year's Halloween party.

"What was the book called?" my mom asked me.

"The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe."

My mom laughed. "That's a Christian book," she said. "There's a longer version. We can read it together."

My mom's copy of Little Women had gilt pages and the most beautiful painted illustrations. Sometimes, I would open the book up and flip through it, just to look at the pictures and feel the paper on my hands.

I still dream about running away to live in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, like Claudia in From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.

There was a book called For Freedom, which almost no one else seems to have heard of.

It was about a teenage girl training to be an opera singer in occupied France.

She was a spy who carried coded messages in the hollowed out heel of her shoe.

In the end, her voice gave out while singing Carmen, which to me seemed a fate worse than death.

She- the girl in the book- would pray: "God, make me brave. Make me brave and make me sing. Protect my family. Make me brave."

I won a Hunger Games trivia contest at my library before Mockingjay was released.

In sixth grade, my friends and I all read Shannon Hale's The Books of Bayern together. There were four of us and four female heroines. We each chose one and we played pretend: Elizabeth was Isi, Lauren was Dasha, Morgan was Rin, and I was Enna

(And then!)

My whole world blossomed into color when I read Gone with the Wind. I had never known such books existed! I remember a kind of frenetic eagerness. A thousand pages in less than a week, and I came away with a fierce, joyful love for messy antiheroines, sprawling epics, and bittersweet endings.

"Recommend me some more of your favorites!" I begged my mother. She handed me Jane Austen, Edith Wharton, the Brontes.

Jane Eyre was a challenge. I was forever flipping to the footnotes in the back of the book, translating the French dialogue and making note of all the words I didn't know. My reading pace was like frozen molasses and I remember several times thinking "Why is this so much harder than Gone with the Wind?"

But by the end, I saw myself in Jane. I was quiet, like her, and I hoped I could capture some of her integrity.

I read Kristin Cashore's Fire right in the middle of my forray into Jane Austen: Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility before, Emma and Persuasion after. For that reason, my mind insists on erroneously filing Fire with Austen's work, a sort of forbidden sixth novel. It does feature

a beautiful, clever heroine who plays an instrument and wanders through the forest,

a romance with a stern but kind young military man,

and issues of class, wealth, and family,

so maybe it's an okay thing if it stays.

Anna Karenina was magic, pure and simple. I couldn't shut up about it. Eventually, my friends begged me to stop quoting. "I think you're even more into Anna Karenina than Narnia nowadays!" This assertion offended me; Narnia will always be my favorite.

(Here, I started high school.)

How to describe the first experience I had with The Age of Innocence?

I read it sitting in a sunbeam over several summer afternoons.

When I was finished, I flipped it back over and read it again.

I think I mostly wanted to embrace Ellen and tell her she was very brave.

I wanted to tell Archer that he wasn't, but that he should be.

My dad gave me a copy of The Story of Earth by Robert Hazen. It was a secular history of Earth's geology and biology, but it had just the slimmest glimmer of theism around the edges. I think this book has set the course of my life more directly than any other.

I read War and Peace and Atlas Shrugged back to back the same summer I read The Story of Earth. What a summer of ideas that was.

More needs be said about War and Peace: I set out to read it because I wanted to conquer it, but then I read Natasha and Sonya gazing at the lovely moon with Andrei below. I was still in my sundress and gold eyeliner from church, and reading Natasha's "Oh, how lovely," I felt positively celestial.

So it was that conquest became a love affair.

The Killer Angels came in the first full year of my battle with chronic illness. It was hopeful, brave and sad; it made me proud to be an American and equally proud to be fighting my own small battle. I wondered if I had any hope of winning.

On the mornings when I didn't have migraines, I sat on a certain bench outside the gym complex with a book until 7:59. I ignored everyone who spoke to me.

I didn't like The Lord of the Rings the first time I read it. I was dreadfully disappointed because I expected to find Narnia. Yet in the pages of The Return of the King, I found no Aslan, only Aragorn.

(Here, I began college.)

The Far Pavilions was just the epic I needed my first year. The migraines were bad; I was alone and in pain and my thoughts were muddled, but whenever Ash thought how unfair his lot was, I felt a little better in mine.

After considerable peer-pressure, I re-read The Lord of the Rings- on it's own terms this time- and at last I loved it.

Then I read The Silmarillion and made all the same mistakes.

It took me four attempts to finally understand the glory of Tolkien's writings.

I read most of The Gulag Archipelago crammed in the back of a van on a road trip to Florida. It was too loud - people talking over one another, radio cranked up high - and I could barely move my legs from where they were pinned to the seat in front of me. My shoulders spasmed and ached. I felt that book in some small yet visceral way. My physical discomfort made the suffering more immediate, which allowed the Solzhenitsyn's knife-words to cut me deeper than they could have otherwise.

Solzhenitsyn got some stuff wrong, my dad says. He just didn't have access to the best information. Try Anne Applebaum, if you really want to know about the gulags. But how can I replicate the experience of reading The Gulag Archipelago in the back of that van?

I was reading Nicolas and Alexandra the next-to last-time I saw my grandfather alive. We sat in the cafeteria in his nursing home and I recounted the most interesting bits for him.

I wasn't finished reading it by the time I left. I'm glad I was reading history that trip; my granddad already knew the ending.

Villette was a book about loneliness and Protestantism. It made me feel less lonely and more Protestant, which is exactly what I look for in a new favorite book.

(Okay fine, I do quite like Wuthering Heights actually, though I wouldn't call it a favorite. Are you happy?)

I picked up The October Horse for quite a shallow reason: because I learned that Julius Caesar was an epileptic, and epilepsy is quite closely related to migraine.

Julius Caesar and Ulysses S. Grant, those were my guys. However, I'd read Grant's memoir all the way back in fifth grade, so Caesar it was.

The rich velvet of Colleen McCullough 's writing came as a delightful surprise, and The Thorn Birds (soon to be another favorite) soon followed.

(It's getting harder to write this now. It's harder to write about more recent history, even indirectly.)

The Master and Margarita was strange and fascinating and I couldn't look away. I have spoken and written hundreds and thousands of words trying to explain it's appeal. I have evangelized on behalf of this book, but ultimately all I can say is: Go read it. Read it right now.

The Sparrow made me weep more times than I would like to admit. Like Emilio Sandoz, in reading it I felt naked before God. How horrible and how lovely a thing it was.

Which of this year's books will I carry with me into the future? This Too Shall Last for practical advice? Dead Souls for justice, Pyrenesi for joy, Deathless for beautiful prose? The Queen of Attolia for friendship, perhaps, or Six of Crows for my sister? Only time will tell which shapes me most.

[seeminglyseph]

My brain is wandering slightly to fairytales again, and I think in my like. Bonkers crossover that’s definitely partially inspired by Neverafter that Witches and Wolves are in the same category of “somewhat predatory forces that live in the woods” like.

If you go into the territory of a wolf and are killed by wolves like. It sucks but like you did go into the wolf place. But also in most fairytales and also the real world the woods are somewhere you need to traverse and often in the real world too like people need to live and work there so like. Congratulations it’s dangerous territory and sometimes that’s because there’s wolves there.

And I can’t un-grow up in Northern North America where we got some fantastic and dangerous animals. Northern Rocky Mountains may have stories that are kinda culture locked for a good reason but like I personally still grew up in an area with Moose and mountain lions and coyotes and grizzly bears? So it kinda feels like I still have Germanic and Scandinavian folktales and fairytales, but also the woods are Canadian.

Which is. Weird in my head sometimes. But also also I see people online who have not analyzed that at all and instead like. Insulted people for having different folklore or history and it’s like. “Please don’t insult people in France for not appropriating an Indigenous Canadian legend? That’s actually a really normal thing for them to have done.” Like. North American folklore isn’t universal either. I think we’ve appropriated that kinda stuff so much half the time it becomes a fight over who came up with it when we should absolutely know better.

But like. You can’t undo where or how you grew up… it’s weird sometimes.

[adamwatchesmovies]

The Nutcracker and the Four Realms (2018)

While I didn't enjoy this film, that doesn't mean you won't. No matter what I say, the people involved in this project did it: they actually made a movie. That's something to be applauded. With that established...

The film The Nutcracker and the Four Realms most closely resembles is Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland. Like it, this reinvention of the classic story overrelies on CGI effects, seems more concerned with creating a flashy-looking world than a working one, and throws its empty characters into a floppy storyline. Unlike the 2010 movie, this bad holiday pudding by Lasse Hallström and Joe Johnston has no chance of being fondly remembered, even by misguided fans. It’s so derivative of other works it fades from your memory as soon as the credits roll.

On Christmas Eve, Clara Stahlbaum (Mackenzie Foy) searches for a key that will open a music box left to her by her late mother. On its trail, she wanders into a magical world divided into four realms. All live in harmony, except for Mother Ginger (Helen Mirren) and her army of mice, who rule the realm formerly known as the land of Amusements. Along with Captain Philip Hoffman (Jayden Fowora-Knight, playing the titular Nutcracker… sort of), Clara sets out to find her key and restore order to the realm her mother discovered years ago.

It’s essentially a watered-down version of “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe” minus the wonder, excitement or anything else that made it good. The residents of the four realms are ridiculous caricatures rather than living, breathing beings we should care about. The Land of Amusements is barren. There’s just a couple of “buildings”, which is supposed to be spooky - I think. Mother Ginger’s army of mice should fill us with terror but the rodents can barely come together to make one human-sized soldier, much less pose a threat. What do the realms need a savior from, again?

If I talk about a film’s running time, it’s usually because someone's overstaying their welcome. The Nutcracker and the Four Realms has the opposite problem. It’s way too short. By the time we're introduced to the major players, the world, the rules and the conflict, there’s no time for anything else. No one has any depth. The movie is about nothing more than Clara finding the key to her music box and stopping the threat during the final act. You don’t get to know her or the Nutcracker at all so it’s no surprise the two of them don’t get romantically engaged by the time the movie ends. They’re blocks of wood no one could get excited about.

There’s nothing for you to get invested in or fall in love with. Fan of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite? There are a couple of brief dance sequences but before you get into it, writer Ashleigh Powell whisks away to witness another barrage of fantasy story cliches. Keira Knightley’s Sugar Plum Fairy is revealed to be the villain all long. Even if you didn’t see it coming, you won’t be shocked. Let her take over the world with her army of toy soldiers (so weak and impotent they make the Battle Droids from the Star Wars prequel trilogy look terrifying). Maybe then, something interesting will happen.

You could make a long list of everything about The Nutcracker and the Four Realms that feels off (Matthew Macfadyen is creepy and I don’t think he’s supposed to be) or doesn’t make sense but why bother? Even if the impressive visuals could make you overlook all of the flaws, no one would ever hold it close to their heart and call it a favourite. It’s dull and empty; as though it wasn’t even spawned by a committee or focus group, but by a machine. (December 27, 2019)

[sparkletastic-cookiedough]

Oh my goodness:

Cowardly lion is very lion, as he should be.

And he’s got an attractive haircut.

He’s so expressive.

Woodman is just a lil rusty, which works.

He’s got a human brain? I think? Works with the book canon backstory.

Love his very mechanical look. It’s looks mechanically functional, rather than humanoid. He’s still a man, but he’s now more machine.

And it’s a unique silhouette, which is important for drawings.

Dorothy is delightfully short.

I would not trust her to wander Oz by herself, but Witch of the North makes different choices I suppose.

Toto is an angular dog.

Love that floppy scarecrow.

Witch of the North! She’s very pretty, with a pretty dress. She should probably be in purple accents instead of blue, but maybe she’s just sporting the local colors…

She’s very glittery.

Which of the west is HOT.

And she’s got yellow accents cause she’s a winkie? Perfection.

Shes so angular. And TALL.

And her one creepy eye.

Updated my wizard of Oz lineup!

[tobacconist]

i have a book of moving pages teehee. seventy eight of them. full of magic pictures. a man can find his fortune amongst its leaves, or he can lose it just the same.

recite the alphabet three times. backwards and forwards, like an ox ploughing a field, but dont actually. and know that him who sows the seeds works the wheels. twenty one plus one, plus four times thirteen, plus four.

a foolish man walked at a crossroads. he met a juggler who performed funny tricks, he had a table with three legs. there was a witch who called herself the pope, but she was crazy, and she brought him before the empress. and her majesty was impressed. and the empress showed him to her husband the emperor, who decreed he should marry his lovely daughter. and so he brought them both before the pope himself, who blessed them in marriage and they ate fruit together. and they rode out of the garden in their chariot. and they met an angel on their way, and the angel was blind, and she weighed them in her balance and found them wanting. and so they went their ways, and he found an old man in the desert, and the poor wanderers candle waxed short, for he was an hermit. and it grew misty, and they came unto three women spinning yarn on their spinning wheel, a girl, her mother, and her grandmother, and the little one combed the fleece into floss and fed it into the machine, and the older one worked the wheel with her foot, and the oldest of all took the string and wove it into a blanket which covered them all and all their hideous secrets, and the wheel was like a clock in its relentless spinning. and the prowling lion loomed in the wilderness, and she fled, and hid in the ruins, and held up the pillars of it by her own strength, and she fought the lion, and tamed him. and the fool was found guilty of his criminal ways and sentenced to be hanged, and he hung from that tree, and it was windy, and he peered into the depths of hell. and he saw inside the mouth of death as it yawned, and in it were crowns and bald heads, and howling voices, and the image of a sickly pale horse. but an angel came and cut the rope and the fool fell down, and the angel gave him water to drink and washed him and told him how to temper his sinful ways. and he peered deep down into the pool and saw the devil in his reflection beneath the earth, and the devil was holding a knife by the blade and an upsidedown candle. and the angel took the fools hand and brought him to the house of god, which was so high it almost reached the heavens and built in worship, but lo! the thunder and the quaking of the earth, the temples foundations were rocked, and everyone ran up the ladders and staircases to reach the top, and the lighting struck the roof, and the people were scattered. in the wreckage, the fool found his beloved once again, and she took him to the pool and they looked at the skies and beheld the stars, and they saw many things in them. and they walked along the stream, and the moon was watching, and they heard the dogs howl, and there was a turtle with a scorpion on his back. and the sun rose and banished all shadows, a child playing in the meadow, a white bull, and a field of corn. and they went up to their judgement together, as the trumpet sounded and the living and the dead joined together to praise the Lord. and the Lord offered the fool the whole world, but of course, he declined; because he was more interested in the back of the card than the front.

and that is my story. i hope it didnt upset you. one can always reshuffle, but it may come at great cost. the lord of mysteries, the lord almighty. the LORD God is good and His mercy is forever amen.

[unravellingsilencehq]

“Oh, Merlin, tell me, does THE CHARIOT get what he deserves?” He is NEUTRAL & OPEN to finding out.“

— he walks through the world as ;

name → harrison bagnold pronouns → he/him identification → cis-male year of birth → september 1956 - september 1955 face claim → daryl mccormack blood status → pure-blood sexual orientation → sexually fluid occupation → ambassador to the united states for the international confederation of wizards in the department of international magical co-operation at the ministry of magic

future information → n/a

— he is best described as ;

CONSIDERED ELEGANCE. He is a GLEAMING PAIR OF CUFFLINKS, pressed into a BRILLIANT CRISP SHIRT, and a WINNING SMILE that would charm even the most determined folk to part ways with a VOTE. He is the SMOOTH and CALMING voice at the table, the FIRM HANDSHAKE guiding you down his path and handing you a pen to sign.

— his story starts with ;

tw: death

The only surviving child of Minister for Magic MILLICENT BAGNOLD [mother], Harrison is the most beloved kind of celebrity. Good looking, intelligent and a heartbreaking backstory to boot. Millicent explained to him young, that the key to high society was networking. With his mother high in the political world, Harrison saw himself as the equal to children like LUCIUS MALFOY [close friend] despite missing out on a spot in The Sacred Twenty-Eight. It was only when he began attending events as he got older he could see the difference. The Bagnolds weren’t as rich, not as much land or staff - and that was where the lying began. Harrison would lie about his family’s wealth for years to come. “Fake it till you make it.” He told himself in the mirror and his parents tried hard to buy him all that was necessary to keep up with the charade. Harrison wondered if his demanding behaviour in childhood led to his parents preferring his younger brother’s company to his, though as an adult he wouldn’t exactly blame them for it. BOOKER BAGNOLD [sibling] was nothing like Harrison, content to play in the dirt and study insects rather than help his parents work a room. 

The way his mother and father split their time and attention between the boys had always been a source of pain to Harrison. Harrison and his brother were the heir and the spare and everyone in their family knew it too. Arriving at Hogwarts, Harrison was sorted into Gryffindor and quickly established himself as the true lion amongst the pussycats, buddying up quickly with fellow alpha KALEB JOHNSON [best friend] who quickly became his best friend. Harrison and Kaleb ruled Gryffindor, but on the Quidditch pitch they had some competition. ELEZAR SMITH [best friend], MICHAEL THOMAS [best friend] and CRISTIANO PARKINSON [best friend], made up the strongest Ravenclaw team for quite some time. What began as a fact finding mission for the boys, ending up in them meeting their best friends and from there on the group were inseparable. They surrounded themselves with just as popular witches, revolving in the same circle as Cristiano’s twin sister ANDRESSA PARKINSON [close friend], ISOLDE CROUCH [close friend], LUCILLE JONES [best friend], her twin sister FLORENCE JONES [close friend] and BERTHA JORKINS [close friend]. 

Undoubtedly the most popular boys in their year, they were untouchable and enjoyed watching the witches in their year battle for power and fight over them as they did. For Harrison there was only one woman for him. The only person who thought of herself as highly as he did, Lucille was his love, but a chip on his shoulder and a wandering eye would be their downfall. Harrison began seeing CORNELIUS CRABBE [former romantic liaison] in their final year. Like Harrison, Lucille longed to be a member of The Twenty-Eight, but even the beauty of a veela and her impressive political connections couldn’t buy her that. He had no idea how to even explain his on-and-off feelings to her because he didn’t even understand them himself. He found himself approaching a close friend, ANASTASIA SIMINOVA [close friend] about it first. She had been there for him a lot, after her best friend GENEVIEVE AVERY [close friend] began dating Cristiano and the two found common ground in their love for secrecy. His friends all found out when they caught him kissing a member of the Hufflepuff team at a party. Him and Lucille broke up not long afterwards.

Harrison had proven he was not just good at making friends, but adversaries as well. EDRICK SELWYN [rival] was an overly competitive Slytherin he enjoyed challenging, though he would later find such connections would follow him into adulthood. Harrison had been given the position as an Ambassador for the International Confederation of Wizards at quite a young age, many thought because of his mother. Whilst it allowed him to travel, he reported directly to Edrick’s father HARRELSON SELWYN [boss], who had an intense dislike of him, ensuring he had to always be on his game. When his mother became Minister for Magic, a sense of relief washed over Harrison. He had been lying for so long it felt good to be true at last. ROSALINE DAVIS [partner], came along at the right time. A pure-blood from a good name, although a purist one, she had designs on being the future wife of a Minister and escaping her family. His life seemed perfect, except for one thing. His brother. Whilst Harrison worked hard to maintain their image, Booker seemed intent on destroying it, going as far as to critique their own mother’s policy on creatures and accusing the Ministry of foul play.

Halloween night in 1982, a heated argument began between the brothers over a petition that Booker had started to rally for creature rights. It got heated and Harrison disarmed Booker before disappearing into the party with Rosaline. An hour later he was floating in the fountain. It was an unlikely friend who helped him with his grief. LILIAS ROSMERTA [close friend] an old Gryffindor drinking buddy she wanted to carry on Booker’s legacy by furthering his petition. The pieces didn’t add up that Booker was killed by a wolf, he believed someone on the other side of the bench was to blame. Harrison attended The Yule Ball with the intention of networking with suspicious characters and keep an eye out for who might have wanted his brother dead. One moment Harrison was speaking to Lucius and BILLIUS WEASLEY [close friend] then he was watching himself behave in a way much unlike himself. Under the imperius curse he listened helplessly as a voice whispered over and over in his mind that no thoughts of his own could form. Harrison followed JONATHAN REEVES [person of interest] and his girlfriend ROSALIE FLINT [person of interest] into a private room. 

He watched as his own hand pointed his wand at Jonathan and cast a killing curse at the man. Rosalie valiantly dived in front of the curse, killing her instantly. Internally Harrison screamed, horrified at the scene he had unwillingly created, the everything went black. When he awoke it was in a strange place with Lilias and her sisters by his side, all staring at him with their wide blue eyes. Harrison had been asleep for quite some time, presumed missing with no memory past the moment he drank his champagne with Lucius and Billius. Harrison has been trying hard to remember what has transpired but no matter how much he works with Lilias his brain has fogged over. Determined to get to the bottom of Booker’s death, Harrison has vowed to try and remember the evening and get back to his life as though nothing has happened in order to slip under the radar and find Booker’s killer. Harrison is convinced his brother’s death is part of a plot to overthrow his mother, though if he just pulled a little bit harder on such a thread he would find a whole world unravel he didn’t even know existed. 

— he is a LEVEL 6 WIZARD & readied for war ;

[random-night2]

Bit of explanation to the aus that no 1 asked 4

Cuphead Au(going more off the netflix series & not the game):

Cuphead: Duke

Mugman: Pluto

Chalice: Berenice

Devil: Lenore

Henchmen: Eulalie & Morella

Dice Queen(king): Annabel Lee

Duke & Pluto are brothers. Divorce arc was s1 ep5(this is what I meant by its based off the netflix series)

Beauty & the Beast Au:

Beast: Lenore

Belle: Annabel Lee

Lumiere: Duke

Cogsworth: Pluto

Ms.Pots: Eulalie

Chip: Morella

Dresser?: Berenice

Gaston: Montresor

Gaston lacky guy: Will

Village girl that turned into Dog footrest: Ada

The other residents at the castle(misfits & random utensils) weren't the castle's work staff but actually were just staying there. Either exiled from their towns or ran away, they came to the castle for shelter & Lenore would let them stay as long as they behaved & helped with the chores. This is how the Misfits came together. Duke, Morella, Pluto, Berenice with Eulalie. Prospero also arrives at some point.

Prospero's either the insane asylum guy or someone in the castle.

If I could draw I would've.

Fnaf Au:

Michael/nightgaurd: Lenore

Crying child: Pluto

Elizabeth: Morella

William: Montresor(not their dad)

Freddy mask bully: Duke. Chica mask: Berenice. Bonnie mask: Eulalie.

Phone guys: the deans

Spectres are the animatronics. Bullys died & became their spectres/animatronics.

Vampire Au:

Lenore, Duke, Berenice: Vampires

Eulalie: Witch

Morella: Witch apprentice

Pluto: Eulalies werecat

Annabel: Human

Pirate Au:

The Misfits & Clusterf#cks are rival pirate groups.

Misfit Militia:

Lenore: Captain

Duke: 1st mate. Everyone else(Pluto, Eula, Bee, Ella) have their respective roles on the ship.

Clusterf#ck Gang(I'm bad at names)

Annabel: Captain

Prospero: 1st mate.

Montys trio are still in the gang but are starting to defect.

Lord of the Rings:(sry for the lack of names)

Aragon: Lenore

Legolas: Duke

Gimly/dwarf: Pluto

Elf girl: Annabel

Other elf leader guy: Prospero

Saroman: Deans

Sarron: the Raven

Hobbits: Berenice, Eulalie, Monty, Will.

Gandalf: Theo

(Also added some aus)

Lion King Au:

Simba: Lenore

Nala: Annabel

Timone: Duke

Pumba: Pluto

Scar: Monty(not the uncle. Lenores fathers brothers nephews cousins former roommate)

Mufasa: Theo

Sarabi: Lucille

Hyenas: Ada & Will

Lenore & Theo are siblings. Lucille stayed while Thaddeus left.

Possession Au:(song: Set Me Free, Nico Collins)

Lenore got possessed by the raven after overthrowing the Deans & the others have to get him out of her head.

Bad Ending:

The Raven sets Lenore free of his control but it kills her in the process. Lenore then is tasked to take care of the wandering orbs for the rest of eternity.

Better Ending:

The Raven sets Lenore free from his control but theres a catch. Lenore has to preside over Nevermore in the place of the Raven & the Deans until another soul takes her place.

Also in this one, Lenore's right eye(same as mourns) turns white.

Fantasy Au:

Nevermore characters have the powers & some looks of their spectres in their human form.(ex, Monty has horns. Duke has a diamond pattern on some parts of his body)

They get more & more like their spectres the more power they use.

If they use too much of that power or become power hungry, they fully turn into their spectres & become lost creatures. Having to preform a very dangerous ritual to turn them back & even at that they look like their spectre only having few human features left.

(Edit: there's much more after I posted this)

Random Nevermore aus I have

Beauty & The Beast au

Modern au

Cuphead au

Lord of the Rings au

Fnaf au

Vampire au

Pirate au

[goldenraeofsun]

Day 21: Haunted

Birds chirp from the branches overhead, and the scent of damp soil fills Dean’s nose. He stumbles through the trees, cursing Ruby Masters every time he trips over an unseen root in the underbrush. Goddamn witch.

He’d only weaseled it out of Garth this morning after waking up and finding Sammy still gone.

Apparently Sammy and Ruby are a thing.

A thing that’s gonna die a death by a thousand noogies when Dean is done with his brother.

Garth spilled everything: how Sam and Ruby had been meeting in secret in the woods because Sam knew Dean would disapprove.

Hell yes, Dean would disapprove. Ruby was bad news, everyone knew that. She and her hellspawn of a sister lived in the woods, the woods that lured in some unlucky girl every few months, woods that Dean was currently tripping his way through to find his wayward brother.

At least the girls always turned up sooner or later. Sometimes after a few days, sometimes as long as three months, but not a single one has ever spoken about what happened to them in the woods. 

Dean refuses to think about what the monster that haunts these trees will do to his little brother.

The sun is fading fast. Years of experience hunting in the fringes of the forest close to their town tell him he needs to turn back soon. Mountain lions hunt at dusk, and wolves lurk at night. Bears, of course, are a danger at all times.

How Dean would return home would have to wait until he found Sammy. Somehow, he’d wandered off the path. One second, he was following the trail to Meg and Ruby’s house, and when he next looked down, the path had disappeared.

He squints up at the orange sky, his stomach sinking with dread. He can either keep going and risk death by apex predator or hunker down for the night and live to keep searching in the morning.

He sighs, scanning the trees for a sturdy enough shelter when he spots – a goddamn castle?

The castle stands off to the left, a looming construction of dark stone and fortified walls.

What the fuck?

The forest goes silent around him. 

No birdsong. No wind whistling through the leaves. Just the ringing in Dean’s own ears from the abrupt absence of sound.

A chorus of unearthly howls starts up to his left, his right, right behind him. 

Dean runs.

* * *

He only has to bang once on the door before it opens with an ear splitting screech of metal on metal.

“There you are Dean-o,” Meg drawls as she steps aside to let him in. Over her shoulder, she calls, “He’s here!”

They’d been expecting him? 

Son of a bitch, maybe Dean should chance it in the woods instead.

Unbothered by Dean’s glare, Meg’s hand darts out, quick as a snake, and wraps around Dean’s upper arm. She tugs him inside before he can protest.

“Come on, you stubborn ass,” she says as she practically drags him down the entryway. “Took you long enough. Your brother is really annoying when he’s worked –”

“Sam’s here?” Dean demands.

“ – up. No idea how Rubes stands him for so long.” She grimaces. “But the heart wants what the heart wants.”

“Where’s Sammy?”

“Relax,” Meg says with an eye roll as the entryway gives way to a great hall. “He’s fine. No need to go all protective mama bear. He’s been fed and entertained. Bathed too, but if you want details on that you’ll have to ask Ruby.”

They both shudder.

“What the hell is going on?” Dean demands. “Where is –”

“Dean?”

Dean turns.

Sam rushes out from a doorway at the other end of the hall, looking considerably cleaner than when Dean last saw him. Huh, Maybe Meg isn’t a lying sack of shit after all.

Sam envelopes him in a hug, “I’m so glad you’re here!” 

“You are so dead,” Dean promises as he clings on tight.

“Sorry.”

“You’d better be,” Dean growls. He steps back. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Sam’s smiles sheepishly. “It’s a long story.”

Dean crosses his arms over his chest. “I have all night.”

* * *

“So that’s it,” Sam says as they sit down at the table for dinner that Ruby conjured from out of nowhere. Night has fallen, and, while Ruby fiddles with the place settings, Meg goes around lighting candles with snaps of her fingers. “If we stay, Ruby and Meg say we have a real shot at saving their boss from the curse put on this place that makes it practically invisible and keeps him here.”

“I’m not convinced,” Dean harrumphs as he reaches for the plate of roast chicken. He glares at Ruby and Meg in turn. 

Ruby slaps his hand away. “Wait for the Master,” she hisses.

“Seriously?” Dean groans to Sam. “The ‘Master’?”

“Ruby says he’s a good person.”

“Ruby basically kidnapped you to get you here,” Dean says acidly, “so I’m not gonna trust a word out of her mouth.”

Ruby flips him off with a sneer.

“No matter how we got here,” Sam says with a pointed look at both of them, “we can do something good.”

“How the hell do you know that?” Dean asks loudly. “Maybe we’re actually for dinner, and they’re asking us to stay here so they can fatten us up for the real feast.” He jabs his fork in Ruby’s face. “Th deal is we’ll get real beds, real food, and every pretty pony we want, for nothing? Sounds like a scam to me.”

“So you can see why we’ve been having such difficulty finding someone so far,” Meg says dryly.

“Come on,” Sam rolls his eyes, “Dad’s not due back from his trip for six weeks. How about we stay here until then?”

As Dean scrambles for a retort, a gravelly voice pronounces from right over his head, “You do not have to stay here one second more if you do not wish to.”

Dean starts violently, knees bumping the underside of the table and upsetting Ruby’s array of carefully arranged forks, knives, and spoons. He twists around in his chair, his heart pounding in his chest. 

A creature – a monster – peers down at him. Glowing blue eyes stare out from a face covered in black fur, and curved rams horns protrude from his temples. Sharp canines poke out from a wolf-like snout, and, as the monster passes to take his seat, fingers ending in sharp talons gently pull his chair away from the table.

At least Dean isn’t the only one staring – Sam seems equally shocked.

“I understand Ruby lured you here under false pretenses,” the monster says calmly to Sam, “and Meg intimidated you with her magic into knocking on our door,” to Dean, “so you are under no obligation to stay.” He shakes his head. “I’ve told them to stop many times, but they insist these methods are the only ones that will work –”

“You tried waiting for some hapless maiden to come knocking of her own accord,” Meg says waspishly as she grabs the roast chicken and serves herself. “And exactly how many turned up?”

The monster looks away.

“Two,” Ruby answers for him with a huff. “Face it, Master, you had no chance without us.”

“I would have managed.”

“You would’ve brooded yourself to death,” Meg says cheerfully before turning to Sam. “Now, what was that about a six week trial period?”

* * *

“Please,” Sam says, puppy-dog eyes out in full force. “What’s the actual harm in staying?”

“It could all be a trap,” Dean hisses, mindful of Ruby, Meg, and their Master listening in from their seats at the table. He shovels more pie into his mouth.

“But –”

“No buts,” Dean cuts him off, spraying pastry everywhere. “We’re leaving in the morning. End of discussion.” Or they’re going to die trying.

Sam glares. “I’m not leaving.”

“Sammy –”

Sam jumps to his feet. “No. Just because you refuse to see the good in people, that doesn’t mean I do.”

“They’re not people!” Dean explodes, gesturing forcefully. “You’re talking about two witches and – and –” he breaks off, a hot wave of shame washing over him as he meets the monster’s sad eyes. God, what would Mom think if she saw him now?

“Rude,” Ruby says primly.

“Maybe we should let this one go, boss,” Meg says, her fingers drumming against the table. “Doesn’t seem the right type at all.”

The monster shakes his head. “It’s his decision.”

“Damn right,” Dean says, but his voice sounds weak to his own ears.

“Whatever,” Sam lifts his chin in the air. “I’m going to bed.”

“Wait – !”

But Sam leaves without a backwards glance, Ruby quick on his heels.

Dean slumps in his chair. Even if he physically drags Sam back to his side, they’d still be exactly where they started, trapped in this magic castle with a monster for company.

“I’d better head out too,” Meg says, getting to her feet. “I’ve got those potions to deliver tomorrow, and they’re not going to bottle themselves. Well,” she laughs lightly, “they could, but not at this distance.”

The monster rumbles his amusement, and Meg waves goodbye before she exits as well, leaving Dean alone with the monster.

Dean can stand an awkward silence for only so long. “So… you go by anything other than ‘Master’ around here?”

“My name is Castiel,” he says shortly. “Meg and Ruby… I didn’t ask them to call me that. But they insisted after,” he breaks off with a dark look. “Anyway, I don’t control them, any more than I control you or your brother.”

“Right,” Dean says slowly. “So you really expect me to think you’ll just let us waltz out of here free as birds?”

“Freer than, since you have free will,” Castiel says solemnly.

“Uh huh,” Dean says. He eyes Castiel beadily, asking, “What exactly are you, anyway?” because if Dean’s truly as safe as the monster claims he is, a little questioning won’t set him over the edge. 

Probably.

But, instead of rearing back or lashing out in offense, Castiel chuckles. “I’m a fallen angel.”

“What?”

Castiel narrows his eyes, and Dean has to look away as the light behind them flares bright. “You’ve heard of the angels, have you not?”

Of course Dean has. They were a staple of Mom’s bedtime stories, the ancient kings who ruled with celestial power. They died out ages ago, brought down by their own infighting. 

“I thought they were all dead,” Dean blurts.

Castiel’s mouth twitches in a half smile that still shows too many of his sharp teeth. “Dead or in hiding, like myself.”

Dean narrows his eyes. “I thought you were cursed. Not hiding.”

“They’re not mutually exclusive,” Castiel says, unruffled by Dean’s accusation. “The curse is a piece of very complicated spellwork, but I’m technically still falling. It keeps me from hitting the ground, so to speak.”

“Sounds painful.”

“It is,” Castiel says wryly. “But it will be worth it. I like my solitude. My ‘people skills’ are rusty,” he says, raising his claws in the scariest set of finger-quotes Dean has ever seen. “Once the curse is broken, I will stay away from humans, but there is a large difference between choosing to keep to myself and being trapped within these walls.”

“Free will,” Dean murmurs.

Castiel dips his head. “Indeed, that’s the difference.”

* * *

Dean gets as far as the treeline before he turns back around.

“Well?” he barks to Sam who stands frozen, where he left him. “You wanted to help the guy. Are you comin’?”

Sam hurries to catch up, and the pair of them reenter the manor. Ruby beams as Sam lifts her in a hug, and Meg merely raises her eyebrows at Dean. “Finally admitted you might be wrong about us, Dean-o?”

“Six weeks,” Dean tells her shortly.

Meg holds up her hands. “The Master’ll be thrilled. He’s such a pessimist.”

Dean looks around. “Where is he?”

Meg shrugs. “I’m not his keeper.”

Dean lifts his gaze to the vaulted ceiling of the entryway. “So what is there to do around here?”

Not much, as it turns out. There’s a whole library, and Sam nearly jizzes himself as he shows Dean the stacks on stacks of books. Dean’s never been much of a reader, not like Sam, so he leaves him to it. 

Instead, Dean explores. He finds the kitchens – magnificent but dusty from disuse. He pokes around, finding at least ten different types of pots and pans, and a dozen other cooking gadgets he doesn’t even know the names for.

He stumbles on two ballrooms.

An armory lined with strange blades.

A portrait hall covered with creepy, all-black paintings hanging in gilded frames.

Castiel finds him in the music room. “So you decided to stay,” he says, and Dean jerks up from inspecting the strings of a lute hanging on the wall.

“Yeah.” Dean rubs the back of his heated neck. “Figured it couldn’t hurt.”

“I’m pleased,” Castiel rumbles. He gestures to the lute. “Do you play?”

Dean shakes his head. “My mom knew her way around a piano, though.”

Castiel gestures towards the instrument, sitting in a ray of sunshine. “Feel free.”

Dean approaches the piano. He reaches out, but doesn’t touch it. “I don’t know how.”

Castiel tilts his head, weirdly bird-like despite the ram’s horns, wolf’s snout, and bear’s fur covering every inch of skin. “But your mother…?”

“Died when I was eight,” Dean says bluntly. “Plus, we were too poor to ever buy one.”

“How did your mother learn?”

Dean grimaces. “She came from a good family,” he says, idly pressing down on a key so his sob story isn’t the only noise in the room. “But they cut off all contact when she eloped with Dad, and then she died ten years later. Bottom line, no piano lessons.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Yeah, well,” Dean straightens. “It was a long time ago.”

“My brother cursed me 147 years ago,” Castiel says quietly. “Some things you don’t let go or forget.”

Dean stares. “Your brother did this?”

Castiel nods.

“Fuck.”

“Quite.” Castiel nods towards the piano. “Would you like a lesson now?”

Dean accidentally hits two discordant notes. Wincing, he forces out, “What?”

Castiel shrugs, his expression rueful. “I can’t play,” he says, holding up his clawed fingers. “But I’d like to show you how, if you’re open to it. It’s been a long time since I’ve heard music from any of these instruments.”

Veins thrumming with anticipation, Dean sits down at the piano.

* * *

Over the next few weeks, Dean divides his time between the music room and the kitchen. He finds a whole shelf of cookbooks and painstakingly tries every single one. He learns he can get Cas to anything for a bite of freshly-baked bread, and he briefly gets on Meg’s good side when he makes her favorite spice cake.

Meanwhile, Cas teaches him how to make music.

Cas can’t carry a tune in a bucket, but he’s a good teacher – knowledgeable, endlessly patient, thorough in his explanations, and willing to listen to the same ten-second ditty over and over again until Dean gets it right.

“Wonderful,” he praises, and the warmth in Dean’s chest isn’t only from the sunlight streaming in from the window.

“That actually sounded good,” Dean marvels.

“Of course it did,” Castiel says with a sharp look. “You’re talented, Dean, but, more importantly, you’re dedicated.”

“Come on,” Dean says, his insides squirming uncomfortably.

“Dedication is an essential skill for mastery of anything,” Cas continues like Dean didn’t say anything. “Just like cooking or hunting. You could have given up or tried something else when you got frustrated, like some other guests, but you kept practicing.”

Dean freezes. “Other guests?”

Cas turns back to the sheet music. “Other unfortunate souls that stumbled on this place. I’m sure you’ve heard of them, maybe spoken to a few.”

“Uh, yeah, I have,” Dean says. “They don’t talk about any of this, though,” he gestures to the castle around them, “All part of the curse, I guess?”

“You guess right.”

He’d noticed it more with Meg than with Ruby, but sometimes they’d stop speaking mid-sentence or change topics with no explanation other than a grunted, “the curse, you know,” and a hand wave.

“How exactly does it work?” he asks curiously. “Some poor bastard has to babysit you for who knows how long,” Ruby and Meg haven't been very clear on those details, “and you’ll be able to leave?”

“Essentially.”

“And nobody’s stayed long enough, is that it?”

Cas doesn’t meet his eyes. “Nobody so far.”

* * *

The day Dad is due to return from his trip dawns dark and cold. The first frost came last night, and Dean feels the chill in the air. He lays in bed, his stomach tied in knots.

At breakfast, Cas doesn’t say a word as Meg magicks up the breakfast Dean prepared in the kitchen downstairs. 

“So,” Sam starts apprehensively. He glances between Dean and Cas. “I was thinking, since Dad’s going to come home any day now, I would head back first and let him know we’re alright.”

Dean exhales a sigh of pure relief. “Yeah?” Out of the corner of his eye, he catches Cas’s head snap around to stare at him.

Sam nods firmly, relaxing at Dean’s positive reaction. “We haven’t broken the curse yet, so one of us should stay. Keep at it.”

Dean grins as he dumps half the bacon onto his plate before passing it on to Ruby. “I always said you were the smart one.”

Meg rolls her eyes.

Sam takes off that evening, and Ruby watches him go from the front window, an inscrutable expression on her face.

A week passes, and Dean makes three different kinds of cake and five different pies. As the days wear on with no message from Sam or Dad, Dean shuts himself up in the kitchen more and more frequently. 

Cas visits him a few times, but Dean’s temper has been shortening alongside the autumn daylight hours. After Dean snaps at him for the third time in an hour, Cas leaves.

Dean makes Cas’s favorite bread in apology, but it isn’t the same between them afterwards.

Dean hasn’t heard from Sam in ten days, the longest they’ve ever gone without seeing each other.

Cas finds him in the music room at midnight, fucking up a scale taught him during their third lesson.

“Sorry,” Dean says curtly, “did I wake you?”

Cas shakes his head. “I don’t sleep.”

“You… don’t?”

“No angels do.” Cas sighs. “You should leave tomorrow.”

Dean’s fingers spasm on the keys. “But the curse isn’t broken.”

Cas lays his hand on top of Dean’s, careful not to scratch him with his claws. “You can come back and break it once you’ve seen them. All you need to do is enter the wood and look for a safe place.” He removes his hand, stowing it safely in his lap. “You care for your brother so much. You deserve some peace of mind, Dean.”

Dean turns to him in wonder. “Seriously? I didn’t think it worked like that.”

Cas gets up. “You’ve already done so much for me. This is the least I can do for you.” Without looking back, he adds, “Trust me, the last thing I want is for you to be trapped here like I am.”

* * *

Meg corners him in the entryway.

He turns at the sound of running footsteps, and Meg is on him in an instant.

“You can’t leave,” Meg says, genuine panic lacing her words. She grabs his arm in a vise-like grip. “You’re so close.”

“But Sammy and Dad –”

She violently shakes her head. “Listen, Clarence will never tell you since he’s all on his free will high horse, but if you leave, you can’t come back.”

Dean’s brow creases. “But Cas told me the trick to finding this place –”

“It only applies if you’ve never stayed here before,” Meg cuts him off. “But you’ve slept here; you’ve eaten his food; you know him. So once you cross the treeline, you’ll forget everything.”

Dean’s mouth goes dry. “What?” he rasps.

“That’s the curse,” Meg says impatiently. “All those girls who wandered back out of the woods – they never said what happened to them because they forgot. The curse doesn’t keep you from talking about him, it makes you forget he ever existed.”

“But –” Dean glances over his shoulder at the castle beyond. “He never said a word.”

Meg presses her lips together, her eyes shining. “He never forces anyone to stay, not even implicitly. He told you on your first night, he would never do that to you. Remember?”

* * *

Each step away from Cas and the castle squeezes his heart painfully. But he can’t stop imagining nightmare scenarios: Sam sick or dying; Dad, missing and Sam searching hopelessly for both of them.

He’s barely known Cas two months; that’s barely any time at all. 

It doesn’t feel like two months worth of friendship, though.

Dean grits his teeth and keeps on, the treeline coming closer and closer. He can’t look back.

Fucking Meg. If she never told him, he would have happily walked out of Cas’s life forever.

But someone else has to come around and break Cas’s curse, right? Staying at Cas’s place is hardly a chore. Cas is the most genuine, giving person he’s ever met, and even Meg has her upsides. Ruby, of course, is only useful because she makes Sam happy.

No, someone else will break Cas’s curse. Someone else will save Cas, and Cas will barely remember the kid who baked him his favorite bread and played the piano with a lead foot. Cas will forget all about him, just like Dean is about to do.

Dean turns around, and he sees nothing but trees.

Horror rises up to choke him, and he spins in a circle even though he knows, logically, Cas’s castle was right behind him.

No, no, no.

He squeezes his eyes shut, as if that can stop reality from closing in.

Somewhere safe. He needs to find somewhere safe.

He opens his eyes.

He needs to find home.

Cas’s castle rises in the distance, just off to the left.

Dean runs.

* * *

He sprints past Meg, still standing in the entryway, her face streaked with tears. “What the fuck are you doing here?” she demands shakily. “I saw you enter the woods –”

“Where is he?” Dean doesn’t let her finish.

Her eyes round with hope, Meg says, “The music room.”

Dean bolts down the castle’s lengthy halls, his legs aching, his lungs burning, Meg hot on his heels. They skid to a stop in front of the closed music room door, and Dean doesn’t waste any time barging in.

He freezes on the threshold. A figure twitches over the piano, but instead of fur, pale skin covers his entire body, pale like it hasn’t seen sun in 147 years. Dean mostly recognizes Cas based on his horns still curling up from his head and the black claws protruding from tips of his fingers. 

But, as Dean watches, the horns fall off, hitting piano keys on the way down. The talons go next.

The unexpected sounds jolt Meg into action. She tugs a very human-looking Cas off the bench and onto the floor, shouting, “Ruby! Get in here!”

Ruby appears in the doorway, her usual frown melting into confusion.

With a face pinched with worry, Meg kneels over Cas, now inhumanly stil. She reaches out to lay two fingers on his bare skin. “He’ll be fine,” she says, slumping forward in relief. “The transformation just exhausted him.”

Dean pulls her up by the elbow. He resists the urge to shake her for answers, but it’s a close call. “What the hell just happened?” 

But Ruby answers instead. “You broke the curse.” She’s smiling widely, looking more than a little deranged in her glee.

That can’t be right.

“How the hell did that break the curse?” Dean demands as Meg wriggles out of his grasp like an eel and crouches back by Cas’s side. He turns to Ruby. “I thought the curse was all about staying, not fucking leaving.”

“The curse would break when humanity fell back in love with Castiel,” Ruby says, rolling her eyes. “But we couldn’t tell you that, jackass, or that would make it too easy. Lucifer was never one to make anything easy for his enemies.”

“Love?”

“Duh,” Ruby flicks him on the forehead. 

Dean splutters, “But – all that crap about staying! I thought that was the key, not love.”

“It’s much easier to fall in love with someone when they’re actually sticking around,” Ruby explains like he’s five years old. "We couldn't tell you about the love part, so that was the next best thing."

“Hold on, what –”

On the floor, Cas stirs. “Dean?” He tries to push himself into a sitting position, but his arms give out halfway.

Dean falls to his knees next to Cas. “Hey, no, it’s okay,” he says softly. “I’m here.”

Cas stares up at him in wonder. “You came back.”

Dean tugs him closer, burying his face in the crook of Cas’s neck. “You said I could.”

“I did,” Cas murmurs in his ear.

“Don’t you ever lie to me like that again,” Dean says fiercely, pulling back to glare at him.

Cas slowly shakes his head. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“And of course I came back,” Dean says. “I love you.”