#yeah tumblr can suffer from this knowledge too i think.

[hotshotriot]

end of beta server party

[sysmedsaresexist]

🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

This is Mod Quill, but this is on behalf of a mutual friend of mine and Mod Dude's. Someone we care about a lot, and someone I'm not even going to fucking name here, because I am so fucking done with my friend suffering. Besides. You're going to know who it is if you have a lick of syscourse knowledge. I just hope they know what this might bring. If you're reading this, hon -- maybe just... delete your blogs and get out of syscourse. Make something new for yourself. Trust me, I've done that plenty of times.

Anyways.

@sophieinwonderland

Let's have a chat. Okay? I mean this completely, 1000 percent genuinely. I want to talk to you. WE want to talk to you. And we want to understand what the hell is going on with you.

Context: A friend of ours is in the hospital. This friend is in the hospital... likely because of you. Well, somewhat -- I'm not here to convince you that you, personally, are at fault for someone else's actions. You did not personally give them whatever implement of choice they used to nearly off themselves. But you have got to see that what you're doing -- what you've done for a very, very long time, causes people a lot of harm. And you have acknowledged it. Repeatedly.

You know that you do. You know you're hurting people. And you've shown constantly on your blog that you're okay with that.

This isn't the first time someone has been hospitalized after you took grievance with their tumblr blog. This is the second time someone has notably been hospitalized after interactions with you, and far from the last time someone's harmed themselves over you. I should know -- I'm a user who tried so desperately not to self harm, but you are the person who brought me to that point, many moons ago in a fit of hell and despair.

Don't worry, I'm all good -- it was barely anything. But it still stings emotionally, to this day.

The user in question who's currently hospitalized is not, and has not been stable, for a very long time. They're someone I hold dear, but I think we can all admit that people with DID sometimes struggle greatly with making really dumb choices. They've made a lot. This isn't the first time they've been in the hospital.

But Dude made a promise to them when it seemed like things were going to hell this time around, something to try and encourage things to go the right way.

Your named was tossed out too. Because of course it was. Like it or not, Sophie, you are 100% the biggest syscourser on Tumblr. You post the most and have the most followers. You are syscourse. And Dude's promise was to take syscourse down.

... But I don't think anyone in this situation really understands what that means.

Sophie, you are a person. Not a blog. Not a stance. Not a slogan, or a preacher, or whatever conspiracy you're trying to lean into next to explain away the angry actions you've shown more and more lately, to somehow explain why it's okay to say the things you've been saying, even when it sometimes, just maybe, seems like... you just don't want to.

As people may know, a (from my perspective, horrifically written, incredibly inaccurate, and only harmful) callout post for Sophie was recently posted to syscourse. What people don't know is that I, Mod Quill, was approached to help write it. Mod Dude was involved in the callout post as well, though to what extent I don't know.

I flat out refused to work on it. And that's because I knew exactly what would happen. I knew my friend would be hurt, or maybe even hospitalized over this. I knew that syscourse -- that Sophie -- would drive someone over the edge again. I knew that the document -- filled with inaccuracies and vaguities and nothingburgers to the max -- would be easy for Sophie to pick apart, easy to dismantle, and it would all start with debunking so much of the very real pain and suffering my friend has gone through.

And yeah.

I was right. Go figure. Maybe I should've done more, my brain inevitably says, I need to help everyone, I should've fought harder to prevent this... Dumbass brain.

Sigh.

Dude edit/addition: I knew the doc was coming, and while I won't say that I was supportive of it going out (I made the owner sit on it for several weeks), I made no effort to stop it. Having made my own callouts on sophie (and Quill, you have, too), I understood the need, and the positives and negatives. I knew Sophie could handle it. I was approached to read and check it, as my posts had been used in it. I even offered to help add to it, though... I ended up being completely unable to. I still can't actually remember anything in the doc. I'm doubting if I actually read it because it seems I retained nothing from it. This likely stems from the fact that I have been in contact with Sophie for several weeks now, getting to know her. I'm so incredibly conflicted on this topic that I chose to stay out of it publicly from start to finish, without comment or publicity. For the first time since I started my blog, I'm not feuding with anyone, I'm having such amazing conversations with people, I feel like I'm making more of a difference than ever before. Certain people have left me alone as I stayed under the drama radar.

I'm so tired of being angry...

My thoughts on the doc and sophie are complicated. I'm sorry to anyone that was hurt through my uncertainty. Instead of helping with the doc, we talked about life, experiences, medicalization, and I was... so happy. I don't think that I really thought beyond... "I wish I had spoken to some of these people sooner."

It's important to note that I don't blame the doc or author for any of this.

Syscourse, as a whole, does not address any sort of recovery, or help, or even just acknowledgement of the issues we are facing, as human beings, as systems, as people on this earth. It is just slinging words at each other with varying degrees of value. And I'll be the first to admit that I have relished that battleground. I have loved the feeling that I might be able to throw the right words or the right punches and get someone to either change, or deactivate. I've also wrestled with those feelings, tried to explain them away, mirroring what I see on Sophie's blog constantly.

But as more and more time goes on and I grow up and I see the damage that's done to me and my friends, I have grown to absolutely despise this place. I try my best to spread what joy I can. I also know it's really not enough.

Sophie, I have sent you, if I had to hazard a guess, at least 10 anons this past year, all of them variations on themes. Either positivity, begging you to take a break, or explaining to you in excruciating detail how I know you are hurting people, and why that hurts so badly. And... each and every single one of those have been met with dismissal. With that godforsaken shrug emoji that convinced me for years that you just... did not care, at all, about other people.

And this isn't just you. I know I'm coming at you, but that's because you are the biggest source of Syscourse Grief(tm) for this particular friend. But lord knows people get enemies here, that's just par for the course. So, this goes for everyone.

Learn to fucking care about each other, for fucks sakes.

God, this really is a ramble. I thank everyone who's bearing with me.

For syscourse in general: Stop. Just... stop. For those who are considering it, just stop for a bit, and witness. Watch. See what happens. Because the ones who are obstinate -- primarily the overly aggressive anti-endos and pro-endos -- will fling their vitriol at each other. It will just get worse and worse, and you can witness syscourse eat itself alive.

For my friend in the hospital: I've already given you some advice, but genuinely, I really, really hope you take care of yourself. I pray that, when you get back, you maybe set syscourse aside. At most, discord is there, and that seems to at least be tamer. But you are young. You have so much future ahead, and coming from someone who is (unfortunately seen as) an older system, I can promise you that it gets beter.

For Dude: GO TAKE A FUCKING BREAK. You are recently retraumatized, recently through a severe surgery, and you are out here promising shit like "I'll burn syscourse to the ground for you"??? Play a fun game and pay attention to your fucking partners, take a fucking break and take care of yourself. Syscourse will wait for you. People will come and people will go, and it doesn't fucking matter. Your life is what matters and I'm so fucking scared watching you obsess over this one, small aspect of it. I'm so relieved you went to that fun pokemon blog. You aren't alone, you are so loved, and don't let this toxic ass place make you forget that.

And Sophie.

I'm going to give Dude a link to send to you. You don't have to take it if you don't want to. You don't even need to acknowledge this if you don't want to. But I'm swinging the door open and offering the olive branch. I know you don't use Discord much, but for gods sake, it's better than Tumblr DMs, and we both know how Tumblr is a mess.

I really hope you'll take me up on it.

And for everyone else.

Wait till you see what happens next.

Edit from Mod Quill: Well, what's next is evidently a need for clarification and yet another callout post. Hello, callout-post author. Thank you for your clarifications. Notably, I attempted to keep your URL out of this, for those who didn't know.

Anyways, for the fullest disclosure and context: I was approached by Mod Dude, who asked if I wanted to participate in "Sophie Drama, Anonymously." I agreed, though I'll admit I was hesitant due to my particular issues with that user. I was then added to a group chat involving an enormous callout post. Notably, it should be mentioned, callout posts are a major trigger of ours that we are still working on overcoming.

I clicked the document and saw it was a mess of grammar mistakes, poor formatting, and impossible for me to read without trembling. But given that I already have an intense distaste for the user who posted it, I wasn't about to tell them more personal details about myself, and I did not want to communicate with them any further due to my own fear of the instability of all those involved. I told them I disliked the callout post due to harassment that it would cause, that I feel Sophie is a person, and that they had better have contacted the user who was hurt -- who is once again revealed in the callout, unfortunately.

I tried to laugh it off and move on, and take care of my mental health. That's what I was lamenting above; the fact that I didn't say more. I felt bad that I didn't allow myself to damage my mental health further to craft a callout post -- something I have tried desperately to avoid since the one I made the mistake of writing years ago about the very user you wrote this callout post about -- and something I get roped into constantly.

I privately read the rest of the document after it had been posted in full, as I still have access to it and it is a publicly posted document. It was filled with things that I found to be either nothing important in particular (things that have already been discussed numerous times) or things that would just be inflammatory (i.e. the OAS sections). I talked with a friend on Discord about the document, to which we both agreed it was bad.

To the OP of the document: I didn't say any of this at the time because, as I said, I felt uneasy and could not be in that group chat. I explicitly said I would not be touching "it" (the group chat). I was taking care of my mental health.

I refused to work on it because, based on my past experiences and triggers, which I do not owe you and still alluded to anyways in my conversations with you, I knew it would end poorly. I tried my best to sway you in the moment, but I was not able to do so because of my own mental health.

So, yes, to clarify: My grievances with the document were not made known to the one who posted it, whom I never mentioned in the original post. I do not condemn the poster of the document. I was simply making my feelings about callout posts known. What is above is not a condemnation of the callout writer, nor a comment on them at all. I genuinely did not want the point of this post to be lost due to callout-post drama.

So let me reiterate the important part of all of this.

This post was about the state of syscourse and how people do not approach syscourse in a good way. It is constantly slinging hate at people, which is never justified.

Learn to fucking care about each other, for fucks sakes.

---

Mod dude, here...

I want to add something to this, but I don't know what. I mean, Quill said it all, quite well.

Hurt people... Hurt other people.

I've made the attempt, over the last year or so, to actually talk to some of the bigger names in syscourse, the ones usually active in the tags, endos and antis alike.

It reinforced that... we're all just fucking people, trying to get by.

Antis, have you even tried to empathize with the community you attack so quickly and cruelly? Imagine if people said those things to you or about CDD systems. Have you, personally, witnessed the things you claim are happening? Because I've been here a lot longer, and it seems you're making shit up. Consider that you should stop parroting everything you hear and stick to what you're actually seeing with your own eyes.

Endos, please don't forget that these are severely traumatized individuals that have probably never even been to therapy yet. If you're not yet, maybe you should get into therapy-- it doesn't automatically mean there's anything wrong, but everyone could use someone to talk to, and seeing what it's like could be really beneficial to understanding the other side and getting an unbiased view of your own behavior and beliefs.

These are real fucking people that are ending up in the hospital.

Quill, the rest of my mods, and I are real fucking people behind these screens.

Sophie is a real person. They just got a new dish washer that they saw on Circ's blog, I missed it, but she linked it to me, and now I'm looking at it. She's going to let me know how it works.

And you know what? This little countertop dishwasher feels a hell of a lot more real and important than anything in syscourse.

As Quill mentioned, I just went through a major surgery. I'm learning that...

I'll probably never be able to walk properly again. My life is forever changed, and I'm really struggling.

My cat just... passed. Feel free to go like that post, it would mean a lot to me.

None of you know that. The people who leaked my main and smeared my wonderful name don't know that.

Sophie didn't know that the last time we fought each other.

My friend didn't know that when I promised him I would bring syscourse down.

Maybe bringing it down isn't the answer.

Maybe just reminding you all that we're all people behind the screen is enough.

Fucking TALK to each other.

Make an attempt to learn and understand.

Talk about things that actually matter.

Grow the FUCK up.

Reblog to share a hug, because that's more worthwhile.

And most importantly.

Please keep our friend in mind while they're in the hospital.

Syscourse community, endos and antis, this is one of our own. A person you've likely interacted with before, that you've seen around.

We exist in this small bubble, all together. Whether we like it or not.

[ko-existing]

https://www.tumblr.com/ko-existing/766133693448372224/httpswwwtumblrcomko-existing7661320713789440?source=share

Ko, please, how do I stop being so desire driven? I’m not asking this as a lesson, but more like a genuine advice from person to person. I’m 100% this is what keeps me from truly seeing the bigger picture.

I tried many times to just let go and not care about outcomes or read the lessons thinking “yeah, this will make me get the things”, but I can’t. Even if I try to convince myself there’s something deep down saying I clearly still only care about the outcomes. It’s tiring not only because it keeps me walking in circles, but also because I experience episodes of pure joy cause “yes, I can get it, it’s easy” and then ones of pure depression thinking “this is bullshit, you’re understanding it all wrong and won’t get anything, deal with it. You’ll never get anything.” It’s always the extremes, you know? 08 or 80.

I tried to simply step back of everything and just move on with the knowledge I’ve got to see if my mind and thought process unfolds naturally and I stop feeling this incessant seeking for finally KNOWING true self instead of seeing as a belief, but I always end up falling on that depression phase and constant need for reassurance that “yes, you’ll get it”, but as you know, it never leads me to nowhere when I’m constantly reading, and asking, and seeking.

You say “step back and ponder” and say that when we encounter the silence it should be enough, but for me somehow is not and it frustrates me because logically should be enough, I mean, I’m literally being left with the nothingness, what else could I possibly need to understand, right?

I just wanna stop feeling limited, trapped and suffering and most importantly, I want to stop being the cause of all of this suffering. But I placed my desires as the ultimate happiness and this constant feeling of separation never goes away. Why is so simply to read and understand “everything is formless”, but when actually “practicing” and applying seems so absurd? God, I’ve been this way this whole year and I’m so sick of it.

To answer genuinely—you're thinking too much.

If you’re feeling caught in this cycle of extreme highs and lows, it might help to try sitting with your thoughts in a more observing way, which can give you a clearer view of what’s driving the whole process. And no, IT IS NOT A NECESSITY. It's a help to watch without getting lost in thoughts but it is NOT A MUST.

I've been on tumblr long enough to know what to expect from other anons reading this like "i thought meditation is not nevessary". No one is saying throw on an orange robe, head off to the himalayan mountains to sit on a rock in a cave, drink Bo cha, chew on Chülen, start fasting and chant " ཨོཾ་མ་ཎི་པདྨེ་ཧཱུྃ" (om mani padme hum) around the clock like it's your monastic lifestyle job.

So, again, I'm not saying this is a necessity or a “must-do”. Meditating, or simply Noticing, can help you see your thoughts without getting so wrapped up in each one—nothing more. There are different options like listening to a guided one or just background music/sounds like rain. I personally like it. So, If it helps, it helps. If it doesn't, see what does.

I've also been on Tumblr long enough to know how quickly people start labeling everything as a “method” or a requirement, so just to be clear again: I’m not saying any of that!

The main thing here is to relax this intense drive for outcomes. You can actually start looking at these desire-driven thoughts as just “passing content”—and yes, this practice can help. When a thought like “I need this outcome to be happy” pops up, instead of believing it automatically, you could take a step back and notice that it’s just a thought arising out of nowhere and passing into nowhere. Watching thoughts like this reminds you they don’t define you and have no reality to them.

Also, see if you can bring your attention back to what’s here without needing to grasp, judge, or chase. Every time you relax that urge for outcome, you’re giving yourself a chance to rest in something that isn’t tied to outcomes at all. " ".

Experience what’s beyond the cycle of “wanting” and “fearing.” Keep it simple, remember it’s a gentle, easy redirection rather than some heavy practice. Never force anything. If you don't want to do it, don't. And never overconsume.

[ahecen]

thoughts on percabeth characterization in wottg (or lack thereof)?

oh my godddddd. first of all I just have to note how hilarious it is that everyone forgot about this book a week after it came out. anyway. percabeth’s characterization in the new books versus the show versus the original books is so interesting to me. with allegedly being very involved in the writing process of the show, you’d think rick would be even more aware of how he wrote his characters and translate that to new books. now i’m not saying 17 yr old percabeth should act the same as 13 yr old percabeth. you’d think they’d grow, right? wottg percabeth just doesn’t have that spark and I was honestly confused seeing ppl gush over them in this book. every time I thought they were about to have a talk, just a moment to themselves, the scene ended. how do you set up several scenes for your fav couple and just. end it. it’s extra strange bc I loved them dearly in cotg. but in wottg,,, where’s the friendship? they remind me of those couples in school that have been together for years and don’t seem to enjoy each others company. they’re currently together because… uh…. if this was my first introduction to percabeth, having no prior knowledge of their relationship, I would question how much they even liked each other. yeah, they love each other. that’s great and all, but do they like each other? it’s like percy and annabeth became caricatures of themselves. haha percy’s dumb. annabeth has an idiot boyfriend that everyone knows she’s too good for. this is the shit you read on wattpad, not a published book. I think the worst moment of all was when annabeth seemed to realize for the first time in her life that percy was intelligent. girl you’ve known that since you were twelve fucking years old. I also think percabeth suffers in this book bc annabeth didn’t have much of anything going on. she was kinda there. percy had an emotional moment, grover had several emotional moments, but there was always prepared annabeth, ready to save the day from her helpless boyfriend and friend. rick isn’t known to write female characters well, but annabeth has mostly been the exception to that. what happened? if cotg was bad, this would be a different story. and I know pjo tumblr likes to tussle about the quality of anything written after tlo, but I genuinely really liked cotg. there was a lot of heart. the shift from a good story to the nothingness of wottg was really disappointing. I wasn’t expecting much, but, like, can rick at least pretend to try? there’s a lot more to say but we’d be here all night.

tldr; it was only a matter of time before percabeth was negatively affected by ricks greed

[pinesfamilyguidetotheweird]

A Corduroy Tragedy

So...I was reading a tumblr post focused on Wendy (and the Wendip ship, which...I still don't care for, honestly. I mostly read it for the Wendy lore) and I came across something interesting.

And its from the Lost Legends comic. Like Journal 3, it too has hidden messages and I wanted to get mine so I can verify what was said in the post.

I don't have it immediately available at the moment (I left it in my mom's room and she's asleep, so I don't want to disturb her), but according to the post, the message had something to do with Wendy's mother.

And it's that she isn't die at some point, like many of us probably assumed (under the assumption that not everyone is privy to this).

The message hinted that she's trapped in another dimension. Sort of like Ford, but not really. Like, I don't think she's dimension hopping. She's trapped in one place. Perhaps this could give the idea that there are random portals/rifts than can appear and disappear.

And Wendy's mother accidentally encountered one and vanished without a trace. As for when...hard to say. Obviously, it was some time after the birth of Wendy's youngest brother, Gus.

We also don't know the ages of the Corduroy bros (except for being less than 15, since Wendy's the oldest child) and Marcus having facial hair surprisingly wouldn't help in this case because it could be a Corduroy thing, sort like how Wendy's height is a Corduroy trait.

Still, I'll take the facial hair for consideration just to make things easy. Of course, facial hair starts appearing during puberty, usually at the age of 13~16 (though some sources say 11~15 for facial hair growing at the corners).

So, I'd make the guessimate that Marcus (the oldest brother) is probably either 14 or 13 years old. The middle brother, Kevin, I'd say could be 3 years younger (11 or 10), and the youngest brother, Gus, is maybe 8.

I personally headcanon that Wendy lost her mother at around the same age as Dipper and Mabel. That headcanon remains true even with this new knowledge. Maybe Mrs. Corduroy went looking for something or went for a walk in the woods and fell through a random rift.

She gets reported missing and despite an extensive search, she was never found. It made no sense to the locals. Mrs. Corduroy knew the woods like the back of her hand, she couldn't've gotten lost. I can kinda see this as a reference to 411 cases.

And, perhaps, an incredible role model to Wendy.

Because...with a family like the Corduroys, I highly doubt that Mama Corduroy was a pansy. No, she was a down-to-earth and strong-willed woman with a sharp wit. She was an inspiration.

And now, she is gone. Vanished without a trace. It left the family devastated and Wendy in a bad headspace. There is a scene with Manly Dan's vehicle where there is a yellow ribbon sticker attached to the back...yeah.

To this day, Wendy still holds out hope that her mom will come back. And when she does, ask why. Even so, she knows that she's gonna have to move on.

This is...somehow more tragic than just having Mrs. Corduroy die in an accident. Because, at least with that, there is confirmation. There is a body. There isn't uncertainty. But, the idea that Mrs. Corduroy just...vanished?

It has a special type of hold...one that will linger for a long time.

Whelp, more angst fodder! Have at it!

...It's 11 pm and I should be asleep, but instead, I wrote this!

Yaaaay...

I am suffering a bit and I am taking y'all down with me.

[snorkling-in-sodasea]

New Thoughts on Blitzo

Warning, people who love Stolas should stay away. And okay, so I've been through tumblr, I heard about the new episodes, and I even saw the trailer for the rest of season 2. I gotta say, I have a new perspective on Blitzo. At the very least, I'm feeling sorry for him

Not that the situation with Stolas was never anything to brush off. To be exact, from the very beginning, I was more infuriated at Blitzo's behavior. The shit he did to Moxxie and to an extent Millie, the shit he did to Verosika, to Fizzarolli, to Barbie. Really, to me, the crap that Blitzo did was far more noticeable to be than the crap Stolas was doing. Like a favorite child and an unfavorite to an abusive parent. Yeah, you'd think it's super obvious who has it good just by looking at it, but you end up missing how the favorite child suffers, too, from their position. In this case, I paid more attention to the the unfavorite child's acting out that I didn't notice how problematic the favorite really was.

Hearing what I heard, though... and seeing the trailer. Well, Blitzo's situation with Stolas has gotten worse and worse over time. Now it's reached a point where not only can I not look at it and think nothing of it anymore, but I actually feel bad for Blitzo. Really, being guilt tripped and attacked over and over to get with the one who made you feel like it really is just about sex, someone who would get mad at you for not loving them like they wanted when you fail their test... that's something I wouldn't want to wish on my worst enemy. No matter how much I hate Blitzo, I wouldn't wish this on him.

Even without that, there's so much ACTUAL shit that Blitzo has done that warrants the relentless attack that the trailer showed snippets of. Stalking, harassment, video taping and watching people have sex without even their knowledge, let alone their consent, breaking and entering, maxing out credit cards and leaving debt for others to take care of, leaving someone to highly likely die regardless of the reasons for doing so, tracking someone down for a week straight regardless of whether or not they want to see you and make THEM the bitch for the voluntary week-long search, and constant insulting and belittling and sheer disrespect in general... yet the thing that Blitzo is gonna ever be held accountable for is not being in love with Stolas. What the fuck? It's like the show's writers are saying that not being in love with someone is the only real crime down there in Hell

And yeah, for the two paragraphs above, I said 'test'. Because ultimately, at seeing that sneak peek of that 'duet', that's what it feels like Stolas's end. That he just wants to see that he doesn't really need the grimoire to have Blitzo. What's more, Stolas clearly has his expectations. He says things like 'can' and 'could' when dreaming about that little fairytale ending with Blitzo that he wants but from the way he carries himself, it's like he's taking it for granted that he will get that fairytale ending. I guess his test will just be something like a formality instead of a test, now that I think about it

I legitimately will never understand people who sees this show as a masterpiece that's perfection representation and all that jazz. If they can enjoy it, fine, but when I hear praise like that, it feels like to me like you're drinking water and you claim it's actually liquidized macaroni and cheese. With no flavor packets with a mac-and-cheese flavor at all

[captainsparklefingers]

So, how many people has Ludinus convinced to, if not straight up drink the Kool-aid, then to be open to trying it? Now granted, I'm not quite done with the episode yet (I think I have like a third left), but I've got some thoughts. They're not very well organized or written out, but I've got them nonetheless. And they're probably not like. Super accurate or anything, this was all just sort of an emotional reaction I had while listening/watching and my attempts to figure it out. Apologies for what is basically me word vomiting on Tumblr trying to figure out my feelings.

It seems to me that this whole 'what have the gods done for us/let's get rid of them' thing sort of feels like a political science or philosophy discussion gone wildly off the rails. People discussing not being happy with the system, what do the gods really do and why do we need them, if the people who serve them abuse their power in these ways is it better to bring down those institutions or start at the source and work out from there...that all feels like stuff people discuss all the time. We debate topics, we argue for or against different moral and political and religious philosophies...debates get messy, historical events happen, the cycle of history continues...you get the idea. Maybe it's not the gods we're debating about but systems of government and power structures or economic structures.

But in a world where the gods are real and known to be real, where they're deliberately behind a gate so as to NOT have huge amounts of influence and power, where average people don't seem to totally understand the Divine Gate and its purpose and where the average person isn't having the sort of interactions with divinity that adventuring groups and religious leaders are, it feels like it isn't a huge step to take people from just talking about this to acting on it. And I know people have acted on things historically in our world too. Maybe that's why I'm listening to this conversation in this maybe hag definitely cult leaders hut and not totally disagreeing with points being raised. It's one thing, I guess, when the argument is being made by Imogen in regards to constantly hearing voices in her head. It's another when the village elder of a town currently suffering abuse under a strict religious system is making it.

I don't believe for one second that Ludinus gives a shit about taking down the gods in the name of freedom. I don't think for a moment that if Predathos is released and does what the name god eater implies that they'll be satisfied when the gods are gone. Ludinus is an ancient, powerful man with a big ole chip on his shoulder who's been nursing a grudge for centuries (who fucking ate fairies to live that long what the fuck ). He's also used to being in a position of power and influence through his role in the Cerberus Assembly and the government of the Empire. Based on the notes Team Wildemount found, we know he started all this by asking questions and fucking around until Molaesmyr found out, and that he either doesn't understand/know or care about possible side effects or consequences of his actions, or possibly both. He just, as far as I can tell, wants a power vacuum. When he says 'we take down the gods and we become the gods', I absolutely believe that the 'we' is 'him'. He becomes a god like figure. The cycle continues. And he's taking advantage of people, their very valid problems with organized religion and the power of the institutions, the problem of corruption and bad apples, the general lack of public knowledge of what the Gate actually does, and he's using it to convince people this is the right way. And it feels so much like things we've seen happen historically that it just...I dunno. I said this was basically emotional word vomit with no point, didn't I? But yeah, it made me feel weird and uncomfortable because I could see how people fell under his sway, how the arguments he makes can have merit to people.

And THAT is why...

Well that and he turned my favorite character into a fuckin orb battery.

[stellamancer]

twenty questions for fic writers—

thanks to @kedsandtubesocks for the tag hehe and I'm sorry to everyone who has to suffer through my yapping. open tagging on this! take it if you want it!!!

1) how many works do you have on AO3?

Ninety. I actually don't think I've posted a lot of my jjk things on there, nor does it have basically anything that I had on Lunaescence...

2) what's your total AO3 word count?

262,115

3) what fandoms do you write for?

mostly jjk these days. in the past few years I've also written bnha and ffxiv.

4) top five fics by kudos

face in my hands. they're all from my mystic messenger era.... I'm too embarrassed to mention them LMAO. i'd like to think my writing has improved since then.

5) do you respond to comments?

yes!! i do my very best to respond to comments i get on AO3, and then also to comment-esque tags I get on tumblr. personally, as a reader, I get really excited when a writer responds to me so I try to do the same for my readers... If that makes sense? I think it's fun!!

6) what is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

my gut reaction is to say don't, if you value your life— but like that fic as a whole is an angst fest and so I feel like while the ending was really angsty, it was in line with everything as a whole. but otherwise idk...

7) what's the fic that you wrote with the happiest ending?

mmmm. I think that the nature of my one-shots means they tend to end on a happier note but it's all pretty equal, both across the fics and the fics generally don't have enough emotional fluctuation for me to think 'oh this was a really happy ending.'

8) do you get hate on fics?

i'm lucky enough to never have received hate fo my work directly. i'm sure someone some where has shit on my stuff in private lmao....

9) do you write smut?

not really. I can, I just don't really.

10) craziest crossover?

there is such thing as magic, which was a base kingdom hearts × full metal alchemist crossover. there were other series in it which included fruits basket. LMAOO.

11) have you ever had a fic stolen?

not to my knowledge LMAO, at least not outright. plagiarized on the other hand...

12) have you ever had a fic translated?

I think someone asked to translate one of my mystic messenger fics once.

13) have you ever co-written a fic before?

yes! me and kelsey ( @cannibalisticskittles )cowrote a modern royalty saeran x reader fic years ago. and sel ( @seiwas ) I are working on a bunch of fics together, albeit very, very slowly.

14) all time favorite ship?

uh. I don't really have one.

15) what's a wip you want to finish but you doubt you ever will?

LMAO. every day I seem less and less likely to finish & here i am alive.

16) what are your writing strengths?

dialogue. I've been told I write tension well too.

17) what are your writing weaknesses?

a lack of focus (like sitting down and actually writing) as well as descriptive writing.

18) thoughts on dialogue in another language?

I think that... it can be immersion breaking, especially if the reader doesn't read or understand said language, to the point of being distracting. Like you're switching the attention of your reader from the story to trying to figure out what the character just said. I mean, you can clue your audience in via narration, so at least they understand...

I think it's best for the audience to keep the fic in one language (not including loan words). mao's ( @yinyuedijun ) recent aventurine fic, translation, did a really good job, I think of conveying dialogue in another language. I think she used italics there... But yeah, not sure if I'm a fan of just inserting dialogue in another language into a fic...

19) first fandom you wrote in?

yu yu hakusho

20) favorite fic you've written?

don't, if you value your life

[aobawilliams]

20 questions for writers

I was tagged by @marcellebelle! Thanks for that!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

15!

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

69,471 (eheh, nice)

3. What fandoms do you write for?

So on AO3 I got My Hero Academia, Detective Conan/Magic Kaito and Before the Coffee gets cold. Outside of AO3 I got some Naruto, FMA, One Piece, Bungo Stray Dogs, wips too (and there was that time I was writing crack fic about Mob Psycho here on tumblr with Panda, that was fun). There's probably some other I've forgotten too- oh yeah there was some Hetalia at some point.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Noisy as the dead (495)

Who The F- Is This (432)

Nothing Wants To Suffer (375)

Who am I beating up? (131)

What it takes to survive (72)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I tend to but lately, I haven't really kept up with it. I am sorry. I should get to it at some point soon, but be aware every comment is read and enjoyed.

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Morituro, probably? Considering both All Might and Izuku died so, yeah.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

I like to think it's Before The Coffee Gets Cold - The Sisters, since this fic is about closure after death.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Oh! I got once a hate comment on who the f- is this, to which i answered with an essay or two. I probably shouldn't have but also it was really fun at the time. Otherwise I don't believe I do.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I can barely write romance, smut is way out of my reach. I also don't really have any interest in writing any, to be honest.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

Crossovers are probably right after Time Travel in term of things I love. Not one I've written but special mention to that one time I dream about Zabuza from naruto/Reigen from mob psycho as a ship.

Don't know if it's the craziest but I had a The Rising of the Shield Hero/Naruto one started once, there was also that Detective Conan/My Hero Academia one started with Panda that the idea was so good. We should get back to it, one day.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

*squint* I don't think so (unless it was done without my knowledge) but strong maybe back in my ff.net era. Though I did translate some fics myself before (it wasn't done very well, but I did try back then, and it did help me a lot learning english. Problem was I'm not good at grammar stuff.)

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Once again, there was that cracky Mob Psycho one here somewhere. Also, some projects with Panda that are really good except words hard for both of us.

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

...yeah no idea right now, come ask me another time. (It tends to change on the day, but also right now I'm on a no-romance streak so, better luck next time)

15. What's a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

*crying* all of them.

Okay so, first of all, a wip is never dead unless I decide to bury it. Which doesn't happens. I still have hope one day I'll get back to them.

Right now I really want to work on Dad For All and the DCMK NOC AU except, word hard and planning harder. But I'll get there, one day, even if it's in 10 years.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I honestly got no idea? I probably got some I'm just not sure what it could be.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

word hard. Also no idea how grammar works beyond "whatever feels right to me".

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

Eeh, I probably wouldn't do it because it's bothersome having to look up a translation while you're reading a fic, unless it's something that fits with the context or just a few words here and there. Also switching languages in the middle of thinking is so hard to do, why would you do this to me.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Naruto, back in uuuhhhhhh probably middle school. It was a long time ago. Nothing is left of what I could have written then. (Also close to that time period was D.Gray-man).

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

Huge huge huge fondness for Before The Coffee Gets Cold - The Sisters, probably because Im very fond of that universe and also when grief is explored and closure is sought. I also really like the flowers have water.

Who the f- is this and Noisy as the dead are my funny projects though, I have lot of fun working on them.

Tagging! @achairwithapandaonit @grolahvol @figurativepieceoftrash @bloustorm @fanfiction-artist-prototype @guesst and uuh really tbh anyone who sees this and feel like doing it! I just picked a few people off the top of my head but I know there's a lot more of you seeing this.

[strandhai]

About Blitzø

So I have rewatched Helluva Boss again (and again and again) and there is something I can't get out of my mind. So tumblr has to suffer now or otherwise this won't let me sleep.

Its about S1 Ep 02 Loo Loo Land (and later than in S1 Ep 07)

First of all: this

Blitzø making finger puplets of Milli and Moxxi and then getting started on the "threeway". That one got my off guard because I just saw it in my fifth rewatch.

I think yeah he may be attracted to both of them but I think its more because of the kind of relationship Moxxi and Milli have. Blitzø wants something like they have for himself. He wants to be part in that kind of relationship. Didn't matter if its his own or (in this case) Milli's and Moxxi's. He is fucked up, how fucked up he is we truly see in episode 7 but also before

We have seen before that he is breaking into M&M's apartment and also into their bedroom

"Hey now I have watched thise two pork many times and honestly they make missonary look relativly exciting..." (Blitzø, Ep07)

Later in Ep02, when Stolas is taking Via to the circus we have a short flashback of her when she eas young, with a Clown Blitzø in the background. (Eithe rhe really was there when Via visited or they just merged the flashbacks)

We get a first glimpse at Clown Blitzø. He is still stuck in the circus, there a now white blotches on his body at this time point. He just hates that clown.

And it escaltes quick after Robo Fizzarolli spotted Blitzø. So even if he hates that Robo clown, Blitzø probably wouldn't have done a thing if Robo Fizz hadn't decided to play dirty.

"Oh my is that Blitzø my sensor spotted up there... I guess the kiddis are still running away from you"

"The 'ø' is silent now"

"Ah... just like your audiance always was, when you told your lazy jokes here"

"Bitch I am making more money killing people than you do beeing a cheap-ass robo-rip-off of an overrated sell-out jester"

"Oh.. someone's salty, real or not though people love me... does anyone love you, Blitzø ?"

"No, but I am really good with guns now.."

At this point, at first watch it dosn't make sense. However with the knowledge of the Episode 01 Season 2 "Circus" we get much more background information. So rewatching this now makes much more sense.

We know that Blitzø and Fizzarolli have been best friends in childhood and their teens (I am almost suspecting there was somekind of relationship, I mean look at them..) an dhe has the pictures still on his phone!

So what ever happened it wasn't that Fizzarolley had been the better clown (or not only because of that) but I have a feeling that he left Blitzø behind for what was fame and money (at least from Blitzø's POV). I guess it has something to do with Fizzarollis Robo limbs. So what ever happened to him, happened in his late teens/tweenties and got him to leave Blitzø behind.

Then there is the picture of Blitzø with his Mum and Sister (which is the one that finally makes him cry) his sister left him (if we believe Verosika she is in Rehab) and his Mother left (death or not, she left him one way or another) so all people he ever loved left him behind.

Because he never was good enough for them to stick around. Not worthy of love. He hates himself and I belive he often thinks "no one cares if I am here or not" we see it at the picture-wall in his flat (his own face is crossed out in everyone of it) and we get a glimpse of it while he has his bad drug trip (S1E06).

"Yet you still shove away anyone who gets too close until they resent you for beeing a selfish shit..." (Verosika)

"Are you afraid to love people, Blitzy?" (Stolas)

"I belive your selfconscious is trying to tell you, that you simply can not fathom proper intimacy but also craving as well, it's rather unfortunate, sir, considering its often how you treat those who stand by you such as myself. Are you worried I may have enough of it as well?" (Moxxi)

He is afraid, because everyone he ever had loved had left him behind (for better or worse). And well we don't need to speak about the whole Symolic shit of that trip. Als his greates fear are there (Striker, Verosika, Robbo Fizz,) and then Moxxi and Stolas, the latter one on his throne above Blitzø, the colden chains. The point that he isn't fighting against the chain but just let it happen.

And Stolas whole behavior is playing into it, giving him the impression that the Prince only wants his body, even if we now knew that isn't the case. But also after the what happened in S1E03 Spring break with Verosika I think he covers much behind bodily affections. It's the way he goes with Stolas after the Prince gave away a interesst in it.

I think thats the point. He gives his body becaus sex is probably the only language he can speak, because never was any one interested into more than that. The only thing he is good enough for.

We also knwo about his abusive father (thanks to S2Ep01) who never gave a flying shit about his son. This is just adding up to the pile of shit.

Also: the white blotches. It makes me sick because I just eanna now so badly how the fuck he got them. I think we all agree that they are scars. So what the hell happened and have it soomwthing to do with Fizzarollis missing limbs and his aversion for overeager fans?

Is that the reason Blitzø first decided to become a bodyguard before he founded his hitman buisiness?

And if they had been best friends, why the hate between them? What Fizzarolli did in Ep07 had been more than cruel. So they definetly parted on really bad terms.

Oh god, so many questions and not enough answers....

[sennaverstappendiary]

azerbaijan grand prix ✩ 30.04.2023

listen. i'm going to be real. the reason this is so high up is because it was my first taste of lestappen cr4ck c0caine i'm being so fucking serious. 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫 this shit fucking killed me. i was unable to talk about anything else. i felt like i had been punched in the fucking gut i'm so fucking serious. 🤧🤧🤧 if you scroll back down far enough you can find my absolute breakdown over this grand prix. i was going BONKERS. getting drunk after quali with my bestie over this shit kinda BONKERS. dancing in the street kinda BONKERS. who needs drugs when you have autism. ☺️☺️☺️

okay lets go back a bit. it had been almost a month since australia, and i had learned A LOT about f1 in the meantime. some very very important things happened, but the most important one is that i made friends! genuine friends! on f1blr! 🥰🥰🥰🤧🤧🌷🌷🌷

i did this by making some rules with myself: if i was going to engage in my hyperfix on tumblr, i should at the very least post my thoughts about it and try to message people. because in all my other fandoms i was just... alone. 😔

to start with, idk how i did it, but i managed to overcome my fear of messaging people first (i was shaking like a leaf while doing it, though), and i somehow managed to message @/verstrapons... which looking back is fucking crazy because i was SCARED and INTIMIDATED and would like... freak out making sure i said the "right stuff" 😭😭😭 looking back this is utterly ridiculous but... i hadn't had online friends in a WHILE okay i was suffering 🥹🥹🥹 it obviously turned out amazingly but!!! i'm so glad we clicked 💕💕 i love you emma... 💓💓💥💥

then i joined the max discord server… i love you guys so much too - i learn stuff every day from y’all and you all made me feel so welcome 🥺🥺🌷🌷 a million flowers to u all… i hope we can meet up at the berlin E prix 🥹🥹🥹

and my lovely bestie @/boxenstopp … my kimi /p… i’m so glad you send me an ask that day on my main blog 🥰🥰🥰 i can’t imagine my life without you and i’m so glad we’re friends… 🥺🥺🥺 you always make me feel so accepted aaaghh… can’t wait to meet up for christmas again 🌷🌷🌷🌷 or maybe we already met. idk when this is coming out 🥹🥹

last but not least… @/xiaoluclair … thank you so much for always messaging with me, especially when we were both more active on tumblr 💌💌💕💕

sappy shit aside.

the other thing that happened during this time? i started realising which drivers i like, which i don’t like as much, and which ships i like and dislike. my top 3 ships have not changed since (lestappen prosenna simi) 😳😳😳 and my tumblr got banned while making a brocedes edit (PLEASE) but it got restored thank the lord LMFAO 🥹🥹🥹 i think i even started my lestappen fic (the first one) during this time‼️‼️ ain’t that something!! don’t mention the fact that sebchal was my first ever f1 fic i will cry 🧍‍♂️/nsrs.

and of course i got to know a lot more about f1! including but not limited to: what the teams actually were, reading the first half of the prosenna book, binging youtube video’s, not quite getting a lot of the references (bono my tyres are dead), what some things on the car do… etc etc. just a lot of general knowledge, although i felt like i didn’t know anything still (well i still feel that way) 😭😭😭

shit we havent even gotten to the race yet. i love yapping 🗣️🗣️🗣️

OH!!!! this was the first time i watched a race while chatting with other people, specifically the ones mentioned above💙💙‼️‼️ thanks for hearing me ramble on about being scared for max always (thats my brand. and he slays every time 🔥🔥🔥)

so, starting with free practice. i still didn’t watch, but i do remember being at my grandparents and quinine texting me that lestappen were 1-2 in fp1? very funny. on the way home i listened to puppy princess and i was like “this is very lestappen core”. lmfao. yeah that changed me as a person for real 😭😭

quali. what. the. fuck. WHAT THE FUCK 🗣️🗣️🗣️‼️‼️‼️‼️ i think i almost passed out. keep in mind, there was a FOUR WEEK gap between australia and baku. i went fucking crazy. when 0.000 happened i blacked out for a moment (/nsrs) and i screamed i was SHAKING i was TREMBLING 😵‍💫😵‍💫 I FELT SICK 🙏🙏 i was happy stimming the entire way to the store (i had to eat afterwards). like that was so sick. i genuinely yelped like a damn puppy (ha) when 0.000 happened. wasnt even upset when charles got pole in the end i was so high on it. and then max kept praising charles OH i felt sick. i felt deranged 💥💥💥💥💥💥

this also happens to be the first sprint race of the season. wish it was the last fuck sprints. sprint quali i just remember me sitting in my brothers room completely disinterested as i always am in fucking spring qualis. lmfao. the real sprint was funny, only bc of the INFAMOUS gax moment 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥 hole in the rb19 😨😨😨😨 max angry 🥰🥰🥰 george. 🙄🙄🙄 LIKE THAT SHIT SLAPPED i was mad asf at george at the time tho LMAO 🥹🥹🥹

OHHHH the race itself was ass btw. was genuinely kinda upset after NOTHING GOOD HAPPENED AND THEY FUCKED UP MAXS STRAT 💔💔💔💔💔 post race was great tho. more than great. it was fucking amazing ‼️‼️‼️💓💓💓 we got: max straight up lying to charles (“you were catching!!” <- charles was 20 seconds behind max 🫣); charles sitting on the wrong chair (typical); CHARLES AND MAX SWAPPING PODIUM POSITIONS AND CHARLES BEING DUTCH FOR A SECOND 💥💥💥💥💥💥💥💥💥💥💥🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️ LIKE WHAT. HUH. SORRY?!?!?? sure. whatever 🤯🤯🤯🤯. and then charles RUNNING over to spray max 🥰🥰🥰 yeah that was good. that was real good 🌷🌷🌷🌷

i really did love this entire race weekend so much - this was my austria 22 i cant even lie. thats also why its ranked so highly, which, looking back, so fucking crazy‼️‼️‼️ we got so spoiled with lestappen content from qatar onwards that looking back this isnt even that much but believe me. to maple this was crack cocaine of the highest level 😁😁😁😁💞💓💕💓💓💘💘💖💞💞💓💗💝

✩ song of the race: puppy princess - hot freaks

erm hem.

[cloudninetonine]

*insert generic and totally not awkward greeting here* Hey there, how have you been doing? Hopefully you’ve been doing well cause I haven’t and I’d like for someone to have a good day around here as a result.

Something something, warning for long ask, and briefly tossing my hat onto the Corrupted/Error Player here, the first time Player gets turned and when they’re killed (or maybe kill themselves if they snap out of it so they won’t hurt the Chain, the angst possibilities are endless), they scream like this (Possible Spoilers for Portal 2 if you haven’t seen it, even if it’s just an audio file)

https://youtu.be/aLB6irPFTRY

I feel like it would be fitting, plus they probably twitch a lot and move either mechanically from time to time or too smooth, like that uncanny valley of movement of something that seemingly moves normally, but there is something fundamentally off about it, or like those times when it looks like your game freezes due to FPS drops, you know like when your character movement is slowed down or sped up so it’s delayed? Something like that.

Also I just realized I haven’t explained how the Azura deal would probably look like in a Songstress Au if Player suffered the consequences for singing magical songs, so I thought I’d just show you here if you don’t mind spoilers, I feel like it would be like this:

https://youtu.be/NwNBPOBcptI

(Skip to 07:46 and stop at 08:27 to avoid spoilers from the other routes and game on the second link)

https://youtu.be/oIfYKm_vSfQ

Make the energy be like Malice or just corruption in general and you got a lovely recipe for angst, and the Chain doing their hardest to keep Songstress Player from singing too much.

I was honestly not expecting to have Lora shipped with Player after like three asks but honestly I’m chill with this outcome, I just hope Hyrule and Wild won’t murder my boy too much XD (I say, as I drop more content that will probably make him get murdered by them, but in all seriousness I’m glad you like the content, and yeah it’s cool if you want to use my stuff for Seraph or the Gerudo, just credit me for it yeah? One of these days I’ll probably reveal my Tumblr here so you can credit me there too or I can share with ya later if you want, I have way too many thoughts and theories about Seraph/Fia and am always ready to screech them to the world as well as general Zelda knowledge XD, but for now just credit the thoughts that are mine under Very Awkward Anon or VA)

Something something, Player and Lora reenacting this, either of these versions work:

https://youtu.be/0nkOCXtJtCA

https://youtu.be/ZUCxkflNJiM

On one hand, Dominant Player (Aka to the Chain ‘Hope this Doesn’t Awaken Anything in Me’/ “Oh.” Moment on both opposites of the spectrum, because that is when they realize that Player can sweep them off their feet in pure protag fashion), on the other hand “By Hylia I wish that were me”/”Lora you sly dog-“ Lora, who is literally just acting in character and probably doesn’t think too hard about it in the moment: “I haven’t done anything though? It’s for the role and they’re chill with it???” only to have the Realization later and just, screams into his hat after a while, or, plot twist, it’s not Lora but actually Octavo after one too many times seeing the Chain simp for Player and needled into it by both Cadence and Operetta (How I call Lora’s Zelda) and decided to take one for the team and also because he fits better as an antagonist protag than Lora and I headcanon both him and Lora have perfect pitch (aka the ability to recognize the pitch of a note or produce any given note) while Cadence and Operetta have perfect tempo (the ability to either instantly tap any tempo at will with perfect precision, or hear a tempo and instantly know the specific beats per minute, so basically they have perfect rhythm), So he can probably hit the JD notes with ease, on one hand, Lora is probably like “Look! Those are my besties! They’re killing it! Slay you both! You rock those roles!”, super supportive like the excited band/theater kid he is specially if Player also has perfect pitch or tempo or both (meanwhile the Chain is just like “Another challenger has entered the ring”, Four and the Colors + Shadow are specially invested in aiding Wild and Hyrule with the those graves now due to Vaati flashbacks/the theory that maybe Octavo is descended from Vaati, it’s even funnier if Player played Minish Cap and Four Swords but really liked Vaati’s design is spite of what he did, so Four has even more reason to be invested due to old beef and I personally headcanoning he can be spiteful when he wants), on the other he probably just turns to Hyrule and Wild and is just “... You know what, I get it, have room for one more in the planning? Cadence can help hide the body if we bribe her with treasures”, I feel like either option could work.

Or, alternatively, they manage to gather enough people between Player, Lora, Operetta, Candance and Octavo and reenact the entirety of the Twisted Musical, because it’s a musical that slaps and is hilarious in equal measure and I feel like it would match the combined gremlin/unhinged vibes of everyone involved perfectly (I’mma send the link here, it’s fully available on YouTube for free though I can understand it’s not everyone’s thing, your choice wether to give it a listen or not, I recommend leaving two full hours free and to be ready for a lot of laughs for maximum effect during those):

https://youtu.be/-77cUxba-aA

Cue Salty Chain chugging vinegar in the back if either Lora or Octavo gets to perform “A Thousand and One Nights” (39:28 to 45:15, bonus damage if Operetta changed the lyrics a bit so it changes Vizier to Hero or knight to cause chaos) or “Take off Your Clothes” with Player (1:27:55 to 1:31:20, also, consider, PLAYER being the main singer and not Lora, Operetta cheekily changing the lyrics also can apply here, poor boy is either flustered after the fact or right there on the floor with Wind, while the rest of the Chain can’t decide wether to choke or go green with envy to match most of their tunics), also I can see Lora, Octavo and Player performing “No One Remembers Achmed” (1:14:06 to 1:18:06) and the Chain being split between chocking/spitting out whatever they’re drinking, chugging vinegar and literally on the floor laughing, this musical is also probably the hardest try not to laugh challenge Wind has ever received in his life I don’t make the rules. If he lived in the modern world he’d definitely have a soft spot for Starkid Musicals.

I also absolutely love the dynamic between Player and Candace and you’re absolutely right, Lora is the shy theater and band kid that will not hesitate to sweep the floor with you in several if you test him or his people, Octavo is the sassy/unhinged theater kid with absolutely no chill and who slays the villain roles everyone inevitably simps for at least once and the guy who can and will break out into song at enough prompting, Candance is definitely the one beating people to death with her shovel and absolutely down to helping someone hide the body if needed be, while Operetta looks chill but will actually shank someone with a dagger on command as a warning if needed be and no one will believe she did it, Player and Lora are arguably the chill ones I don’t make the rules, plus they’re arguably one of the embodiments of besties to lovers if we go the shipping route or Lora is very supportive of whatever relationship they have, but is also ready to call in the rest of the squad if someone hurts Player (Legend beware, you have one Necrodancer, one other possible Descendant, a Grave Robber and a princess with a knife to deal with). Also the only Hyrule where Player can fight is Lora’s Hyrule due to rhythm games and the Chain gets to witness Player being badass for a change, probably the ones with the easiest time there will be Warriors and Sky, maybe Time too, I feel like between knight training and the Kokiri they’d probably have the best time there in the sense of moving to the beat and dancing to fight, Twilight, Legend and Wind are hit or miss but Hyrule and Wild are just horrible given their respective backstories, Hyrule probably never prioritized dancing much and hasn’t had enough people experience to get that experience and Wild is literally amnesiac and probably in the same boat, knight training he can’t even remember can only do so much as well as audio cues you get in the wildness of his Hyrule (like Guardians beeping being indicative of how close you are to one or how close they are to firing, or the way the Yigah talk because I headcanon they have a bit of a Sheikah accent beneath it all) so they’d probably have the hardest time fighting there and rely a lot on luck.

Also more thoughts, headcanons and possible theories on Seraph/Fia because why not? Though there will probably be less today and I’ll send more on another ask, kind of sleep deprived, haven’t gotten proper sleep in like two weeks so my brain is a bit tired, I’ll write what I can today and send more on a part three XD

• I headcanon that the slaughter of the Zonai was likely the breaking point for the Sheikah to split, can you imagine being a Sheikah and hear about all that going down? The Zonai were your allies, magic users and creators like you, they helped you implement and create a lot of technology, they understand better than anyone except maybe the Gerudo how it is to be ostricized by the crown for what you are well even though they need you around or can’t afford to get rid of you. The hero is one of them and helped aid the sealing of the Calamity and defeat of Ganon, they are the only ones who likely understand what it’s like as well as you do, and then suddenly you hear their hero is gone, either dead from sealing the great evil or died right after or maybe even executed after his duty was done and his people were saved, the remnants are scattered and the few who are identified hunted down and killed, and you get the decree that any and all technology from your people, your heritage and that they made with you should be disassembled, banished or destroyed. How do you react to that? You’d probably be furious too, my headcanon is that it was his death or news of his death that made the Sheikah, after many years of loyal service to the crown no matter the hardship or how harshly they were mistreated or slaughtered, finally snap, a group remained loyal because they felt it would be the best way to honor Seraph’s actions and sacrifice because the life of a hero is not an easy one and they won't betray Hylia after all that, while the other revolted and eventually got banished, forming the Yigah clan, maybe the original Yigah’s purpose was never to just be followers of Ganon, maybe their original purpose was to break the reincarnation cycle no matter the cost and if aiding Ganon, either the current or next one was going to do it then Hylia damnit they’d do it, they owed the Zonai and Seraph enough for that, and then the original mission would have been lost among the time gap of 10.000 years into what it is now.

This is probably just crazy headcanon or theorizing, but I feel like if Seraph connected the dots or he figured out what’s going on that he’d feel awful for that alone, because both Flora and Wild suffered as a consequence of his death because of the Yigah hunting them and I feel like he’d probably feel responsible for it even if in the more indirect way possible. Kind of would add up to the guilt of not being able to aid his shield brother.

• Because of this one unused/cut art of Wild with someone who’s most likely his Aryll/Linkle and someone who might be his dad or grandfather, I personally headcanon that Seraph also had a sister because I like making history repeat itself and healthy doses of angst, and I also headcanon that she was the Zonai Queen/Chieftain by right of conquest because since the Zonai are a warrior tribe it would make sense that they value skill more than bloodline or anything else when chosing a leader, why? Because I can headcanon that, and the idea of badass ancient warrior/magic user queen Aryll brings me incredible amounts of delight, I call her Macha (after one of the warrior goddesses in Irish myth) and my main belief is that she probably used a spear, learned and took a lot after her Gerudo Warrior mom in fighting style and that Seraph is incredibly proud of her, just the proudest big brother there is because look! That’s his sister right there! She is amazing and he adores her to death, I also headcanon that she probably survived when Seraph didn’t and that Wild is descendant from her specifically, so Seraph probably is very glad to have Wild as a descendant running around and being himself because in a way, it’s like knowing his people and his sister live on in someone and he’s fine with that even if the customs of the Zonai are gone and/or not present in Wild in a visible way, it’s in the way he cooks, in his looks, in the way he smiles and laughs and fights even with the Hyrulean knight teachings and he honestly couldn’t be prouder because he did his best, and even if he didn’t get it right in the first time he did good and succeeded and most importantly survived even more so than banishing the Calamity something even he couldn’t do and he’s Wild. And that’s enough for him to be glad he has him as a descendant (also probably thinks that way about Calamity, those are HIS great something nephews and he’ll challenge anyone in single combat if they say anything bad about them).

• Wild: I’m not good enough because I failed in beating the Calamity the first time and let Hyrule fall, I had no idea what I was doing but that doesn’t excuse that I could have done better. I apologize for dissappointing you and not being enough to live up to yours and everyone else's legacy.

Seraph, who also had no clue how to deal with the Calamity in the first time before his Zelda, likely his Aryll and Impa suggested creating the Guardians and Divine Beasts because clearly just Fi and Hylia’s Blessing wasn’t doing the trick and he ended up losing an arm in the process and likely died later: And you think I did? Faoil (wild wolf/dog) if anything you did it more smoothly than me even if it took a power nap and having your mind scrambled like an omelete to do it. You’re fine and I’ll fight you if you say otherwise. Meet me in the ring.

Like, can you imagine being Seraph back then? Sure they were expecting for Ganondorf to return eventually (even if they thought they’d be skipped over or that between him and Una they could help him, I mean it happened in Cadence of Hyrule technically, Young Ganondorf that's Wind's age and just vibing with existence is a thing, just throwing that out there), he always comes back due to Demise’s curse, insert William Afton saying I always come back here and all that for the meme. But you think any of them was ready for the Calamity? That is Demise’s curse and rage and fury and thirst for the blood of Sky’s descendants (or First’s, because I doubt he forgot when First sealed him the first time around, the rage probably started from there) and the wish to see Hylia herself suffer, it is pure divine fury that was left to fester for years upon years cycle upon cycle and across timelines, pure will given form and having given up trying to play human because clearly that approach wasn’t working so it evolved, it adapted. That is some eldritch horror/Greek/Irish/Norse/Actually a lot of mythologies type of stuff, I doubt anyone was prepared for it hence why the Beasts and Guardians were built, it was their way of adapting to such a drastic change, Sheikah Towers and Slates to better control and monitor the situation and coordinate Guardian attacks against monsters and heck maybe even soldiers brought back from death since the Calamity was a corrupting force with Zonai runes for self defense and new means of attack for soldiers, Sheikah Shrines not only tests and ways to prepare the next Hero but also as shelter for those who can’t fight, the Divine Beasts, the Magnum Opus of the races, built in record time to be able to aid Hylia’s reincarnation and the Hero with the Champions to pilot it because they couldn’t defeat Ganon and it at first, that was their way of adapting because the usual didn’t work. They knew some details, but they couldn’t imagine those details would change, they were just lucky to shift gears accordingly and be able to seal it for a 10.000.

And ten thousand years is a lot of time for information to be lost or altered, we never hear what happened to Seraph/Fia, or Una, or the previous Champions, we never hear what happened to the Zonai or even how they really were, we just know that they won and sealed it away.

... But what was the cost?

In summary, I believe that what happened 10.000 years ago was a Phyrric victory, and that the crown probably altered it or purposefully let the knowledge die out to give people hope and likely as much information to be able to fight back as they could without stretching just how close it was like how they practically erased the Twili, because it’s strange isn’t it, that Zelda using Hylia’s power was recorded, but not how she managed to do it to give the next generation the best fighting chance? It’s because it was knowledge that died out or was purposefully hidden, maybe how Una got her powers was too awful and traumatic, and so no one would want to repeat the circumstances and that’s why Rhoam only makes inferences, which in turn led Flora to suffer under pressure and being unhappy, no one knows how Seraph was really like, so they create an imagine on their head and push it onto Wild and Calamity who are forced to live up to it and even quit speaking as a result of being the ones to pull the Master Sword from the stone.

In summary it wasn’t that it was easier for them, it was because no one knew just how hard it was and sadly for Wild and Flora and the Champions and everyone 10.000 years ago, the Calamity learned how to adapt too after it regained it’s strength.

It would refuse to give them a fighting chance.

So if anything I bet Seraph would be really proud of Wild and Calamity for managing to do it anyway, no matter how long it took.

(I also headcanon that the way the Calamity was unleashed maybe was as a side effect of Seraph/Fia and Una trying to aid Ganon, but that’s for another post, this is getting long so I’ll save it for when I have more brain power as well as possible Zonai customs Seraph/Fia shows or uses and how I headcanon about the Cú Chulainn/Beowulf/Grettir deal)

• I honestly think that we play as him in ToK, at least in some sections or through his memories or with Wild kind of backseating his consciousness so he can find where he needs to go and to repair Fi, it’s possible I’ll be wrong later about this that’s just me making crazy guesses due to outfit changes, but in the trailer you see Wild not using the slate to use stasis (which makes sense, Flora was the one with it after all and it fell down with her or got damaged from the fall), but from Seraph’s possible arm and the Zonai were strong warrior magic users, which makes me think that the runes in the Sheikah slate were possibly not Sheikah, but translated and repurposed from Zonai spells if we go with the theory/headcanon they worked together, which also makes me draw the connection that either A: Either when he lost his arm (possibly via combat with Ganon or one of his general’s at the time, or history repeating itself and made it so that it got corrupted by the Malice and he had to chop it off before it spread and he became a Blight, which I also have a lot of thoughts about but I’ll save that for another ask) he gained the abilities to use the runes from it but it took his own stamina/magic reserves to make it work, OR, that he already could use runes like that normally and simply got so used to using them normally the arm acclimated to it or was made to accommodate it because I feel like the Zonai probably unconsciously used magic to be more durable and stuff or that was their entire thing, Zonai warriors being very strong because they have a lot of magic and it makes their stamina reserves bigger the more they train and build up their strength. In summary: not only was this man likely as healthy as a horse, strong as a bull or ordonian goat in his prime, built like he could wrestle and suplex a bear or lion and likely hit like a semi truck due to his Gerudo Gladiator life style and his Zonai Warrior upbringing, but he may possibly be the second most prolific/strong magic user we see in the series out of the Link’s like how Twilight, Hyrule and likely Time, Legend and FD are (maybe also Sky and Four?), But also the only one outside of maybe Hyrule who can or could do it without any assistance from a magical artifact and how insane is that? Leave some of the talent for the rest of us like sIR- Can you imagine this man just straight up freezing enemies with Stasis without assistance from his own raw power or just straight up summoning bombs or attracting weapons out of folks hands? I feel like we don’t talk enough about this possibility, it would make him a nightmare to face if you’re on his bad side, like I think he probably could give FD a good enough run for his money if that’s true like this man just snatched the protagonist halo and ran with it. Though I also headcanon he doesn’t do that often unless it’s too serious that he can’t help but use it because it likely ends fights too quickly and he likes fighting too much for that.

And that’s that for now, apologies if I rambled on, hope I didn’t bother you and hope you’re having a nice whatever time of the day is it! :D

-A Very Awkward Anon.

First off I hope you're having a good day to VA! Thank you for sending more of your ideas and also thank you for giving me permission to merge/use them with my own! I promise to give credit back to you once I do eventually use it!

First off you really are starting to make me ship Lora and Player much more, the friends-to-lovers thing? Perfect beautiful, fantastic, also him being shy until he's in song and dance? Definitely Disney Prince material, someone draw him as a Disney Prince (Actually someone should totally draw Disney style Chain for reasons I will not be giving)

Also-

I FUCKING LOVE PORTAL 2 AND THE GLADOS SCREAM WOULD MATCH THEM SO MUCH

Honestly Player just with the GLaDOS voice, montone and cold, but then they have those moments with such raw emotions that it makes everyone uncomfortable.

Also the royal family rewriting history makes so much sense, because come on- honestly I like to think that Seraph/Fia was made to be a very stoic hero, a man who got the job done and have history very fine and cut because they want Ganon done, they don't want emotions from the heroes or what not, they want the following Links to do what they were 'made' to do and that's it.

[kitausuret]

I posted 1,934 times in 2022

That's 1,142 more posts than 2021!

196 posts created (10%)

1,738 posts reblogged (90%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@oliveroctavius

@brw

@seek--rest

@reaperlight

@kitausuret

I tagged 1,835 of my posts in 2022

Only 5% of my posts had no tags

#flash thompson - 246 posts

#venom - 244 posts

#peter parker - 199 posts

#eddie brock - 154 posts

#harry osborn - 134 posts

#asked and answered - 99 posts

#mj watson - 83 posts

#wanda maximoff - 71 posts

#symbiot3 - 56 posts

#felicia hardy - 31 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#'yeah hating things is sexy & cool but you take it too far. why are you spending so much time angry on the internet please just smoke weed'

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Andrea Benton and April Parker, AKA Mania and Mayhem! Commission by the incredible Fiti on Twitter! All of his commission and portfolio information is right here.

They are hanging out and having a great time together. 💕 They are siblings, of a sort!

(posted with permission from the artist)

73 notes - Posted April 27, 2022

#4

616!Eddie Brock should not be allowed on Twitter because he'd see something like "would love to see more mlm romance in media 😔" and he would immediately launch into a 12-tweet-long thread about how we should NOT be romanticizing multilevel marketing schemes and how they are a way for the rich to get richer and how instead we should boost stories about small business owners and on and on

until approximately one hour later he quote-tweets himself saying "I have been informed that 'MLM' is a more versatile acronym than I originally thought. My apologies for the misunderstanding and let me also clarify my unwavering support for the queer community of this city.

"However, if you would like more information on multilevel marketing and pyramid schemes and how to avoid them, please see the sources below: (links)"

84 notes - Posted March 25, 2022

#3

still thinking about the fact that one of my mutuals didn't even technically tag me in a thing about Spider-Man 3, she just did a casual little "@ kita" without making it a real "@" and somehow I still managed to come across it in my massive dashboard. the universe is conspiring against me. she knew that somehow I'd see it. she manipulated the energies of reality and so now here we are and against all good reason I want to rewatch SM3 and by that I mean suffer.

94 notes - Posted June 2, 2022

#2

Behold, the power of Peter's one pair of non-white underwear:

Amazing Spider-Man #298

See the full post

120 notes - Posted September 27, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

I think my favorite kind of comics-based fanfics are the ones where you can tell the writer went into it with at least 200 issues of whatever they're writing behind them because they have a lot of good characterization and reference to multiple events in canon and tons of knowledge

but they have very obviously cherry picked what they did and didn't like to create the story THEY want to see the whole time I'm reading with tears streaming down my face yelling "yes.... YES!!!" because they're so galaxy brained for that

215 notes - Posted May 14, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[zephyrrydrake]

Vent post. Move on if you don't want to read.

I feel like I'm failing Palestine. Idk, I just feel like I'm not doing enough. I know the world sucks, I know that it's broken and that people are dying and suffering and being tortured. I feel like I can't do enough. Like what I'm doing isn't enough.

121. That's how many asks I've let sit in my inbox for over a month. They piled up. They've just gone unanswered. I don't feel like I can delete them because I feel like I need to help them. I have a platform. It's basically a raft compared to the giant boats that are some other people's platforms, but it's still a platform. Since I was younger, the whole reason why I wanted a big platform in the first place, was so that I could use it to help people. My motivations have kind of shifted cause now I just wanna make stuff, but still.

I can't donate any money. I don't usually see a lot of these people's fundraisers getting reblogged. I think a part of me doesn't even want to do this. I know it's selfish and I should be spending my time helping people, but it's hard to care. And I hate that it's hard to care. Because I want to care. I want to want to help these people. But I'm just apathetic. I mean, I'm happy when I see their GoFundMes gaining traction and I'm happy seeing that someone met their goal. I cheered when I saw that someone got enough funds to get out of Gaza. But I just can't always psych myself up to care about all this stuff the way these people deserve to be cared about.

My feelings are complicated. I kind of feel this way towards other aspects of my life too. Honestly, it might just be an autism thing. Doesn't make me feel less guilty about it though. Or more, pseudo guilt? Because sometimes I can't even really bring myself to feel guilty. My emotions are fucked.

And then of course those two fucking gimmick blogs came out and attacked some of the people who verify fundraisers. And I decided to hear them out. And now I'm questioning if maybe these may or may not be scams. Fuck, man. Like I said in my pinned on @rydrake6 I just need a break.

I already know that my "activism" is mediocre at best. I know that I'm probably barely even doing the bare minimum. I know that I need to rethink my methods. Right now I'm just questioning whether I should even keep doing this. As I'm writing this I'm drafting a post in my head that's like "I'm sorry to say, but I'm going to make the unethical decision to stop talking about Palestine."

I don't want to. Or I don't want to want to. But it's not like I'm doing much now anyways. I'm boycotting. I'm staying away from the big corporations and I've been in multiple fights with my parents over this stuff. I've been doing clicks on that one website, even though I might have missed some days. I've been reblogging Gofundmes even though there's not a lot of people who donate because of me to my knowledge.

I just don't know what to do. That's exactly why I need time to think about this shit and get it sorted out. I wonder if it might be better for me to just step away. Just do my own thing. Figure this whole thing out. I know tumblr has a scammer problem, but I don't think that's what's going on with the majority of these gofundmes.

I'll figure something out. But for now I'm just going to keep to myself. Probably try to stay off Tumblr more. Actually, yeah. I think I'm gonna try to stay off Tumblr more. I thought this place was gonna be better than twitter but shit. Everything is falling apart. I think I'm gonna lower my scroll limit. It might just be temporary but I really need to get off of social media. It's bad for me no matter what website I use.

[whetstonefires]

So my problem with the idea that Harrow needs to not have been the initial aggressor in her and Gideon's childhood relationship, to not have been proactively cruel when they were little, that somehow the mutual antagonism must have rested in mutual responsibility or she's Bad in a way that invalidates her as a protagonist, isn't that it's stupid.

And it isn't that it works out kind of uncomfortably victim-blamey based on my reading of the presented facts. It isn't even that it creates a lot of wasted narrative notes and makes the arc of their relationship less dynamic. Though obviously I don't like those things either.

It's that it is fundamentally founded on a purity-based idea of value. It's an expression of that mindset I saw described in a very good tumblr post I think about radfems wherein 'the only real thing in the world is suffering, and it flows from unfeeling agents to unacting experiencers.'

Breaking the whole world down into villains and victims and only the victims deserve mercy, so if you want someone to be a person they can't have victimized anyone ever.

It's based in the idea that you have to be clean to be worth something. And Harrow doesn't get to be clean. That's a fundamental of her. She was born guilty, guilty in a way no human mind can entirely comprehend or tolerate, guilty to death, and she has known it since she was far, far too young to handle such a weight.

And she was also born innocent, because she hadn't done anything yet, but that's an abstraction. She was born into her guilt. She was born unclean. And that drove her, that's an underlying motive for so much of her whole being.

It made her fearless in some ways, and it made her vicious beyond words, and it made her want to die.

You can't wash Harrowhark Nonagesimus clean. Not without washing her out of herself. The very attempt is a betrayal of her, of the path she needs to walk if she is ever to live free.

Also the pattern of Harrow abusing her power over Gideon because Gideon reminds her of the burden of shame she carries for the children her parents murdered in her name is like. A blatant metaphor for post-colonial relations between settler descendants and genocide survivors.

Their whole relationship obviously isn't reducible to that one thing, but that element is clearly right there and. I don't feel like that needs to be bothsidesed. I feel like it really does not need that.

So yeah. Trying to insist that the person who said "I have spent your life trying to make you regret that you weren’t dead" shared equal responsibility for the interpersonal friction with the person she said it to because that person was jealous of her for being better treated by the adults when they were kids, that really bothers me on a lot of levels.

Not because I want to hate on Harrow but because I love her. And I think the fact that she has to learn to live with the knowledge of her own ineradicable responsibility and not let it kill or warp her is a key element of her story. She was set up to fail at being anything other than a monster. Her parents have undermined her at every step, even long after they are dead.

But she wants to be better. She's always wanted it.

And additionally it's very, very important that actions taken out of guilt are not inherently virtuous.

Sometimes, actually really often, feeling guilty makes you behave in shitty ways.

[itsclydebitches]

The Bad Batch: A Crosshair Analysis

Hello, Star Wars fandom! I have just completed watching—and loving—The Bad Batch, which you know means I now need to dump all my thoughts about the first season into the tumblr void. Specifically, thoughts on the complicated drama that is Crosshair. I have no doubt that the majority of what I’m about to say will be old news to anyone who watched the show when it came out (I’m slow...), but I’m writing it all out anyway. Largely for my own sanity enjoyment :D

I want to preface all of this by saying that the above is not an exaggeration. I love the show and I love the entire cast. My enjoyment in each of the characters is directly connected to my enjoyment of the season as a whole, which I say because I’m about to get pretty critical towards some of the characters’ choices and, to a lesser extent, the writing choices that surround those. Does this mean I secretly hate The Bad Batch? Quite the opposite. I’m invested, which is presumably just what Filoni wants. I’m just hoping that investment pays off. 

But enough of the disclaimers. Let’s start with the matter of the inhibitor chip. I’ve seen fans take some pretty hard stances on both sides: Crosshair is completely innocent because he’s definitely been under the chip’s control this whole time, no matter what he might say. Crosshair is completely guilty because he said the chip was removed a long time ago and he chose to do all this, no moral wiggle room allowed. However, the reality is that we don’t know enough to make a clear call either way. The audience, simply put, does not have all the necessary information. What we have instead is a couple of facts combined with claims that may or may not be reliable. Let’s lay them out:

Crosshair was definitely under the chip’s control at the start of the series.

He was able to resist it to a certain extent, resulting in a pressure to obey orders coupled with a primary loyalty to his squad. See: telling Hunter to follow the Empire’s commands—which includes killing kid Padawans—but not turning his team in as traitors when they did not. It’s an in-between space.

Crosshair’s chip was then amplified to an unknown extent. I’m never going to claim I’m a Star Wars aficionado—I’m a casual fan, friends. Please don’t yell at me over obscure lore lol—but within TBB’s canon, no one else is undergoing that experimentation. The effects of this are entirely unknown, which includes Crosshair’s free will, or lack thereof.

Crosshair then becomes a clear tool of the Empire, hunting down innocents, killing on a whim, the whole, evil shebang.

In “Reunion” he’s caught by the engine and suffers severe burns to his face. One leaves a scar that covers precisely the place where the chip would have been extracted.

Removing the chip leaves its own scar behind. If Crosshair’s was removed, we can’t see that scar due to the burn.

After these events Crosshair seems to mellow a bit. He does horrible things under the Empire’s orders—like shooting the senator—but is still loyal to his squad—killing his non-clone teammates to give TBB a chance, saving AZ and Omega, etc.

Crosshair claims that his chip has already been removed. However, Crosshair is arguably an unreliable source if he’s been lied to or if the chip is still there, encouraging him to manipulate the team.

Crosshair claims it was removed a long time ago, which is incredibly imprecise. As we can see from just some of the events listed above, precisely when the chip came out—if it came out—makes a huge difference.

Hunter realizes this and presses for clarification, but Crosshair dodges giving it. Again, a legitimate belief that it doesn’t matter, or evidence that he can’t say because something else is going on? We don’t know.

Hunter checks Crosshair’s head and finds the burn scar which proves… nothing. As stated above, they wouldn’t be able to see the surgery scar one way or another: its existence or its absence. It’s useless data, as Tech might say. I’ve seen a few fans claim that Hunter was also feeling for the chip with his enhanced senses, but 1. I didn’t catch any evidence of that in the scene and 2. Even if we assume Hunter did that anyway, the chips are notoriously hard to spot. Fives and AZ couldn’t find the chip at first when examining Tup. Ahsoka had to use the force to find it in Rex. TBB themselves couldn’t find it at first in Wrecker. If machinery consistently fails to find the chip on the first couple of tries—it’s meant to be a hidden implant, after all—why would we believe Hunter’s senses could pick it up instantly? Maybe he missed it, or maybe it wasn’t there at all. 

Crosshair appears to be struggling with a headache in the finale, just as he was at the beginning of the season and just like Wrecker was for the first half.

The point of listing all this out is to emphasize how ambiguous this whole situation is. I don’t want to use this post to argue one way or another about whether Crosshair’s chip is really out. I have my preferred theory (the chip’s still in, but only partially functional), but at the end of the day none of this is conclusive. The writing takes us in what I hope is deliberate circles. Crosshair says the chip is out? Crosshair is not a reliable source of information until we know if the chip is out. What other evidence is there that the chip is gone? A scar? We can’t see if there’s a scar. Hunter’s abilities? He only checked once for a canonically hard to find implant—if he actually checked at all. And why would the Empire want the chip out? Well, maybe it has to do with that push towards willing soldiers, but if that were the case, why leave Crosshair behind and have the “clones die together”? By that point he was one of the most willing, chip or not. Did they have to take it out because of the engine accident? Pure speculation. We just don’t know and THAT is the point I want to make.

Because it means the rest of the Bad Batch didn’t know either.

The core issue I have here is not whether the chip is in or out, or even how long it may have been in if it is out now. The issue is that TBB spent 99% of the first season believing that Crosshair was under the chip’s influence… and they didn’t try to do anything about that. They abandoned him. They left a man behind. Does this make them all horrible monsters? Of course not! This shit is complicated as hell, but I do think they made a very large mistake and that Crosshair has every right to be furious about it.

“But, Clyde, they couldn’t have gone back. It was too dangerous! Hunter had a duty to his whole team, not just Crosshair.” True enough and I’d buy this argument 100% if Hunter hadn’t spent the entire season throwing his team into dangerous, seemingly impossible situations to save other people. Crosshair became the exception, not a hard rule of something they had to avoid. They went back to Kamino for Omega, a kid they’d only had one lunch with, despite knowing how dangerous the Empire was. They went into the heart of an occupied planet to rescue not just a stranger, but one belonging to the Separatist government. They helped Sid when she asked and there was plenty of compassion for the criminal trying to take her place. Most significantly, there wasn’t the slightest hesitation to go rescue Hunter when he was under the Empire’s control, in precisely the same place. Every explanation I’ve seen fans come up with—Kamino is too fortified, they don’t know where Crosshair is, they can’t risk Omega being captured, etc.—also holds true for Hunter, yet there wasn’t a second of doubt about needing to at least try to help him. And his rescue was arguably far more dangerous given that TBB knew they were walking into a trap. Going after Crosshair would have at least had some element of surprise.

I think the problem with these justifications is most easily seen in “Rescue on Ryloth” and, later, “War-Mantle.” In the former, we do watch Hunter decide that going on a rescue mission is too much of a risk, only for Omega to talk him into considering it.

Hunter: “It’s a big galaxy. We can’t put ourselves on the line every time someone’s in trouble.”

Omega: “Why not? Isn’t that what soldiers do?”

Hunter: “It’s not worth the risk.”

Omega: “She’s trying to save her family, Hunter. I’d do the same for you.”

The arguments that sway him are ‘Soldiers should help people’ and ‘Soldiers should specifically help their family.’ So… what does that say about their feelings for Crosshair? They’re willing to put themselves on the line for the parents of a girl they met once at a drop site, but not their own brother? That’s the message the writing sends. “But, Clyde, the difference is that they had an advantage here. Hera’s knowledge of her home planet tipped the odds in their favor.” Yeah… and Crosshair is stationed on TBB’s home planet. Even more than them collectively having the same knowledge that Hera does, “Return to Kamino” reveals that Omega always had additional, insider knowledge of the base: she has access to a secret landing pad and the tunnels leading up into the city. That knowledge was given and used the second Hunter’s freedom was on the line, but it never once came up to use for Crosshair’s benefit. 

“War-Mantle’s” mission puts this problem in even sharper relief. Another claim I’ve seen a lot is that TBB only took risky rescue missions because they needed to be paid. The guys have got to eat after all. Yet Tech makes it clear that going after Gregor will lose them money. They’re meant to be on a mission for Sid and deviating for that won’t result in a payment. He explicitly says that if they decide to do this, they won’t eat. They do it anyway. No money, no intel, a huge risk “on a clone we don’t even know.” But that’s not what’s important, the show says. All that matters is that a brother is in trouble. This time it’s Echo pushing that message instead of Omega. When Hunter realizes that they’re about to try and infiltrate an entire facility and they don’t even know if this clone is still alive, Echo points out that they took that risk once before: for him. “If there’s a chance that trooper is being held against his will, we have to try and get him out.”

Yes! Exactly right! So why doesn’t that apply to Crosshair?

“Because he tried to kill them, Clyde!” No, that’s the easy, dismissive answer. A chipped Crosshair tried to kill them. AKA, a Crosshair entirely under the Empire’s control. The only difference between his enslavement and Gregor’s is that Gregor’s chains were physical while Crosshair’s were mental. And again, the point of everything at the start of this post is to show that no one knows when or even if that chip was removed. TBB definitely didn’t have any reason to suspect that Crosshair was working under his own power until Crosshair himself said as much. We might have been able to make that case at the start of the season, but “Battle Scars” removes any possible confusion. The entire team watched Rex reach for his blaster when he learned their chips were still in. The entire team watched Wrecker become a totally different person and attack them, just like Crosshair did. The entire team forgave him instantly and had their own chips removed. So why in the world didn’t anyone go, “Wow, Crosshair has a chip too. He was no more responsible for attacking us than Wrecker was. We need to try to get him out, no matter how hard that might be, just like we had to try for all these other people we’ve helped.”

But they didn’t. No one even considered rescuing Crosshair. They only went back for Hunter and, when they realized Crosshair was there too, they didn’t change their plans to try and rescue him as well. He’s treated as a particularly threatening inconvenience, not another team member in need of their help.

The problem I have with how this all went down is that the team treated Crosshair like an enemy despite all evidence to the contrary. Despite Omega outright saying that this isn’t his fault, it’s the chip, the group seems to decide that he’s gone crazy or something and that there’s nothing they can do. “It’s fine,” I thought. “They don’t really get what the chip is like yet. They don’t understand how thoroughly it controls someone.” But then “Battle Scars” arrives and Wrecker is treated with such compassion (which he deserves!) only for the group to continue acting like Crosshair is somehow different. It’s easy to say, “But Crosshair shot Wrecker” and ignore the easy pushback of, “and Wrecker nearly shot Omega.” Up until Crosshair’s own accusations and Omega’s ignored comments, TBB’s understanding of the chip’s influence and the lack of responsibility that accompanies mysteriously disappears when the show’s antagonist becomes the subject of conversation. This is seen most clearly in how Hunter tries to frame things during his talk with Crosshair:

“You tried to kill us. We didn’t have a choice.”

“Can’t you see that they’re using you? It’s that inhibitor chip in your head.”

“You really don’t get who we are, do you?”

Hunter mentions the chip, but he acts as if it’s Crosshair’s responsibility to overcome it: “Can’t you see…” Of course he can’t see, that’s the entire point of the chip, the thing he currently believes Crosshair still has stuck in his head. But Hunter and the others—with Omega as a wonderful exception—never seem to have accepted this like they did for Wrecker. When Crosshair “tried to kill us” it’s seen as a deliberate act that he chose, not something forced on him like with Wrecker. When Hunter talks about their ethics, he subconsciously separates the team from Crosshair: “You really don’t get who we are, do you?”, revealing a pretty ingrained divide between them. Even Wrecker gets in on the action, the one brother who truly understands how much the chip controls someone: “All that time, you didn’t even try to come back.” What part of he couldn’t try is not hitting home here? Again, for the purposes of this conversation it doesn’t matter whether Crosshair was chipped this whole time or not. The point is that TBB believed he was chipped… and yet still expected him to somehow, magically overcome that programming, writing him off when he failed to do that. He’s consistently held responsible for actions that they were told (and, through Wrecker, saw) were completely outside of his control. Even when we factor in his claim that the chip was removed, TBB has ignored all the evidence I listed at the start. No one, not even Omega, challenges this super vague and strange claim, or seeks out proof because they don’t want to believe that their brother could willingly do this. There’s just this... acceptance that of course Crosshair went bad. Why? Because he was an asshole sometimes? Taking it all as written, it doesn’t feel like the batch considered him a true part of the team. Certainly not like Wrecker or Hunter. As shown, the batch will go out of their way, risk anything, forgive anything, for them. They have a level of faith that was never shown to Crosshair. 

“Severe and unyielding,” Tech says and he’s absolutely right, but I’d seriously challenge this idea that any of the others would have automatically done better if the situations were reversed. It stood out to me that each batch member has a moment of doubt throughout the series, a brief glimpse into how they think the Empire isn’t that bad, at least when it comes to this particular thing. Basically, a moment that could lead to a very dangerous line of thinking without others to stomp it down. Wrecker announces that he’s happy working for whoever, provided they give him food and let him blow things up. Tech finds the chain codes to be an ingenious strategy and is clearly fascinated with their development. Hunter initially wants Omega to stay on Kamino, despite knowing that this Empire has already, systematically killed an entire group of people: the Jedi. Doesn’t matter. She’s still (supposedly) safer there than she would be running with the likes of them.

There’s absolutely no doubt that those three made the correct choice in defying the Empire, but I believe that their ability to make that choice is largely dependent on them having each other. They survive together, not apart, and it’s their unity that allows them to make the really hard calls, like setting out on their own and opposing such a formidable force. But if Tech’s chip had activated and he’d been left behind, would he have muscled through to escape somehow...or would he have gotten caught up in all the new technology the Empire offered him, succumbing to both his chip and the inevitability that if his squad no longer wanted him, why not stay? Would Wrecker have escaped, or been easily manipulated into a new life of exploding things? Would Hunter have been able to push through without his brothers, or would he have become devoted to a new team to lead? Obviously there’s no way to ever know, but it’s always easier to make the right decisions when you have support in doing so. Crosshair had no support. His team left him and yes, they had to in that specific moment, but the point is that they never came back. As far as we saw throughout the season, they never planned to come back. They all talk about loving the Crosshair who existed when life was easier, but they weren’t willing to fight for the Crosshair that most needed their help. When he says “You weren’t loyal to me,” he’s absolutely right. The same episode, “Return to Kamino,” gives Omega two powerful lines that the group rallies behind:

Omega: “[The danger] doesn’t matter. Saving Hunter is what matters.”

AZ: “You must leave.”

Omega: “Not without Hunter.”

The key word there is “Hunter.” Danger, stakes, risk, probability… none of that matters when Hunter needs help. Crosshair did not receive that same level of devotion.

Which creates a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. The group is upset that Crosshair isn’t rejoining them, but they fail to realize that he has no reason to trust them anymore. He’s not joining the Empire because he’s inherently evil and that’s that, end of discussion. He’s joining it because above all Crosshair wants a place to belong… and TBB has made it clear—unintentionally—that he does not belong with them. The horrible actions that Crosshair took under his own free will (theoretically) came after he realized that doing bad things while under the Empire’s control was, apparently, unforgivable. If it wasn’t, his team would have come back to rescue him. They could have at least tried. But they didn’t, so Crosshair is left with the conclusion that either what he did under the Empire’s control is something the group can’t forgive him for, or they can forgive that (like with Wrecker) and he’s the problem here. He’s the one not worth that effort.

“The Empire will be fazing out clones next,” Hunter says. To which Crosshair responds, “Not the ones that matter.”

He wants to matter to someone and events show he no longer matters to his brothers. So why not stay with the Empire? I mean, we as the audience ABSOLUTELY know why not. Self-doubt and feelings of isolation aren’t excuses for joining the Super Evil Organization. Crosshair, if he is under his own control, is still 100% in the wrong for supporting them, no matter his reasons. So it’s not an excuse, but rather an explanation of that very human, flawed, fallible thinking. He needs to be useful. He needs to be wanted. Crosshair is an absolute dick to the regs and I have no doubt that a lot of that stems from the harassment TBB has experienced from them (with a side of his inflated ego), but I’d bet it’s also due to Crosshair’s intense desire to be valuable to someone. He keeps pointing out the regs’ supposed deficiencies because it highlights his own usefulness. When Crosshair fails to find Hera, the Admiral says that soon he’ll get someone who can, looking straight at Howzer at the door. It makes Crosshair seethe because his entire identity is based on being useful, yet no one seems to need him anymore. TBB seems to no longer want him. The Empire no longer wants clones. Now even regs are considered a better option than him, the “superior” soldier. Everywhere Crosshair turns he’s getting the message that he’s not wanted, but he’ll keep fighting to at least be needed in some capacity, no matter how small. Even if that means overlooking all the horrors the Empire commits.

“All you’ll ever be to [the Empire] is a number,” Hunter says and he’s absolutely right. But to TBB recently, Crosshair hasn’t even been that. He’s been nothing. Nobody worth coming back for. To his mind, at least being a number is something.

I hope that all of this resolves itself into a conclusion that is kind to each side (preferably without a Vader-style death redemption), especially given the still ambiguous state of the chip, but from a writing standpoint I’m admittedly a bit wary. We’re obviously meant to believe that the batch all love each other, but as established throughout this entirely too long post, this season did a terrible job imo of proving that they love Crosshair. Or, at least, proving that they love him as much as the others. If this was really meant to be just a matter of miscommunication, with Crosshair making terrible life choices because he only thinks he was abandoned, then we as the audience would have seen the batch trying and failing to get him out. Or at least establishing a very good reason why they couldn’t take that risk, hopefully with entirely different side-missions so the audience isn’t constantly going, “So you can risk everything for Gregor... but not Crosshair?” I’m VERY glad that Crosshair was allowed to air his grievances to the extent he did, but the end result of that—Hunter continually denying this, Omega walking away from him in their rooms, neither Tech nor Wrecker actually sticking up for him and acknowledging the chip’s influence during at least some of all this—is making things feel rather one-sided. It’s like we’re meant to take Crosshair at his word and accept that he’s this garden-variety antagonist who joins the Empire because yay being on the winning side… despite all these complications that clearly have a huge impact on how we read the situation. It doesn’t help that the show has already embraced an inconsistent manner of portraying chipped-clones. We know every clone has one, we know only a couple clones are aware of the chip’s existence (and can thus try to get it out), we know they enter a “Good soldiers follow orders” mindlessness once activated… yet towards the end we see a lot of side character clones thinking for themselves. Howzer decides that he’s no longer loyal to the Empire, giving a speech where a couple other clones throw down their weapons too. Gregor was arrested because he likewise realized how wrong this all was. But how is that possible? Do the chips completely control the clones, or not? Are these clones somehow exceptions? Are the chips beginning to fail? All of that has a bearing on how we read Crosshair—what were his own decisions, how much he was capable of overcoming the chip, whether that changed at all during certain points—but right now that remains really unclear.

It’s details like that which make me wonder if all these other questions will be answered. Will the story resolve all those ambiguous moments surrounding the chip, or brush them off with the belief that we should have just taken Crosshair at his equally ambiguous word? Will the story acknowledge Crosshair’s points through someone other than Crosshair, allowing it to exist as a legitimate criticism, rather than the presumed excuses of an antagonist? I’m… not sure. On the whole I’m very happy with TBB’s writing—despite what all this might imply lol. Until my brain picks over the season and discovers something else, my only other gripe is not allowing Omega to form a solid bond with Tech and Echo, instead putting all the focus on big brother!Wrecker and dad!Hunter. I think it’s a solid show that does a lot right, but I’m worried that, unless there’s a brilliant answer to all these questions and an intent to unpack both sides of the Hunter vs. Crosshair debate with respect—not just falling back on, “Well, Crosshair is with the Empire so everything he says is automatically bad and wrong” take—we’ve just gotten the setup for a somewhat messy, ethical story. For anyone here who also reads my RWBY metas, I’m pretty sure you’re not at all surprised that I’m invested in going, “Hey, you had one of the heroes suddenly become/join a dictatorship and do a lot of horrific things, but within a pretty complicated context. Can we please work through that carefully and with an acknowledgement of the nuance here, rather than throwing the ‘evil’ character to the proverbial wolves?”  

God knows TBB is leagues ahead of RWBY, but I hope things continue on in not just a good direction, but one that tackles the aspects of this situation that many fans—and Crosshair—have already pointed out. As much as I adore the cast—and I really, really do—it was discomforting to watch a found family show where 4/5th of that family so completely wrote off one of the members and crucially have, at least so far, refused to acknowledge that. I want complicated, flawed characters, but that’s only compelling when the storytelling admits to and grapples with those flaws. We have quite firmly established Crosshair’s flaws in Season One. I hope Season Two delves into the rest of the team’s too.

Aaaand with that meta-dump out of my system, I’m off to write TBB fic. Thanks for reading! :D