#yes the first gif is important

[beannoss]

Something I think about a lot and wonder if maybe gets overlooked in Twilight’s story and as vitally indicative of his character is actually in the very first chapter:

Anya isn’t needed for Strix. Twilight decides to adopt her anyway.

[Spoiler warning: Mostly this post deals with early chapters already in the anime but there is reference to chapter 62, which has not yet been animated and will be in season 3]

Twilight decides it — “I’m going to rework the mission so it doesn’t involve a child because that’s too dangerous” and he’s 100% right! Donovan Desmond is canonically a far right warmonger with fascistic authoritarian aims. His government made liberal use of the SSS — a group to mirror the Stasi — who continue to operate in morally dubious ways (much more likely they’re actively morally reprehensible, though we’ve mostly only had rumours of that so far). From what we can tell, Desmond is at best an absent father and likely actually worse than that: if that's how he treats his own children, imagine how he might treat others. And the timeline seems to indicate that the experimentation performed on Anya was done under Desmond's government — even if Twilight isn't aware of experimentation on children, he is aware of both human and animal experimentation under Desmond's government. Taking all that and also the complexity of Strix's aims, undoubtedly there were other things that could be done, more straightforward if not necessarily easier.

So. Why? Why entertain the change at all? And then, having entertained it, why go back when the reasoning is indisputable?

On the Doylist level, I think Endo wanted to ensure that Anya had some agency within the set up — Endo also does this with Yor. It would be much harder to be on Twilight’s side fully, or to trust him on an ethical level/take him as any sort of moral authority, if he were just straightforwardly using these two people. To have them be active and consenting participants (arguably to actually be affirming the arrangement: Twilight sets it up, but Anya and Yor actually make it happen) even if the audience only knows the depth of their knowledge/motivations/etc currently, shifts the power dynamic in important ways.

But it also the set up tells us important things about Twilight. He is largely impatient, cold, detached in chapter one. His overarching feelings towards Anya are, I think, real annoyance, real confusion, and real impatience. He just doesn’t understand this damn kid and it turns out she’s a person which is frankly unacceptable — he’d needed and anticipated an automaton, ideally of himself in miniature form. (Though I think one could ponder whether Twilight was, in many ways, an automaton himself at this point, but that's maybe for another meta 🙃)

He’s not entirely unmoved of course — we're given to understand he’s affected when Franky tells him how many times Anya’s been adopted and returned, and isn't amused by Franky's joke about names. Franky's comment — "Just don't get attached" — reinforces this. The prospect of “the future” perturbs Twilight when he’s reading the parenting books. His initial reaction to Anya’s kidnap is horror. All these are true too.

Then there’s also this, from earlier in the chapter:

It’s exposition, yeah, and it’s also exposing. "Hopes" and "joys" are very specific words to describe those events. It could simply have been "A marriage? An ordinary life?" but describing them as such — hope for marriage; joy in ordinary life — expose something of what Twilight feels about those two experiences and, on the flipside, they expose what he deems he's lacking. No hopes of intimacy; no joy in (an ordinary) life. There's an argument as well, of course, that he's being ironic but I don't think that actually invalidates the above analysis. Drawing attention to 'hope' and 'joy' at all are revealing, regardless of Twilight's tone in thinking of them. I think it's also interesting this panel, taken in conjunction with a pair of panels in chapter 62, Twilight's backstory. The above is almost a pulled out version of this below panel of Twilight's recollection of his childhood, and of course the returning image of not just a rubbish bin but a rubbish bin on fire when it comes to disposing of his identity:

Back to Strix. Both his final interaction with Karen and the whole everything of the framing of Strix is making Twilight think (and feel, ahem) things that he hasn't for some time. Twilight decides, I’m reworking this. It can’t proceed this way. Not because Anya is a pain in his ass, not because she’s not as (apparently) intellectually advanced as he’d originally thought, not even because he thinks he can find another child who would better be exactly what mission parameters called for. No:

And what changes his mind is Anya asking to come home.

One of the important parts of this to me is this:

He seeks consent.

This moment is a keystone, I think, to understanding Twilight. It’s also more telling than he maybe realises. Twilight is decisive — we all laugh because he spirals at the drop of a hat when his daughter or wife look even mildly upset but outside those (also very telling) scenarios, he makes decisions and he pursues them. Often he makes decisions quickly. He’s a dab hand at it; it’s a large part of why he’s as good a spy as he is.

He’d decided to change Strix.

Anya asks him, in essence, not to.

So, he doesn't.

But it's wild that he entertains keeping her request at all — why? Why even entertain it? It’s dangerous; it’s impractical; there are too many moving parts outside his direct control; Anya isn’t the sort of child he’d wanted for the mission if he’d spent any time thinking about what a child might actually be like; Strix is in many ways an extremely long shot anyway, Desmond could just stop attending for reasons unknown and unrelated; etc.

So, yeah, why? Maybe because of this —

In conjunction, I often think of this moment in the cruise arc:

Twilight first naming the feeling as lonesome, and secondly tacitly conceding that he perceives Yor as a companion and that that relationship is important to him, something to be missed. What makes this for me though is that Anya calls this out "Papa's you're so sappy" and Twilight's reaction is that of someone caught-out. He doesn’t say “nuh-uh!” but he may as well have. Essentially, something landed a bit close to home, hm? Maybe some of that hope for marriage? A soupçon of joy of an ordinary life?

Twilight’s loneliness underpins many of his decisions with his family — probably without him being fully conscious of it. I think he is at least somewhat conscious of it, but also if he looks too closely... Well, best not to. I could fill this post, I think, with images that demonstrate his loneliness throughout the series; that sorrowful/pensive close-up of his eye(s) is one of the abiding motifs for Twilight throughout. I'd probably start with this one from Twilight's backstory arc:

Anya's request plays directly off his loneliness. Still though, he doesn’t immediately capitulate — he emphasises Anya’s choice. Is she sure? The last day has been scary for a child (and for him, but he's ignoring that part) and Twilight, in his increasing recognition that Anya is a person, is probably aware in the back of his mind that he hasn’t exactly been warm or welcoming or at all patient with her. Things that people respond to — he's otherwise excellent at manipulating people, so of course he understands this. So. Given she'd just had this scary experience, given he hasn't exactly been great with her: Is she sure? She wants to come home — with him?

I think the moment may get a little lost because Anya says something riffing off his own earlier thoughts and self-revelation (featuring that shadowed, lonely eye motif again!)

Were this a post about Anya, I’d talk about how it’s an important character moment for her as well by way both of demonstrating her agency/choice and also that she isn’t nearly as dumb as Twilight thinks (and the audience, maybe, also thinks).

But in my view, she didn’t actually need to say anything about it making her cry. I think she could simply have said yes in that moment and Twilight would have agreed.

Twilight’s an unreliable narrator; he’s disconnected from his heart and that shrouds his own motivations from himself — something he actually also concedes in this chapter!

And it shrouds from us just how much he actually understands himself. He’s also a master of deflection. Easy to assume or say that bringing Anya home is just to align with Strix. Nothing more to see here; nothing else going on. But also that ripping off of the mask in the panel above — and the literal 'riiip' sound effects — also indicate to us that this is an unveiling to himself.

In my view, Twilight agreeing to Anya's request, deciding to go back to original mission parameters, actually shifts his motivations, subtly. Now he’s committed not only to the original mission goals, but also to Anya. He needs Anya to succeed at Strix, not only for Strix's sake, but also because otherwise the mission will end and she’ll have to go back to the orphanage, and he’s just agreed with her not to do that (not right away, in any case). I don’t think at this point he’s thinking it’s forever — his thoughts throughout the manga indicate he still expects the Forgers to be temporary. I don't think the shift in motivation is necessarily even conscious, but given the set up, I think something inside Twilight recognises that agreeing to bring Anya home is a compact, jointly engaged. Mostly all this has become subsumed into Strix: he makes decisions. He pursues them. He deflects, even from himself. Of course it's just for the mission; this saved him the trouble of reworking it, of figuring out something else. Nothing more to see; no need to think any more on it. And to be fair to him, Strix is very high stakes, resting pretty solely on his shoulders, so of course that is, objectively, motivation enough. Why even consider beyond that?

But I personally think that to the extent he's aware of it at all, there is something else going on, that he wants to have Anya for as long as it takes him to work something else out for her. If that's the case, then of course, we have Occam’s razor: the simplest solution may be the best one.

Maybe Twilight should just keep Anya himself, eh?

[Image description: gif from Spy x Family season 1, episode 1. Twilight and Anya have just found out Anya passed her entrance exam and are overjoyed. Celebratory, Twilight picks Anya up and swoops her into the air as they smile at one another. End image description]

[zishuge]

the first time lingling calls him nanzhu The Spirealm 致命游戏 (2024) | Ep. 22

[ratatatastic]

my favourite thing is that its been 3 weeks and we're still asking about the tincan ocean mishap and how it wasnt supposed to happen in the way that it did.

"i did not know that wasnt allowed i promise you...we had nobody with us to say matthew dont be an idiot dont do that" and other lies to tell yourself

KSDK News | 7.18.24 (x)

Sun Sentinel | 6.28.24 (x)

"i think somebody said its technically not allowed but i said it was too late it already happened" oh so there was someone who did do a matthew dont be a idiot dont do that to him but it was AFTER the fact huh and they only allowed this to happen on the terms that the cup wouldnt touch the water...

so heres matthew dunking the cup into the ocean and also matthew and ekky throwing benny overboard during the incident in question and yes multiple local news sources had to reassure viewers afterwards that cup in saltwater should be fine (it was not fine)

Las Olas Beach | 6.25.24 (x)(x)(x)

[benny pic came from his igstory so we mourn the fallen sourcelink o7]

heres them bringing up the cup ocean incident while sasha was in wimbledon to cheer on his gf and guest starred on the volkswagen desk for a bit a week after the incident

Wimbledon Championships 2024 | 7.4.24 (x)

and its so funny he says that he knows saltwater is bad for the cup because...

id like to bring up exhibit A (written account of him bringing the cup over to the beach which incited the cup ocean incident)

and exihibit B (visual of him bringing the cup over to the beach which once again incited the cup ocean incident)

it isnt clear if sasha was aware of the whole "dont dunk the corrosive metal into the ocean" before or after the incident i just think its particularly funny how now he has to go on tv and go yeah that was bad we cant do that from now on like a scolded kitten

and also brady getting upset over not getting credited for the idea because this is what matthew said about it when asked the day after it happened

Pat McAffe Show | 6.26.24 (x)(x)

is he absolutely in every right to get a little pissy about it? yes. does it also make him seem even more like a little brother in the process especially with the way matthew had to go BY THE WAY. IT WAS BRADYS IDEA. AND HE WAS MAD AT ME FOR NOT SAYING THAT SO IM SAYING THAT NOW BUT ONLY AFTER TARYN BROUGHT IT UP. oh yeah absolutely. from one little brother to another it very much reads like that.

EDIT: it was actually ellie his fiancee who quips this because she was in attendance during the hospital visit (youll see her in the bg here) when this interview takes place and that makes it even cuter that she was like hey remember to give your baby brother credit oh this family is so cute 😭😭

[sophsun1]

Queer as Folk – 4.07: Preponderance of Death

[prapais]

akk + smiling at/because of aye, episodes 1 ⇒ 10.

[asten]

M*A*S*H s2e03 - Radar's Report

[seamayweed]

In Defense of Lady Kang/Queen Sindeok (1/3)

As promised, here's the first part of my defense of Queen Sindeok, explaining her historical political situation + clearing up some common fandom misconceptions about her, which I don't blame anyone for since they originate from the show itself. I must admit that I have a bit of a soft spot for her since history generally tends to be unkind to women - this extends to modern media and MCTNA is no exception:

(more under the cut)

Before we start, I thought I'd give a small refresher on the Yi family constellation - crucial for setting up the conflict and crown prince issue - with the aid of this extremely useful graphic by bodashiri (excluding the daughters for simplicity's sake):

(From here: x)

As you can see, Yi Seong-gye (King Taejo of Joseon) had two wives:

His first wife Lady Han (Queen Sinui) gave birth to six sons: 1. Yi Bang-woo (Prince Jinan), 2. Yi Bang-gwa (Prince Youngan), 3. Yi Bang-ui (Prince Yikan), 4. Yi Bang-gan (Prince Hoean), 5. Yi Bang-won (Prince Jeongan) and 6. Yi Bang-yeon (Prince Deokan).

His second wife Lady Kang (Queen Sindeok) gave birth to two sons: 7. Yi Bang-beon (Prince Muan) and 8. Yi Bang-seok (Prince Uian),

meaning that Seong-gye had eight sons overall.

With that out of the way, let's get started!!!

1. Queen Sindeok was NOT a concubine

(From here: x)

She is referred to as Yi Seong-gye/King Taejo's capital/Seoul wife in the show too:

However, every time Bang-won calls her a concubine and her children illegitimate there is never any pushback or correction by anyone, not even when he calls her younger son Bang-seok/Prince Uian a ‘seoja’ (illegitimate child born to a commoner concubine or royal concubine) in front of Seon-ho:

You'd think Seon-ho would defend Bang-seok by correcting Bang-won... but nope. Nada.

Not even Queen Sindeok (!!!) is allowed to defend herself and her children when they get accused of the same:

Like, what is this madness!!!

Anyone who doesn't know about Korean history would never even SUSPECT that this isn’t actually true, and that Queen Sindeok is in fact a legitimate second wife and queen. By giving no pushback to the (false) claims of illegitimacy, the show seems to implicitly support Bang-won’s narrative of her being a lying, conniving, greedy bitch who wants to push her child on the throne despite having no right to it whatsoever as a concubine and bastard respectively.

Queen Sindeok's tragedy, the one that MCTNA fails to portray, is not that she was a concubine who tried to rise above her station (because she was not); it's that, due to the transition from Goryeo to Joseon, she found herself caught between two conflicting sets of laws:

(From Tombstones without a Tomb by Hildi Kang)

A queen while alive, and unjustly demoted to a concubine in death by Bang-won/King Taejong who used these legal changes and the new Confucian ruling to his advantage, her status was a matter of contention for scholars and kings alike for almost 300 years, until finally, in 1669, the scholar Song Si-yeol managed to amass enough people and put enough pressure on King Hyeonjong to make him give in to their demands and restore Queen Sindeok to her rightful status and honor as queen.

+ Bonus:

(From Tombstones without a Tomb by Hildi Kang)

Turns out that according to the new Confucian ruling, Bang-won himself should have been considered illegitimate too!! Surprise!!!

[usertoxicyaoi]

TWINS (2023). Opening Credits.

[gabrielokun]

[petitepatateuwu]

I've made it to the 8th season of ninjago and wtf???

Better animation, new haircut, new city, Lloyd's new voice, Garmadon is somehow back in the plot, and Cole actually has charachter developement?????

I have so much to think after two episodes, they got me really hyped for this one :D

[skitskatdacat63]

2009 Chinese Grand Prix - Parc Fermé - Sebastian Vettel & Mark Webber

[soullessjack]

he is so important to me

[boydykedevo]

not putting this in the tags cuz I don’t wanna spam lol but full set o7

Highly recommend staring at these for hours at a time while listening to music and pretending it matches the beat

[fideidefenswhore]

teenage dream (2023), olivia rodrigo / the spanish princess (2020) / the private lives of the tudors, tracy borman (2016) / the six queens of henry viii (2016) / the vaux passional / the six wives of henry viii (2001) / the lovers who changed history (2014) / blood, sex & royalty (2022) / blood, sex & royalty (2022), gif @fabledenigma / the cross (2014) 

[rraaarr]

GO2 Spoilers ahead! Honestly I love all the theories (coffee, lie, magic trick) and think they're fun, interesting, and thorough, and while I think people are definitely asking the right questions, I personally don't think the Metatron overtly threatened Aziraphale or altered his state of mind in any way.

(the magic trick theory perhaps suggests that metatron just changed things to make Aziraphale more likely to say yes to him, but I don't know if I personally find that necessary)

There is Definitely Somethig Up with how Aziraphale retells his convo with the Metatron, but I really don't think it was an overt threat, esp not one to Crowley

(I think an overt threat to Crowley wouldve seen Aziraphale try to signal to Crowley in some way, they're good at that. And a pretty different/more stubborn,angry reaction on Azis part)

I could def be proven wrong next season, but Aziraphale seems Genuinely excited about the prospect of being Angels together with Crowley in Heaven and wanting that is 99.99% within his character.

Reasons I'm about to get into, but it isn't ONLY that it is within his character to want this, but it's also within his character:

To want to Check with Crowley First

Like, we see Aziraphale Check in with Crowkey before even TALKING to the Metatron. He isn't going to turn down an offer of Angelic Status on Crowley's behalf Without Asking

Like, yes of course Aziraphale is Excited, he Wants Crowley to say yes, there may have even been a disagreement or arguement if Crowley had said "oh you can tell them my answer is a resounding no."Like they may have still had the same convo bc Aziraphale hadn't been prepared for a No answer. (Ppl do this all the time, ask a genuine question then getting upset when the answer is no)

But ppl, I think Aziraphale was Attempting to Ask Crowley for their opinion, for what they wanted because Aziraphale never actually at any point tells Metatron "Yes" (or no)

I think being Angels with Crowley in a Heaven Aziraphale feels he can control ticks so many boxes of what he wants.

It lets Aziraphale:

Be together with Crowley in a way that is Safe for them both (his favorite thing)

It lets Aziraphale Do good and Help the Humans (his other favorite thing)---this may be a post for another time, but BOTH Azi and Crowley seem genuinely concerned for the souls and well being of the Humans they interact with that aren't, you know, freaking nazis. We see this with both Elspeth And Sitis (Crowley stops her from cursing God)

It lets Aziraphale give Crowley something back that he feels was taken away from Crowley unfairly (and in turn restore his sense of balance with the universe)

It lets Aziraphale be sure there won't be another Armageddon

It lets Aziraphale repay a debt i think he may feel he owes Crowley

It could even let Aziraphale help other angels he sees as like himself, hat he has something in common with like Muriel

And Aziraphale can always pop back down to earth when he likes

Like there are so many reasons for Aziraphale to think this is a good idea.

And those reasons are Not Even ALL wrong

The problem is Crowley doesnt Want to, for good reason, and Aziraphale will probably have less power than he thinks

Aziraphale Wanted to be able to say Yes

And he Might have said no to the Metatron if he'd just Asked Crowley with clear words on Crowleys opinion instead of just assuming and then being too shocked and hurt by Crowleys judgement and refusal to even be like "well I didn't answer dear, I wanted to check with you first. "

All that being said, I DO think Metatron subtly threatened Aziraphale, enough where Aziraphale still cared about safety, didn't forget that he and Crowley were unsafe, that Metatron reminded him in subtle ways of all the info that could be used against them Both, all while seeming a friend. I think the Or Death was implied, but I don't think Aziraphale quite caught on cognitively but instinctively (see reason number 1)

Metatron went for an obvious carrot and a subtle stick.

[coachbeards]

nobody liked beard in that office lmaooooooooooooo