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enbylesbianism · 3 years

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ANY WAY THE WIND BLOWS: Simon Snow trilogy wrapped! (review)

Hi, there! It took me a while to finish this post, as I could talk about it for... a long time (not necessarily a good thing), but I got it! I like praise, so if anyone wants to tell me I did a good job... Also, I might edit this post later on. I don’t remember anything else I’d like to add, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I did after posting. My brain does not obey me. Anyways, off to it! By the way, I won’t give this book a real rating.

While this is a review on Any Way the Wind Blows, I intend on analysing some points of the overall series too. The book starts where Wayward Son left off, the end of the road trip, Simon and Baz having problems in their relationship, Penelope helping Shepard with his curse... and the whole situation of the NowNext vampires. Rainbow Rowell only seems to remember the first part. That leaves us with the second book of the series ignored almost completely, with the exception of Simon and Baz’s feelings as well as Shepard’s existence.

Don’t get me wrong, aspects of the book are mentioned, but never in a truly important way. Lamb, the Vampire King, is mentioned by Simon, but only focusing on his and Baz’s relationship, never about the fact that there are a bunch of vampires (supposedly ‘evil’) in the U.S. but I guess what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, right? I could count on one hand the times the NowNext vampires were mentioned (like, literally, this isn’t an exaggeration, I looked up ‘NowNext’ on the e-book and only got five results), all of them either being one of them considering telling someone else about it, then not following through with it, or dismissing it as a concern for Lamb. Which makes the plot of Wayward Son completely useless for the trilogy. Now, that wouldn’t matter as much if everything else had been properly developed, but we definitely can’t say that.

We are introduced to a brand new, poorly developed villain, Smith-Smith Richards, whose character arc is as ridiculous as his name. He’s one of the fake Chosen Ones that started appearing after the events of Carry On (and the only one to be mentioned and/or defeated, for that matter). It becomes clear that presenting as Simon Snow-ish is part of his brand, especially when Baz describes him as looking like the Netflix adaptation version of Simon, and that he was raised and guided by his uncle, who’s just... there. I don’t think it would’ve been hard to make him manipulating Smith-Smith into believing he’s the prophetic savior of the Magickal World, which would not only make both of their characters more interesting, but it could also serve as a parallel of Simon’s relationship with the Mage. Richards also has some special powers such as increasing a mage’s magic for a limited amount of time, but taking it away afterwards, as well as making someone immune from spells. It’s worth saying those aren’t skills that are usual in the Magickal World, or else there wouldn’t be so much confusion and shock from people (specially Baz and Penny, who would definitely have heard of something like this before), but we get no explanation on why or how Richard has them.

Then, we have the Salisbury’s. We, as readers, already know Lucy and Davy are Simon’s parents, making Ruth his grandmother. It’s noticeable that Rowell builds up to that discovery, by making Simon get along with Ruth instantly, him thinking about Lucy a lot etc. It makes us excited to read the part where they actually figure it out, to know how Simon would deal with that, him dealing with the fact that he’s the Mage’s son and the fact that, technically, he killed his father. I suppose that’s the point, but actually getting to that part was incredibly underwhelming. The way they discovered about Simon—being able to lift a family sword—hadn’t been mentioned or hinted at before. One would’ve expected Simon, who’s particularly interested in swords as it’s mentioned many times throughout the series, to notice a freaking Excalibur at the Salisbury’s place before.

And speaking of noticing things: when it’s finally revealed that Simon is Lucy’s son and the Mage’s heir, Baz pointed out the uncanny similarities between his boyfriend and the deceased Watford principal. “Those narrow eyes. That tilt of his head. I thought... I thought he’d learned it. Was imitating it.” + “Merlin, Simon, you even look like him.” (Any Way the Wind Blows, chapter 86) Simon was the Mage’s protégé for years and I assume the Magickal authorities knew that he was the one to inherit all of his money and personal belongings, but no one, in the whole British Magickal community, thought about them being related? I refuse to believe there were no conspiracy theorist teachers at Watford or that Mitali or even the Pitch’s alongside everyone who was against the Mage didn’t at least check to know if there was something behind those characteristics. Baz literally said (chapter 88), “I think it’s undeniable. I’d cast ‘Flesh and blood’ on them, but it would bounce right off of Snow (...)”, so there is a spell for that. Plus, we didn’t even have one whole chapter of Simon dealing with this information! The chapters (no more than five, out of ninety-one) were divided between Simon, Baz and Lady Ruth’s POVs. He’s the main character, so one would think he’d get more development.

Another point that felt rushed was the romance. While Simon and Baz’s relationship wasn’t, as it’s been a topic Rowell has explored for three books (we’re not counting Fangirl here, as their ‘participation’ on it was minor and their personalities weren’t as consistent as in the trilogy. Not that it is that consistent there), the others just felt like she wanted everyone to finish the trilogy with a pair. I’ll start with Shepard and Penny. There were fans who liked them together before Any Way the Wind Blows, but it wasn’t hinted at—it was more like a fandom thing. I personally like them as a couple, but it could have had development and, maybe, foreshadowing in Wayward Son. I mean, they did fight monsters during a huge part of a road trip together.

The next one I’ll talk about is Agatha and Niamh. I love them, don’t get me wrong. Actually, it’s precisely because I love them that I wish they’d gotten a better treatment. Niamh wasn’t introduced before Any Way the Wind Blows. I get why she wasn’t introduced in Carry On—it was interesting to see a character who wasn’t caught up in Simon and Baz’s drama during the school years—but a hint of her existence could’ve been left in Wayward Son. Agatha is an important character on it, and a mention of her father training an aspiring veterinary could’ve fit somewhere, as a hint, maybe. (Also, Lucy, the dog, being absolutely forgotten during this book when a lot of Agatha’s time is spent in a veterinary clinic...) Besides, we could get the vibes from them, but after they kissed, there was barely any content. We didn’t get them calling each other ‘girlfriend’ (or if they even like that label at this point), or the aftermath of the kiss, or a POV from Niamh. Or Niamh appearing the epilogue? If Agatha was taking care of the goats, I’m sure Niamh would have a part in that too. Still on Agatha’s character, but not on Niamh’s, it felt like Rainbow Rowell was setting up for aromantic and asexual Agatha, specially because of this quote: “It was like she'd pulled the feeling right out of my heart. I could have kissed her. (I still wish sometimes that I wanted to.) (That would feel like an answer to... the question of me. Then I could say, 'Oh, thats who I am. That's why I've been so confused.')” (Wayward Son, chapter 4).

And I was leaving the best (I need to be sure everyone knows I mean this sarcastically) of the romance topic for the end: Fiona and Nicodemus. It’s just... so forced and undeveloped. Not even because, to me, they’re both gay as hell. There was just... such a lack of development! I don’t think we had any interaction between the both of them before Any Way the Wind Blows. There was no foreshadowing or why would Fiona, a vampire hunter from a family of vampire hunters, would marry... a vampire! I’d already find it weird to see fanfiction of them as a crackship, but it’s canon?! Like, canon as in they’re going to get married and use Fiona and Natasha’s mother’s ring? Seriously, nothing will take from me that this is a lavender marriage (as I’ve already discussed with my best friend, which inspired this post of theirs.)

I’d also like to speak about a topic that’d been hinted throughout the series, especially post-Carry On, which is the criticism towards the Magickal Community in the U.K.. That criticism is very much embodied in Shepard’s character. It’s explicitly said that the British mages have some kind of supremacy towards other supernatural beings, such as vampires for example, gatekeeping literal magic. Up until relatively recently, mages with weak links with magic couldn’t attend Watford (and that’s a major plot point in the final book) and there’s a denial towards any other kind of magic except the ones that are part of their craft. Even within the Magickal community itself, there are more important families that are more likely to succeed, like Natasha receiving criticism for marrying Malcolm, as a Pitch. It felt pointless not to tackle the issues you’ve set up yourself in your own universe. Penelope has very strict morals related to magickal law and beliefs, something that she could’ve deconstructed, especially considering Shepard, her love interest, symbolises that. Another point related to that is, the trilogy is very clearly heavily inspired by Harry Potter, where many of those points are very clear (e.g. wizard supremacy in relation to other species, such as werewolves and domestic elves and the status quo that makes some traditionally magical families more influential than others, like the Malfoy’s vs. the Weasley’s), so it’s not an easily forgettable concept.

The series also had a lot of inconsistencies. The one I’ve seen talked about more often is Simon and Agatha’s... intimacy status, let’s call it that. Simon’s whole thing in the first book was that he struggled controlling his magic when experiencing intense emotions, which makes it hard to believe that he managed to have sex withount an... accident. Besides that, though, there’s this quote, “She (...) presses a kiss into my temple. No one has ever kissed me there. No one has ever kissed me anywhere but on my mouth” (Carry On, Chapter 27), but in Any Way the Wind Blows, when Simon’s about to have his wings cut, Agatha says, “It’s a strange feeling to look at someone’s chest and know it’s nothing to do with you anymore, but still to remember kissing every inch.” (Chapter 14)

So, we have established that Rainbow Rowell’s work, both character and plot driven, is flawed. “But we got the characters interacting for the closure of the series, at least!” Well... we got interactions between the canon romantic relationships, yeah. But besides that, we didn’t get much. There were no interactions between Agatha and Penny, or Shepard with Simon and Baz. Or Penny and her mother figuring stuff out. Or literally anyone with a therapist. And not gonna lie, the interaction we got between Baz and Dev was underwhelming, to say the least. Niall is nowhere to be seen, too.

Rainbow Rowell’s writing is beautiful: she writes poetic lines that make the book seem perfect at first glance, if you don’t think about it for too long. Her words are very shiny, but once you get use to that light and see what’s behind them, what’s between one shiny quote and another, it has so many flaws and plot holes that it reads like a first draft. There are many concepts in there that are genuinely good: the rest of the trilogy focused on the protagonist dealing with the trauma of being a child soldier instead of being entirely an adventure, Simon being unlabelled, a fake Chosen One that gives mages fake hope... Those are all good ideas, but so poorly explored that, despite being an entire book/trilogy, it still feels like a writing pitch or something among those lines.

I felt iffy about other things during my reading of the series, but they aren’t exactly plot points, so I’ll just list them below:

Mitali, Penny’s mom, including ‘discovering your bisexuality’ as a mid-life crisis thing

As I’ve seen people talking about biphobia/bi erasure in the books, I’ll be including this post that features both unlabelled and bisexual individuals talking about the topic (it isn’t my place, as a lesbian, to talk about this, that’s why I decided not to do so.)

Romanticising of Baz’s suicide (a.k.a. chapter 61) in the first book. If you’re not in a good place mentally, like I was when I first read Carry On, I hope you know that a kiss or romance doesn’t help any mental illness you or others might have. Don’t let anyone use your guilt to manipulate you. Paraphrasing Alice Oseman in their graphic novel Heartstopper, love can’t cure a mental illness.

Any Way the Wind Blows was... very horny. I can’t point out how this makes the book bad exactly, but it wasn’t something I enjoyed. One of Rainbow Rowell’s strongest skills is that her quotes, when loose, are good. They tend to be poetic and just beautiful, overall. But in the... explicit scenes, these skills were barely used, and I felt like I was reading NSFW tweets off of someone’s private account on Twitter. Besides, the first two books of the series weren’t written like that, so the change was very sudden.

The older people could’ve been more explored. Penelope and Mitali’s relationship and how similar the both of them are compared to each other, Daphne and Professor Bunce’s insecurities and why they believed in Smith-Smith, Fiona, Nico, and Ebb... Also, the Mage and Lucy. We could’ve had more on them, y’know.

The pop culture references. They made the book read even more like Twitter’s feed. Honestly, if I wanted to read prompts and nice ship content alongside memes from Twitter with some horny thoughts sprinkled all around, I would’ve opened the Twitter app. Or Tumblr, Instagram, whatever.

The POV switching felt lazy to me at times. It’s nice to know how different characters are experiencing that situation, yes, but sometimes, like during the discovery that Simon is a Salisbury, it read as if Rowell wanted to create tension, but couldn’t think of any other way to do it except the switching around.

Narrative wise, I think Simon and Baz should’ve spent more time broken up.

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aizawaslovebot · 4 years

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NOW PLAYING: the ex factor by iwaizumi hajime

—reader pronouns: he/him

—warnings: curse words ; had to be cut into two parts bec i want it that way ><

—summary: desperate times mean desperate measures, and y/n l/n is definitely the embodiment of desperate. eager to make his ex jealous for reasons undisclosed (read as: he's just petty), he asks his long-time best friend, iwaizumi hajime, to pretend as his boyfriend.

—note: the second part will be out in 3 days! VERY SORRY FOR THE VERY LONG WAIT UHU

TAGLIST: OPEN ; send an ask to be added even if you've already sent an ask back then!! because all that i could recall is @ohmygodronnie2020 and @beyond-the-mxxn

<- the sweetheart playlist | part i | part ii ->

Iwaizumi Hajime should’ve trusted his gut when it went crazy at the sight of you, Y/N L/N, whose eyes held a very mischievous glint that Iwa hated. He also should’ve turned you down immediately the moment you opened your mouth. Iwa definitely should’ve reprimanded you for roping him into this stupid plan.

Sadly, all he’s doing is crying over spilt milk.

He could remember it like it was yesterday. Years of dealing with Shittykawa meant that he knew when bullshit was about to happen. He thought going to California meant finally meeting someone who isn't an idiot on the daily. You were his contradiction. You were his idiot— basically like Shittykawa’s younger, much more mischievous brother.

Honestly, did Iwaizumi only attract idiots?

On the days you aren’t going on and on and on about why the government should be overthrown or why the both of you should buy a frog table for your shared dorm, he found you to be a nice guy. The people Iwa has met always had a hidden layer to them and you were one of them. Shittykawa was one too. Though Iwa wishes he didn’t introduce the both of you to each other— you become an unstoppable ball of everything annoying when you talk to each other.

But I digress. Iwa isn’t here to cry over why he only had chaos for best friends. Iwa is here because you, Y/N L/N, while you happened to be Iwa’s contradiction for all things he considered his norm, had asked him a very big favor.

“No,” Iwaizumi grunts, regretting even entertaining the male’s request. He could see your (h/c) hair bob as you groan out of frustration. Unbeknownst to the male, you were mulling over using what has to be Iwa’s biggest weakness: your very adorable puppy eyes.

“Iwa-chaaaan,” You sniff, putting on doe-eyes for Iwa to see, “I really want to make him jealous.”

Iwa sighs, subtly turning away so he didn’t have to see the tear-stained cheeks and the glossy eyes. The poor male was about to speak, pointing out that you had been influenced by Oikawa with the damn nickname, but he was cut off.

“He hurt me a lot, y’know?” You started to well up, for real this time, “I just wanted revenge…”

Iwa sighs again but he noticeably softens, opening his arms to let you cry while he hugs you. As you wept, you accepted his gesture and immediately let yourself be engulfed in your best friend’s arms. “You’ve yet to tell me why you two broke up, dumbass,” Iwa chided, though it was lighthearted.

“Zumi, is this your backhanded way of saying yes?” You asked, but your voice was muffled by his chest.

Iwa sighs for the nth time that day as he finally resigns to his fate, “Yes.”

That encounter was a week ago. You gave Iwaizumi enough time to prepare and regret his life choices. Honestly, he should’ve predicted that his idiot timed things perfectly so that your stupid plan would take place on the university-wide party the following week. Iwa could proudly say that most of his predictions were accurate and on point. Then again, his predictions were futile anyway— the best example could be his judgement on your then-boyfriend, Akuma Azamuku.

The brunette could clearly remember how he was able to discern more than enough red flags from just meeting the god forsaken guy. It was annoying how blind you could be when you’re heads over heels in love with the wrong people. Were you not really able to see how toxic this… Akuma guy is? Terrible name too, might he add. Iwaizumi would rather you date him than this devil spawn.

But he didn’t move a muscle. Iwaizumi didn’t move a muscle especially after that thought emerged from his head. What in Godzilla’s name was he thinking anyway?

Even if he could celebrate his on-point prediction on how much of an ass the spawn of Satan was, he couldn’t exactly bring himself to mock you with an angry ‘’I told you so!” Not when it meant that your damn ex-boyfriend cheated on you, covering it up by saying that he wasn’t actually gay. Not when it meant that you had been used. Not when it meant that you, his idiot, were hurt. His idiot was hurt.

“You’re being a martyr again, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa tutted through the phone, tactlessly commenting once the brunette finished relaying what was going on.

The male snorted, “What are you on, this time, Shittykawa?”

“Don’t turn this on me, you idiot.”

How the hell was Iwaizumi the idiot? No. He’s lived with idiots his entire life but he wasn’t one. If anything, both of his friends were the idiots. Not him.

“Selflessly complying with dear (N/N)’s outrageous request, regardless of how much it hurts you. Tsk, Iwaizumi Hajime. You’re one big idiot,” Oikawa sighed.

Iwaizumi scoffs at his friend’s claim, “Why the hell will helping him out hurt me? Shittykawa, did you leave your single brain cell in Miyagi?” The brunette growls, annoyed at the way Oikawa avoided giving him the straight answer.

“Iwa-chan,” Iwaizumi’s breath hitches as he hears the next words, “you’re in love with (N/N), aren’t you?”

Iwaizumi Hajime was, in fact, an idiot.

He was an idiot for realizing it much later than wanted; for allowing Shittykawa, of all people, to know this one fact before him; and for opening an avenue for bigger wounds because all he wanted was to help his best friend. He probably had to be the biggest idiot among the three— and that’s saying a lot… like more than a lot.

The soon-to-be trainer could hear his pro best friend sigh in response to his stunned silence. Iwa concludes that it was weird to be on the receiving end of a tired sigh but he doesn’t utter a word. Not even after Oikawa begins to speak again. “I can’t even bring myself to tease you tonight… or today… or whatever time it is there, Iwa-chan. What will you do now?”

Iwaizumi wasn’t the type to let himself get involved in petty things like this nor does he let himself go against judgement. That is, if you weren't in the question. The brunette was very sure that you were his contradiction— unknowingly forcing him to go against all the boundaries Iwa had set and done. You, also a trainer in the making, could easily be the death of Iwaizumi Hajime. But if it’s you, then he’d gladly embrace this death.

“I’m going.”

Those two words were a lot harder to say than the tired male liked to admit. So as he ends the dreadful phone call with Oikawa, he secretly hopes that next week will never come.

Even if Iwaizumi tried his hardest to deny, next week actually came. Not that it was a surprise. No one could stop the turning of time, the rotation of the Earth, nor the ticking of the clock. How the hell would he even stop next week from coming? Heck, Iwaizumi couldn’t even stop you from this stupid revenge quest that you had set.

Pretend to be his boyfriend, you said. It would be easy to do anyway, you said. We’ll be in and out in a jiffy, you said.

To hell with all the lies that you had promised. It was beyond Iwaizumi’s skills and strength to pretend to be someone you romantically loved when he actually wanted it to be true. The Aoba Johsai Iwaizumi would’ve dipped; Iwaizumi from last year would’ve never pushed through. But here he is, standing in front of the mirror in your shared dorm, preparing to do what he deemed an impossible feat.

You will always be Iwaizumi Hajime’s contradiction. And at this point, he isn’t sure whether it was a good or a bad thing. All Iwa knows is that this will soon end and like the way next week came, tomorrow will soon be today.

So all Iwaizumi could do is psych himself up to do impossible— the same way he had convinced himself he was an ace in volleyball or the same way he gave himself assurance with his college application— and push through with the plan.

I can do this. I’m Iwaizumi Hajime, former volleyball ace and soon, an athletic trainer. I’ve dealt with Shittykawa all my life. I was able to get into a college in California by myself. This should be easy. I can do this.

“Should I wear this, ‘zumi?” You call out from the bathroom, holding two slightly different tops for Iwa to see. The way the brunette spluttered at the sight of a half-naked you was embarrassing to say the least, but Iwaizumi was thankful that you had been too engrossed to even notice the reddening of his ears. ‘God damn it, Hajime. Half-naked Y/N isn’t new,’ he chastised himself mentally as he coughs. “Use the darker one,” was Iwaizumi’s curt reply.

I can do this.

You should not have lit up at his answer like that. The sight gave Iwaizumi more joy than he liked to admit. Nothing could ever top what you said next though.

I c-can do this...

“Oh! This one matches yours too! We look good together, huh?”

I cannot do this.

“Idiot,” Iwaizumi sighs to mask his flustered state, “just shut up and wear it already.” You only laugh in response, already used to Iwaizumi’s brash way of dealing with things. “Alright, puddin’. Just wait. You can’t rush art,” You reply sarcastically, using the other nickname that Iwa had begun to dread.

Iwa resorts to the comfort of his phone— or rather, he uses the phone to conceal the undying pink on his cheeks so you wouldn’t see. Maybe if he spared a minute before he did so, he would’ve seen that you were equally flustered; seemingly embarrassed to have said what you had in their conversation. But it is what it is, and Iwaizumi has to continue his emotional constipation without ever knowing that had ever happened.

You take Iwa’s hand in yours before you lead Iwa out of your dorm and to wherever the god forsaken party was. “What’s with the skinship?” Iwa asks, though the way he adjusts the grip so it would be comfortable didn’t go unnoticed. Maybe he had started to like the prospect of this whole fake dating fiasco because it let him taste of what could’ve been instead of just wondering how it felt.

“Nothing you’re not used to, puddin’. And uh… uh… this way we could look like an actual couple,” You stammer and avoid eye contact, your hand still in Iwa’s warmth though.

If Iwaizumi hadn’t been too distracted, too haunted by the reminder that this was just pretend, then he would’ve noticed that you had seemed unsure, seemed too engrossed in the feeling of your hands together that you weren’t able to make a great excuse. He once again resigns to what has been destined. “The Y/N L/N I know doesn’t do things half-assed,” Iwa claims as he drops their hands, “By that logic this should be okay right? So people would really think we’re together.”

‘It isn’t okay,’ You croak internally. Iwa decided to go against all things normal by doing this… this very compromising position that ensured the two of you looked like nothing else but a couple. Iwa decided, despite not knowing how much damage it would bring to your poor heart, to wrap an arm around your waist.

Unknown to the soon-to-be trainer, you were just as, if not more, smitten with him as Iwa was with you. You almost revealed the reason behind your bad break-up and even let Iwa see that he had this much of an effect on you. So this, to see Iwa be so into the role of his pretend boyfriend, both flustered and somehow hurt you.

You didn’t know why it hurt though.

“You okay there, dumbass? ” Iwa asks, getting too close to your face and being far too concerned than your heart could’ve handled.

Everything about this was confusing. Both of your minds were having their own storms as the both of you stumbled upon this new, confusing field in between friendship and romance. Closeness with Iwa wasn’t new to you at all. Him lightly calling you dumb wasn’t new at all. So why, in God’s name, did your ribcage feel like breaking apart from the very loud beating of your heart?

If Iwa had to ask himself the same question he asked you, he would’ve gotten a big ‘NO’ from himself. Initiating skinship to this extent made Iwa’s brain malfunction. Not only that, but the feeling of your waist was very much heavenly and mind-boggling. To put a cherry on top of the sundae called “Iwaizumi Hajime’s gay panicking,” the speechless and cute expression you had was too much for his heart.

Turns out that you would answer the same as Iwa, not that the brunette knew though.

This plan of yours started on the right course. Your dick of an ex did cheat on you and you wanted to make him regret ever even thinking of using you as a scapegoat from his problems. It was common sense to ask for the aid of your best friend, right? He, of all people, would know you and understand you best. So when did your fake dating extravaganza take its turn? At what point did this plan converge into something different?

In other words, did you still want to make your ex jealous? Or did you want to see how it would feel to date your best friend?

Time did not let you answer the many questions that formed in your pretty head. Before either of you knew it, you’ve arrived at the party.

You turn to look at Iwa, who was somehow already gazing at you with that intense fire in his eyes, and nod.

It’s showtime.

—reblogging helps a lot !! thank you for reading !!

#the sweetheart playlist #iwaizumi hajime x male reader #iwaizumi hajime x reader #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu x male reader #iwaizumi hajime #iwa x you #iwa x reader #fluff #fake dating au #friends to lovers trope #male reader #x male reader

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whenisitenoughtrees · 4 years

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Congrats on 500 followers!!!!! Your writing is amazing and you totally deserve it! Would you be able to do “Can you please stop biting your lip…it’s distracting.” for analogical? If you don’t get inspo for it that’s totally fine I’m just on a total analogical kick recently lol

@wisherbystarlight thank you!! i absolutely love analogical so here you go

Title: abject impermanence

Word Count: 3,570

Content Warnings: implied suicidal ideation (in reference to virgil ducking out), negative self image

(fic masterpost)

Virgil would rather die than admit this to anybody, but he develops a crush on Logan after their first debate.

It’s ridiculous, and bothersome, and stupidly humiliating, and he has to spend a few days in his room before he feels prepared enough to face anyone again, prepared enough to put up his usual walls and throw around his usual sarcastic comments, and all the while, his heart is beating far too fast, his mind racing, insisting that he’s being obvious, that everyone knows.

(That is what being Anxiety means: he is under a microscope all the time, his every movement watched and analyzed and derided, alone in a crowd of people who wish him nothing but ill.)

It’s awful, really. Is he truly so pathetic that the first time someone treats him like his opinions are valid, he falls head over heels for them? Because he has to admit, that’s the root of all of this. The debate, and the fact that even though Logan didn’t agree with him, he still treated him with respect, like he was someone worth listening to, and none of the light sides have ever acted like that before.

And they’ve certainly never told him that they don’t mind his company.

So. He has a crush on Logan. And it takes him a few weeks to calm down enough to really think about it, but when he does, he decides that nothing has to change. It’s not like he’ll ever work up the courage to act on these feelings

(because holy shit, how badly would that go? He can picture it now: Logan sneering at him, Logan rejecting him, Logan informing him that he would never in a million years have feelings for someone so irrational and useless, and while Virgil is at it, would he kindly remove himself from his presence and never come back and— well. Maybe Virgil is irrational, but he can’t bring himself to risk something like that)

so the only thing to do with them is pretend they’re not there, right? He’ll keep all of his emotions right here, in his chest, and then one day, he’ll die, and no one else has to know a thing about it.

He doesn’t see what could possibly go wrong with this plan. Which is odd for him because usually, he can only see the things that could go wrong. But the only factor in this plan is him, and his own ability to disguise his feelings, and he’s been successfully doing that for a very long time.

(After all, it’s been years, and none of the others have managed to figure out how much their rejection hurts him, how deeply it strikes at the heart he pretends not to have.)

But he doesn’t anticipate things changing. He doesn’t anticipate trying to duck out, at least, not until the moments in between making the decision and actually going through with it, and he doesn’t anticipate anybody coming after him. He certainly doesn’t anticipate their reactions, doesn’t anticipate being told that he’s important,

(because since fucking when?)

and doesn’t anticipate their acceptance.

He doesn’t anticipate telling them his name.

And alright, maybe he could deal with all of this. Maybe he could ease his way into being one of them, edge his way into their inner circle. It’s something he once would have thought impossible, but now, they seem determined to make him one of them, to bring him into their family, and even though part of him wonders whether they’re just trying to make sure he doesn’t duck out again, doesn’t hurt Thomas, a larger part of him is ecstatic about the fact that they’re including him at all. Maybe he can let himself have this, for once.

But that night, Logan comes to his room.

“Do you have a moment to talk?” he asks, and reluctantly, Virgil takes off his headphones.

Because, yes. Of course. He’s hardly busy, and even if he were, he’s certain he’d figure out a way to put it aside in favor of Logan, because really, he’s helpless to do anything else.

“Yeah, sure,” he says, aiming for casual. He thinks he makes it, if only because he is very practiced in hiding how much of a mess he is internally. “What’s up?”

Logan looks uncomfortable, a bit shifty, even though he hasn’t been in his room nearly long enough for its effects to take hold.

“I merely wanted to check in with you after today’s events,” he says, and then pauses, biting his lip, something that Virgil finds incredibly distracting. “Specifically, to ensure that you are alright.”

He blinks. “Of course I’m alright,” he says. “Why wouldn’t I be alright?”

“Well, I was considering everything that happened, and it occurred to me that we glossed over precisely what ‘ducking out’ would have done to you in the long term.” In an oddly vehement motion, Logan shoves his glasses further up his nose. And Virgil knows very well that as the embodiment of Logic, Logan tries not to display his stronger emotions, but right now, he is the perfect picture of distress. “I find it likely that if Thomas had been unable to utilize you for an extended amount of time, you may have… disappeared, for lack of a better word, not unlike a muscle that atrophies after disuse.”

Well, yes. He knew what he was risking. But he’d felt low enough that he didn’t particularly care about himself.

He was just tired of hurting Thomas.

(And maybe, just maybe, if there was a part of him, small and insidious in the back of his brain, that found the prospect of nothingness appealing, he’ll keep that to himself.)

“I mean, yeah,” he says. “But that didn’t happen. You guys came and got me, and I’m okay now. Not gonna do anything like that again, I swear.”

“That’s not my point,” Logan says, even more upset entering his voice. He crosses his arms, holding his shoulders tensely. “No matter how illogical it might seem, I find myself wondering what might have happened had we not attempted to reach you in time, and the idea is… displeasing.”

Oh.

Despite himself, Virgil’s heart flutters.

“So, I arrived at the conclusion that assuring myself of your continued well-being would help to assuage my concern.” Logan fidgets. “As well as the fact that… I want you to be alright. For yourself, and not just because I am…”

“Anxious?” Virgil can’t resist finishing, even as he feels his face flushing underneath his foundation. God, he hopes Logan doesn’t pick up on that. He shouldn’t be reacting this strongly to something as simple as basic worry, especially after the day they all had, but to know that Logan has been thinking about him? That Logan doesn’t like the idea of him not being around, doesn’t want him to vanish?

That Logan cares enough to come check on him like this?

It’s a strong, heady feeling, and Virgil has the sneaking suspicion that his crush has just upgraded itself.

“Yes,” Logan answers, and he seems a bit embarrassed, but he holds his ground, staring Virgil straight (gay) in the eyes. The direct eye contact is intense, almost too much for him to handle, but Virgil finds himself unable to look away.

“Well, uh, I appreciate it, I guess,” he manages. “Really, it’s nice to know that you care.”

“Of course,” Logan says, and seems almost indignant at the idea that he might not. “I value our discussions,” he adds, and Virgil has to pretend that that statement doesn’t almost give him a heart attack.

But that is mostly the end of that conversation, because really, neither of them is very good with touchy-feely emotions. Logan sinks back out shortly after, and Virgil is left alone in his room, his headphones lying uselessly on his lap as his mind reviews their exchange over and over again, searching for all the places where it might have gone wrong, or where he might have messed up. He can’t really find any, and that is a realization in and of itself, almost enough to distract him from the bigger one, the one that looms over him.

It’s not just a crush anymore. He could try to deny it, but he thinks that would summon unwanted attention. So he accepts it, accepts that he is… he’d say infatuated, but infatuated isn’t the right word. Infatuated doesn’t even begin to cover what he feels when he looks at Logan, doesn’t cover the way his heart races and his words trip over themselves and the way he longs for his approval. It doesn’t cover the way he knows so many little details about him, like the way Logan pushes at his glasses or fiddles with his tie when he’s nervous or upset, or the exact way his lips curl around the edges when he’s pleased and trying not to show it. So many little details, none of which would be on his radar at all if he wasn’t—

Well. He won’t deny it. But he doesn’t particularly see the need to voice it, either.

After all, it’s not like it changes anything. Or at least, it shouldn’t. He wasn’t planning on sharing his feelings when they were a simple crush, and he’s certainly not going to share them now that there’s more.

Except, nothing is ever that simple,

(Nothing ever can be, with him. It’s what he does best, turning easy things into overcomplicated messes because he can’t let go of all the what ifs—)

because suddenly, he’s welcome to spend time with the others. Is welcome at their table, is welcome in the commons, is welcome to join their movie nights and their game nights, and most of the time, he even feels mostly okay with doing so, because Patton is enthusiastic in his invitations, and he can tell that even Roman is honestly trying. And sometimes, it makes him want to cry, because this is all he’s ever wanted, to be one of them, and now he can and it’s almost too much.

The only problem with that is that he’s spending a lot more time around Logan.

Which is fine. Great, even.

Except, sometimes, Logan will do things. Little things, inconsequential things, but things that remind Virgil all too clearly of the feelings he keeps nestled under his heart.

For instance, Logan bites his lip a lot. When he’s working, when he’s watching movies, when he’s listening to the others, and sometimes for no reason at all. It’s a stupid thing to get caught up on, but he can’t help himself. And it’s not as if Virgil’s attraction to him begins or ends with the physical, but—

Whenever he does it, Virgil can’t stop his eyes from zeroing in on his lips. Can’t stop himself from thinking about how much he would like to kiss him.

He would like to kiss him a whole lot. And he’s fairly sure he’s being pretty obvious about it, but he can’t bring himself to stop.

So, really, he should have prepared himself for the possibility of being found out. Under any other circumstance, he would have, but there’s a saying, he thinks, about love and fools.

“Can I help you with something?” Logan says, and Virgil flinches violently, the rest of the world coming back into focus. He snaps his gaze up to meet Logan’s eyes, and the expression on his face might be amusement, maybe, but it could also be annoyance, and in fact, it’s probably definitely annoyance, because actually Logan is annoyed with Virgil and maybe even angry and now their budding friendship is completely ruined and all because Virgil doesn’t know better than to stare when he really shouldn’t be staring and—

No, stop. Stop. He’s not going to do that, not right now. He wrests his thoughts back under control with an effort.

Logan was working, typing away on his laptop, biting his lip as he concentrated. And Virgil just so happened to be out in the commons as well, in the perfect position to watch him and daydream, just a bit.

He needs to reply. He’s left it too long, and Logan’s eyebrows are inching up his face as he awaits a response. And the longer he takes to come up with something, the more suspicious Logan will be, so he should just shrug, mutter a denial, and pointedly turn his attention away. Something like that.

But it’s his job to make snap decisions under pressure. And sometimes those decisions aren’t the right ones.

So instead of taking another second to think things through and deflect Logan’s interest, his mouth opens ahead of his brain and says, “Can you please stop biting your lip?”

Logan stares. Virgil feels himself wilting.

“… It’s distracting,” he finishes weakly, and prays for the ground to swallow him whole. He can’t even manage to sink out

(because his mind is screaming at him now, screaming horrified recriminations, screaming all of the worst case scenarios, and it’s taking all of his concentration to breathe properly, much less get out of here)

because the sheer force of his embarrassment is leaving him paralyzed, curled up in his chair and with nowhere to go, nowhere to escape Logan’s widening eyes.

“Is it now,” Logan says, and he doesn’t sound particularly angry, but Virgil could very easily be wrong. Or, he could be angry and trying to hide it. Or maybe he’s not angry, but irritation would probably be just as bad, at this point.

“Sorry,” he mutters, hunching in on himself. “Nevermind, forget I said anything.”

“Virgil, you’re magnifying,” Logan says softly, and that softness is worse than any anger could be, because what if he’s figured it out? What if he pities him? Virgil would take just about anything over pity. “Whatever you think you just said, I assure you that it didn’t come off nearly as badly as you seem to believe.” He pauses, tilting his head. “Though, I can’t say I’m certain of what you meant, considering—”

He cuts off suddenly, and Virgil can practically see the cogs turning in his head. He should leave now, leave before Logan draws his conclusions, but he is frozen, powerless to do anything but let this train wreck happen in real time.

“I wouldn’t ordinarily consider biting my lip to be a disruptive habit,” Logan says slowly. “It makes no noise and does no one any harm, and it’s not something I would think affects anyone else. But you were staring, which means there is something about the habit that draws your attention. I can only think of a few reasons for that.”

He takes it back. Pity would be far better than this, than this slow and measured reasoning, drawing out all of Virgil’s best-kept secrets, spiraling toward a conclusion that he never wanted anyone to know, much less Logan himself.

Perhaps that is why he says what he says. Because with this, Logan is only prolonging the inevitable, and it’s torture.

It’s like a band-aid. The biggest band-aid ever, maybe, covering one of the worst wounds of his life, but a band-aid. And it’s coming off one way or another, so he might as well rip it off now and brace himself for the sting.

“Oh my god,” he says. “It makes me want to kiss you. That’s why it’s distracting. And I’m just gonna go die in a hole now, if that’s alright.”

His face is burning, mortification rising up in him like a tidal wave, threatening to swamp him. This is, possibly, the worst thing that has ever happened to him, ever.

(It’s not, of course, because anything and everything is better than it was before he was accepted, when he was on his own and so lonely and bitter all the time. But this comes close, he thinks. It’s a different kind of hurt altogether, but a hurt nonetheless.)

Logan sets his laptop down, giving him his full attention. For a moment, he is completely silent, and Virgil prepares himself to stand and sink out and into his room, where he will spend the next few weeks huddled under the covers on his bed with his headphones on blast, hating his life and himself for being such an idiot, because here he is, ruining one of the best friendships that he has ever known, and for what? Because he was too much of a moron to keep himself from staring, from forcing his unwanted attentions upon the one side who was more likely than any of the others to notice what he was doing? It’s pathetic, and stupid, and he knows it, and Logan knows it, and—

“I don’t see why you need to do that,” Logan says. His voice shakes, just slightly. “You could kiss me, if you wanted.”

Virgil stills. He can’t have heard that right.

Logan clears his throat. “That is to say, I would enjoy it, if you kissed me. If I’d realized you were interested, I would have broached the topic sooner.”

Hysterical laughter threatens to escape him, his brain dissolving into static, because what? And he knows he needs to say something, needs to respond, but his vocal cords refuse to work, so he’s left sitting there, staring, stricken dumb.

Logan glances away, something like uncertainty crossing his face. “I apologize,” he murmurs. “I’m not doing this right, am I?”

And that is what finally spurs Virgil to action, because Logan sounds so terribly dejected, and that is absolutely not allowed. Not when it’s Virgil that’s made such a mess of things, when none of it is Logan’s fault at all.

“Do you mean it?” he croaks.

Logan blinks, his expression clearing, and then landing on comprehension. His face softens, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he stands, crossing the floor and kneeling in front of where Virgil sits.

“Of course I do,” he says, and then reaches out with one hand, cupping Virgil’s cheek. Virgil’s breath catches, the contact shooting lightning across his face and down his spine. His heart starts beating faster, and he doesn’t know whether it’s fear or anticipation or some mixture of the two. Most of him still hasn’t processed that this is happening, hasn’t made the jump from Logan can never know about my feelings because he’ll reject me and then I’ll have no choice but to jump off a cliff to Logan knows about my feelings and he is doing the exact opposite of rejecting me hoooooly shit what do I do—

“I think about you often,” Logan says. “Ever since our first debate, if I’m being completely honest.”

Virgil blinks.

The laugh escapes him, then, but there’s not much hysteria in it. It’s something warm, now, something bright and colorful and blooming as he realizes just how much of an idiot he’s been, as his anxiety slowly begins to fade away,

(not completely, never completely, because he is who he is and that will never change, and his mind is already looking to the future, at all the fresh new opportunities he is going to have to screw this up, but for now, in this moment, he has Logan here in front of him, offering to kiss him, telling him that his feelings aren’t as one-sided as he convinced himself they had to be, and it’s very difficult to be negative at all, in the face of such a beautiful thing as this, as him)

morphing into something that he is tentatively willing to call hope.

“Yeah?” he says. “Me too.”

Before he can lose his nerve, he shifts position, leans down, and kisses Logan. Lightly, briefly, and it’s really more of a peck than anything else, but in the split second in which their lips meet, Virgil can feel just how soft Logan’s are, and when he pulls back, anxiously searching for a reaction, Logan’s cheeks are dusted with red.

“Yes, um,” Logan says. “That was… good. Would you like to do it again?”

A wave of fondness washes over him, and he lets it drag him away.

“You dork,” he says, and pecks him on the lips again. He doesn’t yet have to courage to try for more, but he thinks that might come with time. If he is allowed time, if he is allowed this, and he is not prone to optimism, but for once, he might be willing to give it a go.

Optimism, and whatever this is, new and exciting and budding between them. And there is a part of his mind that is screaming at him, insisting that he’s only going to hurt Logan or get hurt himself, and that no brief happiness could ever be worth that, but—

Logan’s lips are gentle and soft, and Logan is smiling at him, and that, he thinks, might be worth the world.

(“I would be extremely displeased if you died in a hole,” Logan informs him a bit later. “Please refrain from doing so.”

He agrees, if only because of that fact that if he died in a hole, he would never get to kiss Logan ever again. And now that he’s started, he doesn’t ever want to stop.

He is not one to believe in permanence. Or in happy endings. But just this once, he’ll try it, and trust that Logan will catch him if he falls.)

General Taglist: @just-perhaps @the-real-comically-insane @jerrysicle-tree @glitchybina @psodtqueer @mrbubbajones @snek-boii @severelylackinginquality @aceawkwardunicorn @gayerplease @elizabutgayer @dwbh888 @thatoneloudowl @sanderssides-angst @gayboopnoodle @wildfire5157 @a-ghostlight-for-roman @ldavmp4

#analogical #virgil sanders #ts virgil #logan sanders #ts logan #my fic #long post #cat does prompts #wisherbystarlight

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bloody-f4g · 4 years

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i actually kind of like whatever’s happening with adiray.

if i were writing it, yes, gray would still be alive, BUT, given that he is dead, I don’t think it’s the immediate bury your gays we all thought it might be, and a good thing?

the trans experience is full of loss. loss of your past identity and the trimmings that come with it, and for many people loss of others in their life because they’re trans. being trans is loss of nights spent worrying about who you are and those around you. loss of many experiences, memories you feel you cannot truly relive or share because they represent someone you wish you didn’t appear as or embody. the same goes for being queer in general: loss of expectations, life no longer fitting into the heteronormative timeline, loss of friends and family members. and the queer community as a whole is still overshadowed by the effects of the aids pandemic.

on the other hand, the trans experience is full of joy. joy at finally finding yourself, joy at finding others like yourself, joy at love, joy at transition (gender euphoria is imho just as important to the trans experience than gender dysphoria, if not more so -- and you don’t need dysphoria to be trans). joy in the face of loss, as an act of defiance. joy that a lot of trans and queer people don’t get to experience.

I don’t think that being queer is fundamentally an experience of loss, but rather one of underlying joy that is often overshadowed by the loss associated with it within our society. in the futuristic utopia of star trek i hope the inherent ideas of loss shouldn't be associated with queerness, but these ideas of loss are still so closely tied to queerness in our own world that it is very much in the vein of science fiction and star trek specificially

so. star trek: so far in discovery we have five canonical queer characters, three of which (jett, paul and adira) have had their partner die soon after (or before) we were introduced to them. In both Paul and Adira’s cases, we get to see them grieve, with attempts to reconnect and attempts to reconcile this loss.

I don’t think that this truly fits the model of the “bury your gays” trope. That trope relies on the Hayes’ Code’s standard that queer characters should be shown to suffer or otherwise be reprimanded for “indecent behavior.” Although the partners of these queer characters do die, we see their grieving and reconciliation, as well as a return (in some form) of hugh and gray. The queer characters’ narratives aren’t defined by loss: they are fleshed out characters whose queerness isn’t shown as a progenitor of loss. The loss isn’t a way to shove away their characters, but rather a way to show development in the face of loss.

I think this development in the face of loss is actually defiance of the trope of killing off queer characters as a way of punishing them. Queer joy in the face of loss is an act of rebellion.

I mentioned the aids pandemic earlier and this needs expansion: the queer community is used to experiencing profound loss, and the idea of Hugh and Gray “coming back” from the dead because of Paul/Adira in some extent is really interesting. because it underlies an idea that the love and bonds between the characters reaches past death. the queer community’s strength is so much created by death and loss; bringing back Hugh and Gray is an acknowledgement of that history and understanding that in the future, we don’t need that loss to have that strength.

i don’t think it was intentional by the writers, but i think there’s some element of queer liberation to existing in a relationship outside of expectations in society

I really have no idea where Adiray will go. Will Gray stay as a ghost? Will the rest of the crew know about him? Will he be treated as Adira’s quirky head rooomate or as a living breathing character with hopes and fears? But I have hope it could be a strong statement about the power of love and queer strength in the face of loss.

Also: all five of these characters being open (we know that Gray and Adira will be explicitly trans later in the season via an interview with Blu) is honestly a really good step forward and yes, i know that fact isn’t that much, but it gives me a lot of hope. i wish i had that kind of representation when I was first coming out.

((this is just my pov, and other queer people are totally valid in their take on this, please add on if you have any thoughts))

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gascon-en-exil · 3 years

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Dark Deity Pre-Release Character Opinions

This isn't actually a tier list, but someone helpfully created a template for this game and it's as good a way as any to do a little visual showcase for this cast. Characters are listed by their class sets, which are fixed but offer a nice variety in terms of promotion options. My opinions on each are as follows, from left to right in each row. Most characters have introductory profiles written up on the DD subreddit, if you'd like to check them out yourself.

Warriors

Alexa

You know those buff female blacksmiths in Echoes and Three Houses that some people wish were playable characters? That's pretty much Alexa. Can't say I'm too hyped about her myself, but warrior + tomboyish female character will do that for me...or not do it, I suppose.

Benji

Seems to have been written to become a meme, and I still can't decide whether that's clever or stupid. Kind of like Raphael only with a bigger emphasis on training than on eating, and with brotherly devotion replaced with brotherly angst that might theoretically go somewhere if the character isn't reduced to being a goofy joke all the time.

Fenton

Doesn't have a character profile, so as far as I know he's just a generic dwarf because DD swaps out its inspiration's loli dragons and other vaguely fetishistic shapeshifters for the two most cliché non-human races in Western fantasy. I wonder whether his VA will voice him with a Scottish accent, to go all in on the (ironic?) laziness. There are a handful of elves in the playable cast, but Fenton is the only dwarf so for better or worse he's representing.

Helena

She's the embodiment of the FE exotic swordswoman archetype, but curiously DD seems to have turned that broad ethnic brush inward. Helena's last name is apparently a Japanese verb, her art shows her with a spear (as in the association of the naginata with women), and she studied and trained in a monastery that seems to blend elements of Buddhism and Shintoism. Not sure how all that fits into the larger setting yet, but at this point she's still got more background development than Petra.

Irving

Our Hero, the one front and center on the cover art. He sounds a bit on the blander side as far as lords or lord equivalents go, with his most promising hook for me being his established friendship with Garrick (see the ranger section). At best I can hope for a bit of a romantic friendship dynamic, although they sound a bit rougher overall as they're military academy schoolmates I wonder why DD went with that instead of lordlings of different territories.

Rogues

Brooke

Looks like Camilla; has a backstory like Niles. Cleavage aside though the sexual element of both is toned down here, and there might be some sapphic bodyguard shenanigans to be had as her current employers are a pair of highborn sisters further down this list.

Cia

For some reason she reminds me of Tressa from Octopath Traveler, only bustier and a bartender rather than a merchant. She's still just a small town girl with big city dreams, and this being a tactical war game following those dreams will inevitably involve stabbing people.

Corvan

Hard to judge him at the moment, as his profile was only the second written and so isn't terribly detailed. He's a moon elf with scholarly interests, apparently. Still, as of right now he's the only rogue who doesn't slot loosely into either a ninja/assassin or pirate aesthetic, so that's kind of neat. Also, he's one of several characters to have FEH-esque beach fanart made of them already, so clearly someone's into elf twinks.

Ford

A former officer at the military academy Irving attends and a smuggler who dotes on his niece, Ford has major dad energy. Per developer reveals he's also bi, and as I mentioned before I'm totally fine with that. More bear sex, please - but what guy in this cast would hop in the sack with Ford? Only time will tell. His personal skill makes him extra dodgy, which combined with the mug of booze in his art makes me think of WoW brewmasters who dodge-tank through the power of being wasted.

Wren

Like Brooke, he's an assassin from a foreign nation - in his case the same one as Helena so presumably he's a not!Japanese ninja. I'm not really feeling him at the moment. What is it about Hao'Fen (the city/territory he and Helena come from) and massive families? That comes up in both their backstories.

Rangers

Caius

I feel like this is the third or fourth character to grow up in some slum or other; at least they've all been in different towns so far. The relative rarity of noble characters is certainly different from FE, but it reduces the political stakes which leaves me wondering a bit about the story. Anyway, Caius is a small town desert hunter who learned how to make arrows out of animal bones. How aerodynamic is bone, I wonder?

Garrick

Irving's BFF and seemingly the Hector to Irving's Eliwood, only with more flirting (his intro doesn't specify that Garrick is flirting with women, but I'm not going so far as to say that indicates anything). He's the academy headmaster's son, with a strained relationship with his father for some of that hotheaded lead tension. Notably, his VA is the one I'm most familiar with in this cast, as he's the voice of Revali from Breath of the Wild as well as love interests in two different erotic gay dating sims I've played. In other words, I know what this guy sounds like making awkwardly simulated sex noises...and I have no idea what to do with that information.

Maeve

She's a half-elf with a very storied background, so much so that it's all rather hard to follow her exploits when little of what's being described has been fully revealed yet. I'm expecting her to be a mid/lategame recruit, unless she's dropped in early on to reveal that (sun) elves exist or something.

Rose

Imagine if Bernadetta were a commoner, although we can only hope they'll be less screaming. Alternatively, Neimi without an obvious boyfriend. She won the beach contest so now she has official swimsuit art, which I guess makes her a top-tier waifu in the eyes of players who care about such things.

Sophia

A ranger in the "has animal companions" sense, although whether that will come into play mechanically aside from her personal skill - Butter the ferret can attack with her! - remains to be seen. Her preference for the company of animals is explained by a lack of social graces, so prepare for klutz-related humor. Of note to those interested in F/F is that her introduction specifically brings up her connection with Sloane (see the mage section) and how close the two of them are.

Clerics

Faust

Doesn't have a profile yet, so not much to go off other than his decidedly unhinged look. The cleric class set does feature some darker-flavored options, so presumably he's more naturally aligned with those. His VA was announced to be the YouTuber behind So This is Basically Fire Emblem and other similar videos, so I'm picturing a kooky and somewhat demented Henry type.

Lincoln

Also lacks a profile at time of writing...clerics get so little love. The Discord has identified him a bland blond paladin sort, but as we know from the likes of Perceval and especially Dimitri that doesn't necessarily mean he'll be boring (or not gay).

Maren

The soft-spoken healer type, and also a childhood friend of Garrick although her intro sibling-zones him but then this game is inspired by FE so who knows if that'll stick. She may have some interesting thoughts on the theology of the setting, as there seem to be several faiths and she's said to have a complicated relationship with her own. I will be utterly shocked if she's not either Irving or Garrick's eventual love interest.

Samara

One of two princesses of the country of Aramor, which appears to be loosely inspired by the Middle East. Heaven help us if the Khalidstans ever get wind of this game. Unfortunately aside from her bond with her older sister (in the mage section) and the knowledge that Brooke has been hired as their bodyguard there's not much to Samara at the moment. Hopefully the clerics all do some comparative theology in their bond conversations, and this isn't like Sacred Stones where none of the clergy characters from different countries ever compare notes. The succession crisis involving Samara and her sister vs. their less-loved cousin the king's son might be a major plot hook? It's still too early to tell.

Vesta

Much like Maeve her backstory has entirely too much going on to really follow at the moment. Basically she's a human who grew up in a sun elf city because Reasons (seriously, I don't know what they are) and was called to a clerical vocation and also something about taking a journey. Has an unfortunate case of silly boob armor, which unlike a certain other character probably won't be rectified this close to release.

Mages

Alden

Maren's precocious younger brother, also basically Ricken up to and including the comically oversized hat. As a unit he follows the tradition of Donnel, Mozu, and Cyril of having a personal skill that buffs his stat gains, so it's safe to say he's a growth unit. At least he'll probably join early.

Liberty

Comes with dead brother angst and a connection to the "aspects" system that will hopefully make more sense once I've played the game and know how it functions both mechanically and from a storytelling perspective. Otherwise she looks to be a busty older - as in, not a teenage - mage in the vein of Calill.

Monroe

Got the first ever character profile, so it's really short. He's the son of a duke and sounds like a bit of a snob, albeit one that can make explosions happen to back up his haughtiness. He's got some scarring around his eye that surely must come with a story. Someone also made featured fanart of him in Heroes summer banner style, so I guess he's got somebody horny already.

Sara

Samara's half-sister, with comparable fantasy Middle Eastern flavoring. Has an interest in discovering magical artifacts and being a just ruler in the event she winds up on the throne (so, almost definitely), and she and Samara travel around with the assassin Brooke as their bodyguard. There's maybe some lesbian possibilities there? Either way, Sara has enough development where I could see her as a major supporting character.

Sloane

Comes with a genuinely fascinating backstory involving manipulative double-crossing parents, an education in the cruelties and deceptions of social life (reflected in her personal skill), and disinheritance - and yet it's all likely to be overshadowed because she may go down as DD's equivalent to Fates's face-touching. Her initial art is even more revealing than Camilla's, and while the developers later gave her a more modest redesign after negative feedback I get the feeling that this controversy may live on. Her introduction mentions her hunting for both heirs and heiresses and she's now been linked to Sophia, so safe to say she's another confirmed bi character.

Adepts

While the other class sets are standard fantasy fare adepts require a bit more explanation. They have innate magical abilities and appear to be feared and distrusted most places in the setting. Functionally they remind me of adepts from the Golden Sun series, if anyone is familiar with those games. The classes in the adept group tend more toward physical/magical hybridization than those of other sets, so that will probably be their mechanical niche. Oh, and their default weapon type is lances, which is a plus in my book.

Aurima

Along with Caius and the royal sisters, he's another one from the desert nation of Aramor. An arena fighter who got touched by a god in what I assume was a non-sexual way and came out of it with a new appearance and adept powers. Also, he's confirmed to be over 40 - how often do you see that in games like this?

Bianca

Looks like a more carefree Mathilda from Echoes. She's a ranking officer in the Delian army which sounds like it'd sit uneasily with her adept powers. Her profile describes Lincoln as her close friend, which is still about the most we know about him at this point.

Elias

This guy's writing plays more into the fairly standard coding that comes with adept powers, as we know they manifested shortly before he was going to confess his feelings to a male paramour and afterwards he was forced to flee his homeland and wander the world. He also spent time among dwarves, so insert short bear jokes here? In the present he's attached to Cia in what seems to be a platonic way; maybe she's a fruit fly, or maybe she just likes having a friend who can light drunken assholes on fire? Elias is definitely into guys, but I would still be a little surprised if he turned out to be totally gay as that's such a rarity in these sorts of things.

Iris

Oof, another lengthy and rough backstory. Iris had better parents than Sloane, but she also had to deal with permanent facial scarring (hence the mask) after a bandit kidnapping and the stigma of manifesting as an adept pretty much eliminating the prospects of her making a good political marriage. Also, she and Elias both come from Neullais, which is prominently featured on the continental map on the DD subreddit but doesn't seem to come up all too often in backstories. I think it's a not!France? Hard to tell.

Thae'lanel

A World of Warcraft blood elf, flowing anime hair and apostrophe'd name and all. I like WoW so that's not terribly grating, but as he has no profile yet there's little else I can say. Thae'lanel is mentioned in Maeve's introduction as a member of a sun elf group called the Exiled, which I'm guessing is tied to his adept status in some way. He and Maeve form yet another adventurer/bodyguard duo.

#Dark Deity #Fire Emblem #Well it's sort of FE

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whitehotharlots · 4 years

Text

Previewing the 2024 Democrat Primary

Within a couple weeks of his being sworn in, just about every person on earth will wish Joe Biden was no longer president. Sure, the few surviving John B. Anderson voters will be thrilled to see 4 years of crushing austerity and half-assed attempts at Keynesian stimulus. But most people will begin dreaming about a brighter future.

Good news! The 2024 Democratic primary field is going to contain dozens of options. Bad news! They are all going to be disgusting piles of shit.

The “top tier”

While it’s too early to do any handicapping, these are the candidates the media will treat as having the most realistic chances of securing the nomination.

Kamala Harris

Kamala did not win a single primary delegate in 2020. This is because she dropped out before the first primary, and that was because no one likes her. She has no base beyond a few thousand of twitter’s most violent psychos. Her disingenuousness approaches John Edwards levels: any halfway incredulous person can see immediately beyond her bullshit. She has no principles whatsoever, and while that may be par for the course for Democrats, she lacks even the basic politician’s ability to intuit anything that might, hypothetically, constitute a principle.

Even better: she is an awful public speaker. She sounds like how a talking dog would speak if he were just caught stealing people food off the kitchen table. She communicates in weird grunts and faux sassy squeaks, which is how she imagines real black women sound like, but something about her is unable to sell the bit. She begins her sentences in halfhearted AAVE, stops and panics halfway through as she realizes that maybe this sounds fake and offensive, and then reminds herself oh wait, no, this is okay since I’m black. This doesn’t happen once or twice per speech. This is how every single sentence sounds.

Kamala is like Nancy Pelosi in that no sketch show will ever impersonate her correctly, because anything that came close to authenticity would be considered far too cruel. This might benefit her in the primaries, as she exists in the minds of Democrats as someone and something she absolutely is not in reality. Nominating her would be like allowing your child’s imaginary friend to attempt to drive you to the store.

Andrew Cuomo

Easily one of the 50 worst people alive, Cuomo has a solid chance because Democrats, same as Republicans, are unable to differentiate between electability and self-serving ruthlessness. Cuomo used the deadliest public health crisis in American history as a pretext for cutting Medicaid and firing 5,000 MTA workers, and his approval rating increased. New York Dems are little piggies who love eating shit. If we assume that the political media will continue their habit of refusing to discuss the legislative history of right wing Democrats, Cuomo might well cruise to the nomination and then lose to literally any human being the GOP nominates by an historic margin.

Joe Biden

The party loves him because he is a right wing racist. “Progressives” tolerate him because black primary voters over 40 supported him, and their opinion is supposedly a magic window into god’s truth. Everyone else can tell he is manifestly senile. I don’t put it above the DNC to pick a candidate who is in horrible health, dying, or even dead--whatever the financial sector wants, they’ll get. But I would be shocked if his approval rating is above 39% by mid-2023, and by that point deep fake technology will be advanced enough they’ll put out a very lifelike video in which the Max Headroom version of Joe explains he’s proud of his accomplishments--that budget’s almost balanced already--but, man, I gotta abd--I gotta abdica--, uhh, I gotta, I, uhh, I gotta move down, man.

Wild Cards

These candidates would have all have a chance if they ran, but they could all much more easily retire to Little Saint James off of kickbacks they’ve gotten from Citibank and I.G. Farben.

Rahm Emanuel

Rahm is going to receive some hugely influential post in the Biden administration. Let’s say he becomes Secretary of Education. His signature achievement will be replacing all elementary school teachers with Amazon’s Alexa, which saved the taxpayers so much money we were able to quadruple the number of armed police officers we put into high schools. This will give him several thousand positive profiles on network news programs and the near-universal support of the Silicon Valley vampires who will own 99% of the country by the time Biden’s term ends. They will use their fancy mind control devices to convince geriatic primary voters that Rahm’s the one who will bring Decency back to the white house. His candidacy will be the paragon of wokeness, as expressing concern toward the fact that he covered up the police murder of a black guy will get you called a racist.

Rahm has a bonus in that Jewish men are now Schrodeniger’s PoC. When they are decent human beings, they are basic, cis white men who are stealing attention from disabled trans candidates of color. When they love austerity and apartheid, they become the most vulnerable people of color on earth and criticizing them in any way is genocide. No one will be able to mention a single thing Rahm has ever done or said without opening themselves to accusations of antisemitism, and that gives him a strong edge against the rest of the field. The good news is that an Emmanuel candidacy would result in over 50% of black voters choosing the GOP candidate--which, I guess that’s not really good but it would certainly be funny.

Gavin Newsom

Newsom is every bit as feckless as Cuomo, but he doesn’t put off the same “bad guy in an early Steven Segal movie” vibes. He will mention climate change 50 times per speech and no one will bother to mention how he keeps signing fracking contracts even though his state is now on fire 11 months of the year. If anything, this will be spun into an argument about how he’s actually the candidate best suited to handle all the water refugees gathering on the southern border. Look for his plan to curb emissions by 10% by the year 2150 to get high marks from Sierra Club nerds. He’s also a celebate librarian’s idea of what constitutes a handsome man, so he’ll have some support from the type of women who claim to hate all men.

Larry Summers

I mean, why not? Larry, like most members of the Obama administration, has politics that are eerily similar to those of Jordan Peterson. In normal circumstances, this makes a person a dangerous fascist who should not be platformed. But if that person has a D next to their name this makes them a realistic pragmatist who has what it takes to bring suburban bankers into our tent. If current trends in Woke Phrenology continue apace, Larry’s belief that women are inherently bad at STEM will be liberal orthodoxy by 2023, and his dedication to the Laffer Curve could see him rake in massive donations. Seriously, I’m not kidding: cultural liberalism is now fully dedicated to identity essentialism and balanced budgets. Larry is their ideal candidate. If he were black and/or a woman, I’d put him in the very top tier.

Jay Inslee

Unlike Newsom, Inslee’s attempt to crown himself the King of Global Warming won’t be immediately derailed, since his state is only on fire because of protestors. This, however, poses a different problem. He’s going to be a good test case for the Democrat’s uneasy peace with the ever increasing share of the electorate who become catatonic upon hearing a pronoun. On the one hand, you need to take their votes for granted. On the other hand, they’re not like black people or regular gays: most voters actively, consciously despise wokies, and associating yourself with them will ruin a campaign even in deep blue areas. There’s still gonna be riots in a year. Biden’s gonna announce the sale of all our nation’s potable water to the good folks at Nestle and some trans freak named Sasha-Malia DeBalzac is going to use that as an opportunity to sell their new pamphlet about how it’s fascist to not burn down small businesses. No matter what Inslee does in response, it’ll end his career.

AOC

I’m not one of those “AOC is a secret conservative” weirdos, but I am aware enough of basic reality to know she has zero chance of coming close to the nomination. The right and the center both regard her as a literal demon. The party is already blaming her for the fact that a handful of faceless Reagan acolytes failed to flip their suburban districts even though they ran on sensible pragmatic proposals like euthanizing the homeless. The recriminations will only get more unhinged when the Dems eat shit in the 2022 midterms. She will be a Russian, she will be white male, she will be a communist, she will be a homophobe: any insult or conspiracy theory you can name, MSNBC will spend hours discussing. Her house seat challenger will receive a record amount of support from the DNC in 2024 and it’ll be all she can do to remain in congress.

Larry Hogan

Don’t be dissuaded by the fact that he’s a Republican. Larry is the DNC’s ideal candidate: a physically repulsive conservative who owes his entire career to appealing to the most spiteful desires of suburban white people. He’s an open racist in a material sense--if you’re old-school enough to think racism is a matter of beliefs and actions, rather than the presence of cultural signifiers--but his is the beloved “never Trump” style of racism that Dems covet. He’s also a Proven Leader who thinks the role of government should be to finance the construction of investment property and give police the resources they need to run successful drug trafficking operations. Few people embody the Democrat worldview more than Larry.

The Losers Bracket

These people will have at least a small chance due solely to the fact that the Democrats love losing. They have lost in the past, and in the Democrat Mind that makes them especially qualified.

Joe Kennedy

The man looks like a mushroom-human hybrid from a JRPG. Trump proved that physical hideousness need not doom a presidential bid, but a candidate still needs some kind of charm or oratorical abilities or, god forbid, a decent platform. Joe aggressively lacks all of these things. A vanity campaign would be a good way to raise money and perhaps secure an MSNBC gig, so Joe might still run.

Mayor Pete

I am 100% convinced that Pete’s 2020 run was a CIA plot meant to prevent working class Americans from ever having a chance of living decent lives. I am also 100% aware that Democrats are dumb enough to enthusiastically support a CIA plot meant to prevent working class Americans from ever having a chance of living decent lives. If we have some sort of military or terror disaster between now and 2023 the Dems are sure to want a TROOP, and wait wait wait you’re telling me this one is a gay troop? Holy hell there’s no way that could lose!

Stacy Abrams

Never underestimate the power of white guilt. She lost the gubernatorial race to Gomer Pyle’s grandson, and her spiritual guidance of the Dems saw the party lose black voters in Georgia in 2020. Nonetheless, she is regarded as a magic font of fierceness within the DNC. She might stand a chance if she can establish herself as the most conservative non-white candidate in the field, but there’s going to be stiff competition for that honor.

Elizabeth Warren

Liz is probably angry that the party so shamelessly sold her out even after she was a good little girl and sabatoged Bernie’s campaign for them--yet another example of high ranking US government officials reneging on their promises to the Native American community. Smdh. The fact that this woman hasn’t been bankrupted a dozen times over by various Wallet Inspectors genuinely astounds me. So Liz is probably going to run again, and her campaign will be even sadder the second time around.

It might surprise you to hear this if you don’t work at a college or NGO, but Liz diehards actually do exist. She’ll get even less support this time because there will be no viable leftist in the field for her to spoil, but she’ll still hang in long enough to make sure the very worst possible candidate beats out the second worst possible candidate. Maybe she’ll fabricate a rape accusation against Sherrod Brown. Maybe she’ll spend her entire allotted debate time doing a land acknowledgment. With Liz, anything is possible--so long as it ends in failure.

Amy Klobuchar

Amy was the most bloodthirsty of the 2020 also rans. She will double down on the unpopular failures of the Biden administration, explaining that if you weren’t such a selfish idiot you’d love the higher social security retirement age and oh my god are so such a moron you think you shouldn’t go bankrupt to get a COVID vaccine? There’s a non-unsubstantial segment of the Democratic base that’s self-hating enough to find this appealing, but it won’t be enough to make her viable.

Martha Coakley

She lost Ted Kennedy’s senate seat to a retarded man who was pretending to be even more retarded than he actually was. Then she lost a gubernatorial race to a guy who openly promised Massachusetts voters that he would punish them for electing him. Her record of failure is unparalleled, making her perhaps the ideal Democrat standard bearer for the twenty twenties.

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beetlemancy · 4 years

Note

Anon again: Thank you!! I appreciate you taking the time to answer me because I am kind of active in the community but very very new. I did know your opinions but being new I just wanted to know whether those recent posts held any weight. I want to be socially responsible with my media consumption and I was worried there was something I was missing, given I have seen specific call outs for certain cast members (Travis, Laura, Sam, and Liam) recently. Thanks again!!

Anon pt2: you don’t have to post this but for context the call out posts were as follows: Travis actively supports the military, Laura voiced a black character?, Sam did brown face??, and Liam is fake woke/virtual signaling (or something along those lines). Obviously I can find out information about this for myself but I have seen more anti-CR stuff lately which prompted my ask.

As with everything, I suggest you do your own reading on those topics, and any topic that comes up in regards to the media you watch. Below is simply my opinion. Note: this gets long.

Travis does support the military - but not as an institution. He has family in the military. He supports the soldiers. He works with Operation Supply Drop and I’d encourage you to look into OSD specifically. Whether you agree with the idea that we should even have a military or not, you cannot deny that our veterans and soldiers are given the short end of the stick. We cannot just abandon them because helping them might be viewed as giving money to the military. I have so many military vets in my disability groups. The VA is awful because it has no funding (I know good people who work at the VA too, but they just cannot help everyone like they’d want to). Programs like OSD are genuinely helpful to a lot of hurting folk and the people who shit on Travis and CR for promoting and helping them out have clearly never actually sat down and talked to a vet or a soldier before.

Laura and many many other voice actors have voiced people of color in various shows. Yes, this is a legit problem. However, obviously as with most things, the problem is nuanced. The fault mainly lies with the VO industry as a whole, in that actors actually have very little control over what they do. There was a whole strike about this very topic (though the strike covered other issues in the industry as well). In the case of Laura, for instance, she was never told what her character would look like until after the fact. And that is super common in the industry. One of the things they tried to get in the strike was more transparency so that actors could make the decisions themselves whether to voice characters or not - not just based on race or culture but also based on type of work (stressful screaming vs chill dialogue) and whether the content of the game itself was something they wanted their name attached to.

Sam’s blackface scandal is extremely old news. That’s not to say it isn’t important to note, and in fact Sam made a point to note it again back in 2018. I know people who can’t watch CR because of it, even after his apology, and that’s fine because its not my place to judge others for how they react to that kind of thing. However I know a lot of people who read his apology and the circumstances surrounding it and decided to forgive. To some people, the fact that he was asked to do so by will.i.am changes the situation. To others, it doesn’t. To some the fact that he apologized and has clearly worked to improve his behavior matters, to others it doesn’t. You have to decide that for yourself. You can read Sam’s letter HERE.

Now. Regarding Liam. * sigh * I think, and again this is my opinion, that you cannot proclaim someone you do not know as ‘fake woke.’ I think there are parts of this fandom that have it out for Liam because of a whole bunch of gross reasons, many of which I’ve spoken about before. He is sensitive and a man - that makes people uncomfy. He plays a lot of women characters and tends to embody them in both personality and body language - that makes people uncomfy. He fully embraces the bi energy (this is not to say whether he himself is or not) - that makes a lot of people uncomfy (and angry). He loves theatre and loves to explore the human condition, warts and all - that makes people super uncomfy. Now. There are people who thinks he’s homophobic. Do you know why? Its because his bi character ended up with a woman instead of a man. That is biphobia, no matter how they twist it. Bi people being “allowed” to be bi and not ‘pick the right side’ in the LG (not BT, lets be real) community IS revolutionary because its so very hated.

Another reason they say he’s homophobic is because of the jokes he is often involved in - some gay men in the fandom believe that joking about sex is him ‘making fun’ of gay relationships. As a bi enby, I disagree, and I read many of the jokes he himself makes as the kind of humor I use among my own friends. I think there is a definite disconnect between bi vs LG humor and I’m not entirely sure who would be considered in the ‘right’ on that. However, when LG people in the fandom claim that he cannot talk about gay relationships because he is cishet? They cannot know that. That is an assumption they are making. When LG fans say that he alone is responsible for this issue and not -literally every single member of CR- ? I have to question whether its really the issue and not just that they still hate Liam for deigning to make a bi character bi instead of gay.

Another thing re: Liam. Aside from Marisha, he is the one I see the most hate about. People on Twitter and Tumblr both have legit uttered death threats about him if he doesn’t do exactly what they want his characters to do in the game. Usually this is about shipping. I have seen people claim that they WISH he was ‘like vic mignogna’ so they’d have a reason to hate him more. I’ve seen a certain group of people and one in particular say they have ‘dirt’ on him but refuse to say what the dirt is - and yet continually bring up that it exists, but that they just cannot say. Why would you incessantly bring up information you possess just to say that you cannot divulge such information?

Legit issues about CR that is attached to Liam is the whitewashing issue. Some say that only Liam is responsible here because he controls all the art. I would say that we actually don’t know that for sure. He is ‘Art Dad’ and clearly has some pull. I do think that CR should address this issue, but I’m not sure they can legally do what the fandom wants them to do, which is “call-out” artists by name and denounce them. Now, this too is more nuanced than the fandom makes out because its often way more about colorism vs whitewashing. Many people do not draw Beau as white, but they do draw her as much lighter skin tones than her original art. Colorism is a real problem, but white allies tend to go about talking about it wrong or making smaller things a bigger deal when POC would really rather talk about something more important to them. It was these same white allies that tore Mica Burton apart on Twitter because she liked and enjoyed a drawing of Reani, her own character, that was a few shades lighter than the drawing she herself had brought in, even after she had said that she appreciated the variety of skin tones due to seeing herself in each of them. On the topic of whitewashing/colorism in the fandom, I personally tend to wait to hear from POC over the masses of white allies.

The CR fandom is very big for a niche thing like DnD. As such, there are many many corners of the fandom that can get really jaded, really dark, and really up their own ass in regards to the discourse. There are legitimate issues in the fandom and with CR as a whole. Nothing is perfect, nothing ever will be perfect, and people should absolutely do what they can to do better and to ask their media to do better. That being said, there are also people who think that if you don’t do something exactly like they want, then you’re Problematic by default. There are also members of this fandom who have an active vendetta against certain cast members and will use any opportunity to co-opt legit issues in order to shore up their false arguments. These people are only using the real issues and it becomes clear pretty quickly that they don’t actually give a shit about the people they say they are trying to speak up for.

There is also some fandom drama that has occurred ONLY in fandom and has absolutely nothing to do with CR other than the fact that the people involved happen to be CR fans. Certain people in the fandom think that CR should arbitrate this issue and involve themselves, call out the individuals responsible, etc. This is, I believe, a GROSS misconception of what CR’s role is and asking way too much of a source of entertainment. The fact that CR has not involved themselves in this issue has led certain members of this fandom to claim that CR is homophobic. I would caution that most callouts of CR as homophobic are directly linked to this first issue, and also a callback to the Vaxleth drama from campaign one, and is incontrovertibly tied to bi and enby-phobia and a seriously sick misunderstanding of the responsibilities a show has versus the responsibility individuals have as viewers of said show.

That’s it for now. I could go way more in depth on this problems, but I’m tired of typing. Suffice it to say, its easy to make a list of things Problematic with CR, but once you actually delve into each topic hopefully you’ll realize how complicated and filled with nuance and Different Opinions going on back from the first episode of Campaign One... Listing problems without actually addressing them head-on isn’t a good way to deal with the problems that are true anyway, let alone tell them from the false ones.

#no fandom tags we die like passive aggressive chipmunks #Anonymous #cr discourse

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hiddendreamer67 · 5 years

Text

The Dragonfly Curse

Summary: Roman often gets hit with small curses by the Dragon Witch- little things being forced to speak only in rhyme or becoming incredibly clumsy for a day. He hides this from the others, as to him they’re punishment enough for his failures. They’re small measly problems- which makes this latest curse ironic in that he’s reduced to a four-inch tall dragonfly-winged fairy.

Words: 4,780

This is a commission piece for @i-will-physically-fight-you! Thank you again for commissioning me, this was so much fun to write. :) My commissions are open! More information available on my blog.

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Roman treaded through the forest, footsteps light as he fought to keep his presence unknown. Uneasily he twisted his wrist, the handle of his blade recognizing the familiar movements as he gave the sword a small twirl to calm his nerves. It grounded him, reminding him that even in this vast expanse Roman still had strength. A strength he had to wield if he intended to protect those he loved.

Imagination could be a fickle thing. Once upon a time, Thomas was young. His dreams were filled with puppy dogs and rainbows (the symbolism ever present in his gay subconscious), and Roman was happy to traverse the magical paradise that had appeared through a portal in his room. Back then it was a magical place, so full of laughter and cheer. Roman had always wished he could bring some of that wonderous joy into his own room so that he could let his fellow sides in on the fun.

Now, Roman’s greatest fear was exposing his family to this hell.

As Thomas had grown older, the Imagination had become overgrown with negative creations, a side effect of the dark sides no doubt. For far too long Roman had blamed Virgil for the shadow figures that now crept behind every tree, or the inky dark marshes that threatened to swallow unsuspecting villagers whole. Now Roman knew better; the horrible demons lurking around the Imagination had appeared on their own, independent of a single creator, instead representing something far darker than the embodiment of anxiety himself.

Roman chuckled darkly to himself. Maybe Virgil would be amusedly offended at the idea of something having a more terrifying aesthetic than his hundred layers of black eyeshadow. The image was nice to chuckle at, but Roman knew it would never be a reality. He couldn’t let Virgil, or anyone else he cared about for that matter, ever learn about these invaders. They were Roman’s problem alone, his burden to bear. Why else would the portal into Imagination only exist in his own room? Clearly this was his purpose as a knight- to protect those he loved, even from fear of danger itself. Ignorance was bliss, surely.

Of course, Roman was unable to hide everything from the sides, much as he wanted to remain covert. There were times when Roman would… lose. The Dragon Witch was a formidable opponent, much as Roman loathed to admit it, and she took pleasure in laying curses upon Roman for her amusement. These curses were hardly permanent but would carry into the mindscape. Perhaps this was the Dragon Witch’s way of trying to affect the world beyond this accursed land, knowing she herself could never get past the portal. Sending back a defeated and hexed Roman was the closest she could get to throwing something of her own into the mindscape.

Thankfully, these curses had never been particularly threatening to Roman’s physical form, just his pride. That only made them hurt worse in Roman’s mind. Was it not enough to be defeated in his own realm? Must she bruise his fragile ego? But in this way, she knew his weaknesses. Stabs wounds healed. The echoing laughter in his mind did not.

Roman thought back briefly, recounting some of her more memorable curses. One of the first had been upon his tongue, turning it a dull silver in mockery of the phrase ‘silver tongue’ and forcing the princely figure to only speak in rhymes. The others thought he was just being dramatic as ever, putting up with his antics as Roman attempted to compliment Patton’s cooking skills and ended up launching into an eloquent soliloquy about the talent of the heart to bring such “delectable, respectable, selectable treats to the table, how my dearest Patton have you proven yourself so able-“ and so the rhyming continued. Roman had even enjoyed that one, leaning into it to test his own feats of poetry. He challenged Logan to a rematch of their rap battle, this time proving himself a worthy opponent.

The Dragon Witch had been less than pleased when he returned the next week, whistling a nameless tune and declaring how “your devious plan backfired; I’m feeling rather inspired!” Perhaps it was his jesting that had earned him the next hex, cursing him to become unstable on his feet. Roman had spent the day tripping over himself, spilling water any time a cup was placed in his hands and falling flat on his face on more than one occasion. Roman could only play those instances off with the line “I’ve falling for you, my fairest Virgil!” so many times before it was clear that this behavior wasn’t going to end. Virgil told him to snap out of it, and Roman was forced to spend the rest of the evening in his room willing his boots to stop making a fool of him.

So the curses continued, slowly accumulating through the years to remind Roman of his failures. Each lasted only a day, gone by the time he woke the next day. Never the same curse- after all, being part of the Imagination, even the Dragon Witch had standards. Unoriginality wouldn’t stand. Normally Roman would appreciate this creativity, but used against him it was less than pleasant having to bravely face his punishments. Which is why Roman made it a point not to lose often.

Roman paused, his feet stopping atop the large carpet of leaves painted in beautiful golden hues. It would be a beautiful sight, if the stillness in the air did not make the hairs on the back of his neck stand so unpleasantly.

“I was almost thinking you would not show.” Roman spoke up, raising his voice. He kept his gaze straight ahead, giving no other indication he knew there was a trespasser amongst the woods. “Or rather, if you’re attempting to be sneaky, you need to work on your dramatics, you son of a birch.”

There was a giggling through the air, as though the trees found this insult particularly amusing. Roman thought they might, and he gave a small smirk, radiating the essence of a casual hero who was sure of his blade. Perhaps if he imagined himself as such, it would prove true.

“Son of a birch?” A tree, darker than the rest, appeared insulted off to the left a few more paces down the path. The foliage shifted, the tree shrinking and curling in on itself as a woman emerged from the wreckage. She looked annoyed, the atmosphere immediately darkening as she stepped forwards. “I was an aspen, you royal twig!”

“Well you’re certainly as-pain in my butt.” Roman retorted. The trees merely groaned at that one, a few of the younger saplings muttering amongst themselves as though trying to figure out what exactly he meant. Roman rolled his eyes. “Alright peanut gallery, I get it, not my best work.”

“Peanut gallery, now there’s an idea.” The Dragon Witch put a finger to her chin, as if considering an idea. “Perhaps when I beat you today I’ll turn you into a peanut plant. Or better yet, I’ll trap you in a peanut gallery comic, so you will be forced to watch everyone laugh at your antics.”

“I’ve already been a comic book character.” Roman groaned, pretending to be bored as he stretched out a crick in his neck. “And you did a strawberry bush only a month ago. Have you really run out of curses so soon? You seem a bit lost for inspiration. How about I do you a favor. After I kick your butt, you can spend the week thinking up better ideas.”

“You make me laugh, Prince Roman.” The Dragon Witch said, but her mouth was still a flat line. “But perhaps you should save the theatrics for your stage.”

“Gladly.” With no more fanfare, Roman charged, sword at the ready. He took a swipe at the Dragon Witch. Unsurprisingly, she disappeared in a cloud of dark smoke. Knowing this trick, Roman wasted no time in bringing his elbow reeling backwards, satisfied by the ‘oof!’ of pain that came as he painfully elbowed her in the stomach. Roman had no qualms against playing dirty against a girl, especially because gender is a social construct and she started it.

“Why, you little-!” Before she could wrap her claws around Roman the prince rolled to the side, coming up to face her head on again. The Dragon Witch growled, a ball of green flame appearing in her hand.

“You wouldn’t.” Roman squinted, trying to gauge how far his opponent would go.

“Oh, I would.” The Dragon Witch sneered, tossing the flame to the ground. Instantly the golden leaves began to catch fire, the flames spreading as quickly the entire scene became ablaze.

Roman’s eyes widened only momentarily before he began to frantically dash back down the path, the flames licking at his heels. He knew that the trees themselves would likely be protected, mere puppets designed by the Witch who wanted an audience (she always was one for theatrics), but everything else in this forest was fair game.

“You’re insane!” Roman yelped, shaking his leg briefly as his pants briefly caught fire. The Witch cackled at this, giving chase through the path as the green flickers did nothing to harm her. If anything, they curled around her ankles, hugging their creator gently.

“Liar liar, pants on fire!” The Dragon Witch seemed to only find humor in this scenario, grinning manically.

“What are you, twelve?” Roman huffed, his breathing becoming heaving as he fought to keep running. Why didn’t Thomas go to the gym more often? Probably due to Patton’s love of cookies. Even if Patton was a fluffball, at this particular moment Roman was wishing he could change a lot of the heart’s habits if only to gain a little more endurance for these aggravating chase scenes. When he got back to the Mindspace, Roman was certainly going to fill Thomas’ dreams with more eye candy muscled men in the hopes of inspiring him to exercise even once.

Too distracted by thoughts of shirtless men, Roman was oblivious to the branches reaching out for him until it was too late. The wooden limbs wrapped around him, forcing his sword to clatter to the ground as one of the tree spirits tugged him into a tight grip.

“No fair!” Roman pouted, watching the Dragon Witch approach with a devious smirk, her flames coming with her.

“What’s wrong, Prince Roman?” She feigned ignorance, lifting her hand to direct the flames to begin climbing the tree, getting closer and closer to his legs which were desperately trying to kick out of their way. “Come now, surely you haven’t been bested by a few candle flames and a tree? Get up, Prince Roman. Fight. Where’s that courageous hero who dared to march into myrealm just hours ago, dressed in regal colors and claiming ownership of a land he can never hope to control?”

“I YIELD!” Roman suddenly declared through gritted teeth, his knees tucked up to his chest as the fire licked at his boots. To declare himself unsuccessful hurt more than their burn, and as the flames disappeared Roman felt the own fire of determination dying in his heart.

It seemed recently it had burning out quicker with each battle, these losses slowly taking a toll on even his resolve.

“Aww, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” The Dragon Witch teased. Roman gave her a defiant glare.

“I already yielded, there’s no need to drag it out.” Roman huffed, slumping back in the tree’s embrace. “Just get it over with, do your thing. Give me your curse and I’ll be on my way. What will it be, the comic or the plant? Well? What are you waiting for?”

The Dragon Witch paused, her expression for once perfectly blank. “Why aren’t you afraid of me?”

“Why should I be?” Roman shrugged, feeling a bit proud that he could make her scowl even in her victory. A conversation was still a battle when it came to the Dragon Witch, and at least Roman could win this. “Your little curses are nuisances at best. Your strongest has only ever left me cowering under a blanket for a day. Just a day, nothing more. Nothing sticks. You can’t hurt me, not in any real way at least, because everything you do is temporary. Your magic is just little parlor tricks.”

“Little parlor tricks?!” She screeched and spat. “How dare you! You insufferable pest, you incompetent sprite, you infinitesimal thorn in my side!” The Dragon Witch’s eyes blazed with a fury unmated by any Roman had ever seen, and for the first time in forever Roman really did feel afraid. She struck her hand across his face, leaving a scorching mark with a familiar tingling feeling of magic.

“There.” The Dragon Witch hissed, letting the tree drop Roman into an unassuming pile on the ground. “How’s that for a parlor trick?” Without another word she spun on her heel and left. The fact that she didn’t stick around to watch her spell take effect was a sure sign that Roman had pissed her off more than usual, which likely didn’t bode well for whatever unfortunate hex had just been quite literally slapped upon him.

Roman groaned, his body feeling like it was collapsing in on itself as Roman curled up into a tight ball. A searing pain had begun just along his spine, and Roman heard the fabric of his shirt begin to tear. Rude; he was particularly fond of this ensemble. But even Princey couldn’t lament the ruination of his garments for long, instead letting out a gasp as another round of fiery discomfort shot through his back. Was this the curse? To be in misery for a day? It certainly made Roman regret being so mouthy.

Thankfully, the pain slowly began to ebb away, leaving only a dull ache in its wake. Roman felt as though something was laying across his back, and new nerves connected to these new appendages. Cautiously Roman opened his eyes, looking back for confirmation.

Wings- he had wings. Dragonfly wings, to be exact. It seemed the Dragon Witch was still just as fond of draconic irony as always.

“Well that’s not so bad.” Roman decided. Sure, they were painful to grow, and they would certainly be impossible to hide, but Roman had stayed in his room during a curse before. He gave them a cautious flutter, wincing as one wing smacked him in the face. Perhaps this would take a bit more practice.

Roman stood up, gaining his footing on the slippery leaf below him and prepping for a test flight. Wait… yes, that was leaf, singular. Roman stared down at his feet incredulously, not believing his eyes. That had to be a very large leaf, unless…

The princely figure let out a groan, looking up to see his suspicions were confirmed. The dark trees now loomed over him, appearing to be hundreds of feet tall. It wasn’t just wings, then. The witch had cursed Roman to become a fairy of all things, reduced to nothing but a poor copy of tinkerbell.

At this size, Roman was even more wary of Imagination land, picturing all the horrible creatures that could make quick work of him. He had to get back, now.

“Alright, faith and trust and all that jazz.” Roman psyched himself up, scrunching his face and giving his body a shake to let out his nerves. He focused on getting his wings to flap properly this time, nearly crying out in relief when his feet left the ground.

“Don’t look down.” Roman instructed himself, firmly keeping his gaze forward as he shot through the air, beginning to get the hang of flying as he dodged the various brambles. More than once Roman nearly went headfirst into a spiderweb, skidding to a stop at the last moment. Thankfully he reached the exit on the other side of the forest without becoming prey to any of the shadowy demons. He was relieved that the door still recognized his presence in this form, swinging open wide. Roman wouldn’t have been able to open it himself.

“…woah.” Roman floated inside, momentarily shocked by how unfamiliar his own bedroom looked at this size. He settled down onto his desk, thrown off by the way he had to look up to see the bristled tips of his paintbrushes. How odd.

A knock came at the door, so loud and intimidating that Roman nearly jumped out of his skin. “Kiddo?” Patton’s voice was clearly gentle, but still it rumbled with an unnatural quality. “Do you want to join us for lunch?”

“Ah, no thanks, Pat!” Roman called back, hoping his nerves weren’t heard in his voice.

There was silence, and then another knock. “Kiddo? You in there?”

Oh, of course- an impulse to hit his own forehead overcame Roman. If Patton’s voice was so loud, it only followed that Roman’s voice must be quiet in comparison. He’d have to commit if he wanted to be heard.

“NO THANKS!” Roman called again, this time cupping his hands to his mouth to be heard.

“Oh, okay!” Patton sounded relieved, if not a bit disappointed. Roman deflated slightly, knowing this was another consequence of the curse. He hated letting Patton down. “Well, uh, I’ll check in on you again later!”

He would, of course, the little puffball.

***

Roman tried not to let the knot of guilt twist in him too tight when Patton came back to ask at dinner, then again at breakfast, and a third time at lunch the next day.

This was the longest day of his life. Roman groaned, collapsing back onto his pillow. It only took a few moments for him to realize this was a terrible plan, nearly getting stuck as he sunk into the overly plush surface. Why wasn’t he back to normal yet? It had been 24 hours, hadn’t it?

Patton came back again at dinner. He was more insistent. Roman snapped at him, and it hurt.

What was he meant to do? Roman couldn’t sleep that second night, his wings beginning to twitch anxiously. A curse had never lasted this long before. Should he tell the others?

The new fairy quickly shook his head. No, he couldn’t do that. Going to them meant admitting defeat. He would have to come clean about his rivalry with the Dragon Witch, letting them know of all his countless failures. What would they think of him? What sort of creativity was he if he couldn’t do his one job of keeping Imagination in check? Roman had to protect his family, not the other way around. Besides, he could only imagine the jests he would receive in this form:

“It seems you are incapable of even performing your own tasks adequately-“

“You tried your best, Kiddo, but leave it up to the real sides next time-”

“What’s the matter, Princey? A little thing like you couldn’t possibly help-“

A knock on the door jolted Roman out of his thoughts, the fae rubbing at the wetness on his cheeks. When had he started crying?

“Roman?” That was Logan’s voice, so cool and calculating and pleasant in tone. “We have been sent to retrieve you for breakfast. Are you alright?”

Roman couldn’t even work up the energy to respond. He just let his head loll to the side. Sooner or later the others would learn to leave him alone. Maybe they’d even forget about him… if he was going to be stuck like this, it might be for the best. Roman was useless.

“I can feel the sulking from here.” A third voice muttered, Roman’s sensitive ears picking up Virgil’s annoyed tone. “I say we just break in.”

Roman quickly sat up. What? Them, here? No, they couldn’t see him like this! He flew into the air, eyes scanning for any place he could hide.

“I thought you were against barging into bedrooms?” Logan spoke.

“Nah, just my room. Call me a hypocrite.”

Roman panicked, hearing the doorknob begin to turn. Without hesitation he dashed out of sight, settling onto the top of his wardrobe. Just in time, too, as moments later his fellow sides came barging into the room.

“PRINCEY, GET UP!” Virgil’s volume made the tiny side cringe, Roman pressing his hands firmly to his ears. “…princey?”

“It appears he’s not here.” Logan sated, the two gazing at the bed with conflicting amounts of bewilderment.

“Yeah, thanks, Sherlock.” Virgil’s facial features had turned decidedly blank, trying to process what was right in front of him.

“You do not sound thankful.” Logan murmured.

Virgil ignored his quip, throwing the blanket off the bed. Of course, the entire thing still looked untouched. The anxious side began to run his hands through his hair, seeming conflicted before he rushed back to the door. “PATTON, GET UP HERE!”

There was a frantic pounding of footsteps, Patton clearly running up the stairs before he too appeared in the doorway. “What is it? Is Roman sick?”

“Sick in the head- he’s gone.” Despite his angry words, Virgil looked frantic, and Roman felt far more than a twinge of guilt.

“This is peculiar.” Logan frowned, a hand put to his chin. “The mindscape is only so large. It contains each of our respective spaces and one communal area. Thomas is asleep, so he’s not there, and none of us have seen Roman in over 48 hours. Where could he possibly have gone?”

“Uh…I have an idea.”

The other two sides looked where Patton was pointing, the door to Imagination still ajar.

No! Roman’s eyes widened with fear. The others couldn’t go in there, they’d be killed for sure! Roman had always lied about Imagination, treating it like a magical secret only for him so that they would never know the true misery he faced every day.

“Do you think his realm would grant us access?” Logan took a step closer, making Roman tense up. “I was under the impression that subconscious domains were only accessible by the primary side.”

“Well, the door’s open.” Patton shrugged. “It’s worth a shot, right?”

“Hold on a minute, Pat.” Virgil reached an arm out, grabbing Patton’s forearm. “I don’t like the look of this. Roman’s an idiot-“ Hey! “-but maybe there’s a reason we shouldn’t go in there. We don’t know what it’s like. Maybe we’ll get corrupted just like you guys do in my room.”

For once, Roman was relieved Dark and Brooding was always so cautious. Maybe his friends would be safe after all.

“Virgil, it’s Imagination.” Patton removed Virgil’s hand with a smile, crushing all Roman’s hopes and dreams. “It’s not going to hurt us! I bet it’s got cotton candy clouds and singing flowers and puppies everywhere. “

“I take it back, that’s much worse.” Virgil cringed, but he allowed Patton to take his hand and guide him forward.

“Assumptions will get us nowhere; there is only one way to know for certain.” Logan reached for the handle-

“WAIT!” Roman cried out, his voice shrill and high-pitched as three heads whirling around to meet his terrified expression. Roman gulped, still frightened of their reactions but knowing he had made the right decision. It was better they looked down on him forever if it meant they stayed safe.

Still, having three giants focused on him was nothing to sneeze at- even with all his pomp and circumstance, Roman found himself continuing to huddle against the top of the wardrobe, knowing the jig was up.

“…Roman?” Patton called out, his voice softer than it had ever been. “Is that you?”

Roman winced. “Yeah, it’s… it’s me.”

He was thankful for his high vantage point, but he knew that if the others wanted to get him down it would be an easy enough task. He might be able to fly, but there were three of them for goodness sakes. At this size, a butterfly net could overpower him.

Roman groaned at the imagery, trying to get these thoughts out of his head. Why was he so frightened of the people he loved? Sure they were bigger now- er, he was smaller now- but they still had to care a little bit for him… right? Logan wouldn’t really pin him to a board and Patton wouldn’t really squeeze the life out of him and wow these images really need to stop right now get a GRIP, Princey!

“Are you harmed?” Logan asked, his question surprising the creative side. Logan was often ignorant to other’s state of being.

“Just my pride.” Roman admitted.

Virgil quirked an eyebrow, but it lacked its usual sass. His expression was more shaken than it should be, and the emo looked paler than usual. “Care to tell us what’s going on?”

Not really. Roman wanted to say, but he knew it was too late to back out now.

“Will you come down from there, Kiddo?” Patton took a step forward, cupping his palms and looking ready to catch Roman. He gazed at those hands for a minute, contemplating the risk before he fluttered down to stand in Patton’s palms. This action earned a series of gasps as his wings had previously gone unnoticed.

“It was the Dragon Witch.” Roman admitted, rubbing at his arm self-consciously. “She cursed me to take this form.”

“So, you’ve just been hiding up here all alone?” Patton looked just about ready to cry. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“I didn’t want you all to think any lesser of me.” Roman ran a hand through his hair. “I know you all think of me as foolish already, and I thought- if you knew how much I failed, that would just be used against me as well. I’m not the protector I pretend to be. I’ve tried to hide this from you because look at me now! A few inches tall and wings on my back like some laughable child cartoon character. I couldn’t stand the mockery on top of everything else.”

“Roman, that is preposterous.” Logan said firmly, earning an elbow to the side from Virgil that didn’t stop the nerd from continuing. “Regardless of your current stature, you are a core element of Thomas’ personality. We require your input. We function best as a cohesive team. Sharing information about your own struggles will only better us as a unit because we will be better equipped to assist you.”

“The nerd’s right.” Virgil rubbed the back of his neck, looking guilty. “Jeez, Princey, I mean… I know we call each other names, but I don’t mean anything by it. I just thought that was our thing. I’m not gonna mock you when you’re clearly hurting, that’d just be cruel.”

“Failure is normal, kiddo.” Patton reached his thumb up, rubbing it comfortingly along Roman’s side. The sensation was strange, but not unpleasant. “Just because you failed once doesn’t mean you’re a failure.”

Roman winced. “Ah, actually, it’s… it’s more than once.” The words began to spill out of him, gaining momentum. “I lose to her so often, she always has the upper hand and it’s never the same curse and I keep hiding them from you but they only last a day and this one hasn’t stopped and I don’t know what to do and I’m going to be tiny and useless forever-“

“OY!” Virgil’s shout made Roman flinch again, and the anxious side had the decency to look sheepish. “…sorry. But you need to cut it out. Panicking is my thing.”

“Roman, it doesn’t matter if you’ve failed a hundred, trillion, billion times.” Patton corrected his wording.

“That’s not statistically possible.” Logan looked confused.

“You will never be a failure in our eyes.” Patton insisted. “You are brave, and kind, and lovable, and you bring so much to the table every single day. We couldn’t do it without you, Kiddo. And even at this size you’re the same amazing Prince we know and love. You’re just… a pocket prince now!”

“Roman, I admit that curses are not my area of expertise.” Logan adjusted his glasses. “But, I believe that with our efforts combined, there is certain to be a way to reverse these effects, especially given the knowledge the previous curses all took time to wear off.”

“Let us help you.” Virgil said, his tone bordering on pleading.

Roman looked around at his family. His fantastic, brilliant, amazing family. How could he have not trusted them with this? Of course they wouldn’t see him as lesser, just because of a small curse. His failures were not what defined him.

“Okay.” Roman agreed, feeling nearly overwhelmed with the love he had for them all.

701 notes · View notes

drunklander · 4 years

Text

Drunj!Der Yells About Outlander

Thoughts on Ep. 511

Ok so this episode is like the perfect embodiment of my love/hate relationship with the books. And the show, but since the author wrote it, the books too, and her writing/plotting in general. I hated the other episode she wrote so my expectations going into this were *rull* low.

This episode was like a series of character-driven vignettes, which is what I like most about her writing (and why I bother even sticking around): random scenes here and there that I really enjoy as standalone bits. But, in true Outlander fashion, it also like ticked a lot of the boxes for stuff plot-wise that I can’t stand. Namely, yet more violence against multiple women, Marsali and Fergus getting shortchanged, Lord John crossing just over the creepy line for a sec with Jamie and the situation with Ulysses’ legal status. It didn’t check the rape box, but we may have to revisit that next week. I sure as fuck hope we don’t have to, but seeing as this show never met a rape it didn’t think was ToTaLlY nEcEsSaRy to include... *preemptive sigh*

Show-wise this very much felt like a penultimate episode and in that respect it accomplished what it was supposed to. In the overall arc of the season though, much like when considering the whole book series, a few solid standalone scenes here and there do not equal a good whole. To be in this fandom is to be an expert in eating around the moldy parts of the bread to get a few nibbles of good stuff.

Anywho, SCIENCE!JIZZ 5EVA!

Fuck yeah PB&J, and Claire is forgiven for not mastering fluff yet. But fluffernutters are also a staple in any growing kid’s diet.

Poor burned girl. It’s not her fault she vaguely resembles a walker so I spent the whole time thinking about TWD.

Omfg I got like PTSD flashbacks when I saw that dress in the title card. KILL THAT DRESS WITH FIRE!

There may not be fluffernutters, but Bree and Claire fluff and Young Ian and Jemmy fluff are good substitutes.

This kid is adorbs tho.

They’ve been really blasé about mentioning time travel in front of folks this season. First Marsali and now Young Ian. The latter will be remedied, but I’m still lowkey annoyed that Fergus and Marsali aren’t brought into the circle of trust... Esp. when there was a perfect opportunity for it later on.

I cannot with men, tbh. Seeking justice for a daughter who’s been “dishonored” by killing the dude is like the most overused trope of toxic masculinity ever. And now we’re supposed to be all like oh look how relatable the Brown guy is! Because our tropey men wanted to kill a dude like that last week! Hard pass. Also, fucking his kid wasn’t raped, she loves a guy who happens to be married, but everything was super consensual. Sooo like double gross points for you, dude.

And yes, I know it’s ThE pAsT, but I am not in the past, I am in the present, and the show is airing in the present, so thinking this sort of behavior is gross is totes ok. So the fucked up squad of randos who always jump into my notes about how they like “their men to be men” can just shove it, ok? Ok.

They’re like really not subtle with the foreshadowing this episode are they. But then again, when has subtlety ever been a thing on this show. That’s a nice still you got there, shame if anything were to happen to it...

I’m really digging the decor in this living room.

Oh hey! They finally decided to stop pretending like Young Ian was dumb and didn’t notice literally *gestures* everything about Claire.

I’m still salty they never told Jenny and Ian in S3 tbh.

Shockingly, considering who wrote it, so much of this episode is directly from the books. So I’m sure the Cult of Herself folks will be obsessed. And like yeah, some of the stuff in this episode is some of the bits I really like from the books as individual little scenes. However! I know some in the cult will use this as a reason why the show should StAy TrUe To ThE bOoKs more. And please, for the love of fuck, fight that instinct. Parts of this episode aren’t good “because they’re from the book,” they’re good because they’re emotional moments between characters, which is where both the books and the show are strongest. “Sticking with the book” on everything would make an already not great show even worse. I mean, the show ain’t great, but thank fuck they’ve streamlined the book stuff as much as they have.

Yes, I did notice the Pamela easter egg from the book. No, I’m not one who gets excited about shit like that.

Aaand here we get the problematic af bit about Ulysses and his legal status. In the book, he was offered freedom and turned it down to stay with Jocasta. Which is twelve kinds of fucked up. Here, he *is* a free man and he chooses to stay and cosplay an enslaved person so he can chill with Jocasta? FUCK THAT NOISE. That is some “benevolent slave owner” bullshit. They don’t get overt with the Ulysses and Jocasta are banging stuff from the book, which is also epically fucked up considering the power dynamic and how a fuckton of men enslaved their own fucking kids because they’d raped the mothers and children take the status of the mother. I’m glad they didn’t come right out and say that. But it’s like lowkey implied and even if it’s not supposed to be taken as canon, having a Black man be given the option to get the fuck out of there and choose to stay with someone who enslaves other Black people is like some dangerous white fanfic nonsense.

Also, thinking about the slave/master relationship dynamic today really makes me wish I saw Jeremy O. Harris’ play while it was running...

Oh yay, Bree and Roger are actually leaving. Much like the Bonnet shit, credit where credit’s due, I’m glad they’re not dragging the will they/won’t they go out for another season.

Don’t sound so butthurt that you didn’t get to murder a guy, Jamie.

Poor Young Ian. Buddy needs a hug. And more screentime for his story. Like, do we really need something else traumatic to happen to Claire when we could explore family dynamics instead? This time with Young Ian and his wife and their Mohawk family?

THERE ARE SO MANY OTHER WAYS TO HAVE DRAMA AND CONFLICT THAT CAN TAKE UP THE RUNNING TIME OF A SEASON THAT DON’T INVOLVE CONSTANTLY PUTTING THE WOMEN IN PHYSICAL DANGER.

Lol at the thought of LJG “working the land.” Like, buddy, have you seen yourself?

“No doubt there a great many things I shall miss about being here.” Don’t make it weird bro.

Yes, I know he’s like gonna miss their friendship and stuff. But he’s always been just a smidge too intense about it. And by a smidge I mean the gay guy openly in love with his straight best friend a gross trope and I don’t like it.

Ok so if we’re following the “rules” of the show that the production used to recite ad nauseam to justify why Jamie and Claire barely seemed to even like each other for a few seasons (”they’re married, we don’t need to see them fuck!” “we already know they love each other, it’s a given!”), this sex scene shouldn’t exist. Because it’s really not essential to the plot. Which just proves the “rules” are and always were bullshit excuses. And the author/writer of this episode def spouted that bullshit too, so she can also shove it.

Because this scene *should* exist and those “rules” *were* complete crap. Because Jamie and Claire are very sexual/physical people and, especially when they’re going through things, use sex to center themselves where they are and in their relationship. Bree and Roger are leaving. Jem’s leaving. They’re sad about that. But they’re also happy that they made a family and got to be together as a family and are glad to have had that chance. (And, they just like to fuck.) So of course this is a good character moment. This is the kind of shit we should be seeing instead of just a constant barrage of plot and violence. And the crew can fuck all they off with their not at all convincing talking points about “rules.”

Also this is a much better use of sex than them constantly having them fuck after a fight instead of actually working through the issue between them.

Also, fuck yeah, get it gurrrl.

SCIENCE!JIZZ! (I’m gonna need a gif of Claire’s face when Jamie’s figuring it out because that’s gonna be in heavy reaction rotation.

I just love Claire fuck yeah science Beauchamp.

It’s also another scene that does nothing to advance the plot, but is a nice respite from the constant trauma. The show has yet to find a balance between the two, which is annoying af because they’ve had five seasons to figure it out. So like whenever there is fluff, folks pounce on it like starving animals. Which some in the crew (and some fans) like to point out like “see, you all like everything now!” Or “look, why are you whining so much, we gave you this!” Or “wow you hate the show but now you like this part? Hypocrite.”

But like, no, that’s not what it means. Not giving someone water for days and then throwing them a small canteen doesn’t mean everything is hunky dory. It’s still super fucked up. So no, enjoying the fact that there are a few fluffy scenes in an episode doesn’t mean the show is good. If they made more of an effort to center the characters and spread the fluff around a bit more instead of waiting until there was like trauma fatigue and throwing in a fluffy life raft, the show as a whole would be stronger.

</rant>

Ok it’s super fucked up they hadn’t told Bree about Willie yet, but I’m glad Jamie is the one who tells her.

“And it wasn’t a matter of love between us, but it was her choice, and that’s all I’ll say about it.” BECAUSE SHE RAPED HIM. COERCION IS NOT CONSENT AND ALL THE PEOPLE WHO ARE STILL TALKING ABOUT HOW “HOT” THAT SCENE WAS ARE FUCKING DISGUSTING AND THE PRODUCTION IS DISGUSTING FOR SHOOTING A FUCKING RAPE IN THE MANNER THEY DID. AND ALSO FUCK THEM FOR HAVING IT BE A RAPE IN THE FIRST PLACE WHEN IT COULD HAVE SO FUCKING EASILY BEEN CONSENSUAL.

This show is so fucking not good.

This scene with Jamie and Brianna is super nice, but like, we saw nothing of them building their relationship. He didn’t even fucking hug her after Murtagh died. The scene loses so much of what it could have had because they never did the legwork to show us what they mean to each other.

It’s the same old shit they pulled with Claire and Jamie. “Oh they’re together and endgame so we don’t actually need to show you them building and working on their relationship that much. Because you know they’re together so just go with it.” Like no? Fuck you? That’s not how this works?

FERGUS AND MARSALI DESERVE BETTER!

Of course Marsali’s preggo again. Why the fuck should she do anything but spit out babies. Also, THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN A PERFECT TIME TO HAVE THE FRASER KIDS TALK ABOUT TIME TRAVEL.

And Bree’s become a sister to Marsali? We saw one fucking scene of them together. See above rant. Fucking show us them becoming sisters. Sorry to interrupt your constant stream of violence and trauma, but fucking actually SHOWING characters building relationships instead of TELLING us they did the thing is how this is fucking supposed to work.

I’m rull pissed we never got quality Fraser kid bonding, y’all.

And ditto with this scene with Lizzie. We saw more of Bree and Lizzie than Bree and Marsali, but like we never really saw them becoming friendly post Bree’s rape and Rogergate.

All the goodbyes are like making me feel inch deep feelings because they’re rooted in nothing we’ve actually seen. And I’m not a Bad Fan or dumb for not filling in the feelings myself. I’m the viewer. It’s not my job to fill in the show’s gaps. It’s the show’s job not to have emotional gaps.

Oh hey! Another shitty man who hurts his wife and another woman trapped in a physically abusive relationship who thinks the abuse is her fault! On Outlander? Who’da thunk they’d have something like this?!

I’m so tired, y’all. So. Fucking. Tired.

I HOPE YOUNG IAN FINDS HAPPINESS TOO, ROGER.

Ok but for real, every time Lord John talks about how Willie and Bree are like Jamie it has that gross tinge to it. Like I know he’s not meaning it like a creeper, but they leaned so fucking hard into him being so into and not over Jamie that the layer of grossness is always there.

Also like, grannie and grandda, we got like one scene of Claire and Jamie playing with Jem. WE COULD HAVE FELT SO MANY MORE FEELINGS ABOUT THEM BEING SEPARATED IF ONLY THEY HAD TAKEN THE TIME TO BUILD THE RELATIONSHIPS ON SCREEN.

Claire making everyone PB&Js is fucking adorable and I love her.

Old timey forks will never not be fucking weird looking.

“And now it’s just you and me again.” Uh, Fergus, Marsali and Young Ian might be a tad offended by that sentiment, Clairebear.

Ok but like do they really think a rope is gonna hold up to fucking magic time travel rocks? It’s gotta just be like a mental security blanket thing, right? Because if not, loooooooooool.

Ok but the really just let their kiddo run off like that in the middle of the magic time travel rock circle? Dumbasses.

Ok but like what’s the betting they ended up in like a RenFest type thing and think they haven’t traveled but they have and it’s like lol look at them fitting in with their old timey clothes vs. skipping them going back to the future and doing the going adventuring around the even past-er past part but with them all together instead of Roger and Buck?

I’m just hoping it’s something completely different than the books because I have zero interest in Bree and Roger in the 20th century and hate the Roger and Buck nonsense with a fiery passion.

Erm, that’s a little close to the house to build a privy, my dudes.

Is the setting a guy’s dislocated shoulder thing supposed to be a cute callback? Because like hey wink wink, first she was kidnapped and then set a shoulder and now she’s setting a shoulder and then getting kidnapped is kind of a fucked up “joke.”

But how about we get more of Nurse!Marsali and less of Marsali just being constantly preggo.

“Sort of like the opposite of what you do when ya joint a hog.” I JUST LOVE NURSE!MARSALI A LOT OK.

Aaand now that we’re all good and docile little fans who have been placated with some fluff and Fraser fucking as a treat, we can go back to the regularly scheduled violence against women. Because we literally just had a violent abduction last week. So clearly it’s time for another.

Everything in this story has been done before...

I swear to fuck, if they do the thing I think they’re gonna do next week, I hope they get rightfully dragged by fucking everyone.

And if by some fucking miracle of Caitriona putting her foot down they don’t do the thing next week, they get zero brownie points. You don’t get rewarded for doing what you should have done the whole time.

And of course the closing is Jamie lighting Flaming Dildo 2.0. His men swore oaths to him, not any government or crown, and protecting his family has always been the top thing for Jamie. So good choice there with saving Claire being the reason he calls up the men.

#*#outlander starz #outlander 5x11 #drunj!der yells about outlander

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brohogany · 4 years

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Hodgkin's International Newsletter (December 15, 2020) Meet André Singleton!

André just recently discovered the long-term Hodgkin's survivor family, and we are very happy that he did! We feature Andre in this month's "Q and A"- happy reading!

1. When were you diagnosed with HL? How old were you? I was diagnosed in October 2004 when I was 18 years old. 2. What was the biggest challenge during your treatment? Everything was the biggest challenge for me. I was 18 years old and fought tooth and nail to get to college. I was a freshman at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia. It was 5 weeks into my freshman year and during midterms. I couldn't wrap my head around the fact that I wouldn't be returning to school AND I was no tasked with fighting for my life. I returned to my hometown, Kansas City, Missouri, to undergo all the blood tests and biopsies which ultimately led to me being diagnosed with and treated for Stage IV HL. Heartbreaking to say the least. So, everything from leaving my peer group to beginning chemotherapy in the winter left my deeply crestfallen. 3. When did you first meet another HL survivor? I met Quiana Parks through her cousin, Adriane Brown, in 2016. She is the same age and went through treatment at the same time. It was an extremely emotionally expressive moment for me. I love her. 4. What has been the most difficult thing about being a survivor? The most rewarding? The most difficult part about being a survivor is the intersections of my survival. Not only am I surviving HL but I am also surviving as a Black man and a gay man. As an artist. As a poor person. It's been so lonely trying to navigate the world with having so many strikes against me. How the oppression of the world really crushes each one of these parts of me and collectively they are crushed. A beloved artist, thinker, feeler, activist and someone who faced breast cancer, Audre Lorde once said, "There's always someone asking you to underline one piece of yourself. Whether it's Black, woman, mother, dyke, teacher, etcetera… that's the piece that they need to key in to. They want to dismiss everything else." I wish the main part of my struggle was at least one of these things that I have been being penalized for embodying (as mentioned in the beginning of my response to this question) but the truth is that they all do and I am punished and denied systemically a chance to live decently. At 18 years old I never had a starting chance to be self-sufficient and independent. I have been tethered to a medical system that has never cared about me. I haven't had consistent care and I struggle with even using the word "care" because it didn't, hasn't and doesn't feel very caring. So, the compounded factors make survival a very very difficult thing. I am often afraid I won't make it to 40 years old. I'll be turning 35 on December 23rd. What a surprise. I feel like I am withering away. The most rewarding has been my ability to understand the shadow side of life. To understand how "darkness" serves me. With such a young and pivotal diagnosis I was ushered into the realm of sickness, dying and death. I have deeply connected with many people who are sick and dying. I continue to honor my dear loved ones who have died. The urgency to care and share what resources I have - whether inner or outer resources - is paramount to me. Creating the world I need/ed for myself inspires me to listen deeply and serve others in whatever way/s that I can. I never personally feel limited but I do feel the limitations that are put on me because of anti-Black racism, homophobia, classism, elitism, ableism and the countless forms of oppression. The struggle has been very real and the truth is that even iron wears down. I can't do it alone no matter how inspired I am or inspiring others find me. I need/ed critical help and support for a very long time. So, I guess the reward has yet to come. Coming? 5. Name the most interesting place you have ever visited or would like to visit after COVID? I would say the most impactful place I've visited is Salvador, Bahia, Brasil. I don't believe that there will be an "after COVID" just like there isn't an after cancer/HL. However, I do look forward to when I will be able to properly visit Africa. I've spent some time in South Africa over the years. But I really see myself spending time in Burkina Faso and other African countries. Burkina Faso is the home of two very important Spiritual teachers that have been major healers and instrumental in fortifying my faith in my body and genetics as an African person. Malidoma Patrice Somé and Sobonfu Somé (may she rest in peace) have written books, journals and lead workshops that are rooted in their traditions of the Dagara Nation/People and they have made this living experience a bit more tolerable. They have reminded me through their words that the reliance on Spirit is essential to not only living but also dying. I have infinite reverence for their understanding and eons of practiced faith which is tremendously left out of the West and the belief systems and all systems that impact everyone. Sobonfu once said, “There is a deep longing among people in the West to connect with something bigger — with community and Spirit. People know there is something missing in their lives, and believe that the rituals and ancient ways of the village offer some answers.” I want to be in a place where this isn't a concept or something you can buy but it is essential to the day to day experiences. 6. Who is the person you admire most? I admire people who endure suffering and really try to make sense of what they have or don't have. The ones that can't help but express what happened to them and how it still impacts them. The ones that keep repeating how they feel because they haven't and don't feel heard. Because I know that this chips away at their Soul/s. That hurts me deeply. But I admire the tenacity and inability to give up in their eye/s and heart/s. The ones that go out with a fight. I never say people "lost their battle to cancer" or "cancer got the best of" because cancer died too when said person departs the physical plane. 7. What would you say to your pre-Hodgkins self? Words of wisdom, advice, "If I had only known..." (Continue to) trust yourself and your heart, mind, Spirit and Soul. Be firm but lead with soft hands, a soft voice, soft heart, soft eyes and love. Always give thanks. 8. Where do you see yourself in five years? Hopefully, still living if the world can give me that grace. I can't be here if others don't see me here and/or want me here. It's not even that I refuse to have the onus on me. I just can't simply do it alone. No one can. Especially not one who has already been fighting vigilantly just to be here on this earth physically.

LINK TO ENTIRE NEWSLETTER

*Bless all the other survivors who contributed to the newsletter + all the folks who know this battle well ... deceased and living. Axé* 😔❣️🙏🏿

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olyollyoxenfree · 4 years

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10 preguntas y respuestas, Pt 2

Thanks for the 10 Questions tag-back, @averysiriuschromie! These were fun!

Your Questions

1. If you get to start over your teenage years, would you change anything, or are you happy with the way things were?

I wish I could've expressed certain things better and could've asked questions to certain people, but I'm satisfied enough with how things were.

2. Do you separate your real life from your Tumblr life?

Mostly, but I do vent on here sometimes.

3. Have you ever shown any of your fanfic/fanart to person you know in real life? How did they react to it?

I don't really show my sketches, which mostly consist of fanart, to people outside of my friend group. One friend spams me with variations of "nerd", and it's great lol

The few times I have shown someone outside my friend group were to kids I tutored; they really like my art and praise it (I nearly die on the spot when they do). There was one kid whose voice was the embodiment of an eyeroll, but that was more about memories stirred up from the content rather than the drawing itself (Miraculous Ladybug; she told me her sibling would not shut up about the show and it got on her nerves. Preteens are such drama queens, I swear :P )

4. State 2 unlikely facts about yourself.

I used to have a bowl cut because my mom would cut my hair. It was bad and I refused to cut my hair for a while because I was "traumatized" 🤣 (Shows how long that "trauma" stuck, because now I keep getting my hair cut short lol)

I was kind of a tomboy growing up and a little terror to the other children around my age in the neighborhood, who were mostly boys. I'm not exploring ditches as much anymore, but my inquisitive nature hasn't changed; I just don't act on impulse if I don't have a partner in crime.

5. Ketchup on your fries or ketchup on the side of your fries?

On the side. I'm not a [completely] greedy animal like my little brother. (But most of the time, I eat them as is or sprinkle them with pepper)

6. If you were trying to convince your non-anime watcher friend to start watching it, what anime would it be?

Depends on their interests. But most of my friends already watch anime to some degree, so I don't really have that issue lol (I only have to coax Sheena with boobs :3c)

7. Since you came from Florida, what do you think your Florida Man headline would be? :p

My brand of weird is normal for me, so I had to call on my friends for answers:

Me: Really stupid question, but I'll ask anyway: What would my Florida Man headline be?

Turtle:

"Florida Woman found with millions of dollars worth of shoplifted manga".

Alternatively, if it was an online article:

"Man found dead after groping Florida Woman: 10 Reasons You Don't Mess With Lolitas"

Rebekah:

I’m gonna go with my first thought even though it might be dumb: "Gay woman from Florida runs for president, is popular candidate".

Either that or "Florida woman built so many bookshelves she can’t get out of her room"

Sheena and Ro:

Sheena: This just in: local Floridian steals a human skull from the cemetery at 11 PM.

Sheena: Authorities still don't understand why this happened

Ro: The only piece of evidence was some art pen

Me: Sadly, that really would be how I get caught

Me: I tend to drop them ;-;

Sheena: I can see the police walk around with your art pen in a plastic bag and ask "Do you know who this belongs to?"

Me: Yup. And I'd just hold up my index finger to the police to hold up, then walk back inside for a minute to apologize to my brother for assuming he took it (because they always end up in his piles somehow)

Emily:

"LOCAL NERD DISAPPEARS IN CEMETERY ONLY TO RETURN AS CHAMPION OF THE FAE"

"[Redacted] GIRL ACCUSED OF SUMMONING THE DEAD"

"FLORIDA GIRL CHARGED WITH CAUSING HEART ATTACKS, CLAIMS ALL SHE DID WAS WALK INTO THE ROOM QUIETLY"

"FLORIDA GIRL TRIPS ON THE SIDEWALK, FALLS STRAIGHT INTO HELL AND RETURNS TO TELL THE TALE"

I have been scalped 🤣🤣🤣

8. Unsolved crimes or aliens?

Unsolved crimes!

9. Name one book you can read over and over again without feeling bored.

Hmm.. I guess any of the short story collections I have:

"The Cabinet of Curiosities: 36 Tales Brief & Sinister" by Stefan Bachmann, Katherine Catmull, Claire Legrand, Emma Trvayne: off the top of my head, my favorite story from this one is "The Cake Made Out of Teeth" by Claire L. (mentions of violence, and verbal abuse, kind of cannibalism and gore, vomiting).

"More Bones: Scary Stories From Around the World" collected and retold by Arielle North Olson and Howard Schwartz (I wrote my name in this book and it has the most wear of all the books in my small collection because I read it so many times over! I kinda want a hardcover copy if it's available): my favorites are "The Gruesome Test" (warning for cannibalism and mentions of death) and "The Haunted Violin" (warning for death).

"Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark" collected and retold by Alvin Schwartz, even though it contains some words that are antiquated and derogatory: a few short stories that never fail to send chills down my spine are "Me Tie Dough-ty Walker" (warning for gore and animal death), "Wonderful Sausage" (warning for death and cannibalism), and "Oh, Susannah!" (warning for death and gore).

...I just realized one-third of these have to do with some sort of cannibalism, which I'm not sure what that says about me, other than I'm probably hungry lol

10. An OTP you’re currently obsessed with!

I'm finding it difficult to pinpoint which ship I'm obsessed with right now because all the fanart I've seen is so cute ;-;

My 10 Questions:

(See "I tag")

I tag:

No one. While I am curious to peep into people's lives, that would require coming up with more questions, and that means work :P

#olyollyoxenspeaks #quizzes and tag games #tagged #oh hey it's me

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