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queens-of-spirits · 1 year

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Why the svsss papapa scenes are literary genius actually, Part 1:

So, fun fact, I originally wanted to do a funny little post where I ranked the four papapa scenes in svsss (with special mention to the start of the return to childhood extra and LMY’s writing) but my deranged ass decided to go full quirky English prof and turn this shit into a proper analysis.

So, believe it or not, the svsss papapa scenes are actually really important for understanding a lot of the characters and themes of the story. So yes. I am going to go through them all and explain why. Starting with…

Maigu Ridge (spoilers, obviously):

If this were actually my silly rankings post (which I still may make), Maigu ridge would rank dead last in any category related to actually being an enjoyable smut scene to read. That’s fine, because, to put it bluntly, that wasn’t the point.

It’s a subversion of the pressure and idea of the perfect first time or instinctive sexual skill seen in both power fantasy and romance/bl novels. That subversion and the shock of what happens is meant to take us out of the scene and make us think about the characters, the situation, and the tropes we take for granted. Remember, svsss is genre savvy twice over, both in Danmei/bl and power fantasy fiction. It explores both those worlds and the complicated aspects of both (I.e the obsession with revenge). It’s not trying to be a good smut scene, it’s setting up the characterization of the couple and the character arc seen throughout the rest of the papapa moments in the extras (more on that in future posts, but it’s about SQQ learning to be more open with his desire and pleasure) and exemplifying the main themes of the book (forgiveness and intention)

So without further ado, here is my analysis on this scene.

The notes about SQQ’s character in the Maigu Ridge scene should be obvious and understood by looking at the broad context of the scene. Like the Without a Cure moment, it shows how much he cares for LBH and his willingness to put his own life and body on the line to save him. It is devotion, pure and simple. However, more depth is revealed when examining specific passages (note all quotes are from the English publications because I don’t speak Chinese, so I’m sorry if the translation muddled the meaning).

The most vital part to me for Binghe’s character is this line:

“he’d done this out of consideration for Luo Binghe’s convenience, but unexpectedly he was flipped back around. Luo Binghe jammed himself between Shen Qingqiu’s legs, his entire attention rapt on Shen Qingqiu’s face.”

This refers to how SQQ tries to turn around so that LBH would not see his face during what is about to happen and LBH flipping him over again.

This, I believe is symbolic. SQQ turns around because he thinks that anyone will do and he is the only one willing, but that’s not true LBH wants SQH specifically. He needs to relieve the energy from the sword’s influence, yes, but despite that pain, he is focused solely on SQQ’s face.

The transformation from the stallion protagonist Bingge to our Bingmei is exemplified here better than any scene before it (I would argue it is later topped by the Bingge vs Bingmei extra). Unlike Binghe, Bingmei is not looking for mindless pleasure to escape his lonely life (represented here by the corrupting energy of the sword) he is seeking the one he adores above all, the one who he cares for more than anything. He has found true connection and THAT is what drives him to madness (remember, he’s trying to destroy everything to be the only one in SQQ’s world so he can’t be abandoned). That’s why, even when supposedly in a mad state, he seeks to look at SQQ’s face, because it isn’t about the sex, it’s about them, the two of them together.

The other vital part is the aftermath, before even the jade pendant. Specifically, this exchange:

“Shizun don’t hate me…I didn’t know…I never wanted to hurt you…why didn’t you push me away? Why didn’t you kill me?”

“This master knows. This master was willing”

Again, this was an act not born out of lust, like with Bingge and his wives, but something different. Bingge takes what he wants and feels no guilt because nothing was ever given to him, but Bingmei was given the world by one person and struggles with not feeling like, with not BEING the animal or monster that the rest of the world sees him as’

LBH had no intention to hurt SQQ

Just like how SQQ had no intention to hurt him by avoiding him

It’s symbolic of their relationship as a whole. Unintentional hurt and the forgiveness that follows. THATS why the remaining papapa scenes are so important. It’s about them learning to not hurt each other. Every single papapa scene that follows builds on this idea of them learning the right way to love each other (remember, their story together is just beginning after the last page of the book) and learning how to not hurt each other unintentionally, LBH physically, SQQ emotionally.

Again, clear themes of forgiveness and intention. The reasons behind why people do bad things (hence the focus on SJ and TLJ as complex characters) and the act of forgiveness and learning from mistakes, which I argue are the two main themes of SVSSS

So while Maigu ridge is terrible in terms of being an enjoyable scene to read, that was not it’s purpose. It’s purpose was to utilize the tropes of both Danmei and male fantasy to take us out of those genres (where first times always go well) and get us to THINK about the characters and why they do what they do, their intentions.

#bingqiu #svsss #shen qingqiu #luo binghe #luo bingge #luo bingmei #maigu ridge #scum villains self saving system #scum villian self saving system #papapa #SQQ #LBH #analysis #of things that maybe should not be #would my English teacher be proud or horrified?#you decide

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freshlybakedspiderbread · 1 year

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augh. (< sound I make when random touhou thoughts flood my head)

I kinda get why touhou ‘canon’ might not ever acknowledge the passage of real time for its established characters. reimu and marisa and so on aren’t just team shanghai alice’s characters, but they belong to all of doujinshi culture. so they and everyone else or even the setting itself won’t or can’t go through any dramatic change of status quo because not everyone might accept those changes.

But I can still wish it wasn’t like that! And I still hold out hope zun will just change his mind on a whim one day regarding that ‘sazae-san’ comment!!

though truth be told this is really only really relevant to me when it comes to two specific characters.

The first is Sumireko, who I would love to get even a hint that she’s carrying her chunni dreams after being done with high-school. You can even excuse her still wearing the same outfit and still calling herself a high-schooler around the rest of the cast because she thinks explaining why she’s not one anymore would be too much trouble.

The other is Akyuu which I uh, have much more complicated feelings over. For the record, I don’t want or think zun should be like ‘and now shes dead’ or anything like that. 😨 But i dunno, her whole thing about having a reduced lifespan feels too thematically important to the character to just ignore with ‘oh medince in todays age is a lot better. But but, like i said above about established characters not going through any *dramatic* changes, its not like canon could ever give some kind of reason for her fate changing. But but but, if she just shows up again in like five years and nothing about her fate is commented on, that would really make all the fans double down on the idea that the passage of time is truly meaningless, so...

...Maybe the best case scenario really is for Akyuu to just never show up again and we just all make up our own ideas of what she’s up to 😅❓ Maybe that why Kosuzu and Kasen have both just disappeared... Their stories in canon are capital o, Over, and so its up to fans to decide what to do with em... Miyoi needs to hurry up and do more stuff before she’s gone too!!

Side note that’s barely related: Reisen needs to be playable in the next game wearing another new cute pink/white outfit and her every other line needs to be about how she loves embracing being an Earthling so that more people at large can remember her character development and also stop drawing her in that blazer!

Side note that’s not related: Aya needs to be playable in the next game and talk more about being weary of her life as a middle-aged corporate woman and I think she should wear maple-leaf themed socks.

#i would settle for reimu having a throwaway line about how shes been doing this for decades #although what if monkey paw hears me and touhou pulls a boruto or something (i've never seen boruto but Imagine what that'd be like)#touhou

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septembercfawkes · 3 years

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Scene vs. Summary & When to Use Which

When I was a young writer, I didn't fully understand what a scene was and what a summary was. Later, when I understood the difference, I wasn't always sure when to use which. These days, I occasionally help writers with the same things. They may use summary for what should have been a scene, or they may write a whole scene for what really should have been summary. Understanding the difference and when to use which can be key when writing a successful novel.

Sure, some of it is subjective.

But what might be surprising to some, is that most of the time, one is more . . . "correct" than the other.

Scene

A scene is a structural unit that tends to have these qualities:

- Happens in Real Time

A scene will largely happen in real time. This means we "watch" the characters move, act, and talk, as if it were happening in real life.

- Dramatizes (Shows > Tells)

A scene dramatizes. It uses showing more than telling. If a character is angry with a friend, we see that anger in action and conversation. We may witness her yell or kick a rock, for example. It's like watching a stage play.

- Concrete

Because it is dramatized, a scene will usually be more concrete. It will more likely appeal to our senses and the physical world and experience.

- Characters Acting in a Specific Location

A scene will have characters in a location (in some very rare cases, the setting or society may act as characters). They might be talking on a train ride, or exploring a cave, or dueling in the snow.

Scene Examples

(Because a full scene often lasts pages, these examples are passages from specific scenes.)

"This won't take long, Andrew," said the doctor. Ender nodded. "It's designed to be removed. Without infection, without damage. But there'll be some tickling, and some people say they have a feeling of something missing. You'll keep looking around for something, something you were looking for, but you can't find it, and you can't remember what it was. So I'll tell you. It's the monitor you're looking for, and it isn't there. In a few days that feeling will pass." The doctor was twisting something at the back of Ender's head. Suddenly a pain stabbed through him like a needle from his neck to his groin. Ender felt his back spasm, and his body arched violently backward; his head struck the bed. He could feel his legs thrashing, and his hands were clenching each other, wringing each other so tightly that they arched. "Deedee!" shouted the doctor. "I need you!" The nurse ran in, gasped. "Got to relax these muscles. Get it to me, now! What are you waiting for!" Something changed hands; Ender could not see. He lurched to one side and fell off the examining table. "Catch him!" cried the nurse. "Just hold him steady--" "You hold him, doctor, he's too strong for me--" "Not the whole thing! You'll stop his heart--" Ender felt a needle enter his back just above the neck of his shirt. It burned, but wherever in him the fire spread, his muscles gradually un-clenched. Now he could cry for the fear and pain of it. "Are you all right, Andrew?" the nurse asked.

- Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Mrs. Reed occupied her usual seat by the fireside; she made a signal to me to approach; I did so, and she introduced me to the stony stranger with the words: “This is the little girl respecting whom I applied to you.” He, for it was a man, turned his head slowly towards where I stood, and having examined me with the two inquisitive-looking grey eyes which twinkled under a pair of bushy brows, said solemnly, and in a bass voice, “Her size is small: what is her age?” “Ten years.” “So much?” was the doubtful answer; and he prolonged his scrutiny for some minutes. Presently he addressed me—“Your name, little girl?” “Jane Eyre, sir.” In uttering these words I looked up: he seemed to me a tall gentleman; but then I was very little; his features were large, and they and all the lines of his frame were equally harsh and prim. “Well, Jane Eyre, and are you a good child?”

- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

Summary

A summary has these qualities:

- Condensed Time

Summaries condense time. They may cover a month in a single sentence. They may talk about recurring events over a time period, within one paragraph. They may relay a past event (or in some cases, a future event) within a brief moment. They don't happen in real time.

- Explains through Telling

Since the moment isn't happening in real time, the audience is told more than shown what happened. This gives summary a stronger, guiding, narrative hand. Rather than experiencing the passage like the character, it's more like the audience is being guided by a storyteller (generally speaking).

- More Abstract

For those reasons, telling is more abstract. It's more likely to express ideas and concepts, rather than specific experiences.

- Characters and/or Setting may Change Swiftly (or Maybe Not Even Be Present In Some Cases)

A summary may not focus on a specific character or stay in the same setting. It may move quickly through settings or may not even mention a specific setting.

Summary Examples

Mother came home and commiserated with Ender about the monitor. Father came home and kept saying it was such a wonderful surprise, they had such fantastic children that the government told them to have three, and now the government didn't want to take any of them after all, so here they were with three, they still had a Third . . . until Ender wanted to scream at him, I know I'm a Third, I know it, if you want I'll go away so you don't have to be embarrassed in front of everybody. - Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

John had not much affection for his mother and sisters, and an antipathy to me. He bullied and punished me; not two or three times in the week, nor once or twice in the day, but continually: every nerve I had feared him, and every morsel of flesh in my bones shrank when he came near. There were moments when I was bewildered by the terror he inspired, because I had no appeal whatever against either his menaces or his inflictions; the servants did not like to offend their young master by taking my part against him, and Mrs. Reed was blind and deaf on the subject: she never saw him strike or heard him abuse me, though he did both now and then in her very presence, more frequently, however, behind her back.

- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

When to Use Which

Most novels are better written with more scene than summary. Scenes dramatize the story, so that the audience feels like they are experiencing and participating in it. Scenes are more impactful. Scenes are more likely to stir emotions. Because they are more concrete, they are more likely to stick in the reader's memory.

However, this is not to say all novels are better with more scene than summary. You can indeed find successful books with more summary. This can be particularly useful in books with huge casts and many viewpoint characters, books that take place over a long period of time (such as a character's entire life), or books with powerful, present omniscient narrators. Not all books that rely on summary more than scene are bad.

But most books are better told largely through scene than summary.

And pretty much all novels need some of both.

So when do we use which?

Sometimes I edit passages that are weakened because they are summarized instead of dramatized. Other times I read scenes that offer very little dramatic value and should have been summarized.

Scenes

A good rule of thumb is the more significant the moment, the more likely it needs to be rendered as a scene.

Big turning points and climactic moments should almost always be a scene--whether that turning point relates to character arc, plot, or theme.

This means that the climactic moments of the beginning, middle, and end, should almost always be a scene.

Anything we've been building up to in the primary plotline related to the arc, events, or theme, should probably be a scene.

If you are following a story structure, key moments in that structure should likely be a scene. The inciting incident should likely be a scene, the midpoint should likely be a scene, Plot Point 2 should likely be a scene . . .

Now, in a novel, there may be many plotlines besides the primary. The less important the plotline, the less likely you need all its turning points in scenes (or even on page).

Impactful moments should usually be scenes. If they are summary, sometimes the audience feels cheated. Imagine building up to the climax of a novel, only to have the author summarize it. It's almost always a letdown.

Sometimes newer writers do this sort of thing, because they are intimidated by trying to write the scene. They may feel unsure that they can write it well. Remember, you can edit, and edit, and re-edit the scene to make it better. Daring to write a poor scene and then edit it, will get you further in the long run than avoiding it altogether.

In many genres, you will have what are called "obligatory scenes." These are what they sound like. They need to happen. In a scene.

So in romance, you almost always need to have a first kiss scene. In a murder mystery, you almost always need to have an opening scene where a body is discovered. Obligatory scenes should be scenes, not summary, most of the time.

Summaries

On the other side of the spectrum, we have summary. If an entire novel were written with scenes, it would probably be long and boring. Not everything is important enough to be a scene. And if you make it a scene, it's a flat scene without any real turning point or change. This kills pacing.

Use summary when the audience needs to know the fact that something happened, but it's not important for them to experience it.

For example, the fact that Jacob didn't get much sleep the prior night probably isn't important enough for a full scene, but it might be important for the audience to know for the next scene. It might influence what happens in the next scene. That is a good time to use summary.

Use summary when you need to cover a broader length of time in a shorter amount of space. For example, you may have characters who need to trek to a distant land, which may take months. But the story isn't about the trek itself. Use summary to tell us about the trek, without making the story only about the trek. (Not to mention if the trek was all in scenes, it'd be overly detailed and likely boring.)

Along the same line, summary can sometimes be great for scene transitions--usually when what happened between the scenes is worth mentioning, but not worth dramatizing.

Summary is also important in providing context for the reader. Summary may be used to set up a situation or to provide additional background information that the reader needs in order to interpret what is happening in the story, accurately.

For example, you may summarize a short backstory to explain a character's current behavior.

Scene vs. Showing; Summary vs. Telling

Scene is mostly like showing, and summary is mostly like telling. However, the concepts are slightly different. For example, I may write in a scene "Emily was tired," which would be "telling" but I wouldn't consider it "summary." Just as I wouldn't necessarily consider "I felt angry" summary, so much as I would consider it to be telling.

Likewise, you may have a scene that is largely introspection, which may be showing a character's thought process as he summarizes events through telling sentences.

Yeah, if we get deep, it turns into splitting hairs.

Even between showing and telling, if you want to make yourself really crazy, sometimes you can use summary and telling on a small scale to show something on a big scale. For example, to show that a character has a habit of being late, you may use summary that includes some telling about his morning routine, to cover several such instances. However, one could easily argue that you could simply do a scene that shows him showing up late, and have another character use dialogue that implies this is a common occurrence.

But let's not induce headaches today! My point is, that the boundaries do blur, and things aren't always as clear cut as we make them sound.

Nonetheless, because summary and telling overlap, you can use many of the same technique that we use to write great telling, to write great summary. And rather than rewrite all those techniques, I have them in my article "10 Cheats to Tell Well."

Mixing Scene and Summary

In order to write a great novel, many scenes will include some summary within them. Like I mentioned above, you may need to slip in some backstory information through summary. Or perhaps in the scene, the characters are having dinner, but you want half the scene to be the cooking and the other half to happen while they are eating. Depending on how long the food takes to make, you may need some summarizing: "Don finished putting the toppings on the pizza and then put it in the oven for 30 minutes."

Similarly, if you are going to have a lengthy passage of summary, it's often effective to include scene-like moments--perhaps a paragraph that captures part of a conversation in real time, before going back to summary. Or maybe the summary includes a significant action that would be rendered better with a little more detail, like a half-scene.

In any case, we want to make sure we are using both scene and summary, and perhaps just as important, that we are using them at the right moments.

#writing tips #writing tips and tricks #writeblr #writing reference #writing tip #fanfic #written #editing

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roadmotel · 3 years

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Hi!

This is a super long ask and I hope it's interesting instead of annoying.

I have just finished reading the book "The Carnivorous Lamb" by Augustin Gomez-Arcos, and one of the main plot points is the love between the protagonist and his brother. Needless to say, many passages reminded me of the brothers. And then I thought I'd send them; even if they're not material for your blog, I thought you might enjoy taking a look, since the book has a very beautiful and evocative style... If it's not your thing, I apologize in advance! All in all, I love your blog and I hope you're having a nice week <3

Here it goes:

Father coming in at neutral moments to plant a kiss on my forehead, then hurrying out (did he love me, I wonder?), my brother, rooted to the spot, devouring me with his eyes. The house gone mad, blind anarchy stealthily taking it over,

Page 28

This ritual of waiting, which I have lived minute by minute since five o’clock in the afternoon last Friday, strikes me as completely useless. It brings me nothing new. Written in my cells when I was a child, it has ruled my behavior ever since. And my behavior has never been more than an appendage of yours, somewhat like a dog’s tail in relation to the dog. What can I do, though? When someone else’s life is the only space you have to live in, you can’t choose but to wait. Whether you come as a lover or an executioner, I am ready to receive you. More ready than ever. With all the obligations that waiting for you imposes on me. But don’t come as a brother, to profane me in the family blasphemy; if you do, my waiting for you will assert its rights. So open the door. Come in.

Page 55

I no longer had any trouble understanding the softness of my brother’s look, and the ever stronger, fiercer desire I felt to melt into him. With me, he acted like a creator. He sensed—no, he was sure—that he was shaping me day by day into the image of something special that he loved unconsciously. And passionately.

Page 70

I felt I should minimize the whole thing, but was petrified by a hardness on his face I had never seen before. A dangerous light glinted in his eyes, and an animal’s clenched teeth showed between his tight lips. The black-and-blue mark someone else’s hand had put on my behind had enraged him—even though I didn’t always emerge unscathed from our own wrestling matches. A savage heat started burning in my flesh, and I suddenly felt proud of having caused the bruise, which had the magnificent power of showing me the strength of my brother’s passion. My skin became translucent, the better to show Antonio my pre-adolescent frailty. He couldn’t take his eyes off my bruised flesh. “The bastard! The bastard!”

Page 90

“I won’t even let my parents raise a hand to him. Do you think I’m going to let you?” “I am his teacher, not his.…” “…brother,” finished Antonio, in a voice as sharp as a whip-crack. “I’m his brother. Me.” They watched each other in silence. No need to explain further.

Page 92

Within me, my brother’s presence stirred a craving for apocalypse. The Latin words falling softly from his lips tickled the most secret parts of my body, as if he were speaking directly to me and not to God.

Page 167

I could detail the disturbing contents of your dreams, the things you yourself don’t know, one anxiety after another. I could tell you if I knew the right words … but who could prompt me, who could give me those mysterious words? I know you so well, I can’t describe you. There is a you of you I can certainly describe. But I can’t tell you a thing about the other you of you, my you.

Page 235

You cross the hallway. You try to open my bedroom door, but it is closed. And locked. You order me to open it, as if I still belonged to you. You beg me to open it, as if you still belonged to me. But I don’t open it, and I don’t stop shouting.

Page 255

You lick our tears from my eyes before they stain my face, like someone trying to get drunk. You feed on us. And you say: “Easy, easy. I’m here.” But I know you don’t want me to stop, because you really do need to feed on me.

Page 256

And this is a classic passage, you might have seen it around before:

“I love you because you’re mine. I love you because I possess you. I love you because you need love. I love you because you’re disorder, and I don’t like order. I love you because when you look at me I feel like a hero, and always have. I especially love you because I’ve finally understood that I can’t talk about my love to anyone else but you, and that’s what real love is. Two beings who make up one solitude, one silence. And I love you because touching you makes me feel I’m more of a man than anyone.” You look at me as if you were in me. And you are in me. And outside me. Everywhere.

Page 262

oh please don't apologize! i’ve actually read this book, i think i’ve even posted a few quotes from it on here. it's incredibly well-written, unsettling, and confronting. funnily enough, i actually found out about this book because years ago i watched the film from beginning to end (also about an intense sexual relationship between two brothers) and there was a quote from it that i really liked:

“i love you because you’re mine. i love you because you need love. i love you because when you look at me i feel like a hero. it was always like that. i love you because when i touch you i feel more a man than any other man.”

so i googled it and the carnivorous lamb popped up and i read the premise and was like wait was the movie based on this book? but there was no acknowledgment of the book in the movie’s credits and i couldn’t find anything about it being an inspiration for the movie on wikipedia so i was like holy shit. then i read the carnivorous lamb (and loved it like it’s really incredible) and realized that from beginning to end completely ripped off the book. even the opening lines in from beginning to end are super reminiscent of a specific passage from the carnivorous lamb.

the movie opens with:

“i was born with my eyes wide shut. sure, everybody is born with their eyes closed. but mine were closed so tight, they formed wrinkles. i remained with my eyes closed for more than two weeks. my mother, contrary to expectations, didn’t worry [...] while he [brother] stared at me through the thick, soundproof nursery glass window, i without any reason opened my eyes, and looked straight into his.”

and in the book, ignacio says:

“from the moment i opened my eyes, an incredible sixteen days after i was born, you [brother] were always sure of everything where i was concerned. it was all laid out in advance for you, even the unexpected. do you remember? mother used to say i was born with the will to stay blind forever.”

god, apologies for my rant but that literally always comes to mind whenever i think about the carnivorous lamb like how did they get away with just straight up plagiarizing agustín gómez-arcos in that movie lmao? anyway! thanks for sharing your favorite quotes i actually have a couple of these highlighted in my book!

#god sorry this got long for no reason :/#anon #answered

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seths-wife · 3 years

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Theory: why is Seth Twiright the demon of wrath? What's his backstory?

Note: this theory tries its best to be as objective as possible in explaining and deducing facts basing on only what is known in the novels and not basing on personal preferences and sensibilities, just cold gathering of the facts and trying to draw plausible conclusion. That doesn't mean i'm right, necessarily.

Index:

1) Demon of wrath or demon of pride? (Biblical references and discordance of themes).

2) Was Seth a victim of abuse? (Can we draw this conclusion basing only on what we know?)

3) That one comic by Ichika

4) Conclusion

Chapter 1: demon of wrath or demon of pride?

Seth is a really peculiar character: the sin he's represented by doesn't seem to be...displaying that much, contrary to those of the other demons in this series.

Gilles is clearly lustful (basing on the catholic religion definition of it, at least) seen his high sex drive.

Vlad is not really explained but he's a cook so he must be obsessed with food (joke), also his interactions with Banica seem to suggest a morbid curiosity of his to try new foods for hedonistic pleasure, no matter if it's immoral and illegal to eat those.

Marie Annette is a really prideful human/demon seen her few lines in the entire series, like "bow down to me" without any legitimate reason.

Eve...well...on another theory about that...

Rahab is clearly envious when also other people get what she has, seen that she's basically the ec version of Ayano Aishi and a big stereotypical yandere, at least in one part of the narrative.

Salem (does he even exist? (joke)) is an economist so he must be obsessed with money and gathering earthly and perishing goods. (joke)

I won't talk about Adam Moonlit as the demon of greed here as it's for another topic.

But Seth? When in the series does he show unrighteous wrath? Do we see him get angry outbursts and go around beating up and killing people because he's angry at them?

No.

On the contrary, in the whole series Seth seems to be pretty calculating and cold, and he doesn't seem to be really excessively troubled by any behavior or at least he doesn't really show a strong vengeful attitude towards them.

Yes, he might get on bad mood when his plans don't succeed as he expected to, but he never goes like "you'll pay for ruining my plan" or something. He proceeds with his plans, trying to adjust the latters in order to fit the new situation.

Actually, sometimes he seems to find amusing and funny when people try to kill him and unmask (pun or not lol) him for his evil bahaviour, like when Adam tried to kill him and the latter was surprised he couldn't succeed since Seth outsmarted him, or Gammon when he confronted him about brainwashing Miroku.

It's as if Seth finds funny when people are frustrated because of him, it soothes his ever-roaring mind and boredom.

For months, i've thought that Seth should have been the demon of pride because of his attitude in the crime novel and because it fit him better as for the Biblical references:

We see multiple instances in the crime novel that Seth likes himself very much: he loves the fact that he consideres himself to be the best scientist in the country™ as he uses this bunch of words everytime he introduces himself (both as Horus and as himself), also he considers himself to be very handsome to the point he doesn't want to change his face because it would be "such a terrible crime" (i mean, i also think he's hot but Seth, calm down, what the hell...).

But his pride doesn't end with him flaunting his intelligence and hotness.

There are also other instances of Seth's pride that are even more remarkable.

Like for example, the whole matter of Seth making artificial humans (so called "ghoul children") mimicking the creation of the "gods" in the series. This can be considered a matter of pride, as he wants to act as the "gods", he thinks he's able to be on par of them.

Well lol, gods...i always found pretty unrealistic how we got from human scientists with high tech from almost omnipotent beings that can cast lightening wherever they want, make ladies pregnant and instill thoughts and visions in people in a single arc while being trapped inside of a spaceship. This always provoked some strong cognitive dissonance within me, this sounds like a stretched, inappropriate and unrealistic even if they have big tech. That's why i call them "gods wannabe". They're still humans playing God after all.

But that's besides the point.

Even more remarkable is this other line, right after quoting the achievements of other "gods" in the series:

"In that case—

I am the god who creates “evil”.

Seth is literally and explicitly placing himself in the place of the gods, considering himself to be a god on par of the pillar ones in the series.

And this is very coherent basing on the fact he should be the parallel of the Biblical serpent, the demon who thought he was on par of God and fell because of pride.

So it would have had much more sense to have Seth as the demon of pride.

So when and why is seth the demon of wrath since in the series it looks more like he's the demon of pride?

His motive? Not really...Seth doesn't seem to act because of some sort of anger as his main motivation is to "follow his h.e.r.s nature and make himself 'new friends' (his own definition of friends)".

Then i think we have no choice than look at his backstory and see if we can spot some unrighteous anger there.

Chapter 2: is Seth a victim of abuse and angry at his mother?

The vast majority of the theories around about the reasons of Seth's evil are based off the fact that Seth might have gone through motherly abuse that provoked him some childhood traumas back when he was a little white and red mask.

Those assertions are usually backed up by pieces of the short story "Outlaw and lychgate".

Let's look at them.

The most quoted line about this issue is:

“My, and what sort of dish is that?”

“It’s not really much of a dish. You just splash some curry powder and ketchup on a sausage. My old ma used to make it for me a lot when I was a child.”

“Just like mom used to make, hm. That sounds quite nice. My mother never did any home cooking for me.“

Well...from this particular line, fans have begun to speculate than maybe his mother starved him or refused to cook for him.

But is it necessarily the case? It can be a possible interpretation but we don't know how masks work in this series or whether or not they need to eat, especially since they don't have a mouth or a digestive system of some sort.

It can also be that Seth was just curious about food in the line upwards since as a mask maybe he could not experience food, given that he couldn't physically eat when he was a mask.

This doesn't necessarily refer to an abusive situation of a mother refusing to provide food and care for her son.

There is also another instance in which Seth spoke about his mother.

"I often hear strangers tell me that they can’t tell what I’m thinking.

Even my own mother said so, before she died.

That’s why, to get her to understand at least a little bit, I shot her in the forehead.

To this day I still remember how stopped moving, her mask cracked in two.

That was the first murder I committed."

Ok, the fact that his mother "didn't understand him" could have been because of various reasons:

1) maybe she didn't try to understand him and neglected him.

2) maybe Seth became too different from his mother since he contracted hers and she couldn't understand and relate to him anymore even if she tried to.

3) Seth is just too cryptic or changes his mind too fast (probably because of his boredom) when it comes to expressing his true intentions or having certain intentions therefore people have big trouble understand him.

I would go for 3 since Seth also explained that not only his mother didn't understand him but also various other characters, so it's not necessarily true that Seth's mother just refused to listen and understand him, it could have been that Seth was too cryptic or that she couldn't relate to a her.

Anyways, we don't have a lot of info about this but i don't think it is correct to see a mysterious passage in just one possible way.

And also i wouldn't like for Seth to be "he's evil because mommy wasn't nice therefore he's angry and wants to make everyone like him and destroy everything uwu" because:

1) that's a really misused trope.

2) it doesn't properly explain why Seth did what he did in the crime novel, it's clear that there has to be an even deeper motivation that made him do those horrific things: abuse is too much of a simplistic and lazy motivation given his role.

Also there is no specific mention of anger and resentment even if there could be.

So where can we see that Seth is angry?

Chapter 3: that one Ichika comic.

Let's look at this one comic.

It is kinda difficult to understand what it means but the face resembles Seth's human form a bit and also this comic shows a theme of anger against the human creators of the first period since the comic seems to be talking about the second one "in this world where everything is an extension" (the second period is a virtual parallel reality to the first one in the series).

Seth seems to be pretty aware of the first period.

I think so because Kiril (his clone) at one point gained back the memories of his original.

Who? Seth? Pale? (That twist complicated things a whole lot).

I will go for Seth since in the series he's always referred to as the original talking about his "clones".

Kiril with Seth's memories came up with "Vocaloid, huh?!", showing awareness of the knowledge of vocaloid (since the first period is similar to the real world in the series) but i don't think this is an info Kiril learnt on his own but he took from Seth's memories since he was a researcher of parallel worlds and wouldn't have been out of place for Seth to learn about the first period.

So, given that Seth is the one of the comic and he's talking about the humans of the first period, he seems to be angry at the fact he was born to be an her (let's remember the humans of the first period started the her problem for their own personal gain) and in the society of the second period he's seen as a problem because of that.

Therefore Seth in his anger invites people to blame the creators instead of him since he doesn't think to have a free will and has no other choice than being evil because of those humans who "made him this way".

Funny how the same topic is faced with Irina and Levia in the duel. And funny how Levia in this series seems to also be a victim of her own pulsions and can't really be a moral authority in this, again, gods wannabe. They have their morals inspired by their originals who made their avatars who have tainted them with a virus, so they can't create, define or judge good and evil themselves.

So funny.

Chapter 4: conclusions.

So i think this is a plausible reason Seth might be the demon of wrath. But still, i wonder how it is that Seth is happy later on to follow those pulsions he thinks he can't control (given by humans) and doesn't try to fight back the instincts.

Maybe he accepted and got happy with his disease or he just resigned that that was his destiny thinking that he had no choice.

I don't know if i will make anymore theories after this, since i want to go on and make content for something else.

#evillious chronicles #evillious #seth twiright

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caguaydreams · 4 years

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A thorough analysis on why Vah Medoh’s dungeon theme makes me want to cry

Yep, that’s an accurate title. Hi there! do you have a moment to hear about Breath of The Wild soundtrack? posting for yet a third time in hopes that tumblr won't hide it. I'm so tired

What started as a quick and harmless post, pretending to simply point out a couple of things, rolled downhill, out of my grasp and turned into a massive snowball of a short essay. How and why did this happen? Well, I assume a lot of people know about this song, and know what I’m talking about when I say that it makes me tear up and sob uncontrollably with every change in key as the seconds tick by and I spiral down into a dwell of misery from where I struggle to find the exit and to later recover.

……No?…..At the VERY LEAST it makes you a little uncomfortable. And I state this with much certainty, because after reading hundreds of comments everywhere online where this song is present, I picked up on a vast majority of people who expressed to feel the same way I did when it came down to our current music subject. See, statistics don’t lie… normally. So, naturally, my intrigue got the best of me. I wanted to find out exactly why this soundtrack was mercilessly stirring up everyone’s emotions, so I caved in and we ended up with this.

Buckle in, fellas.

Out of all Divine Beasts’ dungeon themes, Vah Medoh’s is the one that I can’t sit through. Not without growing antsy and wanting to turn it off as soon as possible. I find it genuinely difficult to listen to, and it’s not only because Revali is my favorite character and the song is just, plainly put, depressing, mind you.

We’ll start from 0 terminals activated.

It opens up similar to the other three dungeon themes; the pace is slow but eerie, gives off the impression that it sounds broken somehow. Something is off here, and it’s easy to figure out what that is from the get go: you’re basically entering a majestic, ancient, mechanical mausoleum, where everything went terribly wrong a century ago. Someone is gone, someone you knew, someone who was probably close to you, but it’s impossible to be sure. You don’t remember a thing, and this entire ordeal is confusing at best, and terrifying at worst. It’s your duty to make things right again.

It’s the same for all four Divine Beasts upon entering, save for the obvious little differences that separates them from each other and make them unique. Ruta’s is played on a major key, adhering to a sense of hopefulness. Naboris’s begins with a startling smashing of the piano keys, much like thunder of a sudden lighting strike. And Rudania’s theme starts threatening, dangerous, like scalding lava.

But now, back to Vah Medoh. The tone here is… alienating. The dissonant chords are all over the place, and feel disconnected, cold. It’s almost as if someone doesn’t want us to be here, or just like the elusive key, our presence is unexpected. Fitting, for a Divine Beast that’s high above the land, impossible for most to reach, yet we somehow made it. Apart from the piano, we have the occasional hint to rito culture, in the shape of a short, synthetic version of the rolled chords at the very beginning of Rito Village. A quiet reminder of where we come from. There is also, of course, the morse code distress signal, but we’ll talk more about that later.

As soon as this formal introduction is over, we finally get to the more, say, intimate stuff. Oh, and wouldn’t you know, it’s just tragic.

One terminal activated.

There’s no better short way I can describe this passage, other than anxiety-inducing. Especially when the strings come into play, and there’s two reasons I can think of why I feel this is an important thing to point out:

1- Characters and Symbolism.

I tend to associate stringed instruments, all of those which compose the violin family, with rito culture. And Revali, most specifically. In Creating a Champion we can see the early concept art and designs for all or most major characters in the game, and Revali’s highlighted rough design might be the one that changed the most throughout proper development of the character, out of all champions. He looks quite different from our usual depiction of him, it’s fascinating. What truly catches my eye, however, is the design of his bow.

You thought bird puns were bad? Oh boy, how do you feel about Revali having a bow that looks like a violin/cello/viola??? And do you need a bow to play it also??? Like, is it even an instrument or it’s nothing more than a mere fashion statement?-

Anyway. I believe this was originally going to be a not-so-subtle wink to rito culture, being heavily musically inclined as we can see and conclude for ourselves. Perhaps Revali was going to be a musician as well, now how cool it that!

Needless to say, the idea was eventually scrapped. But one detail I am CERTAIN carried over to the character we know and love today(okay not all of us love him but seriously if you dislike him why are you still here lol): strings. The association between bows(weapon) and stringed instruments, aside from being a quite clever and creative one, goes beyond the concept art and remains strong as part of Revali’s character, settling for having a presence via score. After all, Revali is a master of archery, so in that way it makes sense to keep strings as symbolism to reinforce the idea and drive it home.

But can you guess what other thing Revali excels at? That’s right: flying. He’s the only rito we know of who successfully managed to take advantage of wind currents and bend them to his will. And do you know what musical instruments are often used to evoke the feeling of flight and gale? If you thought of bowed strings, you’re correct! Unfortunately, I couldn’t find much support on this topic online, so you’ll have to take my word for it. I am most certain that this is fact, although not something worth discussing on the Internet, by the looks of it.

Anyhow, violins/cellos/etc are ever-present whenever we’re close to Rito Village or dealing with a rito related mission. Attack on Vah Medoh, for example, features a sequence of strings that is meant to evoke the strong winds we’re fighting against in that particular moment(*). Another great example is The Final Trial, the song that plays at the shrine of resurrection nearing the end of the Champions’ Ballad. Preceding the activation of each terminal, you’ll notice that a new instrumental element joins the crowd: the first one corresponds to the tambourines, related to the zora and Mipha; the second one are strings, referencing the rito and Revali, etc. I tell you, the moment I heard this during the trial I almost started crying like a baby. And, although strings have a lot to do with Rito culture in general, they tie most strongly to Revali, since he was the champion of his people, and his legacy carried over throughout the years. His accomplishments became material of folk tale, a legend, a source of pride and inspiration for the village. And let’s not forget that, at the end of the day, Revali is the crucial and foremost connection Link has to this place. Other than appeasing Vah Medoh, Link’s responsibility here is to free his past fellow champion’s spirit from Ganon’s malice. The soundtrack is referencing Revali first, and by extension his devotion to his home.

With all that in mind, let’s move on to our next point:

2- Nowhere to Go.

You shoot the canons, land on top of the Divine Beast, do what you gotta do, activate the first terminal and the soundtrack goes off unannounced. Like some sort of surprise anxiety bomb. The rhythm turns fast, the melody erratic, incredibly desperate in its execution. There’s this sheer despair, fear, this feeling of suffocation almost, which are so well achieved in this particular piece.

And that is, partially, because a quite familiar resource is used here as well; one that we’ve heard before in songs such as Rito Village or Revali’s theme. You could even think of it as a motif: two notes are played in an semitone interval, repeatedly and in quick succession. For the sake of later convenience, we’ll call this the Flight Motif, now let me explain why. In Breath of The Wild, this semitone loop is often followed up by some form of resolution. In Rito Village, formerly known as Dragon Roost Island(**), that resolution consists of a graceful descent of the melody, from a high that was built up previously during the motif. On the other hand, if you listen to Revali’s theme, you’ll notice that the interval repeats itself for a couple of times as thought charging up, to then rise fast and determined into a triumphal reprise of Revali’s distinctive assigned melody. This juxtaposition supposes the difference that lays between common rito flight and Revali’s trademark ability; both musical sequences are speaking of flight, albeit in two different languages depending on the way to achieve it. While the rito traditionally use their wings to glide and let themselves get swayed by the air currents Buzz Lightyear style, Revali takes full advantage of his flying capabilities to somehow create an updraft of his own, rising meters above the ground whenever he likes or needs to.

So, now that I layed out my base of thought when focusing on the strings, this’ll be much easier to explain. We’ve settled what the instruments themselves are a symbolic representation of Revali, in this scenario specifically. He was the only one inside Vah Medoh, and the score is, in a way, a retelling of what we can vaguely assume went down here during the Great Calamity, as much as it is what sets the tone and ambience for Link’s mission. But what are we hearing exactly? What we talked about, the Flight Motif, is being repeated nonstop. And that’s the thing, remember how I mentioned that this sequence usually finds resolution at the end? Well. Inside Vah Medoh,… it never does. The melody picks up in numerous occasions, but it’s not nearly as graceful, or calculated, as we’ve grown used to by now. It gets tangled and lost, and then inevitably falls to the ground in disarray. The pattern repeats itself, reaching higher after a handful of failed attempts, but no matter how much it tries, the cycle never ends. What used to tell us about flying and freedom in the skies, has morphed into an almost sinister musical incarnation of a tornado, and there is no way out of this trap. What do you think it must feel like to mindlessly flap your wings against wind currents so strong and violent, that it is impossible to get anywhere nearby, let alone take off every time you lose your balance. Or every time you’re shot down. On top of that, trying to aim and fight back in whatever short breaks and opportunities you get, at an enemy that’s much more powerful and relentless, who’s using your own element as a weapon to destroy you… it’s a risk Revali surely had to take in order to put up a fight. Even knowing full well that the odds were not in his favour, that he was most likely going to lose this battle, that he was going to die. Let that sink in. I’ll skip the activation of the second terminal, since there’s barely any change registered in the theme in general. So-

Three terminals activated.

I know this post is supposed to be a breakdown of the song purely, but that doesn’t mean there’s no place for a little theorising, and the following scrutiny is also quite relevant for our discussion. Bear with me for a bit. I’ve read almost everywhere about people’s most common interpretations on the Divine Beasts SOS signals, and how everyone thinks that Revali’s coming in last (a few seconds later than the other champions) has to do with him holding on for longer. Or, also, overconfident as he was, it means that the idea of calling out for additional support didn’t cross his mind until it was too late, and that’s why the beeping sounds more frantic and panicked than the others’ when it does appear. After giving it some thought myself, I’m betting on the latter option holding more ground, and that’s not all. I want to touch upon a detail of the piece that I never acknowledged was there until very recently(after seeing myself obliged to listen to this song fully and a handful of times, suffering every minute of it for the sole purpose of this analysis. It’s okay I didn’t need my heart anyway). Soon after activating the third terminal, the SOS signal disappears, or grows distant and faint enough that we can’t make it out from the background anymore. In its place, we’re confronted by this… shrill, piercing and painfully slow tune. It sounds synthetic, artificial, devoid of life. And it’s funny, because you know what it reminds me of? I’ll tell you:

A heartbeat flatline sound.

And I want to highlight that this doesn’t happen in any of the other Divine Beasts themes. All their SOS signals carry on, but Medoh’s is no more. This abrupt stop, followed by this bone-chilling tune…. makes me believe that Revali was the first of the champions to fall. A few days ago I came across SuperZeldaGirl’s video on a similar topic, theorising that this could very much be the case. There is not much evidence to support this claim other than some visual cues that could be suggesting to it, but after I found this in the soundtrack, and if we’re to rely on it for anything, I believe Revali was either the first champion to be ambushed by Ganon, or well…. the first to be killed. It is plausible, because short after Calamity Ganon unleashes his power, Revali parts from the group and flies directly to Vah Medoh, and he very well could’ve been the first pilot to arrive.

On this note…. we’ll have to wait and see for ourselves, when Age of Calamity provides long-awaited answers to many of our questions.

Four terminals activated.

An interesting melody is being played on what, for me, would qualify as a glockenspiel or a celesta, which are keyboard based instruments that produce a sound similar to that of a music box(***). If you want to pay more attention to it, I suggest listening to Vetrom’s Instrumental Mix Cover of the theme, where they practically zoom in on this part of the song (keep in mind that it uses the All Terminals’ time signature so it’s being played faster). For some reason, this particular addition makes me feel profound empathy. The sound of this instrument could be described as cute or childlike, magical, even. It is more often than not used to represent innocence, but I highly doubt that’s specifically the intention here. Much like the leading strings’ melody, the melodic contour of this one is trapped in a loop of going up and down constantly, but the difference is that this time around it sounds more under control. And much more uniform too. It doesn’t lose focus or takes risky, fruitless leaps, but rather chooses to stay on a path of waves that consistently rises and falls without taking detours. Like a determined battle strategy, giving it your all. You fall, but get back up again, and try again, and again. It reminds me of Revali’s approach to training, being persistent to the point of overworking himself. He had discipline nailed down to a tee, which I also think served him well in combat. It’s not just about being hard on yourself, either, but being confident and having complete faith in your abilities; believing that you’ll make it. For this to appear now, that the SOS signal is almost completely gone, is significant because it means that by this point, being so close to success on Link’s behalf, the music is sparing genuine encouragement for once, in spite of the tragic outcome of the past and the danger of the current situation. But, in all honesty, this is probably just me reading too much into it. Perhaps the composer just thought this addition sounded pretty bitching and there’s not much else to it, which is completely fine. Although, intentional or not, sometimes coincidences do happen, and at the end of the day, interpretations like this are a form of appreciation for an artist’s work and for what they can unknowingly accomplish.

All terminals activated.

This is the moment when the song finally lightens up. Notice how the strings abandon the wave pattern for a more even contour. The beat quickens, the melody stabilizes. At first I thought, coming from our flight analogy, that this meant a cease in movement entirely, and it was partly one of the reasons why the song in general makes me anxious. But thinking about it now, …there is something different going on here. The strings are playing on a steady rhythm. It resembles a march, it’s like a pounding heart. It’s a lively, hopeful statement. And what’s interesting is that, up until this point, there was so much fear and helplessness present in the score, even going as far as to reach a dead end when we activate the third terminal. But that’s it, isn’t it? the music just keeps going further.

It’s saying: this isn’t over yet. Even after complete and utter defeat, there’s still hope and an underlying wish to overcome this predicament, and we started to hear this as soon as a fourth terminal is activated. The melody we previously talked about? it’s here as well, and its beat is much more daring and confident.

And I just want to say… this is so powerful. Because this sentiment is deeply tied to the game’s story and Revali’s character arc. You see, he is introduced as someone who resents Link for being the manifestation of his failure, in a way, because Revali has trained arduously his whole life to be where he is, to be recognised. And yet… this hylian gets chosen by a magic sword and some tale of divine destiny and, apparently, that’s all it takes for him to be deemed the hero that will save the land. In Revali’s eyes, Link has done nothing to prove his worth before him, so it is easy to see why he despises the silent knight so much; he is yet another individual that was born into their destiny. Meanwhile, Revali has had to build his reputation from the ground up, earning him a place among the greatest warriors of Hyrule, and even then he finds himself surrounded by people who grew up praised for being born gifted. We can see how Revali is the odd one out, and can map out the reason for him acting so antagonistic towards Link.

But once we’re on Medoh, things start to change. When Link enters the Divine Beast, Revali greets him with disdain, as per usual. Of course, Link has no recollection of whatever happened a hundred years ago, other than a small glimpse of the rito champion talking down to him, a memory that came and went in a flash. So as Link, we more than expect Revali to act cold and mocking, which he does. He provides us with as little help as needed in order to free Medoh, reluctantly, shielding his wounded pride over having to wait for Link, of all people, to come to their rescue. But you can hear him starting to open up bit by bit(I wish I could translate his dialogue directly from Japanese but I’ll make do with a couple of dubs and other numerous sources from translators online). With each little step Link takes towards success, activating the terminals, the perception Revali has of him shifts from one of resentment to one of genuine admiration and respect. By the end of it all, he is willing to not only cheer on Link during the boss battle, but to trust him with his life’s worth achievement. And once left alone, he admits defeat and lets go of his bitterness, realising that he was wrong to underestimate Link, and later wishes he could’ve had a chance to measured up to him. To take all of this into consideration and work with it in the soundtrack I think it’s genuinely splendid. And for once, I am grateful that it ends in somewhat of a positive note that puts my soul to rest. I still have a hard time listening to the first two thirds of the entire thing, but now I can look forward to a hopeful and earnestly heartening conclusion for all the pain that this composition puts me in. I must admit that it’s beautifully and brilliantly crafted, and that I am enamoured of it regardless.

That is why I wrote roughly 4k words about it! I hate myself!

If you’re as crazy as me about the soundtrack of this game, I recommend you read the published cd interview with the composers themselves! if you haven’t already. I just found it yesterday(unbelievable but it’s true) and… after writing all of this and checking it out, I felt validated. It sure is a one of a kind feeling.

Alright folks, we’ve made it to the end. Congratulations for sticking around and thanks being interested in my nonsensical rambling!

I also hope that you, like me, will now be unable to listen to bowed strings without being reminded of Revali. Good luck!

————– Annotations/Sidenotes/Whatever

(*)The Flight Motif(in point number 2) is also present in this track. We can hear it in the background right after the Rito leitmotif, as per usual. It starts with a clarinet, I think, before the strings take the lead. (**) Note that the Flight Motif only comes into play in the Breath of The Wild rendition of the song. (***)I strongly associate this instrument with Mipha, given that it is used in her theme, in every “response” to the initial melody. It can be heard in Attack On Vah Ruta, as well, it enters the scene when the notes Mi(E) and Fa(F) are played. The initial tune, Si and Do(B and C) are played on a clarinet or oboe, wind instruments just like the flute that leads Sidon’s respective theme. The celesta can also be heard inside Vah Ruta, activating the first terminal…. when the song really takes a turn just like Medoh’s. Mipha has nothing to do with the song of this analysis, however. We must understand that instruments, although they are attached to characters/various story elements in some cases, can always be used outside of that context, for that is the nature of an orchestral soundtrack. If you have this many tools at your disposal, you will make good use of them.

#Revali #Vah Medoh #botw #loz #aoc

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missanthropicprinciple · 3 years

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A Tale of Elio and My Fixation with Lovable Androids

TL;DR Feel free to scroll past this unless you’re keen to read my ramblings about androids, Neoclassical art, children’s lit, and bad science fiction movies.

Since the late 1990s one of my favourite books has been A Tale of Time City (1989) by Diana Wynne Jones. It’s a mildly confusing story but engaging, with memorable characters, including the android Elio, pictured above - my own fan art from a few years ago. Studio Ghibli really needs to make this film if no one does a live-action version, seeing as they brought Jones’ novel Howl’s Moving Castle to life. Here’s a scan of my favourite edition with mesmerizing cover art by Richard Bober.

This book inspired me so much I’ve done research on it. I wasn’t in a class in grad school that allowed me to write about it so I took it on as a casual independent project in 2019. Two days after my dad died of cancer I was scheduled to present my paper on Elio from ATOTC. Needless to say I was not able to finish writing the essay. I told the department coordinator I would likely not attend but I would let him know. He was seriously surprised that I showed up. I must have looked like a ghost - wearing a nice top, skirt, tights, and short heels. I was still in total shock but I thought I might as well press on. My paper’s working tile remains as it was: Elio: Android Autonomy and the Personification of the Sun God. I presented a long bullet point list of working ideas and research done up until that point. My work is still on the broad side because it’s an intersection of young adult fiction, Neoclassic art, and android autonomy; I have some narrowing to do. Here are my main arguments thus far:

Firstly, the android character Elio’s physical characteristics and personality are inspired by Helios, the Hellenistic Greek god and personification of the sun. Apparently, Elio is a Spanish name meaning sun and also an Italian given name referring to the element helium, originally derived from the Greek name of the sun-god Helios.

Secondly, Elio and Helios share more than an etymological connection and the comparison of Elio to Helios can be articulated in two distinct ways: the aesthetic comparison, and that Elio possesses some of the qualities Helios is known for. Jones’ work repeatedly associates Elio with sunlight and golden hues, aspects which are exemplified in the 1765 Neoclassical painting Helios as the Personification of Midday by Anton Raphael Mengs. (I vaguely remember translating a couple passages from a large art book written in German when I was studying Neoclassical art.)

This work is considered an unusual depiction of Helios. Mengs uses a motif of the glowing arrow which is interpreted by François-Xavier Fabre as a symbol of the midday heat and the sun's rays which penetrate and give light to the earth. The representation of the sun in this way is considered unusual for the 18th century because it goes against Classical and Baroque iconography which portrays Helios riding a chariot. Ironically, Jones references this. Elio proclaims his fondness for films, particularly the chariot race from Ben Hur. Elio, like Mengs’ depiction of Helios, lacks a chariot but retains his beauty and powers.

As for Elio possessing some of the qualities of Helios, the god is often referred to as “all seeing” or “Zeus’s eye.” Similarly, Elio has the ability to anticipate problems and see what humans do not, but not because he’s a god, but because he’s a servant. However, this is where his self governing comes into play when he uses his observations to take action beyond any directives he has been given. His physical strength, like Helios, exceeds that of humans. Elio himself says, “my utmost is more than twice that of a born-human” (Jones, 211).

Thirdly, Elio’s self awareness allows him to use both his powers of observation and superior physical strength independent from humans. He does not always wait to be told how to use his power; he wields it. Not only does he play a part equal to that of humans in Jones’ plot, he specifically controls the fates of certain human characters. For example, he doesn’t always utilize his speed when he’s at the beck and call of his master, Sempitern. He makes choices not to fully comply with the demands made of him.

My fourth point, which I can’t quite articulate well, is that the most significant dynamic of this comparison is the body of Elio and how his physicality interacts with his autonomy. Elio acts as an individual who contributes to a wider mythology just as Helios does. Yet, while Elio is superior to humans in many ways, his quasi-humanity allows him to act in ways which align with Helios’ qualities.

For example, Elio makes personal choices and exhibits emotions not necessary for him, as an android, to function. He confesses a desire to harm another android out of annoyance where a passionate opinion would not be expected from an android. This human failing is indicative of the same autonomy which allows him to act as Helios does. Elio has been constructed as a superhuman body in terms of his abilities, however, the human qualities which contribute to his Helios-like powers undermine his intended purpose.

Ultimately, Elio ascends the usefulness of his “owned” body by acting independently from the humans who utilize him. His human qualities make him vulnerable and therefore he loses some of his godlike powers. Elio, while only an assistant to his human owners, utilizes his own physical and mental powers to maintain his autonomy. Conversely, his god-like qualities make Elio more human rather than affirming his android identity.

This is a very complex subject and I don’t really know where I’m going with it and have possibly made some suppositional errors. TL;DR: What I do know is that Elio presents a paradox: being idealized for his abilities allows him to be autonomous while being autonomous disrupts the servitude of his body.

I am in the process of determining what lens I will use to analyze Elio’s experience and functionality of being an android. I’m thinking about using Alan Turning’s 1950 work Computing Machinery and Intelligence. I’m still navigating the literary theory aspect, or indeed philosophical aspect, of this area of study.

This brings me to something I came across later that relates to Elio and ATOTC.

SPOILERS AHEAD

The closest depiction of an android that I’ve seen to Elio other than Data is from a terrible and somewhat forgotten science fiction film from 1989. “Byron”, (played by pre-Jurassic Park-fame Bob Peck) the android in the painfully awful film Slipstream comes very close to Elio in terms of tone, attitude, and characterization. Despite the embarrassingly bad script and dialogue, Peck does a bang-up job, seemingly acting in a wonderful film running parallel to the absolute trash his co-stars were apparently “acting” in. Yes, I rewatched this film just to write this analysis. (The secondhand embarrassment is off the charts and I had it playing at a low volume most of the time Byron was not on the screen.)

When you first see Byron he’s acting out autonomy but you’re not aware he’s an android. The audience is told he’s an escaped fugitive, a murderer, and that’s all we know for over half the film. Yet there are several clues. When you first see him he’s running over rugged terrain in a suit which was kind of a big hint but nothing makes sense in this film so I just thought that it was a weird costume choice. Then he’s literally shot with a grappling hook. He doesn’t seem to be in pain even though he’s shocked by it, and then is pulled down by a bounty hunter named Tasker (Mark Hamill) and hits the ground from a great height and doesn’t die. He just quotes what I think is John Gillespie Magee, Jr.’s "High Flight”: “I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth….and touched the face of God.” Next time you see him, he’s in handcuffs, looking super depressed, and apparently not bleeding out from the now absent grapple hook that’s gone through his forearm.

He eventually quotes Lord Byron to cryptically indicate his name which is lost on Bill Paxton’s character, Matt. “Byron” essentially means cowshed. It’s ironic because Byron the android is in many ways a receptacle of knowledge. Matt even says sarcastically, “Well aren’t you a walking storeroom of information,” and Byron responds cheerfully, “Yes.”

Byron breaks out of his handcuffs saying they’d “become rather superfluous.” You think he’s just showing off but once you know he’s an android you know he’s just honest all the time. He then heals a blind child and paraphrases Psalm 127:3. Matt says, “I didn’t know you were a healer.” Apparently Byron can perform cataract surgery in less than five minutes. Along their journey together (Bill is set on collecting the bounty on Byron’s head before Tasker can catch up) they camp out. Byron sleeps with his eyes open. (Even if he is an android wouldn’t his eyes need to be “cleaned” in the same way humans need to close our eyes and blink?) Matt wakes up to find Byron seemingly strangling him. “I was feeling your carotid pulse,” he explains. “I was just checking for arrhythmia and episodes of ventricular tachycardia.” At this point you realize he’s not so much a spiritual healer as a doctor who philosophizes a lot.

Byron’s miraculous behavior and pontificating is called into question by a nomadic spiritual community which has been torn apart by an attack on their village. As he lays dying, Ben Kingsley’s character calls Byron a “false prophet” but his faith in this stranger is somewhat restored when he says, “all that will be left of me is bits of gold in the sand. You have a soul, do not abandon it in death.”

Another character says, “The stranger is no mortal man.” Therefore it is clear that Byron likely isn’t human. We don’t find out he’s an android until 46 minutes into the film. Once that’s cleared up, other concepts arise in the script. While not well executed, they are really interesting; emotion both positive and negative, free will, perfection, A.I. slavery, and murder are all addressed throughout the second half of the film. Byron says he doesn’t understand “hate” in context of his “master” to whom he was nurse, brother, father, mentor, and friend, but he admits he was more of a slave than anything else.

The character Ariel takes an interest in him for a variety of reasons, especially romantically. In one very evocative moment we see Byron in a museum exhibit, a false garden of Eden, full of fake vegetation and taxidermies, full body mounts. So we’ve got an android having an Adam experience. Whether or not he experiences “original sin” with Ariel or if he’s “fully functional” is never acknowledged. Although one woman says, “Amanda slept with a robot?!” (who the f**k is Amanda?!) and a man says to another sitting next to him, “I hear they’re rather mechanical in the saddle.”

Byron is less concerned with consummation and more excited about love, sleep, and dreaming. When he is with Ariel he doesn’t quite know how to act in terms of sexual play and then apologizes: “I’m not accustomed to being loved.” We see him closing his eyes when he’s cuddled up with Ariel; the next day he is certainly very pleased that he fell asleep with his eyes closed and had a dream.

In terms of his servitude and autonomy they did not spend an adequate portion of the exposition on it. Matt has a change of heart and says instead of collecting the bounty, he’ll set him free as it’s briefly revealed that Byron killed his “master” upon the man’s request. Naturally, this brings up a lot of confusing feelings for Byron. “Is this what it’s like to be human? I don’t think I’m up to it,” he says. “Can I be trusted with human feelings?” And in a way he cannot. Ariel is brutally shot by Tasker.

Byron is angered over Ariel’s death and follows the bounty hunter to his ship. Instead of taking him in to collect a reward, Tasker tries to run him down with the glider plane. Byron manages to get himself caught in the engine and starts to strangle his assailant. Tasker quotes “touched the face of god” which brings Byron to his senses and he stops killing Luke Skywalker Tasker and tries to save the plane. It looks like he’s going to hot-wire it but then uses the wires like reins (chariot imagery???). They crash into the side of a mountain slope. Tasker dies but Byron survives. Apparently he’s basically indestructible and somewhat godlike. “I’m too dangerous to be human,” Byron tells Matt. In the end, he goes off in search of the place he’d been dreaming about.

Although in terms of physical appearance the two androids are vastly different, they have so much in common. Here are some basic concepts.

Character: Both are stoic, formal, intelligent, honest

Indestructible: Byron is injured with a grappling hook, takes a major fall of about 20 or 30 feet without a scratch: he is somewhat godlike or slave-like, meant to withstand destruction and pain. Elio is less indestructible but easily repaired.

Healer: Byron has the skills to heal people with basic surgery. Elio doesn’t take his own injuries seriously and experiences pain for the first time (Jones, 218-9).

Both think they deserve to be punished: Elio states this quite clearly (Jones, 276) and Byron says the same thing about himself with resigned passivity.

Complex relationship with “human emotions”: Both come to terms with violence, anger, and love.

Autonomy: At the end of the film Byron goes off on his own to look for a promised land. Elio decides his own fate by deciding to accompany the children of the story, stating that Vivian is a “particular favorite” of his (278).

Dreaming and stories: Byron is searching for a place, “where I think I belong,” he says, which is a place he often thinks and dreams about. Dreaming is considered to be a human attribute, a non-essential bi-product to consciousness. Elio enjoys stories and old films (Jones, 180), similarly “human” in nature.

(Peck, seen here waiting for Bill Paxton to learn how to act. Sorry, I’m salty.)

Disclaimer: This is a work in progress! This project is an intersection of niche subjects that interest no one but myself.

Anyway, my point is (yes, I did have a point...or rather several) was that if anyone should adapt A Tale of Time City, Byron from Slipstream is the best example of how Elio should be portrayed in terms of characterization. I feel that Slipstream should have been centered around Byron. The film was kind of like, just about the “we’re both fighting over the bounty of this fugitive” sorta thing. It would have made more sense to focus on Byron as he is arguably the most interesting character and represents many of the conflicts within the story. I would like to combine my research on ATOTC and Slipstream one day. In any case, this is a good start.

Works Cited (WIP)

Jones, Diana W. A Tale of Time City: Knopf, 1987. Print. Perkowitz, Sidney. Digital People: From Bionic Humans to Androids. Washington, D.C: Joseph Henry Press, 2004. Print.

Roettgen, Steffi, and Anton R. Mengs. Anton Raphael Mengs: 1728-1779 Part 2. München: Hirmer, 1999. Print.

Turing, A. M. “Computing Machinery and Intelligence.” Mind, vol. 59, no. 236, 1950, pp. 433–460. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2251299. Wilson, Eric. The Melancholy Android: On the Psychology of Sacred Machines. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2006. Print

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insingersfall · 3 years

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Are dreamers descendants to fallen angels?

So I’ve been thinking a lot about the origin of dreamers, especially in relation to Ronan’s faith and his anxiety about creating life - a job he feels should be exclusive to God.

This is going to be long so the short story: Maybe dreamers are descendants to fallen angels?

Here’s my long ass thesis on why I think so:

Since CDTH I’ve seen this quote a lot:

In a wider sense it doesn’t have to mean anything, just a powerful ending to Bryde’s cheesy monologue about Ronan being too good for basic humanity, but I immediately read it literally.

- do you long back?

And just two pages afterwards we get this:

Coincidence? I think not.

Bryde knows what Ronan is and where he comes from - the sky.

The question of “what am I” is something Ronan struggles with during the entire course of TRC and a vital part of his storyline.

And it’s always this:

Not who am I, What am I.

During the first four books Ronan struggles both with this huge existential dilemma of “what” and with more mundane questions regarding “who” he is. I think Ronan’s coming of age-arc, especially the “why do you hate yourself”/ “I don’t” - scene in TRK is one of the most moving scenes in YA. I read that as being about “who” he is. And In CDTH he’s older, he’s figured a lot of shit out. There are no negative feelings left about him being gay for example. Not in relation to his family, himself or to his religion.

But he still has a lot of negative feelings and anxiety about being able to create life. He still struggles with his identity as a dreamer alongside his identity as a catholic.

Ronan being religious adds so much to his character and this is why I can’t help but read A LOT into the religious symbolism. And it’s there.

Maggie herself posted this a while ago to clear up why Ronan gets so mad in BLLB when the copy of him dies. It clarifies multiple things - that Ronan is very much stuck in toxic masculinity and refuses to show vulnerability while also being very vulnerable, as well as how the situation mirrors his suicide-attempt, which is obviously triggering. But for this theme I want to highlight these two paragraphs:

“First, the setting. Adam is not religious, but Ronan is, and St. Agnes is a place he goes with the broken remains of his family. Now Ronan takes Adam — someone Ronan has only just allowed himself to admit internally that he likes, a lot — not just to the church, but to a private part of the church Ronan frequents on his own. “

And

“But to Ronan, it’s not just a copy. It’s a person who just happens to look like him. Remember that Ronan has spent his life loving dreamed people just as hard as real people. Ronan has spent enough time with Matthew and Aurora to know that even though they came from dreams, their feelings are real. They are not disposable. This other Ronan is really terrified, really in pain, and really dying.

And the real Ronan killed him. He’s killed someone.”

This is one of the very few times Maggie has explained something that isn’t explicit in the book. As we know Maggie is a major spokesperson for “the only things canon are the things in the book” but here she adds additional information. Why? Because it’s really, really important to Ronan’s character. Both the religion and his feelings about creating life. Especially these two combined.

He hates himself for a lot of things, and he hates himself for the ability to create -and therefore take away- life. Something only God is allowed to do.

Well yes Adam, maybe there are two gods in this church. Or something like it.

So - fallen angels? What does that mean really?

The story of fallen angels differ a lot from religion to religion, I’ll focus on the Christian tradition since that’s what our lord and savior Ronan Lynch would like. There isn’t a lot of Bible stories about it, it’s more of a tradition arising from later accounts in religious texts and poetry.

The Devil is a fallen angel who together with a bunch of other angels rebelled against God and was expelled from Heaven to Earth.

In some older interpretations the “angels” on Earth had children with humans and created giants, who in time became demons. Or, if you’re writing YA fantasy with a religious MC, maybe these descendants of angels became dreamers.

Lucifer rebelled against God because he too wanted the power that God possessed.

“Lucifer apparently became so impressed with his own beauty, intelligence, power, and position that he began to desire for himself the honor and glory that belonged to God alone. The sin that corrupted Lucifer was self-generated pride.”

I sure think that sounds like Bryde, and it sounds a lot like the sin Ronan fears God will judge him for.

And on the subject of the Devil. Who in this series is often referred to as a “devil of a boy?”

It’s our man, Ronan.

A quick search of the word “Devil” in the Raven Cycle (1-4) led me to a number of passages, mostly as part of a saying, but at some occasion to specifically describe someone, or as a direct reference to someone.

Ronan, Niall, Kavinsky and Aurora. Dreamers and their dreams.

Coincidence? I think not.

The same search in Call Down the Hawk I would say really confirms this recognition of mine. It has for starters this wonderful paragraph:

But it also broadens the parable to all of the Lynch brothers.

The upper quote about the three brothers all being handsome devils is the only time not even Matthew can avoid the metaphor. A character who up until then has only been compared to an angel.

Contradiction? No, not in the question of descendants to fallen angels.

A creature who are - by definition - both angel and devil, savior and sinner, companion of God as well as a child of Satan.

We don’t know for sure yet how one becomes a dreamer. But we do know that it in some way it’s inherited. In some peculiar way from parent to child. From one devil father to one of his devil sons, the one he created together with another one of his creations. Because Ronan therefore is a clone of Niall? Is Hennessy a clone of her mother? Kavinsky one of his parents? Maybe the next two books will tell. Regardless I still like the idea that they all descend from the first angels on earth, mixing with humans.

I also just have to mention that Ronan not only dream of the sky, but also on multiple occasions dream about flying. Not as a bird, but with his own wings.

So what do I think this will mean in the big scheme of things?

Not a lot honestly! I’m not even sure I’m arguing that this will be a plot point.

But I do think the paradoxical identity in descending from something so torn between good/evil is fucking perfect for Ronan. Someone who’s constantly torn between his own fuck-ups and wanting to do the right thing.

Who creates marvelous life in form of magical animals, angelic brothers and light where there needs to be light, but who also creates monsters, horrors and dangers.

Who wants to protect the world from climate change and protect the people he loves from danger and for all we know might instead accidentally end the world.

Who turns to God and fears hell at the same time as he’s presenting himself to the world as a devil of a boy.

I just think it’s beautiful, whether Maggie has a storyline planned with this or not.

So I’ll just end this thread with the upper picture and with the quote describing Ronans’ birth.

#ronan lynch #cdth #call down the hawk #mister impossible #the dreamer trilogy #pynch #trc #the raven cycle #maggie stiefvater #my post

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twdmusicboxmystery · 3 years

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TWD 11x06: On the Inside - Details

Okay, let's talk details.

***As always, spoilers abound below for 11x06. Don’t read until you’ve watched!***

Connie and Virgil:

The first thing it shows is a spider. I seem to remember seeing one of these around Alpha, and we've seen them other times, too. I wasn't sure what they meant, but remember how I talked yesterday about how Virgil and Connie were led into a trap here, and that points to the same thing being true of the Daryl and Beth in Alone? I think the spider represents someone being caught in a web or trap. And that actually creates really interesting implications for episodes in 4B, such as Inmates.

Speaking of Inmates, we see Connie and Virgil running through tall grass, very similar to how Beth and Daryl did in Inmates. Yet another example of why they (Connie and Virgil) will probably end up being romantic.

Inside this house there are quite a few stuffed animals. Not the toys, but the taxidermy type. See a fish on the wall, a bear, and plenty of deer. All of those are important Beth symbols.

When Connie goes to search the house, she sees a whole bunch of paintings with the eyes scratched out. If that's not a “see no evil” reference, I don't know what is. A.K/ had a convenient explanation for it, but if this is the Beth template, then in the template, it represents something else entirely than in the reality of the episode.

So, what does it represent? Well, obviously we don't know for sure. But I had the thought that they certainly did focus a lot on Connie's deafness here. We’ve never had much indication that Beth will have hearing problems. That’s something unique Connie's character. But maybe the equivalent of that in Beth’s arc is that she’ll have vision problems. So, paintings with no eyes here are meant to represent that Beth will be similar to Connie, except in her case will be vision problems rather than hearing problems. Just a theory, though.

So, they did this thing where when it was shown from Connie's point of view, we couldn't hear any sound. I thought that was really great. It definitely put us into Connie's experience and makes it creepier. Angela Kang talked about how they did that purposefully to show when it was from Connie's point of view. So, one to recognize is that this is proof that what we’ve said about different episodes being from different characters’ points of view is a thing. We don’t have obvious indications of it like this all the time because no other characters are deaf or blind. But this means the writers consider this and do tell various stories or parts of the stories from specific character perspectives. I’m just saying.

In the bathroom, Connie seems sees mushrooms growing beside the bathtub. That's more of the mushroom/hallucination theme.

When she sees the eye on the other side of the wall, she runs down to Virgil and tries to tell him what's going on. She gets so flustered that she can't write it and ends up carving “not alone" into a painting. Obviously, this is another way we can relate this to Alone and suspect it is a Beth and Daryl template.

But also pay attention to this painting. It is a real painting that @galadrieljones was able to find. It’s called “Wolf and Fox Hunt” by Peter Paul Reubens. I’m going to talk about this in a theory later in the week. It’s SUPER important. For now, notice that there are foxes, wolves, and dogs in it. Someone sent me an Ask about something Norman posted and I believe it's related to this. Norman's dropping hints about the duality theme. So, like I said, it's too much for this post but I will be talking about it very soon. Also notice that the painting is framed with deer antlers, which means the deer symbol is thrown into the mix as well.

Also note that the lighting inside this house in general is a lot like Grady, with it being darker inside and having brighter, white light streaming in through the the windows.

We see a door slide across the hallway and separates Connie and Virgil. This is what I mean when I say there are representations of Beth and Daryl being split up and needing to find each other again.

I wasn't entirely sure what was going on with Connie putting her hands on the walls at first. But if you listen to the sound, she can basically hear or feel the vibration of the guy running toward her. It's a little like putting your ear on the ground to hear horse hooves. She can hear his footfalls getting closer and closer. Super creepy.

We do have this one interesting sequence where Kelly is trying to pull her horse forward but the horse doesn't like the mud and is pulling back. Kelly ends up falling in the mud just before Carol's group finds her. It was kind of random sequence and didn't seem to go anywhere in the episode. But if Kelly is a foreshadow of Maggie searching for Beth, it's probably a foreshadow of something else we don't understand yet.

@wdway pointed out that in 10x19, we saw Father Gabriel fall into the mud when he was with Aaron. So, chances are, these are both foreshadows of the same thing, but we don’t know what yet.

We see Connie finding bones in the basement. The walls shake and she climbs into the vent, moving into the passages between walls. This is where she sees Virgil in the outer room, running from the same people she is. This part really creeped me out because my first thought was that he wouldn't know that this was her rather than one of the creatures. I totally didn't see it coming that one of the creatures would walk up behind him. Seriously creepy.

This is another representation of no exit, as I said yesterday, and of Beth trying to warn Daryl of something but not being able to.

I also noticed at this part, the guy Virgil was fighting with said, "hungry." That's in keeping with the idea that these people were cannibals, but it also occurred to me that in the broader, CRM situation, this might indicate something to do with famine and resources.

But here's the other thing. Maybe this goes to the heart of it. I said in the Matrix theory that we don't really know what the CRM is doing, resource-wise, and that’s true. Isobel told Al it had something to do with purifying water, but I’m sure it’s more complicated than that.

The thing is, we've seen several indications of cannibalism now, which all seem to point forward, toward some bigger arc we haven’t seen yet. I mean, it's sort of started in 4x01 with Clara trying to feed Rick to her walker husband. Of course there was Terminus, which was a thing (sort of) in the comic books, but everything about Terminus foreshadowed things we haven't seen yet. This season we have that story Maggie told, and now this Virgil/Connie arc. I just can't help but think maybe one of the things the CRM is doing is using people as a resource in a literal way by eating them. Conjecture on my part, but it does make sense given the symbolism we've seen.

After Connie manages to let Virgil know it's her and not one of the monsters, he pulls her out of the wall, and they hug. This is one of the reasons people are feeling like this might be a romance. It is kind of reminiscent of the Bethyl hug and had a certain intimacy to it.

Later that night, we see Kelly arrive at the same place that Connie and Virgil were at the very beginning. In this case, she goes the wrong way. The opposite direction to the one Connie and Virgil took. The interesting thing is, we see the mailbox has fallen over.

I will post about all the mailboxes later in the week. I do think it attests to the Matrix theory and points to the CRM. I'll explain how I think it was used in this episode when I get to that post. But even showing Kelly go the wrong way is kind of interesting. In the episode, it just means that at some point her group must have doubled back to the house. We’re never told why. Maybe they went that way and didn't find anything, and so decided to come back. Or maybe they heard screaming coming from the house and that brought them back. Either way, I'm sure it's foreshadowing something in the future.

I’m also thinking that the storm we see here is probably important. It doesn’t play a very big part in this episode, but I don’t think it can be unimportant that there’s a storm going on (think Them) while Kelly is searching so close to Connie.

We also see Virgil and Connie talking inside. He says he's never seen people this far gone. "To herd us like prey." That's a “too far gone” reference, which we've seen since S4 and Rick's speech at the prison. And I talked about the fact that this they were herded into this trap yesterday. This is where we get a lot of Beth and Daryl dialogue.

Virgil talks about how he wants to get her HOME, how he wants to get her back to her family. This is also where he talks about losing himself for a long time and Michonne giving him a second chance. Basically, he's willing to die, willing to sacrifice himself to get her back to her sister. But Connie says no, we do this together. *coughs* Bethyl *coughs*

Right after that, they hear the monsters in the house start grunting and Virgil says, “time’s up” and they jump up and run. I just couldn’t help but think of the “time escapes” reference from the clock in Still.

I talked about how I think Virgil being hurt represents Daryl getting hurt and Beth saving him, but also want to point out that we've got a getting-stabbed-in-the-back theme going on this season. We also saw it with Bossi, who Pope threw into the fire. Maggie nailed him in the back with one of her knives and Pope made a big deal about how his wounds were on his back. At it’s core, it’s probably a betrayal theme (another connotation for stabbing someone in the back) and given that Daryl is already planning to betray Leah, that makes sense, and may be the reason for it. We’ll have to see where it goes.

Connie covers herself and guts and lets walkers in. That's how she saves herself and Virgil. I'm assuming that will correlate to something with Beth and Daryl that’s similar.

Daryl and Leah:

In the torture scene with Frost, I just wanted to point out that they're torturing him using fingernail methods, and then Daryl cut off one of his fingers. They specifically did not waterboard him. Waterboarding wouldn’t be the only form of torture the Reapers are familiar with, but the point is, it's a purposeful choice on the part of the writers. Daryl was tortured by water, but Frost wasn't.

(Love how the light is shining down on Daryl’s wings in this picture.)

At one point, Frost says something to Daryl about how are they going to just keep staring dreamily at one another. Kind of an odd reference, no? On the one hand, I think it's a reference to Bethyl, because while the two of them stared dreamily at each other over dinner, there was Frosty Cola on the table. But on the other hand, it could also be a reference to the hallucination theme.

When Daryl and Leah and the rest of them go to check out the town, Daryl stops next to a van that has its hatchback open. It just another way of showing a trunk being open. He uses power lines to alert Maggie to their presence. Could be part of the power/battery/lamp theory.

At this point, Daryl also puts his hand on a mailbox. Once again, I’ll go over the mailboxes later in the week, but this seemed very purposeful to me.

Incidentally, we learn more of the Reapers’ names. Powell, Washington, Fish, and of course Carver. Washington could be a reference to the revolution theme (George Washington). I also thought of George Washington Carver. He was a famous scientist who worked on agricultural methods for eradicating famine. 👀

And of course there's Fish. It sounds like their names that are purposely chosen for their symbolism.

I’ve already said I get heavy Claimer vibes from the Reapers. That was definitely reinforced here. When Carver and Daryl were arguing, Carver kept saying that he was chirping. He said, “Chirp, chirp” to Daryl several times. Which is clearly a bird reference.

But then he also says, “if this dirt bag wants to play, I’ll teach him the rules.” Which is almost a direct call back to Lenny saying that they had to, "teach Daryl." And this extends even to what happens in this episode. Maggie and her group getting out of the house while the Reapers are still inside was very reminiscent of Rick getting out of the Claimer house without them realizing it. I’ve pointed out before how much the situation is like that one. The Claimers were hunting Rick, and Daryl ends up joining them. Here, the Reapers are hunting Maggie for some as yet unknown reason, and Daryl has joined them.

I want to point out a cryptic conversation that Carver, Leah, and Daryl have here.

Carver, talking about Daryl: We both know who he is, deep down.

Leah: What?

Carver: I was there, remember? After? Do you really think this is going to end any different?

Leah: So this is what? You looking out for me?

Carver: Always.

Then she basically calls bullsh*t on that because he allowed Pope to lock her in a room that was set on fire.

But what are they talking about here? In a generic way, it sounds like Leah tends to trust people that she shouldn't, and it always ends badly. Carver is telling her that she shouldn't trust Daryl or it's gonna happen again.

But we’re also kind of thinking that he's actually talking about Daryl here. When he says “after,” maybe he means after Daryl left Leah the first time, in Find Me. So what does he mean about what happened after? It sounds like Leah didn't handle it so well. Did she try to commit suicide? Did she do something else? We don't know. It was just a really cryptic conversation and it's hinting at something we haven't seen yet.

But after that conversation, Carver also says, "You’re not seriously gonna —" but he gets cut off. Sirius reference.

Finally, let’s talk about the title. On the Inside. One thing we’ve learned is that when there are multiple story lines going on in an episode, the title must refer to all of them in one way or another. And often, it will be literal for one story but symbolic for another.

The most obvious meaning of the title is from Daryl’s story line. He’s the “inside man” in the Reapers organization, and is spying on behalf of Maggie and the rest of his people.

But what about Connie and Virgil? Inside of what? The house? Maybe, but that’s pretty cheesy. This is another reason I think this foreshadows Beth and Daryl being inside the CRM. On the “inside” of that organization and trying to get out.

TTD:

A quick note on The Talking Dead for this episode. There weren’t any massive TD smoking guns or anything, but I wanted to point out how they react to the idea of romance between Connie and Virgil.

I’ve said this about a million times, but they only let the actors tease romance partners for Daryl when they AREN’T going to happen. So, I often point to when Lauren Ridloff was first on TTD in S9. People asked about a Connie/Daryl relationship and she made a Daryl/Connie shower joke. Most of the fandom took that to mean they would go canon, but the opposite is actually true. Every time they’ve made that joke, it hasn’t happened.

Meanwhile, with Beth, who was the only one he had really obvious romantic chemistry with, and for whom Daryl’s feelings have now been confirmed, they’re constantly directing us away from it. Saying things like, they were brother and sister, or we didn’t miss out on any great romance, Daryl felt about her like he felt about Sophia, etc. And that, to me, says that Bethyl is the one that will happen. The other things are just teases, but they’re directing us away from the truth so that it’s more of a surprise when it happens. (Not that it will be for TD, but for most of the fandom it will be.)

Anyway, they kind of did the same thing with Connie and Virgil. Again, remember that when they asked LR about Daryl, she teasingly suggested it would happen and made a sex joke. But here, when asked about Connie and Virgil, she acted like it was absurd and she never would have thought of that. And if you ask me, there was WAY more going on in this episode between Connie and Virgil than there ever was between Connie and Daryl.

That, coupled with all the Alone references, and I’m relatively sure Connie and Virgil will be a thing. Because they aren’t canon yet, I can’t prove it. But if/when they do, we can point at this as more evidence of what won’t go canon, and what will. I’m just mentioning. 😉

I think that's all the details I have for now. This is definitely a super interesting episode and I'll be talking more about it over the next few days. Thoughts?

#beth greene #beth greene lives #beth is alive #beth is coming #td theory #td theories #team delusional #team defiance #beth is almost here #bethyl

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cozycryptidcorner · 4 years

Photo

Fiore the Genderfluid Kelpie

Notes: this is a commission from a user who wishes to remain anonymous, about a curly-haired musician meeting her monster match for the first time.

If your roommates weren’t such absolute twats about the noise, then you really wouldn’t have much of a reason to practice your violin in the outdoors like some kind of lonely vagabond. The day is bright, only a few clouds in the sky, but not specifically warm enough to make you melt into the little dirt path. Nor do you feel much strain in your lungs as you hike around the dirt path. It’s the kind of day that hints of summer, with all the warm, soft sunlight of the day without the same, stifling heat that comes in the deeper throes of those months.

Hauling everything- the violin, the stand, and the sheet music should be more complicated than it seems, but you’re so used to it by now that you don’t really notice the effort. All the better, then, because having an explosive argument with your roommate over staying indoors would be more trouble than it’s worth. The smaller university also locks its practice doors during the summer, so you can’t go there.

So, again, outdoors, it is.

Google maps is very helpful for seeing the dirt trail that weaves its way around the nearby lake, though it doesn’t register it as a viable pathway. You have to eyeball it, which is okay, because you think it would be reasonably simple to make your way back to the high rises of the city, as you can see them once you stand on a hill, right on your tiptoes. There’s a gorgeous, large, and ancient weeping willow that google’s satellites have captured, one that’s large enough to provide shade and shelter from any unruly breeze. Already, you spot it on the other side of the water, so you tuck your phone into your pocket and head in that direction.

Setting everything up is easy, the collapsable stand simple enough to build, the ground flat enough to allow it to stay upright. You trap your sheet music to it with clothing pins, just as a precaution despite the breeze isn’t quite strong enough to blow them to kingdom come, and turn on your metronome app on your phone as you set it right next to the paper. Once everything is set up, albeit with your violin still in its case, you allow yourself to go investigate the edge of the lake itself, just for the sake of looking around.

The lake is large, extensive, and a shimmering, crystalline blue. You remember that a few years ago, some environmentalist people in town managed to get a large clean-up production in order, clearing out the trash and filtering the muddied water until it stopped shining with grease. There’s an ancient, dilapidated dock, the old, rotting wood half-submerged in the reeds and water, though you think that the very center might be able to hold your weight.

Wanting only to get a better look at the lake as a whole, you step onto the dock, wincing as it creaks under a portion of your weight, but it seems to take it well enough. Carefully, you place your other foot down, too, then carefully tiptoe over the part of the wood that looks the most stable, getting about halfway down the dock. The lake itself is supposed to be ridiculously deep, there’s a river that provides freshwater from the melting snow on the nearby mountains, so it also must be rather cold.

Funnily enough, as soon as you think that, there is a violent crack sound from beneath your shoes, and you find out for yourself exactly how cold the water really is. It’s freezing, just as expected, a biting, icy feeling running through your nerves, and you barely even have time to shut your mouth tight to avoid getting a mouthful of water. Your arm smarts as it hits a plank wrong, and there’s a snap that you aren’t sure is from the wood or your arm.

You struggle, arms flailing limply as you try to surface. There’s something on your foot, though, it’s somehow pinned or stuck in a stray part of the dock, and you don’t think you even have the air to deal with it. Letting out a breath of bubbles to help ease the tension in your chest, you bend your knee a bit, dragging yourself down further, and try to feel out what you’re stuck in.

Wood, definitely another part of the dock, and it feels like you just punched your foot clean through, right up to your ankle. You wriggle, trying to shimmy your way out, but there seems to be absolutely no way for you to get out without at least dislocating something. Before you can even process true, absolute panic at the thought of drowning, a pair of arms wrapping around your chest and pulls. A shock of pain runs through your leg, and your struggle, harder, jabbing your elbow against something… rubbery, you think.

The water is too murky for you to see beyond the blob figure that swims gracefully down to your ankle. After just a moment, two arms reach forward, snapping the plank with such ease that you wonder why you weren’t able to pop out of it yourself, but suddenly you’re being pulled up again, though this time, you actually feel the air.

You splutter and gasp, your face probably cherry pink with the violent effort your body makes to resupply oxygen. Once you manage to take in a few, choking gasps, you spin around to see your rescuer, a bit taken back when you notice the lack of clothing on her pale, freckled body. She’s slim in frame, not at all looking anywhere near strong enough to be able to snap a slab of wood like it was nothing more than a twig even if it had been rotting in the water for god knows how long.

“Um, thank you,” you say awkwardly, unsure of what else to do, “for helping me, I mean.”

She eyes you up and down, her eyes glittering in the reflection of the sunlight dancing up from the water. There’s something that’s oddly absent from her gaze, like a slab of blankness beneath the blue irises, and you find yourself unconsciously crossing your arms across your chest in a sort of protective gesture of yourself.

“Of course,” she says finally, after a long, awkward pause, “you were drowning.”

The way she says it makes it sound like she wasn’t entirely sure if that was what really was happening or not, so you wonder if maybe she’s teetering on embarrassment? That might explain her strange behavior.

“My foot was stuck, yeah,” you say. “If you hadn’t freed me, I probably would have.”

“Hm,” she nods sagely, as though that were an answer to another unasked question, “you cannot breathe in the water.”

“No, I can’t.” You are suddenly very aware of your wet socks as you shift your weight, the thick layer of silt squishing down and over the soles of your tennis shoes. “That’s the thing about humans, we can’t breathe underwater.”

“Fascinating,” she mulls the idea over, as though she couldn’t possibly relate.

“Um,” you’re trying very hard not to stare at any other part of her body but her face, “yes, so I was here to practice my violin, but um, I didn’t realize that anyone else was here.”

“Practice the violin?” She echoes.

“My instrument,” you gesture vaguely in the direction of where you set up your temporary haven of music, “I was going to practice out here because my roommates get annoyed by the noise. I didn’t realize that someone was out here, though, I thought I’d be alone.”

She waits for you to elaborate, but when you don’t, she suggests, “if you are worried I might mind a little music while I lounge and swim, you should not. I will somehow survive.”

It takes you a moment to process that she must be joking, so you let out a brief laugh. “I’m sorry for crashing your lounging and swimming. Um, do you happen to have a name?”

“Of course,” she says.

When she doesn’t embellish, you ask, “what is it, if you don’t mind me asking?”

She has to think about it for a moment, you can see her eyes fade as she wanders through the depths of her mind to drudge it up. You wonder how long she might have gone without hearing it because the long silence that follows seems a little too meticulous to be her looking for a fake one to give. “Fiore.”

“Fiore?” You shift again, wincing at the feeling of slime absorbing into your shoes still. “That’s a pretty name.”

“Thank you; it is, isn’t it.”

Slowly but steadily, you manage to get yourself out of the muck, kicking off your shoes and socks once you’re free from the reeds. Bare feet on a dirt path, you think, is preferable to the soggy, squishing feeling of muddied and wet shoes, and when you turn around, you don’t spot your savior anywhere. Shrugging that off, you head back over to your little setup, checking over your phone, thankful that you had the foresight to pull it out of your pocket before you took an impromptu dunk in the lake.

Popping your violin case open, you begin on your scales, just as a brief exercise to warm your fingers up before moving onto more complicated pieces. Pressing against the strings, you quickly draw your bow out to make the notes. C major, then minor, then D major, then minor, and so on until you moved halfway through the scales before glancing self-consciously over to where you last saw Fiore, but there isn’t any sign of her slim figure.

Thinking that she might have just left while you were paying attention to your finger’s positions over the strings, you go back to practicing, finishing your scales, and choosing from your bags which piece to begin working on.

You would say that this is the most peaceful practice session that you’ve had since this whole worldwide ugly situation has started. No roommates come banging on your door to tell you to quiet it down, no angry stomping protests from the neighbors in the above apartments. Just you, the violin, and your music, and you find yourself improving somewhat on one of the more difficult passages in a piece that’s had you stuck for a long while.

In fact, it was so productive that you find yourself returning in a few days, spurred on by the annoyance of your roommates. The weather is beautiful enough, a gentle breeze cooling any sort of heat that may become stifling in the warming spring. You repeat the actions from when you were last at the lakeside, setting everything up, leaving your phone on the stand, then move to investigate the shore.

You are looking to see if Fiore is here, you’re not ashamed to admit it, but as you scope out the edge of the lake, you see no one around. Not even a telltale sign of rippling to suggest that someone is swimming just below the surface, so you suppose that she just isn’t around. Which, you assume, might as well be expected, because it’s not like you know her whole schedule of when she actually goes for a swim.

So you start practicing again, going through your scales, then beginning on your regular pieces. As you pause, maybe a half-hour into working, to turn on the metronome on your phone, you notice a head of black hair poking up from the water. Which is weird, because you didn’t see anyone in your periphery arrive, you think you might have given the circumstances, but maybe you were just so sucked into the music that you weren’t paying attention to anything else.

Thinking it must be Fiore, you walk over, popping up on your tiptoes so that you can get a better view of her head, you almost stop in your tracks when you realize that the body swimming in the pond is, in fact, very masculine. And just as naked, but you digress. Face so red you think you might look more like a tomato than human, you take a step back, your foot catching on some root or twisted patch of grass, and you fall hard on your ass.

He’s looking at you promptly, eyes sharp and hauntingly familiar. You’re even more embarrassed, now, because you thought that you might have been able to make a quiet and unnoticed retreat. Instead, you’re looking at the face of someone who seems to be debating on whether or not to eat you alive. At least, that’s what it feels like from his predatory glare.

“I- I’m sorry, I thought you were someone else.” It dawns on you now that he might think that you were trying to get a sneak peek of the goods, and just the thought of gaining the reputation of a peeping tom makes your face heat up even more. “There was like this girl who was here last time I practiced, I mean, I saw her when I was practicing violin, too, and you two actually look a lot alike, so I thought- I, um, thought you were her because of the black hair.”

The man regards you with no small amount of suspicion, eyes narrow.

Nervous, you try to dig yourself out of the hole you’ve made. “I was practicing violin, she seemed to like the music- I mean, I think she did. I’m really sorry to bother you, and I’ll just go back to practicing, sorry.”

As you get up to leave, the man cocks his head. “Your hair.”

Mindlessly, as if spurred on only by the word, you reach up and pluck one of the coils, pulling it down to its full length if it were straight. “Y-yeah?”

“It didn’t do that, not when you were here last. How did you make it crumple up?”

Was he there, and you just didn’t see him? “I- I don’t know what you mean.” You release the strand, and it pops back into place, frowning. “It’s just curly?”

“It was straight when you fell into the water.”

“Oh,” feeling sheepish to have your past mistake thrown out like that by another stranger makes you want to bury yourself, “that’s what happens when my hair gets wet. It stops being curly.”

The man regards you like he’s never even heard of such a thing before. Ignoring the weird feeling in your chest, you approach the water, cupping your fingers together, and bring a fistful of water up to a strand. True to your word, it straightens out almost instantly, and you allow him to stare at you like a bug under a microscope, comparing the now damp strand with the rest of your hair.

“See?” You offer, hoping the pinkness in your face might have died down by the attempts to satiate his own curiosity.

“So it was you,” he says, nodding sagely as if he figured it out on his own.

“Yeah, yup, that was me.” You take a significant step back, wiping your hand on your shirt. “I don’t remember seeing you, though, so you must have been swimming out on the far side.”

There’s an awkward pause, and just when you’re about to turn around and retreat back to your music stand, the man speaks, “You don’t remember me?”

Immediately, you try to go through your recollection of that day to see if you somehow wholly blocked the presence of the man, as well, but you don’t think you did. “Did you introduce yourself?”

He looks almost hurt. “I’m Fiore, I told you.”

Now it’s your turn for your eyes to bug out of your skull, because no, that’s not Fiore. Fiore is… admittedly, the same size as this man, tall, slim, with black hair that does fall past her shoulders, but come on. Come on! There’s no way the two are the same person, at least, you don’t think so, because you could have remembered everything wrong. You couldn’t have, though, because this really isn’t something you can just mix up.

“You’re confused,” probably-not-Fiore observes, which is most likely an elementary observation on his part.

“Yes.” You admit, not wanting to outright refuse to believe that what probably-not-Fiore’s saying is false.

“I see.” There’s a faraway look in his face, open enough to give you the feeling that he’s trying to put some kind of explanation in words. “It’s like your hair.”

“My hair,” you repeat, unsure.

“Your hair changes. My body changes. It’s… the same, but different.” Maybe-Fiore places a hand on his chest and drags it downwards to his stomach. “Sometimes, I feel better in this body. Sometimes I feel better in other bodies.”

“Oh,” you say, because that makes perfect fucking sense, of course, why didn’t you think of that earlier, “right.”

“The humans have a term for that, I think,” Maybe-Fiore places a hand on his chin as he thinks, “another visitor to my lake told me, but I cannot remember it.”

“Oh, you’re not human,” you say, not believing him in the slightest, “I didn’t realize.”

“Did I not mention it,” Fiore says in a tone that suggests that he very well knows that he never uttered a word about his species, “interesting. Anyway, I enjoyed the music you played earlier, and I would like to hear it again.”

“Alright,” you hesitate, though you know that you might as well comply. Slowly, you head back to where you left your stand and pick up your violin. Trying your best to focus, you begin practicing again, starting with scales and arpeggios as you did the last time you were here. Out of the corner of your eye, you spot him, lounging, still very naked, on the outer banks of the lake, clearly enthralled in your music.

You’re not sure if you can be flattered over that or not, but you continue practicing nonetheless. When you’ve put in some time- about an hour or two, according to your phone, you begin breaking down your practice area, collapsing your music stand, and packing away your books. Maybe-Fiore is lying leisurely on the side of the dilapidated dock, eyes only opening once the music has ceased.

Sometimes, I feel better in this body. Sometimes I feel better in other bodies, he has said, and you try to digest what that means, the humans have a term for that, I think.

“Did you mean genderfluid?” You ask suddenly, popping your case shut.

He sits up as you stand, trying to formulate a sentence. “What?”

“You said you sometimes feel comfortable in other bodies, and that there was a word for it. Did you mean genderfluid?” You clarify, trying to adjust the straps of your myriad of bags, so the weight is evenly distributed on your shoulders.

“Yes- that.” He smiles, and there’s a weird feeling swimming in your stomach when you see it. “Sometimes, I feel like a male. Sometimes I feel like a female… and I have the advantage of being able to change.”

“Okay,” you nod, wondering for the first time if he actually is Fiore, if Fiore could simply switch their sexes the moment they felt different. Which… you think is a tad bit out there, because changing one’s shape so instantaneously and thoroughly isn’t physically possible. That you know of, though.

“Will you play closer to the lake next time you come?” Maybe-Fiore says, laying back down against the half-rotted wood, closing his eyes.

“If you’d like,” you say, warming up to the idea. You would be directly under the sun, but a lot of sunscreen and plenty of water might keep you from dying.

“I would like,” he nods firmly, rolling back over into the water.

Trying to not look below his waist, you say your goodbyes, and turn to leave.

The weather is already warming up, as though spring was nothing more than a few-day blip on the calendar. The humidity doesn’t help matters, either, because your hair has decided to do something very unique with itself, poking out in oddly placed tufts that don’t want to conform to any other look but insane person. When you come back to the lake, you have a water bottle filled to the brim with mostly ice to melt and sip on while you practice.

You hear the horse before you see it, the tromping of hooves against the earth, a loud, resounding whinny as it sees you in the middle of its path. It’s an incredibly large, foreboding creature, pale like a ghost, a myriad of speckles dotting its back half. Immediately, adrenaline bursts into your veins, because random, galloping horses are not good news, especially when it seems to be heading right for you.

Just when you’re about to shed your stuff and dodge, the horse makes a sharp turn, kicking up some dirt as it does so. Even though the immediate danger is over, your heart is still quaking in your chest hard enough to feel the aftershocks in your fingertips. You are far too startled to do much other than watch the admittedly majestic creature with a wary eye as it gallops over to the lake, the white spray of water splashing about as it plunges beneath the surface.

All that happened within the span of a few moments, and you are far too surprised at the… the absurdness of it all to do much more than stand there, mouth agape, as you quietly debate the pros and cons of leaving your things so you could run away faster. Before you come to a conclusion, though, you see a head of black hair pop up from the water, and all you can think of is Fiore and a feral horse getting into a tussle that the creature would not lose.

You drop your things and run, but not away from the lake, towards. Wild horses could easily cave someone’s skull in like a mallet to a melon, and you’re not going to just leave when Fiore- whoever they may be- might end up pummeled to death by hooves. While you try to shout- keyword try here- you find that the ungodly speed you’re running at mixed with your panicking lungs, all you can manage is a weak wheeze until you near the edge of the lake.

When you get that close, you see that it is Fiore, her slim, long hair sticking to her skin from the water. You’re just about to run yourself into the mud, but you manage a screeching halt, gasping for air, a drop of sweat rolling down your temple as you manage to choke out, “horse, there’s a horse-”

“Not anymore,” Fiore chirps, completely unaware of your panic.

“What? No,” you bend over, your lungs desperately trying to compensate for the sudden strain, “there was like a huge-ass horse that almost trampled me earlier, it went into the lake- and-” come to think of it, why haven’t you seen it surface for air? Where did it go?

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Fiore steps closer to the shallows, the water only waist-deep on her. “I was just delighted to see you, I may have gotten a little too excited.”

You shake your head, only half processing the nonsense she’s speaking. “Not you, the horse. There’s a horse!”

“Yes,” Fiore sounds like you, almost exasperated that you do not quite understand what’s going on, “I didn’t mean to startle you, I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t startle me, the horse did!”

Fiore looks at you, her eyes narrowed slightly, making you feel like you’re missing a massive, undeniable piece of some puzzle you didn’t know you were playing. “And I said I was sorry, sweet thing.”

Even though a shiver runs through your back when she calls you that- sweet thing- you have to be misunderstanding something significant here because... is Fiore insinuating that she can turn into a horse? You are going to faceplant onto the ground if the answer is yes. “Fiore.”

“Yes.”

“So, you were a horse just a few minutes ago.”

“Yes?” She sounds almost relieved that you finally understand what’s happening. Like back and forth was exhausting, and she could not understand why you didn’t.

“Ha.” You’re going insane. Or maybe Fiore was trying to pull a fast one, a long drawn out fast one, and this is all some kind of elaborate hoax to mock the girl who hikes half a mile just to play the violin. “No.”

“Ha, yes,” Fiore counters, almost impatiently.

“But-”

“What makes it so difficult to understand?”

You feel like your brain is going to explode. “Um… I need to go fetch my violin.”

She brightens somewhat. “Don’t forget that I want you playing closer this time.”

“R-right.”

Surely you’re teetering on the very edge of sanity because that conversation did not just happen. Slowly, you gather your things, trying to mull the conversation over in your head. Fiore- the woman, the man, the horse, this can’t be happening. But you can’t come up with any sort of more logical explanation, especially since any other alternative seems far wilder than the simplicity of shapeshifter. So as you begin to put everything together to play, you ask, almost timidly, “what are you?”

“What do you mean?” She’s sitting out of the water, naked, only a few arm’s lengths away.

“I mean,” your fingers are shaking too much to actually play, so you pretend to tweak at the strings of the violin to tune it, even though you don’t have the means to properly do so, “if you can change like that, and you even said that you aren’t human, what are you?”

There’s another faraway look in Fiore’s eyes, the same as when you first asked for her name. Like she has to struggle to remember, as though she hasn’t had to explain her existence in a long while. “Your people have many different names for mine,” she says, reminiscing, “but I suppose that you might know the word ‘kelpie,’ hm?”

You are not going to be scared, not yet. Trying to keep your voice calm, you ask, “like the man-eating horse creature?”

Fiore, to her credit, seems to find that description funny, of all things. “I haven’t tasted man in so long, but I can’t say that I find it particularly delicious. I prefer those creatures with the horns, what are they called... cattle.”

At least she doesn’t seem to favor the taste human, so you force your body to relax a little. “And you live in the lake?”

“For as long as this village has existed.” She closes her eyes, you can see a timeline play in her mind. “Though, not so much a little vagabond grouping anymore.”

You think of the high rising skyline and let out a little snort, unbidden, “you can say that again. Have you visited the city square recently?”

“I’ve never visited the square,” she leans back on her elbows, staring up at the sky listlessly, “never needed to, really.”

“Huh,” you’ve finally managed to stop your shaking body, calming down enough to lift your violin to your chin, “maybe we should go together sometime.”

Before you give her time to process the offer, you drag the bow across the G string, letting the note resonate over the landscape, just to make sure you didn’t muck anything up during the impromptu tuning. Satisfied with the outcome, you begin to play, not bothering to set up your stand or bring out any books, sitting cross-legged in the soft grass instead of standing. This isn’t really about practicing, you decide, but about letting the music flow through you naturally.

By the way Fiore’s eyes become half-lidded, then slowly close, you can tell that she’s enjoying your improv. With your focus only on the next several notes, you need your fingers to grasp; you can’t put too much attention in how beautiful she is, sprawled out in the sun like this. Only that she is, but you try to only use your periphery to observe this.

“You said that you could show me the main square?” She asks when the music notes slowly ebb away.

“I mean,” how do you put this delicately, “you might have to put on some clothes, first.”

Her face scrunches up in a slight scowl at the mere thought. “Yes, I’ve noticed that humans are cautious about covering your bodies up. If you’d like, you can take yours off now, I wouldn’t mind.”

You try not to balk at the idea right off the bat because you’re not sure if mutual nakedness means the same thing to her as it does to you. “I’m fine for now, actually. I don’t mind the clothing.”

“If you insist.” She goes back to her leisurely lounging. “But I suppose that I would have to wear… something, if I were to enter the city.”

“Yeah, unfortunately, there are laws about public nudity.”

Fiore lets out a little hmph, “and there are certain rules to the clothing.”

“... Yeah,” you say, trying not to show too much sheepishness.

“But you will help me?”

“Of course.”

Fiore pauses, cocking her head to the side as she thinks. “I believe someone once told me that such an outing would be called a ‘date.’”

You just about crack the wood of your violin in half. Not entirely sure in which direction either of you would like to take, you say, “I mean- yes, it could be, but it doesn’t have to-”

“What do you mean when you say it is, but it doesn’t need to be? Are humans always so very confusing about such matters? Must be exhausting.”

There’s some truth to that statement, your brain is especially ready to explode again, though for a much different reason than before. “I mean… if you’d like it to be a date, it could be a date. But if you didn’t want to go on a date with me, it could be like a platonic get-together.”

Fiore squints, running over her options, then shrugs. “I’m fine with a romantic outing.”

The hairs on your arm stand up. “Really?”

“Yes.”

“Alright.” There’s an odd, explosive sensation in your chest, and you’re not sure what to do about it. “That sounds like a plan.”

#exophilia #kelpie #kelpie/reader #monster lovers #monster/reader #genderfluid monster

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thefloatingstone · 4 years

Text

If you’re doing Self Quarintine (and you should be if you can help it) here’s some Youtube recommendations! Some of these I have posted about or recommended before but with almost all of us stuck indoors now’s a good time to remind you of some cool things you can watch for free!

I’m not gonna imbed the videos, I’ll just post the link because otherwise I would only able to post 5 and I want to collect a few so you can make a playlist or something. (I could make a playlist too but then I couldn’t tell you what each video is and you can’t pick and choose which one sounds interesting to you)

In no particular order:

Polybius: The video Game that doesn’t exist

An hour long documentary in which the youtuber did extensive research to find the origin of the “Polybius” Urban Legend, which speaks of an early arcade game reportedly seen around the early 1980s which reportedly gave people migraines, insomnia, nausea, subliminal messages, and in some cases heart attacks.

The Universal S

A shorter video in which LEMMiNO does his very best to try and track down where exactly this S that we all drew in middle school comes from? Why does literally every country on earth seem to HAVE their children draw this S?

I also recommend LEMMiNO’s video on the Dayltov Pass Incident and the perplexing UFO cases

Down the Rabbit Hole: Henry Darger

Fredrick Knudsen has an incredible fascinating series called “Down the Rabbit Hole” which simply focuses on... anything you can discover and go digging into. From weird internet personalities, to bizarre happenings in history. This video is about the artist Henry Darger, a man who lived in the early 1900s and for all intents and purposes had a perfectly average, lonely life, until it was discovered just before his death he had spent literally decades writing and drawing a fantasy world in what is possibly the longest piece of literature ever written.

I also recommend his video on the Hurdy Gurdy

Bedtime Stories Channel

I’m actually just gonna link the whole channel for “Bedtime Stories”. If you like weird and creepy stories, all of which at least claim to be “true” then Bedtime Stories is great. Coupled by illustrations and subtle sound effects, Bedtime Stories is literally listening to someone tell you a story about such things like hikers who mysteriously went missing, Sightings of Bog Men in Florida and giant Birds over Chernobyl, as well as weird and unsettling murders that remain unsolved. Sometimes the facts are a little dubious or have been disproved, but that’s not the point of the channel. It’s here to tell a creepy story, not give you a documentary.

A Journey Through Rule of Rose

Rule of Rose is a Survival Horror gave for the PS2 which has rather bad gameplay... but a FASCINATING story with just as many layers and symbolism as Silent Hill 2 could boast. It tells the story of one young woman traveling back into her own childhood in an orphanage in the 1930s, and all the horrors that contains. From repressed grief, abusive relationships, child neglect, abuse, and bullying... but it ALSO contains symbolism of societal class structure, politics, eating the rich, and how power structures work. Not for the faint of heart, but HIGHLY recommended.

I also super highly recommend his video on the similarities between Silent Hill 2 and Solaris

Clemps Reviews Crisis Core

Mr. Clemps is a great internet gamer who reviews JRPGs and other games he simply enjoys. Sprinkling in a heavy dose of comedy and very fast jokes and observations, Clemps’ videos are always upbeat, fun, and incredibly enjoyable to watch. I’m linking part 1 of his Crisis Core video in which he explains why the PSP game remains a personal favourite of his despite its flaws.

I also recommend his video on Eternal Sonata

Defunct TV: The History of Dragon Tales

Defunctland is a channel that deals with theme parks and theme park rides that are no longer standing, or which are no longer around in their current form. Defunctland also has a sub series though, called “Defunct TV” where they look at the origin of children’s TV which are no longer airing. I recommend the video on Dragon Tales which is incredibly wholesome, and a genuinely uplifting and soft story of good people trying to make good things for children. (I also recommend the videos on Bear in the Big Blue House, Zoboomafoo, and Legends of the Hidden Temple)

Hagan’s Histories of Polar Exploration

A Playlist for Diamanda Hagan’s videos about the doomed Franklin Expedition from the late 1800s, where England tried to find a passage through the Northern Arctic to the Pacific Ocean. This went horribly horribly wrong, with every member of the Expedition dead. Over a 100 years later we are still fuzzy on what EXACTLY happened, but apart from the arctic chill, there is also evidence of faulty canned food, a series of bad decisions, and cannibalism. Caution advised for this series.

I also recommend the rest of Diamanda Hagan’s channel. She is NOT for everyone, but if you enjoy somebody reviewing Z grade indie movies as well as just BIZARRE films, really bad Christian media bordering on Science Fiction (without making fun of religion itself) hot takes of classic (and modern) Dr. Who, an introduction to Red Dwarf, She’s an EXCELLENT channel to check out.

Good Bad or Bad Bad: Pass Thru

A half podcast half review show where two guys watch a terrible film, decide if it’s “Good” Bad or just Bad Bad and tell you if you should watch it too.

That’s it. That’s the whole show.

I recommend diving into the untold madness that is one of the best(?) bad film makers currently still producing batshit insane movies, the immortal Niel Breen.

There is literally nothing I can say that’ll prepare you for Niel Breen.

(I also recommend their more recent video for “Dancin’ It’s on!”)

History Buffs: Apollo 13

Do you like History? Do you like movies ABOUT History? Do you want to know if the movies about history you watch actually resemble what really happened in any way at all? History Buffs is an EXCELLENT channel, which does talk about the merit of a film itself, but is mainly focused on letting you know just how true to life that historical film you watch is. I highly recommend his longest video which covers the space race between the USA and the USSR, leading to what is known as “The most Successful Failure in NASA’s History”. The Infamous Apollo 13 and where the words “Houston, we have a problem” came from.

If you’re not interested in Apollo 13 however, I also recommend his video on the movie Casino, as well as his video on the female philosopher, Agora.

The Internet Historian: The Goodening of No Man’s Sky

With videos with literally MILLIONS of views, you probably already know the Internet Historian. But I still want to recommend him very highly because his videos are just THAT good and entertaining. I recommend his newest video, documenting that time we were all pissed off about No Man’s Sky, the difficulties the game studio was in when the game released, and how they have been working hard to finally create what is now a truly brilliant game which is winning major awards. A really good underdog story of how a video game company actually saw what was wrong with their game, and FIXED it.

I also recommend his video on Fallour 76 as well as the Failure of Dashcon

8 Creepy Video game mysteries

Hey. Did you know that sometimes there’s some REALLY weird shit in video games, hidden easter eggs which took literal decades to find as well as just a lot of “what the actual fuck?”. Oddheader is a channel with a dedicated discord and Reddit form solely focusing on trying to find or replicate bizarre video game finds, mysteries, and hidden glitches. Even if it means getting in his car and driving to a specific arcade just to check a rumour about Street Fighter II’s arcade version. So if you like getting spooked by weird game shit that’s not just some dumb creepypasta, this is a great place to start.

I also recommend his video on weird discoveries in DVDs and movies.

Red Letter Media: Best of the Worst

Look you already know who Red Letter Media is.

You know... these guys:

Here’s a video of them and Macaulay Culkin watching 3 terrible movies together.

I recommend literally any and all of their videos. Their discussion on Carpenter’s The Thing is amazing.

The Impact of Akira: The film that changed Everything

Ok trying to pick just ONE Super Eyepatch Wolf video is literal torture. Originally I was going to suggest his recent video on Final Fantasy 7 for the PSone but I realised I recommended something FF7 related with Clemps, so instead I will recommend The Impact of Akira, a video talking in depth about Akira both as a film as well as a manga, how it completely and utterly changed the anime industry both in Japan as well as the west, and why it is still a meaningful and one of the most important anime/manga even to this day, still being unsurpassed despite so much competition.

However, ALL of Wolf’s videos are incredible, so I also recommend his videos on wrestling (despite me not caring about wrestling at all), His video on how media scares us, The bizarre reality of modern Simpsons, Why the Dragon Ball Z manga is great, and literally any other video he’s made. He hasn’t made one bad video yet.

Was Oblivion as Good as I remember?

Exactly what it says on the tin. The Salt Factory goes back to playing The Elder Scrolls Oblivion and now with hindsight and modern sensibilities, gives feedback on his experience and whether Oblivion still holds up. This isn’t a super in depth review of the game’s mechanics or how its put together or how it was made. This is simply one guy talking about his experience replaying it with somejokes thrown in and how he felt revisiting it. It’s pretty good.

I also recommend the video he did on Morrowind (because I’m biased).

Weird Japan Only PS1 games

Thor High Heels is SO GOOD and deserves SO MUCH MORE subs than he currently has. THH focuses a lot of obscure and lesser known games as well as big popular titles like the Yakuza series, talking about what he likes about them, what he thinks is cool, and just what kind of atmosphere and mood a certain game has, even if the game itself is kind of ass. He’s done several videos on games that were only released in Japan, as well as videos talking about the fashion in Squaresoft games and how it inspired as well as was inspired by real world street fashion, the aesthetic of PC-98 games and other topics. He also styles his videos and thumbnails after promotional art for video games from the 90s and generally just has an excellent style to his channel over all. Very chill.

Blue Reflection Review

ValkyrieAurora is a channel run by Sophie where she talks about games she personally likes and enjoys. Her videos are really laid back and her voice is really calm and pleasant to listen to. She’s made a bit of a reputation for herself as “The channel that talks about the Atelier Games” and general is just a really enjoyable channel worth checking out if you just want something soothing to listen to.

Ancient Chinese Historians Describe Japan

Voices from the Past is a channel were historical text is read out loud in english. These can be anything like the above video where Chinese historians describe the people of Japan around 297 AD, Accounts of “Dog-Men”, or the worlds oldest letter of complaint from 1750 BC. If you’d like something interesting historically to listen to but don’t want a full blown history lesson, this is a really good way to hear contemporary people talk about their experiences and what they thought about each other in their own words, without opinions or input given by the narrator.

The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet

Whang! is a channel that covers weird internet stories, some horrifying, some curious and interesting, and some just plain weird. His video on The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet and its update, are about a song which was recorded off the radio in Germany around the 1980s, and after one person online asked if anyone knew who the artist was as they couldn’t find any information, led to the realization that NOBODY online knows where this song came from or who sang it. It’s a fun mystery to look into that, unlike some others on this list, is not creepy or unsettling, although perhaps a little frustrating.

I also recommend his video on The Most Mysterious Anime theme song, and the haunted Ebay Painting.

5 Lost, Destroyed, and Locked away Broadcasts

Yesterworld is similar to the Defunctland channel in that it talks about obsolete rides, theme parks and other forgotten pieces of entertainment. Although the majority of the channel focuses on movie rides, rollercoasters and Disneyland, I recommend the video on lost and locked away broadcasts which you can no longer see. I also recommend the video about Lost and Rediscovered movie props.

The Nightmare Artist

I talked about this one recently as I just discovered this channel. This video is about the renowned Polish artist Zdzislaw Beksinski who painted surreal and horrifying paintings during his lifetime. There is no mystery here or anything like that, it merely talks about the impact WWII left on Beksinski and how the trauma his country and people suffered influenced his painting, and how certain images and motifs can be seen to directly reference this terrible part of Poland’s history.

Disabilities in Prehistory

Modern media likes to portray how “savage” the ancient past is, and tell us stories of how any person born with a deformity or disability would be thrown over a cliff or dumped in a well because they would be too big a drain on a community to look after. But here’s the thing... according to archaeological evidence, it turns out our ancient ancestors actually did their best to look after its disabled members to the best of their abilities. This video talks about archaeological finds of people who had genetic disabilities and what we can learn from their remains. TREY the Explainer is a great channel for archaeology and also talking about what answers we could have for sightings of cryptids. (not ALL of which we have answers for)

I also recommend his video on Pre-Contact dogs as well as Homosexuality in Nature and the Genetic History of the Ainu.

Decoding “The Secret: A treasure Hunt”

“The Secret” was an art book released in the 80s full of beautiful paintings, but it is also more than that. The book has a fantasy story talking about 12 fantastical races who left wonderful treasures for humans to find,and the book’s paintings and riddles will tell you where you can find each of these treasures which are yours to keep if you can solve the puzzle... and the treasures are 100% true and can actualy be found and claimed, if you can solve the riddles in the book. The video tells the story of the artbook, who was behind it, what the treasures are, how many have been found and various other facts and details.

I also recommend the videos on this channel “The Game: A scavenger Hunt” and “The investigation of Erratas”.

5 Ancient Inventions That Were WAY Ahead Of Their Time

I would recommend you be careful with this channel as its main focus is existentialism and rather alarming topics such as “how close are we to the apocalypse” and other things whose titles alone are enough to upset me. However this video is nothing like that. This video is exactly what the title suggests it is. 5 ancient inventions that were so incredibly ahead of their time you’d think they were made up. From the computer used by ancient Greeks to steel swords we don’t know how to replicate, this video is a great mix of mystery and history.

Although I caution you with this channel, I recommend Joe’s other videos about mysterious books, as well as his video on the most inbred people in history.

However, I know I keep repeating this, I highly recommend caution with this channel. Perhaps its just me and the topics of life and existent are just triggering for me, but I’d recommend maybe just doing a search for the titles I mentioned and not to go searching through the video library unless you’re not bothered by this kind of thing.

Anyway I could keep going, but I think that’s a LARGE amount of videos to keep you occupied for the time being as well as some suggestions for further viewing.

Please enjoy, let me know if you found something interesting, and look after yourself!

If you enjoyed this list at all, please consider tipping me for a coffee

☕️ Ko-fi ☕️

#self isolation #Youtube #Links #Recommended #recommendations #documentary #long post #ask to tag #tumblr ate the 'read more' I put on this so screw it #Just scroll past or hit J to skip this if you want #No editing we die like men

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night-rise · 4 years

Text

F.O.W.L’s PLAN

F.O.W.L... The fiendish organization for World larceny..

They live up to their reputation of being fiendish. A group of criminal masterminds with enough power, brains and resources to give people like Scrooge and Darkwing Duck a run for their money. They are a threat that have the capability to destroy the entire duck family.

Scary part is... that’s just what they’re doing this season..

Their sights are set on anyone connected to Scrooge McDuck and they have stepped out of the shadows to challenge them and destroy them once and for all...

But how?

What’s the plan? What plan can be great enough to challenge them? The Duck family have conquered shadow armies, an alien invasion and have defeated countless other villains.

This beautiful family is strong and is growing stronger with each new ally they meet. BOY’D is a freakin super robot now! And we have Lena! She’s already an army in one lol What could FOWL possibly do to match this families strength?

Well that’s what we’re here to find out! And I think I got something.. Something that very well could be the end of Scrooge and his family...

Hey guys! NightRise here with another head scratching theory that will have you up all night pondering

In my previous and first FOWL theory (which I would suggest you go read before reading this. It’s super short don’t worry lol) I talked about the connections between the Bounce serum and Fentons Energy Crystal. How they both could be related to a larger scheme because both are related to BOUNCING.

But how do these two things fit in with fitches journal? The thing that seems to be FOWLS main focus this season.

What’s the missing piece to this plan?

Well I’m here to kick start the many possibilities that is FOWLS plan and help you all see the connections. Maybe you’ll take something from this to help with your own theories.

Now I’m telling you right now that this theory is absolutely a stretch and has about a 50% chance of being accurate. For the obvious reasons being that we’re not even half way through the season yet and we still have so much more of FOWL left to see.

But because of the pieces that I found connecting so well together and the show going on a little hiatus (boo) I thought I’d go ahead and drop this off now.

It’ll be my final theory on this fiendish organization and I want to share it with you the good people so you have something during the break to think over and keep you up at night theorizing.

So with that VERY long introduction out of the way, lets rise into this:

I’ve been thinking a lot about the bounce serum and it’s capabilities. What FOWL was going to use it for and how they think it’ll help them rule the world.

But how exactly? How does bouncing help with that?

Black Heron said she wanted to use the serum to create super soldiers to cause mass destruction and chaos across the- ... (Why am I having Captain America flashbacks...?)

Anyway!

But the thing with that is from what I’ve seen the Bounce juice doesn’t really cause mass destruction when its consumed by a normal person. It just makes them bounce and invulnerable to fall damage. It didn’t create a shockwave of destruction or anything like that when they landed. So how is she going to cause destruction with it?

Bouncing is only good for escaping or surviving from high up places. How could it possibly destroy anything?

Well I got to thinking. What happens when we bounce in a second story house on the top floor? It creates a stomp. A loud BOOM!

Vibrations

And the higher we jump the greater that vibe is. So I got to thinking where would strong vibrations be the most effective and catastrophic?

UNDERGROUND!

Earthquakes!

According to an adorable red hatted nerd we know, Earthquakes are shifting plates that move.

But as also stated by another adorable duckling “who’s pushing the plates”

(Okay so you might already know where I’m going with this and like I stated previously this is what I meant by this theory being stretched and far fetched. But this was the ONLY connection I could make with this so please bear with me, you’re about to see the connections I PROMISE)

There are only one species I know that are capable of causing earthquakes with little to no effort..

The final piece that I think is in FOWLS plan is.......

The Terrafirmians!

I know, I KNOW it’s crazy. And some of you are probably already leaving but HEAR. ME. OUT. PLEASE. Let me SPEAK. Cause I’m about to explain why.

As usual I’ll try to keep it as brief as I can:

Terrafirmians, ancient rock like cretrues that live in a society deep underground. Not much different from the above ground civilization.

Their capability to move around the earth effortlessly is amazing. And they are incredibly strong. With little to no effort they were able to make a clean safe passage back to the surface for the Duck family in a matter of seconds. Their rock like exterior makes them almost impenetrable.

Honestly they would make the perfect soldiers for anybody.........

So why wouldn’t FOWL want them in their army? They certainly can find a use for them. One specific use in general:

To use the juice

The Bounce juice is an organic drink, so you can’t give it to an army of robots. And we’ve seen what happens when you give it to a normal person. Not much.

But the Terrafirmians with their already tough exterior (which was redesigned in this reboot series. From furry and plush to rocky and tough) would cause a lot of damage if they were bouncing around everywhere. Bouncing is how they operate. They bounce and crash into rocks. But instead of digging right through the earth they’ll bounce right off of it, creating vibrations.

That serum would be perfect for them. Perfect for FOWL. An impenetrable army that could cause so much destruction in an instant. It’s the perfect plan.

Think of the time gap between the two missions involving the bounce serum.

Why did Heron return after so much time had past?

For so many years she could’ve attempted to capture Beakley and get the serum information she needed. So many chances. Why wait? Why was FOWL so quiet for so long and then suddenly pick up where they left off DECADES ago?

What changed?

I’ll tell you what changed. The plan changed. The original idea they had for the serum.

When Heron was explaining the plan she didn’t really sound like she had all the pieces together. Just soldiers bouncing “here, there and everywhere”. It was messy and not well put together.

It sounded like a disorganized plan for an organization.

FOWLS original plan was incomplete and had too many errors. So it was unnecessary at the time. That’s why FOWL didn’t try to go after the juice the first time Heron failed to acquire it. They weren’t desperate. They didn’t need it then. They found it unnecessary.

So why is it now that they are trying to complete that mission? What makes now different from back then? Why is it now necessary to acquire the serum after all this time?

Because they found the final piece they needed.

The Terrafirmians

But wait! How are we even sure we’d see them ever again in this season? Well because we only saw 4-5 of them. There’s an entire civilization of these guys. Are we really not going to explore more of them? This season is all about Huey so why wouldn’t we go back to the first obstacle he faced in the series?

Think I’m crazy?

Remember what Bradford Buzzard said at the end of Double-O-Duck? “We’re going to take it from them. From right underneath McDucks nose” UNDERNEATH! That’s gotta be a clue.

Their FOWL base!! Its underground! They moved from a tower to an underground lair. WHY? The tower looked perfectly fine to me. It seemed to be working just fine. Why move underground? That’s another clue.

But how does Fitches journal (which was found UNDERGROUND) fit into all this? Well allow me to explain.

The Terrafirmians are a peaceful friendly tribe, that have no beef with surface dwellers. If they had a problem with them they would’ve showed up a long time ago. But they haven’t. It’s obvious they want peace.

This doesn’t fit in with FOWLS plan though. So they are looking for a way to change the Terrafirmians way of thinking. Take away their peaceful ideals. They want to corrupt them. Control them

Mind control.

They are looking for an artifact that helps with that. It’s become obvious that they are not looking to acquire every artifact in that journal.

If that was the case they would’ve been there to steal the Harp from the ducks or showed up after they left to take it. But they didn’t. Not a sign of them anywhere.

And they already have the third eye diamond. Found in their personal archives. (How that’s possible is full of theories that I will leave to someone else to work on lol)

But by the way it was presented in the episode Double-O-Duck, it didn’t seem like it was needed. Or important. Just a side project. Why?

Because they are after a SPECIFIC artifact. One that would help with controlling the Terrafirmians. That’s what Bradford meant by “The race is on”. The race to the final key they need. The final key like...

The Stone of What Was!

“STONE”. That’s already connected to the earth. There’s a chance this stone is with the Terrafirmians. Or it might be the case that this stone will help whoever has it find the hidden civilization that is the Terrafirmians.

Kinda strange they’re saving that one for last, don’t you think?

Could that be the final thing they need? Would that bring them total control? Who knows but it’s interesting that the creators of the series would save that adventure for last.

But wait, how does Fentons crystal fit into all of this? How would that help FOWL in anyway?

Well if my previous theory was correct, Gandra is already working on that solution.

See that’s the thing about theories everybody! When you do them, include everyone that applies to it!

Putting certain characters in scenarios that fit them. And that’s what I did with Gandra. Shes a scientist plus she has a connection with Fenton. Her and Fenton obviously are going to meet again. What else would she possibly work on?

She’s going to replicate Fentons experiment on a larger scale. Wrap the Terrafirmians in that same synthetic crystal, like clothing or Energy suits, to boost the power of their bounce.

The greater the bounce the greater the vibration.

FOWL is going to control an army of Terrafirmans, give them bounce juice and wrap them up in Fentons Synthetic crystal so they’ll be powerful enough to create INSTANT EARTHQUAKES!

But not in a city wide rage! Specific locations. FOWL said they don’t want to destroy the world. Just the Duck family. In fact they don’t want to destroy the world at all. But steal it from everybody else. What better way to do that then to have an army of earthquack making soldiers that can split up and target each individual family member and take them out unsuspectedly?

FOWL said it themselves they want to do things smarter. What’s smarter than an earthquake making army you can’t see coming that can take you out before you even know what’s going on? At anytime. ANYWHERE.

The very world itself would turn against the Duck family. It’ll be robbed from them!

They don’t call it “WORLD LARCENY” for nothing am I right?

Magica and Lunaris already tried taking the aggressive approach and failed. Now FOWL wants to do things more stealth like. In the shadows. Leaving no trail that will lead back to them. The charging head first method has failed multiple times so FOWL is trying something different.

Still think it’s crazy?

Well check this out:

What do you guys notice about this picture? For one thing it has every target that FOWL is after on it. But what else do you see? Where are they?

In the sky..

Now why would everybody meet up in the sky? Is it because maybe the ground is currently unsafe? Hmmmmmmmm?!

Brute force is not going to work this time. It’ll be a battle of intelligence. Lucky for us we have a duckling that can out brain all of FOWL

They might have an army

But we have a Huey...

I’m looking forward to seeing the outcome of this season. This hiatus WILL be the end of me I just know it lol but it gives us the fans plenty of time to figure this out. I’ll be looking forward to taking this journey with you all.

If I said it once this season I’ll say it again

BRING. IT. ON. F.O.W.L.

#ducktales #season 3 #ducktales 2017 #scrooge mcduck #f.o.w.l.#dt huey #huey duck #Terrafirmians #fowl #fenton crackshell #gandra dee

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theoniprince · 3 years

Note

If you had to pick one name/alias/moniker to go by, fandom-wide, what would it be?

Where, besides Tumblr, can people find you doing fannish things? (Obviously only mention sites and usernames you actually want to be found at. Don’t expose your secret identities on my account.)

What other names have you gone by on these platforms, including Tumblr, if any?

When did you join the IT fandom? And what got you into fandom, to begin with?

What are your favorite ships, or characters, if any, and why? What do they mean to you?

In what ways do you participate in fandom? (ex. Posting memes, reblogging/commenting on content, writing fanfic, making fanart, creating fanmixes, etc.)

Do you have any in-fandom inspirations? Other members of the community that drive you? (And if you have the time/energy, in what ways do they inspire you?)

Name and link some of your favorite works, please!

Do you have any works of your own that you feel particularly proud of, or wish more people would’ve consumed? Please provide links if possible.

Have you ever participated in a fannish event (ie. IT Week, a fic Big Bang) or applied to be a part of a fanzine? If so, which ones, and can you please link them?

Without any form of bashing or lashing out, what is something you feel this fandom is missing?

First of all thank you so much for asking me!!! 8D It was a pleasure to answer all these questions. During this I got quite emotional (haha Stanpat, Eddie). It showed me again how much I love this 8DDD

( I apologize in advance for all misspellings and my sloppy English =_=)

If you had to pick one name/alias/moniker to go by, fandom-wide, what would it be?

Oh, what a start XD I'm not that into nicknames. Generally people using my first name to address me or my username which is mostly onyprince (in reference to a character from Hakuouki) ID Sometimes they say Oni or J(ay) (Nickname for my first name). Do as you wish (though I like ‘J’ the th most) 😉

Where, besides Tumblr, can people find you doing fannish things? (Obviously only mention sites and usernames you actually want to be found at. Don’t expose your secret identities on my account.)

Twitter. But everything I post there is also here. Feel free to follow my account, but you don’t have to. https://twitter.com/oniprince_

What other names have you gone by on these platforms, including Tumblr, if any?

Oniprince_ (Twitter) yeah… you see, I am pretty boring XDDD

When did you join the IT fandom? And what got you into fandom, to begin with?

Actually 23 years ago (haha I am old XD) When I was eleven I saw the miniseries with my cousins for the first time. The horror factor wasn't that important to me or maybe I didn't see it that way. It was more like an adventure story with an unfunny and nasty clown. A group of friends who had to endure an adventure. In any case, it entertained me well, even if I was not aware of some elements like that it’s a story about growing up, friendship, love and all these issues around becoming an adult XDD Then with 13 I read the book. It was a new experience, and I loved every single word. Over the years I talked with friends and Kingsianer (XD) about it and read it for a second and a third time. At this point I could start a list with things I don’t like about the movies, but I’d rather mention on thing I really appreciate about them: they are a good opportunity for a new generation to explore this universe. Every adaption like the book itself is a reflection of a specific decade and what is more yeah… immortal, universal and diverse than a story about growing up. It was a discussion with a dear friend about book to movie adaptions some weeks ago that probably brought me back to this fandom

Nevertheless there are things from the book I would have loved to see in the movies. Let’s be honest at this point if you want to adapt such a brick of a book you simply have to cut some elements. You can’t please everyone

What are your favorite ships, or characters, if any, and why? What do they mean to you?

Ships:

Stanpat - orz q__q they are such a sweet couple and it is so heartbreaking, they never ever had a real chance to become parents. They would have been excellent parents. Imagine them on a beautiful summer day. They have a picnic with their children and Stan would watch birds with them. He would tell them all about the birds and keeps a journal about their observations with his kids

Reddie - Despite the constant teasing their realtionship seems like a natural, casual und easy thing from the start. And Eddie likes the nicknames. These secret names are like another identity. He can be someone else. They take care of each other. Their relationship is a deeper friendship that runs mostly on an emotional level and is sometimes expressed through small, physical gestures. The chemistry between them is indescribable. It is cute when 90s Eddie immediately starts to giggle as soon as Richie makes a dumb joke at their reunion. And thing about the little moments when Richie pokes Eddie and calls him cute. I am won’t quoting this one passage in the book that leaves much room for speculations, but there is no doubt their special bond is official. In any case, the decision to make Richie gay in the movies gave the ship another push. I don’t complain. I love it. Though I still think Eddie would have been a better option. There are already some scenes in the book which are like an invitation to speculate about his sexualityTheir chemistry is very obvious and believe me, there is nothing I would more appreciate than a happy end for them Q__Q

Benverly „Your hair is winter fire

January embers

My heart burns there, too

This is one of sweetest things I have ever read in a book and that is all I need to explain why I love this ship.

Fav, Characters: Hmm when I read „IT“ for the first time I had a crush on Bill. He ist the born leader and in my childish, pre-teen way found his stuttering cute. There is something about him that cast a spell on you. It is perfectly understandable that he was a role model and an inspiration for his friends – especially for Eddie. In my personal opinion book!Bill ist the best Bill.

Richie - I love this chaotic megane dude. He is this silly type who use jokes, pranks to protect himself. His voices are like safe heaven (the same goes for Bill, whose stuttering almost disappears, when he pretends tob e someone else). He hides himself and his insecurities behind them. It is a shame that he doesn’t know what an impact he had on his friends. Richie seems to never ever shut up and sometimes his trashmouth is still talking, when he better should be quite. And I am famous to fall for funny characters. He can lights up the mood immediately ( and OMG…. I love Harry Anderson in the miniseries. A real entertainer, BUT BILL HADER…. Bill Hader…just to make it clear BILL HADER did such an amazing job. He rocked the movie and I still think, not just because I love this dude since over a decade, without him… the movie wouldn’t have been so entertaining)

Eddie - He is in these abusive relationships. First with his mother, who keeps him small and makes him believe that he is weak. At the end her own fears of beeing left behind prevented her son from becoming a self-confident adult. Eddie always thought he is weak and fragile. Although he knows that he doesn’t need all this medication, his childhood experience were the reason for his coping-behavior as an adult – he still uses his inhaler. He married a woman who is like his mother. Mike's call was something of a turning point. Until this call Eddie could not overcome his fears and had to face them again as an adult. I can remember. While reading the book there were several moments of silence and I stopped reading and thought: poor Eddie.

Ultimately, his story is about a hero who surpasses himself, overcomes his fears and by sacrifice himself he protects what is most important to him - his friends. It just touched me. Eddie gave his life for his friends and I think you can say he's my favorite character. His death may be a tragedy, but it was necessary for his character arc. My theory is that Eddie represents someone who has lost track in his life and prefer to stick on old but unhealthy patterns.It is almost like Eddie stands for missed opportunities, but at the same time it is never to late to change something. He is a hero. There are so many things I would like to talk about, therefore I should start an own thread XDDD

Oh and Bev - I could always identify with her (not bc of abuse or domestic violence. My childhood was amazing). She is the only girl around the losers and I was the only girl in my favourite clique too. We spent most of our time outside - it was great. Of course I had other friends (female) as well, but with my boys… it was always special).. As you know as an adult she falls back in old patterns. Her husband is tyrannical man like her father. Again Mike’s call is a turning point. Maybe the Benverly arc is the most satisfying. I was… I am very happy that Bev got her happy end.

Last but no least - I like Ben, Mike and Stan too. They have all there unique character treats and you sympathize with all of them. The Loser’s club is bunch of adorable idiots who just doing their best to become adults. I think it is normal that their friendship feels more intimate in the book – I highly recommand the book.

In what ways do you participate in fandom? (ex. Posting memes, reblogging/commenting on content, writing fanfic, making fanart, creating fanmixes, etc.)

Mostly fanarts, but recently I thought about posting my own theories and sharing my hcs and random stuff about the characters and the different relations.

Do you have any in-fandom inspirations? Other members of the community that drive you? (And if you have the time/energy, in what ways do they inspire you?)

The fandom is full of amazing artists and writersand actually it would be a, but i want to name those who inspired me the most (mainly artists – hopefully I copied the links correcty):

https://tonyofthetrees.tumblr.com

https://meowsteryyy.tumblr.com

https://slashpalooza.tumblr.com/ ( you have to check out ‚Loose Ends‘)

https://coldcigarettes.tumblr.com

https://vvanini.tumblr.com/

https://eggocrumbs.tumblr.com

https://twitter.com/10_sgan

https://twitter.com/kasphacked

https://twitter.com/tac_nor

(oh.. the list got longer than expected IDDD)

Do you know this?

https://ragnarozzys.tumblr.com/post/189890790551/those-early-hours-after-a-sleepover-when-you-wake

Have you ever seen something as cozy and cute before I///D? – me neither XD

Trust me they are all worth a visit and I am sure most of us already know them 8D

Do you have any works of your own that you feel particularly proud of, or wish more people would’ve consumed? Please provide links if possible.

My art I provide on tumblr can be found here:

https://theoniprince.tumblr.com/tagged/myart

Honestly I like these the most:

https://theoniprince.tumblr.com/post/649446311120273408/my-first-reddie-sketch-now-scanned-the-quality

https://theoniprince.tumblr.com/post/649548606679007232/close-to-you-now-scanned-with-coloured

https://theoniprince.tumblr.com/post/650697175346593792/hammock-iconic-richie-is-reading-a-monthly

Have you ever participated in a fannish event (ie. IT Week, a fic Big Bang) or applied to be a part of a fanzine? If so, which ones, and can you please link them?

Oh… unfortunately I am not feelin‘ very confident about my own artworks. Sometims I have the feeling I am not creative enough and that my ideas are more or less boring. Nothing special ID Totally dumb – I know. As I mentioned before I came back lately to the fandom… I guess I missed many amazing IT weeks. I participated in some weeks/mainly shipweeks in other fandoms (Yakuza/Ryu ga Gotoku, FFXV) If I find an interesting annoucement I can imagine to participate in the future ; )

Without any form of bashing or lashing out, what is something you feel this fandom is missing?

In general… the fandom is really friendly – I hope so. Lately I have seen some salty comments on different stuff, topics… and well.. I have just an advice: life can be exhausting enough and time is always running. Don’t spend time on things you don’t like. Discussions can esclate quickly and worde can hurt too. So, just thing about before you jump in.

Thanks again! <3

(Special lil sketchy piece of art I did for this ask)

#ask me stuff #personal #it book #stephen kings it #be nice to me #this is my opinion and I like to talk about this stuff

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fellownarnian · 4 years

Text

Queen Susan and her Magical Horn

Spoiler! This is a long passage containing me trying to explain why I think the Susan’s Horn from Father Christmas holds a hidden meaning.

Okay so I just a had a thought but I’m not sure if anyone’s ever talked about it. But remember how Susan got a Magic Horn from Father Christmas who told her that help will arrive to her whenever and wherever the horn is blown.

"And when you put this horn to your lips and blow it, then, wherever you are, I think help of some kind will come to you."―Father Christmas

It kinda hit me, what if, Father Christmas had given the horn to Susan because he knows, and so does Aslan, that one day, there will be a time when she would need help the most?!

What if like Dumbledore, who had given the Deluminator to Ron because he knew Ron would need a little more push to get him to make the right choices, Aslan knew that Susan would one day need a little more push to get her to start believing again?

What if, Aslan understood Susan because unlike the others who have experienced the power of Aslan and Narnia more personally, Susan was always the one filled with doubt? I mean, think about it.

Peter experienced Narnia as an older brother who not only had to lead his siblings away from trouble but the whole of the Narnia too. Narnia relied on him and those battle scars he earned are not easily forgettable. His personal experiences were significant because they taught him how to be a leader.

Edmund experimented Narnia in a more eye opening way because he realised how his betrayal of his family nearly costed them their lives. Narnia will always remain in his heart as it’s where he learnt the value of family and love. The journey he went through transformed him into a better man, not just in Narnia.

And Lucy, who practically grew up in Narnia, who went to bed and woke up with the sounds of waves splashing against the sands, remembers Narnia as a place where she truly belongs. She was the sole reason they were in Narnia and the majority of her childhood memories consisted of her life in Narnia. In a way, Narnia affected her more than anyone.

However, Susan, who is the second oldest, always had doubt in her. You can’t really blame her because while the eldest makes his decisions, she needs to be the constant follower that judges whether Peter’s decisions will result in the four of them being harmed or not. That’s why she was pronounced as the Gentle because while her three siblings went on to fight wars, she stayed back to help treat the wounded and took care of the current affairs.

Susan’s time in Narnia was obviously one of her most glorious and happiest days, but as soon as she stepped foot back into the 1940s England, she doubted whether that time was reality or not.

I would assume she dreams about Narnia, about the days when they ruled the country and when they were running around the pathways in Cair Paravel. But it is because of those dreams, she starts to doubt her memories. Was it all just a make belief story the four of them made up while they were hiding in the Wardrobe?

And when they depart from Narnia after helping Prince Caspian with the information that they can never go back again, she channels her sadness and doubt into denial. She denies that Narnia ever existed and I feel like she only did this because she doesn’t want to face the reality that Narnia is real and yet she cannot go back to it.

Then, in TLB, when her siblings, her parents, Professor Digory, Eustace, Jill and Polly dies in the train accident, she will somehow remember a specific sound that seems like it was from a dream of a dream. She will remember how that sound will only be heard when someone’s in trouble. It had a specific frequency that when it danced through the air, it resonated a bright, powerful melody and would lead help to wherever it was required.

I feel like this is when the true meaning of the Horn comes to play as ‘help’ is given to those ‘who needed it the most’! Susan needs that confirmation one last time so she could finally realise that Narnia and Aslan do exist!

“My Horn...” She quietly says as memories suddenly flood into her mind, awakening that frozen Narnian heart of hers. She will remembers all their royal adventures and Aslan saving them from the White Witch at the end of the battle. That’s when she starts believing again!

And on one particular day, she will hear that melancholic sound again but this time, help doesn’t arrive and instead she’ll see her siblings waving at her from the doorstep of Aslan’s Country.

I just feel like the Horn from Father Christmas holds a more important meaning and thought maybe I would share my thoughts with you guys! :) I relate to Susan a lot because, in a way, we share the same experience which I may or may not explore sometime in my Tumblr Narnia Career xD

Please feel free to comment your thoughts on this! I love reading people’s views on Narnia thoughts! :)

#narnia #fellownarnian #narnia thoughts #the pevensies #the chronicles of narnia #peter pevensie #susan pevensie #edmund pevensie #lucy pevensie #aslan #thoughts

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gloomverse-theories · 4 years

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Something I’ve always been curious about regarding Gloomverse is: what was the deal with the dream versions of Wallis and Harold? The whole color change thing they had going on and why did Wallis have slight differences in his design from the Wallis in the non dream world? (For example, dream Wallis was wearing a tie while real Wallis was not.) Any thoughts or feelings on the matter? Personally I don’t trust dream Harold and especially not dream Wallis.

Mod Joe’s response:

Okay, strap yourselves in for a long one, because I have A Lot to say. I won’t talk about the clothing, this is mostly about Coloring and Rights... rights that were and are being broken.

TL;DR of my thoughts/feelings: The dream selves are supportive of Rylie and signal protection for their newfound family. They know a lot more than they should and seem to have even more in store. Even the links to Murder Hobo do not upset me because their general goals align, for the moment. Virga and Yellow are the greater threat...

Let’s talk about the Colors first. Colors change color when they get Magic. Why do I bring this up? Because we have this panel:

This moment is important because Harold addresses the Dark Overlord directly here. And from the sound of it, his hair and eyes changed to the black and red we know when he got his hat.

But wait. If he says her hair and eyes didn’t change, so it’s her real hat, then if eyes and hair do change, it’s The Wrong Hat.

But that shouldn’t be possible. As per the Right of Passage, you can only gain Magic through your own Hat, by taking out your wand from it. This is the first Right being broken here. Harold got Magic through a Hat that is not his own, a fact supported by us never seeing him with a Wand.

The giant lollipop does not count, as he only uses it to bash people with it. We never see him Manipulating anything, which you need a Wand for; he’s only ever seen Creating candy out of his “fake” Hat. But that’s another theory.

Important thing here is that he is breaking one of the fundamental Rights of Magic and changed color because of it.

We have another panel that we shouldn’t forget when discussing the dream selves: Wallis going berserk.

Not included in this picture is the levitating Seaweed hanging on to him, complaining that she cannot breathe in the next panel... which is violating another Right, that is the Right of Protection from magic. It states that Magic cannot be used directly on the body of a living being. Which he already violated once before (and after) by making limbs invisible.

This seems to indicate that this coloring (at least for them) is tied to Right Breaking. Something we should keep in mind...

Onto the dream itself now.

Sorry Harold, You didn’t have a good panel while standing upright.

Here, the colors are reversed. Wallis has the black hair and red eyes while Harold has his natural colors. Why? What rules could Wallis be breaking here? Well, he is in another person’s dream, which is having influence on their mind and by that breaking of the Right of Protection again. It could be that... but then Harold wouldn’t be breaking a law by being in the dream. Hm.

Wallis’ color scheme could also be tied to how he is MIA and color shifted at that point of the story, but then again, Harold also is. Another thing to note here is that Wallis is in full control of himself, not going mad with rage as he did against Cakegirl. Furthermore, not only are his clothes noticeably different from his magic show outfit, his limbs are still visible. This is most likely not directly the Wallis who disappeared during the magic show...

— Mod Green : When Purple found Wallis in the crater, his hair was still reverting to its normal color so I’d guess he was indeed frozen in time or in stasis or something... —

Harold is a bit of an oddity as well. He has his natural colors, invisible limbs and candy canes, as well as the hat we’ve always seen him use.

We later see Rylie with both legs in her dreams, so having his limbs back shouldn’t be an issue; but she also only got multicolored hair when she remembered that’s how it currently looks like. It seems that the dream appearances are tied to one’s self perception.

So, could this just be how Harold sees himself. After all, he has had missing limbs for much longer than the other two, since childhood. Or maybe it’s a little off because it’s a sign of something greater. Why is he even there in the first place...?

Because, as for their intentions...

Dream Wallis is clearly being supportive of Rylie here but does extend a word of warning too. They even came specifically to wake her up early.

Which seems to indicate that these versions know more than their waking ones... but in the world they know, Rylie didn’t wake up after only two weeks? Hm! Perhaps Virga found her in Gloomverse then, or there is another timing issue we don’t know of that necessitates the change. Something seems to have happened that could be solved by her waking up “earlier”. (How much earlier? Days? Weeks? Months? Years? We don’t know, but Wallis dismisses two weeks as a short time, which is pretty alarming on its own.)

In any case, all points towards Wallis and Harold having the ability to go back in time in some way... but we’ve seen something similar lately, with Rylie and Prisma talking. Perhaps they contacted Rylie the same way. We’ll know more soonish.

— Mod Green : @trixylalamoon suggested that Harold’s “true” magic would have been time magic, fitting a time/space motif between him and his brother. And that does explain a lot of things! They could come from an alternate timeline, or from the future, and decided to intervene and wake Rylie “earlier”, maybe to prevent something from happening? Or provoke something. Like Wallis’ crash. He reappeared and crashed two weeks after the magic show, approximately at the same time as Rylie woke up in the hospital. Are those two events linked someway or purely coincidental?

What it doesn’t explain is “how did they get here?”. —

This timey weirdness doesn’t change the fact though that the brothers view Rylie as family and are going to help her get through whatever may come as best as they can. I do not doubt the sincerity of that, and neither should you...

“BUT HE LOOKS LIKE PRISMA’S MURDERER! TRUST NO ONE!” I hear you exclaim in chorus with Rylie. And you would be right to be suspicious, considering that Yellow is set on Necessary Murder and Amadeus seems equally determined.

For one, however, we don’t actually know whether Wallis and Harold from the dream are working together with Amadeus; we can only confirm that they seem to know of him. (“Other red-eyed magician? What did they look like?” then a meaningful look once Rylie describes a long black haired, red eyed magician.)

— Mod Green : We know that “Mancers could inflict their powers directly on the human mind”, so to be inside Rylie’s dream, they would need the help of a Mancer. You could make a case that Harold and Wallis are mancers, but their magic wouldn’t really allow them to visit a dream, unless Wallis can open a wormhole in people’s head. Who are our other options? Of the five Mancers mentioned, we have only met two : Amadeus and Prisma. However, I don’t think Ama would help his sons to wake Rylie up. In fact, he would probably have preferred that she never wake up again.

When Rylie wakes up and try to explain her dream, Hobo’s face is.... dread.

What about Prisma? She seems to care a lot about Rylie, and would want her to wake up. She’s already trapped in some sort of Dreamscape so she must have experiences. Well I’m not so sure... Without Dream!Wallis and Dream!Harold intervention, Rylie might have met Prisma faster. What if they were trying to prevent that...? She’s the reason why Hobo fears her and Yellow wants her dead.

We can scratch Amaryllis and Malus from the list of suspects. One went missing thousands of years ago and the other is more of a “physical violence” than “spiritual help”. Which brings us to Hyacinth. Out of all the mancers, she’s the most likely to have mind related magic (we will talk about that another time), and she’s possibly still alive in Ecoverse. What is her interest in helping Rylie? No clue, but we can’t dismiss any lead.

And finally... Harold. I said before that maybe his “real magic” was time magic, but it’s only one possibility. He seems pretty at ease in Rylie’s dream, flying around on a giant lollipop just because he can, while Wallis looks powerless. He even has his original color scheme, so contrarily to his brother, he’s not breaking rules by being here.

He is also the first one to notice that Rylie is waking up, and says that they have to go. Which means they can come and go whenever they want, and are not dependent on another person to pull them back out. Finally, Amadeus asked the lemon kid to watch on Harold, and specifically on his sleep. He is “sleeping well” and so “his risk is back down to almost zero”.

The Dark Overlord gave Harold a false hat, but is he also keeping his real one away to prevent him from using his magic? —

Secondly, about Ama’s motives themselves:

The reason I am using this image is to draw your attention back to the moment where Wallis went into a rage. Yes, Ama here seems very much in control of himself,but he seems to be leaking Magic everywhere. Just like his son when in great emotional turmoil. Hm. Just like...

Here. But seemingly much less controlled, indicating that he might have been less cold than he let on back then...

This picture is one of my favorite Amadeus moments. He just threw a few bombshells at us: Rylie is someone important, he’s the Dark Overlord, he murdered Prisma, he won’t let something happen again, and on top of that, he’s Petunia’s husband and the father of Harold and Wallis! Plus he has the same general color scheme as his sons! (Note that he’s ALSO rule breaking: no hat nor wand is visible during his magic usage.)

So how could we trust them when they have moments where they look like a murderer who’s been tricking the entire cast for months!?

Well, to sum up, two reasons:

1) Amadeus acts out of conviction. Both when murdering Prisma (despite his possible unrest in the moment) and when giving Rylie her Hat back. We can’t know for sure about the first, but he did the second to protect those important to him and his sons. He even apologizes to Rylie. I wholeheartedly do not think that he will harm Rylie as long as he can avoid it. Whatever it is he wants to prevent, he’ll try to explore the ways that avoid killing the newest member to his family.

2) Wallis and Harold are still their own people. They will oppose their own father who was not there for them for most of their lives if it is to protect their little sister. Even their dream selves would do it, as I have discussed above. It would not match their shown intentions, even if they seem to know more.

In other words: We should currently be worrying more over Yellow and Virga than Hobo and the dream selves of his sons...

#Anonymous #gloomverse #mod joe #mod green #theories #assistant #harlold gloom #wallis gloom #mooching hobo #gloomversetheories

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