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crazycookiecrumbles · 2 years

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Ugh, Men

Masterlist

A/N: This is just a bit of a mess with some OG6-ish sort of shit added in. TBH IDK why i’m even still writing lmao

Pairings/Characters: Jennifer Walters x Platonic! Reader; Avengers x Reader (Platonic —for now? IDFK)

Warnings: fluffy crack, attorney bashing; Tony being delinquent on his level one tony stark bullshit

Summary: Jennifer’s in town on a little vacation to visit Bruce, which happens to be a perfect time to invite you so she can catch up with her best friend.

Jennifer’s head flew back as she laughed, her hands flailing in front of her while you were shaking your head, pinching the bridge of your nose as the memory of what had happened replayed itself in your mind.

“And this is why I hate attorneys,” you told your best friend while she continued to laugh.

“Oh, come on. We’re not all that bad, right?” She asked you with a straight face before you both started to snort and laugh. You both took a shot together and took a few seconds to yourselves before she nodded and moved her hand, gesturing for you to continue. “Okay. So, you told the guy to restate his appearance for the record, right?”

“First, I laughed at him because I couldn’t believe he had the audacity to speak that fast,” you explained.

“Ah, so that’s how you ended up with Mr. Slow-Mo.”

“Who does that?” You scoffed. “Honestly, that man is too old and too seasoned to be treating the court reporter with that much vinegar. They know how it works! Slowly and clearly for the record or it’s not getting taken down. Ugh, I wanted to punch him so badly in his smug little face after he started to say his name in slow motion. Does he think he’s funny? He’s not. Dickhead. Ugh.”

“Well, it’s over now, and you’ve got a funny story to tell. Plus, you didn’t punch him, so that makes you even doubly better than him,” Jennifer pointed out.

“You know? I think you’re doubly right,” you replied and raised another shot glass.

Beaming, she grab another shot. You two toasted each other and downed your shots.

You and Jennifer had a long history together. You’d met each other while you were still working as a freelance court reporter. You were new, unseasoned, and had yet to be comfortable putting most of these older, stubborn, arrogant attorneys in their places in order to make your job easier.

You’d met one day when you were growing particularly more and more frustrated with the plaintiff’s attorney. Having told him to stop interrupting and to slow down so many times, your hands were shaking and you yourself weren’t sure if you were going to cry or scream or both. Jennifer had asked to go off the record, and you couldn’t lie, you had wished she stayed on the record just to take down the verbal undressing she gave this man.

After the transcripts were done and there was no longer risk of any conflict, you two were having drinks together and sharing experiences. The rest? Well, safe to say, it was history.

Now, the two of you were sitting comfortably in Avengers tower. Jennifer was in town visiting her cousin and she was happy to visit you as well after you had moved to New York for a job in the courts rather than freelance any longer.

“You wanted to beat that guy for making a joke? Tough crowd. You sure you just didn’t need some chocolate that day?” Tony asked as he came around the bar to make himself a drink.

You and Jennifer went silent as you both stared at him. From a few feet away, Bruce sighed and grabbed a seat for himself to prepare for what was to come. Natasha rolled her eyes and muttered that she wasn’t going to be saving Tony this time around. Clint, comedically as always, immediately turned off the music that was playing so he could really enjoy this. Thor was mumbling that he was confused, as assault seemed like a fine answer to such arrogance, while Steve muttered that he might be seeing that happen right that moment.

“Some chocolate, really? That’s your response, a PMS joke?” You snapped at Tony who blinked.

“I have some right now, actually, since it sounds like you need —“

“It’s the audacity to hire a court reporter for a service and then to blatantly disrespect them while they’re there to do a job they were hired to do,” Jennifer jumped in. “It’s having the nerve to continue on doing whatever it is they were doing, after the reporter tells them exactly what to do and what not to do! Consider the rage you feel when that SHIELD agency that I totally don’t know about at all contracts you to do something and then does everything they can just to make your life harder .It’s annoying, it’s frustrating, it’s —“

“Please, doesn’t happen. I do what I want,” Tony replied as he sipped his drink.

“It’s a waste, Jennifer. He doesn’t understand because he’s a white man with money and his brain is so far up his ass he feels nothing but pride, even for the stupidest things, 24/7,” you sighed.

“See? She gets it,” Tony beamed and raised his glass like it was a toast.

“Tony is useless and untrainable in these regards, ladies,” Natasha said as she walked over to the table. “I’m afraid he only remotely pretends to understand the female plight when Pepper is involved.”

“Hey? I’m plenty female-friendly! I love women,” Tony argued.

“You literally just stood there for about five minutes and showed how unfriendly you are,” Clint pointed out from across the room. “You didn’t even need to say anything, Tony. All you had to do was shut up and listen.”

“Exactly! You don’t have to feel the need to chime in on every single thing, Stark. All you have to do is sit down, shut up, smile, and look pretty while the women take care of business,” Jennifer told him, taking his drink from his hands and chugging it herself.

Tony blinked several times as he watched her, “Dare I say, Banner, your cousin is a little hostile with men. I am a victim here.”

Jennifer rolled her eyes and looked to Natasha, “Let me know when you want to file a lawsuit against him.I’ll make it happen.”

“Thank you, Jen. Far more useful than Bruce,” Natasha teased.

“Hey!” Bruce whined from his seat, hands going up in the air. “I did absolutely nothing wrong!”

“I mean, you totally could’ve told Tony to shut up instead of sitting down to watch the show, Bruce, allyship,” Clint said as he grabbed a slice of pizza.

Now Tony and Bruce both glared at Clint. They shared a look with one another before nodding. Tony began to throw ice cubes at Clint while Bruce announced he was going to go and break all of his arrows. Clint shouted in protest, ducking the ice and grabbing his pizza as he ran to go make sure his arrows went untouched.

Thor’s brow furrowed as he looked around at everyone, “Are we not going to punish these men, or what?”

You blinked as you raised your hand, “Actually, I’d totally go and — “

“I think you just need another drink,” Jennifer snorted as she poured another shot for you.

Natasha leaned in to whisper in your ear, “Let me know if you want to get some revenge on that attorney.”

“Natasha,” Steve said in a warning tone as he looked at her.

Natasha rolled her eyes and stood up straight, “Oh, golly, sorry grandpa. Didn’t realize you were the parent in charge tonight.”

Steve sighed heavily as he stared up at the ceiling and shook his head.

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revengeisourlullaby · 3 years

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Everything Happens For a Reason

Warnings: 18+, smut, Cheating/mentions of cheating, “revenge” sex, arguing, dealings of breaking up, ex-partner being shitty, dom themes, hair pulling, dumbification, degradation, feelings of worthlessness, Thor being an asshole, Loki being an asshole sexually, sensual themes, some angst, some softness but mostly tough love vibes, this will take place around the time of Ragnarok for visual reference, kinda domestic but not really

a/n: This is my first time writing for marvel characters! I previously was writing for mha, which I still do if you’re interested. Apologies to the Thor lovers, he’s an ass in this. Nevertheless, I hope you enjoy it and that I do a good job of representing characters that we all enjoy. :)

Word count: 6.7k

Main: Loki x female!Reader Ex: Thor x female!Reader

You were on your way back home after ending a grueling shift at work. Everything around you left you in a sensory overload. The sound of your feet pattering on the sidewalk, the aggressive car horns of New York’s taxis, conversations you passed by all created a stinging buzz that roared in your head. Finally reaching the station, you walked down a flight of stairs, the horrific New York air filling your nose. A stench that made you feel at home but somehow could never get used to. Sighing you thought to yourself.

I just wanna get home.

The idea of having to mush yourself into the train in desperate hopes of not only being able to find a seat but to not be bombarded with the evening nonsense made the buzz in your head turn into an unfortunate headache. Waiting for the train to rush through the tunnel, you grabbed your phone and frowned, seeing that your boyfriend had yet to answer the text you sent earlier. He said he was free from any heroic duties for the next month so it was peculiar to not hear from him. You began to grow worried.

Picking at your nails, you were thinking about all the possible “what ifs” that could have happened with Thor. You guys had been dating for some time now, almost two years. It had become common to be met with all the craziness that his job title of hero held. Truly anything could happen. So, of course, your brain was constructing all of the terrible things that could’ve possibly happened with him.

You couldn’t fuss about it too long, the train came bustling through the tunnel, the air from up underneath it blasting you in the face with the trademarked scent of burnt rubber tires and gasoline smoke. You trudged your way into the train, squeezing your way to a spot closest to the door so you could make your way out quickly. Holding on to the railing beside you, you popped your AirPods in and dissociated. Trying your best to drown out the noise and the perpetual thoughts of what was going on with your boyfriend. You couldn’t help the aggressiveness of your worries so you pulled out your phone and gave Thor’s phone a ring.

You waited, and waited, and waited and the line went to voicemail. Your mind was running a mile a minute. It felt like you couldn’t breathe. You tried composing yourself, you were almost at your stop. When the PA system announced your stop, you rushed through the automatic doors and ran to your apartment. The sky, now overcast, and the slight smell of rain tainting the air, only adding to the tension. Running up the outside set of stairs, you headed to the elevator preparing yourself for the worst. Once the elevator dinged, you rushed down the hallway to your apartment.

Fumbling with your keys at the door, you began to hear a slew of moans. Stopping in your tracks, you moved your head closer to the door to make sure that you were hearing the moans slip from the other side of your apartment door. Placing your ear against the door your suspicions were confirmed with a groan that seemed to billow from none other than Thor’s throat. Your heart began to shatter and become blanketed with the bitterness of winter, you slowly turned the key into your apartment.

Conscious of your steps you tried your best to not cause creaks to squeak from the floorboards. The air wreaked of sex and was starting to become seasoned with rotten jealousy. Turning the corner to head down to your shared bedroom, you were acquainted with Thor pile driving into your best friend.

She caught you in the doorway and to your dismay, she called out

“Y/N! Oh my god. Thor stop!”

With the mention of your name, Thor whipped his head around but you were already making your way towards the front door. He threw on his pants that were thrown on the floor and rushed his way over to you.

“Y/N!”

You turned around with a quickness and landed your hand right across his cheek. Leaving him with a scarlet mark to brand his betrayal upon him. You looked up at him through your eyebrows because you didn't have the strength to look at him in the eyes for the tears that were welling up would threaten to spill over.

“Thor...why don’t you go finish your business with her. Since clearly, she’s the priority.”

“Y/N, it’s not what you think it is. She brought herself upon me.”

“Oh! And you just couldn’t resist right. Cause she was just so overbearing against yourself?”

His silence solidified your suspicions and you wanted nothing more than to just get out of that apartment. Not waiting for him to come up with another response you grabbed your bag that you dropped on the floor and turned on your heel to leave.

“And when you release yourself of whatever leftovers you’re straining to hold, I want you to get your shit and leave. There’s nothing here to be salvaged and honestly, the last thing I wanna do is attempt to fix this.”

You slammed your apartment door and took the stair exit, not wanting to chance to have to confront him again while waiting for the elevator. Coming up on the last flight of stairs you held yourself up against the railing and felt the emotion in your throat bubble up and release itself.

It hurt. A strangled whine erupted from your throat and you hid your face in your hands. Hoping that it would muffle your cries enough so that no one would hear you in the stairwell. All of your insecurities began to settle in and resurface. Why weren’t you good enough for him? What made your best friend better? It's not like she was otherworldly or something. You could maybe understand if it was Valkyrie, but this was some regular bitch. This was someone you knew and felt undeniably close with. It felt sour, like residual vomit on the tongue.

You pushed yourself up from the stairs and slowly walked to the main door of your building. You were brought out of your haze with cold droplets of water that began to roll down your face.

“This is just comedic now.”

You laughed to yourself. Not only did you just spoil your eyes by seeing your now ex-boyfriend inside of your best friend but now you're stuck out in the exordium of New York rain with no real place to settle. Not at least until Thor packed his things and left. You put your bag over your head and searched for the nearest station to just catch a ride on. Walking down the steps, you again waited in the queue for the next train. Leaning on the wall you were suddenly overwhelmed with the stench of your wet outside clothes and wanted nothing more than to curl up and go to sleep.

With the roar of the train coming through the tunnel, you got on. Unaware of where you were going just desperately wanting to get away from the drama currently suffocating your mind. Trying to forget about the world around you, were brought back into reality by the buzzing of your phone in your pocket.

Of course, you had a list of missed calls from Thor as well as your best friend. Lists of texts from Thor, but the notification that stood out the most was a text message from Loki. It was unlikely for you to hear from him and coupled with today’s events it felt like salt being rubbed in a wound.

It can’t get any worse, honestly. Just open it. Fuck it.

Going against your brain and entrusting your gut, you opened his message.

Would you happen to be in the Manhattan area?

You looked up at the sign above the train doors, flashing the streets of the next stop. Luckily for you, you were getting ready to be dropped off right in the heart of Manhattan. Sighing you swallowed the lump in your throat and straightened your shoulders. Replacing your previous weight of mourning with now a sudden spark of pride and revenge running through your veins.

Yeah, I’m actually on my way there now, why?

You rolled your head back and bounced your leg, sudden nervousness striking your body. You didn’t fear Loki, it was nothing like that. But rather you were intimidated by him. His presence demanded attention and you were one to give it to him. You couldn’t deny that he was incredibly handsome. Despite his condescending nature, you found him all too alluring. Yet, here you were awaiting a response from him to come through.

Interested in some company while visiting your planet for personal business. Care to be that company?

Your heart started to thump behind its ribcage, beating a rhythm that you hadn’t been familiar with. You were excited. Quickly you typed back, not wanting to wait too long.

Sounds like a plan. The train is getting ready to stop, probably will be in central Manhattan in about 10. Where should I meet you?

I’ll be waiting outside the Baccarat.

The train doors dinged and you rose from your seat and maneuvered your way through the 5th Avenue-53 St. station. Climbing the stairs, you were met with the unfortunate luck of it still raining and now with nightfall completely draped over the sky, you were beginning to regret accepting the invitation of meeting Loki. Looking ahead you noticed a store on the corner. You bolted in there, desperate to find something to change your soaking top out for. You walked in and saw yourself in the mirror. Your hair was still okay somehow, not too damaged by the wetness in the air. Just a tad more frizz. Fluffing your hair, you walked away from the mirror and searched for the men's section.

Wanting an oversized hoodie you felt you had your best chance to find what you wanted there. Coming across a graphic hoodie, you pulled it off the rack and walked to the checkout.

You got into a fitting room before you left, taking off your soaked shirt and now bra, and slipped into the hoodie. Stuffing your hair under the hood, you placed your clothes into your bag, sprayed some perfume on, and walked back outside to head to the hotel. The rain had let up some but you weren’t trying to risk it considering today had been littered with bad luck. You quickly walked up the street and finally made it out to the front of the hotel.

You went to pull out your phone from your pocket, but when you did you were tapped on the shoulder. You whipped your head around, an instant attitude flooding your body. You were about to mouth off until you looked up and realized it was Loki who had grabbed your attention.

“Tense, are we?”

You rolled your eyes, wondering why you showed up. His tone worming through your ear and rattling your brain with contempt. He seemed to be a bitter reminder of his brother and you questioned why you thought this was a good idea. Looking up towards his face, you remembered why you came. His features, absolutely tantalizing, and the cadence of his speech almost always put you in a trance. The suit he was in only added to your inner desire. This was a moment of revenge, a moment of sheer pride that you needed to take advantage of. Finally, you opened your mouth and looked up at him.

“A little, the day has been quite rough, but I don’t think you’d want to hear about all that.”

You looked toward the entrance of the hotel silently wondering why you two were still waiting outside.

“Shall we go in? Standing in the rain like this is quite puerile.”

You looked up at him incredulously,

“I swear you can read minds.”

You both shared a chuckle while he guided you in the hotel, his hand resting upon your lower back. Once you were in, you were struck in awe of the decor of the building you were in. It’s not that you had never been anywhere nice before but compared to your day-to-day lifestyle this was something very unexpected. You soaked it all in, not wanting to ever leave the luxury.

“Y/N? You in there?”

You finally came to and gingerly shook your head to settle back in your body realizing you were now standing in front of the elevators.

“Yeah, I just got distracted, my bad.”

The door dinged and you two stepped into the elevator. He pressed the last set of numbers on the pad and you waited to be dropped on the floor of what you assumed where his room was. Your stomach dropped when the elevator arrived on the floor, almost adding to the anxiety you were feeling being so close to Loki. Walking down the hallway you reached his room and he pulled out his room key. Wanting to cut through the silence you broke the ice by asking Loki a question.

“So what are you doing back on Earth? Here to cause some trouble or just for leisure.”

“Leisure, more or less. I came back for my brother but he has yet to inform me of his whereabouts.”

Dropping your bag down at the door you felt your body become heavy. Like someone had just dumped an anvil on your shoulders and expected you to be fully prepared. It stung. You couldn’t escape the sour taste that lingered from the day's earlier events. You sat down on the bed and had become unusually short. You had spit back at Loki.

“Yeah, he failed to let me know as well. Had to stumble in on him.”

“What do you mean “stumble in on him”? Where was he?”

Expelling air, you puffed out your cheeks slightly. Silently expressing your disdain for the question asked. You suddenly became aware of your hair still being tucked under your hood when you went to trail your hands across the top of your head. Removing the hood and fluffing your hair, you stood and walked up to the mirror to fix yourself before sighing again. Tears of frustration began to well in the corners of your eyes. You pursed your lips into a tight pucker and had to look up toward the ceiling to prevent them from spilling.

“I’d prefer to skip over the antics, darling-”

“-Your wonderful brother was fucking somebody I was once close with, but now that relationship is undoubtedly severed, and quite honestly thinking about the event makes me want to cry and vomit.”

You finally let your voice shake and a fat tear rolled down the left side of your cheek. Hot and stinging your lash line before it fell. Exhaling more air, you shook your hands in a feeble attempt to calm yourself down. You heard the springs of the bed squeak as Loki situated himself on the bed.

“No one ever listens to me about that brute. He may be my brother but he lacks the capacity of decent intelligence.”

Turning around to face Loki, your eyebrows furrowed wondering how in the hell you thought sitting in a room with the smuggest piece of shit to ever exist would be a good idea after being cheated on by none other than his brother. Sniffling you brought yourself together and smiled at him.

“You know, for someone to be baggin on someone else about decent intelligence, you sure are lacking in the emotional department.”

“Never said I was perfect sweetheart, just alluded to being better.”

You laughed. You had to. It was all too much to bear. Your ex-boyfriend sleeping with your ex-best friend and now you’re stuck in a hotel room with his shit-eating brother. You wanted to peel off your skin and remove your brain from its confinements. You needed to leave, you could find somewhere else to loiter around until tomorrow.

“Ya know, I’m still trying to figure out why I thought having you for some company would be a good idea. Think I’m gonna leave you and your better than average intelligence to fuck off together.”

You couldn’t even look at Loki because inside you didn’t really wanna walk away. You were just projecting because all day everything that could go wrong, went wrong. It felt like your legs and heart were going to buckle at any moment and it was becoming too much to lug around silently. You wanted to scream for hours on end. Walking towards the door, you picked up your bag. Too engrossed in your thoughts to hear the bed creek signaling Loki’s movement.

“Y/N, wait.”

Loki grabbed your wrist and your heart stopped beating for a moment, almost forgetting what it was you were upset about because you had someone else’s warmth heating your tainted soul. You looked up at Loki, creases in between your eyebrows beginning to form from you trying to hold back the tears that were welling up once again.

“What? Look, Loki. I don’t want to be the downer of the evening and I’ve surely already done that. The last thing I want to do is burden you fully with what’s going on. I’m not gonna dump it all on you.”

“Will you sit down, please. Don’t leave.”

Sighing you dropped your bag and flopped onto the bed. Leaning over and burying your face in your hands.

“Let me apologize. I was not thinking about the severity of what you were dealing with, that was foolish of me.”

He sat next to you on the bed and once again placed his hand on your back but this time it was rubbing back and forth. An action that seemed to calm you down instantly. Taking a deep breath you looked at him and couldn't help but feel an overwhelming amount of lust pool in the pit of your stomach. It felt wrong but, so right. You hoped he wasn't looking too deep into your eyes because you could almost predict how blown your pupils must’ve looked.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap and be so dramatic.”

Loki chuckled to himself, a small smile dancing across his face as he unbuttoned his suit jacket and laid it on the bed.

“No need for an apology, I was being insensitive. As for your dramatics, I’ve grown used to them.”

Your face folded and your lips pursed, annoyance clear on your face.

“Yeah, you would be used to dramatics, Mr. “I need to rule over Earth cause I can’t back home.”.”

Your eyes lidded, you had your lips rolled around your teeth trying your best to hold a snicker in.

“You Midgardians never know how to let things go, do you?”

“Well considering you were demolishing half of New York with an alien army it’s kinda hard to forget....I forgive you though.”

“Do you now?” Loki raised his eyebrow smirking at your remark.

“Yup, kinda hard to stay mad at someone so easy on the eyes.”

It wasn’t until after you said your words, did you realize what just rolled off your tongue. Your eyes grew wide and heat rushed to your face. You breathed heavily out your nose and brought your gaze to his.

“Easy on the eyes huh?”

“I-” you couldn't even get any words out you were so embarrassed. All you could do was laugh to yourself and decide to be a little bit bold.

“There’s no reason for me to be shy about it. You’re obviously the more attractive one.”

Grazing your hand across his knee, you trailed your hand up to the meatier portion of his thigh.

“Are you planning on plowing through every Asgardian you meet?”

Mouth agape you couldn’t believe what he just said to you. But you realized quickly this was your time to go in and plant the seed.

“Not exactly. You’re the one I really want. Your brother just happened to fall in my lap first. It’s always been you though. Honestly, I was just too afraid to say anything. I couldn’t fathom the thought that you’d look my way.”

In the moment of your ramble, you hadn’t realized Loki rolling up his sleeves, using his nimble fingers to expose his veiny forearms. Once you had looked down you noticed his now exposed arms and your eyes met Loki’s again, the tension between you two becoming so thick it created a fog.

“Honestly, I have yet to meet someone as dense as you are. The verity of my liking for you I thought was terribly noticeable. Yet you still somehow ended up with my oaf of a brother. It’s quite amazing actually.”

You were astonished, to say the least. While Loki was sarcastic with you, he had confessed his liking for you. Not just an inkling for you but a liking for you in a romantic aspect. You were over the moon. You stood up not being able to contain your excitement. Walking towards the desk you stared in the mirror and composed yourself. Looking in the bottom right-hand side of the mirror you caught Loki’s blue eyes in the corner. He stood up and walked behind you, almost stalking you like a predator does prey.

“Why didn’t you say anything sooner?”

“Truly I thought you were happy darling, it wasn’t my business to interfere. Although, if I knew your deepest feelings sooner, I would’ve acted with more haste.”

Hearing “darling” come from his mouth so freely made butterflies fly hoops in your stomach. It did something to you that you had yet to describe outwardly. Turning around to face him, you hooked your fingers into the loops of his pants and pulled him closer to you, all so nonchalant.

“Shall we make up for lost time then, Loki?”

Lust dripped off your tongue when saying his name. Your tone penetrating through the fog of sexual tension and your eyes undressing him before the affair would begin. You heard his breath hitch while you looked back up at him, his blue eyes were now almost black. His breath heavy and waiting for the go-ahead to indulge in each other's desires. For a moment you saw his eyes flicker to portray something of uncertainty. Dare you say something of insecurity.

“Only if it’s true. I want you to want me in the purest form of carnal desire. Not as a pawn to veil what you want to erase from your mind.”

You moved your hands from his belt loops and traced your hands up his arms and planted them upon his neck, playing with the hair at the nape.

“ Don’t stop now, we’ve already started. I’m begging for you Loki. Always have, always will.”

With the quick reassurance, his lips found yours in a heartbeat. Intertwining with each other like flies in a spider’s web. It was intoxicating you couldn’t breathe properly and still you pressed yourself closer against his body. Your leg inching up on his side and grinding into his now hardening dick. Your hand that was resting at the nape of his neck, crawled its way into his hair and grabbed a fistful of it, fully giving into the moment of you and Loki getting lost in each other. Your fistful of his hair would soon be gone, being replaced with his hand buried in your mass of hair and craning your neck back to look up at him.

“I control things around here, Pet. Don’t forget your place.”

His voice seemed to drop in pitch. Your eyes glossed over fully with lust and the sheer need to be ruined. Dominance enveloped his being which instantly quelled the brat in you. The reality of sleeping with Loki made you dive headfirst into a subservient space. You wanted him, you needed him. In being completely lost in submissive thought you almost forgot who was in front of you. That was until he spoke again.

“Understand?”

He grabbed your hips and pressed your body against his, eliciting a slight whimper from you while nodding your head.

“Yes, Loki, I understand.”

Your voice was so meager, a complete 180 from your previous behavior in the night. You wanted as much of him as you could get so you shoved your lips against his again. A fiery kiss that made you dizzy and warm all at once. He moved with such fluidity, it made you feel like you were floating. His hands snaked down your back and his large hands landed on the cush platform of your ass. Squeezing, you moaned into his mouth and he picked you up. Turning around and laying you down on the bed. Your lips dislodged from one another and you felt empty and needy without him on you. He preyed over you, his stygian locks falling down his face.

“If you don’t want this, tell me now and we’ll never speak of this aga-”

“-Loki, there has been nothing I want more than you…I need you. Please.”

With that, Loki attacked your lips again, his hands wandering up your hoodie. You had forgotten you ditched your bra earlier until Loki’s hands found your pert nipples.

“Expecting this, weren’t you.”

You went to respond, but Loki rolled them between his fingers and a breathy moan was all you could muster up. Your hips rolled upwards, aching for some type of friction to your core that was more than soaked.

“Maybe I was. Have to be prepared for anything.”

To emphasize your tease you moved your hand down to the tent in his black pants and applied a bit of pressure. Loki sucked in air through his teeth and released a light laugh.

“Careful, Pet. Make sure you can hold up this front you’re putting on for me. Not sure you can handle it all.”

It was a challenge and a challenge you’d be more than happy to oblige in. Smirking up at him you began fiddling with his belt and undid his pants. Fishing your hand into them you lightly stroked his cock.

“Try me.”

The restraint in him broke and a sardonic smile adorned his face. You knew you were in for it and were entirely ready for everything he had to offer.

“Darling I hope you’re ready to feel what it’s like to be fucked by a real god.”

Your hoodie came off with one swift motion of his hand and they wandered over your body egregiously. He was taking his time with you and was determined on making you fall apart. You messed with his dress shirt buttons but couldn’t get them off fast enough for your liking. Catching onto your frustration Loki mocked you,

“Aw, look at you, Little one. Having some trouble there?”

You huffed, the attitude in you not wanting to fully give in just yet. You finally got the top button undone and slid your hand back down to his pants in a feeble attempt to take the heat off of you.

“Ah ah, it doesn’t work like that. Let me help you out since you’re in such need of relief.”

Finishing off the rest of his buttons, he pulled off his shirt and threw it somewhere in the room. Snaking his way down your body he undid your jeans button and peeled off the zipper with his teeth. Looking down at him you shuddered, excitement coursing through your veins.

“Easy now Y/N, I’ve barely even started.”

Removing your pants and underwear completely, you were now fully exposed to him and almost felt a bit of shyness envelop you. And of course, he noticed your legs attempt to cover yourself,

“Don’t hide from me darling, I want to see every bit of you crumble before me and show you how it feels to have your concupiscence satiated.”

You let your anxieties fade away once his tongue placed a swipe across your aching cunt. A moan louder than you expected emitted from your throat, catching you off guard and a chuckle to release from Loki. The vibrations only added to the pleasure you were already feeling. Losing yourself in the silver tongue of the god between your legs, your hand found itself in his stark black locks. Your moans became more frequent and you were beginning to feel the coil tighten in the bottom of your stomach, heat spreading to your core.

“Loki, please I-”

You hadn’t enough time to finish your sentence for Loki had wrapped his arms around your hips pulling you closer to him and making your back arch off the bed. Your moans becoming higher in pitch you could feel yourself coming to the precipice of your orgasm. Lifting his head for a moment he caught your eyes as you moved your head to look down at him.

“Cum for me Y/N, I can feel that you’re there.”

As Loki went back to devouring your pussy, you threw your head back into the pillow behind you, your orgasm finally washing over you. It was like none other you had before. Your legs caved in around his head and your body began to shake. Coming down from your high you reached for his neck to guide him up to your face, sharing a sloppy yet intimate kiss. The taste of yourself evident on his tongue and glistening on his chin. You felt the need to return the favor. Turning you two over you were now on top and you slid your way down to his basal regions. Undoing his pants you felt his hand upon your wrist.

“Not tonight, this is about you Y/N”

You shook your head, surprised by his actions. But, it wasn’t in your nature yet to fully comply. You went back to the hem of his slacks and went to pull them down. While Loki let you slip them off with ease, egging you on with a few hitched breaths, it wasn’t until you came back up and lined your mouth up with the head of his painfully erect cock that he took control again. You placed a kitten lick on the tip of his head, looking up at him while doing so. Loki then grabbed a fistful of hair, forcing you to stay stuck on his face and giving him full leverage of where he wanted you.

You crawled up his body because you had no other choice unless you wanted to continue to feel the slightly painful pull on your hair. Obeying his silent command you were brought face to face with him once again.

“You just don’t know how to listen, do you?” he chided

“Neither do you, but you don’t see me complaining.”

In an instant you were flipped over again, being towered by Loki’s body. Your breath quickened and you watched his blue eyes dilate once again. A lascivious smirk and energy cast across his body. Wanting nothing more than to feel him, you raked your hands down his back and dragged them across the sides of his ribs, only to let one of them begin stroking him again.

“Ah~ Y/N”

It was at this moment that the last bit of power you had completely dissipated. Loki’s hand moved with such a quickness that it took you a moment to realize that his hand was now wrapped around your throat. Sending your eyes to roll to the back of your head in absolute euphoria.

“Such a dumb little girl you are. Can’t follow simple instructions yet here you are begging, for me to ruin you. Fortunately, you’re pretty. Otherwise this would be quite pathetic of you.”

Your walls clenched around nothing. It was becoming painful to not have some form of release. You just kept being pushed towards your edge with his words bringing you closer every time he spoke. He was dragging it out on purpose, you could see the sadism glint behind his eyes. Strangled you spoke, tears of desperation falling lightly from the side of your eyes.

“L-Loki, please. I need you so bad. I can’t take it anymore, please.”

“You may need me, but do you deserve it is the question at hand.”

“I promise no more games, I’ll be good for you”

Removing his hand from your neck, he traveled them down the valley between your breasts bringing one hand to massage one while the other traveled further, landing on your soaking clit.

“All this, from a little degradation...I expected more from you, darling”

Jutting your hips toward the hand currently nestled between your folds you begged,

“Loki, please I need you inside me, I need to feel you.”

He finally lined himself up with your entrance, teasing you with just his cockhead, reveling in your juices. You couldn’t help but whine the teasing was getting to a point of something almost unbearable. Your voice breathy and hot you whimpered one last plea,

“Please~”

When he fully sheathed himself inside you, your head rolled back, moans coming out of you at a pace you couldn’t control. He made you feel so full. You had yet to feel something so reminiscent of rapture. It almost made you dizzy. When you looked up at him there was a softness in his eyes that contrasted his tone of dominance a moment ago. It caught you off guard, but you were soon brought back to reality when his head brushed against the inflamed spongy spot within.

“Oh! My god”

“Yes darling, I am your god-”

You couldn't help but roll your eyes at his comment. His cockiness always finding a way to rear its head. But in your moment of ecstasy, you didn’t think he’d be able to catch it. Wrong. In a second, his length left you, flipped you on your hands and knees, and slipped back into your drenching cunt. You settled into the position, propping your ass out even more so to give him better access. You heard him growl behind you, his hand coming across your ass check and without a doubt leaving a mark. You yelped, startled by the sudden action. His pace became unrelenting, pounding into you with a ferocity that would make angels weep. His hand slid down your back and rested and the bottom of your hairline, once again grabbing your hair and pulling you back so your back met his chest. Directing your head to the side to face his own, he got in your ear,

“Roll your eyes at me again and there will be more than just a simple punishment awaiting you.”

Your walls clenched around his cock, eliciting a loud groan to come from Loki. You couldn’t help it, the noises he made were beyond divine and each one had you one contraction away from being sent over the edge one more time.

“Fuck, Loki, you feel, so good~fuck, please.”

You weren’t quite sure what you were pleading for; it just felt right leaving your mouth.

“Yeah, you like it when I fuck you like this. Like the little whore you are.”

“Fuck! Loki, oh my god~”

You were in so much pleasure you couldn’t stop the tears from rolling down your face. It felt so good to have this instinctual release. Loki released his grip from your hair and pressed your face down into the mattress. Unable to truly control the noises that flew from your mouth, you were now whimpering in the mattress. The ravaging of your body sending you into a full-blown frenzy that you never wanted to be free from. Loki’s thrusts became more erratic and his moans and groans flew more freely from his mouth. Enjoying the moment of approaching his climax.

“You’re going to cum with me and I’m going to paint your pretty little insides my color. Wanna know why?”

You tried your best to be attentive, flipping your hair out from your face, you looked behind you facing the god above you.

“Why, L-Loki?”

Bringing his hand around your body to massage your clit, he gave you an answer that you weren’t prepared for.

“Because you’re mine now. There’s no leaving after this. You belong to me.”

With one final clench, you tightened around his cock. Both of you reaching your peak at the same time, milking him of his seed. Both of your breathing was heavy, bodies sticky with sweat. Loki pulled out of you, his seed spilling out of you like donut filling. You rolled over on your back as he did the same and there was a comfortable silence that filled the room.

With the distraction of reaching a climax now faded, you felt violently vulnerable under his gaze. You found your courage and looked back at him, his eyes still dilated but now with a different emotion swimming through them. Adoration? Wonder? Regret perhaps? Before you could let one more intrusive thought in Loki brought you out of your head.

“Stop worrying, you’ll make the wrinkle between your brow permanent.”

Your mouth opened slowly in disbelief, slightly offended by his comment but also at a loss for words for him figuring you out so quickly.

“Is it that easy to figure me out.” you chuckled.

“Yes, in fact, you wear every single emotion on your sleeve. You couldn’t hide what you feel even if you wanted to.”

You sighed, a smile stretching across your face as you exhaled.

“Can’t fool you, can I?”

“It’s quite hard to fool someone who is the master of fooling others. I’m the creator of the ins and outs of mischief.”

You shared a light laugh but you couldn’t ignore the overwhelming feeling of guilt and disquiet swirl in your head. Did he honestly feel for you, or did he perhaps just indulge your desires because he had wants of his own. You were in the perfect state to be taken advantage of, heartbroken and needing something else to fill the hole in your heart. You rolled on your side, your hand resting on his chest, beginning to draw feather-light patterns on his skin. Your hand created a path up to his neck, your fingers guiding his face forcing him to have nothing else to focus on but you. You needed to quell the noise in your head, you didn’t want this to eat you alive as well.

Worst he can say is no and we just move on Y/N. That’s all that can be done. Just ask him.

“I know you’re not one for sentiment, but did you mean what you said to me? About your liking for me.”

Moving a few coils of your hair away from your face he gazed into your eyes with an intensity you were unsure how to read.

“One thing about me darling is that through all my moments of deception, dealing with such intimacy is not something I take lightly. While not sentimental, I meant every word. I assure you of that. Now, dry your eyes.”

You hadn’t even realized the petal-soft tears slowly rolling down your cheek. You were too engrossed in Loki’s words of affirmation that you felt you left your physical body for a moment. Loki’s hand came up and wiped the tear streaks away from the bridge of your nose and under your eye. He made you feel at home. Warm and comforted even if he had his instances of sharpness, you didn’t want this moment to end.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.”

You chuckled and the light was restored in your face.

“I don’t care what you say to me, you can read minds. Now stop reading mine, you’re freaking me out.”

Your laughs echoed through the room, any remnant of tension long gone from the space. You stared at the ceiling thinking about how the rest of your days would pan out. You felt the waters would be rocky but they would calm eventually. The thrashing of emotional waves turning into gentle swells. You felt at peace for the first time in a while. Pulling you once again from your thoughts, Loki’s voice filled your ears.

“Now, I am aware that we have done this quite backward, but would you care to join me for dinner tomorrow night? And do this the right way?”

Rolling back over onto his chest you smiled against him

“I’d love to”

Amiable silence fell over the room as your body began to rest. The beating of Loki’s heart created a rhythm that seemed tailored specifically to put you to sleep. Eyes growing heavy, you fell asleep, ultimately feeling secure within his arms.

#loki #loki laufeyson #loki smut #loki laufeyson smut #marvel #marvel fanfic #loki fanfic #marvel smut #loki x reader #loki laufeyson x reader #loki x you #loki odison x reader #loki imagine #marvel imagine #marvel x reader

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balillee · 3 years

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my unpopular dsmp opinions, some of which genuinely should be popular

c!dream has crossed the moral event horizon and is irredeemable. once you cross that threshold, you're no longer a 'morally grey' character.

pre-recorded, heavily produced lore killed the lore. it was cool, sure, but you completely misunderstand the magic that the smp had when people watched it initially. the story is improv and that's how we like it. we can tell the cc's have lost interest in it, you can admit that to us, we'll understand, just stop lying to me.

c!dream's pov isn't necessary to understand his character or his motivations. if you've watched literally any c!primeboys stream he's basically spelled it out for you.

i don't understand how fans can dislike l'manberg or have claimed to be against it since the beginning. i honestly don't get it. what's so bad about wanting your own spot where you make your own rules and skirt accountability that has been used to technically oppress you before - and, before someone who never saw the earlier streams tries to disagree with this, the og l'manberg crew were imprisoned for shit that everyone else on the server was practically encouraged to do. also, what do you have against fun and happiness?

i think some of you forget that 'hybrids' aren't a thing, discounting c!ranboo. there's no piglin hybrids, c!techno is just a pig. there's no avian hybrids, c!phil is just a man with wings. there's no creeper hybrids, c!sam is just a creeper who's indecently exposed from the hips down. canonically there's no hybrids, and therefore no hybrid discrimination. people ran with that concept too much.

the loss and the fanon rewriting of the early lore up until pogtopia has ruined fandom perception of c!dream and the og l'manberg boys. c!tommy is more morally white than you think he is, and c!dream has always been a villain - he massacres and he kills and he destroys and he schemes and he always has broken his own rules. no wonder the boys wanted their own space after how they were treated.

i think ranboo oftentimes forgets his own lore. he brings stuff up that c!ranboo may have done, such as exploding the community house to frame c!tommy, holding onto Cat, and it goes absolutely nowhere. we've gotten all of these developments in his story but they have never been expanded on, and we're nowhere closer to figuring out his relationship to c!dream and what his other side is and honestly i see no hope that we'll be any closer to knowing even by the end of the year.

your characters don't all have to be morally grey for the story itself to be morally grey. this is fiction - some people can be nothing but evil and others can be nothing but good. being purely good or evil doesn't mean that you're one dimensional, either.

c!dream apologists have ruined c!dream for me. he's not a good person. how about you let me enjoy a villain for who he actually is, rather for than your percieved woobified ragdoll you pass off as c!dream.

the story was better when there was a central writer. it was brilliant back when wilbur wrote it to be that the environment drives the characters and the story, and it was really good in early s2 up until techno's execution day when it was more character driven. since then, the amount of autonomy people have over their characters without any central 'director', as it were, has been a detriment to the story overall. there needs to still be one overarching figure or director or writer.

not everyone is a main character. just because they have a pov, doesn't mean they're a main character. some characters have such little impact on the overall plot and describing everyone as a main character oversaturates the story and makes some characters seem more important than they are.

the egg lore had so much potential up until it didn't. all that built up threat that we were expecting and we still don't even know what the egg wants really other than just controlling people. does it hatch?

genuinely, if there's no major plot developments by the end of the year (and let's be honest, it's a very big possibility at this point), a few of the more prominent members of the server should do a podcast style stream talking about where the story would have gone, because at least then we would have gotten somewhat closer to a conclusion.

c!techno is a villain and an asshole and a bad person. he stops caring for people once their interests don't align with his or if they look at him funny. he makes meta-jokes about his own tyrannical and oppressive nature. stop taking that away from him. he's a bad person. cc!techno does a fabulous job portraying that in a comedic manner and the balancing of him being a deeply flawed person with deeply flawed morals and ideas with his comedically-portrayed stubbornness and lack of willingness to hear out opposing viewpoints is incredible. i want to like characters who are arseholes for the sake of being arseholes, and who refuse to take into account the hurt they've caused either out of self-righteousness or because they don't care, so let me. he's the anti-peacemaker, LET ME HIM ENJOY HIM FOR THAT!!!!

i think tommy and wilbur's way of doing lore is my favourite. relies heavily on improv, voice acting, sprite acting and facial expressions. really shows off the acting props and they pull off the emotional moments well for the insanity of the creative medium.

i'm not a fan of fan-music. i find songs about media i'm into difficult to listen to. coincidentally i'm also not a fan of shit like slam poetry or live music/musicals/pantomimes.

the death of l'manberg killed people's motivation to go on the server casually. i've talked about it more in depth before, but destroying what was a central, driving environment for the story killed momentum and motivation. imagine in an episode of she-ra, the princess alliance just nuke the freight zone and all of the members of the horde just have to deal with it. that would be shit.

until season 3 has some momentum, i'm counting the end of the smp as january 20th. that had a conclusion. season 3 has... whores, technoblade and tommyinnit. that's about it.

i wasn't a fan of the development of c!tubbo joining las nevadas. i preferred snowchester and the walled city conflict. give c!tubbo some backbone and some badassery. also tubbo where's the fucking nuke bro if you're shelving that plotline just tell us on like an alt stream what the plan was i beg

add like 2 or 3 new people to the server so that michael mcchill has someone to talk to and so that there's something always happening on the server. it gives the og's more motivation to return if things are happening in and out of canon and it'll help with momentum, and who knows? maybe they can write their own story/stories.

i really think that c!sam is an underrated character. he's multilayered, extremely interesting, and the dichotomy of his loyalty to his job and how far down the rabbithole that's taken him versus the genuine love he has for his friends that drives him to do what he does out of wanting to do right by them is brilliant. i don't talk about c!sam enough.

STOP HAVING FUCKING VILLAIN ARCS!!! I'M FUCKIN SICK OF IT!!!! i want to see more characters who see everyone else being absolute selfish, abhorrent cunts and go 'if nobody else is going to be a good person, i fucking will'. GIVE ME SOME MORAL WHITENESS!!! IT'S INTERESTING AND MORALLY GOOD CHARACTERS ARE FUN!!!

let tommyinnit build cobblestone towers. everyone bullied him too much for how ugly they were and the one he built outside of the prison looked genuinely really nice. it gives the boy something to do.

i'm a fan of the revive book and the canon lives system. don't ask me why, but i think it might just be the morbidity of it. it adds to c!dream's god complex persona, and i think the fragility of death itself is a really fun concept. not enough fan cc's have made connections with that and c!mumza, and it could make for cool fanfic.

ranboo your house is fucking ugly. it's an eyesore

c!niki, and to some extent now c!jack and c!fundy, are boring me and ruining my mood. i think c!jack is the closest to being an actually interesting sympathetic villain, mainly because nobody else seems to realise that c!niki is a villain. not a good one imo, but she's a villain. c!jack just has the problem of starting a new project over and over and over and over again and because of the slow in momentum for the primary cast, there hasn't been a lot of recent development for him.

not really a dream smp opinion, but if philza went full geordie accent, i would love it. i want him to, in canon, say shit like 'me n ye' instead of 'me and you' and use geordie dialect. i want him to be physically unintelligible because it's funny.

i don't really know what's up with c!foolish but i think he's a dumbass. he had a while to think about c!q's proposal and then changed his mind about joining the guy to admitted to letting him die just because. moron

i wish there was more c!eret lore. i wish he was an actual king with an actual kingdom and actual subjects and royal advisors. c!eret is far too fucking cool to be the king of nothing and nobody. fatten up the kingdom and the castle with people who work with c!eret, and don't just make it tyrannical and dictator-y to prove the point of the server's 'anarchists'. make it a healthy working environment, please - if you want moral greyness, have 'anarchists' who claim to care about the welfare of the server oppose a kingdom of happy people under a fair and just ruler because their ideologies clash.

the server needs more characters who oppose anarchy in more peaceful ways, or passively wish for systems to be a part of. i think a chaos vs order conflict ending only in mutual understanding where everyone understands that they should just leave each other alone would slot nicely into the story that's been created so far.

you need to have watched all of the previous arcs to understand the story. i've seen people argue that they don't need to know about earlier lore to understand the prison, but that's the equivalent of only watching the final season of pretty little liars and expecting to understand the context of what's going on.

some characters aren't that morally grey. some characters, take c!tommy for example, are definitely on the whiter side for the morality scale, he's just an asshole. he's abrasive and rude and a dickhead but he also doesn't agree with terrorism, he's patriotic, he strives for a better world, he's apologetic, but he's also a fucking BITCH.

you can add onto this if you want, but not if you're a c!dream apologist. nobody likes your opinions

#dream smp #dsmp #esclaposhitpost

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evilwickedme · 3 years

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ok so to sum up my feelings for leverage: redemption, season 1(a): (long post warning, there’s a tl;dr at the end)

I knew that Hardison wouldn’t be in most of the season due to Aldis Hodge being a busy bee nowadays, but I didn’t realize that meant he’d only be around for the first two episodes. He was sorely missed, not only because of my attachment to him, but also because he’s usually the grounding factor in the group dynamic, and his role as info guy and tech guy was split evenly between two characters who had their own issues.

That said, Hardison is absolutely a highlight of the two episodes he’s in. his speech about redemption was everything I could’ve hoped for (plus, more evidence for the Jewish!Hardison pile...). I wish we’d gotten to see more of his dynamic with Breanna because what we saw was funny and sweet and we don’t generally get to see Hardison taking care of somebody who so desperately needs taking care of. I hope that Aldis Hodge is around for more episodes in 1(b), because what we’re left with feels a little hollow.

Sticking to original leverage characters for now, for the most part the leverage crew still felt true to the original series as characters, even if the show itself was a little bit confused at times. The actors understand their characters and embody them so well that I think one could give them the trashiest script ever and they’d still sell it. Sophie is a particular focus in 1(a) because of Nate’s death, and she’s particularly well written as a result.

That said, I’m super bitter that we saw little to no mastermind!Parker. Parker’s character being given the mastermind role was a big deal and it feels like they’re walking it back because they feel uncomfortable with it. It is eventually given an in-text excuse, but literally in the last episode, and it was not a particularly convincing reason, and in fact contradicted moments from previous episodes (Sophie leaving for a client meeting and ignoring Parker in ep3 comes to mind). It’s frustrating, it makes the end of the original leverage feel pointless, and letting Parker make a decision once in a while is not the same thing at all. The original series repeatedly showed us that while everyone in the team had their strengths, Parker works problems and solves them in unique, interesting ways, and other characters’ days in the limelight tended to be comedic or even failures. It’s a broken promise, and a pretty major broken promise at that.

On a more positive note, Parker’s dynamic with literally everyone was fantastic. She’s possibly the best written character this season. They’ve taken the autism out of the subtext and into the text (although obviously still undiagnosed), and given her coping mechanisms that were taken seriously in the text even when they were played for laughs, which I appreciated. Her attempts to mentor Breanna were sweet, her friendship with Sophie was electric and at times (CRIMES) hilarious, and as usual, she has a fantastic dynamic with Eliot that makes my heart burst. If you don’t think they’re romantically involved, at least acknowledge there’s a life partnership here. They’ve spent the last decade together.

(We’ll get to Harry.)

Eliot isn’t given much arc-wise, which is frustrating since he’s my favorite. He’s being presented as the goal at the end of a redemption arc, ie to keep working at it every day until your soul heals or whatever, and it doesn’t reflect the message they’re trying to convey via Hardison’s speech and our two new characters. He’s got his moments, but I think they under utilized his potential.

Breanna!!! Breanna’s my new favorite, except for Eliot. She’s hilarious, she’s insecure, she’s nerdy and excited in a way that’s similar to Hardison but still distinct in its inherent teenage-girl-ness and I LOVE IT. Unlike the previous series, where Hardison’s “age of the geek” was often a joke played on Hardison, we’re at the point where Eliot and Parker are both right there with him, and so they accept and even appreciate Breanna’s nerdiness. Also, canon gay character? In YOUR Leverage? It’s more likely than you think.

(No, I never thought they’d make ot3 canon on screen. I hoped, but I didn’t think it would actually happen.)

I think Breanna’s the character that will be the most interesting to see grow. She’s got a lot of potential and a list of crimes a mile long (or more). I adore her with all my heart. I want to see her tiktok account.

Harry. Oh, Harry.

It took me a while, but I do like Harry. It took a while, because the narrative positioned him at the same level as Nate back in episode 1 of original Leverage. But in episode 1 we didn’t know the other characters. We had Nate as the POV character, and so we cared about him because we were seeing the world through his eyes. (This is TV Studies 101. I know this, because I took TV Studies 101 in 2019.) In Leverage: Redemption, we no longer have a POV character, for several reasons:

Nate, previously the POV character, is dead.

As it is, by mid-season 3 of leverage Nate was no longer a POV character. This is, coincidentally, the point where the leverage writers realized they had four other characters in the main cast they could do something with, and in-universe, Nate accepted that he was a thief, not a special Good Man.

Sophie is sort of a POV character for the first episode of the revival, but only for the first few minutes. Afterwards, the series settles into the groove of seasons 3-5, i.e., the entire crew is our POV. We know our crew, and we love them as is.

Narratively, however, Redemption insists on positing Harry as the POV character, because it is his redemption we are pursuing most vehemently. And I think they really relied on us already knowing the actor - I’ve never seen him in anything before, so to me he was a completely fresh face and they put almost no effort into selling him to me. Beyond being competent and consistently mildly baffled by the antics of the leverage crew, I honestly don’t know who this man is by the end of EIGHT episodes with him. I have a much better handle on Breanna by the end of 1(a), and I can tell you I knew all five of the original leverage crew better by the end of the first episode of the original series than I do Harry. What’s the name of his daughter, John Rogers. Is he still married. How old is the daughter. Why is none of this worth mentioning. Give him a sense of humor that isn’t reacting to other people’s shenanigans. I’m so frustrated. It’s bad writing.

I did manage to grow to like Harry by the end, but I’m pretty sure this is down to Noah Wyle’s charismatic portrayal of an under-developed character, at least partially. And I never stopped being frustrated at not knowing who this man is at all.

The two highlights of the season are undoubtedly episodes five and six. Episode five was the first time I felt like the episode was more than a collection of good moments between the main cast and mediocre moments between the main cast and also the main plot. The issues with pacing and tone that I suffered through for most of the season were mostly non-existent in ep5 and 6, and at least in episode 5 I attribute that to the pared down cast. They had time to focus not only on our actual characters - Sophie, Parker, Breanna - but also on the case. This is the only client from 1(a) I am going to remember next week without googling it first, mark my words.

Episode six worked for the exact opposite reason - it completely disregarded the client and plot and immersed itself in the characters. Breanna gets a moment to shine, but everybody else gets their bits and I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the script that was most fun to write. The characters felt natural, real, and captured the found-family dynamic that’s been missing all season for the first time.

While episode 2 is the weakest episode, I don’t actually have much to say about it. I am disappointed in episode 8. For a mid-season finale, I really expected them to do something. Instead, it was an episode about Nate Ford that copped out of being about Nate Ford (both with fake-Nate and with the new version of him being relayed to us). I would have told the writers to give that energy back to episode 1 and write an episode that’s about anybody who isn’t Harry, oh my God. I know I said I grew to like him but so many episodes were about Harry. He’s the newbie! Why didn’t Hardison get an episode that was actually about him, considering he was only around for two episodes? Why does Eliot have to be the butt of the joke when the theme of the series should directly tie back to him in a much more meaningful way? The last episode parodies their own tagline by saying Eliot isn’t just a hitter, but it deftly avoids noticing that they’ve turned him into nothing more than very muscly comic relief, including in that very episode!

Also, I hated the Marshal. Eliot actively looked uncomfortable around her.

tl;dr

The season took a while, that’s definitely true. But it did find its footing eventually, and by the halfway mark of 1(a) it finally felt cohesive again. The characters were played fantastically even when they weren’t well-written, and if nothing else, the humor landed every time. It still has its kinks and problems to work out, but if you look at it as a brand new show rather than a continuation of one that went off the air over eight years ago, it’s actually doing rather well. I’m choosing to judge it in both lights - according to its own standards, it establishes its identity in episode five; according to Leverage standards, it establishes its connection to its roots in episode six. Either way, I thoroughly enjoyed 1(a), and continue to have high hopes for 1(b).

fic writing will commence in three, two, one...

#leverage #leverage meta #leverage redemption #leverage ot3 #parker leverage #alec hardison #sophie devereaux #eliot spencer #breanna casey #harry wilson #mine

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theravennest · 3 years

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Let’s Talk: The Blooms at Ruyi Pavilion

I finished all 40 eps about two weeks ago, actually. I enjoyed it for the most part, the 1st half especially, but there were several things near the end that took me out.

But first some of the good bits...

The cast chemistry was immaculate. Our four main lead actors were a lot of fun together. Not just Zhang Zhehan and Ju Jing Yi, but also Wang You Shuo and Xu Jiaqi (Loved them!). The four of them have such obvious ease with each other after their previous work together in Legend of Yun Xi and it made scenes with any combination of the main four really pop.

I was especially drawn to the sisters’ relationship and the Prince-Vassal bond going on between Prince Su and Little Marquis. (Y’all know I’m a sucker for both sibling stories and stories about fictional royals and their loyal vassals.)

Most of the ancillary characters were interesting, actually. As y’all know from my last post about this one, I was crack shipping like crazy all the side characters. 😂 This cast made it easy for me.

Except for Prince An. (Sorry to hit the bad so early.) Good god, I hated that man. His character was poorly drawn in pretty much every way, which is unfortunate cuz he’s the main antagonist. Any story with a main antagonist that just doesn’t work is always gonna be weaker.

Also, no offense to people who like that actor but he was the only cast member who did absolutely nothing for me in terms of performance. So much of the story was focused on his weaksauce motivation and dry acting like, my god, put me out of my misery I do not care.

Anyway, the set design and costuming was top notch and I even enjoyed the broader story ideas the show was trying to put forth. The sitcom vibe of the first 20 eps or so was SOOO good. Our four mains’ comedic timings were pitch perfect.

Unfortunately, the writing took a sharp nosedive in the back 3rd or so and it had a rough ending. (The lightning strike on the tower scene, the fight in the underground temple, the return of Prince An’s mom...all of that was trash. let’s be real.)

I mostly blame this on three things: the missteps with the Prince An character, the lack of development of Rong’s prophetic dreams even though that was the main premise of the show, and the jump-the-shark moment that was the wedding night and its subsequently underwritten fallout.

Now to clarify, I don’t mean to say the wedding night event shouldn’t have happened at all but rather the execution of it within the story was poor and it negatively impacted 90% of the other character motivations/progressions and the overall pacing.

You know, it felt like that thing you do as a writer where you wake up and have a specific scene in your mind. It’s evocative, impactful, fun, or otherwise intense. But you just have that scene and it’s something that would have to happen in the middle of your story. So you work your way backwards to try to get to that scene and you do your best to get the characters to make decisions to get there but when you sit down to write nothing works out. It’s clunky or OOC for the scene to still happen so you end up having to either scrap the evocative scene or keep the clunky lead up and hope no one notices. That’s what that wedding scene and everything that happened after felt like. They wrote themselves into a corner and just struggled to recover until the bitter end.

The main pairing suffered the most because of the poor writing choices. No matter how much chemistry ZZH and JJY have together, even they could not completely salvage Rong’s yo-yoing behavior with Prince Su. They started off so wholesome and then dove into such toxicity and miscommunication for no reason.

Don’t get me wrong. I can very easily enjoy angst. But Fu Rong consistently broke this man down. After ep 25-26, it stopped being good angst and became so awful to watch all the emotional manipulation and turmoil. There’s something broken in the writing if 9 out of 10 times Prince Su cried or fell into depression it was because of something Rong did or said to him after jumping to a conclusion with only part of the puzzle pieces gathered.

I could forgive some stuff because Prince An was manipulating things but some stuff was just all Rong not giving Prince Su the benefit of the doubt or plain old not doing her due diligence in investigating. She is supposed to have inherited the most prolific and successful spy organization in the show and she still got 90% of her conclusions wrong. It was like she was determined to always think the worst of Prince Su no matter what despite how often he went above and beyond to help her. Despite the fact that he literally had a reputation as a general for being a harsh taskmaster but fair and just.

I think what broke me was when she did the bare minimum investigation into her own father’s death and just fully blamed Prince Su without confronting him honestly or even considering his personality or their relationship up until that point. She really believed a single street seller’s entire testimony over the man she lived with and supposedly loved for months. Girl...

And this is after she’d previously mistakenly accused him of killing her mentor with very few facts to the point where she stabbed him on their wedding night.

There came a point where I actually wanted Prince Su to finally, truly divorce Rong and settle down with someone who could love him right. Maybe give him time to heal from the repeated heartbreaks, betrayals, and the literal stab wound in his chest but he was so fucking in love with Rong, he just couldn’t escape.

(If there were behind the scenes production reasons for the clunky-ness of the back half, I would not be surprised at all but ultimately they don’t matter cuz the story we got was the story we got.)

Imagine if we had gotten a Rong who used her prophetic dreams to navigate the cut throat world of royal politics. Or imagine if we’d gotten Rong as a true apprentice to Ruyi who learned both metalsmithing and spycraft in the first half and took over the pavilion as a competent leader in the second half. As it stands, it just felt like wasted potential.

I’m glad they had the modern day special AU eps tho cuz those were great. Zhang Zhehan and Ju Jing Yi had the opportunity to really showcase their incredible chemistry but in a modern setting and with better writing than the back 3rd of BRYP.

Now let’s talk Zhang Zhehan since he was the reason I started this in the first place. I loved him in this. I truly did. He was stern and serious but also playful and sweet. He was romantic but awkward, badass but vulnerable. He really delivered a nuanced and charming performance. I loved every second.

I think my favorite moment wasn’t some badass fight or even a super romantic moment. No, it was when he got drunk and started crying like a little baby cuz Rong was constantly doubting him no matter what he did. It was simultaneously sad and hilarious. Like gut busting funny. Y’all can watch it here:

youtube

I laughed so fucking hard at this. Oh my god, guys! This shit was too much.

Random Thoughts:

The romance between the 2nd leads was A+. Truly an adorable affair. Though I think they should’ve gotten together officially earlier around ep 25 or so and we should’ve seen the rest with them as a couple.

The costuming was so good y’all. For all the main four characters but I was especially drawn to Prince Su’s outfits.

The ghostly pale look with the bright red lips and eyeshadow makeup for Rong did not bother me at all. I actually liked it for her though I think it would’ve worked better if she’d had more explicit prophetic abilities.

I could’ve used more actual war scenes with Prince Su and Little Marquis.

The OST for the show SLAPPED!

That one kid spy in Ruyi Pavilion was voiced by the same actor as Chengling from WOH and I have never double-taked harder. lmao

Even though there were things I didn’t like in this show, I appreciated how gay I could make it in my last post. Truly it was a bisexual’s dream aesthetically.

#the blooms at ruyi pavilion #cdrama #zhang zhehan #ju jingyi #liveblogging #meta #reviews #long post

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bao3bei4 · 3 years

Text

kpop music videos that gave their fans sexual brainworms

OR accidental fetish pop and its fringe fanbase: meditations on gendered desire

large warning here: i am someone who has been into kpop for the past 10 years. however, i have always been an extremely casual fan. i do write fic, but not rpf. if any of that makes you not want to hear me talk about kpop rpf (or you don’t want to hear about it in general), please keep moving.

anyway, obviously pop is corporate, soulless, and manufactured. but sometimes some truly bizarre shit gets past the committees and destroys a generation. these are their stories.

the video that started this is all is got7’s just right, released july 10th, 2015.

yes that’s all 7 members of got7 (one is out of frame) shrunken down for your viewing pleasure. they live in your room and tell you you’re just right.

this sheer fetish power of this video is nerfed only by how utterly sexless it is.

they’re styled like and dance like this. it’s a totally unironic sendup of the seminal work that preceded it by four years, “what makes you beautiful” by the white kpop group “one direction.” the chaste energy of the whole thing makes you legitimately wonder if the good people at jyp have just never heard of microphilia. (during a dramatic reading of this piece, here a friend interjected seriously, “i think it’s korean culture not to talk about things like this, fetishes in the workplace.”)

it’s for the best, honestly, though because the actress in the music video is lee ja in, who was 11 when the video was shot. considering that the members themselves ranged in age from 18-23 at the time, i think it’s actually very impressive that we only have to cancel one.

you receive absolutely no prizes for guessing that it’s jackson wang we’re sending to social justice prison. why’d he do this? no one asked.

at any rate, got7 fans, or “gans” (they actually call themselves igot7s which is too twee for me), have much to think about here: all 7 very small members of got7 sneaking into their room, possibly weird age play, and jackson wang eating a very large cake.

let’s see what they actually did.

twitter was actually very tame. the most charged thing i found was (unsurprisingly) from a bts fan (“ban”). i don’t actually know what it means, but i think it means something.

so, of course, i turned to the internet’s last bastion of free speech, where you can say whatever the fuck you want and receive cheers, or as the kids say, “kudos.” that is, i read fanfiction.

for those of you who don’t know your herstory, i started my journey at Asianfanfics.com, where, at the time of writing, there were 12,067 got7 stories. i want to start this by saying that i think feminism won, because someone was paying real human dollars to advertise their irene/wendy fanfiction on a banner ad, which is quite possibly a win for women for everywhere.

anyway, Asianfanfics.com’s search engine sucks ass (i kept on finding stories about different combinations of bts members worrying about their weight and being reassured by another member that were entitled “just right”), so i decided to look through all got7 stories written between july 2015 and december 2015.

but, alas, not a single got7 microphilia fic to be found.

also, some genre commentary while i’m here: i think the stories i respect the most are the “[y/n] is a ordinary girl who’s assigned to be got7’s manager! can she make them into superstars? as sparks begin to fly, can she keep it professional?” like fuck yeah that sounds like a kickass dating sim. it almost definitely already is one. i salute all the teens around the world for buying into the fantasy of dating a boy band member that they themselves sell you.

however, i don’t think i respect the “[member a] and [member b] are mafia/jocks and nerds/college students/high schoolers” concepts. in my opinion, the whole fantasy of boy band member is their personas, their hidden real personalities, their celebrity, and the show business setting. find a different intellectual property if you wanna write about school. i even respect the “yugyeom drank girl juice [not estrogen] and turned into a sexy girl” story more, because at least it knows exactly what it wants, and also because they’re all still boy band members. well, band members. shout out to yugyeom.

so, anyway, i looked elsewhere. at the time of writing, archive of our own only had 11,645 got7 stories, but it does have a better search, so it effectively has more. as an aside, i think it’s so funny, and mildly disorienting at first, that archive of our own separates the “music & bands” section from the “celebrities & real people” section. boy band members aren’t real people.

the first problem i encountered is that only 20 or so stories were written within a year of just right’s release. absolute cringe gans. don’t you care about your boys? there were zero stories tagged “vore” or “microphilia” either. stories containing the word “tiny” that were rated either “explicit” or “mature” were all normal (“normal”) size fetishization rather than, you know, just right.

however, i learned my lesson from twitter. i realized that what had happened was that watching this video had created sleeper agents, just waiting for their activation phrase. that activation phrase? bangtan boys. and yeah, lo and behold, there was one! unfortunately (fortunately?) it had nothing to do with got7, let alone just right, so i’m not going to talk about it.

basically what i learned is that this video may have actually been very normal, and my brain has just been destroyed by being too online at a young age.

however, there are plenty more videos in this genre. i present to you exo wolf, a banger from may 30th, 2013. i say banger, because in a comedic inversion, it’s actually fucking terrible.

this video is pretty self-explanatory in terms of why it might induce certain responses.

let’s get the formalities out of the way. this video, the member who’s getting cancelled is kai. he has braids in this video :/

also skating on thin ice: xiumin and chen. guys what was up with the whole exo-m thing? like, we’re gonna have a cpop subgroup, but it’s going to be part chinese members and part korean members that we’ll give a chinese name? unsurprisingly, the three exo members who have departed from the group are all chinese. they weren’t able to stand the microaggressions probably. but xiumin and chen remain uncancelled as an official chinese apology for five thousand of years of on-and-off invasions of korea. sorry guys that was kinda fucked up. our bad!

anyway, there are basically three avenues for exo fans to take: 1) humans with wolfish characters (usually wolf pack dynamics, which even wolves themselves don’t fucking use so i think all of you should shut up. the real omega here is your brain), 2) werewolves (duh), and 3) wolves with human characteristics (i.e. standard furry fare).

exo themselves let all these possibilities exist at the same time, superimposing them over each other, which is very woke and egalitarian of them. let’s see what the people decided. awoo.

Asianfanfics dot com had many stories in this vein. i feel very validated that this time i was able to correctly predict a fetish. that said, briefly returning to my earlier comment regarding alternate universes: it’s intense psychic whiplash reading about these vampires and werewolves, and going okay okay luhan is a vampire this that whatever, and then seeing the actual real performance photos the author attaches at the bottom of each chapter. bro i forgot these were actual people.... it breaks immersion so bad... i’m sorry, i just can’t believe that any of these dancing boys are having weird vampire sex with wings or whatever.

archive of our own also had many stories in this vein. and i think there are some important difference between the two sites worth talking about.

first of all, i think the higher engagement rate of archive of our own really enables some of the authors to get super bold. it makes Asianfanfics.com seem a little quaint, actually. like the wordcounts are waaay longer, for one. it’s uncommon for a story hosted on Asianfanfics.com to be more than a few thousand words long (most of them could easily be published in the new yorker), whereas some of these archive of our own people have written full length novels about if the members of exo were werewolves. i guess it’s just intensely demoralizing for the aff.com crew to get, like, three comments per story.

the second big difference is that i’m noticing more common themes between the ao3 crew’s writing. like stan intertextuality, or plagiarism, or whatever, but they seem to be implicitly engaging with each other’s characterizations, storylines, and tropes. i think it is because they probably all follow each other on twitter. (i have been active on twitter for three weeks now so i am an expert on fanfiction twitter.)

anyway, like not that i am a particularly big gan (cannot even list all the members), but these people seem to have reached a very specific consensus on how jackson wang, for instance, would react in a variety of situations that really surprises me? if i were to sit down and write a got7 story, i think the fuckboitude, the douchebaggery is a big part of his charm. not to be nationalist or anything, but for god’s sake, he’s from hong kong. but these people have him as very sensitive, lots of protective instincts. not that i understood what anyone on aff.com was doing with his character either, but they did all seem to be doing different things. “kudos” to that, i guess.

but: exo. wolf. i searched the “wolves” tag. this filtered the list down from 33459 stories to 52 stories. and the “wolves” tag was very different from the aff.com “wolf” tag. for the most part, aff.com liked stories where a member was a wolf (usually shapeshifting), feral boy, lots of y/n, lots of y/n dating a feral boy who is secretly a wolf.

ao3 really, really, really likes alpha/beta/omega stories. sorting by the most popular stories, only five on the first page weren’t a/b/o. and one of them was a cis f!baekhyun story, so i think the intended effect was communicated. anyway, let’s talk about some of the themes.

first of all, i’m disappointed. today’s bonus cancellation is of ao3 “wolves” writers. why the fuck are you drawing so heavily from european wolves?? there are wolves in asia!! you don’t need to keep giving their packs and ranks weird latin names. i will kill you. i hate italy. korea literally has a native wolf. i hate all of you!!! if you want to write caucasian wolves go watch that dumbass cw show!!!! my god.

the second theme (the first one was white supremacy) is that no one wants to be a wolf who fucks. i think that we need a sex positivity movement, or something, for omega rights. like, are all of you doing okay? you’re queering misogyny by inventing new genders to oppress. another level to “no one wants to be a wolf...” is the “who fucks” part. there are so many consent issues. and not even in like, a sexy intentional way? in a “i genuinely do not think this author understands how their writing comes off” way. unfortunately i am sensitive to untagged sexual coercion, and there was a lot of that.

at any rate, the aff.com wolves were at peace with being wolves, very self-actualized. the ao3 wolves know that every minute they spend alive on this bitch of an earth is suffering, and also sex.

the third theme is the evolution of y/n. y/n, who, in a startlingly woke move for aff.com, is almost always korean, is a girl main character stumbling into love, boy bands, and wolves (i think it’s because aff.com is oldschool kpop fandom, so therefore heavily asian itself in userbase). but y/n is not the main character in ao3 stories. she is the straight best friend. in what i think is a hilarious move, ao3 authors invert the gay best friend paradigm to give the gay main character a straight girl as best friend. she usually calls him “a gay,” she has lots of thoughts on boys, and she knows his sexuality better than he does and before he does. (sidebar: if all the men are gay, and all the women are straight...)

there’s a really fun twist to this, though, because the main character is always a self-insert in fanfiction. but where older fanfiction like aff.com was at peace with this and literalize it via y/n shenanigans, modern fic writers who haven’t finished distangling their complicated relationship with wanting to be a man who loves other men instead simply imbue their main character with their essence. a little voodoo doll sehun, with a lock of y/n hair.

this creates a deeply ambivalent relationship with gender in these stories. the main character is usually an omega, but one who resents being an omega. their body and its parts is usually described, if at all, as ostensibly intersex (except more offensively), but in practice, these discourses inscribe a trans body. (nb: i think cis writers approach this in a really fucked up fetishizing way, but i hope by this point we know that that goes without saying) it’s incredibly straightforward to read this, and see the underlying desires and fears in a heady cocktail of unfiltered writing that’s deeply confessional. you know when freud had people say whatever the fuck they wanted and figured they’d eventually free associate into releasing their subconscious into reality? yeah.

okay, and while we’re on the topic, let’s talk f(x) nu abo, released on may 4th, 2010.

this is a blitzy, maximalist, amped up dance hit that even has its own applause and cheers built in. it’s so fucking annoying, and i love it.

this song is on here because the second most popular kpop a/b/o story on ao3 is called “nu abo” except it’s about bts. that’s offensive enough in its own right. write something about f(x) (702 works). when will women win the right to have their own self-lubricating holes.

anyway, even though f(x) is probably innocent in all of this, i’m still cancelling amber liu.

for queerbaiting. who told her to look like ruby rose but hot? and for what? i’m also cancelling her for racism, but that wasn’t in this video.

moving on to a double feature: vixx voodoo doll and vixx chained up, released november 19, 2013 and november 9, 2015 respectively. this is because while voodoo doll is more formative, i think the fans who write fanfiction today got into kpop more recently, so we are casting a wide net.

anyway, voodoo doll is jam packed with weird pseudo-medical imagery, blood, vivisection, bondage, puppet shit, femdom, sharps, piercings, asphyxiation, dollification, stabbing/penetration metaphors, and a really sick and catchy dance. god that looks like the list of tags on the a/b/o wolf stories.

for this song, we’re cancelling you, for being way too into this song when you were 13.

vixx voodoo doll made me goth i guess! insert that pic of the your music saved me sign, except it saved me from getting into emo or pop punk probably.

chained up, comparatively, is much more tame. the only thing of note about it is that there are around 10 completely different chokers and choker looks the members wear in this music video. also they’re singing about being chained up, but that seemed a bit obvious.

we could argue that voodoo doll is gay while chained up is gay (derogatory); that voodoo doll is queer while chained up is gay; that chained up is a sensitive masterpiece of omega4omega sexuality. but we’re not going to.

we’re going to talk about what voodoo doll fanfiction was and was not. first, Aff.com had plenty of it. however, i was extremely disappointed to see that much of it did not hew to the spirit of vixx voodoo doll. my god, the voodoo doll becoming the one preying upon you disgusts me. the fantasy of the voodoo doll is that of absolute power. the idea that the doll itself has agency? instantly breaks the fantasy. i’m even not into voodoo dolls and i’m offended.

i also don’t think it’s part of the voodoo doll fantasy to release the doll. the only story on there that involved Y/N kidnapping vixx members like in the music video was unavailable because the author deactivated their account. come back qxeen what did you see.

i think this got off track, actually, in that i was mostly wondering why these people imprinted differently onto vixx voodoo doll than i did. like i don’t think you’re supposed to actually like straightforwardly absorb the morals and aesthetics of music videos like it’s propaganda. however, it’s more entertaining if you do. i hope ao3 doesn’t let me down.

out of the then 5932 works in the vixx fandom (the least out of every group so far, excluding f(x) because they’re women), 59 of them included the word “voodoo” somewhere. that’s 1%. i legitimately can’t tell if that’s high or not.

after some more cursory reading through the first page of popular results, my big takeaway is that people watched that video and wanted to be tortured and enslaved? but not, like, in a sexy way where the torturing is the point, the way where the point is to suffer bravely and beautifully, to endure the world’s harms like jesus on the cross, and then to fall into the arms of a beautiful boy who may or may not be the one hurting you in the first place.

there’s a certain predictability to these fantasies. like it’s not even masochism, which would be fun at least, it’s literally just like the desire to be beautiful, even as you suffer. and i do find that a little boring. (but, i mean, you can’t help being a woman!)

sidebar: on chained up. what’s interesting about chained up, is that most of the then 38 “chained up” works (likely because the video has no storyline) are about the members fucking during chained up promotions. no one’s ever actually chained up, but whatever. it’s fine. it’s fine!

anyway, here, more than ever, the nature of desire is stripped bare. i’ve written before [elsewhere in the unreleased tshirt cinematic universe] on how kpop boys are, through fandom, re-formed as white, or more strongly, i guess, blank slates. it’s really interesting to me how so much of this dynamic of projection is enabled by the fact that they’re asian men. they’re infantilized, feminized vessels; they’re seductive, but childlike, oblivious to their own charms, so nonthreatening; they have uncontrollable desires for sex, they’re scared of sex. and above all else, white women submit themselves to them, insert themselves into them. basically kpop fans tend to rework old school yellow peril and emasculation fantasies to reenact their own desires, often white, often cishet on them.

what i am saying is that there’s another thesis about forced feminization and its racialized subtext in here. obviously gender is a racialized construct to begin with, but like it’s fascinating to argue that when white women remake asian men according to their own desires, that is, into themselves, they (hopefully) unintentionally echo these old fears about the sexual order.

it illuminates, it seems, the underlying dynamic in the denigration of asian men, which is of course the fear of miscegenation. now, my breathtaking ability to make everything about me aside, miscegenation is interesting because it presents a racial synthesis, beginning to collapse and trouble the artificial designations of purity. so we make asian men into white women, and end up with an unsettling hybrid. i’m sure this has deep implications for me personally.

but i think we already knew that quite a few of these people had yellow fever, so let’s talk about the gender dialectic at play. basically, the above dynamic, of making men into women (whether literally, in body; or subjectively, in mind; or even relationally, as they are objectified into passive vessels for your desire) coexists with the ostensibly converse dynamic, in which the straight women desires to be a gay man. these aren’t necessarily in conflict: it could easily be that these are different writers writing different stories, that both are ways of expressing discontent with existing in a raced, gendered body, or even that the end product of both is the same.

it’s been a while without a picture. all of you now have the legal right to hunt and kill me for making a d&g joke.

anyway, what i want to talk about is how these two fantasies can coexist. that by making a man into yourself, you can speak on your own desire in a passive way. my normal interest is analyzing forced masc fantasies (albeit in chinese opera lol), and they bear little to no resemblance to this kind of fantasy. this kind offers plausible deniability, of course, because wanting things is embarrassing. but also the fantasy isn’t about wanting to be a man, it’s about having no choice but to be a failed one. the gender pessimism running through these stories is palpable. basically andrea long chu wants what wolf fanfiction writers know: everyone is an omega, and everyone hates it.

at any rate, this racialized dynamic is one that i wasn’t sure how to bring up throughout this piece, mainly because there is no definitive way for me to tell the race of any individual writer, beyond just like the clear and present vibes that i receive. but i think it structures a lot of the fantasies contained in this essay. (i felt more comfortable bringing up the gendered dynamic, because it was fairly trivial to find out the current gender of the person writing each story i was reading.)

obviously we should return to the specter haunting this conversation: the very much alive david eng. i think this sort of argument is familiar to readers of racial castration, especially his chapter on m. butterfly. btw sorry for mentioning that play 2 out of 3 posts on this blog. i have problems.

let’s talk about the parallel imagery between the depiction of gallimard’s final speech and the fanfiction i’ve described above. in it, gallimard makes himself into his own dream woman, dressing in yellowface and robes, the costume of puccini’s original madame butterfly. and he laments his lost love:

there is a vision of the orient that i have. of slender women in chong sams and kimonos who die for the love of unworthy foreign devils. who are born and raised to be the perfect women. who take whatever punishment we give them, and bounce back, strengthened by love, unconditionally.

in that, i see the self insert, and i see the sufferer of vixx voodoo fic. the fantasy that gallimard has about asian women is repeated, this time about asian men and a helpless identification with them. and on some level, gallimard’s women do have something very compelling to identify with: they suggest that there’s a way to endure white male violence without sacrifice, and even more potently, to enjoy it on some level.

but onward to the titular racial castration. eng argues that gallimard’s wilful ignorance of song’s true gender is a psychic castration -- song’s masculinity is diminished so that his own can be enhanced within their relationship. this, eng believes, acts out “richard fung’s contention that in western imaginary ‘asian and anus are conflated.’” this process stabilizes the relationship between the asian man and the white woman: they occupy the same place within the sexual dyad.

this is, i think, why some people are addicted to writing from the bottom’s perspective. again -- not implying that irl bottoms don’t exist or that bottoms are psychically castrated lol -- but rather that you can fantasize about this ideal asian man that you can come to embody. in kpop rpf, rather than it being between a white man and an asian man (unless someone’s started writing chad future fic), it’s between two asian men. so this transformation is performed. whiteness is always intruding and so i think eng is helpful here to making it visible again.

this essay isn’t a callout or actual cancellation or anything like that, i do wanna be clear. i guess i just like talking about fantasies, even the embarrassing ones, and where they come from. i think oftentimes in fandom spaces, we write a lot of stories off as idfic, and i think virtually every single one of the stories i referenced to write this fairly uncontroversially fall into that category. but i think calling something an “id” something or the other naturalizes the satisfaction it gives as purely instinctual and unconscious, when i do think there are deeper narratives at play. while i didn’t ever actually reference the base here (sorry), i do think it’s worth talking about how real world power shapes & maintains the superstructure, and thereby our fantasies.

anyway in conclusion, maybe i was the one with sexual brainworms the whole time.

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snarktheater · 3 years

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Hey, d'you have any French book recs? I'm trying to work on my French, and rn I have downloaded one of my favourite book series' French translations, but I figured maybe books already written in French might work better? Also have you read the Ranger's Apprentice series? 1/2

RA's def flawed - the books' narration does like to point bright arrows at the protagonists' intelligence, and the last few books def have the tone of 'old white man trying to write feminism', although at least he's trying? - and it's aimed more to the younger side of YA, but it is still a very fun series, and I can ignore the flaws fairly easily, at least partly due to nostalgia? This rather long lol but I'm wordy.

I'll start with the second question: no, although every time the series is brought up I have to check the French title and go "oh, right, I've seen these books in stores". But I've never purchased or read them. It sounds like something I probably would have enjoyed as a teen but I just missed the mark, and these days I'm trying to drown myself in queer books, so that probably isn't happening.

As for your first question, geez, I haven’t read a French book in years, so this is gonna skew middle grade/YA, though that may not be so bad if the point is to learn the language. I will also say that as a result, these may read a little outdated.

I'll put it under a cut, even if Tumblr has become really bad with correctly displaying read mores. Sorry, mobile crowd.

It's also likely that old readers of the blog will have seen me talk about most of these. I don't feel like going through old posts.

One last thing: while I was curating this list I took the time to make a Goodreads shelf to keep track of those.

The Ewilan books by Pierre Bottero

(It's a testament to how long ago I read these books that these are not the covers of the edition I own, and I can't even find those on Google. I'm settling for a more recent cover anyway since it'll make it easier to find them, presumably)

There are at least three trilogies (that I know of) set in the same world.

The first trilogy is essentially an isekai (so, French girl lands in parallel fantasy world by accident) with elements of chosen one trope, though I find the execution makes it worth the while anyway.

The second trilogy is a direct sequel, so same protagonist but new threat, and the world gets expanded.

The third one is centered around a supporting characters from the previous books, and the first couple of books in it are more her backstory than a continuation, though the third one concludes both that trilogy and advances the story of the other books as well.

Notably these books have a really fun magic system where the characters "draw" things into existence. It's just stuck with me for some reason.

A bunch of stuff by Erik L'Homme

I have read a lot of this man's books, starting with Le Livre des Etoiles.

They also skew towards the young end of YA, arguably middle grade, I never bothered to figure out where to draw the line. They're coincidentally also using the premise of a parallel world to our own (and yes, connected to France again, the French are just as susceptible of writing about their homeland), but interestingly are set from the point of view of characters native to the parallel world.

It also has a very unique magic system, this one based on a mix of a runic alphabet and sort-of poetry. I'll also say specifically for these books that the characters stuck with me way more than others on this list, which is worth mentioning.

This trilogy is my favorite by Erik L'Homme, but I'll also mention Les Maîtres des brisants, which is a fantasy space opera with a pirate steampunk(?) vibe. I think it's steampunk. I could be mistaken. But it's in that vein. It's also middle grade, in my opinion not as good, but it could just be that it came out when I was older.

Another one is Phaenomen, which was a deliberate attempt at skewing older (though still YA). This one is set in our (then-)modern world and centers a group of teens who happen to have supernatural powers. I guess the best way to describe it is a superhero thriller? If you take "superhero" in the sense of "people with individualized powers", since they don't really do a lot of heroing.

...I really need to brush up on genre terminology, don't I.

The Ji series by Pierre Grimbert

This one is actually adult fantasy, though it definitely falls under "probably outdated". It is very straight, for starters, and I'd have to give it another read to give a more critical reading of how it handles race (it attempts to do it, and is well meaning, but I'm not sure it survives the test of time & scrutiny, basically).

If I haven't lost you already, the premise is this: a few generations ago, a weird man named Nol gathered emissaries from each nation of the world and took them to a trip to the titular Ji island. Nobody knows what went down here, but now in the present day, someone is trying to kill off all descendants from those emissaries, who are as a result forced to team up and figure out what's going on.

I'm not going to spoil past that, though I will say it has (surprise) a really unique magic system! I guess you can start to piece together what my younger self was interested in. Which, admittedly, I still am.

Once again, this one also has a strong cast of characters, helped by rich world building and the premise forcing the characters to come from many different cultures (though, again, I can't vouch for the handling of race because it's been too long).

The first series is complete by itself, though it has two sequel series as well, each focusing on the next generation in these families. Because yes, of course they all pair up and have kids. Like I said: very straight.

A whole lot of books by Jean-Louis Fetjaine

OFetjaine is a historian, and I guess he's really interested in Arthurian mythos especially, because he loves it so much he's written two separate high fantasy retellings of them! I'm not criticizing, mind you, we all need a hobby.

The former, the Elves trilogy (pictures above) is very traditional high fantasy. Elves, dwarves, orcs, a world which is definitely fictionalized with a pan-Celtic vibe to it. The holy grail and excalibur are around, but they're relics possessed by the elves and dwarves with very different powers than usual. Et cetera.

Fetjaine also really loves his elves (as the titles might imply), and while they're not exactly Tolkien elves, there's a similar vibe to them. If you like Tolkien and his elf boner, you'll probably like this too. And conversely, if that turns you off, these books probably also won't work for you.

This series also has a prequel trilogy, centered around the backstory of one of the main characters. I...honestly don't remember too much about it, but I liked it, so, there you go, I guess.

I said Fetjaine did it twice. The other series is the Merlin duology, which, as the title implies, is a retelling of Merlin's story. Note that Merlin is also in the other trilogy, but it's a different Merlin; like I said, completely different continuities and stories.

This one is historical fantasy, so it's set in actual Great Britain, and Fetjaine attempts to connect Arthur to a "real" historical figure...but, you know, Merlin is also half-elf and elves totally exist in Brocéliande, so, you know. History.

Okay, that's probably enough fantasy, let me give some classics too.

L'Arbre des possibles et autres histoires - Bernard Werber

Bernard Werber is a pretty seminal author of French sci-fi and I should probably be embarrassed that the only book of his that I read was for school, but, it is a really good one, so I'll include it anyway.

It's a novella collection, and when I say "sci-fi" I want to make it clear that it's very old school science fiction. It's more Frankenstein or Black Mirror than Star Trek, what we in French call the anticipation genre of science fiction: you take one piece of technology or cultural norm and project it into the future.

It has a pretty wide range of topics and tones, so it's bound to have some better than others. My personal faves were Du pain et des jeux, where football (non-American) has evolved into basically a wargame, and Tel maître, tel lion, where any animal is considered acceptable as a pet, no matter how absurd it is to keep as a pet. They're both on a comedic end, but there's more heartfelt stuff too.

L'Ecume des Jours - Boris Vian

(no cover because I can't find the one I have, and the ones I find are ugly)

This book is surrealist. Like, literally a part of the surrealist movement. It features things such as a lilypad growing inside a woman's lungs (and, as you well know, lilypads double in size every day, wink wink), the protagonist's apartment becoming larger and smaller to go with his mood and current financial situation, and more that I can't even recall at the moment because remembering this book is like trying to remember having an aneurysm.

It is also really, really fun and touching. Oh, and it has a pretty solid movie adaptation, starring Audrey Tautou, who I think an international audience would probably recognize from Amelie or the Da Vinci Code movie.

I don't really know what else to say. It's a really cool read!

Le Roi se meurt - Eugène Ionesco

Ionesco is somewhat famous worldwide so I wasn't even sure to include him here. He's a playwright who wrote in the "Theater of the Absurd" movement, and this play is part of that.

The premise of this play is that the King (of an unnamed land) is dying, and the land is dying with him. I don't really know what else to say. It's theater of the absurd. It kind of has to be experienced (the published version works fine, btw, no need to track down an actual performance, in my humble opinion).

The Plague - Albert Camus

You've probably heard of this one, and if you haven't, let me tell you about a guy called Carlos Maza

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I'm honestly more including this book out of a sense of duty. The other three are books I genuinely liked and happen to be classics. This book was an awful read. But, um. It's kind of relevant now in a way it wasn't (or didn't feel, anyway) back in 2008 or 2009, when I read it. And I don't just mean because of our own plague, since Camus's plague is pretty famously an allegory for fascism, which my teenage self sneered at, and my adult self really regrets every feeling that way.

Okay, finally, some more lighthearted stuff, we gotta talk about the Belgian and French art of bande dessinée. How is it different from comic books or manga? Functionally, it isn't. It really comes down more to what gets published in the Belgian-French industry compared to the American comics industry, which is dominated by superheroes, or the Japanese manga industry, which, while I'm less familiar with it, I know has some big genre trends as well that are completely separate.

The Lanfeust series - Arleston and Tarquin

This is a YA mega-series, and I can't recommend all of it because I've lost track of the franchise's growth. Also note that I say "YA", but in this case it means something very different from an American understanding of YA. These books are pretty full of sex.

No, when I say YA I mean it has that level of maturity, for better or worse. The original series (Lanfeust de Troy) is high fantasy in a world where everyone has an individual magical ability but two characters find out they're gifted with an absolute power to make anything happen, and while it gets dark at times, it's still very lighthearted throughout, and the humor is...well, I think it's best described as teen boy humor. And it has a tendency to objectify its female characters, as you'll quickly parse out from the one cover I used here or if you browse more covers.

But still, it holds a special place in my heart, I guess. And on my shelves.

The sequel series, Lanfeust des Etoiles, turns it into a space opera, and goes a little overboard with the pop culture reference at times, though overall still maintains that balance of serious/at times dark story and lighthearted comedy.

After that the franchise is utter chaos to me, and I've lost track. I know there was another sequel series, which I dropped partway through, and a spinoff that retold part of the original series from the PoV of the main love interest (in the period of time she spent away from the main group). There was a comedy spin-off about the troll species unique to this world, a prequel series, probably more I don't even know exist.

Les Démons d'Alexia

Something I can probably be a little less ashamed of including here.

Some backstory here. The Editions Dupuis are a giant of the Belgian bande dessinée industry, and for many, many years I was subscribed to their weekly magazine. That magazine was (mostly) made up of excerpts from the various books that the éditions were publishing at the time; those that were made of comic strips would usually get a couple pages of individual scripts, while the ongoing narratives got cut into episodes that were a few pages long (out of a typical 48 page count for a single BD album). Among those were this series.

For the first few volumes, I wasn't super into this series, probably because I was a little too young and smack dab in the middle of my "trying to be one of the boys" phase. But around book 3 I got really invested, to the point where I own the second half of the series because I had canceled by subscription by then but still wanted to know more.

Alexia is an exorcist with unusual talents, but little control, who's introduced to a group that specializes in researching paranormal phenomena, solving cases that involve the paranormal, that kinda stuff.

As a result of the premise, the series has a pretty slow start since it has to build up mystery around the source of Alexia's powers, but once it gets going and we get to what is essentially the series' main conflict, it gets really interesting.

Plus, witches. I'm a simple gay who likes strong protagonists and witches.

Murena

There was a point where my mtyhology nerdery led me to look for more stuff about the historical cultures that created them, and so I'd be super into stuff set in ancient Rome (I'd say "or Greece or Egypt" but let's face it, it was almost always Rome).

Murena is a series set just before the start of Emperor Nero's rule. You know, the one who was emperor when Rome burned, and according to urban legend either caused the fire or played the fiddle while it did (note: "fiddle" is a very English saying, it's usually the lyre in other languages). He probably didn't, it probably was propaganda, but he was a) a Roman Emperor, none of whom were particularly stellar guys and b) mean to Christians, who eventually got to rewrite history. So he's got a bad rep.

The series goes for a very historical take on events, albeit fictionalized (the protagonist and main PoV, the titular Lucius Murena, is himself fictional) and attempts to humanize the people involved in those events. Each book also includes some of the sources used to justify how events and characters are depicted, which is a nice touch.

It's also divided in subseries called "cycles" (books 1-4, 5-8 and the ongoing one starts at 9). I stopped after 9, though I think it's mostly a case of not going to bookstores often anymore. Plus it took four years between 9 and 10, and again between 10 and 11. But the first eight books made for a pretty solid story that honestly felt somewhat concluded as is, so it's a good place to start.

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whetstonefires · 3 years

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Since you like the Hellboy...*perks up* Can I ask what you like about it? Does this need to be part of the ask game, if so, smash it in there. But opinions! I would love!

Ooh! Hm. This is actually surprisingly hard to articulate.

I’ve been ‘into’ Hellboy for like. Half my damn life now, and while I could have gone on at length about all the things about it I found fun as a teenager it was at its core very much a ‘this makes me Feel Happy’ thing. And now that glow is less intense but it’s bolstered by that habitual sort of attachment you feel to like. Family members.

Let’s see how far I can break this down lol.

I have never been able to much like most of the BPRD tie-in type materials and I was not at all pleased with the films, so to an extent I think I can say confidently part of what I like is the way Hellboy is situated in a superhero-comic-adjacent space while being very much coordinated by one overarching creative sensibility--like, other people were brought in to work on Hellboy a lot over the course of the run, but Mignola always had a unifying voice and even when I don’t actually agree with his taste or values that level of artistic...intentionality? Judgment? Presence? Something like that. Gives the work a sense of...integrity? Maybe just unity.

Anyway makes it feel less plastic than comics often do. This is a corporate product of course but it’s also just Mike Mignola hanging out doing whatever he thinks would be cool. Drawing rocks and monsters because that’s what he wants to draw. I like that.

Some of the higher-quality webcomics you get nowadays, when they don’t take themselves too terribly seriously but aren’t outright comedic, can land similarly in terms of voice, but even just fifteen years ago webcomics weren’t really at that point yet as a medium, and even now most are still amateurish as well as amateur. Which is fine, but different.

To get slightly less meta, I love the collection of genres that are smeared together for Hellboy--we’ve got a lot of detective noir stuff cut together with cosmic horror and like...the genre where people research folklore and then mostly punch it. Does that have a name? And then there are a bunch of other influences stirred in, sometimes for only a single issue, sometimes more.

Mignola managed to be significantly less offensive than average about the way he adapted world folklore into his weird groddy kitchen-sink fantasy system, which is pretty funny because he doesn’t come across as being careful about it at all. Not that I think there was no effort made, but also he just used research as a basis for narrative much more often than he started with a story premise and stretched the creature to fit, which by default gave him less scope for dickery.

Also I think the only god he ever fights is Hecate and she’s handled from a 19th-century-occultist angle rather than a Classical angle.

Also Hellboy fights Nazis and cyborg gorillas as well as like. Baba Yaga and vampires. The balance of schlock and gonzo nonsense to pathos and sensitive emotional bits is usually about where I like it.

The episodic format is really well used. It lets the storytelling style lean heavily on the late-19th-through-mid-20th-century short story genres that it borrows a lot from, and which honestly has always worked better for comics than end-to-end long-arc serialization. I like how the anachronic order of many sections of the series allowed for a lot of ‘building outward from the middle.’

Also it means the story can stay true to its roots and kill off a lot of characters in gothic excess without constantly sloughing main cast or having to do fakeouts.

...I can’t believe that since Hellboy isn’t really emotionally involved with the issue of his birth parents except inasmuch as it explains the world-ending stone hand, the single angstiest part of his backstory is technically when he went on a drinking binge road trip around Mexico in his teens and made friends with vampire-fighting luchador triplets but then the youngest one whom he was closest to was kidnapped by the vampires and Hellboy had to kill his best friend, and this is all established in a random side story that pushes the intentional genre absurdism to its breaking point and is equal parts comedic and grotesque.

(The second angstiest is probably the bit in volume 1 when he finds his dad murdered by frogs.)

I also just love characters who wear trench coats and are actually really clever and knowledgeable and kind but tend to resort, in extremity, to just hitting problems really hard. Okay? I like that. That’s a fave.

Hellboy’s whole character design is very strong, a bunch of dramatic broad-strokes decisions that contrast interestingly against one another, and then a lot of subtler elements layered in crosswise.

The way his relationship to the narrative ‘occult-fighting antichrist figure’ could be really straightforward, but keeps stepping a little sideways off the usual shape of the tropes in a way that creates depth.

He’s a giant red demon guy who stopped aging in the 50s; he’s never going to be able to be ‘normal’ or pretend he isn’t what he is--but also he’s a dude with a government job and probably a Social Security Number who goes and interviews people about the situation and says ‘I’m Agent Hellboy’ and gets called ‘Mr. Boy’ and is just this guy who knows his shit and can take a beating.

(This was one of the major things I hated in the first movie, that they decided to make him this weird secret cryptid whose dad keeps him locked in a vault when he’s not fighting.)

The way the identity thing is never reduced to comfortable binaries with him except by enemies trying to psych him out is just really satisfying. He fights monsters not because he hates them or himself but because he was recruited into this career young and he’s really good at it, and he feels good about helping people who are being victimized.

When something occult isn’t hurting anybody he’s down to chill, and if it turns out they secretly are after all he’s always so tired and disappointed, and if they really aren’t then he has a new friend. Whom he may never see again or may hit up for a game of cards next time he’s in town.

(I also like how he combines ‘being pretty private’ ‘being very casually friendly’ and ‘being an asshole who makes a lot of enemies’; it’s not that unusual a combo for his type of main character but it’s one I enjoy.)

When he breaks off his own horns as part of his rejection of being Anung Un Rama it’s not ‘choosing humanity’ or w/e it’s choosing not to be used for this. His name is Hellboy, which is an objectively awful name but it was given to him by people he loved and who chose him, not the people who made him or brought him to this world to be used, and he chooses it.

And that has weight. That has force enough behind it to carry a world.

Just in general in spite of all the identity stuff he gets swamped with he’s really good at self-knowledge and letting other people’s ideas of who and what he’s supposed to be just wash over him. As the story goes on and shit gets weirder his sense of identity gets shaken, but he never quite loses that anchor in the knowledge that he is the ultimate arbiter of his own identity.

His exasperation on being told via stabbing that he doesn’t get to be King of England even if he is the first male descendant of King Arthur since Mordred is so funny. Why is this a thing, says Hellboy. Why am I finding out like this. Why do I always find out this shit like this. Why would anyone think I wanted to be King of England. I already punched so many skeletons about not wanting to be King of Witches.

He’s got so much righteous anger that comes out when people are treated as disposable, or as less for being not human or less human or superpowered, and of course it’s founded in his own experiences and his own fight for respect but it’s not about him. It’s about the person who’s suffering now.

One time his combat one-liner before shooting something started with ‘The Torch of Liberty said I was the worst shot he ever tried to train’ that’s so funny! I love that!

He’s my boy okay.

#have this rant lol #hellboy #my opinions #fandom recruitment pitch #i have all 12 volumes and a number of very disappointing tie-ins #i almost didn't get them all because i was collecting at a leisurely rate #and then all the bookstores stopped stocking it because it had wrapped up #and guess what???#volume 11 of 12 ain't easy to find used!#comics #writing #identity #names and naming #beastenraged #ask #hoc est meum

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alarawriting · 3 years

Text

52 Project #38: All We Wanna Do Is Eat Your Brains

Like “No Lullaby” at number 19 and “The Lake” at number 20, this is a songfic. Unlike those, the song itself -- Jonathan Coulton’s “Re: Your Brains” -- is comedic, so this is a comedy wrapped up in the skin of a horror story. Trigger warning for zombies, but no speaking characters get killed by zombies in this story.

-----

The fifth floor of the six-story Peaceful Pines Towne Centre shopping mall was entirely occupied by the business offices of the real estate company that owned and managed it, and many other similar shopping malls.

It was divided into two halves, the west side and the east side, with elevators in the center, and locked, heavy wooden doors between the two sides. At one point both of those doors had been unlocked. On the west side, there had been attractive, frosted glass doors leading to the reception area; those had been smashed. On the east side, there were security doors painted the same color as the wall. Those were locked, but could normally be opened with company badges. The system that allowed the badge locks to work had been unplugged, and the badge lock itself had been disconnected from the inside.

Once upon a time, the salespeople and the financial analysts and the C suite had all had offices or cubicles on the west side, and the IT people, engineers, and facilities management had all had offices or cubicles on the east side. HR had been on the west side, but right near the doors; all the people from that department were all on the east side now.

The bathrooms were in the hallway; the break room was on the west side, with the coffee machine, refrigerator and water cooler. On the east side there was nothing to support human life except air, the water cooler replacement jugs, and several packages of granola bars that one of the engineers had stashed in her desk.

The security cameras still worked, so it was quite possible to see, if you were looking at the monitor screens, a disheveled, pudgy man with short, straight dirty-blond hair, wearing a suit, with skin that was normally the pinkish-beige of a white guy but was now kind of grayish and also yellowish, standing in front of the security doors. “That you, Tom?” he said cheerfully.

“Uh, yeah?” The man on the east side of the security doors was tall and skinny, with black hair in a ponytail. He was also white, but had the kind of skin color which could maybe mean Greek, Southern Italian, Northern Middle East, or something like that, except that it hadn’t seen much sun in months, maybe years. It also had a bit of a sallow cast to it, but nowhere near as strong as the man on the other side of the doors.

“Hey there! It’s Bob, from down the hall. Good to see you, buddy! How’ve you been?”

“Uh… okay, I guess? Overall? Today hasn’t been great though…”

“Oh, I feel ya, buddy, I feel ya. Things were going okay for me, too, but now I’m a zombie!” Bob chuckled. “Isn’t it funny, the curveballs life throws you?”

“Uh, yeah. Funny. Hey, if you’re a zombie how come you can talk?”

On the monitors, they could see Zombie Bob shrug. “I’m no egghead. I’ll let the scientists figure that one out. But we’re not all dumb just because we’re zombies, you know. I’ve been the head of Strategic Marketing for two years now… oh, but I guess you know that!” Bob laughed. “I know, I know, we’re coworkers! I don’t have to explain my position to you.”

“Sounds like maybe a touch of memory loss, there, Bob,” Tom said.

“Nah, nah, I’ve just been meeting with so many new people today! This zombie thing, it’s really underrated. I know I was practically pissing my pants when I realized I’d been bitten, but now that I’m a zombie? Oh, I know I look kind of unhealthy, but actually I feel great! No pain, and I’m never gonna have to worry about dieting again! Yeah, I’m gonna miss French fries, but to be honest I was considering doing keto, and this is kind of like extreme keto, right?”

“But zombies eat people. Right?”

“Yeah, yeah, of course we do. Mostly brains, those are the best part. Hey, listen, Tom? Could you do me a solid here?”

“Uh… what do you want?”

“Ah, it’s not a big deal. I just need you to open up these doors so me and my new colleagues can come inside and eat your brains.”

Tom took several seconds to process this request. Finally he said, “Why, exactly, do you think we’d be willing to do that?”

“Hey, I know. It’s a big step, right? You just get a little bite, then you turn into a zombie and you live forever, long as you can keep eating, but we’re gonna be eating your brains, so you’re not gonna be turning into zombies. I can see why you’d be reluctant to do that.”

“Okay, so why did you ask?”

“Well, here’s the deal, Tom. You’re all gonna die screaming. It’s gonna happen. Maybe not this minute, but by the end of the day, it’s happening. So why put it off? Why put yourselves through the agony of anticipation? Just, you know, rip the bandaid off and get it over with.”

“Yeah, no. We’re not doing that.”

“Come on, I don’t think it’s unreasonable. All we wanna do is eat your brains. It’s not like anyone’s talking about eating your eyes here!” Bob laughed again. On the monitor, the elevator opened, and two more zombies came out. They began to scratch mindlessly at the security doors. “Hey, hey there, folks, we’re not getting through these bad boys unless they let us in. Save your fingernails and teeth for a softer target, okay?”

The zombies actually seemed to listen to him. They stepped back and stood quietly.

“I’m not sure you’ve fully thought this through, buddy,” Bob said in a genially condescending tone. “Don’t mean to nitpick here, but this isn’t much of a plan. I know you’ve got a few guns in there, and maybe you’ve got the extra water cooler jugs and the refills for the vending machine? But really, how long’s that gonna last? You haven’t even got a bathroom in there. Bet it’s getting pretty stinky.”

“We’ve got some supply closets over here , and some buckets. We’re getting by.”

“Yeah, well, it’s not like you can open a window and let some air in, or dump your buckets! Those windows in there, they don’t open. I know! I kept sending memos to facilities, asking if I could get a window that opened, and it was always, no, none of the windows open, they’re not designed that way! Guess they didn’t want any of C-suite to be able to jump if commercial real estate tanked again.” Bob laughed.

Tom stepped away from the door for a moment, speaking quietly and urgently to Nishant, who was waiting for an update. “They don’t know about the windows,” he whispered to Nishant, who grinned briefly, and then ran back toward the IT manager’s office. It was Tom’s office, but it was on this side, with his department, rather than on the other side where all the other managers’ offices were.

He returned to the door to talk to Bob. “We’ll get by,” he said.

“Whoo-ee. Only thing I can smell anymore is tasty meat, but I tell you, I don’t envy you. Hey, why don’t we compromise? You open up the doors so you can dump your buckets, and then we all come inside and eat your brains.”

“That isn’t much of a compromise, Bob.”

“Sure, Tom, but have you thought through your alternatives? I mean, what’re you gonna do, spend the rest of your lives locked up in half the fifth floor of the shopping mall? Good enough for now, I suppose, and maybe you’ll get used to the stink, but sooner or later you’re gonna run out of food and ammo. Guess you’re gonna have to make a tough call then, huh?”

“I guess so,” Tom said.

“No, I don’t envy you at all. The way I see it, your options are, die of starvation, wait for us to break down the doors and eat your brains, or let us in, and at least the third option’s pretty quick.” He laughed again. “Though I’m gonna be honest here, Tom, I’m gonna eat you nice and slow.”

Tom sighed. “I have to say, Bob, I’m a tolerant guy but I’m really leery of this lifestyle choice of yours. I mean, eating brains? Have you ever considered not eating brains?”

“Well, I’ve considered it, but frankly they’re so goddamn tasty, who wouldn’t? I mean, if you guys manage to hold us off long enough, maybe it’ll come to the point where you have to eat each other, and then you’ll be eating your own brains. It’d be better to just get it out of the way quick, don’t you think?”

“I think we’ll manage.”

“I don’t think you’ve really thought things through, though. But that doesn’t really surprise me. You were always a detail-focused guy, never had much of a head for the big picture. Always trying to solve the problem of today, even if it causes problems tomorrow. But me, the big picture is what I do.”

Tom had heard this particular spiel before. “So what’s the big picture, then?” he asked, as behind him Ekaterina tapped him on the shoulder.

“The big picture here is that you’re gonna be dead one way or another. The whole human race is gonna go, Tom. And by the way, I don’t appreciate your comment about my ‘lifestyle.’ I’d be reporting you to HR, but I’m pretty sure all of HR is on your side of the doors.”

“Who’s on your side?”

Bob laughed. “Oh, wait, I got it! You’re mad at the comment I made about gay lifestyles a month ago! That was supposed to be a zinger, right?” He chuckled again. “Well, you’ll be pleased to hear I don’t care about any of that stuff anymore. You remember Kevin, right? The graphic designer?”

Kevin had been 23 and engaged to a boyfriend who was a guitarist in a band. “I remember him.”

“Well, now he’s one of us, and that’s all any of us care about. Gay, straight, white, black, it doesn’t matter once you’re a zombie. We’re all united together.”

“When you say ‘us’. Who’ve you got?”

“Well, right off the bat we got Horace. You would never imagine how delicious he was. You’d think all that fat on his gut would be a problem, but I’m here to tell you, he was exquisitely marbled.”

Horace had been the CEO. Tom shuddered, as he removed his pants and shirt, stripping down to his underwear. “I meant, who’s a zombie?”

“Well, honestly, most of the folks over here, we ate them. I got bit on my lunch hour, and after I turned, I led a bunch of folks from the mall up here. They’re good people, though, Tom. Really focused and dedicated. Hard workers.”

“Working hard at eating people.” Tom handed his clothes to Ekaterina, and she ran them back tto his office.

“Hey, it’s hard work to catch you guys. It’d be a lot easier if you’d just let us in.”

“Okay, break it down for me, Bob. What’s our ROI on letting you in? Where’s the win-win?”

“Sure thing! Now you’re speaking my language, Tom. I think it’s really great that you’re willing to work with me on this.” In the monitor, Bob smirked. “So here’s the deal. We’re all really hungry and we really want to eat your brains. You’re stuck in half a corporate office with nothing to eat and nowhere to go the bathroom. And no toilet paper! Man, that's gotta be rough. So what I’m suggesting is, you let us in, we eat your brains, you don’t have to live through any more of this bullcrap, and you don’t have to watch your families and loved ones get eaten. What do you say?”

Tom swallowed. The laser printed message in 48 pt font, on the paper Nishant was holding up, said “15 FT SHORT.”

“I can see you’ve got some good points there, Bob. But we actually don’t want to get eaten, so I think we’re gonna stick it out for now.”

“I sympathize with that, Tom. And I appreciate how you’re listening and considering my proposal. I’d really like to help you out, any way I can. What if I offer fast mercy killing? We don’t start eating you until you’re already dead, and we bludgeon you to death fast, no biting and tearing. How’s that?”

“Give me a minute to run that past some of my people,” Tom said, and walked over to Nishant. In an urgent whisper, he said, “You can’t find any more cloth?”

Nishant, who was naked except for Western-style underpants, shook his head. “The bras and underpants for everyone here wouldn’t get us the rest of the way, either,” he said. “It’d be different if we didn’t have to support Jason’s weight=”

“No one gets left behind, Nish.”

“I know, but that’s why we’ve had to make what amounts to five ropes in parallel instead of just one, because Jason’s arms are not strong enough to support 400 pounds.”

“Okay, and is anyone proposing a solution?”

“Xi said we should toss down cardboard boxes, but they won’t take his weight either.”

Tom sighed. “I can probably stall Bob for another five, ten minutes tops. You’re engineers. Figure it out or we’re dead.” A 15 foot drop wouldn’t kill most adult humans, but it might well render a lot of them unable to run afterwards, and in a zombie apocalypse, that’d essentially mean death. “Have we got confirmation on the helicopter?”

“They say it’s on its way,” Nishant whispered, shrugging.

“Okay. I’ll tie him up as long as I can.” Tom returned to the door. “Sorry, that’s a non starter. I’ve got a counter-proposal for you, though.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Bob said approvingly. “Hit me.”

“What if, and I’m spitballing here, you let half of us go, and you just eat the brains of half of us?”

On the monitor, Bob shook his head. “That’s not going to work for us, I’m afraid.”

“What about a quarter?”

“It’s logistics, Tom. There’s no way you get out of here except the stairs and the elevator, and they’re both overrun with zombies. I can’t control all the zombies in this mall, just my own people. You’re not getting to the bottom uneaten, and frankly, if someone’s going to eat you anyway, it should be me and my fellows. You can see my position on that, can’t you, Tom?”

“You could turn half of us into zombies, and eat the brains of the other half,” Tom suggested.

“No, afraid that’s not doable either,” Bob said.

“Mind filling me in on the decision process there?”

“No problem,” Bob said cheerfully. “We’re really hungry.”

“Huh. Well, I guess I can respect that, but that doesn’t get us past the hurdle that we don’t want to get eaten. You have any suggestions?”

“Sure, I can compromise a bit. I want to work this out with you, Tom. I’m not a monster.” He paused. “Wait. Technically, I guess I am. Huh. A horror movie monster.” On the monitor, he shrugged. “It doesn’t feel too different from normal!”

“I doubt most monsters think of themselves as monsters,” Tom pointed out.

“Hey, good point, good point.” Bob looked at his wrist, which did not have a watch on it. “Look, it seems like we’re at an impasse for the moment. I’ve got another meeting, so maybe we could wrap this up?”

“Well, we haven’t worked out a deal yet…”

Nishant came back. This time the 48 pt font on the paper he was holding up said “ROOF. JASON’S UP. REST OF US GOING.”

Tom nodded to acknowledge the message. He didn’t really want to know how his mostly nerdy and unathletic coworkers could have climbed to the roof in the first place, but it was only one story overhead, unlike the ground five stories below, so it was a good plan. He turned back to the door. “But if you have a meeting, I guess there’s no help for it.”

“Yeah, we’d better table this for now, sorry. We’ll come back to this. I know we can get to common ground, somehow. Just gotta work it out,” Bob said. “I need to report in to my colleagues who’re chewing on the doors. Real dedicated folks.”

“Sure, and I need to report to the engineers with the guns that that’s what they’re doing.”

“Hey, I appreciate you taking the time to hear me out! I know we’re all busy as hell, and time is the one thing we can’t get more of, right? Especially for you guys.”

“Not a problem, and I'm grateful for all the advice.”

“I’m glad you take constructive criticism well, “ Bob said, the genial condescension back. “Not everyone does. We’ll swing around to give another go at working things out later, and we’ll put this thing to bed when I bash your head open, all right?”

“Sure, if you don’t get a skull full of lead first.”

Bob laughed. “Man, Tom, you’re a funny guy! You should’ve done stand-up. See you later!”

As soon as he was gone, Tom ran for his office.

Bob seemed to have normal human intelligence despite being a zombie. As soon as Tom had realized that, he’d known he’d have to keep Bob distracted so the zombie couldn’t hear any of the sounds within, especially the sound of breaking glass. He was right that the windows weren’t designed to open… but that wasn’t much of a barrier for a dozen desperate engineers.(Well. Technically nine desperate engineers and IT personnel, and three desperate people from HR.)

It was a good thing Bob himself wasn’t an engineer, or he might have figured out what Tom had known, in a cold pit in his stomach, the whole time.

The security doors were nearly impenetrable. But the walls they were attached to were just standard drywall. And they didn’t even go all the way to the real ceiling – just to the drop ceiling where the wires were. So any zombie who knew that could climb up into the ceiling and then jump down. If zombies could keep their human intelligence, then it was just luck that only one of the engineers had been down at the food court earlier today when the zombies attacked, and he’d moved fast enough to escape.

The window in his office was shattered. There had been a heavy hammer in the facilities closet, and Alexey had managed to grab two guns and ammo from the Bass Pro store in the mall before coming up the freight elevator and getting in through the delivery door – which was, thankfully, on the east side. The glass on the fifth floor was thick, but between the hammer and a well-placed bullet, it had broken enough that they’d been able to smash the rest of it out.

Dangling just outside the window, where he could easily grab it and pull it inside, there was a cradle made of four ropes, where the ropes had been made by tying together scissored strips of everyone’s clothes. Tom stepped into the cradle, using the loops that had been tied onto the ropes to secure his wrists, and the straps on the bottom of the cradle to secure his legs. “Okay! I’m ready!” he yelled upward, and tugged on the cords.

His team pulled him up to the roof, with Nishant, Alexey, Xi and Timothy pulling on the ropes, and Jason sitting on the roof with the ends of the ropes tied behind him. Jason’s heart condition wouldn’t allow him to pull the ropes, but he could use his body as ballast to make sure none of the team fell. His face was pasty white, like there was no blood in his body, and he was breathing hard and sweating, but since Jason usually looked like that after any kind of minor exertion -- his heart was barely managing to do its job -- Tom wasn’t afraid he had turned.

Pete was holding one of Alexey’s two rifles. Ekaterina was unraveling the fifth rope and tying pieces of it around people’s waists and women’s chests, so they could have a tiny bit of modesty back.

“How did you guys manage to get to the roof?” Tom asked as he untied his straps and stepped out of the rope cradle.

“It was Ashley, actually,” Nishant said.

Ashley from HR was a petite woman, but in nothing but her bra and underpants, she was more muscular than Tom would have guessed. “ I do parkour and mountain climbing,” she said. “I’m not saying getting up here was fun, but you know, when the alternative is getting your brains eaten…”

In the distance he could see helicopters. “I know we contacted them already,” he said, “but let’s wave them down. Just to make sure.”

“We’ve got plenty of cloth to make flags,” Ekaterina said.

Tom wondered what Bob would think, when he and his zombies got the door open and found that they’d all gone through the window. The ropes had been pulled up, so he doubted that Bob’s first guess would be the roof… but Pete and Alexey were on guard with the guns, just in case.

Indrani, one of the programmers, leaned over the edge to see where they had come from. “Uh-oh,” she said. “They’ve found the window… looks like one of them is climbing out on the ledge.”

Alexey walked to the edge, cocked the rifle, and pointed downward. He fired. “Not anymore.”

They could all see the zombie fall. The shot hadn’t killed it – it was a chest shot, and they could see it flailing – but when it landed, a puddle of red appeared beneath it, including under its head, and it no longer moved.

“How much ammo have we got?” Tom asked.

“Enough to kill about 300 zombies, if every shot is perfect,” Alexey said.

“Which it’s not gonna be,” Pete added, somewhat unnecessarily. His brown hands were clenched so tightly on his rifle, the knuckles had turned white. “I’m… not the world’s best shot. I go to the range sometimes, get in a little bit of practice, but mostly I suck.”

“You’re probably better than most of us, though,” Tom said.

“I knew I should have gotten a shotgun,” Alexey complained. “At close range the rifle is almost useless.”

“You were under time pressure,” Ekaterina said. “If I’d been in the food court when a zombie turned and started biting people, I don’t think I would have been able to think clearly enough to go to the end of the mall and get a gun from the Bass Pro. Let alone two, and ammunition.”

“I think I see Bob down there,” Indrani said. “He’s… what is he doing?”

“Don’t fall off the side!” Timothy went to his knees rapidly, ready to grab Indrani’s ankles.

“I won’t. What are they doing?”

Rachel from HR peered off the side from a different vantage point on the left of the broken window. “They’re forming a human chain. Well, a zombie chain. One’s climbing on top of another and they’re holding onto each other.”

“That’s not good,” Pete said. “Alexey, you need help there?”

“No, stay covering the door to the roof.” It was chained and padlocked shut and the door was a metal security door, but who knew what would happen if enough zombies banged into it. Alexey took aim, and shot the bottom zombie of what was now a three-zombie human ladder, and all three fell. One managed to grab a ledge; the other two fell to the ground. One stopped moving; the other crawled feebly, her arms and legs obviously broken.

Tom looked up at the helicopter coming toward them. It had a rescue basket, large enough to fit all twelve of them. Twelve. The company had been thirty-three people this morning. He thought maybe one of the sales guys had been out in the field on a call, and the regular receptionist had been out sick, so… thirty-one people in the office had turned into twelve survivors. Plus some that had become zombies, like Bob.

A phone rang. Everyone looked at Donatella, the third of the refugees from HR. She was as underdressed as the rest of them, but she had a purse on her, made of a crunchy plasticky recycled material that no one had thought would hold up to the stress of being part of their escape ropes. The phone was ringing from inside it.

Donatella withdrew the phone, her hand shaking, and answered it. “Rose and Weldon Company, this is Donatella Antonucci, can I help you?” She listened for a moment. “Why don’t I put you on speaker?” And looked up at Tom. “It’s for you, do you want it on speaker?”

“Is it Bob?”

Donatella nodded. Tom rolled his eyes. “Fine. Put him on.”

“Hey there, Tommy boy! You there? It’s me, Bob, again.”

“Yes, Bob, I’m here,” Tom sighed. “No, we’re not going to let you in to eat our brains.”

“Yeah, I can see that you’re on the roof,” Bob said. “Who’s that with the gun? That Russian dude? Ilya or something?”

“His name’s Alexey, and yes.”

“He’s good,” Bob said approvingly. “But listen, Tom, it’s not too late to open up the door on the roof and let us in. We’re in the stairwell.”

“Then who’s trying to form human chains down there?”

“The correct word is ‘zombie,’ Tom, not ‘human’. Please don’t misattribute our species.”

“Okay, fine, who—”

“That’s Barry from Sales. You remember Barry, right? Always bragging about his workouts and his gym routines and the times on his runs? Well, turns out he wasn’t all hot air. I thought he got away from us – he sprinted off when we almost had him, and he was too fast for any of us to follow. But then an hour later he came back and joined us, because one of us had landed a bite and turned him. Isn’t that cool?”

“It’s really not as cool as—”

“I sure think it’s cool.”

“Bob, I’m a busy man, please get to the point.”

“Sure, Tom. I know your time is valuable, I don’t want to waste it. It’s just that you should know, Barry’s a talker, like me, so he has our colleagues doing the zombie ladder thing there, and I’ve taken us up to the roof, and I’m pretty sure we’re gonna manage to knock this door down sooner or later.” There was a “thump” from the chained, padlocked roof door. “So I’m just offering it up as an option here, you might want to consider just letting us come outside and eat your brains.”

The helicopter was getting larger, but the closer it got, it seemed the slower it was coming. “I imagine you could do that,” Tom said. “How many zombies you got in there?”

“Why do you wanna know?”

“No real reason,” Tom said. “Just, we’ve got a pretty defensible position here and a lot of ammo.”

“That’s good to hear. Makes it challenging. A good workout before dinner always makes the meal tastier, isn’t that what they say?”

“Actually they say you shouldn’t eat until half an hour after working out…”

“Pretty sure that’s a myth, Tom. But you could Google it on Donnie’s phone. I know you don’t have one of your own, I found it ringing in your office when I tried to call you.”

“So what’d you do, wardial numbers until you hit one that rang?”

“Pretty much, yeah. I probably should have thought of one of the HR ladies first, since I know they got over to your side before you closed the doors. By the way, Bart? In sales? You know, the guy who didn’t make it to the door before you shut and locked it? Dee-lish. Appreciate you leaving him for us.”

“Bob, have I ever told you what an asshole you are?”

“That’s really not professional language, Tom.”

“I know, but I’m standing here in my underpants and you want to eat my brains, so I’m not feeling very professional. I have a counter-proposal for you, though.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah, I think you guys should strongly consider the merits of eating shit and then dying. Especially you. After fucking off so long and so far there’s no longer any off to fuck. And also going to hell, straight to hell, without passing Go or collecting 200 dollars.”

Bob laughed. “Man, you’re funny, Tom! I’m gonna miss these little chats after I crack that skull of yours like a steamed mussel shell and scoop out the brainy goodness inside.”

Another “thump” from the stairwell. Alexey shot another zombie chain, sending three more of them falling. “This is fun,” Alexey said. “Tell Bob I’m looking forward to blowing his head off. I want to see if he still has red blood or if it’s turned green like some of these guys.”

“I heard that fine,” Bob said. “Is that Alexey? I’ve always liked Russian food.”

“Were you this big of a clueless narcissist when you were alive, or is this just a zombie thing?” Tom asked.

“Oh, come on, Tom, I thought we had a rapport. I thought we were making some progress, working on this thing together.”

“Bob, when you and I worked together on identifying cities whose legislature might be open to letting us build a new Towne Centre shopping mall in their town, we had a rapport and we made progress. You really wanting to eat our brains is just not our problem and I don’t feel obligated to help you with that.”

“Yeah, what do you guys even do for the company?” Bob snarked. “We’re not an IT company, we don’t write programs. We develop and sell commercial real estate. All we ever needed was one dude to hook up our PCs to the Internet. We didn’t even need servers, we could have kept it all in the cloud.”

“We did keep it all in the cloud, Bob. We haven’t had servers in about five years.”

“So what did your department even do? How did you justify your salaries?”

“Among other things, your database marketing plans wouldn’t have gone very far if we hadn’t been maintaining the database… but that isn’t even the point.” The thumps and the sounds of the shots had grown more frequent, and the chain, somewhat rusty, was actually rattling hard. It was entirely possible that if Bob and his zombies just kept throwing themselves at the door, it would break open.

Again, not the engineers’ solution. But Bob, and Barry for that matter, seemed to have retained their normal human intelligence… not gained any intelligence. Bob hadn’t thought of makeshift explosives yet. Or shoving a long heavy-duty file into the crack and filing away at the chain. Or anything else that might work.

“I can’t hear you very well, Tom, what’s going on out there? Sounds like you’re standing right next to the air conditioner, or a generator?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Bob, maybe it’s the line on your end,” Tom lied as the helicopter, finally above them, lowered its rescue basket. It was hard to hear Bob through the “whup-whup-whup” of the helicopter blades, but Tom made the effort to talk normally, rather than shout into the phone as instinct told him to do.

“What?”

“I said maybe it’s the line on your end,” Tom said, as rescuers directed Jason to sit in the exact center of the basket, and then had the rest of them spread out by estimated weight, to balance the load.

“What? I can’t hear you at all, Tom, what’s going on?”

Very loudly, because now he was in the basket and standing right under the helicopter and its whups, Tom yelled, “What’s going on, Bob, is fuck you!”

He hung up on the zombie and handed Donatella back her phone as the helicopter climbed, pulling the rescue basket into the air. “Block him.”

There was another human chain of zombies forming, now that Alexey was no longer in a good position to shoot them down. Tom, on the edge of the basket facing the building, stuck his middle finger up and leaned out as far over the edge of the basket as he dared, making the gesture at Barry and his zombie ladder as broadly and visibly as he could.

#52 Project #zombies #songfic #comedy

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fatesdeepdive · 3 years

Text

Entry 54: Demigod Shit Magnet

Got a lot of stuff to talk about, no time for intro.

Class Profile - Ninja

The Nohrian thief class and base class of Saizo, Kaze, Kagero, and Asugi. Has good speed and skill and that's about it. Wields shurikens, which make them work best for inflicting debuffs. Also oddly good at mage killing. Oddly enough, the game considers them to be the Hoshido version of a Cavalier. Their first skill, Locktouch, is a utility skill that allows them to open chests and doors without a key. Their second skill, Poison Strike, deals 20% damage to enemies after battle but cannot kill, helping establish their niche of injuring enemies from a distance so stronger units can come in and finish them off. Ninjas can promote to Master Ninjas or Mechanists. I like the Ninja design a lot; the light armor fits well and the scarves, headbands, and arm knife thingies look cool.

Class Profile - Oni Savage

This game’s version of the Barbarian class and Hoshidan rival to the Fighter class. Wields axes, can promote into Oni Chieftain or Blacksmith. Weirdly, Rinkah is the only Oni Savage in the game, making the fact that it has two exclusive promotion classes weird. Oni Savages have great strength, hp, and defense, countered by atrocious luck, skill, and resistance. They can do good damage, assuming they can hit anything, or act as a wall, assuming they don’t die instantly to magic or a crit. Their first skill, Seal Resistance, lowers an enemy’s resistance after combat. I do not know why this was given to this class. Their other skill, Shove, is a utility skill that can be used to move a neighboring unit one space away. I actually like the Oni Savage design, despite it being ripe for fanservice, because the male and female designs are similar. My problem isn’t barbarians being shirtless, it’s when the game does stupid shit like have the female version of a class wear a thong while the male wears pants. The mask and beads worn by generic Oni Savages are also a nice touch.

Class Profile - Monk/Shrine Maiden

This game’s version of the Priest and Cleric classes, Hoshidan versions of the Troubadour class. Sakura and Mitama are Shine Maidens, while Azama is a Monk. Oddly enough, despite this game mostly getting rid of gender-locked classes, these two remain separate. They’re basically the same class, though. Both wield staves, have the same skills, and have good speed, luck and resistance, hampered by awful defense and HP. Oddly, Shrine Maiden has 5% better magic, while Monk instead has 10% better skill. Regardless, the job of these classes is to avoid combat and heal allies using staves. These classes can promote into Onmyojis and either Great Masters or Priestesses. Their first skill, Miracle, gives them a luck-based chance to survive a fatal blow with 1 HP. Their second skill, Rally Luck, boosts the Luck of nearby allies for a few turns. They also secretly have a 10% extra crit evade. I enjoy the simple, modest designs, which fit with the class’s aesthetic.

Conquest Chapter 8: Cold Reception

As Felicia leads the group to her village, Moron and Silas are separated by a blizzard. Moron faints from the cold and is rescued by Kilma, the Ice Tribe’s leader. Moron begins to introduce himself, but Silas reminds him that they’re here to crush a rebellion. Corrin bemoans the fact that everything is so morally grey. Honestly, I wouldn’t call this route morally grey, so much as it’s the same black and white shit as Birthright with Moron being to stupid to understand he’s on the evil side.

Kilma says he only let Moron into the village because he carries Yato, the sword prophecized to save the world. Kilma introduces Moron to his daughter, Flora. The fact that Flora and Felicia are the daughters of the head of a small country colonized by Nohr is kinda weird. Garon conquered the Ice Tribe, took the daughters captive, and forced them to work as servants for his other kidnapped prince.

Felicia and Elise show up and Elise blurts out that they’re there to suppress Kilma’s rebellion. Elis is an idiot. Flora sounds the alarm and the Ice Tribe rushes in to fight the Nohrians. Flora calls Felicia ignorant and says war is the only language Nohr understands.

This chapter uses the same map as Chapter 17 of Birthright. The gimmick of this chapter is centered on five villages spread around the map. A pair of enemy soldiers will try to go to the villages to summon reinforcements, while the player can visit them to get gold. At the start of turn two, Odin and Niles show up to save us, acting on orders from Leo. Moron has to convince them to not kill everyone brutally, because Odin’s a chunibiyo and Niles is genuinely morally grey.

Odin

Owain from Awakening, now a Dark Mage instead of Myrmidon and pretending to be an evil wizard instead of a legendary hero. He also switches his costume to this tight, garish yellow outfit with a v-neck that stretches to his crotch. I’d complain if it was any character other than Odin; for Odin, it fits. I did like Owain in Awakening, but I will admit his schtick can get old. His personal skill gives him a boosted crit rate when using a named weapon with a name more than 12 letters long, something ridiculous that fits perfectly for a guy obsessed with legendary weapons and powerful spells. Also, he can reclass into a Samurai, a Hoshidan class, which makes sense given his class in Awakening.

Niles

Leo’s other retainer, a sadistic Outlaw. His personal skill, Kidnap, works the same as Orochi’s capture. Conquest is a bit harder than Birthright, though, so I’m afraid I won’t be grabbing another Kenshi. Fun fact, Niles is the only non-promoted bow user in all of Nohr. Niles’s design isn’t half bad; I like the eyepatch, white hair, and hood, although I’d like to note that it’s a bit odd that the sadistic criminal has a noticeably darker skin tone.

Flora apologizes to Moron for standing by her actions, calls Felicia a moron, and tells Jakob she wishes she was meeting him under better circumstances. Felicia’s battle quote with Jakob is especially interesting, confirming she was a hostage and hinting that she has feelings for him. Kilma prays for forgiveness for fighting Felicia and says Moron deceived him.

Moron spares Kilma. In fact, he wins the battle without killing anyone. Somehow. Moron has Elise treat the enemy wounded. Kilma is shocked by Moron’s kindness. Moron negotiates a deal where the Ice Tribe stops rebelling in return for more autonomy, something he has the authority to do that totally won’t be ignored by the child kidnapping mass murderer Garon. Kilma says that Moron might be the legendary hero after all. Flora apologizes for defending her people from an invading army who kidnapped her and her sister as a child and swears fealty to Moron.

So, here’s my problem with Conquest. Nohr is evil. Garon is evil. But Moron is good. So every chapter has him win battles without violence or negotiate people into working with him. Rather than having Moron struggle with his morality, it has him keep his hands clean, even as he conquers neighboring nations for the glory of a brutal dictatorship. It’s idiotic. And it will only get more idiotic as this game goes on. But first, we have some Supports to read.

Support: Corrin/Odin

C: Corrin finds Odin posing. Odin says his stance needs a unique name. Corrin gets annoyed by Odin and walks away.

B: Odin asks Corrin to name his pose. Corrin says they need tome to think of a name.

A: Corrin tries to hide from Odin. Odin tracks them down and annoys Corrin for a while. Eventually, Odin comes up with a dumb name for his pose: Shadow Glitter. Corrin is relieved that they don't have to talk to Odin anymore.

S: Odin asks Corrin to marry him. Corrin gets tired of his long-winded proposal and demands he get to the point. Odin gives a heartfelt proposal and immediately gets back on his bullshit.

Review: Not bad. Odin toes the line between funny and annoying and seeing Corrin get sick of his bullshit is a good dose of realism. This is also one of the only times Corrin isn’t ridiculously friendly. Also, by marrying Odin, Corrin joins yet another royal family.

Support: Elise/Effie

C: Elise asks Effie to go on a walk with her, but Effie is full from eating and asks Elise to roll her like a barrel.

B: Effie uses Elise as a dumbell. The two of them reminisce about how they met: Elise snuck down to the underground and befriended Effie and, when the guards tried to take Elise back, Effie tried to fight em off.

A: Effie talks about how she trained for years to become a castle guard so she could protect Elise.

Review: This is what Corrin and Silas’s relationship should have been. That is, free from dumb bullshit about Corrin having the memory of a goldfish. Lore is always good in Supports and this does a great job establishing Elise and Effie’s friendship, while also having some great comedy bits.

Support: Felicia/Niles

C: Felicia spills some soup on Niles. Niles begins stripping seductively. Felicia offers to take his clothes to the laundry.

B: Felicia offers to give Felicia a special, heavenly dessert. Niles assumes she's coming on to him. Felicia gives Niles a cookie.

A: Niles mocks Felicia for not understanding his double entendres. After finding out about Felicia's childhood as a hostage, he apologizes.

S: Niles proposes.

Review: A fun, kinda dumb comedic Support.

Support: Arthur/Mozu

C: Arthur finds Mozu analyzing the soil around camp. Mozu rambles about how farming is awesome.

B: Arthur helps Mozu plow a field. Mozu corrects his form. A: While Arthur is plowing, a heard of dragons fly over and shit all over him. Mozu is overjoyed because dragon droppings are great fertilizer. Also, I'd like to note a script error in this Support: dragons and wyverns are not the same thing. Wyverns are the mounts with animal-level intelligence, dragons are ancient magic beings that can transform into humans. Unless a flock of demigods flew by to shit on Arthur, the game means wyverns.

S: Arthur proposes by giving Mozu a special flower that is supposed to be planted by a husband and wife. Mozu accepts because Arthur's bad luck is a good source of fertilizer.

Review: The start of this Support is a bit bland, but Arthur getting covered in shit is great.

#fire emblem fates #flora fire emblem #owain fire emblem #odin fire emblem #niles fire emblem #corrin fire emblem #fire emblem conquest #nohr

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peepingtoad · 4 years

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OKAY SO.

It’s not that often that I talk about what I really think about Jiraiya, and I guess I mean more how I feel about him, since I always try to write my ‘deeper’ headcanons/metas from a more... idk, trying not to get too emotional about it point of view. Basically it’s because I know how controversial he is, and I pretty much ritually avoid a lot of takes because I don’t want to get irritated about something that really doesn’t matter much in the grand scheme, because we’re all entitled to our opinions and I largely get my say through the act of writing and developing him how I see fit.

Which is enough for me, mostly, but for the purpose of reinforcing/building upon how I see my muse’s plight, working through some of my Sannin-feels and also to dip my toes into why I find blindly judgemental/single-faceted takes of him, his priorities and the Sannin’s bond so exasperating, I kinda feel like rambling my thoughts (feelings) anyway!

Politely sticks this stream-of-consciousness mess under a cut.

So sometimes I do think about the fact that Jiraiya kinda, lmao, forgot about Everything Else in the world because of Orochimaru and his (frankly) obsession with him/them. And the fact that a ridiculously significant portion of bad shit that happened is down to his actions/inaction. And the fact that he really did go and leave the likes of Naruto (and maybe to a degree Kakashi, although there’s zero actual evidence he didn’t get involved given the strong indications of a great rapport in the canon), just because he was so hellbent on pursuing Orochimaru, who was not even shown to be affectionate towards him at the best of times. When I think about it in terms of Jiraiya being gone and the main reason we’re given for it, things suck for a number of people, and quite largely because of potentially unrequited/horribly communicated/obsessive JiraOro pursuits, in essence :’)

(And for all it’s still quite the rarepair, Jiraiya does express on accounts that he was destroyed when Oro left. I mean... this is the guy who rarely acknowledges his sadness so... It’s not my bias at all I sware)

Of course JiraTsu is very real in my eyes too, albeit a very different kinda tragic, as is OroTsu. And the messy poly ship? Ohohoho, even better, but... yeah. Tsunade does at least go her own way for a long time, as messed up as that is in itself, for reasons including the fact she seems to pointedly not heal or move on from her grief. And given the absolute debacle that was her and Jiraiya reuniting... and both her and Oro even discussing a possibility of sacrificing him... and just, them in general for that whole arc :’))) yeah. They are without a doubt messy and troubled, but even despite how fraught things become I genuinely think all the furtive expressions and the undercurrents of longing and the evasion of their past exhibits a history much deeper and full of lost love compared to many other team dynamics we get (otherwise the Three Way Divorce wouldn’t have been quite so horrible on them, would it? That and they’d probably have split up after Team Hiruzen was no more, if they really hated each other/just tolerated each other out of familiarity like I sometimes see speculated).

But yeah, back to our main man. Jiraiya’s intense (and frankly very Scorpio of him) love for our first series Big Bad kinda did ruin him and what he was setting out to do in some ways, to the degree that the actual story of Naruto wouldn’t be very much without him in terms of drama. I mean, he always loved a good story, right? So art imitates life, and innit just pathetic poetic.

And in so many ways it is incredibly tragic and pitiable that he’s Just Like That. Idealistic and warping everything terrible, no matter how bad, into adventure in his mind! As growth! As pain that makes you TOUGH and makes you a stronger man! As something to be pushed aside while you just keep on truckin’! Whatever anyone you love throws at you, it’s Totally Fine!

After so long narrating through his personal lens, I’ve come to realise he truly is so convinced that everything bad that happens, is sort of just... something he has to deal with and feel big and guilty and feelsy for while spinning it in ways that enable him to keep going. He just loads it on himself and sorta holds it. The fact he’s so sad and filled with sickly pining grief that he has to try and exorcise it with impulsive bouts of decadence? Fine. And it’s not abnormal at all, how he approaches things with such broad scope and just kinda... thoughtlessly wrecking-balls his way through everything he thinks is a great idea at the time. He experiences the fallout of these things and simultaneously feels the entire ravages of it acutely while compartmentalising it ever so neatly away. The crazy thing, too, is that he’s exceptionally convincing at making everything he does and how he handles things seem so grand and noble and romantic and tragic... but in a humorously self-deprecating and still ultimately very hopeful way, to the degree that I as a mun get caught up in his relentless optimism and forget he actually is a sad and heartbroken guy wrapped up in all this grandiosity.

Sometimes I do step back and look and I just think yeah, fuck, he really is a total disaster! He’s a walking disaster and he’s been so damaging to himself and others in so many ways, all because of acting on emotions and impulses without really thinking about the impact! He really did kinda give up on those who needed him and for what? A love that will never love him or prioritise him back?

A wonderfully tragic theme that I do love with him, don’t get me wrong.

But then at the same time, there’s always more nuance to be had than just ‘he is a disaster and made bad choices, as tragic and romantic as it is, he was actually just selfish and kinda sucked in the end, pathetically whipped by his friends and unable to let go of what they had’. There’s more nuance to be had than reducing him to a purely romantically-inclined character, who just snubs everyone else for a doomed love... because in the end, I think a huge part of JiraOro’s demise in particular was that Oro felt immensely snubbed by Jiraiya when he stayed in Ame, when his loyalty to Konoha (as a place and people, not necessarily a system) and of course loyalty to his own ideals was prioritised over Oro.

To an extent, I feel like Tsunade could have been a similar case, were she not preoccupied with already having lost so much, and besides I really do think she and Jiraiya were quite firmly in best friend zone at that point. With Tsunade not being able to get comfortable around Jiraiya or to pursue any underlying affection for him because of the dumbass way he always behaved (understandably of her tbh), probably until she got with Dan, by which point I reckon Jiraiya started to really come through by showing how he valued her for her, where we see by them having each other’s backs so closely in the second war. Not to mention him generally respecting that his feelings for her have no place by the time he gets her back to Konoha.

In terms of that first split in Ame, Jiraiya, I feel, simply didn’t think him leaving was going to be a big deal, because the three were always fiercely headstrong people who had their own shit going on (simultaneously independent while also being, perhaps not to their knowledge, So Very Codependent). Not only that, but his overly affectionate ways and incessant jolliness were probably considered such a joke that he was basically like ‘they’ll be fine without me’. I certainly don’t think he felt needed by them, which I don’t think is their fault or a point of angst and ‘waaah poor blameless Jiraiya’, because quite honestly, the strain on their relationship was something I fully believe even he didn’t realise he needed out of at the time. His one-track mind was just on ‘save kids, teach kids, this is right, must seize opportunity to be the change I was told I’d be, not continue with this godforsaken war’

Selfish? Maybe. Well-intentioned? Certainly. Intended to hurt anyone or imply he stopped caring? No.

In essence, when it comes to why in the end Jiraiya seemed to be so horrendously bad at being around at the worst of times, at being responsible, whatever else (and I’m not even going to go into scenes intended to be comedic because, they are comedic)... I’ve got to look at it from more than just one view. It’s easy to say ‘he’s ridiculous and terrible because he pretty much flaked on what was important based on his whims/a doomed love/his dick’ (which I have seen said lmao) but there are so many other things at play here.

So I’m thinking, while he was shirking duties (godfatherly mainly)... did he actually consider that his most important duty? Was it anyone’s place to tell him it was? Minato didn’t, as I recall, and when he sacrificed himself he specifically left it to the Third because he (presumably) respected what his teacher was about and knew he wasn’t for staying put. Did Jiraiya not consider his primary duty to be to the prophecy, and in a more general sense fixing the big wrongs and trying to foil big dangers to his home? Were these things not pretty much what he existed for (as much as his faith wavered and went off the rails at times)? Was that not the main source of any real purpose he ever had, being a kid who showed practically no ambition before? Did he not pretty much redesign himself as being ‘from Mt. Myōboku’ rather than Konoha after two devastating wars, and thus is it not understandable for him not to focus solely on Konoha—not outright destroying it, still ultimately loyal to his home and not about to let anyone destroy it, but seeing that the world is in fact so much bigger than just his little town? Is that really something that’s so bad and wrong of him, in a story where the main cast’s country has a pretty fucking nasty system and is established to do so very early on? Is he not pretty revolutionary in his own brand of not blindly serving, but not going on a destroy-it-all frenzy either?

Also, was he not the only one who actually bothered to investigate Akatsuki and the forces that would see Naruto dead, in time? For all he did help bring Akatsuki into existence in ways, it was inevitable from before he even met the orphans that they were going to be groomed/moulded into what they became, regardless of whether Jiraiya came onto the scene. Jiraiya leaving them was just a different kind of suffering to what they were inevitably going to suffer anyway, and hell, with his influence at least there was a time where they might’ve stood a chance of going totally against Madara/Obito’s path, especially while Yahiko was still around. Jiraiya didn’t know that the whole thing with the Ame orphans was, by a design out of his control, doomed to end horribly. So while he felt personally responsible not knowing this, and it’s taken as a given that he was... actually, was he, when there was a master manipulator at play? Was it wrong to want to give some kids a chance?

With regards to all those things I see people say he should have stayed and fixed, that he should have been there, he should have done x y z... Is it not the responsibility of everyone not satisfied with their lot to step up to the plate and make where they live better? Jiraiya wasn’t the only adult. Tsunade, and I absolutely love her, does seem overwhelmingly to be absolved of leaving Konoha because... ??? Kicker is that she too is related to Naruto, of course.

So... was she not also needed for the very material ways she could’ve helped at numerous points? Was she not also placing her grief and lost love before everything else? Are some reasons inherently more ok than others to ditch? As Kakashi’s generation grew up, was it not also then up to them to decide whether they’d change the status quo? Were Minato’s own generation, presumably his own peer group, not complicit in Naruto’s ostracisation? We got a slight taste of rebellion with Asuma, Hiruzen’s own son, but the fact is many Konoha-nin were overwhelmingly complacent with how things were. And yet never get demonised at all for it. Because it’s Jiraiya’s fault for... not staying and giving it all up to be a guardian who could well be depressed and unfit to raise a child... or just being a flaky as hell one that’s never there anyway because he has shit to do? (and in doing the former would let too many things go unchecked by a completely tuned-out Hokage, not gathering all that spicy useful intel, y’know... essentially he wouldn’t have ended up largely doing his job along with the personal shit in between).

Basically when I see claims saying that Jiraiya as an individual should have done pretty much everything better, and somehow been there for everyone that needed him at any given time, and that (mostly Naruto’s) suffering was a failing on Just His part because of his selfish whims... I feel like the point of his tragedy is absolutely missed. That tragedy being that barrelling through things alone is definitely a failing and harmful in numerous ways, as we see with Itachi shouldering everything alone too, and we see them both miss out on Naruto and Sasuke as a result... but at the same time, is just settling down and leaving everything else to chance not also a huge failing, when there are so many other circumstances and enemies acting against you, when you do have the power to change tides, and when so many other people refuse to or can’t seize their own agency? Jiraiya does put his faith in a lot of people too, and a lot of people fail. Don’t fail him, but in a general sense many, like Minato, fail to make the change they wanted to. That’s life in this world, it’s tragic, and after losing a lot of loved ones yeah, he retreats and goes at it alone.

But how can he win? How does he do what’s right, other than by chasing what he thinks he can do to actually help the world, which happens to be bigger and not centred on individuals, even those he cares about?

(and remember, nobody knows Naruto is special-reincarnation-prophecy-boi, which is why I tend not to blame-game any characters for him being treated like so many orphans were because... while it’s not morally right or nice at all, it’s tone deaf to how the world is, to the fact all characters having different degrees of knowledge and priorities, and it’s insensitive of the fact most the characters had their own struggles and were just doing their best with a bad lot gdi).

Hell though, Jiraiya even does put Oro, his big obsessive wild goose chase that whisks him away into selfish pining hopelessly devoted land, on the back burner at points. Maybe not in a lasting way, particularly by the last databook where he’s inspired anew by Naruto, but he does prioritise other shit on numerous occasions. And there’s a lot of shit to try and prioritise.

What I’m trying to say is, Jiraiya can’t solely be held responsible for people. Sure, he’s a character whose decisions were pivotal to events, but what of every other character in the story? Why are they not held to the same crazy high standard of doing and protecting and preventing and somehow doing everything ‘right’ that would have also meant him fitting neatly into the Konoha mould? Would other characters really have been that much better in the position of The Big Guide/Martyr/Tragic Hero/Force For Change character? And also is having a tragic Chaotic Good bastard of a hero not a sign of a damn good and interesting character, that at the very least tried where so many others didn’t? Would Naruto not have been a boring as hell story, whose main protag didn’t really have much conflict to make him compelling, without Jiraiya (among others) being a mess with the best intentions? Without so many other characters having failed him, for him to overcome it and still be able to love and inspire change (albeit through sometimes-clumsy talk-no-jutsu)? Was I missing the point of the story?

............. Hmm!

No longer sure where else I’m going with this now, so.... here, I guess, ends my ode to why character hate (especially that reduces them to One Thing) is dumb, why demonising truly well-meaning characters doesn’t feel particularly woke to me in a cast full of flawed characters and horrible circumstance, and why I’ll defend this poor bastard with far too damn much hinging on him to the end I guess :’)

TL;DR HE’S A DUMBASS AND HE TRIED, OKAY?!

#i feel like this is like... about as bold as i'll get with this subject #{ooc}#{memoirs(headcanons)}#not sure about it being a headcanon as such but it does include some of mine so.... for now it can be #{long post}#{meta&analysis}

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takerfoxx · 4 years

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She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, Season 5, Episode 13, “The Heart, Part 2,” First Impressions!

I am going to miss this show, I really am.

Well. Here we are. The final episode of She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, an almost three decade later reboot of a show I’ve never seen, which in turn was a spin-off of a show I’ve never seen, and yet somehow became one of my favorite shows of all time.

Now, when this show was first announced, there was a lot of pushback. You had the usual murder’s row of so-called anti-SJW troglodytes who like to swoop in on anything that looks like it wasn’t designed with straight white guys in mind (and speaking as a straight white guy, these guys are just. So. Tiresome!), as well as fans of the original who didn’t care for the new character designs, direction, or lack of connection to Masters of the Universe. Which, okay, I get it, and to be honest the little to no He-Man business still strikes me as weird, but come on guys. It’s been almost thirty years! Times have changed, audiences have changed, and the targeted audience of kids’ shows today are very different from what they were in the eighties.

But despite all that nontroversy, She-Ra rose above and established itself as a genuinely great show in it’s own right, becoming both a critical and commercial success. Like, okay, it wasn’t Avatar the Last Airbender or Steven Universe-level big, but it definitely established a real niche for itself and gathered a sizeable fanbase. The excellent writing, incredibly on-point comedic timing, superb voice acting, casual diversity, oodles of complex and likeable characters, tight-plotting, mature handling of difficult topics, and immaculate direction made it out to be an amazing children’s show from a decade that has had no shortage of amazing children’s shows, and expectations were insane for the final season, with the climatic final episode being under incredible scrutiny.

I mean, it makes sense, right? For once, given the huge LGBTQ fanbase the show has, and given how many times the LGBTQ community have been burned at the last second, there is little wonder that they would be wary. And while some shows like the aforementioned Avatar the Last Airbender and Breaking Bad have remained of high quality throughout its run and delivered with an excellent finale (or so I’m told, still working my way through), others like Voltron Legendary Defender and Game of Thrones have become notorious for shitting the bed in their latter halves, and other shows like Steven Universe have had more mixed receptions. So how would She-Ra turn out? Would it end up flopping at the end, or would it stick the landing and enter the pantheon of shows that actually completed their entire story arcs and are fondly remembered?

Yes. Yes, it did.

The final season was spectacular. It started off all right, but from the third episode on immediately turned into pure brilliance, one that seemed to constantly top itself with wonderful character development, emotional payoffs, scenes of gripping tension, ballsy writing, and fantastic action. And any finale that makes me cry gets a thumb’s up from me.

Now, obviously I have a lot of gushing to do, but before it do, I should point out that I don’t think the finale is 100% perfect. There are things that kind of bugged me, and a few others that I felt really could have done better. Of course none of them were deal breakers, only little flaws that I feel could have stood to either have had more focus or different execution. And I might as well get the negative things out of the way.

And for me, the biggest problem is Shadow Weaver’s exit.

And to be clear, I don’t have a problem whatsoever with Shadow Weaver dying. I wanted her to die. I’m glad she died. Nor do I have a problem for her dying to save the two girls she’s spent two decades abusing. And nor do I have a problem with them mourning her death, given that they never actually forgave her, and it only made sense that they would have complicated feelings toward her. All of those are fine!

What I have a problem with is how that moment was framed and directed. It was framed like a heroic sacrifice, from the dramatic final stand moment to Shadow Weaver being suddenly acting selfless to her telling Catra how proud she was of her and finally showing her face.

Everything about that moment was exceptionally well done, yes, but the problem I have is that it doesn’t feel earned. That’s the sort of end you give a morally complex character that has been struggling with their negative qualities throughout a long character arc. And I’m sorry, but while Shadow Weaver is a pretty great and complicated character in her own right, she as never even tried to redeem herself until that moment. With Catra, we still saw how much her actions haunted and tormented her, even when she was at her worst. We saw her wrestling with her ingrained toxic behaviors and her conscience, so that when she finally makes the decision to do something right and, as far as she knew, sacrificed her life to rescue Glimmer and save Adora, it felt all kinds of earned!

But even after defecting to the Princess Rebellion, Shadow Weaver showed no signs of wanting to change. She showed no signs of regretting her mistreatment of Adora and Catra, and still continued to demean, undercut, and gaslight them whenever she was with them, and whenever she was called out on it, she would just brush it off and/or roll her eyes. Even when she was “helping” and “praising” her golden child Adora, she still continued to try to twist her head and mold her into what she wanted Adora would be. And her treatment of Catra didn’t change at all.

So I’m sorry, but that moment just didn’t work for me. Yes, I know Noelle has said that her sacrifice was still selfishly motivated, and I believe it, but it still felt off, especially with her finally telling Catra that she was proud of her, when she was AGAIN demeaning her earlier in that same episode! It carries the unintentional implication that Catra needed Shadow Weaver’s validation in order to move on. I honestly would have preferred that she never got it but realized that she didn’t need it to begin with. And that “You’re welcome,” which is incredibly condescending, was framed as a badass final line. There’s a disconnect between her character arc and its payoff that feels off. I wish something had been handled differently.

The second issue I had was just how rushed a lot of the character payoffs felt at the end. Yes, I know Noelle said that she doesn’t want to do an epilogue and would like us to decide for ourselves how things turned out, and that’s fine. But one day later wouldn’t hurt. Wrong Hordak was shown a couple times cowering next to Swift Wind in group shots and then straight up disappeared. And given their complicated history together, Scorpia and Catra deserved so much more than just a hi and a hug. Chipped Micah was given more time to harm and demean Glimmer than real Micah was given to love her. The Entrapdak thing got more focus and despite what I said about Hordak needing to either die or lose his memories, I’m not too upset that he didn’t do either, but instead simply broke free and got a happy ending, and Mermista’s line of, “So, are we like okay with this?” was great, but it feels like there should have been more. And I know they never had their own character arc and did all they needed to do last season, but if you’re going to bring Double Trouble back, then give us more than just one episode and a two-second cameo at the end.

Like, just give us some kind of montage of the rebuilding stage. Show us Wrong Hordak leading his scared and confused brothers in becoming individuals. Have him meet the real Hordak and show us how they would respond to one another! Give us a proper Catra/Scorpia reconciliation! Do more with Double Trouble or don’t bring them back at all. Hell, pair them up with Wrong Hordak partway through the season so they could bounce off each other, because that would be comedy GOLD! And while I’m glad that we at least got to see Lonnie, Kyle, and Rogelio (and they adopted Imp!), it sucks that that was their only scene this season, and it didn’t even have any lines. I’m not so upset about Huntara, because I know her voice actress is hard to get ahold of, so I’m okay with her just getting a wordless scene, but the others kind of bug.

I understand that time was a factor, but surely something could have been done.

All right, now I got all those out my system, let the gushing BEGIN!

Catra and Adora. Oh man. Oh man oh man oh man oh man. Now, I know I said that Catra needs to leave in order for her redemption to work, but even though she didn’t and got pretty much forgiven and accepted by everyone she hurt, I’m still very happy with how her redemption arc went down. Because she made the switch early in the season, showed genuine regret for what she did, made real attempts to apologize to those she hurt without expecting forgiveness, was shown wrestling with her bad traits, sometimes falling back into them, sometimes almost succumbing to bad habits, but was also shown finally making the right decisions and rising above them. She was the best-written character in the show with the most complex character arc, and they fucking NAILED the landing.

And that is because of her love of Adora.

Catra and Adora, two white-hot messes of weirdly compatible issues. Catra is so afraid of abandonment that she instinctively pushes those she loves away or runs away herself rather than let them leave her, and Adora only knows how to place others before herself, to be selfless to a fault, take all the blame for everything, and not let herself be the one who’s loved and protected. The two needed each other in order to overcome their issues, to put aside the damage Shadow Weaver instilled in them.

And they finally did.

Catra came back for Adora. She stayed by her side, refused to leave, and refused to let Adora give up. And Adora rose above her feelings of failure, allowed herself to be loved by another, and became whole.

And then we got it. We finally got the moment we’ve all been waiting for, all been praying for, all wanted so goddamned desperately.

We got the Big Goddamn Kiss.

The love each other. They’re lovers. They’re soulmates. After everything, how could they be anything else? It’s pure, 100% romantic love, a full, no ambiguity friends-to-rivals-to-enemies-to-allies-to-lovers storyline. Not subtext, no reading between the lines. It’s real, it’s canon, it’s between the two main leaders, and it happened right on the screen and saved the goddamned world.

Catra finally reached out to someone and showed love, and Adora finally allowed herself to be brought up and loved. And it’s that love that overcame Horde Prime’s virus and destroyed the Heart of Etheria. It’s that love that freed the magic, released She-Ra, and allowed her to vanquish Horde Prime once and for all.

And hey, two girls kissing, turning into a rainbow, and annihilating the influence of a controlling religious cult and the symbol of exploitative colonizers? Hmmm, subtle!

I love it.

Look, after everyone talking about how much the finale made them cry, and after already sobbing my eyes out when Angella sacrificed herself in season 3, I was worried that I wouldn’t feel the same, that everything had already been spoiled for me so it wouldn’t have the same emotional impact. Hell, the kiss itself had been spoiled for me! So if I knew it was coming, how could it affect me like it did others.

I was wrong. I was so wrong. When Catra screamed at Adora that she loved her and always had, the tears came gushing out. And when they finally did kiss, it made me happier than I had been for a long time. It was such a beautiful moment, and it was so wonderful to see all the magic unleashed, turning Etheria back into the paradise it was meant to be, and the Spire into a giant floating sprig of broccoli!

The Horde was finally defeat, and Horde Prime ripped out of his Wi-Fi network and destroyed once and for all. He will not rise again. His corrupted vision of purity is finally eradicated once and for all, and the galaxy is free again.

It was wonderful.

Other moments I want to highlight! Beginning with Bow!

Oh Bow. I haven’t talked as much about you as I did at the start of the show, but you really are wonderful. After similar unpowered male goofball sidekicks like Xander and Sokka being big balls of toxic masculinity and ingrained misogyny caused by insecurities that they had to overcome, we get an unpowered male goofball sidekick who is a shining example of positive masculinity, someone who knows who he is and is comfortable with it, someone who more than holds his own in battle, constantly makes himself useful, and stands proud with his superpowered friends. And even then, he still feels like real person, one that gets frustrated, feels down, and gets angry at both himself and his friends, but still continues on, because he’s a soldier and that’s what he does.

So it was wonderful that he got the Rise Up and Fight speech, because he deserved it, and oh it felt so good, seeing all those instances of people throwing off Horde Prime’s control while his words were playing. Bow really is wonderful.

And Hordak! Look, I know what I said about wanting more from his ending, but my God, that moment when he threw off Horde Prime’s control and shot Horde Prime in the back to save Entrapta and reclaim his identity was so! Fucking! Cool! I was cheering in my car when that happened! So good!

And hey, give it up for Glimmer for not listening to Chipped Micah and refusing to back down. She overcame a brilliant sorcerer wielding dark magic through the power of sheer stubbornness! Chef kiss, beautiful!

Though I really do think she got most of her stubbornness from her mom. Miss yah, Angie.

And Scorpia and Perfuma? Why, I think I like that quite a lot! Why yes, give Perfuma a big, strong girlfriend with a huge heart! Give Scorpia tiny, cute hippie girlfriend who will take no shit from anyone. Yes, I like this very much.

So...yeah. This really was wonderful. The world is saved, the Best Friend Squad is about to go on a space romp, and it feels good. And from there? Well, Noelle told us to come with that ourselves, so yeah, I’m sure Etheria was able to fully rebuild following the Horde’s destruction. I’m sure that Wrong Hordak became some kind of benevolent leader to his lost brothers and helped them come to grips with their individuality. I’m sure that Scorpia rebuilt the Scorpion Kingdom from the Fright Zone’s ruins and made it a haven to the lost Horde soldiers. I’m sure that Sea Hawk and Mermista burned down a boat together. I’m sure that Glimmer and Bow were married and became king and queen of Brightmoon and had a long and loving reign with lots of babies. I’m sure that Entrapta was given all the discarded Horde and First Ones tech to crack and find good uses for and remained as happy as a clam, especially considering the Hordak harem she’s built. I’m sure that Adora and Catra continued to build each other up, helped and supported one another to keep themselves from falling into bad habits, and Melog was always there as a faithful therapy magi-cat. I’m sure that Perfuma helped Catra along with meditative exercises and Catra never had the heart to tell her that she was just napping. I’m sure that Frosta grew up to be a strong and powerful queen who also founded her own iceball league. I’m sure that everyone started going to Netossa and Spinnerella’s game nights and just decided to put up with Netossa when she got like...that, because at that point she deserved to. I’m sure that Swift Wind finally did emancipate the horses and taught them to form their own weird society, but still made time to visit Madam Razz. I’m sure that Kyle and Rogelio became proud adopted fathers of little Imp, and one day while chilling at the local pub, Lonnie caught the eye of a big, strong purple woman.

I’m sure they were all very happy from there on.

I am going to miss this show. It was a wonderful experience, one that’s given me so much. It made me laugh,it made me cry, it made me cheer, it made me shiver, it made me bite my nails, but most of all, it made me happy.

So thank you Noelle and Molly. Thank you Chuck and Mary Elizabeth. Thank you Sunna and Aaliyah. Thank you Aimee, AJ, Karen, Marcus, Keston, Reshma, Lorraine, Christine, Adam, Genesis, Vella, Merit, Gina, and Jordan. Thank you to all the writers, animators, and directors. Thank you to everyone who worked on this show. Thank you all.

And a very special thank you to @smxmuffinpeddling for filling my dash with She-Ra content, which convinced me to check this show out in the first place!

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libermachinae · 4 years

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An Abundance of Prowls

I remembered the first time I read IDW, feeling like I couldn’t get a hold on Prowl’s character, like he existed as a general concept but I was never really sure what his goals were or why he did... anything he did. I mentioned it to my girlfriend, who was delighted to introduce me to the discourse of our local cop car/war criminal.

Months later, in anticipation of Prowl Week, I said to myself, “Well, I could read through all of Prowl’s appearances, in the order they were published in, and see how the writers developed him over time. That could help make sense of his character.”

Friends. It did not. Here’s a summary, plus my thoughts. [Spoilers ahead!]

Infiltration: Prowl’s first appearance in IDW is him yelling at Ratchet for exposing the Autobots to the humans. We’ll call this guy Rule-Abiding Prowl, and he’s very steady/boring throughout the rest of the -ation series. His main function is to try to stop kids from being involved in the plot. Thanks Furman.

Spotlight: Kup: Our first glance of Spec Ops Prowl. Though he’s not physically present for most of the issue, Nick Roche still delivers a Prowl who is behind the scenes, pulling the strings. I was honestly surprised by how early on this was set up, considering everything we’re about to trudge through.

Megatron Origin: More Rule-Abiding Prowl, this time by Eric Holmes. He has a job, he does as he’s told, he clings to the chain of command like a padlock.

All Hail Megatron: Seven instances in which we’re victorious! It’s number-cruncher Prowl time; also anxious, war-weary, slightly hopeless Prowl. Maybe Shane McCarthy was trying to do a combination Roche and Furman? It’s all for naught, in the end, because Roche got brought back in to follow up on Kup’s story and he dove all the way in with Prowl being a sneaky bastard.

Spotlight Prowl: Can’t get too far ahead of ourselves, though! Mike Costa wanted Prowl to be a hardboiled detective with a a spark of gold SO BAD. Also the point at which Prowl falls into his terrible cycle of learning a lesson only to learn the opposite thing in the next issue. In this case, it’s between doing what’s right regardless of the rules, and sticking to the rules because order is paramount. Is this unresolved internal conflict going to haunt our boy for the rest of the continuity? Mmmm. Transformers V1 is more of the same, except now Prowl has a little buddy. Can’t lie, Streetwise delights me and I wish he’d stuck around.

Death of Optimus Prime: Co-written by Barber and JRo, so it’s tricky to say who exactly was responsible for what, although I have a feeling JRo was all over that Peaceful Resolution backstory. This does provide a perfect bed in which to sew the seeds of who Prowl will be in the coming arc.

MTMTE: Okay, full disclosure? I jotted this guy down as Warm Prowl in my notes. Through flashback, JRo gives us a gentler version of the character whose blunt nature and vow to regulation are underscored by a hidden concern and appreciation for his partner, Tumbler. Don’t look at me, I think about the conversation about the coming war and them leaving together all the goddamn time. Also, JRo waves at his buddy Roche’s Spec Ops Prowl from afar.

RID: War’s over, everyone can (literally!) go home! Prowl? Hey, bud, did you hear the news? No, ofc not, because this is Endless War Prowl, the guy who is convinced the Neutrals are out to murder everyone and also that Bumblebee sucks at his job. This is also the arc where Bombshell happens :(

Dark Cybertron: Prowl Buries His Trauma

Spotlight Bumblebee: Rude boy. Doesn’t like Bumblebee? Doesn’t respect the chain of command?

Autocracy/Monstrosity/Primacy: Prowl wants to follow rules! He trusts Optimus’ judgement! Babey Prowl.

RID Pt 2: It’s hard to classify this Prowl because so much of what he does in this arc is in response to things that have been done to him. The Decepticons mind controlled him, so he has to keep them from getting the Engima. He’s been saddled with gestalt coding, so now he needs to have the Constructicons along wherever he goes. Spike Witwicky betrayed him years ago, so dammit, now he’s gotta spend a Saturday trying and failing to squish one tiny human. He’s Renegade Prowl in my notes, because this is definitely the point where he stops giving a shit about rules. (Get a teeny bit of Warm Prowl, tho, when he calls Bumblebee his best friend. Kinda comes out of nowhere, the guy could have used your support like, any time over the last few years, but it’s a nice moment.)

Combiner Wars: Absolutely loses his goddamn shit. It’s like Spec Ops Prowl, going behind everybody’s backs, making the “hard choices” (he’s literally deciding to kill off the Cybertronian species; please keep this detail in mind), but he does it all as a giant combiner who solves problems by smashing them, so we’re gonna stick with Renegade Prowl. Barber wants to blame this on gestalt coding. I shrug and say sure, though I do raise a hand to question it when Optimus proceeds to beat him up for it.

Sins of the Wreckers: NAUGHTY SPIDER TIME. Roche takes all of Barber’s Bitch Prowl energy and embellishes it with those sweet spec ops tactics we’ve been missing so dearly. Gone are giant combiners smashing shit: now it’s just Prowl having ideas, making deals, and twisting morality to suit his own needs while desperately trying to avoid the fact that he has a conscience. Roche also makes the fascinating move of highlighting Prowl’s shittiness while subjecting him to Tarantulas’ arguable shittierness. There’s a nice moment at the end when he decides he wants to do better going forward, though Roche leaves it open for other authors’ interpretations via violent interruption by Impactor. Nick Roche never writes Prowl again, and an infinitesimal part of the internet grieves.

MTMTE Pt 2: AKA the misadventures of Luna I, AKA the one scene where Prowl’s helping with the dishes and actually seems comfortable for the first time in centuries. JRo takes a comedic approach to the character which is evocative of his Warm Prowl invention. Just one thing. Remember that detail I told you to remember earlier? About how he was entirely ready to bring Cybertronians to extinction? Here to Sentinel, Prowl says, and I quote, “And unlike you, I don’t feel the urge to kill the rest of my species.” I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about this, so rather than risk turning this into an actual literary essay, I’m going to leave it at that.

Optimus Prime: Two versions of Prowl in here: one from the past, where he describes himself as “unpopular” and beats up Jetfire, and present-day, where he somehow ends up in a ship with Stardrive, Garnak, Wheelie, and a vamparc gun from Autocracy. No one bothers to explain how this came about, the same way no one explains how by the books, rule-driven Prowl started battering prisoners before the war ever started.

Unicron: The most bizarre. Prowl does his whole logic thing, gotta sacrifice Devisiun so we can save everyone else, y’know. But then, in the showdown with Shockwave, he gives a whole speech about how the real battle is within the self, to make sure goodness prevails or something like that. It comes out of nowhere and I guess is a follow up from the Wreckers, but honestly idk?

Lost Light epilogue: Rule-Abiding Prowl! Hey dude, how you been? Work for Windblade now? Have an official job reviewing Functionist Cybertron and establishing ties with the Galactic Council? Neat!

Optimus Prime epilogue: Giving this one its own thing because it’s one of Prowl’s most memorable moments for me, personally. He begins by acknowledging his own multifaceted nature through an argument with Shockwave, arguing that every one of an individual’s identities are “real” and rendering this entire exercise moot. After I dragged myself off the floor from that realization, I went straight into the line that has always stuck with me, “We are our actions... not our hopes.” Barber wraps up Prowl’s character by having him acquiesce to the criticism he’s been facing since the beginning of the continuity. It places a heavy emphasis on Spec Ops Prowl, the one who made “hard choices” in hope of possibilities that rarely came to pass, but is not entirely bound to that identity. Every aspect of Prowl I’ve described here performed actions that influenced the overall plot of the comic, though his motivations throughout are rarely transparent. What do we make of it, now that the character himself is now saying they didn’t matter? Is Prowl the sum total of the crimes he committed, friends he betrayed, and lives he sacrificed? In our calculations of Prowl, is there any variable that represents an unclaimed seat on the Peaceful Resolution?

Answering that question isn’t what I set out to do here, though, and I’ve already had to stop myself from writing an English essay once. I hope someone finds this useful, because putting it together was like building a puzzle of pieces that don’t quite fit together. You could even argue that not all of them are important, and that some bring down the integrity of the whole. They’re all in the box together, though, so we’ve gotta make something out of them.

#maccadam #idw tf #prowl #my writing

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