i was having a chuckle to myself last night about Gristol, and how his plans are basically:
Restore Ford Cruller's memory
Find Maligula
???
Profit
but then... of course they are, right? this is Gristol we're talking about. Fatherland Follies drives home again and again that he's still operating on a child's logic, a warped and reductive version of the world that he never bothered to grow out of. both of his memory vaults center on the images of his childhood, this idealized version of the past that he clings to no matter what. and that's still how he remembers Maligula, too - as this saviour figure, who rushes in to help him when he's in trouble.
[ID: Two slides from Gristol's memory vault, Glory to Grulovia! Left: Gristol clings to Maligula's back as she summons waves to sweep away his assailants. Right: Gristol and Maligula waving from a balcony as the people cheer. Gzar Theodore brandishes a dagger in the background.]
like so much else, Maligula represents a return to this idyllic childhood - to the peace and simplicity of his youth, when he was free from worries and responsibilities. in his mind, he doesn't need to make any further plans - once Maligula's back, everything will go back to normal. Maligula will make everything better.
...is what i thought, but then i remembered this line:
[Screenshot source. ID: Gristol, in Truman's body, bows on his hands and knees in front of the newly-awaked Maligula. The caption reads: "Yes, High Priestess! I am here to correct the mistakes made by my father!"]
and that's kind of interesting, right?
to be clear: this happens directly after Maligula sees Helmut-in-Gristol's-body, and recognises him. her line before this is:
"Little Gzesaravich! Have you come to pay for your father's sins?"
my first thought was that Gristol hadn't expected to still be in Truman's body by the time he managed to find Maligula, and this was him trying to placate her and buy some time until he could explain the situation. but watching the cutscene back, that's clearly not what's happening here. Gristol is answering as himself, and his response of throwing himself to his knees before her is, as far as i can tell, genuine.
so what is going on here?
in Fatherland Follies, there's this line in the ride narration that stuck out to me:
"Why didn't the Gzar help Maligula in her time of need? No one knows, but historians agree - it is Gzar Theodore's biggest failure."
other lines mention Gzar Theodore's "mistake", and it's wording Gristol himself echoes in the screencap above. evidently, he believes that his father abandoned Maligula, leaving her to her fate at the hands of the Psychonauts, and it was that mistake that lead to them being driven out of the country - that mistake which he seeks to correct. maybe he even feels like he has a debt to repay to her for his family turning their backs on her all those years ago.
the 'High Priestess' thing, though - that's kinda weird, and threw me for a loop the first time i played the game. it took me until my second playthrough to connect the dots, and remember how the room in the Lady Luctopus - Gristol's room - was full of Delugionist scribblings and symbols.
[Screenshot source. ID: left, the walls of the hidden backroom in Gristol's hotel suite, covered in scrawlings of eyeballs and Maligula's name. Right, the pinboard from the hidden backroom. On its surface are photographs and newspaper clippings connected by pieces of string.]
i mean, look at this stuff! he had a whole conspiracy board and everything!
we learn very little about the Delugionists and their beliefs as a whole during the game, but i think drawing the connection here suggests two important things. one: that Gristol was in deep with this stuff. i don't know how he linked up with them - maybe via old family connections, or just good old-fashioned digging (we know he's skilled at worming his way into peoples' good graces, after all) - but it seems likely that he's begun to internalise their ideas, maybe even warping his own memories of events. and two: the Delugionists themselves are, if you'll pardon the pun, pretty far off the deep end.
like... i understand why PN2 didn't go heavy on the "mass-murderer cult worship" aspect of things, in the end, but man this is such a tantalising glimpse into the wider mythos around Maligula. Gristol is proud and haughty and thinks himself above everyone else; the fact that his first reaction seeing Maligula is to throw himself to the ground at her feet says so much about the way he's come to see her. he's not just trying to bring back Maligula, his childhood bodyguard. he's trying to bring back Maligula, the High Priestess of the deluge, the semi-mythical figure whose supporters believe even death couldn't stop. he doesn't even flinch at the way she confronts him, and maybe it's because he's bought in so completely to this deified figurehead, this idea of Maligula; more a living force of nature than a person. and it all comes back to the same place: an abdication of responsibility, not just to the person who protected him when he was little but to this avatar of floods and destruction. Maligula will make everything better.
i'd write more about my thoughts on the Delugionists but that'd be taking a hard turn into speculation, and this is already kind of long and rambling so i'd better end it here. but what an unexpected and evocative line, right? it's some of the only stuff we have to go off of regarding the Delugionists as a whole, but i think it does such a good job of hinting at the wider story - at teasing another layer to the mythos surrounding Maligula, one whose ripples we see throughout the game but which never quite breaches the surface.
218 notes
·
View notes
ok based on what im seeing from cohost it actually seems like the best alternative if you actually wanna be able to make whatever kinda posts you want. so like for my purposes it HYPOTHETICALLY works best. its also pretty similar to tumblr in terms of layout though im not a huge fan of the design of the site? hopefully i can customize it more though- theres a waiting period of about a day or two before i can really post or do anything so i really cant say 100% if im on board
but if tumblr went down i might try to use cohost for my oc stuff, and honestly i would like it if enough ppl used it so that i could just stay on there, but if i have to use twitter to keep in touch w ppl so be it. i really hate how public twitter feels though, i like it better on smaller sites like here and, well, hypothetically cohost, where it doesnt feel like i could be subject to the public eye at any point.
so yeah ill tell you all how good or bad it is once the waiting period is over and hopefully if its good enough for me and maybe some of you we can make accs to move to, if the time ever comes. but for now im happy with my stuff here and i hope i can keep it here. if you already have one my username there is the same, tho obvs its empty. anyway im going to watch k on
30 notes
·
View notes
just saw more so of a critique against andor is that it would’ve been better if the season was released all in a day but like...... why? we have 12 episodes. in these 12 episodes, nothing’s rushed because it’s supposed to make you see the tensions and conflict arise but also make you feel it. a good example is the aldhani heist. yes, it was 3 episodes but like being there and watching it realtime helped build that anxiety. in episode 5 when you’re wondering what’s to come and you’re nervous for the team and you have to wait *gasp* a whole week! if i were to watch andor in a day, i would be nervous but it wouldn’t have been as strong since i would know the outcome in one hour, not one week. and it probably would’ve been forgotten easily. it’s basic psychology we remember moments that we have more of an emotional connection with. i remember the nerves i felt after episode 5 and seeing episode 6 and not knowing what was to happen after that heist just made my viewing experience that much better. idk why people are so insistent on having it released all at once when i love waiting and i love the nervousness before an episode and the week waiting period combined with the writing makes for the perfect build up. (also it’s so clear this format of streaming television where all the episodes in a season get released in a day has rotted your brains lmao)
14 notes
·
View notes
What got you into Proseka? Was it any particular character? Or something else? For me, I was immediately drawn to Rui. I'd love to know how you joined the fandom!
Sorry for the long post ahead, I love talking about it 😅
I've always had a history with rhythm games. I played Love! Live on and off for about 3ish years which is what sparked my interest for them.
Honestly what got me into Project Sekai just has to be the crazy timing of events that came before it. November of 2020 I started playing rhythm games casually again (Persona dancing games which is embarassing to admit but it's my favorite game series, as well as Muse Dash and a couple of other PC games). Which led to my older sibling also having their interest in rhythm games sparked again. They always really loved vocaloid but at that point I still had no idea what it was and only really knew Hatsune Miku's name.
Feburary of 2021 they introduced me to vocaloid as they planned on finally getting Project Diva and thought I may enjoy it as well (and I did!) although I had my interest particularly sparked by 2 songs MioDioDavinci's Rotten Hersey and Chocolate cover with Kyo and Tora's cover of Patchwork Staccato with Kaito.
Then I started to play Project Diva and I loved Kaito and his songs, I can't count how many times I've played Cantarella or Snowman. This led to me going down my own vocaloid rabbit hole where I saw the Japanese Project Sekai ad for the first time. It looked super cool, but at the time I didn't know how to use a vpn or other services to play games from overseas, so I was devastated to hear it was probably never going global.
To my surprise, I ended up seeing an english ad for it about 3 months later. I was /estatic/. I managed to actually catch the beta and was in the beta for the last two weeks or so. To be totally honest, I didn't know anything about the actual characters but I told myself "whichever group has Kaito will be the group I choose".
Although now I play more competitively and focus a lot on the meta, it's still just a series of coincidences that I even found out about it before it's release and that it led me to Wonderlands x Showtime at all.
I ended up joining the fandom because, as my older sibling could tell you, I was absolutely insufferable about it. Some other things happened, but eventually I thought it'd be easier to just have my own little space for talking about it.
10 notes
·
View notes