I love that the Bruce Timm Batman is, Canonically, a huge comicbook nerd who is consciously modeling himself after his childhood comicbook/radio serial hero, the Grey Ghost. It’s such a wonderful, humanizing detail which adds depth and nuance to His Whole Deal, like: the tragedy of losing his parents is absolutely what motivates him, but it’s not the ONLY thing, and it’s these other influences -from Alfred’s constant Sahara-dry Pisstaking to the idealism of his parents to even just something as “frivolous” as a child’s favorite story- which shape HOW Bruce does WHAT he’s decided to do, and which keep him from becoming just another violent asshole.

"But if college was free, then people would abuse that and get useless degrees" hell yeah I would! If I could go to college without debt I would make it my job to get a degree in every little thing that interested me. I'd get a doctorate in film studies. I'd have a bachelor's degree for every science I like. I'd try to learn at least 5 languages with varying results. I would learn something "useful" like coding and then follow it up with a ""useless"" degree like art history. I'd be the world record speed run holder for getting every degree possible.

But I can't afford college without going into massive debt, so instead I spent the last 5 years trying to figure out what I am passionate enough about to consider going into debt over, because unfortunately being passionate about everything is extremely expensive to pursue.

i'm literally insane about the last agni kai and the lightning scene(s). i swear i've rewatched it 10+ times since my last rewatch of the show (which was my first watch in years) and like. azula sees katara come into view from behind. zuko doesn't. he follows azula's gaze and sees katara and is immediately horrified. he doesn't even think or hesitate because he doesn't have time and for once he doesn't have to look back at azula to figure out what she's doing because he knows what she's doing and he won't let it happen. time dwindling into slow motion as a haunting score plays? and zuko literally yelling out "no!" because that lightning absolutely cannot hit katara. as soon as he sees it there's no chance of that ever happening. and then katara watching in horror as the lightning flashes against features in what is probably one of the most hauntingly beautiful animated moments of the show? zuko hitting the ground still convulsing with lightning and katara crying out "zuko!" and immediately trying to run to him before azula attacks again? and the next scene we cut back to with them, zuko is groaning weakly and trying to lift himself up, and we see katara literally gasp in surprise as she realizes he's still alive (i'm sobbing because i do quite literally think she thought he was dead) and immediately tries to run to him again, nevermind that she knows azula is still there, and the hand katara uses for healing is already doused in water as she reaches for him. but then azula starts attacking again. and zuko, despite literally being in so much pain that he can't stand and can barely even move at all without whimpering, still tries to reach for the spot where he can see azula attacking katara. katara is forced to hide from azula's attacks. and as azula is mocking "zuzu, you don't look so good" down to zuko, the perspective shot is such that you can SEE that katara is also looking at where he lies prone in the distance, surrounded by flame (probably wondering how much time they have before it really is too late) before looking back up at azula and realizing she needs to defeat her as quickly and handily as possible so katara can get to zuko. obviously katara would have done this anyway (the whole reason they were THERE was to halt the continued cycle of the imperialist regime of the fire nation), but the scene is specifically framed as katara trying to figure out how to stop azula so the obstacle to her getting to zuko is no longer in the way. katara's defeat of azula was epic and deserves its own post. but then after making sure azula is securely chained, she runs to zuko, looks at him with such immense sadness and horror and fear as she hears him in so much pain, tenderly turns him over so she can get a good look at the wound. and she cups his head? briefly but so gently? so that he won't hit it as she turns him over? and when she tries to heal him you can tell she is so genuinely unsure if it will even work, and so relieved that she starts crying tears of joy when she sees it has (at least enough to keep him alive and somewhat lessen his pain.) they thank each other (and you can tell it's still really hard for zuko to talk and his eyes are barely open but he thanks her anyways i'm.) and she thanks him back and!!! when he starts to try to sit up she makes a little surprised face and then immediately helps him to do so (and puts a tender hand to his chest while she does!!!) and obviously that last shot of them standing together is also one of emotional support, but katara's hand on his back is also partly because i still think (and certainly katara still thinks) trying to walk/stand on his own would be a bad idea, so it's definitely not happening.

While of course "yo Mr. White I just bought my first binder. bitchhhh"posting is "inaccurate" to the content of Breaking Bad (I put "inaccurate" in quotes because it's obviously inaccurate, it's intentionally inaccurate, the disconnect between the content of "I need a penny for the souvenir penny presser yo" posts and the show is literally the joke), I don't find "Tumblrinas when Walt and Jesse KILL PEOPLE instead of BEING TRANS (CRINGE, NO MEDIA LITERACY)" posts to be really accurate representations of the fine nuances of the show either (and they're usually posted without the same level of self-awareness)

Business comes first! Drinking is the job!

[First] Prev <–-> Next

I know I've said this and many variations countless times before, but just a reminder:

responding to fandom analysis posts of a show with "haha or it's just bad writing 🤣", "wow the writers must have written this by accident because they're bad 😛", or "wow one interesting thing managed to happen despite how bad the writing is 😆" is... grating.

I get it. You don't like the show, and no matter what happens in it, you'll never change your opinion of that. So why are you even interacting with analysis posts? What do you get out of it if you think literally everything in this show is written by accident? Why do you think the OPs of these posts want to hear about how much you don't care and don't want to even try to engage with it at all?

Make your own post. And tag it with the appropriate salt tags so I can blacklist.

No ok I've had this rattling in my brain for fucking years now and I think it's high time I say something. I find it soooo absolutely delectable that dreams and sleeping are, accidentally, such prominent parts of hlvrai. Like, yeah, we all know "There's a world in your dreams Dr. Freeman, and I need you to take me there," but that's just the tip of the iceberg for me. Coomer realizes that everything around him is fake and that Gordon, the player, is the only actually real thing. When Gordon sleeps in the game, in actuality, he's taking off the headset and going about his day in the real world with real people. From Coomer's perspective, Gordon's reality is a dream, but from Gordon's pov, the modded game Half Life vr is a type of dream.

The way I see it is like if Alice in Wonderland took place where Alice knows she's dreaming and that everything is fake, but to the citizens of wonderland, it's all real, because that is the only thing they have ever known since they first began living (aka when Alice closed her eyes and began dreaming). Once Alice wakes up, the dream world ceases to be, but Alice continues on like nothing happened because that's what it was to her. Nothing.

What got me thinking about this is the it's all a dream trope, more specifically, Overly Sarcastic Production's video on it. Tldr, there are multiple avenues through which an author can do an it's all a dream plot, ranging from inconsequential one-off to the dream world may exist in its own way, but doesn't exist within reality. To Gordon, his adventures with the Science Team are the equivalent of a normal dream that turns sour once you and the people in your dream realize what's going on.

there's something about jimmy and martyn this season

four times over jimmy has walked the well-worn path into the realm of death all alone, his feet sinking in the inky, star-speckled puddles of the void and his hand shaking on the icy doorknob of After. and the familiarity— and oh, is it so familiar— never manages to suffocate the dread each and every time. the knowledge that this door, these wings, those eyes are all horrifyingly inevitable, following him, miraculously, across worlds.

until now. he steps in the pond of the void and there's a warm hand in his, so warm jimmy knows it to be unwelcome in this place. no one has ever been here with him before, and never in his endless lives and deaths has he ever been left staring wide-eyed at theback of someone's head, the back of martyn's head.

and martyn leads the way. there are no words— there never have been in this place— but his hand is firm and real in jimmy's. he walks confidently, the soles of his shoes marring the ground he walks across with ripples that never stop. and this time, martyn reaches out, and swings that haunting door wide open, ceasing its endless whispers all at once.

when martyn turns around, his eyes lock with jimmy's, and he doesn't speak— no one can, here, jimmy is sure of it— but he might as well, really. his eyes are tired, but they are certain. martyn says nothing, but jimmy hears him. of course he does.

follow me this time, would you?

Could you possibly do an essay on the Mario and Luigi reunion from the movie? It’s such a beautiful moment 🥺

There is very little I can say that has not been said already, but doggone it I'm gonna SAY IT ANYWAY.

All images are taken from this post: X

They're so happy. Luigi's smile is not only the first time he's genuinely smiled since his capture, but the biggest smile of the film. He looks like he's about to explode from joy.

He has gone through hell. Everything for the past few days has been mayhem, misery, and confusion, and throughout it all Mario has been on the forefront of his mind. Luigi's heard word of his big brother traveling with a princess, but that's all. But now, seconds from a horrible demise, Mario swoops down out of nowhere and plucks him from the jaws of death.

Mario lands, putting his little brother down on safe terrain. Luigi still wears that giant, "oh my God I can't believe this is actually happening" grin. Mario clutches his heart like it's about to burst, and immediately goes in to hug Luigi like they've never hugged before.

Mario is audibly on the verge of tears. Everything he's done throughout the film has been an effort to get here. He has broken into a royal palace, threatened a princess, angrily confronted a king, fought a gorilla, burst out of the gullet of a giant eel and battled his way through hoards of Koopa Troopers, all so he can see his brother again. And now his brother is here, and he's okay.

Is Luigi okay? Mario has heard terrible things about Bowser. He had barely arrived in time to rescue Luigi from falling to his death. He cups Luigi's face in his hands, presses their foreheads together, looks deep into his eyes. He has to know this is real, that they are here... that Luigi is okay despite all odds.

The euphoria overwhelms him. Mario goes in for a second hug, shaking his brother and picking his him off the ground, confirming that Luigi is, in fact, standing in front of him.

At last, he is satisfied enough to set his brother down. He's still looking at him with some sense of disbelief as Luigi lets out a heavy sigh; days of dread and anxiety, released. Big brother is here. Everything's going to be alright.

Immediately, Luigi falls into his old role of verbal reassurance. Out of both genuine confusion and a desire to comfort his sibling he starts teasing.

"Mario, why are you dressed like a bear? What is this!?"

Mario smiles wide. He doesn't know how to explain it, he hasn't really questioned anything so long as it brought him one step closer to reuniting with Luigi.

But yeah... now that he brings it up, it is all kind of weird isn't it.

Unknown Knowns

So, while I was just taking my1 Walk2 just now I was thinking about This3, and in particular, whether Vriska’s final confrontation with Terezi constitutes another one of these failed attempt to ‘fix’ her relationships by flipping the committer and receiver of violence, and I think it is.

Vriska wants to ‘fix’ her relationship with Terezi but, as we know from their first dialogue, her idea of ‘fixing’ it is making things Like They Used to Be, rather than building something new. As always, her myopic desire to have things her way, rather than meet them on their terms, helps to cause(she’s not the only one with agency here obvsl) the failure of her larger goal of making Terezi a part of her life again(and also it kills her). Beyond being an example of the themes I discussed earlier, the whole thing is ALSO an example of another of Homestuck’s major themes, Irony, and specifically Dramatic Irony, and I have helpfully arranged those examples into an unnumbered series of discrete paragraphs u_u u_u

Vriska sees Terezi in her old FLARPing getup and thinks she’s cosplaying. Thinking this expresses a desire to return to their old relationship, she responds in kind by putting on her old FLARPing persona to match. That’s not what’s going on. Or it is, Terezi IS Cosplaying, but she’s Cosplaying Seriously(which is ANOTHER irony, and also another example of “Becoming Who you Want to Be”, but it’s Nested, so I wont paragraph it seperately u_u), not as a peacefrond wiggled tenuously towards the face of making things Like They Used to Be, so what Vriska’s actually doing is encouraging Terezi to kill her, which is the opposite of what Vriska wants.

Vriska doesn’t really know anything about Terezi’s Mind abilities, which bolsters this misinterpretation, while Terezi and the audience do know about them.

Vriska thinks she’s offering Terezi a Choice when, from Terezi and the audience’s perspective, she isn’t, since both actions Terezi sees WILL be taken and only stabbing her is part of the Alpha Timeline.

Terezi thinks there’s only two possibilities when the Audience knows she, and possibly Gamzee, are constraining her perspective to what fits her desired conclusion.

Terezi THINKS she's gathering evidence to make a decision, when actually she’s justifying a decision she already made before she even started. As we know from her convo with Dave about it, Terezi’s feelings for Vriska are ambiguous and conflicted. While she cares about her, she also finds their relationship Exhausting, Vriska’s constant Behavior(ie Murders) Dangerous&Counter-Productive, and fundamentally wants their relationship and what you could call “The Problem of Vriska” to be Resolved and Settled, for it to be Finally DONE, by any means. And she feels it is her ‘Duty’ to make it ‘Done’. While she tells herself she’s making it for the sake of Justice and Causality, it’s this desire for resolution which really shapes her perspective, and thus limits her to a ‘kill, dont kill’ mindset.

Just as Vriska feels the values of her society demand she kill Tavros(and immediately regrets it), Terezi feels the values of her society demand she kill Vriska(and immediately regrets it). Vriska completely misunderstands the situation, but her conclusions about their similarities and Terezi’s inability to live with killing her are correct(she knows because she can’t live with having killed her friends either&that conclusion flows from their ‘sameness’). Terezi correctly conceives of the particulars of her situation in their totality, but because her perspective on it is constrained by her inability to be honest about her feelings(and, Gamzee’s influence in this regard), her conclusions are wrong. And for this final irony she condemns herself to three years of self-punishment via the troll-equivalent of alcoholism and an abusive relationship with her manipulator(unfortunately, she has a Type X| X|).

The Management wishes to inform Our Dear, Sweet Readers that this walk was a Team Endeavor, Endeavored in its physical aspects mostly by The Management -The Management ↩ ↩︎

Our Staff’s Ride -The Management ↩ ↩︎

The Author: Our Staff wishes to inform Our Dear, Sweet, Dear-Dear SWEET Dear-Dear, Sweet, Dear Readers that I wrote that, All By My Self, with Nobodyelse’s Help: spcl not the EDITING entirely metaphorical tonguestick to No Monumental Persons In Particular |p |p |p ↩ ↩︎

and if you’re ever tired for being known for who you know, you know you’ll always know me, dorotheeeeeea.

Yosuke Hanamura & Food as a Love Language

I recently saw a post talking about how Yosuke's love language is Food, along the lines of gift giving/acts of service kind of way, with examples of "he buys other people food during social links/plot points." And not only do I agree, I'd like to add that it goes the other way, too.

[Photo ID: a screenshot of Persona 4 Golden. It is June 22nd, after school. The Protagonist, Yosuke, Kanji, & Rise stand in Marukyu Tofu, having a conversation. Yosuke says, "Hell no! I always eat what people give me." End ID.]

This specific line is actually two-fold, as well. Not only is it verbal, primary-source confirmation of my point /lh, but the surrounding context adds to it as well.

Rise: Here you go, three ganmo. That'll be 600 yen. There's extra tofu in there for everyone... A little thank-you for worrying about me. Yosuke: Whoa, seriously? Thanks! Kanji: Yosuke-Senpai, you can't eat tofu, right? Want me to take yours? Yosuke: Hell no! I always eat what people give me.

Could one interpret this as "I don't wanna turn something down in front of THE Risette, Kanji" with just as much validity? Maybe as a joke about Mystery Food X at the camping trip? Absolutely. However, I think it's much more fun to imagine this goes along with how he communicates affection for people around him. Food can be a very intimate, very human experience! It makes sense that he'd feel cared for when on the receiving end of (good) Given Food.

BONUS: Y'know what else is a subcategory of Food Love Language? Knowing & remembering what someone is allergic to.

Yosuke: Anyways, now that all those people are gone, we might as well check inside [Marukyu Tofu]. I'll buy something. Protagonist: [recommend ganmodoki] Yosuke: How'd you know I can't eat tofu? Wow, that's considerate of you. >Yosuke seems somewhat happy... (+bonus SL points)

like, logan viewing shiv as his Little Girl Forever is directly connected to his inability to treat her as a serious contender for ceo, in the sense of infantilizing/belittling her but more specifically as an innocent nonsexual being. logan has no compunctions about his sons' involvement in waystar, which also means he doesn't hesitate when constructing his sons as sexual deviants. kendall gets accused of bending over for lawrence yee in the vaullter deal and spreading his legs for sandy and stewy, roman gets called a fag for doing an interview to repair logan's public image. but pinky? never. though shiv may think otherwise, logan's view is that as a woman, no, she is physically incapable of fucking someone else; her control over tom is an indication of her deficiency and fear, rather than her being able to exert power over him. and as his daughter, she can never be a sexual being to him, so he also cannot/will not process the concept of someone else thinking of her sexually. keeping her safe in childhood also means keeping her imprisoned there

im so insane about this little movement between these two here like the way morty notices rick kinda start to slip through the door and almost like instinctively leans toward him and when he then falls over onto the bottles morty just falls over himself to stay close to rick with his arms stretched out toward him . theyre like magnets to eachother have you noticed that how they’re like always moving based off where the other is and what he’s doing and they never go for more than like 10 seconds tops without glancing at the other trying to figure out what he’s thinking and acting accordingly

The way Halsin approves whenever you're silly or play along with children really has me going through it right now.