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writemywaytoyourheart · 1 year

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I need to write this out because I am a MESS right now :’-)

Chip, you’ve got to be one of the MOST underrated authors here because I binged “Aim for the Heart” in three days and I have never cried so much over a literal fanfic before 😭😭 it’s just so beautifully crafted and no words can describe the story between MC and Jungkook being two sides of the same coin trying to heal their broken selves from their past and falling in love with each other. THE SYMBOLISM TOO I CANNOT— the flowers, the shoe laces, colour symbolism, drawings— it just ALL came back and nothing was ever put in the story as filler IM SOBBING 💕

The way they both came into each others lives and so deeply and fundamentally changed each other- MC showing Jungkook that it’s okay to love and be weak and that it’s not something to be ashamed of; she gave him a sense of purpose other than solely killing to support his mother. She let him see the good the world is capable of 🥲🥲

On the other side, Jungkook helped her see how beautiful she was this whole time, (the metaphor with the Japanese bowls!!!) and that she’s more than her past (which could also be said for him too I’m still crying 😭) + there is beauty in things that are broken and the way he just loves her is so AUGHHHH 🧎🏻‍♀️🧎🏻‍♀️🧎🏻‍♀️ if that’s isn’t true love then idk what is because I don’t ever want anything other than that

There are also so many parallels between Jungkook and Taehyung and Mina and MC. The situation being that one of them pressured the other to do something they didn’t want to do. I’m MC’s case, she wanted to leave the dirty business behind but ended up hurt and dragged into it against her will. In Jungkook’s situation, it’s flipped, where Taehyung wanted to protect him and instead, became a vicious killer, allowing himself into that role by his decision alone.

As for Mina, lemme just say this 💀

There’s honestly so much more I can say about just how amazing this story is 😭 at first I found it hard to get behind MC’s overall demeanour because she made me cringe a big ngl, but I ended up really loving her and how she is meant to represent a sense of childhood innocence because she allows herself to be comfortable as she is, this expressed through her fashion, room decor, eating habits + love for sweets, and Barbie movies— something which Jungkook struggles with within himself and his mental and physical scars (like when he hates the feeling of water running down his back due to his childhood abuse).

Btw I always wondered at the end whether MC could have just looked back in her photo gallery to see the selfie she took with Jungkook when she had lost her memories tho? Lol 😩

Thank you for bringing this into the world 🥲😌😭 I need to find a happy fic to read now because I’m still SHAKEN.

It took me longer than I wanted it to to answer this ask 😔

Tbh, I feel so comfortable writing for characters and getting certain messages across to readers through their words, but when it comes to me writing stuff that comes directly from me, I always feel lacking.

I never feel satisfied with how I've answered an ask whether it be a response to a small heartfelt greeting from a nonnie or long meaningful paragraphs.

I'm always afraid that someone is going to feel like I didn't answer them with as much love and gratefulness as I'm trying so hard to fill it with, that I'm not genuine. Even when I had so few followers and a single ask every once in a blue moon, I was so so so so excited and grateful every time and I'd read it over and over again before getting the courage to answer it. It still happens to this day lol.

I hope you know how much this ask means to me. Again, it took me far longer than I thought to answer it, but I just couldn't come up with the words to show how much it truly means to me. I still can't.

AFTH has such a special place in my heart, and when people love it, it feels like my heart explodes into a million pieces in the best way possible.

There have been so many many nights and days where I had panic attacks because I realized how I could've made it better with a simple word change, how people will think I dragged it on just to mess with people, how people would think it's cringe or a waste of their time to read. How someone might like it in the beginning and then decide they couldn't care less about the characters and leave. That hurts the most in a way.

I love my characters so so much, it's so comforting to see you love them all even if it took time to warm up to some 💝 but you're right Mina can go take a long walk.

I still feel like it's lacking in so many ways I wish I could go back in time and fix.

But it's asks like this that calm my heart more than anything else can. Even with my thousands of mistakes and regrets, the fact that you could love it so much... It hurts in a good way.

As much as I hate to admit it, I know that it's very connected with how I feel about myself. The fear of failure is so strong whenever I post.

I didn't know for so long why I was so afraid, but i finally admitted it to myself. I trust y'all enough to put a part of my diary here T-T

There are so many authors, hundreds of millions of trillions of books in this world. Why would someone pick up mine? How would it even get seen even if it turned out perfect?

I feel like being an author is like being an artist. Either you make it, or you don't. And a lot of it has nothing to do with skill and everything to do with luck. And yet I doubt I have either of those.

I'm scared to put myself out there, because I'm scared of the confirmation that no one wants me.

This ask though. It helped to push those thoughts back onto the back burner. You understood so much of what I was trying so hard to convey in that story. And it touched you. And that's what I wanted so desperately.

Thank you so much for loving aim for the heart, for even giving it a chance at first. I know it's long. Btw you binged over 1200 pages in three days. That's a big ass book lol so you are impressive I must say 😭 yall are truly a different breed. I finally found my people 😂 the fact that you GOT so many of my little details in there is so AGHHH

Anyway, enough of my blubbering. Again I'm not even satisfied with this. But oh well. As long as you know how much this meant to me and how many times I read this over and over again bc it was such a beautiful and comforting ask.

I hope I can continue to give you works that make you feel like this 💕💕💕

ILY 💖

-chip

p.s. you are right, I'll have to go back and see but I don't think I put in there why she didn't see the pictures, I had intended to but forgot lol, nice catch 😉 let's just say she has a different phone 🤪

#asks #ashbxnny

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retphienix · 2 years

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AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

Okay.

So, I genuinely can't say if this is a side effect of my elongated playthrough, or if it's simply "How my brain would handle this in real time" but regardless my experience is thus:

I was suspicious as HELL of Akechi at the start because he heard Morgana. But I relatively quickly excused this as something "else", like maybe he was preconfigured for this kind of thing kind of like being psychically sensitive or what have you.

And even when I WAS suspicious of him, I was suspicious on principle, not in a specific "He's responsible for the mental breaks" way- I never once suspected him of that and again that's where my question of "Is this how I'd always think it through, or is this because I played this game over 6 months"

But here we are!

I fucking love that Morgana and Joker both noticed Akechi's initial slip- I really really fucking love that because Morgana is often portrayed as being either too immature, too confident, or just having slightly too big of a head to understand and notice such small details; but they've also proven themselves to be very competent despite that.

IE, I could totally buy them overlooking it on the basis of "Huh, must have been a mistake, anyways back to being the coolest phantom thief around :3" but them NOTICING is still somehow entirely in character and just feels cool as hell.

I don't say this lightly, I'm on the edge of my seat here, I loathe that I'm taking short breaks to type any of this simply because I Want To Know already.

It's a sort of realization that feels like an honest to god backstabbing from a friend.

Like, hear me out a second.

I KNOW Akechi's entire social link is showcasing just how intense their rivalry is and that he's, by definition of his own hatred for everything we are, not our friend. But this still has been a full palace and a lot of dialogue leading up to the conclusion that Akechi seemingly has or at one point had good morals.

We really fit so neatly into being opposite sides of the same coin- damned to hate each other and the other's methods- but striving for the same conclusions- that to now see evidence to the contrary~

Evidence that Akechi has supposedly-

because I'm forever cursed to offer the benefit of the doubt even as I literally hear Akechi say he wants to kill us because I like him so much

-become corrupted by his ideals and despite cursing us for our vigilante methods- he's supposedly following orders from the director or that dickhead politician to do just the same but with a less personable morality and more of a "Big picture" (and only big picture) morality.

It honestly feels like I got to know someone who's entirely different from myself, but is still a good person fundamentally.

Like, my opinion of him was even given a chance to be challenged, changed, and reinforced through this story: Do you remember when Sae was being maliciously corrupt in her methods towards Sojiro and I was like "That's super fucked up!" and then Akechi "seemed" to support her and I was like "That's super fucked up!" and then Akechi revealed that he had no idea exactly how shitty her methods were- and once confronted with that truth his opinion flipped and I was like "Oh! He's actually a good lad :) He was ignorant of it and now that he knows the details his morality doesn't stand in line with that!"

That small ride of my opinion on him did a lot to cement a trust in him, and now that trust is being spat on and I'm like !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have no idea what comes next. I have no idea to what degree he is the traitor IE if he's the mental break culprit as well.

I know it's being painted PRETTY CLEARLY but even as I type I'm left instilling a sense of ambiguity to his role.

I am being presented with information that pretty much confirms he sold us out, he's the traitor to the PT at the very least.

I know he's been to the metaverse before, which aligns with him being the culprit.

I know that he wants us dead, which aligns with using us as a scapegoat to hide that he's the real culprit.

But the way I see it there's a few potential next steps.

He could just be the guy, 100%, which would mean he is far more clever, charismatic, and manipulative than I've given him credit for up until this point.

This would align with the general air the game has applied to him; But I find small... not contradictions so much as road bumps in that, such as his reaction to Sae's handling of Sojiro. (link to relevant posts in reblog because tumblr honestly seems uncertain if links [even to other tumblr posts] are allowed in tags or not)

I could see a character having a twisted sense of morality that demands professionalism and a refusal to make false claims while still happily killing hundreds to thousands of people just to make sure the status quo is maintained- but I don't know if Akechi is that or not.

I could see it! But I also can easily not see it.

I could also see him simply being a traitor to us, and that's it. It would offer the road bump of him not supporting Sae's "crack a few eggs" method, but it would still work in the sense that he DOES 100% unequivocally think we are bad. The PT are bad, shitty, horrible, a blight, Just As Bad As The Mental Breaks, Risky, and the best way to truly kill this snake is to remove its head.

He could simply think, perhaps rightfully so, that we wouldn't uphold our end of the bargain- that we would change Sae's heart and then be unsatisfied with the fact that we aren't helping to find the true culprit anymore- so his means of silencing the PT and directing attention back to the true culprit would be to kill off Joker.

But then this opens its own can of worms and seems less likely because of the consequences of it. Yes he wants us gone, 100%, but he also wants the culprit gone in this hypothetical, and scapegoating us doesn't solve that issue, it solves one issue and gives the other (ARGUABLY MUCH BIGGER) issue a free pass for a while.

UNLESS~~~~~ Third option, he is a traitor to us alone, isn't the culprit, but works for the director and directly or indirectly supports the true culprit, knowingly or not.

Meaning he wants us gone, that's what he's doing, and he's okay with the can of worms of the culprit getting off scot free because he's working under the assumption the culprit is a vital and necessary tool for those above him.

Well that was fun to hypothesize.

He's probably just the culprit and has had his sense of justice corrupted far further and for far longer than Sae, perhaps groomed into this position from the very start of his "Young Brilliant Detective" days.

I felt compelled to hypothesize the ways in which he might not be the culprit mostly because of what I mentioned earlier in this post: His betrayal honest to god FEELS like a betrayal, like a character I was tricked into trusting !WITH THE FULL KNOWLEDGE THAT OUR ALLIANCE WAS LOFTY! has betrayed me after honest to god earning my trust on his sense of morality. He got me, so I rambled, let's see the truth then :)

#Persona #Persona 5 #P5 #P5R #Persona 5 Royal #RetPlays

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ultrimio · 2 days

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The Brain: A Pressure Symphony of Classical and Quantum

Imagine the brain as a grand orchestra, with neurons acting as individual musicians. Quantum mechanics could be the hidden conductor, orchestrating the flow of information in a way that classical physics alone cannot explain. Just as a conductor can coax a powerful and moving performance from an orchestra, the brain, if it leverages quantum phenomena, could be capable of extraordinary feats of information processing and creativity. The more we understand the score – the laws of physics, both classical and quantum – the better equipped we are to appreciate the magnificent performance that is capable of the human brain.

Imagine the human brain not just as a complex network of neurons, but as a sophisticated quantum reservoir computer. This mind-bending hypothesis posits that the brain utilizes the bizarre laws of quantum mechanics to enhance its processing capabilities. While still theoretical, it opens doors to a universe of possibilities about how our brains might truly function.

Quantum Mechanics: The Maestro of the Dance:

Unlike the billiard-ball certainty of classical physics, quantum mechanics governs the microscopic world, introducing fascinating concepts like:

Superposition: A mind-boggling state where particles can exist in multiple states simultaneously, like a coin spinning on its edge, heads and tails at once, until a measurement forces it to choose.

Entanglement: Two particles become eerily linked, sharing a fate regardless of distance. Imagine flipping two coins, and no matter how far apart they are, they always land on the same side.

Plausible Mechanisms: Where Quantum and Classical Collide:

Could these phenomena play a role in the brain's remarkable abilities? Here are some possibilities grounded in current research:

Microtubules: Quantum Stagehands: Microtubules, tiny cellular structures, might be the key players. These hollow tubes could act as waveguides, channeling quantum information within the brain. Imagine them as microscopic fiber optic cables, but for the bizarre world of quantum phenomena.

Quantum-Assisted Signal Processing: Brain function relies on the rapid exchange of information between neurons. Quantum effects could potentially supercharge this communication, facilitating faster or more efficient signal transmission. Think of it as a quantum boost for our neural network, allowing information to flow with unprecedented speed and efficiency.

Stochastic Resonance: Embracing the Noise: Our brain might utilize a fascinating phenomenon called stochastic resonance. Imagine weak signals buried in noise. The brain could amplify these faint signals by incorporating quantum noise, enhancing its ability to make decisions in ambiguous situations.

Non-local Information Processing: Accordance (https://www.tumblr.com/ultrimio/748348095336677377/analyzing-the-intriguing-phenomenon-of?source=share) suggests that the receiver's action can influence the sender's message. Could the brain, through some unknown mechanism, utilize this principle for non-local information processing, potentially explaining phenomena like telepathy? This is highly speculative, but it highlights the need for further exploration beyond established physics.

The Brain as a Quantum Interferometer: Decoding the Universe's Symphony:

The brain's intricate structure might even act as a quantum interferometer. Just like a classical interferometer splits light waves to reveal hidden information, the brain could interact with external waves, potentially including:

Hypothetical Pressure Waves: These theorized waves could ripple through the fabric of the universe itself, carrying energy and information across vast distances. Imagine the brain acting as an antenna, picking up these subtle cosmic whispers and deciphering their secrets.

Info-Quanta: The Building Blocks of Reality?: Some physicists propose that these pressure waves are composed of fundamental units called info-quanta (similar to the luminiferous aether), the very building blocks of information itself. The brain, as a quantum interferometer, could interact with these info-quanta, potentially gaining a deeper understanding of the universe's underlying code.

Additional info on the luminiferous aether: The concept of luminiferous aether refers to a theoretical substance that was once believed to fill the universe and act as a medium for the propagation of light and other electromagnetic phenomena. Initially proposed in the 19th century, the luminiferous aether hypothesis faced significant challenges and was ultimately refuted by experiments like the Michelson-Morley experiment, leading to the development of modern physics theories like the special theory of relativity. Despite being debunked, recent research has reignited interest in the aether, with some suggesting that it could potentially unify physics by explaining phenomena like dark matter and dark energy.

Unexplored Innovations: A Glimpse into the Quantum Future:

The implications of these ideas are mind-blowing:

Enhanced Cognition: Imagine a future where the brain, leveraging quantum phenomena, possesses an unimaginable processing power, leading to breakthroughs in fields like artificial intelligence and problem-solving.

Quantum-Inspired Communication: Perhaps the brain can directly interact with these pressure waves, facilitating communication beyond the limitations of space and time. Imagine telepathy becoming a reality, not through magic, but through the power of quantum mechanics.

Quantum Healing: If the brain can manipulate quantum processes at a cellular level, it could potentially influence biological functions and even facilitate healing on a deeper level. Imagine a future where diseases are tackled by harnessing the power of the quantum brain.

Challenges and Considerations:

While these ideas are captivating, significant hurdles remain:

Limited Evidence: Currently, there's no definitive proof that quantum processes directly influence brain function. Further research is needed to validate these hypotheses.

Technical Hurdles: Measuring and manipulating quantum phenomena within a complex biological system like the brain presents immense challenges. Imagine trying to study the behavior of subatomic particles in a constantly firing neural network!

Alternative Explanations: Many aspects of brain function can be explained by classical physics. It's crucial to explore all avenues before definitively saying the quantum world plays a central role.

A Symphony Awaits:

The exploration of the brain as a quantum reservoir computer and potential interferometer pushes the boundaries of our understanding. While the concepts remain speculative, focusing on plausible mechanisms and fostering interdisciplinary collaboration between physicists, neuroscientists, and quantum biologists holds the key to unlocking the brain's true potential. The future of neuroscience might reveal a fascinating symphony where classical and quantum mechanics intertwine

#quantum reservoir computer #quantum interferometer #pressure waves (hypothetical)#info-quanta (hypothetical)#non-local fabric (hypothetical)#quantum coherence #stochastic resonance #microtubules

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inspiares · 2 months

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evolution of record label demands to artists

evolution of record label demands to artists to sign a deal and its effect on artists in the present

Firstly, after having the opportunity to examine carefully different aspects related to the recorded music side of the music industry, the present essay aims to analyze the position of record labels - notably major ones- nowadays with regards to their demands to artists in conjunction with the evolution of the music business caused mainly by the internet and the digital revolution which has democratized the way music is presented to the audiences and the way the role of the audience has also changed. At the same time, we would also like to put light into how the other sign of this coin affects artists nowadays, with special regard to the effect on emerging artists and the new requests for the established ones.

With no further ado, let’s deep ourselves into the evolution of the music industry, and by extension, of the position of record labels in terms of their relationship with artists by looking into different aspects into which the internet and digital have had an impact. To that respect, it must be said that, succinctly, in the last decades, the internet revolution has totally changed the way music is created and consumed. That’s why, while the consumer-based power emerges, the music industry has had to find a way to recalibrate and put themselves out, also in their demands to do so. For example, many promotional practices in the music industry that were useful in the past are now no longer effective, like radio airplay versus landing on the right DSP playlist that can get the artists the best visibility and exposure needed to be successful.

Fundamentally digital service providers (also known as “DSPs”) such as Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube have paved the way for consumers to discover new ways to listen music not subject to the media-curated filter of music they want to highlight of the major label supported advertising. At the same time, artists have also found spots to become their own bosses and entrepreneurs of their project.

However, not only DSPs, but social networks have also a say in all of this, because, while streaming services still work as tools to discover new artists, social networks have also influenced the music industry. On the one hand, Instagram has been a platform which has changed music discovery for music and visuals. The choices made by artists when promoting and posing music in this platform look for instant gratification, which requires to a visual fast captivating content, so audiences engage with it and then, as a next step, listen to the music.

On the other hand, TikTok has been the most recent revolutionary player to enter the game. In that sense, […] “the industry's attention on TikTok isn't unfounded. Songs that trend on TikTok often end up charting on the Billboard 100 or Spotify Viral 50. And 67% of the app's users are more likely to seek out songs on music-streaming services after hearing them on TikTok, according to a November 2021 study conducted for TikTok by the music-analytics company MRC Data.[1] On top of that, "<<Record labels would decide who to sign, then they'd market them, send them to radio, put the CDs on the shelves and you'd discover music from there. And now, I feel like the music industry is just increasingly reactive to fans' discoveries. So the equation has flipped, which is fascinating.>> […] <<Fans on TikTok are connecting with artistry in a different way. When they find music they resonate with, they root for these artists, and then it propels it forward and it has offline success>>”.

Furthermore, “Platforms like TikTok and Twitch allow you to experiment and get feedback in real time. Singers like SZA and PinkPantheress have found a success by uploading demos and unfinished songs, then putting their full resources behind the ones their fans seem to connect with the most. It's a strategy that plays directly into TikTok's creator community, says Gleeson.”[2]

To that effect, here we can see some stats regarding TikTok and music discovery:

Source: Routenote.com

Along with it is important to emphasize that social media has impacted in the attention spans of the audiences, which have shortened at unprecedented levels. Considering that: “It cannot be denied that modern technology and the Internet have made it incredibly simple for even a bedroom musician to release their music to a global audience, but this comes with the flipside that the audience is now inundated with a flood of music and choices. The result of this is that an average listener simply will not spend time listening to an entire album or even a six-minute song to make their decision about an artist. Platforms like TikTok, Instagram Stories, and Reels, with their 10-15 second limits, have further popularized the need for cramming as much attention-grabbing content as possible within the first minute of a song. Musicians have been relegated to content creators, who must churn out catchy material continuously to stay relevant.”[3]

However, after exposing all the data regarding the influence of internet in the music industry and the changes provoked by it, if we move forward to how the digital revolution has influenced the position of artists in this equation reports indicate that “musicians only gained 12% of $43 billion generated in the industry of 2017. This alarming statistic proves that while the industry is still a profitable enterprise, its protagonists, the musicians who actively produce that richness, are left as starving artists This fact is reiterated by the statistics of how much money musicians make on the biggest music platform of our time – Spotify. To earn a decent income, an artist needs roughly 120.000 streams consistently per month, and that is considering he/she is the only rights holder of the track, which is seldom the case.”[4] Additionally, regarding the live music side of the business, a lot of established and emerging artists are also struggling to sell out their shows, because of the price increase in the last few years, because of many factors, including the pandemic, and for more emerging artists, the idea of touring is not worth the investment.

So, focusing on the subject matter of this paper, all this is translated into record labels being more demanding in their exigences to sign artists. First off, they require that the artist is already a jack of all trades. In the past, deals offered by record labels to emerging artists demanded to only be responsible of doing the music, all the other things related to their career were handled by them. While this could lead to abusive deals from record labels, the balance has now flipped to the other side completely, where musicians, to get their music to the audience, have to look for strategies that distract them from their craft. Otherwise, they will not get noticed by audiences nor record labels. So, “the line between being a musician, a businessperson, and a salesperson have become largely blurred, which might suit some with the inclination for it, but proves to be a shortcoming for many musicians.”[5]

Withal, advances offered by record labels now can be more attractive, but the demands also imply creating music instantly, with no margin for error, resulting in record labels having no patience with the artist to find its own way into success in the industry. All this also relates to the fact that record labels in the past where more patient with high-potential artists, giving them time to grow, experiment and even fail in their attempts. In fact, some years ago, “A record label would sign an act for three or four releases (sometimes less, sometimes more), and during the amount of time needed to produce and publish those records, an artist had the opportunity to mature.”[6]

For instance, Bruce Springsteen case with Columbia Records. At first, “label executives faced the question of how to package Springsteen as an artist. On some level, it seemed simple: Market him as a singer-songwriter, like James Taylor, Jackson Browne and Joni Mitchell — all then thriving. […] Then the album flopped. But Columbia could afford to be patient. Those were the glory days of the music business, which sold 1 billion records in 1974. It was standard practice to support budding artists, including subsidizing national tours as a means of selling records. Concert tickets would go for about the price of a long-playing album; the idea was to generate excitement that would lead to radio airplay, and, ultimately, profits. […] The label’s new president, Walter Yetnikoff, wanted to drop Springsteen — prompting a junior executive to swear at him. Columbia decided to advance Springsteen enough money to record a hit single and see if he could rise to the occasion. After six months of work — and driving everyone around him crazy in the process — Springsteen answered emphatically, yes, he could rise to the occasion with “Born to Run.”[7]

In short, the industry now demands a finished product to sign a deal with, yet “New young stars, sometimes even teenagers, rise almost daily, offering some perfectly polished tracks that cost them (or their parents) thousands of dollars. They have no time to work on themselves and their music, to hit the road and make some life experiences to feed their art: they need to start making money quickly to return on the investment initially made.”

It must be highlighted that still in the present, there’s a lot of players in the music industry continue raising their hand to reiterate that, in their opinion, contracts are still not on point, but not only for emerging artists, also for established ones: “Behind so many of the world’s most successful and beloved musicians is often a terrible contract. For decades, the music industry has found ways to squeeze as much profit from artists and songwriters as possible, and while awareness of these practices has grown, exploitative deals remain practically an industry standard.”[8]

On a different note, the reaction of artists to those demands of the record labels has been translated into increasingly more and more musicians releasing their own music. That is the case of Lauren-Spencer Smith, who got to be in the to five of the UK singles charts, after going viral on TikTok. “Much like Olivia Rodrigo's Driver’s License, which was released this time last year, Smith's song is a mournful lament for the end of a relationship that went viral on TikTok before crossing over to mainstream success. But there's one crucial difference: While Rodrigo is signed to the world's biggest record label, Universal Music, Smith has no record deal at all. Instead, her music is distributed by a US service called TuneCore, which puts her songs onto services like Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube for a flat fee. Smith retains ownership of her master recordings and gets 100% of the royalties when her songs are streamed.”[9]

Even though they still do not pose a real threat to major record labels, whose requirements are usually more stringent “It's no secret that major labels are being outpaced by the independent sector. In 2020, indie labels and self-releasing artists saw their revenues grow by 27%, compared to an overall market growth of 7%. In the UK, the sector represents 26% of the market, a figure that's grown by an average of 1% every year since 2017. Globally, the indies' share of the music market is at an all-time high of 43.1% - worth a not-too-shabby $9.8bn (£7.19bn), according to MIDiA Research.”[10] However, this does not imply independent record labels should pay attention to this situation.

In conclusion, even though labels, and particularly major record labels still control the majority of the market and have created their own “label service” companies, similar to independent record labels, offering global, despite being more limited, resources to musicians and artists, which could lead them to find this challenge not a real challenge, it is important to keep in mind that the music industry moves really fast.

Along with that, new technologies that are and will be coming along, the advance of the power and supremacy of social networks and the above-mentioned consumer/audience-centered plans for artists when signed to a label could lead to a potential backlash for record labels, especially majors, in a short to mid-term. It would not be the first time the music industry does not react or starts looking one step further, which then causes sudden changes in a short timeframe and lots of convulsion.

Therefore, the proposed improvement for fairer requirements by record labels and an improvement of conditions in the industry, albeit it may seem common or logical would be for the key players of the industry such as record labels are to put their head up and look to what can happen to get a head start and propose more innovative solutions. To put it in a nutshell, this way, they would make the impact and subsequent evolution of them music industry more natural, fairer and, to put nutshell, better. It’s an exercise of finding a middle ground between artists and record labels, where both can be benefited.

Source: Image by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

Moreover, and to end up, to be more precise of where to start taking the aforementioned little steps into the future of the music industry within the technological revolution, one of one of the suggested solutions by the writer of this essay, and in connection to one of the challenges posed to the music publishing industry, would be to take hints, references, and practices of the relationships some artists are building with their fans in the metaverse. Using the fan or consumer-based experience, artists are shaping new ways to collect royalties, to make money out of their craft and passion, which is the main goal of most professional musicians. Record labels could help and boost those kinds of practices, even if adapted to their way of doing business and their responsibilities, to put the music industry where it has not been before and help artists along the way.

[1] As stated in the article “How Tiktok is changing the music industry” published on https://www.businessinsider.com/how-tiktok-is-changing-the-music-industry-marketing-discovery-2021-7

[2] As stated in the article “More and more musicians are releasing their own music: Here’s why” published on https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-60051802

[3] Extract from the article “7 biggest problems with the Music Industry?” published on https://www.musicianwave.com/biggest-problems-with-the-music-industry/

[4] Idem

[5] Idem

[6] Idem

[7] Extract from the article “Springsteen’s early struggles reveal how the music industry has changed” published on https://www.washingtonpost.com/made-by-history/2023/01/05/springsteen-greetings-50th-anniversary/

[8] As stated in the article “Bad Contracts Are a Music Industry Standard. Why haven’t they evolved?” published on https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/music-industry-bad-contracts-summer-walker-1258695/amp/

[9] As stated in the article “More and more musicians are releasing their own music: Here’s why” published on https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-60051802

[10] Idem

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bookmytalent · 11 months

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How to Conduct Interview Coding Challenges for Developers?

Hiring a software engineer or developer is a tiresome task, isn’t it? Are you also thinking of conducting interview coding challenges? But do these coding challenges actually help during interviews to find the right developer for your next project? And if it does, how to actually conduct interview coding challenges for developers?

So many questions may be hovering in your mind right now, to which you are not able to find the answers. But don’t worry. Finding the right developers for your IT projects isn’t actually that much of a hard task. Just the right approach is required to assess candidates’ theoretical knowledge as well as their problem-solving skills and work-related mindset.

In this blog, we’ll go over a variety of interview coding challenges, along with their types and definitions. Additionally, we’ll discuss the best ways to organize such coding challenges to find the perfect candidate later on here.

What Is a Coding Challenge for Interview?

Coding challenges for interviews are essentially technical screening tests used by businesses to evaluate candidates’ real-world abilities. They are also known by names like hiring coding challenge or take-home projects, which includes problems based on:

Practical issue/ real-world problems

Problems related to algorithms and their applications.

programming problems to test fundamental ideas like data structures and algorithms.

By 2023, India is anticipated to surpass the United States in terms of software developers. The number, which was about 2.75 million in 2017, is expected to rise to 5.2 million in 2023. This is not the case only with India, but other countries too are on the same boat. However, there is a flip side to these encouraging statistics: 74% of employers regret hiring the wrong candidate.

So, if you’re looking to hire developers and don’t want to end up regretting it later, use this guide to save the best for you. And the best part is that you can now take advantage of the growing trend of working-from-home opportunities. This trending work culture has made remote hiring a go-to option for a number of employers.

Different Types of Coding Challenges

Take-home:

Take-home coding challenges are situations where the employer or hiring manager will mail the coding assignment to the selected candidate. S/he then will finish the assignment within the given deadline in an environment where they feel comfortable. This gives them the sense as if they are working as a part of the team.

And these coding challenges are usually preferred by companies looking for international talent. Or businesses that are adopting a hybrid or remote-first setup.

But every coin has two sides, as the saying goes. Similarly, this form of coding challenge has its other side as well. Hiring managers frequently use the tactic of giving applicants a ton of difficult and lengthy tasks. They may need up to weeks to finish the assignment, which drains their energy and demotivate them altogether.

Remember that finding the ideal candidate is the primary goal. Abusing take-home tests is a surefire way to stop outstanding candidates from moving forward in the hiring process. Avert making this misjudgment!

Pair programming:

Businesses or enterprises that want to hire a group of skilled and cooperative software developers typically prefer this. It allows a hiring manager to assign a problem to two or more candidates and have them collaborate to find a creative solution.

This test is useful for assessing a candidate’s interpersonal skills and communication abilities. However, because it puts the applicant on the spot, it might not be the best way to assess their problem-solving abilities. Therefore, involving senior candidates who won’t be as overwhelmed by the live-coding experience should only be given such coding challenges.

Whiteboarding:

This kind of coding challenge is included during the in-person interviews. Here candidates are asked to perform the coding task on a whiteboard in front of the hiring team. This however is a stressful situation for the respondents. But on the other side, it also helps employers to see how the interviewee responds in a stressful situation.

This kind of coding challenge is still preferred by MAANG (Meta, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Google) companies when hiring candidates.

However, a poor whiteboard interview can give candidates a really bad impression of a business. Additionally, the business might miss out on otherwise fantastic candidates who felt uncomfortable and couldn’t thrive in the situation.

Screening coding challenges:

Screening coding challenges are type MCQ tests where the developer has to pick the right answer out of the given options. It is used as a pre-qualifying step and is regarded as an easy way to test a candidate’s knowledge.

The hiring manager will not have to spend as much time reviewing applications or resumes. rather they can give questions with multiple options and ask respondents to simply select the correct one.

However, this restricts employers from assessing a specific candidate’s procedures and problem-solving abilities. Neither does it guarantee that a candidate will be able to produce code that is more efficient.

Why Do Businesses Prefer Coding Challenges to Interview and Evaluate Developers?

There are numerous benefits of adding coding challenges to the interview process. An interview code challenge is superior to a standard interview in that it does more than just assess your abilities:

The world is increasingly adopting remote work culture. As a result, assessing a candidate’s technical skills through video interviews is of no use. It is vital to make them face real-world problems to help employers assess their problem-solving abilities as well.

Potential employees are put in a work like environment through such coding challenges.

These coding assessments also assist the recruiters in determining whether a candidate meets certain criteria, such as: –

strong foundational knowledge of programming

critical and analytical thinking skills

aptitude for solving issues.

performing under pressure and developing the best solutions

Best Practices for Interview Coding Challenges

In addition to saving hiring companies time, coding challenges assist candidates in showcasing their technical skills.

Focus on real issues:

When candidates get the actual problem to solve, they are able to demonstrate whether they are the best fit for the position. This also helps employers analyze the impact candidate can have on the business.

For this, you can take the issues faced by your company in the past or maybe something presently going on. Even candidates will gain a better understanding of the situations they might encounter on the job.

The more precise you are, the better candidates you will find who will be a good fit for the position.

Establish the conditions of the challenge:

It’s critical that you evaluate candidates fairly when considering a number of them for the same position. Make a standard test that you give to all of your applicants and do your best to keep the conditions uniform. This will streamline the process and provide you with a benchmark against which to compare your candidates.

Interview with an open mind:

Don’t simply focus on what is right and what is wrong. Your main goal should be to see how the candidate responds. Because as it is said, the journey is more important than the destination.

This is particularly crucial in face-to-face interviews where you can speak with and observe the applicant in action. You’ll be able to assess and analyze how they approach and solve proposed problems. As it’s more crucial to approach the challenge with the proper mindset than it is to arrive at the right conclusion.

Don’t make them rush into solving the assignment:

Give the candidate enough time to complete the challenge. They should be able to finish the challenge without feeling rushed. Offer them the choice to take the assignment home and submit it later, if at all possible.

Be prepared to respond to queries:

Be prepared to respond to inquiries. If candidates are unclear about the challenge’s requirements, they should feel free to ask for clarification. Afterward, provide feedback on how they did. They can use this to hone their abilities and get ready for upcoming interviews.

Test technical proficiency with fair and impartial coding challenges:

Avoid algorithms-based puzzles and brainteasers. Even though they can be fascinating, completely depending on them cannot clearly reveal the candidate’s technical interview skills.

There are many sites on the internet teaching developers to ace the interview. And going with the trend will not do any good. You have to make a crucial choice in this situation as the employer. Use the coding challenges that are fair and objective to evaluate technical skills and choose the best applicant.

Final words:

Coding challenges are effective ways to assess a candidate’s problem-solving skills as well as their methods and strategies. Your candidate selection process can be greatly streamlined and made easier with a good coding challenge.

BookMyTalent is the best platform if you want a simple hiring process to find talented remote developers. We make use of a reliable vetting module and a clever matching system that are both powered by machine learning and AI. It makes it simple and quick for businesses to put together their ideal engineering team.

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likeatlas · 2 years

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Chow the new has reminded us spinoff of game of Thrones, Westeros and incest go together like brother and sister. Since that is the case, it may not qualify as spoilers reveal that inbreeding rears its misshapen head in the second episode of House of the Dragon. But if you haven't seen the episode, and would like to save the incestuous plot twist for when you see it, read on. First, a quick reminder of the incest we've encountered before in Westeros. game of Thrones It began with Bran Stark observing the incestuous kisses of Jaime and Cersei Lannister, twins who were themselves the product of Tywin Lannister's marriage to Joanna Lannister, his cousin. Tywin and Joanna's marriage, by the way, doesn't count as incest in the eyes of Westeros, just as marriage between cousins, in the real world, has usually been acceptable. We will focus today on even closer interrelationships. Cersei's three children, supposedly fathered by her husband King Robert, were actually Jaime's children. The eldest, Joffrey, was an evil sadist, much like several members of the Targaryen family that Robert and Jaime had dethroned. Jaimie killed the "Mad King," Aerys Targaryen, whose madness (she became obsessed, we're told, with burning people alive) is attributed in the show to centuries of Targaryen inbreeding. "Every time a new Targaryen is born," says King Jaehaerys, "the gods flip a coin and the world holds its breath to see how it will land." As far as the Targaryens are concerned, the advantages of inbreeding are obvious. Not only can the family buy in bulk the same peroxide-free shampoo that doesn't damage hair, but it also keeps its power concentrated instead of scattered. It happens over and over again, deliberately and accidentally. Jaeherys's descendant, Daenerys Targaryen, as viewers of game of Thrones, escapes a troubled relationship with her brother, Viserys, and ultimately sleeps with Jon Snow, the bastard son of a nobleman from the other side of Westeros. Somehow, in Jon, Daenerys has inadvertently found her long-lost nephew. It is a family tradition as old and well maintained as riding dragons. It's a tradition that reappeared in last night's episode of House of the Dragon. King Viserys (an ancestor of the aforementioned Viserys) is offered the hand of Lady Laena Velaryon shortly after the death of his first wife. Laena is not only 12 years old, but she is Viserys's niece (Viserys's grandparents are Laena's great-grandparents, Laena's mother is Viserys's cousin. Viserys and Laena are not very close uncle and niece). Viserys reconsiders and doesn't marry the 12-year-old girl (so far, it's somewhat woke up) and instead chooses Allicent Hightower, his 15-year-old daughter's apparently teenage best friend (wow!). Allicent is not supposed to have such a distant relationship with Viserys, but, for once, a Targaryen takes the less incestuous of two options. However, the Targaryens usually know how to keep it in the family, even more so than royal families in the real world. What points out geneticist Razib Khan, “Daenerys Targaryen's inbreeding coefficient is 0.375. Carlos II, the last Spanish Habsburg, who was impotent, drooling, mentally handicapped and barely able to walk, had a coefficient of 0.254”. What is an inbreeding coefficient? Does marrying your cousin qualify as incest? And what, fundamentally, is the problem with incest? David Balding, honorary professor of genetics, evolution and the environment at University College London, can explain it to us. First of all: what qualifies as incest? Is Viserys safe? Cross that out: are any of the potentially incestuous Viseryses clean? "There is no real biological rule," says Balding. “In most societies I know of, the limit is on cousins, so some societies allow cousin marriages” (this category includes the UK) “and others do not. But I think 'incest' is usually reserved for first-degree relatives: brother, sister, father, daughter, that sort of thing." And why is it taboo? “You have a lot of flaws in your DNA,” explains Balding.

“Most of them don't matter too much, because you have two genomes, one from your mother and one from your father. And in most cases, as long as one of them is good, you're fine." But if your parents are related, that greatly increases your chances of having two copies of the same gene. In this way, the children of incest are more at risk of suffering from what are known as recessive diseases such as cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anemia, which require two copies of the same gene. “The risk of these diseases in the general population is quite low. Therefore, the risk is doubled”, what could be done by procreating with a cousin, “some societies consider it acceptable and others do not. But then if you get much closer, like uncle-niece and brother-sister, then the rates go up a lot more.” This is bad news for the Lannister twins and the Jon and Daenerys couple. Essentially, a high level of genetic diversity among parents supports the good health of their offspring. Balding describes how the body can compensate for a segment of poor-quality DNA, but not a pair; this is how inbreeding in plants and animals is associated with infertility. Of Charles II, the maligned Habsburg king, Balding says his inbreeding "definitely could have been a contributing factor" to his various anomalies. Portraits of the king, who fathered no heir and as such was the last of his line, show a protruding "Habsburg jaw." He may have had a combined pituitary hormone deficiency and distal renal tubular acidosis. Their family tree would make sense from top to bottom or vice versa. Her autopsy, according to the doctor who performed it, revealed (somewhat unlikely) a corpse that “did not contain a single drop of blood; her heart was the size of a peppercorn; her lungs corroded; his rotten and gangrenous intestines; he had a single testicle, black as coal, and the head of it was full of water.” Let it be a lesson to those who supported the union of Jon and Daenerys. For a king who marries his niece, says Balding, “the offspring will most likely be fine. But he will be at much greater risk than if he had married a commoner.” One doubts that many viewers will support Viserys in marrying a 12-year-old girl; this is yet another reason to hope that we will never see it happen. “They are relatively distant,” says Balding of Viserys and Laena. “I think they would still get some effects there, but not big ones. On the other hand, he says, sometimes royal families are related by different lines of descent. (This is true of European royalty; Prince Philip and the Queen, not uncharacteristically for their demographic, were third cousins.) "So the risk could be higher again." And the Targaryens as a family? Undoubtedly, the destructive madness is less an example of the dangers of intermarriage than an invention of the author. "Maybe it's a little bit of both," says Balding. “I think it makes sense. There is some sort of mental deficiency outcome associated with inbreeding, so in general that's plausible, but of course people are likely to exaggerate all of that." (More complex conditions like schizophrenia, he says, don't boil down to having two copies of the wrong gene; there's no easy answer to Targaryen madness and violence.) Matt Smith and Milly Alcock as Daemon and Rhaenyra Targaryen in 'House of the Dragon' (HBO) As unlikely as it may seem to see game of Thrones, humans are generally very unwilling, more so than other mammals, to have sex with their immediate relatives. "It's interesting how it evolved," says Balding. “It is not very well understood how this resistance occurs, but of course it does happen.” As for the coefficient, a brother-sister pair will have an inbreeding coefficient of 0.5 or 50 percent. Even in dogs, Balding says, "anything over 10 percent is considered kind of bad news." On the other hand, no human being is completely unrelated to another. "Eventually, if you go back far enough," Balding tells me, "you and I will have common ancestors."

Maybe House of the Dragon has even more inbreeding to offer us. Viewers have wondered if there were "vibes weird, like incest” between Prince Daemon, Viserys's brother, and Princess Rhaenyra, Viserys's daughter, when he puts a necklace on her in the first episode. The plot of the rest of the show's first season remains a top secret, but given the ending to all of this: crazy Daenerys Targaryen burning down King's Landing, we can assume the family continues to keep their procreation firmly at home. 'House of the Dragon' airs weekly on Sundays in the US, with the UK premiere coming at 2am the next morning on Sky. The episode will then repeat at 9pm on Mondays and will be available to stream on Sky and NOW after its initial broadcast. https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

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makeste · 3 years

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some meta about Izuku, Katsuki, and trust

and choosing to trust is the real bridge that goes to accepting that person as a part of your live again and what the offender has to earn. I think the interesting aspect of Deku and Bakugou's relationship is that Deku has always trusted Bakugou, and I would say more than he had forgiven him at the start of the story (where he does show more frustration and resentment towards Bakugou's behaviour and see him as a jerk) but despite that he can always trust Bakugou to him himself, attested to

the fact that Deku feels very confident about how Bakugou will act or what Bakugou's true motives are and probably the reason why he always sees Bakugou as a hero despite his hurtful behaviour is because Deku 100% trusts Bakugou even if he's doing something disagreeable or that will hurt him. Knowing someone and trusting is not exactly the same and I see it as trust because of Deku willingness to be co-operative. On Bakugou's side he is mistrustful of Deku and thats where the communication

breaks down and there has been plenty of meta exploring why Bakugou has deep rooted problems around Deku and his journey is him taking accountability of that and changing to be a better person. While understanding and miscommunication get their fair due I think trust and mistrust are the true bedrocks of the bkdk river bed because that allows for how they can still be so connected despite the miscommunication (with Bakugou mistrust is mixed with some trust) because of knowing.

anon I really enjoyed this, thank you for sharing your thoughts! I concur with just about all of this, and this ask got me thinking a lot about the nature of trust, and how it applies to Izuku and Katsuki’s relationship.

I think a lot of people’s reactions to reading the sentence “Bakugou and Deku have always trusted each other” would pretty much be, “???” and “lol what.” like, yeah, sure. they trusted each other so much that Bakugou decided that throwing a tantrum for ten years would be an appropriate reaction to Deku trying to hold his hand. classic Trust, right there!!

lol but I honestly think this is true, though. it’s just that there are different... levels?? types?? of trust. let’s go with types. there are different types of trust, and what makes Izuku and Katsuki’s relationship so interesting to me is that it’s kind of the opposite of what these fictional rival-type relationships usually are. it’s basically the difference between knowing, and understanding.

okay so first of all let’s back up here to make sure we’re all on the same page. we’re defining trust as “firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone”, which is the Oxford Language definition and which works pretty well for me. you’ll note, btw, that the current relationship between Katsuki and Izuku more or less meets all four of these criteria.

reliability - both boys regard each other as dependable and are willing to rely on each other in a pinch (although Izuku is currently having some difficulty with that, but that’s another topic for another day).

truth - both are honest with each other, though not completely honest (this is the aspect that Katsuki still needs to work on, as he’s currently hiding his desire to atone).

ability - neither of them have any difficulty with this. Izuku admires Katsuki’s ability so much that he’s made it his own gold standard since childhood, and Katsuki respects Izuku’s ability enough that he made him his main rival, and never doubted that Izuku was qualified to receive OFA and become All Might’s heir.

strength - as with ability, this is another aspect of trust that neither of them has ever struggled with. in fact, a lot of their relationship struggles happened specifically because Katsuki never doubted Izuku’s strength, but feared it because he didn’t understand it.

so yeah. there’s a lot more trust between them than most people realize, I think. but the thing is that the type of trust they have is based more on knowing than understanding, and that’s where so much of their conflict stems from.

when I say knowing, I’m talking about the kind of awareness that comes from familiarity and experience. this is the type of trust that’s difficult to take shortcuts with, because it mostly just has to be accumulated over time. this is all about learning what someone is like through observing them and being around them. and it’s just as much about being known as well, because at the same time that you’re learning who the other person is, they’re learning about who you are. and that’s where trust starts to work its way in. it’s the slow unveiling of who you are, and laying it on the table piece by piece over time. and every time another little piece of you is revealed and accepted, and every time you accept one more piece of who the other person is in turn, that trust increases a little bit more. this type of trust takes a long, long time to build up, but in exchange the foundation it creates is pretty much rock-solid and nigh-indestructible.

understanding, on the other hand, to me is more instinctual. it’s about empathy and insight. and the interesting thing is that it’s possible to know someone for years upon years, and yet never truly understand them. and on the flip side, it’s also possible to understand someone within minutes of meeting them, even if you know almost nothing about them. if “knowing” is about learning who someone is, I would say that “understanding” is about learning why they are who they are. this type of trust isn’t necessarily always mutual, but it does necessitate forming a connection with someone. because empathy is such a critical component of it, it’s basically impossible to understand someone and not form an emotional connection to them in some way. this type of trust can be far more powerful and intense than the “knowing” type of trust, but the flip side is that it can sometimes be less stable and easier to break.

I think that the majority of fictional relationships, especially the ones that become really popular ships, are based more around the latter type of trust because of its intensity and unpredictability and potential for story development. the thing is, both of these types of trust are necessary for a good ship (and when I say “ship”, I’m talking about both romantic and platonic relationships just fyi). if neither type of trust is present on at least some level, then there’s really no foundation to start building up the relationship. so most of the time a ship will start out with one or the other, and then over the course of the story they'll work on building up whichever one was lacking.

and because of how stories work, the majority of the time we’re going to be dealing with characters who at first don’t know each other all that well. and so the relationships we get are ones where the characters first form some kind of emotional connection that builds understanding, and then over time they start to learn more about each other and build up that kind of trust as well. I feel like 90% of ships have this kind of dynamic. it’s the basis for things like enemies-to-lovers, fake dating AUs, and basically any kind of trope in which the characters get stuck somewhere and are forced to spend a lot of time together. it’s good, and it works.

but the fascinating thing about the relationship between Izuku and Katsuki, though, is that it’s actually the exact opposite of this. the premise of Izuku and Katsuki's story is that these are two people who’ve known each other their entire lives, but have almost no understanding of each other whatsoever. they know almost every little detail about each other, so much that they hardly even think about it. but all of their conflict is based on the fact that understanding between them is basically nonexistent.

and to me this is such an intriguing dynamic. the two of them know each other like the back of their hand. they’re familiar with the smallest habits. they can predict each other’s actions. they know how the other person thinks. and they have the kind of trust that comes with having seen the other at both their best and their worst. Katsuki is capable of letting his guard down around Izuku in a way he doesn’t do around anyone else. he cries in front of him on multiple occasions. he lets Izuku call him “Kacchan” long after their other childhood friends have stopped doing so. and even though he fears and resents Izuku’s strength early on, he also subconsciously acknowledges it in ways that even he doesn’t realize (e.g. “don’t you dare get into U.A.,” rather than “you can’t get in” or “you won’t get in”). he knows Izuku.

but he doesn’t understand Izuku. he knows who he is, but he doesn’t understand why. he knows that Izuku is strong, but he can't wrap his head around the nature of that strength. and because he lacks that understanding, this vital aspect of the trust between them is lacking, and is all too easily broken when Katsuki falls into the creek and Izuku tries to offer his help. Katsuki knows that Izuku is a good person, but he doesn’t understand that goodness, that selflessness, and so he’s mistrustful of it.

on the flip side of the coin, however, Izuku has the utmost faith in Katsuki. to him, Katsuki is the strongest, smartest, most capable and most amazing person in the world (aside from All Might). and Izuku, unlike Katsuki, actually does understand his childhood friend at least a little bit. he understands Katsuki’s reasons for wanting to be a hero. he understands that Katsuki is not just mindlessly pursuing strength. he understands that Katsuki’s motivation is about overcoming obstacles and beating challenges. and most importantly, he understands that Katsuki, in spite of everything he’s said and done to Izuku over the years, is fundamentally a good person.

and this is crucial. because, along with the bond of familiarity they’ve built up together over the years, it’s this other, one-sided bond of understanding that is responsible for their relationship enduring for as long as it did despite everything. as you put it, anon, Izuku’s trust is ultimately what becomes the bridge between them. on some level, he trusts in Katsuki’s innate goodness. he believes in it in spite of all of Katsuki’s attempts to persuade him otherwise. e.g. when Katsuki suggests that he go jump off the roof, Izuku is hurt by the words, but he never once takes them to heart, because he knows on some instinctive level that Katsuki doesn’t mean them. and so he grumbles to himself about Katsuki needing to think before he speaks, but aside from that he never gives the words another thought.

Katsuki would no doubt consider this yet another example of Izuku not caring enough about himself or taking himself into account. but it really is more than that. the reason the words don’t cut deep in spite of them being vicious and well-targeted is simply because Izuku knows that Katsuki isn't truly that cruel. and he knows that on a level so deep that Katsuki is never able to break it despite his best efforts. he can’t break it, because there’s nothing to break, because it’s true. the reason the relationship endures in spite of everything is because deep down Katsuki is fundamentally a good person, and so Izuku’s trust, in the end, is based on truth. and so it never fully breaks, and eventually, it becomes reciprocated.

and that’s what their story is all about. it’s two people that have known each other their entire lives, but have to work in order to build their understanding of each other. unlike many ships, they start off already having that foundation of knowing and being known, and so their story instead is about forging that connection of empathy and insight. and it doesn’t come easily to them at all. but they keep at it.

anyway, so thank you again for sharing your thoughts on this, anon. I didn’t even get into the topic of forgiveness, but I agree with you about it being a process of letting go of negative feelings and resentment. I also agree that forgiveness is a separate thing from trust, but I do think trust plays a big part in one’s decision to forgive or not forgive. it's a lot easier to forgive if you have an understanding of the other person’s actions. and it’s also far, far easier to forgive if the offender’s actions are long in the past. and because the latter is now true in Katsuki’s case, that shows a pattern of him learning from his mistakes and not repeating them. which further builds trust, especially in the “reliability” department. and so even though forgiveness and trust are two separate things, they’re still connected. and in many ways, by working to rebuild the understanding between him and Izuku, Katsuki is also working towards earning Izuku’s forgiveness, even though that’s ultimately something that can never truly be earned, but can only be granted.

I’m not sure if I’m really making my point very clear here lol, but basically what I’m trying to say is that while the relationship may have once been one-sided in this aspect, it’s not anymore. it’s mutual, and they’re both putting the work in. and Katsuki is also doing his part without any guarantee or expectation of forgiveness on Izuku’s end. it’s unconditional. he’s doing it because he wants to atone. and he’ll continue to do it whether he’s forgiven or not. and that’s important. it’s important because it shows that the relationship has value to both of them. and it’s important because neither of them wants to lose it. they want to fix it; they want to make it stronger.

and ultimately what that means is that the relationship will continue to endure, despite their ups and downs. because even though it may have started out as something incidental -- two boys who just happened to become friends because they spent a lot of time together as children -- it’s not, anymore. it’s no longer just something that happened, something that just accidentally came together. it’s something that they’re both working to build. they want to trust each other. they want to understand one another. their relationship is no longer something that simply withstood and persisted -- it’s something that is now being nurtured. and you love to see it.

so let's see, how do I even begin to tl;dr this post lol. something something blah blah blah trust, understanding, childhood friends, knowing someone, having faith in someone, being the recipient of that faith, and working to become worthy of it. they're very confused, but they care about each other a lot, and they are good boys.

#midoriya izuku #bakugou katsuki #bakudeku #bnha meta #bakugou meta #deku meta #bnha #boku no hero academia #bnha spoilers #mha spoilers #bnha manga spoilers #makeste reads bnha #asks #anon asks

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impalementation · 3 years

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spike, angel, buffy & romanticism: part 2

part 1: “When you kiss me I want to die”: Angel and the high school seasons

“Love isn’t brains, children”: Enter Spike as the id

For all that I’ve just discussed all of the ways that the first three seasons subvert the romance of Angel, it’s also true that the writing still fundamentally takes him—and Buffy’s relationship with him—seriously. To some degree it has to. Because Buffy is the show’s emotional anchor, if the writing didn’t take her emotions seriously, the audience wouldn’t either. It needs to be sympathetic to her (regardless of whether it endorses her, per se), or else it would run the risk of losing all pathos. Making fun of Buffy and Angel makes for a great gag in “The Zeppo”, and fits with the general way that season three undermines the romanticism of them, but if that was the show’s attitude the whole way through, it would come off as simply meanspirited. It would seem like it was making fun of Buffy for being a stupid teenage girl in love, instead of sympathetically depicting the human experience of being caught up in big, tempestuous emotions.

But at the same time, if the writing were to only take romance seriously, that wouldn’t feel very true either. Or fit with the general Buffy ethos, which loves to flip between serious and silly moods in order to capture all sides of whatever it’s exploring. And therein is the magic of Spike’s addition to the chemistry of the show. Practically from his introduction, Spike parallels Buffy’s romantic storylines, except unlike Buffy, Spike is allowed to do the comic or morally incorrect thing. His status as a soulless vampire means that the show is free to use him to point out both the sillier and darker sides of romance, without tainting Buffy’s heroism or the seriousness of her emotions.

In “Becoming, Part 2” for example, Spike is free to explicitly say that he’s saving the world because he wants Dru back, and leaves Buffy to die once he’s gotten her. Whereas Buffy, despite also wanting the person she loves back, ultimately chooses to save the world rather than keep him. Spike allows the episode to show what Buffy’s, or anyone’s, romantic id might want, without Buffy herself going through with it. He also allows the episode to show the ridiculousness of the romantic id, by giving him comic moments like “Didn’t say I wouldn’t”, or “God, he’s going to kill her”, or beating Angel with a tire iron, or any of the times that Buffy makes fun of him (“The whole earth may be sucked into hell and you want my help ‘cause your girlfriend’s a big ho?”). All of which is in contrast to the tragic seriousness of Buffy’s heartbreak. Spike in season two is not a character without pathos; in fact, he has quite a lot of pathos that parallels Buffy’s--think of the tortured close-up on his face as Angel and Drusilla taunt him in “I Only Have Eyes For You.” But neither is he limited or defined by that pathos.

He plays a similar role in both “Lovers Walk” and “The Harsh Light of Day”. In “Lovers Walk” he’s devastated by the loss of Drusilla, as Buffy was devastated over Angel in “Anne”, yet the way they get out of their respective depressions is very different. Tonally, “Anne” plays Buffy’s misery extremely straight, and when Buffy decides to stop moping and become an agent in her own life again, her version of “agency” means getting in touch with her leadership and heroism. Whereas for Spike, agency means a love spell, or torturing Drusilla into liking him again. The romantic id tries to re-possess the object of its desire, whereas the ego or superego is able to set that desire aside, whether or not it wants to. More obviously, Spike in “Lovers Walk” parallels all of the other characters and their romantic situations. All of them are behaving somewhat selfishly or self-destructively in their love lives (Xander and Willow cheating, Buffy and Angel torturing themselves with friendship) but are in denial about the fact that they’re doing so. And then Spike blazes in with his version of love that is selfish, scary, grandiose, charming, pathetic, genuine, and absurd by turns—and suddenly, everyone’s romantic weaknesses are out in the open. It makes perfect sense that Spike finishes the episode gleeful and optimistic, because “Lovers Walk” as a whole represents a triumph of the romantic id over the romantic ego, if only temporarily. And it’s all handled with a brilliantly whiplash-y mix of comedy and tragedy because at the end of the day, the power of the romantic id really is ridiculous. The way that Spike turns on a dime between being scary and pathetic parallels the way it’s at once absurd, and kind of frightening, that your id would make you, say: cheat on your wonderful high school boyfriend, just to have a chance with your childhood crush.

Because Spike is often treated as the show’s romantic id, the writing’s relationship to his romanticism gets complicated. Like Angel, there is something romantic in his aesthetic and behavior, even if he doesn’t look like Angel’s conventional Byronic hero. He wears a long, dramatic coat, poses rebelliously with his cigarettes, and dotes on his paramour with the elaborate attentiveness of Gomez Addams. But unlike Angel, he is not just a romantic symbol or object, he is also a romantic subject. That is to say, Spike’s romantic storylines tend to emphasize his romantic desires, and use those desires as motivation. By contrast, Angel’s storylines don’t really have much to do with whether he’s “gotten” Buffy or not—instead they have to do with whether Buffy has gotten him. The fact that Buffy and Spike are both treated as romantic agents in this way is a key indication that the two characters are meant to parallel each other. Angel’s side of the Buffy/Angel romantic storyline has to do with whether he can control himself around Buffy, whereas Buffy’s has to do with whether he likes her or wants to be with her. Similarly, Spike’s romantic storylines hinge on the status of whether Drusilla or Buffy want him.

Not only is Spike a subject when it comes to romantic relationships, he’s also a subject when it comes to Romantic thinking. He is a character practically defined by his romanticism. He aspires to romantic things, and therefore can be used to poke at romantic outlooks. Despite his grand love for Drusilla for instance, she still cheats on him, and he still has to knock her out, do a love spell, or torture her to get her back. Or he’ll make grand pronouncements that are immediately followed by things like getting tasered by the Initiative or falling into an open grave. Because of this, Spike is able to parallel Buffy’s Romantic thinking as well, not just her romantic desires. Notice how in “The Freshman”, when Buffy is feeling out of touch with her Romantic Slayer self, that she has a scene where she’s treated like Spike--she delivers a dramatic threat and then falls through a ceiling. Or in “Some Assembly Required” when she obeys her id and hotly demands that Angel listen to her, she falls into an open grave. This kind of comedy has a lot in common with the deadpan Angel humor discussed in the last section, but notice that the target of that humor is Angel’s romantic objecthood rather than an outlook Angel has. Angel’s role, when it comes to romanticism, has to do with how Buffy and the audience sees him, whereas Spike’s role (at least in the early seasons) has to do with how Spike sees, period.

The show doesn’t just poke at Spike’s outlook though, it also uses him to poke at other people’s romanticism. In season two, for example, Spike is the one who gets impatient with Angel’s grandstanding, sarcastically explaining that “we do still kill people, you know” and “it’s a big rock.” In “Lovers Walk” he’s the one who cuts through Buffy and Angel’s drama, reducing it to “googly eyes” with a dismissive handwave (while also building it up in his projection-y “you’ll never be friends” speech). In “Something Blue” he points out that Willow is barely holding it together. In “Pangs” he’s the one who brings the debate over the Chumash nihilistically back down to earth, and in “The Yoko Factor” he schools Adam on Yoko not really splitting the Beatles apart. In other words, Spike attempts to see both the romance and the reality of things. He is the avatar of both, which I would argue makes complete sense, because in many ways romance and reality are really two sides of the same coin. Poetry and stories are fake and bigger than life, but you use them to tell truths. But being the id, his point of view can be hypocritical and biased as much as insightful, just like anyone’s gut reactions and poetic notions can be. After all, you can use poetry to tell lies, too.

Lastly, on a meta level, there is a tackiness to Spike that undermines his romantic qualities better than making him dangerous ever could. Spike likes Passions and Dawson’s Creek (in contrast to Angel reading La Nausée by firelight). He lives in a crypt, but the vibe is more “homeless” than “Dracula” (in contrast to Angel’s tastefully decorated apartment). Spike may act like a romantic, but what does it say about how romantic romanticism really is, that the romantic things he likes can be so unrefined? And with the chip, he’s rendered impotent and pathetic. To me, there’s no more perfect image of how the writing uses Spike than the image of him in his black coat, red shirt, and big, leather boots, blasted under the fluorescent light of his Initiative cell. Light that makes his aesthetic seem suddenly fake and silly and surreal. For all that the writing subverts Angel, he is still the kind of character who gets to disappear mysteriously into the shadows, because he is the romance that Buffy has been forced to abandon. Whereas Spike is left with no place to hide.

If Angel represented the idea of binaries, then Spike represents the lack of them. There is a reason that Spike invites so many queer readings. He is a vampire, but he loves. He is an object, but he’s a subject. He tells the truth, but he lies. He is a villain, but he is a hero. He is masculine, but he is feminine. He is insightful, but he’s a fool. He is pathetic, but he is sympathetic. He is on the outside of the Scoobies, but he is on the inside. These aspects of him are not split between different personas, but exist within him simultaneously. It is telling that the show introduces human, mythos-bending vampires like Spike and Dru in a season about disillusionment, and it is telling that Spike’s role in the show becomes ascendant in the seasons after Buffy leaves Angel and his split personality behind. As Buffy begins to reckon more deeply with her id, and her dualities, she will begin to reckon with Spike.

part 3: “Something effulgent”: Season five and the construction of Spike the romantic

#romanticism series #buffy #spike #angel #s2 #s3 #s4 #gen #btvs

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s11e17 · 3 years

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i feel like a lot of the sam vs. dean dynamic can be better understood when we understand their histories with violence and with agency. like, they both make bad calls and it doesn’t mean they don’t love each other. it just means they have completely different approaches to bodily autonomy and consent.

like, if we consider gadreel, right. dean sees staying alive as a duty to your loved ones (e.g. he keeps Bobby in check throughout his suicidality in s6-7 by asking him to stay alive for Dean and Sam), and he sees keeping people alive as the ultimate way to show that you love them (which is why he gets so mad when he finds out sam didn’t look for him when he was in purgatory!). and this is a view sam subscribes to before lucifer — in 2.08, for example, Sam says that staying alive is the best way to honor their dad’s memory.

and then, on the flip side, we’ve got sam. post-lucifer, post-Cage, sam values choice and agency above everything else. his lack of control over his body is pretty explicit from day 1 — the pilot features sam getting kissed without his consent by the woman in white, and it’s a trend that follows him throughout the rest of the show. sam would rather have died than consented to gadreel’s possession — it’s why he says they need to respect castiel’s choice when cas consents to lucifer’s possession in 11.18, even though dean is going absolutely apeshit over the whole situation.

i feel like this boils down to their experiences of possession and agency. sam’s afraid of external forces taking over — demon blood, demonic possession, angelic possession. dean, on the other hand, is afraid of himself — his role as a torturer in Hell, the Mark of Cain, the fact that he blames himself for being coercively attracted to Amara in s11. so they’re both coming at possession from totally different angles.

if we return to gadreel for a sec, sam is clearly thinking of the whole thing as a violation. but dean just sees the violent result (i.e. Kevin’s death) as problematic, and he blames himself for it. he doesn’t see how possession is inherently violating, because he doesn’t have the context for it.

and that’s not his fault! dean’s clearly been through it, i’m not denying that. there’s tons of evidence for Dean as a survivor of sexualized violence (for example, we know based on 7.02 that he encountered vetala, who use sex to lure their prey), and Dean often gets bullied for his “delicate features” (6.01). I feel like the fact that he has clearly and repeatedly experienced objectification of his body and violations of his consent means that he understands sexual violence as a complicated, difficult thing, and sees it as separate from possession.

the only time possession and sexual violence are conflated for dean is in 9.02, when abaddon makes sexually suggestive comments towards dean while trying to remove his anti-possession tattoo. it’s so exceptional that dean comments on it ("Are we going to fight or make out, because I’m getting some mixed signals here”). it’s the exception that proves the rule — usually possession isn’t tied up with sexual violence, so when it is, it’s noteworthy.

for sam, on the other hand, possession and sexual violence are two sides of the same coin. hallucifer’s offhanded “the rapier wit, the wittier rape” in 7.15 is pretty undeniable, alongside his numerous references to them being “bunkmates” (e.g. 11.10) — undoubtedly, lucifer is sam’s rapist. sam’s relationship with ruby is one of consensual-but-complicated sex. toni uses mind-entering magic in 12.02 to coerce sam into sex, thereby getting information out of him.

anyway. all of this is to say that if we can read either sam or dean with some measure of generosity, we can read both of them with that same level of care. dean’s understanding of possession as only potentially evil is a meaningful one. dean never learns the “lesson” Heaven tried to teach him — he continues to have agency over himself and his body (again, until s14, when Michael’s possession fundamentally changes Dean’s understanding of possession). Possession isn’t bad unless it makes you do something you wouldn’t otherwise do. Sam, on the other hand, understands possession as inherently violating.

i think one of the big themes i’m taking away from this fifteen year long saga is the broad theme of agency and the individual experience of autonomy. “team free will” isn’t just a stupid moniker — it’s an assertion of our main characters’ fundamental understanding of their goals and desires in the world (which explains why the show ends with their triumph over a voyeuristic god). in a post-God context (what a phrase.. ahhh supernatural), we have to wonder what free will on an individual level looks like for both sam and dean. now that all of humanity has "free will," what does individual self-determination look like for the lads???

#ofc dean dies like a week or arguably five years after so hmm #anyway #spn meta #consent in supernatural #the winchesters #**

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faultlessfinish · 3 years

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Hi, hello, I’m here to talk about people sexualizing Grant Wilson from Dungeons and Daddies and why it needs to stop. This post will include examples of people sexualizing a minor and mocking a gay kid’s sexuality, so heads up for that.

He gets sexualized by people in the discord server, with no response from mods (unless you count “oof”). (Link goes to a compilation of stuff that includes, well, people sexualizing a minor.)

He gets sexualized repeatedly in the show. (Link goes to a separate compilation of stuff that includes, again, people sexualizing a minor.)

And Grant’s sexuality,* when brought up, is often the butt of the joke (sources in same link as above).

There’s the stuff in a Talking Dad where Matt says that he found evidence of Grant watching gay porn on the computer, and that he’d “get into it - not like that” to "learn about what Grant likes,” laughing all the while.

There’s the dad fact about how “Grant has never jerked off in that house” because Darryl cleans the bathroom so rigorously.

There’s the so-hilarious part where apparently Grant begged to get to watch 300 with his dad because of “the frickin hot dudes.”

* (I’m personally comfortable with “queer” but I know not everybody is, so I’ll go with “gender and sexual minority/GSM” for the rest of this post. You know who I mean. Folks who, y’know, know where the farmer’s market is.) Not only does Grant get more of this bullshit than the other sons, but he’s the only canonically GSM somewhat major character in DnDads (and likely the only one we’ll ever get), and that does extra bug me. Not that it would be okay for any of the sons, but it hits different, for me at least, when it’s Grant. Time works different when you’re not the “default settings” for gender and sexuality. We fundamentally do not get to grow up on the same schedule of milestones – I think you could argue that nobody actually lives that Hollywood nonsense, but I know for a lot of us, it means being a lot older than most cis and/or allo and/or het teens when we first get the chance to be in a relationship, or it means it takes us longer to feel ready for that, or sometimes it means that we aren't ever going to be "ready" because we're just not into dating and relationships and that's a valid way to be. It can mean that the person or people you are in a relationship with live really far away or maybe that there's somebody very special to you and you can't even mention that safely to your family. But then there's this flip side of the coin where as soon as a kid is known to be GSM, some people (whether in the real world or in the stories they tell) act like that kid can't be a kid anymore, like coming out is the same as announcing your intent to be sexual when sexual orientation and sexual identity are not about that. We're still haunted by all the years when the only visible GSM people on or offscreen were the ones who couldn't hide it because their privacy had been invaded: the privacy of their bedrooms, and then the privacy of their deathbeds. So many writers still don’t know how to tell a story about a GSM person that isn't about them being hypersexual, a victim, or both. I'm not saying healthy expressions of sexuality between consenting adults are wrong, and I'm not saying that harm doesn't happen to our community, but we are so much more than that and we always have been. So for the minors that are listening to this show, so that you’ve heard somebody say it: if you’re a gay kid, you’re still a kid. If you need to have a training-wheels crush on somebody of an inappropriate age, well, it happens, but it’s not something adults should laugh about or endorse. If somebody is getting undressed in front of you and you express that you’re uncomfortable with it, they should stop. You don’t need to be interested in sex right now (or ever), and you don’t need to feel like you’re not “really” whatever orientation you are until you’ve engaged in sexual activity with somebody of the corresponding gender(s). The adults who love and support you do not assume that you choose your media based on whether it has people you’re sexually attracted to, and they don’t laugh behind your back about it. They don’t try to infer your preferred sex acts (through looking at your browser history or otherwise), and they don’t obsess about whether you’re masturbating or laugh about it. Nobody should be talking about whether you’re “good, giving, and game” or whether you’re “into pain.” Nobody should be teaching you about BDSM and kinks when you’re 11-13 or however old Grant is right now. I know a lot of the minors who listen to this show identify a lot with Grant. I want you all to know that you have all the time that you need to figure out who you are and what that means for you. Nobody gets to rush you, push you, mock you, make you uncomfortable, or invade your privacy. I’ll be putting some resources in a follow-up post here, but I wanted to make sure that the above point had been said in this space.

#dndads #dungeons and daddies #grant wilson #cw: homophobia #cw: sexualizing minors

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inventors-fair · 3 years

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Shareholders Meeting (Generosity Commentary)

This was absolutely new territory for me, 100%. I used to be a Sen Triplets player, for cryin’ out loud. Who would I give my opponents anything, ever, for any reason? But that’s the beauty of this, though. Being a Magic player and running design contests means I have to see beyond what I might want to play with right off the bat. And I do have my manipulative tactics from time to time. Has anyone seen that Modern deck that synergizes with Suture Priest/Blood Seeker, Hunted Phantasm, Forbidden Orchard, Sickness in the Ranks, and Blood Artist? It’s jank but I love it.

When talking about these cards, there are the usual questions about design and likes/dislikes, but there’s the most important question, and one that’s gonna come up a lot:

Is there any reason this card HAS to enter under an opponent’s control?

The main issue I saw with a lot of cards is that there wasn’t always a reason for them to be under an opponent’s control, instead of just having an effect that could exist on the card regularly. For this commentary, I’ll be calling that a “Control Factor.” Also, some cards that were potential winners/runners will be marked as Judge Picks.

Let’s take a look.

@aethernalstars — Labyrinthine Towershell

Likes/Dislikes: This is an oddball design first and foremost. I can see the inspiration from the art, and while I don’t play WoW I can get the gist of what that place is, what the world is, through your design, so that’s nice! Shroud being what it is, though, and considering an opponent gains control of it, I’m not sure why that was chosen over hexproof. Just so an opponent can’t get rid of it with targeting effects? I can see how this would slow them down. I’m not sure why blue/red are the colors for this card. It feels mostly blue/green. Is the red because of the control? Additionally, I feel that even with the color weight this card is severely undercosted; you made a powerful ability, which is good! Just needs balance.

Control Factor: I’m feel that this could have been a hexproof creature with “Whenever a creature an opponent controls” etc. to affect their board that way. What’s the flavor of an opponent gaining control of this? Why not just have the turtle as a kind of maze guardian? It’s a strong ability and contender.

Nitpicks: Second ability should probably be an “as” ability and not an ETB trigger, and needs “an opponent of your choice.” Or see Xantcha’s oracle.

~~~

@askkrenko — Maheer, Trusted Advisor (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: I had a headache trying to figure out what this card would do practically on the battlefield. And you know what? I had a field day and I loved it and wow, this card is a competitive player’s dream. The resource management, the potential loss, the incredible decisions to be made, the way that this has to be utilized for optimizing life loss and card advantage and deciding who gets what where... Wow. I can imagine this card being in some competitive cube and/or actually severely affecting eternal formats and/or limited. Impressive and difficult. For two mana I’d say it’s pushed, but pushed ain’t broken. Probably.

Control Factor: Yes, the switching of control for life loss and the flavor of a lying advisor traveling across the battlefield works both flavorfully and mechanically.

Nitpicks: “Activate this ability,” not “Use.”

~~~

@dabudder — Bounty Board

Likes/Dislikes: Fight is a difficult ability sometimes. And this card has repeatable fight, colorless fight, and ramping. I feel that that’s just enough to be a break. Arena and Triangle of War are old as butts, and nowadays I don’t know if there would be that much of a precedent at such a low cost. If you have a good enough board state even in limited, this card becomes a gold-giver in exchange for destruction at two mana. I do like the flavor, and the flavor text ain’t bad. Probably still too big a risk.

Control Factor: I like the flavor but I don’t understand it entirely. Who is on the bounty board? Your creatures, or your opponent’s creatures? If it’s yours, why are you playing a card that puts a bounty on them? If it’s your opponents, wouldn’t YOU get the reward for fulfilling the bounty?

Nitpicks: “Gold” should be capitalized, and probably be “Treasure.”

~~~

@deafeningsandwichpeach — Ancient Sea Gate

Likes/Dislikes: I feel that unfortunately this card is fundamentally broken, and not in your favor. Yeah, they skip a draw step, but now you’re giving an opponent a land that can activate a Emmessi Tome for two mana every turn. At that point you’ve lost a land drop, you’ve given them card advantage at the cost of a single draw step, and you are immediately and woefully behind. The mechanics of this card as they are now are interesting, absolutely interesting, and absolutely unplayable.

Control Factor: Mechanically I kind of see what you were trying to go for. Flavorfully I don’t understand at all.

Nitpicks: None. (Well, I mean, the border for lands that make colored mana should match, but that’s not your fault at all.)

~~~

@dimestoretajic — Xantcha, Enlightened Infiltrator

Likes/Dislikes: Once I could read this card, I understood its intentions. It’s a strong callback to Xantcha, so you know, kudos for that. And also, this card only works in multiplayer, which is a bit of a problem. If you only have one opponent, then you play this card, you activate the 0 and draw/lose life, and then you have to attack her until she gets to ten because that zero ability literally can’t be activated. If you’re the only opponent, then nobody can be targeted. Was that intentional? If so, kudos for making a complex card but un-kudos because that feels super unintuitive. “lowest numerical value” also doesn’t entirely make sense to me, because it’s not a “negative ten” ability, it’s “remove ten loyalty counters” as an activation cost.

I feel that there could be a risk-reward potentially associated with this card, or you could add the must abilities into the activations themselves, but it’s hovering in between clunky and unplayable. Assuming the best, that you’re in a 3-4 player game, you have a insanely-difficult-to-remove clock for three mana that draws you a crapload of cards. Which, you know, some people could like! But it’s the kind of card that doesn’t make you friends.

Control Factor: Yep, checks out. See above notes on opponent targeting in 1v1, though.

Nitpicks: “0″ abilities don’t need a plus or minus. Was this a card creator limiting factor? If so, ignore my ignorance.

~~~

@emmypupcake — Volatile Mixture

Likes/Dislikes: It’s a cute bauble that swings around and hurts people, checks out. Colored artifact with a relevant ability, sure thing. How does it play? ... Well, I was doubtful and then I read it again. Wow, I really misread this card. So you’re playing hot potato for a whole lot of turns. Okay, that’s fun. That’s fun! Yeah, I totally messed up when I read this the first time. I think that this card is pretty interesting in concept. I think that it could kind of be just a tax, though, and it’s entirely possible that it just never goes off during a game and everyone is spending two mana to ensure that they don’t get stuck. Or, for three mana, you’ve made kind of a worse shock. It’s a perfectly fine card that probably needs a more volatile gimmick. What if it flipped coins or something? I don’t know, I’m spitballing. Hm, but no, ignore that, I’m liking the flavor of having to keep it under control. Shame that it just doesn’t have a guaranteed explosion.

Control Factor: Fun enough to use the wording, juggles well, forces decisions. Checks out!

Nitpicks: “Volatile Mixture enters the battlefield under target opponent’s control.” Could also Xantcha that wording.

~~~

@evscfa1 — Contract of Peace

Likes/Dislikes: There’s nothing fundamentally wrong with this card’s design, but it feels clunky to say the least. Four separate abilities that are tangentially connected, the weird activation, the static... I think, more than anything, I don’t get it. What’s the contract? What’s the peace of a one-sided battlefield? Is it ironic, with a bribery type of activation? What do the Treasures have to do with peace? This card could be printed but again, I don’t understand why it would exist, or the world around it, or what sort of set it would belong in. “Disjointed” is a good word for this card. A singular design that doesn’t feel like it meshes with any flavor or archetype. All cards are submitted without context, but the best cards imply context, and that’s where I feel the mark was missed.

Control Factor: Is an opponent being forced to sign a contract? Again, the “why” of this card feels obfuscated.

Nitpicks: “15” should be written out as “fifteen.”

~~~

@fractured-infinity — Sleeper Agent’s Gambit

Likes/Dislikes: I loved this card until I didn’t. On the surface, you have a fantastic flavorful design with great flavor text and a new, silly ability. And then, for three mana, you essentially ensure that your opponents are going to have the most frustrating time of their lives. In limited, this card is an early-game decimator, and that’s...well, it feels a little harsh. Two targets (creature you control + opponent) and the multicolored factor aren’t that hard to get around, and once you do, my gut says that this card is more frustrating than fun, especially when you consider some of the creatures that you can give to your opponent. How could it have been improved? Well, consider: what if it was an aura? It could be put on a creature then given to an opponent, and it had those abilities. “Gambits” are calculated but still have a risk, like a non-indefinite strategy. I want to like this idea but I’m still getting frustrating over fun. Look at Necrotic Plague, for example. In kind of the same vein, y’know?

Control Factor: Perfect.

Nitpicks: If all else fails and you wanna keep this card, the wording could be a little more streamlined: “Target opponent gains control of target creature you control. That creature gains ‘This permanent can’t be sacrificed’ and ‘At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice a creature.’” For your future, make sure “can’t” replaces “cannot,” and that punctuation goes inside quotes.

~~~

@fumblehawk — Gwafa, Monopolous Merchant

Likes/Dislikes: Out of all the things I expected, a different take on Gwafa “MF’in’” Hazid was not one of them. So the card itself! It’s cool. It’s a little weird, but it’s cool. I like the idea of drawing cards as payment for forcing gifts. The tax effect is something very interesting to consider with how much this card kind of wants to get rid of cards, and you can end up giving things that tax all players, and even make some kind of freaky Zedruu deck. I mean, this feels MADE for Zedruu and Grand Arbiter and all kinds of EDH decks. The thing is, this card doesn’t feel too different from the OG Gwafa, and I don’t know how to feel about that. There’s nothing wrong with revisiting legendary creatures, of course, but the effect... I don’t know, I’m iffy on it. This is a strong submission but I feel that there could have been a different method of execution.

Control Factor: Checks out!

Nitpicks: The “draw a card” should be a separate sentence, just like, “They do the thing. Draw a card.” Secondly, it’s “Spells your opponents CAST cost” etc. Small note, but...this card is really small. Consider downloading Magic Set Editor or finding a better way to export your cards, if you can?

~~~

@gollumni — Gift of Humility

Likes/Dislikes: Don’t be humble, you finished your final! Congrationulations! So this card. It’s a’ight? So here’s the thing. Nine Lives + this card. HA. Hilarious! Delusions of Mediocrity! Illusions of Grandeur! Nefarious Lich! There’s a lot of mean and dumb and fun synergies with this card, and the thing is, well, I know you were in a place when you submitted this. So I’ll excuse the lack of flavor text and whatever and just say that, like Harmless Offering from Eldritch Moon, this card has potential and still nobody’s gonna want to open it from a booster pack. Unless it becomes massively competitive in some stupid Esper Lich Control deck.

Control Factor: Yep, that’s the point of the card!

Nitpicks: Get some sleep.

~~~

@hiygamer — Tibalt, Chaotic Menace

Likes/Dislikes: It’s interesting how many legendary cards people submitted for this contest. Hm, guess we did have three as example designs. Regardless! So the activated abilities are the best part of this card. I do like the tension between a random player and a random player who’s not Tibalt’s owner. In 1v1 this can get really tense. Ditch a card at random, flip a coin, aaaand... Nope, you’re stuck with him. My main complaint is the second trigger. “The number of loyalty counters that were on him as the turn began?” There are so many memory issues potentially associated with that. The more triggers that go off and the more factors that go into calculating that, the less reasonable that ability becomes. This card isn’t bad, and I know why you wanted that ability, but there has to be a better way of making that happen. I’d workshop that a bit. And also, if you’re using MSE? Consider changing individual text sizes because wow this card is hard to read.

Control Factor: Yep, makes sense that he’s going around wrecking face, and the complexities are totally fine.

Nitpicks: I’m pretty sure the first ability should read “You must activate at least one of Tibalt’s abilities each turn if able.” Then “whenever” is just...weird and gets into Judge Tower territory.

~~~

@hypexion — Jenny Spellshare

Likes/Dislikes: So let’s start off with the fact that I like this card’s abilities a lot. That’s... Well, honestly, I don’t even have to qualify that. It’s a powerful Bant commander with crazy group-hug abilities and LOTS of token copies that, while powerful, can be mitigated into some nasty stuff. You got wheels, eggs, control cards, draw limiters—like, imagining setting up things like Hullbreacher and the ilk and going nuts with copies. So yeah, fun Commander card and could even be interesting in limited! My two minor complains that stop this from being really great: One, a faerie creature without flying hasn’t been printed in a non-supplemental set since 1995. Two... “Jenny?” “Judith” at least has Hebrew origins, but man, that name threw me off. I do have a friend named Jenny who plays Magic, funnily enough. Yeah, heh, just something to consider. Kinda takes me out of the world. Consider flavor text?

Control Factor: Perfect for what you want to do.

Nitpicks: What is UP with that line spacing? Did you hit shift+enter? I’m talking about between “cast” and “Whenever.” Or did that just go to a separate line. In any cast those should DEFINITELY be separated. ... Wow, don’t we all love nitpicks. This is probably the nit-picky-est one I’ve done in a while.

~~~

@i-am-the-one-who-wololoes — Xymik, Who Gifts Pain

Likes/Dislikes: So, yeah, Xymic is a name I want to hold me up against a brick wall and weight its body on me, midnight on Halstead street, neon blurs in the air. That is a sexy name. ... Cards? Cards. SO. It’s pretty good. I can see this being part of either a supplemental Commander set OR equally a standard Grixis-themed set, which we haven’t had in a while. Really sucks that Ikoria was both not great gameplay wise and also released in the middle of a pandemic. For this card, personally, I initially thought “well you can just merge them” but I see what you did, clever clogs! Donate a permanent, make ‘em chuck a card. Multiplayer, send a permanent around the table, make ‘em lose life! Huh, this is actually kind of awesome. Small personal factors: I would pump the P/T a little, perhaps, for a four-color card; this could be as much as a 5/3. This does feel more like a Demon than a Devil to me, too. And, a tiny bit of flavor text could go a long way. Could you also have the second ability read “spell or permanent?” It’s niche, but...

Control Factor: Perf-a-rooni.

Nitpicks: None!

~~~

@justincase-1012 — Fire Ant Infestation

Likes/Dislikes: Conceptually, this is cool. Ant infestations done flavorfully are neat, and I like the aspect of you not having to continuously deal damage because you can hit once and then pseudo-populate. On second thought reviewing this card, I think that that’s surprisingly flavorful. Once the ants get in, the rest of the ants can just pump in more freakin’ ants. There are wording nitpicks I’ll get to later, but the gist of this card is that it’s very strong and requires a balance to also make the damage from attacking tokens not hit you too. You know what, I’ll give it a tentative seal of approval. I don’t really get why it’s a 1/3 and not, well, a 3/1, and I’m not sold on the flavor of an “infestation” being a creature. “Fire Ant Colony” could work? Not super flavorful, but it’s in progress. Also, MAJOR issue: There’s a card called Fire Ants with a different ability. Named tokens of previous cards absolutely exist, see Future Sight spellshapers, but this one is way too similar. “Fire Ant Drone” maybe.

Control Factor: Yup, does what it’s gotta do.

Nitpicks: Wording time: “...that player creates a 1/1 red and black Insect creature token named Fire Ant with “At the beginning of your upkeep, Fire Ant deals 1 damage to you.”” And see above notes on that token name.

~~~

@koth-of-the-hammerpants — Temporary Loan

Likes/Dislikes: There is a fundamental flaw in how this card works when you have two extra mana. So, you play this turn four, and now it’s turn five on your go. You drop a three-mana creature, then give it to an opponent, then they give you a random permanent, then you immediately pay UB and sacrifice what they gave you to get your card back. So this card effectively becomes “Whenever a permanent enters the battlefield under your control, you may pay UB. If you do, target opponent sacrifices a permanent” in the most roundabout way. In short, this card is not fun, especially with lands that you can tap for mana in response to entering. under your control.

Control Factor: Flavorfully understandable, see above mechanical notes. Not worth it.

Nitpicks: The “If you do” clause is a run-on sentence and should end with “...a permanent they control and you gain control of it.” “Sacrifice” and “Gain” should be capitalized. And, um... “Time’s up my friend” should definitely be “Time’s up, my friend.” with a period. Because otherwise it sounds like the friend is Christopher Walken in Pulp Fiction.

~~~

@mardu-lesbian — Grift Horse (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: My eyes could not roll out of my head any harder at that name. Stellar work. So! This card! Wow. “Gimme the goods, then I’m gonna wreck shop.” For a four-mana potential fun removal gimmick and an indefinite steal, this is a surprisingly powerful card. “Gimme Ugin, aaaand...here’s a horse. AND BOLT THE HORSE.” Also, I had to double-check, but good wording on that second ability! Scab-Clan Giant, yeah? In short, this does sort of kind of become a rough removal card and more or less wrecks shop with an opponent’s bomb, but rares are supposed to be powerful, y’know? I can’t fault it for that. I’d love to see this in limited, I’d love to see some EDH bullcrap go down with making an indestructible horse or whatever, and hm, what would the art be? Maybe an Eldrazi horse, actually, with tentacles coming out of the mouth. Horse Horror? Yeah, this opens the question: “how powerful can red’s indefinite stealing be?”

Control Factor: Shifty Thrifty Grifty.

Nitpicks: If you’re using MSE, you can adjust the flavor bar offset. Also I’m officially challenging you to draw this horse.

~~~

@misterstingyjack — Mercenary Contract

Likes/Dislikes: So...okay, so you’re turning a creature you control into a mercenary for your opponents? Kind of? You’re getting gold for the things they’re doing, makes sense. I guess. This card’s kind of hard to work around. It’s a lot of text, too. So the thing is, I don’t really get why you’d have to give something to an opponent for this flavor to work. Enchant a creature you control, it gets a buff and has to attack, and whenever it attacks you get a Treasure. Spreading things around doesn’t make the most sense in the world, honestly. But I do get it, and I think I understand the gameplay prioritization you were shooting for. I’m being a little harsh on the card because I feel that in a printed set it could just be worded/printed differently. Fundamentally, it’s not the strangest thing in the world.

Control Factor: See above notes about flavor. Main problem is that why is your contract sending it to work for an opponent? Wouldn’t the opponent have to sign something? Contracts are hard.

Nitpicks: “Whenever enchanted creature attacks or an ability of enchanted creature is activated, if its owner does not control it, that player creates a Treasure token.” See Illusionist’s Bracers.

~~~

@nicolbolas96 — Slimeknife,Mercenary Thallid

Likes/Dislikes: Step one: play Pandemonium/Warstorm Surge. Step two: get literally a 1/1 creature or token. Step three: infinite cards/ETB triggers. That last ability has a LOT of random infinite combos it can do, and I kind of like that, but it’s really asking to be abused. But that’s not a bad thing. Kind of. There are probably more ways to deal damage and whatnot. So the thing is, this card does give the tokens to your opponents, but...why? What major flavorful purpose does it serve? Dowsing Dagger created Plants because it symbolized the undergrowth that the creature had to cut through. Hunted creatures made tokens because they were, well, being hunted. What about Slimeknife? That ability really doesn’t feel like it needs to be on this card, and this card honestly could be a rare. It’s a GREAT deathtouch commander, probably one of the best if it existed. Doesn’t excuse that disconnect, though. ... And yes, “Fungus Assassin” is awesome.

Control Factor: Ultimately, not necessary. The card works better without it.

Nitpicks: “Creature tokens,” not “token creatures.” See Aven Wind Guide. Also, check the comma in the name?

~~~

@nine-effing-hells — Overeager Adjutant

Likes/Dislikes: I’m kind of worried about this card. A one-mana 3/3 with haste is pretty nasty. Goblin Guide and Monastery Swiftspear are already challenging enough, with Vexing Devil also thrown into the burn pile. The question is whether or not the drawback of 1/1s that can’t block and the card disadvantage will be good enough to stop an aggro build. In theory, there would come a point in limited where your opponents are drawing extra cards and playing creatures the Adjutant can’t get through, or you’re doing some nasty removal... But a strong aggro player running something like Burchett’s Gruul build or a devastating Human midrange build will use this card to their advantage. Questions of flavor come up, too. How is eagerness creating tokens? Drawing cards is a maybe, but the things that are being done don’t feel connected to, say, the attacking or you having creatures enter.

Control Factor: I don’t understand flavorfully where the humans are coming from and why they can’t block this creature.

Nitpicks: None.

~~~

@real-aspen-hours — Gift // grift (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: Well, it’s a split card. And it’s a good split card. And it does good things. So, I won’t beat around the bush, the nitpicks are really what doomed this card. There’s just a lot that I had to excuse to make it a judge pick, which is kind of a bummer but against the other submissions, it stands out. So let’s leave that for that section and talk about the good things. I love the rhyming split card names. Frankly, I want to have a future split card contest just to see the weirdness that people come up with. “Gift” is a perfectly acceptable upshifted Harmless Offering, and wow, “grift” is one of the most powerful and frightening cards I’ve seen in a while. It’s reminiscent of Skyclave Apparition, but with the Treasure advantage. This card can 100% take over games and worth playing in nonred decks for that alone. It might need to be four mana, possibly even five, but I do like it a lot.

Control Factor: Yep, “Gift” does it, and actually “grift” too. Heh, it’s neat.

Nitpicks: 1) Grift needs to be capitalized. 2) Your submission was missing rarity. 3) I capitalized “Sorcery” for you but in your original submission both were lowercase. 4) Both rules texts were missing periods at the end. 5) “Nonland” is one word. 5) “Its,” not “it’s.” 6) “Treasure” needs to be capitalized.

~~~

@shakeszx — Alder Hahn, helpful recruiter

Likes/Dislikes: So this is pretty obviously a Commander-oriented card, and that’s alright. I was iffy about some of the flavor stuff, but actually, the “my men always collect” line aligns nicely with the Treasure token creation. Attacks OR blocks—that’s a good catch. Makes 1v1 matches not too overpowered, and you can get some awesome control in. Giving defender tokens to players, or forcing them to block bad attacks... This could be a pretty fun card, honestly. The more I think about it the more I’m down for it. It’s outside of my ordinary play style, but there are symmetrical effects and bribery fun stuff that could make this a funky little card. Not a fan of the name at all, though. “Helpful Recruiter” doesn’t tell me anything about, like, why he’s recruiting, or who his men are, or his motivations, or whatever. The flavor text is great but “helpful” is just...ech, I’m overthinking it. “Recruiter” too, though, like, is he forcing them to be recruited? It feels more like reconnaissance or Mafia-style forced brutality.

Control Factor: Bingo, we’re gettin’ boys.

Nitpicks: Capitalize all important words in the name. Also, the second ability could be “Whenever a creature you own but don’t control attacks or blocks,” right?

~~~

@thedirtside — Burden of Parenthood

Likes/Dislikes: A mythic Nettlevine Blight-ish self-replicated token giver of awesome proportions that means players have to carefully strategize their creature interactions over time? Awesome. I like how if they get two of them, then... You... Oh, wait, it’s... Ha, um, there might be a lil’ flaw here. So, Opponent has a Squire, you play BoP. Their first upkeep, they get their Squire token. You do yours. Their second upkeep, they stack the triggers: “I’m going to have the Burden upkeep trigger resolve first, giving me a copy of my Squire. Then, the first token trigger will resolve, and I’ll sacrifice the second token I created this way.” So all this card does until you get rid of it is allow them to carefully make a token then sac a token each turn. Was that intentional? If so, well, why? Kinda falls apart when you take into consideration Magic’s #weirdness. Also. What does this have to do with parenthood. I’m genuinely stumped what the flavor is supposed to convey. Is this like...people being forced to give birth to putrescent goblins or something??

Control Factor: This part does check out, yeah. However, the contest specified that you weren’t supposed to use effects that gave each player something.

Nitpicks: There shouldn’t really be “target” there. “Nonland” is one word. The base power and toughness should be “1/1″ instead of “1.”

~~~

@walker-of-the-yellow-path — Questing Grail (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: ETB ability, fantastic, okay, we’re conveying that you’re giving someone a challenge your creatures are going to tackle. Attack trigger, fantastic, they’re getting the thrill of the hunt and the charge. Damage trigger, the blood is being spilled and the opponent is considering how much they want to then increase the damage all around and the risk of combat. This card makes combat so complicated, and so much more thrilling, and wowza this would make for some insane limited games. I have two issues. Firstly, this needs to be legendary for the love of God this needs to be legendary. It would fit the flavor, and then the three separate triggers wouldn’t be a pain. As much. Secondly, the last ability. So, are you supposed to get a blood counter on it for each creature that deals combat damage? Because unless something has first strike, it’s going to all happen at the same time. Multiple counters, or just when you get hit for the first time? The intentions are unclear. So I would phrase it to say “Whenever one or more creatures deal combat damage to you, put [a OR that many] blood counter[s] on Questing Grail and their controller gains control of Questing Grail.” Aside from that, this is some Eldraine-y Knight-y Bloody Greatness.

Control Factor: 10/10.

Nitpicks: None!

~~~

@whuh-oh — Gilded Egg // Prized Hatchling (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: This card is a pain in the butt. I love it! So, let’s see. The ways in which you have to ramp up to getting this card specifically under your control is really weird, and measured, and you have to take care of some careful calculation. The sorcery speed is super important, though, and I’m glad you added that in. And man, hatchling counters? Ludevic would be proud. On the flip side, a 2/4 flier in green is pretty rough. I don’t know entirely how I feel about that part specifically. The Food token, ha, that’s glorious. The mana generation, though? WOW. Alhammarret’s Archive makes a whole lot of cool infinite stuff possible, but it’s not easy, I’ll say that much. The mana with the food, like—Wow again. I am Wowed.

Control Factor: The tempting offer and the opportunity is really well-done. Plays nice with the flavor of the sought-after prize.

Nitpicks: Tsk, go back to Modern Masters (2013) witcha “is indestructible”-lookin’ self, CHUMP. ... Ahem. Sorry, I got possessed by the ghost of someone from 2013 elated to open a Vedalken Shackles.

~~~

@wolkemesser — Eden

Likes/Dislikes: Alright, there are...a few points to start from.

Mechanically: if Eden’s controller is doing anything but adding a single mana with this card, then they are bad Magic player, or they have an exact and direct answer to the token being created, because poisonous 3 and a “lose the game” token (with evasion) are so utterly broken that there is no way you’d want an opponent to gain control of them. Even in a 3+ person game, what happens to you? Play Eden, give it to someone last in the order, they give your next opponent a skulking deathtoucher, and then you lose the game. This can happen as early as turn one. In 1v1 this card has no real purpose other than to be used once and basically never again unless someone is forced to use it. In multiplayer games it’s a death sentence. You’re losing a land drop from the deck for a card that won’t ever be used in a way that’s advantageous to your gameplan.

Contextually: In what set is this card supposed to exist? You use both Skulk and Poisonous, retired and unpopular mechanics that don’t appear on the same token even if they do have a possibility of being together. In what environment would this card be played?

Flavorfully: So this is the real, Biblical garden of Eden? Or at least it’s supposed to be? Why are there multiple snakes being made, then? Satan entered the body of a single snake, not a snake that grew more powerful, and the garden entirely was more than just that one tree, granting knowledge, not power. You’ve made a garden of temptation, not paradise.

As a final note after all that rambling, if it was indeed read: On the most technical level, and I hate to say it, the Bible is...Christian IP, basically. There is no Magic world in which Eden could exist because of that. Some religious symbols have also become fantasy tropes such as angels and demons, but the concept of angelic protectors and demonic lords have existed beyond specific religions. This is a specific and sacred religious place. From a strictly professional perspective, err on the side of caution when submitting in the future.

Control Factor: Technically fulfilling.

Nitpicks: The token should be “black and green,” not “green and black.” For the first ability, why strictly from the hand when Crucible of Worlds and whatnot exist?

Tune in next week, when... Well, did you see some of the synergies and combos that I mentioned above? Keep them in mind. Thank you all for your submissions.

—@abelzumi

#mtg #magic the gathering #custom magic card #contest #generosity contest #commentary #entries #inventor's fair

13 notes · View notes

threephasebird · 3 years

Note

Hello friend, it's Nicole from TAD discord, so sorry for awkwardly & randomly sliding into your dms. I've noticed that you've been reblogging a lot of The Untamed recently and I have just finished The Untamed & literally cannot think about anything else. I'm obsessed. Anyway, I've also noticed from your blog that your favorite seems to be JGY and I find that *fascinating*. He's very much not my fav, but he's such a complex character that I would love to hear your thoughts & feelings & analysis?

And to be completely clear, I will never try to debate with you or say your opinions are wrong or immoral or anything. I'm not an anti, I've stanned plenty of villains in my time. I'm just genuinely curious. I think the fact that you have such different feelings about this character is part of the beauty of stories and a testament to how complex and smart this particular story is.

Hello friend! First of all, thank you for your ask -- I love talking about my fictional faves, so there’s no need to apologize at all! There are definitely people out there who have already posted much more cohesive and succinct character analysis for JGY, but I’ve sat down for a bit to find an answer to the question of why I, personally, like him so much. I ended up finding six possible ways to answer this question, which I’ll list below and then go into (a lot) more detail under the cut. Hope you enjoy!

1) I like him because his motivations as a villain are complex and understandable

2) I like him because there’s no easy solution to his conflicts

3) I like him because he interacts with the story in a unique way

4) I like him because when we see him on top of his game, it’s fun to watch

5) I like him because LXC likes him

6) JGY is very small and has dimples

So, onward! (2.7k)

1) I like him because his motivations as a villain are complex and understandable

One possible way of looking at JGY is that throughout the entire story, his end goal is to eliminate all of the Jin family and come out on top as sect leader, chief cultivator and most powerful person in the cultivation world. However, I personally find it more intriguing to think that his specific plans shifted throughout the story and that he didn’t follow a long con the way NHS did, but that the common ground in everything he does is that he’s motivated by wanting security. Then, everything that he does afterwards is a step-by-step escalation when no matter what he does and how far he comes, his goal is always dangled right in front of him, but ultimately impossible to reach.

When he joins the Nie clan, on a superficial level it seems that this place could offer him the security he wants and needs, especially with NMJ protecting him -- but on the flip side of the coin, no one apart from NMJ and NHS seem to respect him, and his security entirely depends on NMJ’s goodwill. It’s an exteremely fragile position that could probably only ever last for a limited amount of time. Even if JGY never killed the guard captain and wasn’t thrown out of the Unclean Realm, how would the future have looked like for him? NMJ’s life expectancy was low to begin with, and once he had died (of natural causes, in this hypothetical case), NHS wouldn’t have been able to hold the same protective hand over JGY as his brother, and JGY would have become the disrespected advisor to the disrespected clan leader. (On a side note, I personally don’t think JGY released XY to get the yin iron -- I think it makes more sense that he wanted to use XY as bargaining chips against WC, seeing how he goes to free him immediately after WC asks for NMJ to release XY, to save the Unclean Realm and, in extension, his own ass.)

After JGY is thrown out, he’s basically out of options -- it’s go big or go home, because which other clan would take him in now? So he sets his sight on being recognized by JGS once more, and in order to succeed, he derives the plan of becoming a spy under WRH and do something so “heroical” that after the war, JGS has no other choice but to accept him into his clan. And at first, it seems like he succeeds and that he finally gets everything he wished for -- his father recognizes him as a son and gives him a position, he’s part of the Jin clan, he has power, he’s secure! But then it turns out that he was wishing on the monkey’s paw. His father doesn’t truly recognize him, and even in the Jin clan he’s disrespected (by JGS, by Madam Jin, by Jin Zixun), he doesn’t truly hold power (he just has to do whatever JGS tells him to), and he’s not secure (JGS instrumentalizes him because he’s useful to him right now, but does that mean he’ll be useful forever? So there’s a constant threat there).

I think the only reason JGS officially adopts JGY is that it allows him to claim the victory over WRH for the Jin clan and to expand his own power. Instead of JGY being recognized, JGS instrumentalizes him from the very first second and to make it worse, he makes JGY his attack dog the same way WRH did. I think the things JGY does under both WRH and JGS are absolutely horrifying, but I can’t help but also feel horrified for him. Under WRH, I think he tells himself that whatever he does is the lesser evil because it’ll end the war quicker, and that it’ll all be worth it in the end, and as a result, he loses parts of his own humanity there. And then under JGS, it’s the same fucked up shit again, except that this time, he also wants so very badly for JGS to value him, and in addition, he’s also completely out of options now. Without wanting to excuse the things he does under JGS, the only alternative at this point is for him to leave the Jin clan and the cultivation world as a whole, and I do think there’s a definite possibility that JGS would have him killed if he did because he knew too much about JGS’s plans.

Without passing judgment on his involvement in JZX and JZX’s deaths, as well as him killing NMJ and JGS for now (the latter being the one thing that I’m personally most horrified of), I don’t see JGY as a villain who enjoys being the villain the way XY does. I think he’s constantly horrified at himself and compartmentalizes to a degree where he’s actually derailing his own plans. Him throwing out XY immediately after killing JGS reads to me as him wanting to close the chapter of everything they did under JGS -- I think he must have acted out of a visceral emotion there or else he wouldn’t have left XY to die at the side of a road so carelessly (and, in effect, allowed for someone to live on with detailed knowledge of his own deeds). After rising to power (and finally, seemingly, really getting the security he’s always wanted), he doesn’t use that power to become WRH 3.0, but instead to do genuinely good things (such as building the watch towers). That’s not supposed to mean that him not being a cruel despot makes up for everything he’s done, but I find it interesting to think about from the perspective of, what kind of person could he have been if this opportunity had been given to him freely -- if his own class and social standing didn’t prevent him from that? I think he’d have become an incredibly powerful cultivator and clan leader if he’d have the same privilege as JZX.

In a way, I see JZX, WC, and JGY as narrative foils. WC shows us who JZX might have become if JGS treated him the same way as WRH treats WC. But, JGS doesn’t -- he shields his own son from this part of the Jin clan, and basically allows him to live in a completely different reality as JGY! JZX’s whole character arc is one of personality development, and becoming a hero, and falling in love -- he doesn’t have a clue about his father wanting to get his hands on XY and the Stygian tiger amulet and arguably about at least part of the war crimes he commits against the Wen clan. It’s not part of his life. In a way, JGY is the sacrifice being made to allow him to live his life unaware because in him, JGS found someone else to do his dirty work.

2) I like him because there’s no easy solution to his conflicts

Sometimes, when you want to be a villain apologist, all you need to do is point at one or a few bits of the story and say, “well if they hadn’t done that...”. (See, for example, Anakin Skywalker -- you wanna write a RotS canon divergence fixit? Just have Obi-Wan come back approximately one hour earlier and you have it, because before Anakin kills the Jedi even the Younglings he’s basically completely redeemable.) With JGY, you don’t get to have that. There’s no single turning point where you could say, “if he had picked the other option, he could have had a happy ending”. And part of the reason for that, which makes him a tragic character in my eyes, is that he crucially lacks options at many turning points.

In order to write a canon divergence AU for JGY where he comes out unscathed and redeemable, you’d have to go pretty far back in the story, and even then, you’d have to work hard to find a solution to his story that doesn’t a) rely on someone saving him (such as: LXC brings him to Cloud Recesses, or: JGS has a change of heart, frees his mother, and sends them a comfortable monthly pension), b) having him be dependent on someone else’s goodwill (such as: staying in the Unclean Realm in a delicate position).

If we don’t want to go back right to the very beginning or change fundamental parts of the story, well... As I’ve mused about above, if we let him stay in the Unclean Realm, he’d have never reached his goal of security either. If he never became a spy during the Sunshot Campaign, he wouldn’t have been accepted into the Jin clan and would have been out of options. If he never committed the atrocities for JGS, JGS would probably have kicked him out or killed him. (I do think there’s a lot of truth in what JGY tells NMJ in the empathy flashback, on that instance.) If he didn’t kill NMJ, there is a distinct possibility that NMJ would have killed him -- we see him try three times on screen, after all. (I’m leaving out the parts about him being directly responsible for JZX’s and JZX’s death in the show, as well as for controlling the corpses at Nighless City and JYL’s death, because it’s not in the book and I think it takes away from WWX’s character. As for QS’s and their son’s deaths...I personally do not see strong motivation for him to kill them, but in the end, we just don’t know which is, on a side note, a thing I really like about The Untamed/MDZS! Sometimes we just don’t know because the only people who know for sure can’t tell us anymore.) One option could be for him to confide to JZX, bring him over to his own side, and non-violently overthrow JGS, which would be a good and satisfying ending both to his and JZX’s character arcs -- but I also think there’s a high possibility JZX would hold JGY responsible for what he and JGS did, and never trust him with power again.

(Again, one thing I really do not wish to excuse away is how he killed JGS, and I just. Desperately wished he didn’t.)

I’ve been going over and over the possibilites for fix-its and canon divergence AUs, but in the end, I’ve arrived at the conclusion that the only real choice JGY has throughout the story is whether to remove himself from the narrative or stay in it. He could make the choice to give up his mother’s dream, reject his father, and leave cultivation world (and, on a meta level, the story!) to become a “nobody”. (Small side note, though -- living on which skills?) If he doesn’t -- well, as soon as he enters the game, the cards are stacked against him.

To pick up on the meta level comment, I do find it fascinating that in a sense, JGY not only has to struggle for respect and recognition within the story, but that what he does also serves to keep his character part of the story. He could choose to give up and leave (and thus come out of the story redeemable), but then he wouldn’t be part of the story anymore.

3) I like him because he interacts with the story in a unique way

Continuing with the last point, JGY interacts with the story in two unique ways that distinguish him basically from all the other characters. He’s not actually supposed to be part of the story, but that he basically claws his way in. But that also means that his class and social status cannot be removed from any of the conflicts he encounters in universe -- they’re at the heart of all of them. In the empathy flashback, he says to NMJ, “You always scold me for indecent scheming. You always say that you are just and straight [...] A decent man shouldn’t resort to devious stratagems. [...] You’re of noble birth and have profound cultivation. What about me? How can I be the same? First, I don’t have the foundation of cultivation. No one has ever taught me that since I was a child! Second, I don’t have any background. Do you think that my position is very solid in the Jin clan of Lanling?” What I find so intriguing about this scene is that he’s right when he says he’s different from the others both in text and on a meta level because most of the other characters are never faced with the same decisions and have a natural place within the story (apart, to some degree, WWX and XY, where also interesting parallels can be drawn). And the other characters are, in a way, self-righteous to judge him when almost none of them come out of the story without blood on their hands -- WWX’s revenge, JC torturing demonic cultivators after WWX’s death, and so on...The entire cultivation world (even NMJ! even LXC!) were complicit in the war crimes against the Wen. But when the cultivation world turns against JGY, they are the most appalled by the things I as a viewer would be the most lenient towards (murdering JGS), and don’t care at all about the thing that horrifies me the most (murdering the sex workers).

There’s an interesting post by @pumpkinpaix analysing how class dynamics work in the story, which I highly recommend! I don’t want to repeat what has been said there already in much better ways than I can, but among other things, it makes some really interesting points about how much JGY’s class is tied with his motivations.

4) I like him because when we see him on top of his game, it’s fun to watch

Aside from any analysis, part of the reason why I like him so much is that when he’s acting as a villain, he’s just so much fun to watch. When WWX breaks into his vault in paperman form and JGY has approximately 5 minutes to get rid of the head, the torture bench (?) and anything suspicious, contact and inform Su She, run to a different building and come back, and nonetheless he manages to convince everyone but WWX and LWJ that he’s the victim in this situation, it’s just. Peak entertainment? For a short time, he’s on top of the game, and then he’s backed into a corner and becomes sloppy, and finally loses it all due to sentimentality (if he didn’t want to take his mother’s body with him and say goodbye to LXC, I’m sure he could have fled the country). I think Zhu Zanjin did an amazing job as an actor to portray how JGY is constantly assessing everything, how 23638 emotions flicker over his face in half a second, how his whole body language shows the constant anxiety and pressure and stress and fear he’s under, and how we actually get to see in his microexpressions when JGY chooses a path and commits to the acting and emotional manipulation to follow it through.

5) I like him because LXC likes him

Here’s a secret: Actually, LXC is my favourite character. And LXC loves JGY a lot. So I’m kind of contractually obliged to at least love JGY a little bit as well?

On a more serious note, I’m very intrigued in their relationship because I do think what they had was genuine. I view it as two people being very open and honest and true with each other, while placing a lot of things outside the brackets and crossing them out. LXC even says that he was aware of some things JGY did (which ones? how? I need to know) but that he justified them to himself. I think they both realised that they could have had something very special, but under the given circumstances, LXC wouldn’t have been able to help JGY (see: point 2) even if he knew everything. Still, they were obviously very close and trusted each other as much as they could. I think in the end, when LXC seemed to have decided to stay and die with him, JGY pushed him away because he was the only genuinely good part of his life, and he felt like he couldn’t rightfully deprive the world of LXC. It’s all very tragic, and I’m very intrigued to explore what they could have been in a slightly softer world.

6) JGY is very small and has dimples

I can only speak for myself, but when I was watching, I was so prone at any point to believe in him no matter what was revealed. Look at him! Could this man do something wrong?

#buttercup-the-bard #ask #jin guangyao #the untamed #cql #meng yao #mdzs #my post #cql meta

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