honestly tempted to write a yandere sierra fic, but not in a romanticised way. like, a horror fic about how she relapsed into super unhealthy habits during/after all-stars, until she eventually tries killing either cody himself or the people in his life. or her forcing cameron into acting/dressing like cody in her mania, only to attack/kill him when he doesn't meet her impossibly high expectations.

just. sierra's stalking taken to it's logical extreme, and the consequences thereof.

on Consequences in minecraft streaming

Okay so one of the real common things that I've been seeing lately is an increasingly passionate call for certain characters to experience Consequences (and the rest of the post always makes it clear that they mean a specific type of definatively negative repercussions) for their actions during QSMP events. And aside from the absolute deja vu of having seen these same calls when DSMP was airing, and how that turned out (sorry, the syndicate did not all have a meeting where they apologized for their sins while tommy told them they were horrible people), I'm not 100% sure if that's going to happen or pan out in the exact way that I think people are aiming for and expecting will happen.

I keep seeing a lot of people saying that it would be bad writing if people don't get "consequences" for their actions, and what they're specifically asking for is punishment and for people to realize what they're doing was wrong. BBH is supposed to repent for furniture thefts and torturing the people keeping him from his kid. Phil is supposed to realize that actually he's good at PVP and apologize for saying that his team has been suffering in purgatory. Tubbo is supposed to fill in his tubhole and only do things other people ask him to do.

But like, so much of the time, what we're seeing is these streamers being interested in writing morally grey characters, just some little guys who make bad decisions, and the thing about characters being morally grey is that they don't always have a come to jesus moment and become morally pure. Sometimes they just keep being morally grey. Sometimes they get worse on purpose.

Maybe BBH never decides that torturing that guy was bad, because he wanted to get his FUCKING KID back. Like, I seriously think you have to be prepared for that character arc to never end in Bad going "that was wrong to do", and maybe his cubito will still be happy. Phil is a dude with anxiety who's been sure that his kids are going to die from the moment he got to purgatory, streaming at 1-4 in the morning while other teams break into their base, even if bolas goes insane and scrapes out a win I think it's way more likely that that team is gonna go "what a wild fluke that's the power of gas masks" and not have a moment where they go "it was unfair of us to assume that we were underpowered, I guess everybody else was the underdogs! Our bad." Tubbo is tubbo, he's already building a new create thing, he is not going to apologize for leaving marks on the landscape with mod packs.

Like, the streamers are interested in making human characters, making interesting decisions, not communicating moral lessons to their fanbases. Bad is operating within a Taken film, not a sermon. Quackity wants his cubito to be pathetic, gay, and out for revenge, not to communicate the importance of forgiveness to those who hurt you. Tubbo's victory condition is having a nice date with Fred, full stop, does not care who he has to run over to get there.

Absolutely I think there are people intentionally doing corruption/villany arcs on the server, and they probably intend for that to lead places. There will be Consequences, as in, things will happen. Cellbit is doing cannibalsm on purpose, and not as a teaching moment about how good cannibalism is for your social bonds. But like, maybe that leads to him being thrown out of his family and not trusted because of his sins, OR maybe it leads to him murdering his way through a federation complex, facing down a bloody cucurucho, and going "you made me into you and I hate this" and eating him. Narrative consequences does not always mean punishment and a return to moral purity. Sometimes people just do bad things, and then repercussions happen, but they don't necessarily "see the error of their ways". The specific call for like— retribution and repentance as the consequences people are going for— for punishment— if a character has done something bad they don't "deserve" good things to happen to them and it's bad writing for that to happen— I just don't think that those are the stories the creators are necessarily interested in telling.

And secondly, what people are often asking for is character conflict— they want people to be socially excluded by characters they feel have been wronged, and learn the error of their ways that way until they apologize sufficiently. Phil is gonna hate BBH or Tubbo is going to hate Roier or something once they return from Purgatory. People want their cubitos to have beef with each other.

But the thing is, on a meta level, I don't doubt that the entire admin team and streaming team on QSMP is just screamingly aware that this fandom cannot be trusted with conflict. The election was just part of it, but I made it through the election, and Purgatory has been so much more unpleasant— and I am not just talking about twitter. This website, tumblr, has been full of people fighting each other for their teams. And I am not just saying "red team fans have been bad", because boy have I been staring in horrified awe at the takes that some red team people have been putting forward (what on EARTH do you mean BBH deserves to have his kid die, touch grass immediately), but if I step outside of red team circles, everyone is talking about how red team people are horrible hypocrites who win too much and only deserve to suffer (I saw this posting the day that blue had back to back wins, so it isn't even tied to how well red is doing). The quality of the discourse has been increasingly unpleasant, and this has been taking place in streamer's chats, on twitter, in discords, and here on tumblr.

Every QSMP streamer is increasingly aware that having conflict with another streamer is basically sending a wave of negativity their way, and setting off bombs in the fandom at the same time. And they're all friends with each other! Sometimes they decide that the story beat they're going for is worth it and just tell each other to stay off twitter, but like, you have got to be prepared that maybe they will just be friends again. And that might be weaker writing, for people to keep forgiving each other, but that is an unfortunate aspect of the technical aspects of this medium and this fandom. Maybe the creators would be more willing to have character conflict if they didn't know that that meant the person they were mad at in-game would get death threats on social media.

Like no fucking wonder Phil apologized for getting mad at Wil within the same stream and before Wil said sorry to him. This is why the French have given up on revolution arcs, you know it's why the women are all very careful to get along with people. All of those creators know the cost of making anyone into a villain, and I'm just saying maybe get prepared that we won't have inner-party conflict. Maybe they'll decide it's worth it for a fun story moment! Maybe they won't. Maybe don't get 100% married to the idea that the only good writing possible moving forward is for people to be thrown out of the community and then repent for their sins.

”Why do racists always invoke MLK…?”

This is a comment from Reddit. I swear to god, it’s like the redditor who wrote this transcribed all the shit my racist, entitled, privileged, Boomer parents said my entire childhood. Like, word for word.

”Why do racists always invoke MLK…?”

First, you gotta understand their position, which is “Racism doesn’t exist anymore”.  Because black people aren’t lynched, because there are wealthy rappers and basketball players, and because there was a black president, racism doesn’t exist in the US anymore.  And this is especially important; when black people get upset about their lot in life, it is because they are lazy and want a handout rather than earning their way like white people do.  When a black guy is killed by cops, he was a criminal and deserved his fate.  When a black woman loses her access to food stamps, it is because she was taking advantage of the system.  When black people get into college, it is because they are given special privilege they didn’t earn.  And when black folks talk about reparations, it is because they want to punish innocent people so they can be handed their success rather than earn it.  

Because there is no racism, and anytime some white person is called a racist it is likely because they don’t support simply handing success and money over to people who haven’t earned it, and not at all because they act racist in any way.  And the term “racist” has become toxic in the US lately; people lose their jobs after being called racists unfairly.  Heck, one could suggest minorities call white folks “racist” in retaliation, knowing there will be social consequences which are completely unearned.  So to combat this unfair and, in their view inaccurate, narrative they employ a couple tactics;

1) “I’m not racist, you are for even suggesting it”.  Since racism is defacto non-existent, playing the race-card is introducing a factor that doesn’t belong.  When a black person calls a white person racist, they are not only lying, but specifically targeting someone based on their race and falsely labeling them something socially toxic with intent to cause harm.  And the white person is defacto innocent because they would see anyone as insert accusation here, not just black/brown/gay/muslim/female/handicapped/immigrant people.

2) “Black people don’t know how good they have it”.  Classic myopic delusion that assumes the complete lack of racism in the US also means any ongoing hurdles faced by black/brown/gay/women/etc people are their own fault.  The fears behind CRT are great examples of the struggle to maintain this delusion, and not have people delve too deeply into history and see how cause/effect resulted in the current socio-economic imbalance.  And since there are successes in the black community, that is proof that racism is over.  Black folks had a black president, now shut up and stop making waves.  There is an attempt to show that any calls of racism are not only unfounded, but examples of success in the black community disprove systemic racism; wouldn’t MLK be proud?  And not only proud of the success, but would side with the white folks who are now experiencing reverse-racism as the lazy black folks ask for more.  Racism, they think, is simply targeting another race purposefully, and has nothing to do with power imbalance.

3) “I earned my success, so black folks need to earn theirs”.  And this is the crux of it all; white folks today don’t believe they are in a position of privilege because they work hard and their success was difficult.  Many of them come from poor families, struggled to pay for college, don’t have a family history of slaver ownership.  They see any minorities complaining as trying to get privilege unearned.  They assume that, because there is no more racism, there is balance and parity among the races.  Illegal immigrants are trying to circumvent the law, reparations and affirmative-action programs are unearned handouts, and special months/parades celebrating a particular group/race is promoting racism by giving them special attention they don’t deserve.  Many white people see themselves as victims because they don’t receive any overt benefits from being white, meanwhile minorities are showered with unearned benefits all the time.  The Great Replacement Theory is constantly being reenforced for them as they watch society take the side of minorities anytime someone attempts to call out this apparent imbalance in their favor.

But underneath all of this is the undeniable knowledge that they are, indeed, racist.  Whether it is a jealousy, or a fear of socio-economic parity, or ethnocentricity, they know that society isn’t accepting overt racism anymore.  And because of this, they have to hold back, watch what they say, watch how they treat people.  “Make America Great Again” was a call to return to a time when casual racism was fun, and didn’t mean anything, and people weren’t so thin-skinned.  Being “Woke” is forcing people to take difficult looks at the fact racism still exists, which is uncomfortable and threatens to challenge the current socio-economic stability, so terms like “woke” are being dismantled, misused, redirected into something that seems illegitimate.  There is an active, desperate avoidance of acknowledging racism still exists, because admitting otherwise means admitting their world-view is wrong.   invoking MLK isn’t done out of malicious intent, but out of desperate denial of a world that doesn’t fit their assumptions.  Many, perhaps most, white folks in the US have no consciously ill will towards minorities, and would recoil in distaste at the notion of being considered racist.  And they will spend all day explaining why they are perfectly justified in accepting a racist position on a topic and how that doesn’t make them racist because the minorities in question are to blame.  Deflection.  Denial.  Dismissal.  And then vote to prevent change.

(Source)

You know I think you guys might be on to something when you call Sam woman coded cause - genuinely - how do you, as writers of a show, be so misogynistic as to not include any female characters asides from damsels and hookups (specifically referring to the early seasons), and yet need so desperately to have a outlet for macho masculine patriarchy power dynamics that you have an adult male character experience misogyny?? How do you mess up that badly??

It's like, although they thought that putting female characters in the narrative other than to exist as sexy distressed lamps wouldn't appeal to the true blooded 2000s American audience. But yet it was completely necessary for there to be a bottom rung in the masculinity pyramid because - well how else can we as a society function!!

Anyway, ik reading too far into things is my special talent, and in most circumstances all of this stuff is just a joke in the show but wow they really had Dean poking fun of any of Sam's characteristics that don't fit into this Hyper True Blooded American Masculinity ideology as a butt of jokes for 15 years. The fact that he has longer hair, that he cares about his hair, that he's tidy, that he likes salads and isn't a big meat eater, that he's sympathetic, that he's a bitch. And of course these are just silly little jabs that Dean makes in sibling-like fashion but like wow 15 years. Damn.

And of course it's not only this that leads to the rather odd interpretation of a woman-coded Sam, but also the way he is treated directly by the narrative. Like, for example, being the family's possession, rather than an equal member. Dean has seen it as his job to look out for his little brother since he pulled him from the fire and the wellbeing of this infant was thrown onto his shoulders at age 4, and this has created a lot of ricocheting effects on both of them. This isn't to say that Dean doesn't love, care, respect, and value Sam, but it does mean that sometimes he treats him like a possession rather than a person. He makes a lot of crazy decisions in the show that he justifies as being for Sam's own good, even if it goes directly against Sam's wishes. After Sam leaves a note to Dean telling him he's going out for a bit to handle a case, Dean weasels his way in, not trusting him to handle it due to the mental issues Sam is facing at the time, and kills Amy, despite Sam begging him not to. Even though Dean knows Sam would never consent to an angle possessing him, he tricks him into it anyway. He does these things, and many others because he believes that he is acting in Sam's best interests, totally disregarding the fact that Sam has capacity to make judgements and handle the consequences himself, even going so far as to oppose what he directly knows or Sam tells him he wants.

Then of course there is the fact that the fear integral to his character - a loss of autonomy (bodily autonomy, but also autonomy to make his own decisions about his future, to be good, to be pure and faithful), is an explicitly feminine one. Then there is the strong subtext in his story of SA themes, I think in s4 a demon even refers to Sam as a 'whore' or that he's 'whoring it up' (with respect to Ruby), and the interesting prevalent idea of Sam questioning or going against the ideals/ideology of the masculine figure head (which would be Dean I guess) and getting punished for it. Sam suggests that maybe they take a more humanitarian approach with the cow blood drinking vampires in s2 and Dean punches him, Sam tries to get him to talk about their Dad and Dean punches him, Sam tries to get him to talk about Lisa and Ben and Dean punches him, Sam gets caught simply using his abilities and Dean punches him - twice. I think you get the picture.

Anyway. This post comes off as rather critical of Dean, which wasn't really my intention. It's more sort of a broader criticism of the rampant sexism that had its part in shaping the show - being one to come out of the early 2000s. Ideas such as this - you could really go on for hours as its fascinating how ideological frameworks are presented certain ways in media - and the way masculine and feminine social dynamics, to list only one, is presented in supernatural is definitely a can of worms.

I'm sorry but what exactly did you mean in your chapter 423 tags? "People read all sorts of feelings and such into these characters"? What characters are you referring to in what feelings? Thank you

All of them. A lot of people have instilled these characters with meaning and extrapolated their predictions for said characters based on those expectations. Which is fine, we all do that. I do that. The question is, are such people open to the idea that their readings may have been wrong? And will they still retain interest at that point?

This happened a lot with Izuku and Katsuki where so many people projected a victim-bully relationship on them in a manner that wasn't there. It COULD have been there if Horikoshi decided to go that way, but ultimately it didn't pan out.

It happened with Spinner and the heteromorph plotline where people wanted an X-men-like story.

A lot of people projected a certain societal punishment they wanted for Endeavor that to them would have been justice, but that assumes what Horikoshi is trying to do is portray social justice. It also ignores how in many ways Endeavor's story runs parallel to many of the villains'. I've had some similarly weird conversations with some villain stans who just couldn't seem to wrap their heads around the idea that, even justified, their beloved favorites committed unjust transgressions against others, even if those others were nameless and faceless and just as bad and incidental to the story. There's always a reason people do things, even bad things. Does that absolve them of the crimes they've done? And even unabsolved, does that mean they will ultimately face consequences for their actions?

It's about the narrative. Horikoshi is trying to tell a story. Sure, he can put his opinions and philosophies in here and there, but is that the primary goal of making this story? I doubt it. He has a story in his heart and he wants to tell it. Is Horikoshi trying to comment on what he thinks the fate of abuse victims should be with Tomura's alleged end? I have a hard time making that leap if only because sooooo many characters are abuse victims and they all had different treatments and different fates. A lot about Tomura's story changed with the twists that have come up in the story, and AFO's reveal about his involvement in Tomura's life since before his birth does have an effect on what sort of character he is. Tomura's goal was always destruction, particularly of anything that stemmed from "that house," and AFO's trump card reveals that Tomura was also a product of that house. That raises the question: did Tomura ever think of himself as part of that house? I think it's very possible, which means in some regard he wanted to destroy himself. That makes some part of his fate self-determined. I always had a hard time predicting what would happen with Tomura because he seemed like a character whose desires were only to destroy, not to live in the aftermath. He wanted to destroy so that OTHERS could live in the aftermath, but he didn't seem to have any vision for his own future. At least in the very end his own perception of himself changed for the better. He started to see himself as more human.

I always felt like Good Omens was about free will not only as an individual thing, but as a systemic issue. Since it was first published, there was always an aspect of the story that explored systems and how they exert pressure on people. This flowed into an exploration of ways people can take responsibility even when everything is too big to handle alone. A lot of it seemed, to me, to be about just showing up and doing your sincere best even when you weren't quite sure how it could all work out.

All this to say that I don't feel that the...pressure? coercion? Aziraphale may have been feeling about going to Heaven can be handwaved away entirely. There is a System and the pressure it is putting on him is real, not just fluffy nonsense in his head. He knows what Heaven does to dissenters. He knows what they were ready to do to him. Seventy-five percent of the time, he chooses to ignore it, but he knows. In fact, I think it's a bit of a feedback loop in which the fear of consequences leads Aziraphale to believe Heaven has to be right after all because the alternative is intolerable.

I've never seen any satisfactory explanation for what Heaven would do if Aziraphale insisted on saying "no" to the Supreme Archangel thing. As we see from Crowley's trip up there in disguise, the very best Aziraphale and Crowley could hope for would be to be left alone for a little while until Heaven destroys the world, except in that scenario, they wouldn't know anything about it until it started happening because they'd be off being clueless. This is Good Omens, so humans would almost certainly save the world again, but with all his anxiety around control this season, I don't think Aziraphale is in the headspace to be placing that bet right now.

And where did that anxiety around control come from? Heaven, of course.

I don't love the idea of dismissing the coercion of a system as massive as Heaven because Heaven feels like an analogy to real-world structures. Like, are we going to suggest that people can just magically break free of their religious/cult/authoritarian influences and face no serious repercussions from the people around them? That is usually not the case, and in many situations, those repercussions are so bad that people don't actually have a choice but to stay silent.

I can definitely embrace the idea that Aziraphale has actively decided to put on a happy face and believe the best of Heaven because of the sunk cost, the need to feel good and useful, and the fear of punishment, but I can't embrace the notion that he has a real, free choice.

I'm working on a long, long post about this, about the real central issues I believe Aziraphale is facing and how I think the primary mistake the narrative wants him to address is the manner in which he talked to Crowley during the Final Fifteen, and the complicated stuff he's going to have to disentangle before he can figure that out. This post didn't exactly fit there, but I wanted to post it separately because of the amount of chatter I've seen lately about Aziraphale.

Anyway, getting in that elevator most likely wasn't the mistake. How is it a mistake if you probably don't have a choice in the first place?

yknow, some questionable meta aside, i still vastly prefer morrowind having divayth fyr be present in it as a powerful respected rich ex-politician and entrepreneur and scholar, who also is a rotten person horrifically abusing his daughters and his patients and keeping them prisoner on the isolated island he calls home, and no one questions him and people blindly look up to him from afar, and the isolationist If Youre Powerful You Can Do What You Want politics of house telvanni further protect him, and his educated well-spoken gently eccentric persona further discourages people (including the player) from questioning him, and his own daughters isolated and manipulated as they are dont even know what to think about their own situation (and its awkward for them to even try to explain it), and because of his access to unique resources and information at some point in the main quest you have NO choice but to work with him if you want to survive/progress, and you have to confront all of that ugliness and decide what you want to do with it, if you even choose to notice it. the game doesnt punish you for not caring! why would it? has that not been the reality long before you ever got there? you can just get what you want from him and walk away, or you may remain angry and frustrated at your helplessness, because you know that you don't stand a chance against him and his magic he spent centuries and endless resources to hone, and there is no one with any incentive or authority to confront him. you may stay rightfully furious that this situation will not change just as it hasnt changed in so long, just as so many sickening things about the status quo on vvardenfell are way beyond your power as an individual to change. OR, if you're powerful enough--or if you come back later, having trained for this moment--you can simply take matters into your own hands, knowing this is the only way for the man to face any consequences, and get rid of the fucker once and for all. because he is, for all his pride and might, Possible To Kill. and you get cool armor out of it. so then how is it rare just kill him etc. do you see how compelling a narrative this is? both the maddening helplessness at the injustice you witness--a recurring thing in the game--and the catharsis of killing fyr? Do You Understand.

i vastly prefer all of the above to just retconning the whole thing, either ignoring it or clumsily trying to rewrite fyr into this quirky but totally harmless old man for the sake of Hey Remember This Guy. i understand not everyone likes the tone of morrowind and id be a complete fool to say it doesnt fall into a ton of pitfalls regarding many subjects and themes it tackles, but if thats the case, i really think eso was lame as hell for bringing back divayth fyr and stripping him of all that context. was it worth it? is the addition of divayth fyr to eso really that good? was the shallow "oh omg this guy was in morrowind" aspect worth it? i dont think so. and that fathers day joke was foul and we all know it

The constant Shouto put downs wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the fact it feels like Shouto is being blamed for how Dabi was treated. Shouto can't be a hero because it's unfair on Dabi. Shouto can't get a power up because it's unfair on Dabi. Shouto can't be the only one who has ice and fire because it's unfair on Dabi. Right now it feels like Shouto is the one being punished for Endeavour's mistakes.

I'm not sure if you are talking about the narrative framing or fandom takes. Fandom takes you will never be able to control - there will always be people whose reading of the story triggers you - all you can do is to choose the spaces you interact with and the people you follow.

As for the narrative framing of the story:

The narrative doesn't blame Shouto for Touya's treatment. It puts the blame squarely on Endeavor and to a lesser extent on Rei. Touya's neglect started before Shouto was even born - in fact, his birth was to "discourage Touya". Yes, Shouto was born for all the wrong reasons, and his birth is clearly not a happy event in the family. He was born to break it, but he chooses to piece it together. That's his arc, his choice, his own affirmation of why he exists. Btw, I feel like Touya is not blaming Shouto for how he's treated. He's envious of Shouto and he blames him for throwing away so carelessly all the things Touya would have wanted for himself. There is a difference.

Shouto couldn't be a hero fully until he faced the turmoil inside himself (hence failing the provisional license exam), but he is definitely portrayed as the hero for the final arc (in fact already starting from the Endeavor internship arc and even earlier, like the Stain arc or Kamino - Shouto is usually on the right side of events, for the right reasons). More precisely in the endgame, he's embodying the theme of the hero who is there both for his family and the public.

I'm not sure why Shouto didn't get a power-up during the final arc. Maybe HK is viewing Phosphor as his power-up - even if it's not a quirk awakening but something he developed and worked on himself, it is clearly a power increase. In the PLF War, Shouto couldn't match Touya fire vs fire. Now he can: fire vs (fire-fuelled) ice. But it's also possible that he'll still get a power-up because saving his family was his "long way around" to the "path he's aiming for". There is plenty of foreshadowing that his endgame is to join his friends.

Like I said, I don't really view Touya having both ice and fire as something that takes away anything from Shouto. They could have the exact same power-set (although that doesn't appear to be the case) - the important thing is what you do with the power you have. That's the theme of the Todoroki family. We know what Shouto chose to do with his power, and I hope we will see at least some resolution with Touya too.

I agree that Shouto is suffering from Endeavor's mistakes - that's one of the points of the entire Todoroki family plot: the whole family suffers for Endeavor's sins. And even if he wishes to atone, he cannot fix anything - as those mistakes keep coming back to haunt them. Shouto's choice to pick up the pieces after Endeavor, to put himself in the path of Touya's wrath, to choose to face him is meant to be a pure and heroic choice contrasted with Endeavor once again not being there for his son. The narrative tries to balance these: the near catastrophic consequences of Endeavor's choice and the heroic save that Shouto gets for making the right choice. I personally think that we should still get a scene, where Endeavor fully steps up as a father and takes on the responsibility that comes with it, and for once in his life puts Touya above everything. This would also let Shouto be able to make a choice freely without having to worry about his family. I think that's the logical endpoint of the three arcs: Endeavor's atonement path to be a father, Touya getting the attention his inner child needs to heal, and Shouto's arc of emancipation and being able to decide who he wants to be.

ok not only was this just a bad narrative choice for the show in general and natalie's character, this was also such a WEAK narrative choice for misty, too.

christina has talked about how something happens at the end of the season that "changes" misty. but the thing is, this has happened before. to her. same circumstances. this is the opposite of something that should change her, because it's exactly what happened with crystal!

both times misty found a friend when she was desperately alone, she clung to that friend and put everything into the relationship. and then, due to the intensity of her relationship—sharing everything with crystal, wanting to protect natalie—she caused the death of the person she loved.

there is nothing i love more than parallels, but for a parallel to be narratively meaningful, there needs to be a purpose to it. you need to use it to highlight differences, or show a progression. there is no progression for misty here. this is just history repeating itself. if misty didn't change after crystal died, and nothing has changed between then and now for misty, then WHY does this change her? she just needed it to happen twice??

killing natalie was a disgusting choice, and if we're supposed to believe that it was necessary for misty's character growth, with absolutely no narrative justification for it to be, then—beyond it just being awful—it is an entirely lower level of bad storytelling.

i am all for a story where these women continue to (figuratively) cannibalize each other as adults; i signed up for a dark show about women making bad choices. but 1) this wasn't a choice. this was, once again, an accident. i signed up for a show about women with agency, and making everything around them an accident or an unintended consequence is absolutely spitting in the face of that (presumably to make them more ~sympathetic, and i hate it).

and 2) there are other ways for them to hurt each other without death being a factor. this show is supposed to be about struggling with trauma, and you can't struggle with trauma when you're dead. the far more interesting story is one where the past is well and truly saturated with conflict—with characters you know are doomed and you still learn to love, and with characters you know survive and you have to continually struggle to forgive and understand.

i had so, so much love for season one because that's what i thought we were getting. i thought we were getting a bittersweet love story about the complexity of women, the complexity of trauma, the complexity of survival.

instead, this is becoming yet another show where things happen to women. where, to make them sympathetic—as more palatable to mainstream (cough male cough) audiences—they need to write women as victims of circumstance, as victims of their pasts, as victims of their own actions.

this is becoming a show where women who make bad choices are not allowed to stand behind them. who must be out of control (shauna, lottie, tai), or must be punished for the unintended consequences (misty), or must die (nat, van potentially).

and now, with natalie the antler queen in the past, and a character we no longer have in the present, i wonder how long it will be until she becomes the scapegoat for the surviving characters. how long until the worst actions in the wilderness are put upon natalie's shoulders, to lighten the load from the surviving women. how long until the only characters allowed to have agency, allowed to be complex and make disagreeable choices that they intend to make, are ones who die.

how long until our beautiful, complex, surviving characters are washed down to nothing, to shells of themselves in the name of making them more sympathetic. more palatable. how long until this is just another shallow mystery, without the beating heart of the first season.

Thinking about Amma Crellin and her actions as reflections of the social hierarchy she grew up in. (spoilers under the cut)

Amma is pretty much Windgap royalty. Not only is her family extremely wealthy, her mother holds power over the livelihoods of big parts of the population. Her family history is deeply tied to that of Windgap. The sheriff and other officials are at Adora's beck and call. Everyone knows Adora and deferes to her, and this status transfers to Amma:

She plays the star part in the school play as a matter of course. She can get away with everything, from shoplifting to breaking curfew, from taking drugs to insulting and taunting a police officer. She's hot shit and very good at being a hot girl to boot, on the way to being prom queen like Camille once was. Her friends do everything she wants. Boys, she feels, are hers to control. Others are her playthings. At home, she's at the mercy of her mother. In the rest of Windgap, she's invicible.

Then, Ann and Natalie. Both outsiders who moved to Windgap only recently, their family without social capital worth speaking of. Both freaks, misfits - tomboys and late bloomers, still running through the woods instead of following the norms of girlhood and femininity. Still lacking self-control, prone to tantrums and biting. In the social hierarchy both of the school and the town, they're near the bottom - it's interesting Amma was friends with them once at all, but then this keen sense for social status often becomes more prominent once puberty hits. I think it's a safe bet they were bullied. They were not cool girls. And so Amma, who never faces consequences for everything, who's royalty, who has friends entirely devoted to her - she's safe killing them, in her good right almost, they're nobodies, and Windgap, that she knows so well, proves her right by not even once suspecting her. Had not an other outsider and freak, Camille, disturbed the status-quo, she would have gotten away with everything swimmingly. Her friends laugh about it too - Ann and Natalie's lives don't seem to have had much worth to them.

[I do believe her choice of killing Natalie wasn't entirely out of convenience either - I have the suspicion that Amma had a childhood crush on Natalie's older brother John that got rejected, and that killing his beloved little sister was a form of punishment for this unheard of outrage. Amma telling Camille John fancies her (despite him treating her like a venomous snake in the pool scene) could be a sort of wish fullfilment. Would explain how viciously she latches onto the 'baby killer' narrative.]

And then, Mae. To me it's VERY MUCH not a random choice to have Mae be a black kid. The only people of color Amma has probably ever met in the conferedate nostalgia enclave of Windgape are domestic workers that obeyed her, or workers at her mother's pig farm who defered to her, all of them incredibly lower on the social hierarchy than the litte Windgap princess. And now she meets this black city kid, who lives in a rented apartment, maybe with a single mom. That's not someone Amma would respect, or consider on her level, but instead I think she'd have this deep belief that Mae was her inferior and should obey her, defer to her. Did she plan on killing her when Camille granted Mae attention? Or did Mae refuse her somehow, got sick of being bossed around, in this fight they supposedly had?

And I love how all of this is both implicit and subtle yet crystal clear, in everything we learn about Ann and Natalie, the way their peers describe them (in contrast to the adults who are more proficient liars), in every interaction we see between the white upper class of Windgap and POCs.

NETTLES AND THE IDEA OF INNOCENCE

Innocence, especially for women in asoiaf has a particular place in their perception.

Innocence in our world holds a very similar place.

When a character is innocent, you want better for them because any turmoil they go through is undeserved, and by the rules of both societies, it should allow them to be exalted from hardships.

So when it comes to such a small character like Nettles the idea of her innocence is perpetuated past the character we have because she is exalted from the concequence of what she is accused of in the narrative and is redeemed from all the hardship she faces towards the beginning when she claims a dragon.

But I don't think that's fair or correct so I want to go over some things we know and hear about her that people use to defend this idea of innocence and come to the conclusion that even though she is innocent it's not in the way typically attributed to her.

1. Nettles and Sheep:

Her relationship to this animal is a fun metaphor to understand her. Nettles trades sheep to gain her dragon Sheepstealer. Nettles trades innocence for power.

"Lambs have always been sacrificial animals. From the Ancient Greeks and Romans to Christians and even later civilizations, lambs were used for sacrifice to a higher purpose. In most cases, it was the sacrifice to Gods.These are the qualities that make lambs so symbolic. "

"They are a sign of innocence, purity, vulnerability, and sacrifice. Many of these symbols overlap with the symbolism of youth."

The idea of innocence is something that her taming Sheepstealer inherently corrupts. She slaughters sheep every day to get close enough to establish a bond to him. It's a continued effort to trade innocence for power, and because dragons make Targaryens closer to gods than men, the idea is that she's offering a sacrifice to a 'god' to gain power.

I'll link my post about this parallel she has to sheep further.

Another thing is that she's young, and that plays a part in what she is absolved from in the narrative because of the nativity and ability to grow with the potential of youth.

2. Nettles and The Cost of Power:

The regression of this trade for power comes after Driftmark is sacked and burned. In the war effort that Nettles largely contributed to, she loses her friend and her home. We are told her reaction to the loss is crying through the soot on her face so hard it leaves streaks. As with what happens consistently in mythology, the protagonist reaps benefits and consequences in the quest for power. The cost of gaining that power was fighting in the war, something she knew would happen. The fact that it came at the cost of her closest known relationship at the time as well as the place she grew up and had to leave behind to join the war effort is conceivable but not predictable for anyone to know. Especially not a 16 year old girl.

3. Nettles and King's Landing:

A while back, I drew attention to the fact that in the book, we have no real evidence that Nettles had any of the promises made to the Dragon Claimers kept to her. No marriages, lands, or knighthood equivalents are given to her in the wake of the fight. A lot of people use this as a way to say she's innocent because she believes in a cause and is sticking by it. That doesn't seem accurate towards the situation. King's Landing is the capital at that moment for punishing treason. She's a young, grieving girl, experiencing the price of power in a place where her refusal to fight or her running away will be met with a death warrant. Nettles has a nose scar for stealing allegedly. She's one of the characters we know understands the cost of disobedience in this world. She is a cost they'd be willing to pay. Even with her dragon adding to her necessity during the war, they're executing Noble men at that time. Nettles' entire life in juxtaposition to their's is incredibly small. Whether or not she cared about gaining anything (I like to think they gave her money), it's very clear that it's a weary time with major consequences for defiance or treason.

4. Nettles and Daemon:

This is the one people use this idea of innocence the most frequently for. "Nettles was innocent of the accusation made against her (sleeping with Daemon, not witchcraft), and Rhaenyra was influenced and turned against her."

Nettles doesn't need to be innocent for what Rhaenyra did to be wrong. The men who defend Nettles against the decree say that Nettles is wrong but young and shouldn't be killed for that. They conceded that the idea of treason is fair, but the idea surrounding it with the spell implications is simply incorrect and will make Daemon kill them if executed. Daemon is the sole person who puts her in danger and saves her in this narrative for his own character arc. Nettles isn't innocent, but she is young. She has her life ahead of her and has done everything that is expected of her. She isn't punished for love by the narrative. It saves her life and allows her to escape the trapping of power altogether, something she never returns to traditionally.

She does return to it with the burned men, but entirely away from the system, she originally gained that power from.

5. Nettles and Treason:

She did commit treason. That's not an innocent thing. It quite literally required her sleeping with a married prince. Whether or not she's a virgin (we'll get to it) in this world, giving into sex outside of marriage or prostitution as a woman is framed as wrong because of the value of virtue for women. With someone like Nettles, she'd know it's a bad thing and still proceeds with it. While as prince consort and a man Daemon will never dare a lick of concequence for adultery, Nettles would, and treason isn't a far stretch for the crime. Even with the understanding that Daemon would protect her, that they seemingly have, it's not okay. (It is to me. She's completely innocent.)

6. Nettles and Virginity:

Virtue is a currency in this world. Sleeping with a girl and deflowering is seen as a commodity and milestone. Virtue for women is posed as an added value. Without it, as we see in the books, women without maidenheads are seen as a lesser offer often beneath the standard of noble men.

Nettles is not ever positioned as a virgin. In this world, it's a logical conclusion to draw that she is not and would've traded sex for food or money. I'm not saying that happened, but if it did, there seems to be a stigma that it makes her lesser character in the story and / or denies her own autonomy by demeaning her. With the way it is presented in the narrative, it's a fair conclusion to draw. It's said to deter the idea that Daemon would sleep with her because she isn't even worth it, and that's my issue with the she should be virtuous reading.

It falls into the temptation of a character doing what she must to survive being a way to demean her. Nettles was surviving every day before the sowing. Her having sex, prostitution or just because she could, should not shroud her character in any world. Nettles can exist as both a critical view of how Westeros treats girls like her and as an autonomous character who chooses whether or not to have sex given her situation without it being demeaning or derogatory towards her as a character.

7. Nettles and Sex Work:

To add on, sex work is often demonized in this world, and because of the poor class of women often in these positions who are quite young and have no real alternative. Nettles as a character would exist in contradiction to the narrative of not only sex workers who die or are brutalized in that life, think book Shae, Show Roz. She'd also be the one who is actively saved by the class of people who often perpetuate this system of abuse they exist in.

Nettles isn't in it anymore or has once been preyed on by the entrapping cycle that brothels perpetuate but escapes and makes her own way. She's foul-mouthed and marred because of it, but she also becomes a dragonrider, and then when she has sex it's because she wants to.

When the narrative tries to condemn her for it, she's saved by the person who puts her in that position, unlike the other girls, like Tysha, Nettles' value isn't placed on her past sexual partners, and she is like the other girls who fall victim to the predatory sex work establishments in ASOIAF, but she escapes and isn't punished in the narrative for sleeping with someone or trying to survive in the first place. Something we don't really see in this world.

Overall,

The overarching angle of innocence pushed on her character is extremely strange and does not benefit her as a character. Innocence in this world is based on patriarchal feudalism that commodifies women into property and places value on them like stock that depreciates with superficial nonsense.

Question this world.

Nettles isn't innocent and shouldn’t have to be to deserve the ending she gets. She can just escape because she learns and grows and is young enough to do it without major consequences for her.

Nettles is innocent however, in the narrative of a poor, homeless girl with nothing, accomplishing a tremendous feat and gaining power from it, being used in wars and fights that have nothing to do with her and having the threat of death looming if she doesn't comply.

In being used as a means to an end in a conflict between the two most powerful people in the realm and escaping without any permanent concequence to her. She's not guilty.

Let girls have fun and be complex characters in their narratives. Innocence isn't a necessity, but even if it was for you to like her, she is, in a sense, innocent.

I have a question about your RWBY au: how would you handle teams facing consequences when making a big decision that backfires?

My problem with RWBY is that despite making choices that should had have consequences (telling government secrets to Robyn hill, pointing a gun at Whitney, agrus incident etc) the characters instead get rewarded for their actions.

What will you do differently?

I apologize because this got long and maybe veered a bit from the original question but here we go.

For a TL;DR: we need better world building, more apparent character flaws the narrative actively calls out, and villains to be dangerous

I think the main issue with why RWBY never had proper consequences, is that it largely operated (and still somewhat does) on rule of cool. Characters are powerful when the plot demands it in ways that kind of make the stakes feel nonexistent.

To properly implement consequences for characters we need to know what their flaws are and what they could get as punishment if those flaws aren't handled.

Our characters have some referenced flaws, but often times their flaws either never get checked because the writers don't view them as flaws needing to be fixed, or they're excused in canon. Bad things don't happen to them mainly because they mess up, they happen because bad people do bad things.

While pyrrha is the character I'm most annoyed about with the lack of depth, all of them are written to be cool and kind of flawless. So first step is I'd set up clear flaws from volume 1 and have them face consequences that will carry over long term. Here are some examples.

Ruby: For Ruby I feel like she tends to focus on handling things herself. She's incredibly self reliant to the point that she makes a lot of choices to do things solo that ultimately could get her killed. But the writers never go that far. She faces off against Cinder twice and leaves unscathed, if we're going to have her track Cinder to the tower, Ruby needs to leave wounded. Allowed to live because Cinder let her. Give her a scar that remains on her for the rest of the series. Maybe it's normally covered but it's a reminder of the dangers she faces. And even then we don't have to have her learn her lesson yet.

Yang is one where her consequences will effect the Atlas arc. Because I want her semblance to make her black out when she rages. Something she never focused on fixing because normally she could direct it before she blacks out so that the only person hurt is the one who caused the rage. Her teachers keep warning her of the damage she does to the area around her and how her black outs get longer the angrier she is. But she kind of waves it off because she's had this semblance for years and she knows how to deal with it.

However during the vytal festival when there are several competitions between schools and we build up a rivalry between team villain and team rwby we see her anger boiling. She's containing it and does a good job for a while, but the Mercury fight is the last straw. When she attacks Mercury its not just that she hits him once, in fact the villains new her rage made her black out and expected her to hit once. She downs him bad. She has to be restrained and the entire of remnant bears witness to her building rage culminating in her pummeling a kid from a different school. And when she attacks Adam that's once more her lashing out before thinking leading to her arm loss. When she travels she's met with wariness and fear because people know her as the girl that destroys.

Her six month hiatus is not just full of her wallowing over her arm, but angry over everything and raging out sporadically. I'd honestly give taiyang the same semblance as her being the one to help her train to properly control it. But the shadow of her actions won't disappear and people will try to exploit that weakness if she doesn't curb it.

For Blake it would be her being a traitor and running. RWY need their trust regained by her that she'll have to actively work towards doing so but it won't just be them. In Atlas Ironwood knows her past because he would've run checks on any people if interest and found her connection to Adam who was one of the people leading the attack on Beacon and subsequently also was the leader of a group that attacked Argus. Finding out she was a loyal follower of him almost her entire life means that she isn't let into the inner circle and in fact spends most of her stay in Atlas monitored and on probation. The group vouches for her but that can only pacify someone like Ironwood slightly.

For Weiss I'd have her actually be very loyal to authority figures in a way that often causes arguments between her team and her. In Atlas it would cause a major fight because if Yang were to spill secrets to Robyn, Weiss would probably avoid speaking to her for a decent amount of time. I think by that point she'd not outright tell Ironwood herself, but she would be furious at the disrespect. It would mean that more often than not, she's causing unnecessary disagreements in the group but it would also mean that she knows best how to handle people in places like Atlas.

Largely I'd just have a big focus on how dumb choices they make effect their relationships with people outside of the core group. Revealing secret information leads to Penny becoming very disappointed in them and a slight breakdown in the friendship. Potientially if Yang did it without talking to the others it now means Yang gets into a verbal fighting match with the rest of the gang because everything starts to go wrong.

Going off to fight things alone or not properly training means you get into situations that could maim or kill you. Trusting anyone too easily can result in someone dangerous entering your group with the intent to cause harm.

In general I'd really just focus on building flaws, turning down power levels at the start, and making the world and villains more dangerous. Also I think making each kingdom distinctly different in its politics and government could've helped make it so that the group trying to approach all situations the same backfires a lot. It's something I'd have to rewatch the show for to list specific instances of things I'd make consequences for but those are my current notes.

your posting about the disparity in portrayals of cobra kai and miyagi do reminds of the vibes of how redditors and those even here say that anybody who LIKES sam must be privileged rich women, or even posts preaching daniel was the true bigot even as a kid who provoked everyone and fought hate with hate and DESERVED to be beat for spraying johnny. the goalposts for the good kind of poor kid/rich kids move a lot with the show and the fan reactions.

The Karate Kid is about a hotheaded boy who, through respect for his elders and hard work, wins the respect of his peers and causes them to choose a less aggressive path for themselves as well -

And this bothers people!

It tells you a lot about what we value as a society, hm? And apparently it's violence in boys, and yes, always looking away from the consequences. Miyagi interfered because these boys were very close to beating Daniel to death. Something they may have been too young to recognise (though Bobby didn't let himself get blinded), but he would have recognised from his time at war. And in Cobra Kai, I had such mad respect for them showing the natural consequences of that No Mercy attitude - Miguel getting seriously, almost irreversibly hurt.

Except, no - we don't want to face that. The Cobras do not deserve to be called out on nearly killing another boy, because he, well, he deserved it 😒 We can't accept that this is bad behaviour! Because we don't want it to be! And violence ultimately does not have consequences for Miguel because we don't want it to! Miracle spinal injury cure it is!

As for Sam, who has no redeeming qualities in the narrative because she doesn't face any hardship, well, of course the default opinion is dislike. She's a white teenage girl. What good can she possibly do? And what is clever about Cobra Kai is that Sam knows this in-universe. She can't do any good, but she can do plenty wrong: she's not supposed to be too smart, so she ditches Aisha, who is her best friend but not white and not girly pretty. She can't be as hard as Yasmine or as soft as Moon, or she will be deemed a bitch or laughing stock. She's a rich white girl so she has to date a jock, cue Parker. She can't do karate, who does karate? She can't be sexually available, she'll be punished, but she also can't not be, she'll be punished. And then Miguel defends her honor, so she has to be with him, he's earned her.

She knows she'll be basic if she follows the rules but she's terrified of not doing that. And well,with reason, cue Reddit. She picks out the girliest, pinkest Prom dress that looks absolutely hideous, but at least showcases how she is still a good girl, and not a psycho karate bitch -

And then there's Tory, who so unapologetically is a psycho karate bitch it makes her blood boil. She's so angry that Tory gets away with it that yes, it turns her into a catty bitch - the only aggression she's allowed - until Tory gives her permission to let it all out. But for Chrissakes, she's punished for being a catty bitch by nearly getting murdered twice. But that too is justified to us. Daniel wasn't allowed to be a whimp and she's not allowed to be a bitch, or anything but what she is and even if she's just a basic white girl, following the script to the letter, it'll never be enough.

Makes you appreciate how insanely brave Ali Mills is. She goes for the poor whimp. She's unapologetically into soccer. She defies her parents in rejecting Johnny. She drives Daniel's car, and anyone who dares comment can kiss her ass. Sam wishes she was as brave! But as we can see, Sam is so perceptive to what other people demand from her that she doesn't know who she is anymore. Yes, karate gives her an outlet - but she still hasn't figured out she isn't into Miguel, or Robby, or perhaps any guy. Because forget getting hate for being basic... imagine the hate for being gay!

But who cares, right? She's just a basic teenage white girl, even though that's all she's allowed to be...

And who else would care to think about what that's like for two seconds, but indeed other basic white girls?

What is that draws you to Ruby x Oscar? (I mean it on a 'pls infodump me' vibe.)

I enjoy committing to the bit of less popular ships in RWBY and suffering the consequences

@flytehwire Ok, seriously, to answer this properly I need to explain something about myself. When I am looking for character pairings, I am looking for, in order of importance: 1. Harmonious themes and rhetoric, 2. Character interactions, and 3. Other, extenuating factors. While other factors can sometimes determine how I view a pairing (romantic/platonic/friend/familial/etc) and character interactions can override the thematic element, I am primarily looking for those sweet, sweet story beats.

So, when you give me two kids carrying the weight of massive legacies they feel they have to fulfill, stepping into leadership roles neither were prepared for, and throw in a smattering of identity issues to boot? Yeah, I'm hooked 100%. These two are important to each other on a base narrative level, before even considering we see they're important to each other in their interactions throughout the show. Their arcs mirror each other, but are different enough that they compliment each other and are not going through the exact same thing.

By which I mean, both are struggling with the very same things listed above, but slightly to the left of each other to make them different enough that it makes them both unique and interesting in their own rights. For sake of time and ease of answering, I'm not going to fully cite my sources, but it became increasingly apparent (especially through v9) that Ruby's whole issue is attempting to follow the legacies of those from before her, starting with the general, Hunter/Huntress ideal and the heroes of stories in the early volumes, and then moving over to the SEWs and her mother in the later volumes. A lot of untangling in this personal arc for her revolves around reconciling the fairy tales she believed in and what is being asked of her in reality, and then determining who she is and what she stands for when it becomes apparent those ideals are more lofty dreams and reality is much more complicated. In essence, Ruby's arc is finding who she was when stripped of everything she believed as a child, and we saw that exactly throughout v9 ("What are you?" // "What is a Huntress?" ultimately boil down to "Who is Ruby Rose?")

Oscar, conversely, I would argue, already had some sense of who he was at the start. Sure, he may have wanted more and was unable to voice exactly what "more" was, but he's young...who honestly knew what they wanted to do with their life when they were 14? Regardless, his arc is less about asking who he is and is more about the fear of losing himself entirely now that he's part of the Ozcarnation line--and thus, it's also more about proving who he is to the world around him as everyone else assumes he's just another copy/paste of Oz. Oscar had to have a strong handle of his own identity at the start simply in order to beat the "he's just Ozpin" allegations, which he eventually did do (with some help from Oz's disappearing act).

And that isn't to say that there aren't echoes of each other's themes as well. Ruby very much does lose herself and must reassert who she is at her core (most evident in v9, but definitely starting in v7). Oscar very much does have to figure out who he is in the Ozcarnation line and how he specifically wants to handle situations (most prominent in the "Her name...is Jinn" decision in v6 and his actions through v7, but also metatextually hinted at when he talks to Ironwood at the end of v7 holding himself and acting like Ozpin, and then getting shot, and then in v8 when he tries to act like Ozma and Salem directly calls him out. It's almost like fate is punishing him because he's supposed to think and act like Oscar, and not try to be those who came before him...). And I think ultimately that's what makes them fun for me, they revolve around this overarching theme of identity in the face of legacies and destinies and leadership and each take a piece to compliment the other.

Of course, that doesn't mean they have to be romantic. And that's correct, they don't! Full transparency, I honestly wasn't fully onboard with Rosegarden until the end of v7/start of v8. Oscar's blush at getting rescued was the first time I felt fully vindicated over a ship, but the ending of v7 is really the beginning for the end of me I think. It was at that point where it became apparent their themes were merging and then splitting off again into the projected trajectories they're on now. And, in terms of interaction, throughout v7 and v8, Ruby and Oscar are shown repeatedly to be in sync with each other and trusting each other (even when they don't necessarily agree with each other!) All of those moments for me boiled down to one single, striking fact: because of what they're going through and how similar each struggle was, Ruby and Oscar to me are the only two characters in the show who could understand each other on a deeper level.

(And as an aside, the release of 'Until the End' and 'Fear' being the last two songs of that volume, and clearly being a Ruby song and an Oscar song respectively, completely altered my brain chemistry. That's a separate 3k essay, but the call and response between 'Fear's' "Who will you see there in the darkness? // When no one is watching who will you be? When you're afraid and everything changes will you see a stranger? // Feel proud or betrayed?" vs 'Until the End's' "I promise I’ll be here until...Our story has been told // 'Til our bodies break down every door // 'Til we find what we’ve been looking for // And stare with pride into the face of fear // In our finest hour, I’ll be standing here // And should we fall to darkness // This power, I will harness // I promise I’ll be here until the end" just does things to me on a personal level).

Others come close. Jaune and Weiss both have similar arcs about breaking legacies as well (Weiss with her family and Jaune with...presumably his family, if not his personal views on what he should be and on his promises to Pyrrha), but they're both on a far more personal and less world-shaping level than Ruby and Oscar. Blake as well, with reclaiming her identity, but that as well is a little more personal and also more about regaining what was "stolen" by Adam, so to speak, than finding herself altogether. And Penny is more about learning everything altogether and learning about who she can and cannot trust more than about who she is at her core. And, as an aside, I am a multi-shipper. I do like several of these pairings with Ruby, and Oscar and Penny is an utterly fascinating concept to me.

The reason why Ruby and Oscar come out on top for me is because at the end of the day, they're still the only two who can understand and empathize with each other on the deepest level. They're the two that appear to be entirely in sync with each other. And they're also the two currently slated to be running the show in the next generation. And if there's one thing I love more than seeing my power couple ships completely in love, it's seeing those two characters entirely and implicitly understanding and trusting each other.

This is of course glossing over a lot too. Their scenes together are often pretty striking: the dojo scene in v5 (Oscar admitting he's scared, Ruby for the first time really opening up about Penny and Pyrrha at The Fall of Beacon), the cane scene in v6 (Ruby being the only one to comfort Oscar and reaffirm that he isn't Oz), Oscar's panic during the fight with Cordo, like...every scene they had in v7, Oscar's blush in v8 and the almost hug that wasn't, and of course, THE scene in v9 (and another 3k essay could be written on why that had to be Oscar, though most of the starting points on my opinion for that are above). They also have some other dichotomies going on in their rhetoric, with the silver/gold symbolism and the sun/moon symbolism; and the extra info in the show with the "Warrior in the Woods" fairy tale and Oscar's allusion to the Little Prince. But several other people have written far better analyses on those than I could ever do currently, and this is getting long enough as is.

But yeah, tl;dr thematically and rhetorically complimentary kids just trying to do their best, figure themselves out, and save the world? Yeah, I wanna see them cuddle and comfort and rely on each other in the way they only can with the other.

I really am obsessed with the idea of the Collector being the perfect parallel and foil to King, as the person he once saw himself as, and will become; A feared and revered, all-powerful tyrant, but also immature and who was never told no. And after losing his power and being reduced to just a little kid, the Collector is forced to mature and grow and interact with people as REAL people, and eventually finds out that he’s not really so cruel or evil himself, once he’s made to choose between power and his family!

Like it’d just be so narratively poetic, if King had to confront his worst past self via a true fulfillment of that in the Collector; Who already has an army worshipping his name! Imagine the Collector having feasts with King, just as King himself bragged! It’s like Luz confronting the worst version of herself in Philip Wittebane...

Which is why I really hope the Collector’s fate is to simply be... Stripped of his power and forced to live as a little kid, as King thought he himself had been. We know that people have imprisoned the Collector before, that he’s been freed before, and then trapped again, and it didn’t make a damn difference. He still didn’t learn his lesson, and with how the show critiques Philip for trying again and again the same thing he KNOWS has been proven to fail, via cloning his brother...

And I have to wonder if TOH is doing the same, especially if we compare the Collector to Luz in a lot of ways, how the isolation of the reality camp probably wouldn’t have helped Luz, just hurt and broken her because of rejection. Maybe the Collector’s imprisonment was also like that for them, and while obviously there’s a real difference between Luz and the Collector’s chaos... I think both stemmed from that unthinking desire to have fun while innocently not considering those who might get hurt from it.

And it makes sense, a parallel and foil to King would be one for Luz and vice-versa, because Luz and King are themselves parallels to one another! It’d be poetic if King even had to guide a depowered Collector when all was said and done; Understandably he might not want to after what happens in Season 3. But I think it could really further that cycle of kindness theme that this show has, and be incredibly compelling for King’s arc, to face the person he wanted to be and thought he was, and help THEM with it this time; He did learn many lessons while under the impression he was a knocked-down god, so King sort of still can relate!

Like King, it might be shown that the Collector really is fully capable of being a sweet kid, who might talk hot shit of destroying everyone and razing the world after he’s knocked down a peg; But then it becomes apparent how easily he’s placated with proper attention. How he’s not malicious and when made to face actual consequence, can really learn and take that into consideration.

Plus with King’s lifespan going to make him outlive everyone else, he needs that long-living friend who will actually BE a friend to him this time and relate to King, via the Collector! And the Collector can get closure over any betrayal he perceived from the Titans with the last of them, and make up for his genocide of them by supporting the final one.

The Collector would essentially be what we once analyzed King as back in Season 1, and that’d just be SO fascinating and a wonderful bookend to the show! Maybe the Collector will lose a ‘crown of power’ and/or be struck down by a dark spell... Because the show really is aiming for the idea that to truly break pain for kids like Luz and Amity and Hunter, you just have to treat them with compassion instead of punishment over their mistakes for once.

TL;DR This isn’t just a coming-of-age story for a good portion of our cast, hell it’s a coming-of-age for the Collector as well! And if it’s King’s friends/supporters who help cast down the Collector... Then that’d just be a perfect karmic parallel to the implication of the Collector’s worshippers, the Titan Trappers, taking everything from King by killing his father!

We might even get a parallel to a familiar shot, with the POV of the Collector as he falls from the sun and its power he’s associated with; Just as King believed his fall to be metaphorical. Perhaps the Collector will be in the embrace of another as it happens, like King with Jean-Luc... And/or Jean-Luc himself will return to be a nanny to this kid, indestructible and immortal enough to keep up the task!

You're welcome to play however you like.

Yeh? You can play evil MC but the ending won't be really satisfying: "Bah, you were killed. The end! " Play good MC and maybe you will be rewarded.

A subtle manipulation authors sometimes use​ if they want to steer readers towards a specific route. I've seen this before in some games....

And whos the say I won't do the same for those play moral and good characters? I've said it before, I'll punish you for being too good, I'll punish you for being too bad. I'll even punish you for liking one brother over the other. People have asked what happens to MC that are too naive, merciful or trusting and I say- "well, people(your allies) will probably kill those you spared behind your back." or "They're gonna use you for their own agendas."

This is game, at the end of the day, is a story with a narrative with an ongoing theme. I've talked at length before how I will punish both good acts and bad. I've said countless of times that these characters have their own morals and agenda that go beyond their relationship with the MC.

I'm telling you right now, that if your MC is too corrupt to the point that it makes makes your rivals look like the good guy- it would be a disservice to my own character's backstory and convictions if they allow that to exist. They will not accept it. They've suffered under the status quo for too long to tolerate a leader that is significantly worse. It doesn't matter if you're their best friend, sibling or lover, they will put down the dog if it's too feral. You're one person, but the people being affected are in the thousands.

If you want to play the extreme option, I welcome it, it continues the narrative about leadership and change and sovereignty that I am trying to weave, and I enjoy seeing characters pushed beyond their limits- but you have to understand extreme choices come with extreme consequences. Its not so much about you being killed and that's the end- it's you were so fucking unreasonable and cruel, it made your lover strangle you in your sleep because they couldn't live with the guilt that you slaughtered someone they cared about unjustifiably. It's the people rising up against a tyrant to freedom. It's the ambition of power tainting your MC's body and mind and paying the price. It's more nuanced than you think.

If I didn't want to explore it, I wouldn't have made it an option. It would be easier to write a book. But I instead I do, because I still think there is narrative value in exploring a corrupted narrative in the MC and how the characters in the story will react to it.

This isn't going to be some evil wank fest- nobody is going to glaze you off for being so evil. I'm not interested in entertaining that narrative in my story. It has no place for it. The world as I have crafted it, will not tolerate it.

All interactive fiction is a lie by your standards then. As all choices only exist within the breadth of choice that the Author allows. And we authors are all manipulative as fuck. If we want you to engage in the narrative a certain way, we'll make sure it happens the way we want it to. That's the difference between a shitty sandbox an a story of choice that explores a evolving narrative theme.

As authors, we write stories to make you feel exactly how we want you to feel- unreliable narrators exists for the sole reason to lie to readers and gaslight them into believing that some false is true. Hell, I have character lie to your face because I want you to believe in something that might not actually be true, cause the real truth will hurt much more later in the story. I have a fucking fake love interest hiding in the crowd right now as we speak.

If you want to play the villain, you get the villain ending. Sorry anon.