"You can't fall in love with some gifs"

The gifs in question:

I've come back to Time and Again... it's a threshold day miracle!

Whelp, it's been 1 year since I've posted my first fanart on this blog. In turn, I decided to do a 1 year redraw of it, so cool to see my progress but I've still got a lot more I want to work on. Onto the next year ���.

(Original below the cut)

Jacobi and Eiffel both externalize all their problems, but Jacobi projects his own flaws and failures to be other people's fault, while Eiffel thinks his redemption/solution is only in other people's opinions and out of his control, discuss.

i've said before i think the most interesting thing about jacobi is that the finale is the start of a character arc for him, not the culmination of one. and i think this is a big part of that. in things that break other things, he says, "it wasn't anybody's fault. everyone was doing their jobs right, but it just... two guys died. good guys." and i think that line makes a lot of sense if he actually was at fault, or at least feels that he was and can't admit it to himself. in dirty work, he realizes he blames himself for maxwell's death. and then: "i was wrong and people died. and the only thing i can do is not be wrong again."

it creates a perfect loop from his recruitment to where he's at in the finale: two people are dead, but he survived. he's out of a job. what now? i think that's an interesting set up for how jacobi's storyline post-canon could mirror and intersect with lovelace's - they're both people who have been blinded by hurt and anger and desire for revenge, and have had to step back from that ledge. they've both lost "their" people - the only survivors of their respective missions. i don't believe jacobi will ever willingly stay in contact with the rest of the hephaestus crew, but lovelace...? narratively, it could work. "i've got this friend" about lovelace in the finale is an opening. if jacobi's arc so far is a loop, and he's finally open to change, then he and lovelace could also share a thematic link re: breaking cycles.

as for eiffel, i would go so far as to say he completely removes himself from the equation. he projects his desire for redemption onto other people - people like hilbert, who absolutely don't share that desire - but he doesn't want to be in the story. it wouldn't matter if someone told eiffel he was a good person - he wouldn't believe them - and when people do call him out, like in shut up and listen, he takes that as confirmation he's irredeemable and everyone is better off without him. both jacobi and eiffel are treating themselves as passive actors to avoid accountability, in some way, but what eiffel really needs to accept is that he's the only one who can live his life. he isn't a uniquely bad person doomed to harm and failure; he's just like everyone else.

(maybe worth noting in eiffel's view of himself as a bad person vs. the antagonists of the show, including jacobi, is how eiffel sees it as an inherent character flaw that he doesn't want but can't escape, while "let's go be monsters" etc. is an active choice and rationalization from someone who signed up to be the bad guy, who decided he could compartmentalize and live with that.)

another kinda interesting place i'd say jacobi's worldview clashes with eiffel's is that they are both centered on people first. unlike maxwell and kepler, i don't think jacobi really believes in his own version of The Big Picture - he just believes in people who believe. it's progress for the sake of progress, but the nature of that progress isn't his to define; he's not even pretending it is. "because people like me - and people like him - make it possible for people like maxwell to do their jobs." and where eiffel's perspective necessitates recognizing the humanity in everyone, jacobi rationalizes his actions through a strict us-versus-them mentality. so much of how he operates is explained by that line: "there aren't sides. there are just people you'd do things for and people you'd do things to."

Season 4 spoilers below

I think I get what he's saying here.

He's basically saying to do what you can with what you have, and that even managing something like walking when you have three legs is an accomplishment. When you're stripped of all power and the world has you pinned to the ground, even managing to push yourself off the ground with your hands can help you seize the day.

You don't need great power to fight, or to make a difference. Heck, you don't even need a regular amount of power.

When you're left debilitated and disabled, fighting just to stand, getting up and walking anyway will leave an impact, not because you managed to bring down some great evil or heal all the worlds scars.

But because you fought against the odds and won, and that's enough to serve as an inspiration for others in their armless, three-legged fights.

Much like how later in the episode, when Ao Lie is about to be devoured, Mei, who is chained to the ground, barely able to move an inch, summons up all the power inside her to protect him, and breaks free of her restraints, even summoning a new sword altogether. The magic, however, isn't her powers, or how she makes a new sword. It's that she was left with three legs and no arms, but still managed to break into a run. All to protect someone.

It's not about what you succeeded in doing. It's about the fact that you succeeded in the first place.

anyway. might get cancelled for this but the namkook a/b/o fic is like............................... really good. sorry ill see myself out

A new kaiju has been sighted recently, though not a whole lot’s known about this one, unfortunately. It was spotted in Primp recently, and reportedly moved some of its residents to a... temporary new location. Weird, huh? When people were dispatched to go take care of it, it had ended up disappearing on them entirely. Attempts to track it only led up. Like, really, REALLY up. Even still, no one seems to be able to recall what it looked like, or even what it did aside from move everyone over. I mean, you’d think you’d remember a giant animal of any sort, but, guess that’s kind of a bust. Anyways, search party’s been sent out to Suzuran to get everyone who was forcibly moved there back to Primp. And, uh, on that subject, if anyone sees Sig please let an authority figure know. Yeah, that includes Lemres, he may as well count by this point. We know where he landed but if he doesn’t lay down and take a really, REALLY long nap (actually wait. he might do that) he’s probably going to be gone by the time anyone gets there. Anyways, thanks for listening to the news, as always. Signing off.

SPEAKING of charmac dogboys i have GOT to write that teen wolf au

googled extinct animals and briefly felt faint at the near-limitless diversity of Creatures to choose from

— hera lindsay bird

I don't remember why but I dreamed about looking up the common religions in different regions of Thailand last night

animals that kozu is to me simultaneously: a jackrabbit(easy), a serval cat, a lynx cat, a caracal cat, a viper, a wild horse...

As our resident Eiffel expert, what do you think his childhood was like? As in, do you think there might be some trauma there? (Probably nothing “major”— nothing he’d think of as trauma— but I feel like it probably wasn’t entirely healthy either. Or maybe that’s just projection due to knowing someone veeery similar to Eiffel)

oh! i wrote about some of that in this post.

that line from his backstory doc - "eiffel was extremely hesitant at first, but desperate to become independent from his family and strapped for cash, he finally relented." - and what gabriel urbina said about eiffel being an unsupervised "tv is my parent" kid really defines / reinforces my perception of his childhood. like, mostly i think eiffel's parents just... weren't around. i think he was an only child, and hasn't been in contact with his family for, like, his whole adult life. he's resentful about people always forgetting his birthday in a way that makes sense if he's been holding onto that hurt since childhood. he's so used to being alone - not even being present in his own life - and he's internalized the feeling that he doesn't matter much to anyone. i think it was @books-space-things who said something to me, like, eiffel is so used to being alone, he doesn't realize how lonely he is.

most of his relevant backstory stuff with canon basis is covered in that linked post, so, on the headcanon side of things... he's got that undiagnosed / unmedicated adhd; i'm sure as a kid he was constantly getting the message, like, "i know you can do this, why don't you try harder?" and he didn't know why it was hard for him, so he thought he must just be lazy. i think he really wanted a dog, and either 1) really got his hopes up, but never got one, or 2) had a dog, but came home from school one day to find out his parents gave it away. if his parents were still together, they probably shouldn't have been. needless to say, i don't think he had a happy childhood, but i don't know if he fully recognizes the ways it was unhappy, because more than anything it was just kind of... empty? because his parents' lack of attention meant he got to like, stay up and watch movies all night on a school night, and eat junk food, and go wherever he wanted by himself, whenever he wanted... when he's talking about his childhood, sometimes he mistakes that for freedom. and that kinda ties into his pop culture escapism. but, like, he's probably got a core childhood memory of waiting for one of his parents to take him to / pick him up from something they completely forgot about. pretty much his whole life, i think eiffel's been training himself to expect disappointment.

the lunar chronicles shouldve been like eight books we didnt get enough down time moments with these characters

day 47 of posting Whispangle until they kiss in canon

“I wonder how Tangle got that scar on her face?”