#case in point: i basically just wrote a whole second post in the tags
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college courses making me realize i am nowhere near as knowledgable, insightful, or analytical as i could be. i genuinely do not have a problem with this, as it means i can still grow as a thinker, which is one of my favorite things to be. it excites me that i am still learning, that i am still being surprised, that i am still misunderstanding and getting things incorrect, because then, i know. i retain what i can, and am able to apply it to anything in my life. the possibilities are infinite already, but that infinity keeps growing larger and larger. i'm glad i'm here.
#hi hello#biblog#and of course ones value is NOT dependent on being knowledgable insightful or analytical#i know this and still sometimes lose focus of that fact#but - simply put - there is no greater joy to me than contributing meaningfully to other's lives#as a child and as an adult i have always been able to do so best with words written or spoken#i place an extremely high importance on what i say and don't say - when i am lax with my words it feels wrong#not just in vocabulary - but in what i mean to say#thats what im getting the most out of college right now - the ability to synthesize my jumbled mess of a brain into words and concepts that-#fully and completely articulate exactly what i think#anyhow#i simply enjoy talking - sharing myself with others#case in point: i basically just wrote a whole second post in the tags#ANYHOW anyhow - byebye for now! gonna get dinnar 🔥
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Hey, thank you so much for answering my previous ask. I love reading your blog and what you have to say. Also I forgot to mention the person who thinks Sasuke fucked Karin also talked about what you said on your blog with someone else, https://dushman-e-jaan.tumblr.com/post/663748673413464064/i-saw-a-post-where-anyone-who-says-that-sasuke-and I'm pretty sure that's your post bc I read it. They're basically making fun of the whole thing and again slapping the "brothers" label onto practically everything you said 😭 What are your thoughts on this?
Hello.
Woah, yeah, that is my post. I wrote it a long time ago, I had no clue that they got this triggered by it, that they went through it line by line, as a response to me, replying to every statement I made in second person and didn’t even tag me. If it weren’t for your ask, I would never have found out about it. Well, I am going to take it as a compliment, whether they like it or not. Lol.
I don’t generally write my content to defend my takes, I give all the reasoning and cite evidence within my posts, and if someone has a problem with it, I generally reply to them in the comment box. But since this aforementioned post seems like it has gone some way into the anti SNS fandom, and because I wasn’t even aware of it, I will address some of these issues.
Okay. Gear up, this is going to be long.
First things first. They are offended because they don’t agree with my statement :
“Well, at least you are being consistent. Because people who think Sasuke and Naruto are brothers are the same people who think Sakura and Hinata are feminist role models.”
And they want to make it clear that there are other fans who don’t think highly of Sakura and Hinata, but still consider Sasuke and Naruto brothers. Well, I will give them that. I am aware there are additional fans who consider them brothers, CASE IN POINT. My bad.
Honestly, there’s a lot of stuff here, that just doesn’t require my response. Like my mention of Tarkovsky. It was used as a figure of speech by which I wanted to say that decoding Sasuke and Naruto’s romance wasn’t rocket science, it’s a straight statement, I don’t know why they gotta twist it. I think the mention of Tarkovsky threw them off, because they feel that only they have the authority to talk about more brainy things. Lol. So I am going to sidestep all the fountains of their insecurities and come to the point.
Okay so, they insist that Sasuke and Naruto are spiritual brothers, mainly because their chakras are reincarnation of Indra and Ashura’s chakras who happen to be biological brothers. And they take great offence to my statement that people who think of them as brothers are heteronormative and homophobic. I will come to that part later, I will address the reincarnation part first.
I honestly thought we were past this non-sensical and juvenile non-argument of them being brothers for the aforementioned reason. These antis use such big words and cite academic papers and articles and then, flip right over to say something so counterintuitive and irrational, without even considering any alternative understanding, it hardly seems like an argument and more like intellectual masturbation. Which it is.
Okay. This is their argument to support their stance.
“However, this story includes chakra, Indra, Ashura and is very much tied to spirituality. Buddhism, Hinduism and Jainism deal with that. Kishimoto took his inspiration from there.Hindu scriptures exhort spiritual people to lead exemplary lives, control their sexual desires and abstain from sex, just as they are expected to control all desires and practice renunciation and detachment with their minds absorbed in the contemplation of God or the Self.”
And it doesn’t stop there, this rambling goes on and on and on…phew. I appreciate the amount of effort they have seemed to put in their arguments. Sadly, it's all as misguided as it can be, lol.
While I agree that one can see the myriad influences of various philosophical schools of thought and spiritual belief systems in Kishimoto’s work, NONE of it proves their brother argument. Why? Because it’s all out of context. I see this a lot, the pitfalls and trappings of sticking to one’s projection in one’s favourite piece of art/literature and bending text and context to their will, with citations, whether it’s relevant or not.
Such mental gymnastics, lol. I have seen this kind of response by student film theorists when they analyse Ozu's films. Oh why did he put that vase in the centre of the frame, what did he want to say by showing that vase? Did he mean to depict loneliness or does it indicate the effects of capitalism and consumerism in an insular, collectivist, traditional Japanese society of the times, or is it about the soul that is trapped in the material prison of flesh etc etc etc. Over analyzation. Which they apparently have accused me of, hahaha.
Unfortunately, that’s not how storytelling works. And it definitely doesn’t work in Naruto’s case. They would do well to remember that writers are not out to con you. Any writer worth his salt uses a combination of narrative tools to tell his story. Sad thing is most fans in this fandom just don’t understand how stories are written, the specific tools that a writer uses and the narrative devices that guide and lend a certain flow and approach to the story. Kishi is just like any other writer, in that context. So when he wants to give a certain narrative or visual information to the audience, he will use these common tools to drive his point home. For example, foreshadowing. What is foreshadowing?
Sourced from Wikipedia :
“Foreshadowing is a literary device in which a writer gives an advance hint of what is to come later in the story. Foreshadowing often appears at the beginning of a story, or a chapter, and it helps the reader develop expectations about the upcoming events. A writer may implement foreshadowing in many different ways.”
And do we see this foreshadowing in Kishi’s plot? You bet, :).
And this is Chapter 3. Lol.
If Kishi wanted to depict Naruto and Sasuke as brothers, he would not have made them kiss. Even if accidentally. This scene, right at the start of the manga, indicates the very romantic nature of their relationship. I wonder why these stans don’t find it suspicious that even though this kiss is supposed to be accidental, both Naruto and Sasuke think of this kiss as a precious memory, not as a joke, but something significant, something that contributed to develop their dynamic in the manga. I have seen hundreds and hundreds of films in my life, but I have never seen anywhere where two likely brothers were made to kiss like this, for the sake of developing their dynamic. Only in romantic relationships.
Let me state it out in as clear words as possible. - In a macro sense, the overarching narrative of this manga includes a clear intention by the author to push the characters of Naruto and Sasuke to give an appropriate name to their relationship, continuously harping on defining and redefining their relationship with plot points strategically appointed to affect their dynamic that further propels the central narrative of the story.
Simply put, Kishi forcefully insists on weaving this story in a way that forces the protagonist to think and rethink the meaning of what he feels for Sasuke, as instigated by Sasuke himself, who every time they meet, insists Naruto answer his question as to why Narutio is so hell bent upon following him, why does he care so much so that he is ready to leave his training and the people he loves behind, just to bring Sasuke back. And everytime Naruto even breathes the word ‘friends’ or ‘brothers’, Sasuke’s either annoyed or surprised or displeased, never satisfied, never convinced. The satisfaction comes at the end of the manga, in chapter 698, when Naruto finally gives some explanation as to what he means by it. Shippuden didn’t end with the war arc, it ended with Sasuke and Naruto’s reconciliation. It didn’t end on the note of an ideological conflict and its eventual resolution, it ended on the note where Sasuke asked Naruto : But what does being friends mean to you?
And Naruto said with a clear sense that he understands what Sasuke is asking of him and so after thinking for a very pregnant pause, says : Even if you were to ask me that, I don’t think I would have an answer. But when I see you carrying your burden, it hurts me, so much so that I just can’t take it.
You really don’t need a PhD to see the nuanced significance of this text.
Point is, this going back and forth trying to define their relationship is not an isolated incident, it basically makes the backbone of the story. Which is why the aforementioned dialogues make sense, as they form the conclusion of this story. If they were brothers, why would this element exist?
Everything in the story serves to contribute to the central narrative and for the sake of character development of its main players.
That Kishi saw a need to even discuss why they were not friends, and that they were not brothers, but that Naruto feels immense hurt at seeing Sasuke hurt, is indicative enough that Kishi was definitely not trying to portray them as brothers. That these stans consider them brothers, when this art made by Kishimoto himself exists, is proof enough that they are highly indulgent of their self projections.
They are so motivated, for their own projections, to ignore the nuanced characterization of Naruto’s closeted gay self, or Sasuke’s oft pointed disinterest in women, that their understanding comes off as extremely lacking.
Ask yourself, why would Kishi even write these nuances in the way of visual imagery and strategic scenes where Naruto is made to react so strongly to even mild and unintentioned homoerotic moments? Why would Naruto be written to overcompensate to cover these moments up with something distinctly heterosexual? Why would Kishi even put so much effort in writing these characters this way if Kishi only wanted to portray them as brothers? What would even be the point of it?
Every single chapter goes through multilayered scrutiny by editors after it’s written, which means anything that is unnecessary or extraneous to the narrative is taken out. It’s supposed to be concise, and yet have the desired effect on the readers. Why keep those texts or panels that don’t serve the story? Instead, why do these elements serve to develop the characters? They obviously mean something, don't they? They are there for a reason, and anyone who has seen the portrayal of homosexuality in media will instantly recognise it. Those who haven’t can at least wonder why and venture to find out instead of giving their relationship names that are incongruent with their actual dynamic.
No other brotherly dynamic in the manga itself is even close to Naruto and Sasuke’s. Honestly, I have seen so much Japanese media outside of manga and anime in the last year, and I didn't see two men or boys depicted as brothers who make kissy faces at each other, or stand side by side looking like they are giving each other hand jobs and orgasming, or where one man’s mouth is deliberately drawn over another man’s crotch. To say that this indicates they were depicted as brothers, is not only counterintuitive, but downright ridiculous and plain stupid. It’s some real heavy duty denial.
If Kishimoto meant for them to be brothers because their chakras were reincarnation of Ashura and Indra, he would have made some character say it out loud in some context. Like I said, writers are not out there to con you. They will make sure that their intent is clearly shown to the audience, through text, subtext and visual language. And everything about Naruto and Sasuke, everything that contributes to their dynamic, whether it be dialogues, orchestrated situations, plot points, visual imagery, some of which exudes sexual tension, in no way indicates a platonic relationship. Those who have the presence of mind to pick it, will pick it, those who don’t would spout non-sense like our antis here. Lol.
Kishimoto knows how to use foreshadowing. Case in point.
He gives us an advance hint of what’s to come, and the narrative takes its twists and turns, being developed with this thread in mind, and then the arc ends with a conclusion of the underlying idea foreshadowed earlier with the hint. NONE of this is accidental. It’s all part of writing, it’s a literary tool, a narrative device. Hell, it isn’t a coincidence that Kishimoto keeps repeating this element over and over and over again, where Naruto goes through a whole range of situations and emotional upheavals in order to understand his feelings for Sasuke. First, he wonders if Sasuke is like a brother, or a friend, or more. Kishi can’t say it explicitly, but honestly, he doesn’t need to. These antis look for all sorts of reasoning and proof OUTSIDE the manga. If they were a little more honest with themselves, they would see that one really doesn’t need to do that, all the pertinent information that one needs to decode the nature of their relationship is inside the manga, in panels, visual imagery, dialogues, narrative development and notes.
Like I always say : First rule of deduction : Work with what you have. Facts, use what’s is available to you in the source material.
It is absolutely valid to look for outside source if you see a solid and legitimate reason to, which is congruent with the source material, like in the case of Chikamatsu. It’s already established clearly that Kishimoto is his fan, he has put a lot of effort to pay tribute to him in his own manga, he makes sure that this element is clearly present in the context and text, and the editors have talked about it in the notes. And ALL of that makes it a legit link, for one to connect it with Shinjuu.
The antis talk of irrelevant sources such as Jainism and Hinduism and whatnot, lol, it honestly looks like a super desperate attempt to twist and deform and bend the narrative to their interpretation where they conveniently ignore all the relevant panels where Naruto clearly says that him and Sasuke aren’t really brothers to Hagoromo, where Sasuke makes it a point to say to Sai that he only has one brother, clearly implying that he doesn’t consider Naruto a brother. All these extra interpretations that antis force upon the narrative is a result of their own projection. It's as simple as that.
If Sasuke was satisfied with the explanation that they were brothers, why would he keep asking Naruto the same question again and again? Doesn’t that indicate that he isn’t satisfied with Naruto’s understanding of it? And he is only convinced of it at the very end, when Naruto is bleeding out, about to die, when he finally, with much visible reticence, admits that he doesn’t know how to explain it?
Think about it, if they were just brothers, why would there be this hesitation? Being brothers is not a controversial thing, it’s not a taboo thing, it’s not abnormal, opposite in fact, given how much the characters of this story are shaped by their familial bonds. Instead of thinking of the most obvious things, these antis round up obscure and entirely irrelevant articles to sound smart and intellectual, as if that’s gonna make a difference. How is this extraneous intellectual regurgitation gonna help your case if your basic premise is wrong? That’s not how dialectics work. Lol.
Then they said this.: “(Considering Ino to be a closeted queer who only went for Sasuke to gain Sakura’s affections would be another one of these hilarious mishaps.)”
I honestly don’t know who they are referring to, because I have never said or implied anything even close to it. Maybe they are just assuming things. It’s not the only time they assume things. They also think I am some Western Man with my capitalistic and consumerist takes on Naruto. hahahaha.
Damn, I can't help but notice that whenever someone disagrees with them, they instantly label them as Western. Well, they are wrong on both counts, because neither am I western, nor a man. In fact, my socio-cultural understanding of the world is pretty close to Japan’s. I would also like to mention that my community practises the same religion that happens to be the official religion of Japan. But of course, I have never needed to flex on that, because it’s just not needed. The information that I got from the manga itself, plus my own experience of media is enough for me to make my points. I am able to qualify my content with the evidence found INSIDE the manga, and if I see clearly delineated references to outside material in it, I point them out. Like I have done here.
Honestly, it’s as simple as that. No need to twist your head at a 180 degrees to prove your point, if you are trying that hard, it becomes clear you have no legit leg to stand on and you are making shit up, just to validate your headcanon.
Don’t act against intuition, don’t act against text and visual language, don’t act against what is both explicitly and implicitly given in the manga because that is the opposite of examining something objectively. But well, people do worse to keep sticking to their denial.
Anyway, this foreshadowing can be seen in the first arc, where the central theme is ‘protecting one’s precious person’ and how one can unlock special hidden strengths when one is motivated to protect the person most dear to them. This element is foreshadowed in the relationship between Zabuza and Haku and through twists and turns, is finally concluded at the end of the arc, where Sasuke almost dies to protect Naruto and both unlock special powers for each other. Not rocket science. Kishi is a generous author that way, he wants this reader to know what he is saying and what he means by it, and so he will supply enough textual and visual information to make sense of the overarching story and themes. To simply ignore that for one’s head canons is a gross injustice to the story and the artist. If you have to ignore what he is saying explicitly or drawing explicitly, why even bother to engage with this manga? lol. What a waste.
It is not a complicated thing at all, in fact, it would have become a lot easier for Kishimoto to write this story if he could just have explicitly written them as brothers, a lot of effort would have been spared, no? And it would have all been believable, because it makes total sense that Naruto would want to save and protect his brother. The story would not change at all. Then why the hammer like insistence on having this whole brother or friend or comrade dialectic? Why? You know why?
Because they are NOT brothers.
Next, they said this : The problem with a lot of western readers is that they discard any and all relationships, familial and platonic, in favor of their romantic obsessions and delusions of “freedom” in a capitalistic society,................... ... the widespread consumption of amorous rituals constitutes the core of contemporary romantic love, reinvigorating capitalism and lovers alike.”
And this goes on and on….I am not going to put the entire thing here, it’s basically unnecessary blathering and intellectual masturbation.
Snickers, Delusions of freedom in a capitalistic society. Bwahaha. Where is this even coming from? Entirely irrelevant. Reminds me of my younger self when I would deliberately attach esoteric sounding citations to my papers to impress the professor and would still get a B. Lol.
I have written enough on the subject of the importance of familial bonds which shape the characters in this manga, so they are definitely wrong on that count. But well, they think they are the authority on Japanese media, what can I say? Sidestepping what’s actually in the manga and supplementing your argument with entirely disproportionate and irrelevant pointers only indicates that they are floundering. When you have no legit foundation for your argument, this happens. Lmao. I am no stranger to it, thankfully I got over it in my teens.
Then they claimed this : (Remember, Kishimoto comes from a very small village and is from a different generation altogether; so the odds of him penning anything even close to the “sexual categorizations” of the post-modern western sexual-domains are less than the second coming of Christ.)
Hahahahahaaha, I know you can’t tell, but I am literally wheezing here.
These stans literally talk like Kishimoto is a hundred year old man. Like…the lack of reason and logic in this statement is so apparent, I am surprised that they thought it would be worthwhile to make this comment. Lol. Sexual categorizations of the post-modern western sexual-domains??? What crap!!! Hahahah. Just say you are a straight homophobic woman who wants Sasuke’s dick and go!
So what if Kishi comes from a small village and a different generation? Does that mean he doesn’t know what homosexuality means? He doesn’t know sexual categorizations of the post-modern western sexual domains? What a bunch of hooey, lol. These stans talk of homosexuality like it’s some kind of western propaganda. Go ahead, tell me it’s not homophobic, heh. PoSt mODerN WEsteRn SexUal DomaiNs. Lololol.
Truth is, pre Meiji era, Japan was perhaps the most progressive of all cultures when it came to sexual categorizations. Here, this post is educational. Funny how these stans call SNS western and then do the same thing that most western fans do, who know absolutely nothing about history of sexuality in Japan. Here, they should maybe learn about it before sounding this ignorant, the video is pretty self-explanatory.
Edo period Japanese culture accepted homosexuality as the purest form of love that could exist between two samurais. Young men were allowed and even encouraged to have young male lovers, and after a certain age, they were expected to get married to women. A lot of men chose not to. And even though it was frowned upon, it wasn't a punishable offence.
Hell, one doesn’t even have to go there, check out Edo and Meiji period art, you will find lots of peculiar, very creative art with homosexuality as its subject. I would put those pictures here, but it would make this post x-rated, lol. The sexual imagery is off the charts, like Japan’s imagination is mind-boggling, like woah. They might be a small country but the scope of their imagination is huge. With the advent of Meiji era, that changed, as homosexuality became illegal, but this art was still produced underground.
Hell, a lot of the most celebrated artists in Modern Japan have created art about homosexuality. Film makers such as Nagisa Oshima, Takashi Miike (Shinjuku Triad’s Society, Big Bang Love, Juvenile A), Toshio Matsumoto (A funeral Parade of Roses), Akira Ogata (Boy’s Choir, a film about two orphaned boys who study at the same institution, and eventually fall in love with each other), have made excellent cinema on the subject matter. And these aren’t your run of the mill commercial yaoi creators, these are serious film makers whose films have done their rounds in national and international film festivals, earning awards and accolades from critics and audience alike.
The film, ‘Funeral Parade of Roses’ is a story about a young, gay, cross dressing boy who is in love with his father, a modern day adaptation of Oedipus Rex, only flipped. And this film was released in the 60’s. A product of the Japanese new wave cinema, it is considered to have influenced Stanley Kubrick’s ‘A Clockwork Orange’. It was considered quite a controversial film for its time in the west. It took over forty years for ‘Hereditary’ fame film maker Ari Aster to make a film on the subject, ‘The strange thing about the Johnsons’ in 2011, and the audience was shocked to their core with it. Japan was doing this shit in the 60’s. Lol. Oshima belonged to a small region in the southern Okayama prefecture called Tamano, founded in the 40’s. So? Kishi also belongs from the Okayama prefecture. What, people from small villages remain ignorant throughout their lives? They can't learn? They can’t be exposed to stuff?
Oshima was a pioneer of Japanese New Wave cinema, going forward to become one of the most celebrated film makers in the world, with a beautifully distinct voice. He made films on themes of homosexuality, and his stories were inspired by real life events in Japan. He made Gohatto, a Jidaigeki film (which basically translates to Japanese period drama, usually set in the Edo period) which is about Samurais lusting after a bishonen boy, training at the Shinsengumi, organization of Samurais. People of Japan are more than familiar with the tales of Shinsengumi, they grew up with it. He made ‘Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence’, which also features homosexual themes, starring David Bowie btw.
Kishimoto wasn’t even born or was of legal age when some of these films were released. Japan was experimenting in the fields of cinema and various subject matters, including unsimulated sex in a legit film.
They think he wouldn’t be aware of these films, Kishimoto who happens to be a film buff himself? Honestly, how insular do these stans think the Japanese are?
These people talk like the Japanese are some dumb, ignorant group of people, who don’t know shit about what’s going on in the world. Honey, that’s you, not them. Kishi is a well read, well exposed, well rounded writer.
Like yes, Japan was quite insular at some point of time, but after the second world war, they were forced by the allied nations to open up their borders. And the influence of western elements and themes can be seen in their art. In fact, western influence had already taken roots since Meiji era. The men even had to cut their hair for it. Even kabuki wasn't left alone. And it's not like this is some well kept secret. Kishimoto’s manga is definitely very much Japanese, but it has a cross cultural appeal as well. I don’t think one is doing their due diligence when one simply ignores that factor.
Okay. Let’s talk of Kishimoto’s influences.
These are a few excerpts from Kishimoto’s interviews, the Western influence is pretty clear. Does this look like some dude who doesn’t know what he is talking about? Does this look like someone who is inert and insular and ignorant?
Look how inspired Kishimoto is by Akira and its mangaka, Katsuhiro Otomo.
For those who don’t know, Akira was the anime that opened up the western markets for Japanese animation and manga. The film was made for the express purpose for Japan to open the western markets for her products, show off their goods to the world, that this is what they can do, and as it turned out, it was better than anything western audiences had ever experienced in terms of animation and storytelling at that point of time.
Cartoons were earlier considered to be for kids, the common perception was that animated media was supposed to be infantile, catering to a certain target audience. Akira changed that perception. The legacy of Akira is humongous. It opened up doors for other animes and mangas such as Dragonball Z, Ghost in the shell, Naruto even. This was the time in late 80’s when Japan was experiencing an overall good economy for the first time in 20th century, their financial shares were soaring. This was the time when corporations had opened up in Japan, and anyone who was ready to become a salary man could take advantage of the financial benefits resulting in significant disposable incomes. So people had more to spend on entertainment, and so production companies were chasing talented mangakas left and right to adapt their work into anime. Japan was so committed to this great enterprise of Akira, they formed a committee to finance the very high budget that a commensurate and successful rendering of the manga’s adaptation would require. The committee consisted of Kodansha, Mainichi Broadcasting System, Bandai, Hakuhodo, Toho, LaserDisc Corporation and Sumitomo Corporation (if you can’t tell, these are big, huge corporations) who all forwarded money and promotion towards the film, and appointed the mangaka himself to direct the film, because who else would be able to tell this story better when so much was at stake?
Otomo worked his ass off, drawing hundreds of storyboards to condense the 120 chapter long manga into one film. And he did it, and what a film it is. Like wow, I was blown away. Akira, being a cyberpunk manga, also has that cross cultural appeal, even though its major themes are still very much Japanese, but if you look closely, this film tells a story the entire world can benefit from.
Kishimoto is inspired by American film makers such as Michael Bay, Quentin Tarantino. He talks of Takeshi Kitano, lovingly known in Japan as Beat Takeshi, a very popular figure in the west, who also was a regular in Oshima’s films, having played major roles in his gay films. These stans think Kishimoto, a cinephile himself, isn’t aware of these films? Bullshit. Lol. A lot of mangakas want their work to be recognized by the entire world, especially in the west. It speaks of their global success, why would they want to just keep to their native audience?
Truth is, otaku culture evolved in a very specific way. The second world war, especially after Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed, drastically affected the ethical and emotional landscape of the collective Japanese psyche. While the reverberations could be seen in their media, unfortunately, it wasn’t in the mainstream media where these effects were manifested, rather it was in alternative media, in the subcultural genres. You don’t have to take my word for it.
Takashi Murakami, a product of Otaku culture himself, talks about this, someone that Kishimoto himself has paid a significant tribute to in his manga (Deidara’s aesthetic is super flat, which is basically a socio-politico-cultural art movement pioneered by Murakami). And I saw for myself what he was talking about. Japan is a collectivist society, there isn’t much freedom for individual expression. Japanese emperor Hirohito, who is directly held to be responsible for the Japanese contribution to second Sino-Japanese war and the second world war by many historians, was considered to be a God by the Japanese, literally. Like Kim Jong Un style. No one questioned him. But after Japan’s role in the war as the predator and subsequently a victim, it broke the Japanese in a major way. Turned them humble, repentant. This collective grief and shock and widespread devastation brought the people together, they forgot their differences for the moment, to somehow pick up the pieces and go on living their lives, with gratitude for what they had. But yes, it’s not as explicit in their mainstream media as others. I mean the amount and variety of films based on the second world war that I have seen in European and American cinema, like damn. Japanese cinema on the other hand? Pretty tame in that regard.
Takahata made ‘Grave of the Fireflies’ on this subject, a heart rending and deeply disturbing story about two orphaned siblings living during the war, is considered as one of the most effective anti war films ever made in the history of cinema, as said by Roger Ebert, the man himself. Anyone who has seen the film will know it is an anti war film. But when Takahata was interviewed about it, he denied it. He said he didn’t make an anti war film, he wouldn’t even talk about it and later, stopped giving interviews about it altogether. Never underestimate the censorship of the Japanese administration. Oshima, a staunch modernist himself, a huge critic of Akira Kurosawa’s old world values and humanism, equally critical of the right wing and extreme left wing politics of Japan, made heavily political films, broke up with the studio system that launched his career, because of how left leaning, political and individualistic his voice was. His films were often banned or taken off screens, he was subjected to numerous court cases. But he persevered and even a stroke couldn’t stop him. But that’s Oshima. Oshimas are a rare breed.
So what couldn’t be seen in the mainstream media, you saw them in alternate or subaltern media. Akira is a direct testimonial to this. Akira is a story about a bunch of orphaned kids living in a dystopian world, that has been devastated by a bomb blast, past which Tokyo, now Neo Tokyo, is submerged in corruption and civil wars. The administration uses children as weapons to protect their own borders, but is eventually destroyed by these same children, when they couldn’t handle their powers. The reverberations of the post war atrocities can be viscerally felt in the themes of this manga, prompting a myriad of ethical implications and queries, questioning one’s understanding of a nation, of responsibility towards one’s people, love, hate, revenge borne of that hate, power, megalomania, philosophical implications of technology and the destruction borne of it, conflicts between different ideologies and so on and so forth but it’s resolve is quite familiar.
The resolve is about love, redemption, atonement and peace. That wars happen because there is love and hence there is hate, it's the people that make wars happen and it’s the people that pick up the pieces and go on living. That one can be hopeful even in adversities. No one is singularly condemned, no one is singularly held to blame even though it’s not difficult to see that things could have been handled better. But it’s not as black and white as that. It’s complex. World is complex.
But what we do see is that Tetsuo, an orphan who lives on the streets, who loses himself in the quest for power, fuelled by his need to be acknowledged, finally gives up on destroying everything when his lover Kaori dies protecting him, and at the urges of his best friend Kaneda, Tetsuo finally sees light, for the sake of his love for Kaori and Kaneda, and so he repents before dying. That all his passions come to nought when he loses the one thing he held dear to him, love for his friend and girlfriend, the only people that made him feel like he mattered.
Similar themes can be seen in another manga Kishi is influenced by. Ruruoni Kenshin, basically a romance manga in shounen, written by Nobuhiro Watsuki. Battosai, the political assassin, falls in love with Tomoe, a spy, basically two people from opposing ideologies. Tomoe sacrifices herself for Battosai, even after Battosai has discovered her true identity. The manga is structured with themes of ideological conflicts of love, revenge, love for one’s nation and adherence to one’s philosophy/belief systems, as it's set in the time period of transition between the Edo and Meiji era, but the resolution is similar. That love trumps all, that true love is greater than all the constructs made by humans.
Is there any wonder we see similar themes in Naruto? Kishi uses similar effects and themes for his world building in Naruto and Shippuden. A dystopian society where children are barbarically used as weapons, where gross injustices happen, but people go on living. This world imagined by Kishimoto is a reflection of the real world, richly dramatised with similar themes of love and conflicts and ideological differences and war and devastation and revenge and human ethos and peace and atonement. Similar resolve? I would say so.
And I won’t even dismiss that Sasuke’s character is definitely left leaning. Sasuke is partially based on Sasuke by Sanpei Shirato, a popularly known leftist voice in the manga industry. It’s pretty clear for anyone with half a brain to see that Sasuke is anti-establishment, and for good reasons too. The collectivist, utilitarian, highly corrupt system of the shinobi world leads to utter devastation and genocide of his entire clan overnight directly under the noses of the citizens and leaders of Konoha, and whose body parts are then commodified in the name of protection of the same nation that was built around the philosophy of ‘Will of Fire’, which was supposed to protect them but instead who slaughtered them in their sleep.
Sasuke’s interests and need for justice stands in sharp contrast with the ways of the shinobi world, and where no one could understand him, Naruto finally does. He is the only one who tries. He is the only one who is capable, who is made to be capable by the way of the narrative where Kishimoto develops his character accordingly. Naruto is naive and simple minded to start with, but he is written to learn and evolve and understand different points of view. To learn from people’s tragedies and losses and grief and motivations. He is exposed to the way of this world through anti hero archetypes such as Nagato and Obito and Zabuza, where after Naruto, through his own inherent moral and humanistic code, begins to understand a world that is founded on love turned hate, which further paves the way for revenge, but is determined to put a stop to it. By proving his love for Sasuke, and Sasuke accepts his love. Sure, had it not been for Sasuke, he would have let it continue or have simply died with Sasuke before he could witness a better world. But my point is, similar resolve : Love trumps all, peace, redemption and atonement.
This is not to say that I approve of the ending, I do not. I hate it. Firstly, if the theme of Naruto and Shippuden was already established and concluded as 'love trumps all else including the socio politico cultural structures and institutions made by humans ', then why the hell were they made to marry women when they are clearly gay? And secondly but equally importantly, Sasuke should have gotten his dues, he deserved it, so did Neji and Naruto. The truth of the Uchiha massacre should have been revealed, and Konoha should have taken accountability and repented, these are after all, some major themes in the manga. Kishi broke all sorts of storytelling rules at the end and I am mad as hell at him for that. But unfortunately, I didn’t write this story and couldn’t have had if I tried. Doesn’t mean I will look for things in it that aren’t there. Kishimoto is not a communist or a right winger. He is Japanese. Both extremist interpretations of manga are misguided. Tobirama was a bigot that plotted against the Uchihas, Hiruzen was a complacent failure of a leader who let things happen in his regime that by no means indicates good leadership, Uchiha clan was discriminated against. But Kishi could not have made Sasuke reach his goals, not if Naruto, the protagonist, was supposed to be of any consequence, which essentially makes Naruto hold a moderate position. I also don’t like the fact that the ending and consequently Boruto, diluted Sasuke’s belief systems and very justified goals, I wish they could have modified it to a conclusive ending where him and Naruto could have worked towards changing the status quo, but I don’t think it would have materialised, Shonen Jump is strict about these things, namely pedagogic values appropriate for a certain target group.
The conflicting ideologies definitely serve to make this manga drama and intrigue rich, but let’s not go overboard and look for things that aren’t there, which is what these stans seem to do. There’s no use in chasing shadows.
Then they said this : “He (Miura) actually does talk a little about the sexual tensions between Guts and Griffith! Must’ve been one of the parts I was having a hard time putting into decent English. Basically Miura says that he doesn’t really agree with how people read sexual tensions into the Guts-Griffith relation, because men can have passionate feelings about each other without it being like that……..Yet none of this is meant to be “romantic love”. There’s passion here, intensity, obsession, but it isn’t sexual. ”
Truth is whether it be western or Asian media, the concept of misinterpreting homosexuality as brotherhood is quite well explored in global media. Don’t believe me? Here. All facts, no frills.
One doesn’t even have to go very far, just look at Clamp, and you would be lucky if you were able to find more than five heterosexual characters in their entire range of mangas, lol. And honestly, their example of Berserk actually works in my favor and not theirs? GriffGuts is a valid gay ship. But of course, if they can reject SNS, it’s likely they would reject GriffGuts. Kishimoto and Miura, no matter what they say in their interviews, why is that more important than the story itself? Not like Kishimoto sounds all that confident in his interviews either, when he talks of them being more brothers than blood brothers.
I have not looked very deeply into Berserk, so I would like to invite veteran blogger @maoam to shed some light, one of the very few bloggers that I find with one of the most balanced and informed takes on Naruto and other relevant mangas.
Going ahead, let’s see what Miura says of boys.
Really Miura? Now what is this 'tingling' feeling?
What does this remind me of?
Lol. Now this isn’t the most accurate translation. This is the accurate translation, I am not sure of the source, I got this screengrab a long time ago, but I know for a fact it is legit.
Btw, the 'kyun' sound effect used here is used in Hentai to denote sexual arousal, lol.
Tell me what kind of brothers feel these feelings for each other? I have seen numerous Japanese films whether it be family dramas, Jidaigeki films, Japanese LGBTQ+ films, and I have never seen brothers behaving with each other like this once. Not once. What spiritual brothers? Lol. Why go against reason, intuition, narrative, visual imagery and cultural context to prove something using irrelevant sources?
Like I thought we were past this Brother argument, it’s the 21st century, there are more discussions on homosexuality, the subject of homosexuality has gained more exposure and a lot of talented and individualistic creators have explored this subject. So why is Naruto fandom this backward and narrow minded??
I find it hard to believe that despite Kishi’s subtle but not really, and repetitious ministrations on the issues surrounding a stigmatized subject such as homosexuality, is that invisible. All you need is an open minded approach, that is all. You do that and the manga will unfurl itself so you will be able to see things that you so conveniently ignored before to satisfy your headcanons. Is it that unfair of a request?
Do these fans think they know everything about everything? They couldn’t have missed something? Something as glaring and apparent as SNS? Before they claim that they are some omniscient, all-knowing being, maybe watch some LGBTQ+ media, and compare notes? Analyse tropes? Give themselves some credit, that they have done their due diligence before spouting things they obviously do not understand? Or is that too much to ask for?
Maybe they have learnt everything in the world that is to be learnt and there’s just no free space in that highly evolved noggin of theirs.
Maybe we are all just stupid fans who don’t know what we are talking of, even if we give the most objectively valid reasoning and evidence found inside the manga. Maybe they know best, maybe that’s why they think Sasuke slept with Karin, even when he shows no interest in her apart from maybe once or twice protecting her as his teammate, something he also does with ALL his other teammates? And generally, gets really annoyed and uncomfortable with Karin’s over the top sexual proposals, and then doesn’t think twice about getting rid of her when she is used as a bait to have him captured. Hmmm, I see their logic. They must really be the all knowing omniscient being, the Arahat, the wise one, the one who finally achieved Nirvana, proper enlightenment and all huh? Damn I feel so small. (A tear rolls down my downy cheek as my bosom trembles in humiliation). LOL.
Interestingly, the way Miura talks of boys, that they give them a ‘tingling’ feeling, makes me think. Keep in mind, Miura never married, there is no evidence of him having had a girlfriend. But let’s not speculate, even if it sounds fishy.
Understanding homosexuality in a conservative society is crucial in order to understand the SNS dynamic. There’s no doubt that Kishi wrote Naruto as a closeted homosexual and Sasuke as a homosexual boy. If one denies this, I can’t even take them seriously.
But it reminds me of an anecdote my gay friend told me. He is a national award winning filmmaker, an intellectual in his own right, and works a lot with the trans community in my country. A conservative, ultra religious, non-western country. As a young man in his twenties, when he had just come out, he would date men who would simply not identify as gay. He would sleep with them, and do what do people sexually attracted to each other do. But sleeping willingly with a man and accepting the gay identity are two different things. Where my friend understood these nuances even then, as having come from a conservative society himself, he would not force them to come out. These men would never even acknowledge that being attracted to men and not women makes them gay, it was not even a part of their understanding. Rather, they would think of it as something that ‘certain’ men do. Doesn’t mean it’s weird or uncommon, even though they knew straight men did not do this. But they would simply not go there. They would just chalk it up to something temporary, something that they needed to do before they got married to women they didn’t feel anything for, because that’s how it’s done. It’s not like they weren’t aware of the gay dialectic, my friend would talk to them about it, but they would simply not acquiesce, the denial was so strong. Till date, these men don’t admit to it, now they are married and have children. But still look for sexual relationships with men outside of it.
Which brings me to my next anecdote, told to me by another friend of mine. He is a stylist, absolutely flamboyant and openly, proudly gay. Very adventurous and experiment loving. He told me that in his experience, the best carnal fun he had was with Muslim men. And that most men who approached him for sex were Muslim men. (This is not an attack or criticism of the religion or community, it’s just something my friend told me). He would be approached by these men who would have the most voracious of appetites and tastes, and my friend went with it because he preferred to suck circumcised dicks, lol. Quite a lot of them were married, but my friend didn’t discriminate. He told me the same thing, these men would never identify as gay, not even during intimate moments, nope. Accepting your sexual identity is a more than a matter of sex. People in conservative societies face a lot of challenges and obstructions before even coming to certain realizations about themselves, it’s not that easy. In many ways, my country is even more conservative than Japan. Homosexuality is quite a taboo, hell, I didn’t even know the concept myself till I was well into my teens, and even then, I was only told the most stereotypical of things. I also grew up in a small town. It was later, when I went to the city to study, when I came into contact with people from all walks of life, nationalities, tastes, and sexual orientations, that was when I understood them as people, and not categories and labels. And now I have a friend who works as a dominatrix for a living and I still learn a lot.
I refuse to judge people on the most basic and stereotypical of preconceived notions.
The reason why I consider these fans to be homophobic…. Honestly, what gives them so much confidence to consider Sasuke and Naruto as brothers despite everything that is in the manga? Everything, from characterisation to plotting to the overarching themes to visual imagery to cultural context to text indicates their very romantic relationship, not platonic. Naruto admires the way Sasuke looks physically more than once and effectively calls him hot in Gaiden, what kind of guy thinks of his brother in those terms?
These stans are so pressed to label them brothers without even looking at gay media, or gay narratives, without even paying attention to nuances in the manga, or Japanese historical context or their own gay media, appropriating everything for the sake of their projection, dismissing or ignoring loads and loads of text and panels and characterisation, why? Why can’t they at least entertain the idea for once and reread the manga with that approach? You can’t be so sure of your projection, c’mon, you know it’s counterintuitive, it just simply doesn’t gel with what’s in the manga. So why this extended stubborn denial? Give me proof that reincarnated chakras make two people brothers. Where does it say in the manga? Show me. I can show you everything that I claim, it’s all inside the manga. Where’s yours? So just because it satisfies your ego, it’s a valid take? Why are you this sure of your takes? Given you have gotten multiple things wrong? Like objectively wrong.
Look, I understand denial is a strong factor, when we don’t want to see things we don’t like, our minds act like blinders. It would restrict your vision and make you see only what you want to see. And what a sad way that is to live, what a waste of time. I don’t believe in living that way, not in my media and not in my real life. But this obstinate refusal to accept SNS as romantic, is nothing but one’s desire to not accept Naruto or Sasuke as homosexual because you think it’s icky? Undesirable? Unattractive? Different from shounen norms? And because you want them to be straight so you can self insert? Whatever the reason, as long as you ignore real evidence and real proof, I will see you not only as heteronormative but also homophobic, you don’t gotta be overt, your underlying beliefs reek of prejudice and bias, especially when you haven’t done your due diligence, something that you mandatorily should have done in order to analyse this story. Doesn’t take a PhD degree to see that.
Like Denis Diderot said - We swallow greedily any lie that flatters us. But we sip only little by little at a truth we find bitter.
My advice to them? Give yourself a break. Give yourself enough credit that you are open minded enough to entertain an alternative understanding, even if just for the moment if nothing else, and see where that takes you. Watch more media, watch gay media, talk to people, listen to their stories, try and understand their point of views, read more, compare notes, learn more. And ask if you don’t know. There’s no shame in admitting you might not know something. Because you obviously don’t.
I am always of the mind of learning more and more, and I know I have strong opinions, but give me reason and logic and evidence, and you can bet I will listen, and even acquiesce to you, if I find it satisfactory. Because that’s how things should be, if we can’t grow and learn from what life teaches us, what’s the point? We all have a lot to learn, don’t we?
Anyway, there’s some more shit that they claim which is essentially written in a similar vein, more or less, albeit in the same condescending tone. Lol.
But I am done for the day, I am tired. So imma stop, this is me.
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THANK YOU FOR THE ANSWER <33
i asked you this bc i needed it for a project, and you've answered it with something that would never cross my mind, thank you!
also i read your tags and it says that you wrote a thesis on lalo's character??? im really interested to read your thoughts about him, that is if you don't mind posting lol.
once again, thanks a lot!
Ok fair warning first; I'm really bad at putting my thoughts into words, so while this makes a lot of sense in my head, it may not do so here, so apologies in advance! Also i'm pretty sure others don't see lalo in this way and i'm just really weird like this; no need to fight me on this, i know, trust me!
When i think about lalo’s character, that one thing that stands out to me, is how distanced he is from a logical and rational thinking process.
Lalo, to me, seems like someone who’d boast about their gut instincts, to the point they’d find no use for logical thinking because their instincts are always right (but we know for a fact that they’re not). Lalo has lived a privileged life in the cartel; he’s basically cartel royalty in a sense, and his charms, money and the Salamanca name have taken him anywhere he wanted to go. He is vastly different from a character like nacho, who has always been in a disadvantaged position and had to think on his feet as each step put him in yet another dangerous situation.
I think the driving force behind Lalo’s character, that one thing that really makes Lalo who he is and informs his decisions and the things he does, is his skepticism and distrustful nature, which is btw not based on facts and evidence, but on the principle that everyone’s lying and everything's a lie unless proven otherwise. And so, when forced to re-evaluate his assumptions, he will either go to extreme lengths (bc he NEEDS to be right about this, goddammit) or he will just drop it if that need simply isn’t there.
For the first case, just look at his whole business with fring. Lalo had no evidence to distrust fring. But he did it on the principle of distrusting everyone unless they proved to be trustworthy. I know people would just say lalo was so smart to “figure out” fring was behind the attack, but the truth is lalo had no evidence, so there really wasn’t any figuring out. He just arrived at that conclusion because he had this idea in his head that fring is behind everything. If there was any figuring out process involved in lalo’s head, he’d have figured out nacho as well. But he didn’t. Nacho had completely blindsided him bc lalo had decided not to distrust him on principle (why? What was about nacho that lalo liked so much to let go of his distrustful nature? God, these two.)
Also he thought he has no use for evidence until hector told him that he actually does. And remember how enraged he was that he had to go find evidence now? Why couldn’t things be simple? lol
For the second case, let's look at the jimmy incident. Even though I knew jimmy was lying, i was still baffled that Lalo thought he was lying. Bc to me, he wasn’t being rational. Being rational was how kim put things into perspective for him. Lalo was just being distrustful on principle. He didn’t have any proof and his way of thinking didn’t make sense. If he thought it was Fring who put him in prison and it was also him who attacked jimmy to steal the bail, (bc again, fring is behind everything, according to lalo) then how the hell did jimmy survive the attack and come back with the money?
So yeah. I think what makes lalo’s character so interesting (and also a kind of antithesis to nacho) is how he fools everyone into thinking he’s so smart, but what’s really happening is that his decisions don’t really follow any logical thinking and piecing together clues and figuring things out. He just goes by his gut instincts and when he gets this idea in his head that someone’s the enemy, he becomes unhealthily obsessed. And when he decides someone’s trustworthy?
Just look what happened with Nacho.
#sorry this got out of hand i told you i wrote a thesis lol#i think what happened bw lalo and nacho had a lot to do with all of this#also sorry if this doesnt make much sense#bcs#lalo salamanca#nacho varga#bcs asks#better call saul
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I love how people mistake my words as 'loving' a character that I really have no feelings for, make a whole post saying how me saying I 'like' that character under a post of another character is basically invalidating the second character and this persons views, tells me to to write them to discuss it, and then BLOCKS ME so I can't.
So acgames, since you want to make me a bad guy over YOUR misunderstanding, I shall write it here. I can't post my initial response since not only have you blocked me, but my secondary tumblr account can't see my response since I assume you deleted it in your childish tantrum.
First off, here's my response to their tags on the Alexios post, which are (asgames reblogs, Alexios of sparta, Finally someone gave alexios credit he deserved, Everyone who posts alexios content over Kassandra is my favorite person, Alexios fans-you are my fave, assassin's creed odyssey.)
As you can see, I agreed that Alexios is a great character, but that yes as acgames said, most odyssey posts are of Kassandra. I went on to say that I believe this is the case because she is 'canonically' the 'correct' protagonist (ie. from the viewpoint of ubisoft) And then went on to try and make conversation by saying I have started odyssey and picked Kassandra, not for any 'correct' reasons or anything, but merely because not many games have female lead's, so I like to choose that when it's an option. Not for any other reason. I didn't pick Kassandra because she was the 'correct' protagonist or whatever, I literally thought it had no actually plot point like in Valhalla where no matter if you picked man or woman, the main assassin is called Eivor and that's it. Didn't know Odyssey was going to have a 'the gender you didn't pick is now a 'bad guy' that you will have to spare or kill at some point in the story.'
Now, acgames's post, which I responded to trying to explain the above in a shorter format.
As you can see, they tagged me in this post where they say "I never mentioned I consider you being wrong for playing as Kassandra." Of which I did not say that...at all. "I have no idea why you feel you have to defend your point about playing as her." Which I wasn't. I was simply stating a fact. I started Odyssey. I picked Kassandra. End of story. "You should play the way you want and no one should tell you otherwise (which I am pretty sure I didn't at any rate.)" No, you didn't. And that's not what I was saying either. You took what I said the wrong way.
Their next paragraph I completely agree with. Kassandra and Alexios are both possible canon protagonists, depending on who you choose at the start. I simply said that Ubisoft basically wrote it as Kassandra being the 'canon' option, if her showing up in Valhalla means anything.
"This is what I expressed: I love people who play as Alexios because of how underrepresented he is. I see scraps of Good guy Alexios story, I show love to that, but at the same time I never throw any shade towards Kassandra players." Which is also what I expressed.
"If story has favored protagonist and underdog protagonist, who "canonically" is villian, I will always prefer underdog, because there so much less content and love shown for them and I just vibe with underdog more." My favorite characters usually are the 'bad guy'. Final Fantasy 9- Kuja. Marvel Movies- Loki (though this is... questionable?? sometimes?) Winter Soldier (Again, questionable, but he is a badass villain.) Final Fantasy 10- Seymour (Honestly love the crazy bad guy hair, and his Aeon which you can also get? Badass) Naruto- Itachi, Sasori, Deidara (And many, many more)
"So why you have to write your testimony towards (I assume) me, it's very weird to me" It wasn't a testimony, it was trying to start a conversation with a fellow AC fan and sharing my own gaming decisions. Not that it actually matters. (My mistake for trying to talk to you.)
Their tags under that post.
Not once did I try and 'pressure' you into liking Kassandra over Alexios. I was perfectly respectful, you making a passive-aggressive shit post, however, is. Again, I wasn't defending my choices. I was trying to make conversation and simply sharing my choices. I never said you hate Kassandra. Again, I have no preference to either Alexios or Kassandra, I haven't gotten that far in the story yet to really 'like' the main character yet, so you saying I prefer Kassandra over Alexios is literally you putting words in my mouth. I definitely don't see you as my role model. I'm a grown ass woman with a job and a mortgage, not some teenage girl looking for a role model to obsess over. I wasn't challenging your preferences, nor was I being 'serious'. I was making conversation.
I LITERALLY can't write you an ask with any issues I have, as you've blocked me. Very childish. I also wasn't posting my issues with you under other people's posts. I had no issues with you AT ALL until now. You're the one who created issues where there wasn't any.
In your post itself? Not really. But your tags and these comments after the fact that I can't respond to? Yeah, pretty aggressive. About something that was merely suppose to be a friendly conversation. I wasn't defending Kassandra as a character, simply stating what I chose at the beginning to start a conversation about Odyssey. Which you took issue with.
As for me saying 'You should have dm'd me' in the comments you blocked anyone else form seeing? I meant your apparent issue with me stating simply what I did in a video game. I was being nice, trying to start a convo, you came back with a passive-aggressive post about my 'defense' and 'love' for Kassandra, of which didn't happen and not what I feel for her.
"Idk, posting under alexios themed post that you prefer kass because she's female protag... I do not get what dialogue you are trying to make there, because I otherwise miss the point..." You very much have missed the point, and made yourself look like an ass doing so. I NEVER said I preferred Kassandra. I simply said that's who I picked. I can infer you probably picked Alexios then?
I wasn't making excuses to you, I was trying to explain what you obviously misread or misunderstood. Again, I do not 'love' or 'prefer' Kassandra. I really don't give a shit about her. I simply stated I picked a female protag in a game because you don't often get that choice, and you've twisted it into this bullshit. I picked female Eivor too. Are you going to say I hate male Eivor because I chose to play a female protag because I'm also a female?
And as you can see, acgames did hide/block/ or remove my 2 comments trying to explain what my original comment was about.
But that's not all! Acgames continues to go on about me and twisting my words to make themselves a victim! How fun!
For your information, I touch a lot of grass. I own a farmstead, with vegetable gardens, berry patches, starting on orchard etc. Plus flower gardens. I spend a lot of time outside. I play very little video games anymore. Because I'm a grown adult with responsibilities. In fact, saying I can't take normal discussion? Sorry, that's you. With how often your post's are 'I can't deal with people, I'm gonna be gone from tumblr for a few days.' etc. I am owning it, btw. Your the one throwing a tantrum and blocking me after making several posts saying I should send you an ask or dm about issues. And you only allow messages from people you follow? I can't contact you anyway, so why tell me to? You make all this shit up and then run away?
"Read the notes to make your own assumptions of our spat." Wasn't even a spat, and people literally can't see my two notes because you removed them. "Some people just want to start the fights..." Wasn't starting a fight, was trying to explain to you how you mistook my words. Now I'm pissed off cause you make these allegations, ask people to back you up by reading everything, then HIDE what I said so people can ONLY side with you. "I am too old for tumblr drama bullshit." But are you?? Didn't you make all of this into drama??
Like you, I am also 28, but one of us is obviously more mature than the other. It feels like there's already some bs drama going on in your life, and you mistook what I wrote and decided I was to be your punching bag. I hope you get whatever help you need, because if this is how you react to people trying to start friendly conversations with you, well... Good luck to you, because you'll never make it through life or work with this kind of attitude. And maybe put my messages back up on that post so people can actually get the full story and not just what you're selling them.
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So...I know you've never really liked Lucky's "Yossha (Literally His Namesake)!" or AkaNinger's "Moete Kiita!"...or King's overuse of the word "Brave" albeit to a much lesser degree since you got through that show (it was your first sentai show iirc) in the first place.
Apart from maybe pre-battle or post-battle catchphrases...is Jeremy's "Well now..." technically one of the very few catchphrases that actually work for you? (Although then again, like with Houtaro's "Gotcha", he doesn't necessarily say it almost all the time and he tends to say that phrase when it makes sense to so obviously there's nothing to compare to the other negative examples)
Honestly...this does help me realize in interesting lesson regarding people's tastes in something. How one thing of a something (shows in the case of Geats, Ninninger, and Kyuuranger for you) can be so bad to someone that it practically overshadows everything that may have been good or interesting that you no longer differentiate that one thing you despise about the content from literally anything else like it's all just the same.
Like the red rangers' catchphrases for Ninninger and Kyuranger were so bad, and the way Geats was written (Takahashi is up there with Mr. I-Wrote-Donbro/Faiz/Jetman/Kiva Man for you anyways) as the show got worse in the final fourth was so bad... it basically completely overshadows anything else that may have potentially been interesting or likeable. The one thing you despise basically kinda reduces your brain to mush and then you couldn't care less about the said shows anymore because the most frustrating and grating negative(s) are naturally the first thing that comes to your mind about the said shows that you can't bring yourself to like it again even if you tried to differentiate the bad with the good. But then again in the case of your two least favorite sentai shows, that annoyance was there from the get go whereas Geats just tanked hard in the second half and became a massive underwhelming disappointment as a result.
At least that's I'm assuming...or I'm just overthinking it with the analysis on how even one single bad thing can overshadow everything else. Basically the negatives (even if it's just one) an severely overshadow literally everything else, including positives, you can't bring yourself to care nor like anymore even if you try to differentiate the bad from the good and okay. Everyone has different tastes and I respect that, you've just showed me an interesting lesson on this so I'll give you that. So thanks, I didn't need to think much on this but I did so here you go.
(Okay, wtf? How did I completely shift the topic from asking your thoughts about Jeremy's catchphrase to this deep analysis shit?! Sorry about this but ah well... ^_^')
Well, you're not wrong. I'm not tagging this post for reasons that will become clear under the cut
In the case of the catchphrases, yeah, they tend to be dealbreakers for me. If they annoy me enough it really ruins the whole experience of the show for me. Heck, "Yossha Lucky!" nearly ruined Sentai as a whole for me, that's how much of a dealbreaker it became.
It also became the shorthand for a certain character type I don't care much for to begin with- and if that character is the focal point of the show... yeah.
As for Geats... well, it's true that the season tanked hard for me right during the JGP arc and that Takahashi used tropes that annoyed me (specifically the lack of a buildup to proper redemption arcs, or forgiveness/redemption arcs for those that don't really deserve it at all). I'm a bit more forgiving of the latter tbh, but only because Takahashi isn't the only one guilty of it.
What really ruined it for me wasn't the show itself... it was the Buffa apologists. It was the first time other fans ruined the show for me. At some points all I could think about was, "Oh great, Buffabutt's done [insert horrible thing] here, I wonder how they'll justify this bs again?"
And of course, the same people who justify him murdering Keiwa and Ace and scores of other people for his wish to have the power to beat all Riders with "it's okay, they all get revived anyway, what's the point getting mad about it"... are the same ones who harass the ones who point out the absurdity of their arguments by accusing them of sending anon hate (as if it being supposedly anon means they have no actual proof of the fact).
So yeah. Geats would've been just meh to me if not for those assholes. Maybe I would've cared for it more. But because I've come to associate their nastiness with Geats, I preferred to just move on with my life and the new show than dwell on it (and by extension them assholes).
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Hi! How are you?
First, thank you for create tbaf and hb, I really love the au's you create and how you tell stories, idk you are amazing. I just needed to tell you :D
Now, I'm sorry if this ruins the 'no spoilers' but can you say if there is a happy ending for homeward bound series or is there not one planned yet?
Have a nice day, thanks!
hello!! i’m pretty good, actually! i hope you’re doing good, as well!!
no one has to thank me for tbaf and hb, these two projects have been very fun to write and have helped me a lot in terms of developing my writing styles and exploring different approaches to writing in general, and i genuinely LOVE writing them (even if i sometimes go a Very Long Time between updating them lmao) so please no need to thank me!! thank YOU for reading them !! ❤️❤️❤️
honestly i’m not against giving spoilers, i’m more just worried about posting them and anyone who may have wanted to avoid them getting upset? it happened a few times back when i wrote reddie fics (the reason i stopped writing for the it fandom is because i would get a lot of messages and asks that were in general not nice and very demanding about what i write and how often i post and it just took all the fun out of it) so i’m just like… overly cautious probably lmao
but!! if anyone WANTS vague spoilers, there are some that i don’t want to share at all because i’m very excited to see peoples reactions to them (there are things i haven’t even told oddy, who i have messaged A Lot about hb and have told the most about my plans for it) but i’m down for some spoilers/hints !!
here’s my compromise i guess for anyone who WANTS to see these hints and mild/vague spoilers and stuff: i’m down to post them, but i’m gonna put them under a read more tab and maybe i’ll start a hb spoiler tag?
homeward bound fic is my tag for the series (i also follow the tag in case anyone else ever wants to post about it pfkfkf) but i’ll tag this homeward bound fic spoilers and any posts in the future that drops hints and shit will be tagged the same !!
anyway, your question: will hb have a happy ending? look under the cut if you’d like to see my answer!!
okay, so here’s some transparency about the series: i don’t have the whole thing planned out.
i have a lot of ideas and i have certain things decided and vague ideas about the other parts, but past the last three chapters of the first fic, i don’t have like proper outlines or anything just yet. i didn’t even have a plan for the first fic when i posted the first like two or three chapters—i was coming up with it as i wrote it and it wasn’t until i was a couple chapters in that i started planning ahead because it was at that point that i realized how massive i wanted the fic to be and it was around that time that i started thinking about making it a series instead of a stand alone fic.
i’m still trying to decide who the antagonists of the second fic are gonna be (i know one, but i’m debating adding more and am ironing out subplots and such)
basically: i don’t know how the series is going to end yet. i’m planning on having the four main fics that will basically be the main story, and then having additional one shots/short fics that kind of fill in gaps and provide moments after college, as the four fics are supposed to encompass one of their school years. this might change, i might make it three fics or add a fifth one or something, but as of now that’s my plan.
while i don’t have the actual ending figured out, i can say with certainty that i want it to be a good ending. maybe not necessarily a super happy one, but it’s not going to end in tragedy. harley and peter are going to have a future together. the spidey squad is going to remain a found family and support system for each other. (also the spidey squad is going to consist of more than the core four we currently have, but i’m not going to spoil that part. it’ll start to be clear who else will be in it group as the series continues. matter of fact, the last chap of the first fic starts that process!)
the one shots that i plan to write based after the end of the main fics will have a lot of snapshots of moments as they all grow up — ups and downs, highs and lows, relationships taking next steps and having fights and making up and everything in between.
this answer is kind of long and rambly, sorry, let me try to summarize my answer in a few sentences:
while the ending of homeward bound has not been officially decided, it is not going to be a bad ending. it’s not going to end in sadness or tragedy. that being said, it might not be a super upbeat ending either, because life will always have its struggles, but the ending will be hopeful and happy in whatever way is most fitting of the series once it ends.
hopefully that answers your question well enough? idk i don’t wanna make it sound like it doesn’t have a happy ending at all, because i definitely want the best for these characters and their futures, but homeward bound has, at its core, been the embodiment of being a realist—not an optimist, not a pessimist, but a realist. the reason i started writing the first fic was because in the emotional turmoil following nwh, i wanted to try and take a realistic approach towards what peter’s story could be following the spell and may’s death and the loss of everything that his life used to be. and also wanted to explore how harry and gwen could be introduced and how harley could be brought into the loop. and of course as a parkner shipper how to make it into parkner as well lol.
life is hard. these characters have been through a lot (and will go through a lot more as the series progresses) but they are strong and they are full of love for each other and that will get them through it.
thank you for the ask!!! genuinely i LOVE answering questions about my fics and having a chance to ramble about them so please feel free to send more!!
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Fanfiction Writer Bingo (+a silly poll)
Got tagged by @scumtrout, whose example I'm following in explicating a few squares, albeit with more shilling.
Talking Points:
Smut Content: For the most part, I virtually never get even as far as sexual content that would meet the bar for mature—two fics that depict sex acts without explicit details/body part terms. The only explicit sex scene I've ever written is still less than a third of the length of the fic as a whole, which I guess makes it only debatably smut. Is there a percentage you can exceed at which point the sex becomes part of the story rather than the story itself, or does any sufficiently explicit sex scene make the whole of the work smutty? Well, in any case, my writing is usually gen enough that the one story with the explicit sex scene the whole story is leading towards feels smutty by my standards.
Unbeta-d Fic Posting Crimes: I get extra pairs of eyes when I’m writing specifically gift fics, but otherwise I basically do all my own beta, which does mean I sometimes miss things. That happens less if I take the time to paste a work into a different format or look at it on a different device—it’s true and good advice that doing that freshens up text to your brain!—but I’m just not hugely stressed about pruning out every single orphaned word or stray comma in writing I do for fun.
So Self-Indulgent: This will be more prominent if I ever do more with the ShigRD mermaid AU (which is, my god, so self-indulgent—mind control powers? 100% The Author’s Fetish), but the Gundam IBO Wedding Fic is pretty much twenty-two thousand words of me rolling around in post-series character dynamics and throwing worldbuilding absolutely everywhere I think it will stick. I’ll also throw in a shout-out to the extreme silliness that was See the Blazing Sky Before Us, a Yuletide treat I wrote involving Doctor Doom, Gwen Stacy (Sorceress Supreme version), and Santa Claus, with the aim of replicating in prose the effect of reading one of those really over-the-top Jack Kirby comics from the 1970s.
Multi-Fandom Drifting: I have a very established pattern of fandom migration, so most of my fic writing is done in multi-year spans of same-fandom-ness. That said, I certainly have written for more than one fandom in my life, particularly during the years I was doing Yuletide.
Research Before Riting: I often just bracket things off when I’m writing first drafts and do the deep research on the second pass, but there are also cases where the whole fic rests too much on research I need to do for me to even start drafting before I do the deep dive. In either case, have a silly poll about it!
Deserves More Attention: I fear Moon Shot Aim is too spliced in with Overhaul/Nemoto to appeal to people who want more fic on Lady Nagant, and too Lady N-centric (as well as being a bit esoteric with its soulmate mechanic) for the people who want Overhaul/Nemoto, but I’m really quite happy with both ‘sides’ of the story, and wish it could get a bit more love. Likewise, I wonder if all the OCs in the first chapter of The Way You Survive Is… scare people off of a story that is, in all of its subsequent chapters, much more focused on the canon characters. Alas that my dedication to exploring the MLA as a group means I’m willing to make up a thousand MLA OCs before shoehorning in a canon character where I don’t think they fit!
Finally, have a few brief notes on two boxes I didn’t check—
1: Formatting my meta for posting is absolutely hellish, but I don’t typically do very complicated things with my fanfic.
2: While I did once want to be a professional writer, I fear it’s one of those ambitions that’s somewhat fallen by the wayside as I’ve gotten older. Some of that is a matter of not having the energy/freedom to really focus on it in my financial situation, but it’s also the case that my two major original projects suffered from opposing problems—one was a story with a vastly underdeveloped world, and one was a rather nicely developing world with no specific story to happen in it! But who knows; I do have periods of going back to dabbling with original projects, often in between my intense fandom periods, so maybe I’ll get something off the ground yet.
(Thank you for reading this silliness. Come back next week to finally talk BNHA's hospital attack.)
Tagging @codenamesazanka, @robotlesbianjavert, @leftofrevolution. @evilasiangenius and @megkips, if they would like to play. Here's the template!
#memes#my writing?#silliness#stillness would like to point out that the legal forms mentioned in the poll were being sent by a literal demon lawyer#to a small child who had just regained her memories of her past life#in which she initiated a cosmic lawsuit against the prison dimension Carceri#turns out it's hard to draw out a lawsuit longer than the plaintiff can afford when the plaintiff is a serial reincarnator!#the epilogue for that D&D game was A Lot#specifically A Lot more than I could fit into the poll option
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I absolutely adore atwccd, as sad as it is, it's a really cool idea to explore. You start the story thinking at the characters 'if you are reaped and die quickly in the arena may be the best case scenario for you' because surviving in the games might be easier than surviving as a victor.
Your writing is great, like, this is a Hunger Games AU so on some level I can guess what is going to happen because I know the source (the books) and read the tags, but is still unexpected, I had the same ice cold realization Annabeth has that her life is not the one she should be worried about, even if I knew the story of Percy's sponsor was coming. But I didn't see the whole thing with the reaping and the threat towards Estelle coming! Real gut punch there!
Like I said, cool idea to explore because the story really sucks you in
But at the same time I'm thinking : this is a very sad story, but you're actually posting it so... What in the world was that UFS sequel about for it to never see the light of the sun? ☀️🤣
aah thank you!! I'm so happy you're enjoying it so far <33 That's exactly what I was hoping people would get out of it, so it makes me really happy to hear that feedback!!! I think most of y'all basically know what's coming, but I think it's safe to say I have one more trick up my sleeve for the last chapter lol
As for the UFS sequel... oh boy 😅 in some ways its really not as bad as atwccd, but I think it's more the blatant tone shift from UFS to the unnamed sequel that would be jarring to people than the content, necessarily.
The thing about UFS (and I am about to go on a Tangent here but I rarely have an excuse to talk about it so I have to take whatever chances I can get) is that I wrote it after taking a post-colonial literature class with an absolutely brilliant professor who really changed my point of view on a lot of things and really expanded the ways in which I view literature. UFS is really heavily inspired by a lot of themes that are common in post-colonial lit; homecomings, fractured or conflicting allegiances, otherness/the struggle to belong, etc.
UFS obviously has a happy ending (or bittersweet, whatever, mostly happy) but that's almost entirely because you get to imagine what happens next. The mysterious island paradise Percy (and eventually Annabeth) call home is a paradise because we know nothing about it. We don't know its complexities, or what struggles its faced in its isolation, or how Annabeth will adjust to such an extreme difference.
There's an idea in post-colonial literature that the homeland is often viewed as a paradise, this faultless, unreachable place. That if you could just go home, everything would be okay. But there are also a lot of books that subvert this idea (my favorite being White Teeth by Zadie Smith), that say that no, actually, home is not perfect. Home may be more fucked up than where you are now. Home may not even exist anymore, not how you remember it.
I think UFS itself very much plays into the first idea (home is paradise, home fixes everything, if you can go home you will be saved) and the ideas I have for the sequel play into the second (home will not solve your problems, home might actually fuck you up more). And I just think that would make people really sad and I don't want to do it 😭
so like, TLDR: the things I put them through are bad but not atwccd bad, but its mostly the way that it would ruin the perception of the ending of UFS that makes me hesitate to ever post any of it.
#yes i did write a paper on the metaphysical nature of home as a paradise in postcolonial lit#and my professor did reccomend me to the honors program for it#anyway that was so long i am so sorry#i just love talking about PCL#asks#valshadowhunter#UFS#atwccd#long post
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HIHIHI first of all your art is SO pretty I love it <33 second does K have any kinda lore ? :00 what's her story I'd love 2 know more !!!
Hi! Thank you so much, that’s very sweet 💖 I wrote a little blurb about K a while ago, but I’m happy to share more!
Okay. I’m going to be real with you. I’ve done someeee research on the source (don’t want to name it in case my posts appear in the tags or something you know?) but I’m not a hardcore mega fan who knows the lore ins and outs, so my character’s story obviously deviates from some canon facts. Although I will say I think I have a grasp on the basics.
With that disclaimer out of the way, K is…complicated. She doesn’t a tragic backstory, not in childhood anyway, as she grew up not really fitting in most places. For reference, K is around the same age as Padmé, though they don’t know each other. In a perfect world, K would have become a jedi and helped “save the galaxy or whatever” (as she would put it), but K had her own personal issues with them and put into question if this life was worth it or even made her happy. The promise of something greater, a position that would give her power, one that would in her mind give her freedom, seemed very enticing. I wouldn’t say she was manipulated into joining the dark side, rather that she made a conscious choice.
Now, I won’t spoil her entire backstory in this post, but she has many years of success as a sith (I want to say Empress, but I don’t think that’s lore accurate. I don’t know!!), though she doesn’t quite get along with her peers there either. (Though she does have another romantic relationship I won’t spoil for now). But respect and like are two different things, in her mind if they don’t like who she is, they at least regard her as a powerful figure. So, long story short, she “dies” somehow, betrayed by her own. Why? I haven’t come up with a reason yet oops. Anyway, this event in which she is killed causes her to lose all her memories, and she is left alone on a planet she doesn’t know the name of, let alone her own name. She is eventually rescued, a shell of the person she once was, and discovers the resistance base. Because she is at this point unrecognizable (she wore a mask because you know, sith lords are edgy like that), and has no recollection of the combat prowess she once had, K is given a pretty menial job, just something to do, not something she likes. Once again, no sense of belonging, no purpose, and frustrated that whoever she might be, she may never know (she does get her memories back at some point down the line). Anyway, I could go into the details of her romantic life (how they met, etc) but that seems like a whole other thing in itself.
Another thing I should mention is that K is good at deception, and “playing the game”, so to speak. She knows how to use others to her advantage, but doesn’t enjoy preying on the weak. She has a history of playing the role of other people for various missions. This skill comes into play much later in her life…
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https://www.tumblr.com/pinkpalette/739724608258834432?source=share
You are spreading misinformation. The Houthis are a religious extremist militia that started and continue to perpetuate the Yemeni Civil War that has killed hundreds of thousands of people. They are not a non violent group. They are directly responsible for the Yemeni famine which has also killed hundreds of thousands of people. They reintroduced chattle slavery to the regions of Yemen that they have taken over and openly engaged in the sex traffickng of Ethiopian women. The words "A Curse Upon The Jews" is literally written on their flag and they ethnically cleansed the last 5 Jewish families living in Yemen in 2021. There is only one Jew left on Yemen, who is a prisoner of the Houthis and has been facing torture for the past 7 years for the crime of smuggling a Torah scroll to another Jewish family before they too were expelled from Yemen by the Houthis.
This group has not been targeting Israeli ships to protect Palestinian people or engaging in a peaceful embargo. They have been attacking ships at complete random, the vast majority of which have been neither coming nor going from Israel. Their rocket attacks have been intercepted, which is why no one has died yet. Not because they aren't trying to kill people. You cannot just trust random screenshots from Twitter about things that are this serious. The Houthis are literally one of the most violently oppressive groups in power right now and they explicitly hate Israel because they hate all Jews. It is on their flag. The KKK also hates Israel. That doesn't make them anti-Zionist freedom fighters.
Ok well, I wanna first say this I found out about the Houthis and their antisemitic views way after I reblogged that post and since I’m not chronically online I didn’t care to remove or edit tags. second of all, we all know what is happening right now with Palestine and yes you’re right that they might have ulterior motives due to their oppression of Yemeni Jews, however, the world does nothing and watches a whole genocide of Palestinians happen at least the Houthis are doing something even if they have an ulterior motive. And that tweet doesn’t have any misinformation about it, the Houthis haven’t killed anyone since they started blocking the Red Sea their goal is a ceasefire in Gaza they said it themselves. Their goal is to stop the genocide and they’ve been clear about that.
And as for your comment about how the houthis are a threat to their own people. The situation in Yemen is very complex obviously there is a civil war going on between the Houthis and the Yemen government (basically a Shia versus Sunni Muslim war) both have been violent towards each other. This is WHOLE separate issue and was unnecessary to point out in this case.
I studied journalism in college and I'm a Muslim-American who lived in the Middle East before. I am well aware of how misinformation is spread and how to spot it. My capstone project was on misinformation and I wrote an investigative piece on misinformation in student media. The U.S. has always since post 9/11 tried to demonize the Middle East and has butt into their affairs causing problems for both their citizens and the citizens of those. I’m frankly tired of it. Just like antisemitism is widely acknowledged after the holocaust (as it should be), it’s time to acknowledge Islamophobia and orientalism that is rampant right now and has been for a long time. I am not trying to defend the Houthis and their treatment of Yemeni Jews, it is wrong and I don't support it at all. However, the Houthis have made it clear that they are doing this to help the Palestinians and the Palestinians have been left to fend for themselves as the world watches them being ethically cleansed off the map. Plus they are only blocking ships, Israel is committing a genocide so who’s really the bad guy here?
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Reading Meme for Feb 1 2023
What I've Read
Gideon the Ninth - Tamsyn Muir - Oh, man, the last third of this book is just payoff after payoff - stuff that I was certain was going to be left to be resolved in the next book was just laid out in front of your eyes and it worked so damned well. This was my second attempt to read this book - the first time, just after it came out, I made charts and tried to keep track of all the characters and figure out the mystery of the whole thing, well, I had some trouble. The second time around had a much better result when I just let the whole thing wash over me. I really enjoyed this book and I'm starting on the next one immediately.
Penric's Fox - Lois McMaster Bujold - I am still really enjoying this series, which are short mysteries set in the Chalion universe with a metaphysical 'odd couple'- a young human man with no background in magic is host of a centuries-old demon who has the memories and personalities of nine previous women hosts as part of her constituent parts. They fight crime! It's also got touches of the kind of settled affection that I tend to associate with long-married couples who still adore each other. Penric gets roped into solving murders that are short and clear, with a cast of interesting recurring characters and a boss who is a badass woman in her 70s. The mysteries are a bit straightforward but explore some of the interesting edge cases of how magic in their world works. Fun palette cleansing reads. (I which Bujold had a little more eye for queer relationships in her books but what she does provide is emotionally solid, so, meh.)
I'm Not As Think As You Drunk I Am - Mardiaz173 - https://archiveofourown.org/works/33021898 - Clark Kent/ Bruce Wayne - DC comics universe - This was just a nice short little fic where Superman wants desperately to date Batman, but Bruce Wayne keeps showing Clark a side of himself that few people get to see. Which will our hero choose? (I read this on the recommendation of the podcast Clio/Mireille for their Sept 2022 episode on Superman/Batman Identity Porn fic.) It is a fun fic and a charming podcast.
Living With a Tiger by x_los - https://archiveofourown.org/works/33488392 - 人渣反派自救系统 - 墨香铜臭 | The Scum Villain's Self-Saving System - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù - Original Luò Bīnghé/Shěn Yuán, post Post-Bingge vs. Bingmei Extra - I am delving at last into the fic for the Scum Villain fandom, and I love the set-up on this. X_los wrote an AU that really delves into a grey version of the characters from the canon, and I really enjoyed it. (If you don't care to read the canon, this is still mostly intelligible on its own.) The tags are accurate.
What I'm Reading
Harrow the Ninth - Tamsyn Muir has got her hooks in my soul. Like with Gideon the Ninth, I was spoiled by tumblr osmosis for some elements of this book, but I honestly don't think it matters! Starts basically directly after Gideon the Ninth and I am glad I followed my friend's recommendation to start this book immediately upon finishing Gideon, as my poor memory would not have helped with understanding this book. I find these books do very little explicit handholding of like, "Character realized that this new development related back to This Setup from Chapter 2" and yet Muir does indeed set up enough reminders to guide you back to the points you need to recall for the payoff to be satisfying.
What I'll Read Next
Phoenix Extravagant - Yun Ha Lee - Book Club
The Uncle's Story - Witi Ihimaera - The library wants this back and I don't want to give it back! I might end up having to buy more of the Ihimaera books I want to read - local libraries are NOT great about having these around, and I am slow.
The Good Lord Bird
Library books
Frankenstein in Baghdad by Ahmed Saadawi
A Half-Built Garden by Ruthanna Emrys
Unnamed Midwife (whole series)
Owned and need to read: Frey Marske's A Restless Truth, and Susanna Clarke's Pirenesi California Bones, Raven Song by IA Ashcroft, Kraken's Sacrifice by Katee Robert, Even Though I Know the End by CL Polk, True Colors by Karen Traviss, At The Feet of the Sun by Victoria Goddard, Tamryn Eradani's Enchanting Encounters Books 2 and 3, Like Real People Do by EL Massey, Tom Stoppard, invention of love. Smoke Gets in Your Eyes by Caitlin Doughty, "You Just Need to Lose Weight" and Other Myths about Fatness by Aubrey Gordon, Alisha Rai Partners in Crime, the Right Swipe, Aphorisms of Kerishdar
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It's Always been You.
I love you
Destiel Meta. 15x18 meta.
Keeping the fire burning in our hearts, i can't believe what we just saw last night, and i have to keep screaming about this historical scene.
I wrote this meta with my friend's huge help @mrsaquaman187 , because we needed to talk more about body language. Because the scene was perfectly played by Jensen and Misha.
And i want to say thank you to my dearest friend @spnsmile because she made amazing gifs for this analysis. Love you girl!
Before start this meta, i want you to read a meta i wrote two years ago, and i want to share it again with you today.
Break the jar and do it again. The slow construction of Destiel Canon
Okay, now, let's start this journey...
Castiel's honesty at his purest form
I will analyze word by word, because this is historical, as I said before. So, let's rewatch the scene together, the scene in which Castiel released himself, and allowed for the first time, to be happy. (I want my angel back 😭).
“I always wondered, ever since I took that that burden, that curse, I wondered what it could be, what...what my true happiness could even look like. I never found an answer. Because the one thing I want...it's something I know I can't have."
Well, my friends, as I yelled in my Destiel meta you can find here, is canon now that Castiel was wondering what would it be to have Dean not just as a friend, but as a lover, and I'm.... Okay. (Internally screaming).
And damn @weird-dorky-little-deana and her post here in which I screamed again, this is it, my friends. Is perfect. Because is all along what I was suspecting... Remember 14x09, Pamela represented Dean's fem side, Dean's subconscious, so, in conclusion, Pamela was Dean talking to himself and saying :YOU WANT WHAT YOU CAN'T HAVE. Is because Dean thought CAS didn't love him back, and Cas saying he can't have Dean is a huge parallel because it shows the way it was constructed. Both men thinking they can't have each other. Is perfect and angsty and so romantic.
"But I think i know...I think I know now. Happiness isn't in the having. It's in just being. It's in just saying it.”
This is such a deep thought and it talks about Castiel's maturity of character. He understood once for all, that loving Dean Winchester, feeling what he feels for him, and expressing that to Dean, is his true happiness. Because...
METATRON: "(...) You draped yourself in the flag of Heaven, but ultimately, it was all about saving one human. Right?"
Dean didn't know it
Dean: “What are you talking about, man?”
Dean's question shows us he didn't know what Cas was trying to say, he didn't know Cas was about to confess his love for him, he didn't know Castiel loves him back the same way Dean loves him.
Cas: “I know. I know how you see yourself, Dean. You see yourself the same way our enemies see you. You're destructive and you're angry and you're broken. You're...you're 'Daddy's Blunt Instrument.' And you think hate and anger, that's...that's what drives you. That's who you are. It's not. And everyone who knows you sees it.
I just have to put everything in red because, OMG, people, this is Cas in the barn all over again but after 11 years of being with him and truly sees through him, and this is Cas in the golden room:
CASTIEL: What is so worth saving? I see nothing but pain here. I see inside you. I see your guilt, your anger, confusion.
This time answering himself, this time, healing all the weight and the pain Dean could carry inside. Because Dean deserves to be saved. That's why Cas gave his life again for him.
Even now, with Billie outside saying IT AS ALWAYS BEEN YOU, and naming him like the rebel, Cas rewords all of that, and shows Dean why he is all of that, because he is GOOD.
Oh Lord, okay, everytime I see Cas smiling and saying those words i have to repress my tears, but...
"Since Castiel laid a hand on you in Hell, he was lost!"
No, sister, he was found.
Castiel is rewording each bad comment or mocking angels had done based on his romantic love for Dean, he is saying , yes since I met you in Hell, i was found, you changed me, I fell for you. Damn... Dean go get back this angel because I swear...
But now, i want to share with you my friend reading about their body language on this scene.
@mrsaquaman187 wrote:
"Here is interesting because usually with conversations like these Dean would get upset or strut around then disagree and blame himself for something. BUT he doesn’t do that this time. Which leads me to believe he knew what Cas was going to say... you can see his face stiffen, intense eye contact and he clenches his jaw. Which tells me he is MAKING himself listen. He knows what’s coming and he has made the decision to HEAR it."
@mrsaquaman187 wrote:
Gif 1:
"Here he’s trying to hold it together. He’s swallowing back tears because he wants to see this conversation through to the end."
Gif 2:
"Oh this one is fascinating because he’s not moving. This means he’s no longer trying to be sure of what Cas is saying. He definitely knows what he’s going to say. Also if you look at his eyes, his pupils are dialated. Fun fact: when you’re looking at someone you love, your pupils dialate."
If you are still alive, i just want to point how romantic is this, because he is saying that Dean changed him for good. And he is naming all their family, Sam, Jack, and humanity, the world. Dean. So practically, Cas is saying, Dean showed Cas how to take care of others. Damn...
But also....
ISHIM: The way you let those simians talk to you... Castiel, when did you get so gooey? You know why we're meant to stay away from them humans? Hmm? It's not because we're a danger to them. They're a danger to us. Case in point.
CAS: Well, my friendship with Sam and Dean has made me stronger.
Castiel rewording again, because he knows what Dean did on him, Dean changed him for good.
I Love You
@mrsaquaman187 wrote:
Gif 1:
"Hmmm this one is a mixture of disappointment and denile...he’s basically thinking “you can’t be leaving me again”. His slow blinking and calm appearance indicates that he’s sort of asking out of disbelief or denial."
Gif 2:
"My poor boy had so much to say! Here you can tell he realizes what Cas was saying...he gets the meaning but can’t get his response out. He starts with the head tilt which signifies endearment and fondness. He swallows hard which represents the nervousness he feels and the sadness he feels. And then you can see his lips twitch and turn into a light smile along with his eyes softening. So he understands that Cas is confessing to loving him. And he understands that Cas has been holding it in and hurting the whole time. Which is why he tilts his head. The hard swallow is because he’s being loved but wants to love back and has no idea how to express that. All he could manage was “don’t do this Cas” which along with the body language equals to “Cas don’t leave me”.
I'm crying again, damn...
Okay Dean is shocked, shocked because he just figured out Cas loves him, Cas had loved him this whole time!! Is a huge, huge revelation to him, because Dean didn't imagine his best friend would feel the same for him! That's why he always thought he couldn't have Castiel the way he wanted to.
"I can see the love inside of you, but is croaked in shame."
Shame because it was his best friend, a pure, beautiful angel, out of his league. But now... This angel is confessing he had been in love with him the whole time! And not just that but he dies after that!
Dean losing again the love of his life after knowing he loved him back, is a new level of shock and despair to him. So Dean's reaction is just accurate and perfect!
And the scene crying alone in silence, not answering Sammy's phone call is SO SO IMPORTANT! He forgot about Chuck, about the world ending, about everything, because he only could think about Cas, and how he just lost him, and how he loves him the way Dean loves him, this whole freaking time.
To Conclude:
This was the most beautiful Destiel scene until now, and i only hope for the second Destiel canon scene, in which Dean will said I LOVE YOU TOO to his angel, closing his ILY journey, and rescuing Castiel. Maybe with the reset button, maybe entering into the Empty. But this is not the end, my friends, is just their starting.
Hugs! Love you all!
Tagging @metafest @gneisscastiel @emblue-sparks @magnificent-winged-beast @weird-dorky-little-deana @michyribeiro @whyjm @legendary-destiel @a-bit-of-influence @thatwitchydestielfan @misha-moose-dean-burger-lover @lykanyouko @evvvissticante @savannadarkbaby @dea-stiel @mybonsai1976 @anarchiana @angelwithashotgunandtrenchcoat @trashblackrainbow @destielshipper221b @mishtho @dancingtuesdaymorning @feathered-castiel @bre95611 @zoerayne2426 @justmeand-myinsight @that-one-fandom-chick @proccastinate @studio-hatter @pepevons @poorreputation @mrsaquaman187 @dizzypinwheel @jawnlockwinchester @dwstiel @thislunarkiss @ladygon @shippsblog @la-random-fangirl @lets-try-this-again-please @mychemicalobsession514 @destiel-shipper-11
@asphodelesauvage @2musiclover2
Buenos Aires November 6th 8:54 PM
#destiel#destiel meta#15x18 meta#spn spoiler#castiel meta#castiel#dean winchester#dean winchester meta#meta spec
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Heyy, just wanted to say I LOVE your stories (and all you headcanons and tags hehe) I'm new here and wanted to ask how and when you started writing fanfiction for star wars and if you have any tips 😊
hello! thank you for the kind words :’) and of course, welcome!!
so if we want to get really technical about things, i started writing star wars fic like,,,,waaaay back in 2013, and i kinda cringe a little when i think of those fics now because lol i was thirteen years old then--and i wrote for a little while until maybe 2016-ish? and then took a break because of mental health things, and then got back into writing fic in the past year and a half or so!
as for the how, i wanted to write star wars fic mostly because as a thirteen year old, i was devastated by the season five finale (back then, that was when the show just got cancelled and the season five finale was the only series finale we were gonna get!), and i just kinda wanted to write all these stories about the tcw fam actually being happy. filling in the gaps and all. (lol considering how my gut reaction to the tcw season seven finale was also to write as much fic as possible, i can safely say that some things just don’t change.)
as for tips! i got a little into writing gen fic specifically here, but as for writing fic in general: (and under the cut because i,,,as usual, went off for a while.)
1. rewatch/reread source material! this is something i usually do when i’m trying to refresh my memory on a certain episode--i won’t watch through the whole thing, sometimes i’ll just kind of jump around, but i like to get some quick look back into the source stuff to put myself in the right headspace to explore how to extend/expand the story somehow.
of course, if you’re writing something that’s an AU then you don’t really have to worry about this, but!! rewatching the source can also just be super helpful when you’re trying to characterize properly/try to get a feel for what the characters’ voices are like.
2. wookiepedia is your best friend, but if you don’t have enough info on something, either search through fanon star wars meta or!! just make up something on your own! like, i cannot tell you the amount of times i’ve wanted to tear my hair out because i couldn’t find enough information on x or if i had to stop and be like “wait, but does star wars even have y??” sometimes, wookiepedia is helpful for providing those answers, and other times, blogs like @gffa really provides a big, broad look at all the stuff in star wars, and her blog kinda runs like wookiepedia itself, so i can guarantee that you’ll find some useful stuff if you’re ever kind of lost about what certain jedi customs/culture or in general, what different cultures were like in the galaxy far, far away.
but also, as i’ve mentioned, i think it’s okay to just kinda ignore the technical stuff and just make something up in star wars as you go along. you don’t like that glass in star wars is called transparisteel? then use glass. you’re not sure if star wars even celebrates the new year? screw it, why not? you’re the writer--you get creative license!
3. there is no such thing as “too much” of one trope. so, idk if you might struggle with this, but just in case you do--sometimes, fic writers will hit a wall and be like “no i can’t post this because so many people have already written about this/used this trope/etc.” to that, i say pffft, nah. there’s a post floating around here on tumblr about a cake analogy and how like,,,to you, you might have just brought another cake to a party with already so many cakes, and you might feel kinda embarrassed about that, but to the large majority of people? all they see is more cake, and who doesn’t love more cake?
what i’m basically trying to get at here is!! write whatever you want and don’t worry about if someone’s already done it, because everyone in fandom lives to see their favorite storylines expanded over and over and over again/everyone lives to see their favorite tropes used over and over and over again. fic is wonderful for that very reason, and you shouldn’t deprive yourself of enjoying that.
4. this might seem kinda trivial, but spellcheck and formatting is...mostly important. the unfortunate thing about fic is that sometimes people will click out the second they see a huge block of text like so:
“this is just a practice run,” i say as i start this paragrah. i don’t really know what i’m writing about but this is an example, and i know that this is probably going to look really, really ugly on the screen but here we go oh the things i do for explaining fic i already know that this has gone long enough but who is to stop me you know? wait no i haven’t made any spelling errors yet to prove my point so okay let me think of a common spelling error i can’t think of any right now but hm let’s see i will causally say that i have made a spelling error. oh look! i have made a spelling error (well, not a spelling error, more like a mix-up of words) because you can tell that instead of writing casually which would be more correct i wrote causally and those two are very different things. but there are other spelling errors that can sometimes be a turn-off for readers like when they notice that the k in kenobi isn’t capitilized and once or twice that’s all fine and most people will overlook that, but if you do that consistently then most people will be turned off and click into another fic and oh dear it seems that i am actually explaining things so i guess that means i should stop with this ugly paragraph and actually move forward. “move on!” i shout to myself now. (and just pretend that something like this continues for a good two or three pages.)
do you see how ugly that is? it’s an eye-strain to most people when they read, and you can write the most beautiful fic in the world, but if the formatting and the spelling is off, then most people will move to a different fic. (which is, again, unfortunate, especially for younger and newer writers, but! ‘tis a thing that comes with fic.)
5. have fun! don’t get yourself caught up with appealing to the crowd. write what you want to write first and foremost, because at the end of the day, it’s you who’s putting in the work and the effort to craft a story, and if you’re about to invest your time and energy into anything in your free time, then it should be something that brings you at least some joy and comfort. so go on and write, and keep writing if you enjoy it! no one can take that away from you.
hope that all helps!!
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Fic writer review
Tagged by @picnokinesis thank you Taka!
1. How many works do you have on Ao3?
Twelve! (I’ll have to write another to make it 13 lol!)
2. What’s your total Ao3 word count?
665,232
3. How many fandoms have you written for?
Just the one that I’ve posted online- Doctor Who, and specifically Thirteen!
4. Top 5 fics by kudos?
1. Rising Tides (270)- I’m incredibly touched this has the most kudos as this was the first that I put a lot of effort into, I had with my previous works but this one was longer and covered complex themes, so it’s very touching!
2. Timeless (214)- This is the first fic I wrote! I remember doing it right after the series 12 finale as I was so compelled by the ending! I’m very pleased it’s been appreciated, a very kind way to be welcomed into the writing community!
3. On Hallowed Ground (127)- This one I also find so touching and I’m so pleased this many people enjoyed it as I became consumed by this and wrote it over 6 days so to know so many others also enjoyed something that quite literally consumed me and basically wrote itself is just fantastic!
4. Ipseity (123)- I have a soft spot for this one, too, my first longer (ish) fic that I planned out and I’m really pleased people enjoyed it! I think it all started because I wanted to see 13 in a leather jacket and was very intrigued by the prospect of her having past lives she didn’t know about!
5. Heaven Sent (110)- Ahh, I’m so happy this has made it to this list! I’m writing the final two chapters now and it’s been a passion project, my whole heart’s gone into it so to know this many have enjoyed thus far and we’ve still got a while to go (just coming up to halfway!) is really... ahh, I’m chuffed!
5. Do you respond to comments? Why/why not?
Absolutely, they’re so precious to writers and I really appreciate people taking the time to leave one! Also, it’s nice to chat with your readers and it’s how I’ve made many friends!
6. A fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?
Hmmm I had to think about this for a while, I don’t really think I’ve got any with an angsty ending, I think bittersweet might be the closest, in which case I’ll say ‘On Hallowed Ground’ as it’s angsty with the circumstances but also hopeful at the end.
7. Do you write crossovers?
No, although sometimes my mind wanders over doing a Doctor Who/Merlin crossover fic, all for the bants of seeing those characters interact (Graham and Gauis immediate besties), but I don’t think I’ll ever write it!
8. Ever received hate on a fic?
I have not, which is nice!
9. Do you write smut?
hahaha nope! I do include sexual themes in my work, but do that annoying thing where it cuts away before they get to the actual smut bit! I just can’t do it, it’d be terrible, although I know someone who wants me to ( @ivyinspace 😉)
10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?
Wait that happens?
11. Ever had a fic translated?
Nope but if anyone wants to please don’t hesitate to get in touch!
12. Have you ever co-written a fic?
I have not, although had talks about it!
13. All time fav ship?
All time?! Gotta be the Titanic. Lmao no I’d say Thasmin, although I am partial to some Thoscei
14. WIP you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?
I’ll be honest, I don’t think I’ll ever finish Cosmic Fireworks. I wish I’d left it as a one shot tbh but I don’t want to delete the second chapter off ao3. But I can’t see myself finishing it, I wasn’t into it as much as I am normally with my fics, but we’ll see, who knows, perhaps one day I’ll wake up with the inclination!
15. Writing strengths?
*mind goes blank*
ermm... I think I’m quite good at taking complex themes and exploring them well- I find that the pieces come together easily in my mind and (provided I write it all out and plan first) it’s like I can lay out a problem and carefully craft the solution. I suppose that might make me good at characterisation? I also think that I’m good at setting the scene and describing places maybe.
16. Writing weaknesses?
I write way too much, I need to be more concise. Also I think I have a habit of needing my characters to show they’re good people, and that means sometimes my own voice carries over into theirs, and perhaps I could be better at exploring the complexities of characters, if that makes sense (something that goes beyond characterisation is what I mean, like maybe I’m making the point too hard sometimes). I also think that sometimes I need to chill- there doesn’t have to be a big point to scenes sometimes, no great narrative or thing to take away, sometimes it’s just the pleasure of reading something that’s important, even if it’s silly.
17. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in a fic?
I wish I could speak another language, but alas I cannot, otherwise I would, but I would then put translation.
18. First fandom you wrote for?
It was actually Merlin, I never published it online but it was when I was about 13/14 and first discovered fanfic and was a huge fan of Merlin I thought, ‘that sounds fun let’s do it’! I was already writing little silly stories anyway so it was like a whole new concept which also felt familiar, although they were awful so I’m glad they never went online!
19. What’s your fav fic you’ve written so far?
Agh idk! In terms of a story I think is good quality and engaging, I’d say ‘On Hallowed Ground’ as it’s concise, the plot and emotions mix well, I think, and overall I’m really proud of it. But in terms of my favourite one to write, I’m not sure if I can pick one. I enjoy writing them all, although tbh with some there are chapters I just have to grit my teeth through to write (by my own fault because I make things way too complicated!), but enjoyment is what it’s about! But maybe I’d single out my aus because they’re more my own invention that the others, in particular Heaven Sent- so that and Rising Tides, final answer! (see, this is what I mean, I write too much jfc...)
This is open to anyone who wants to do it!! 😊
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Neon J In D&D
Alright so I don't know how else to title this but here we gooooo.
(Oh and for those of you following me because of the fanfiction I wrote, I'll be getting back to that soon enough. I'm just geek-ing out over this.)
So I made Neon J into a D&D character, mostly because I've been on a roll making my favorite series into playable characters. First one I'm excited to share: Neon J as a Battle Master Fighter - but also a close-quarters Dexterity Fighter.
Bit of a disclaimer here, I usually roll all my stats (unless they're garbage), but I'll be posting point-buy stats AND standard array in parenthesis next to it; just in case you also want to play but the GM won't allow rolled stats for some reason.
I also build up to 3rd level, since it's where most classes get their actual subclass, and if I need to scale it down to 1st level it's no big deal.
Overview
Background: Soldier
"Custom Background": Replace Athletics with Acrobatics; if wanted, replace gaming set with a tool proficiency
Race: Warforged
Tasha's Cauldron: +2 DEX, +1 CON
Specialized Design: One Instrument + Performace
Class Details
Class: Fighter
Sub-Class: Battle Master
Fighting Style: Two-Weapon Fighting
Maneuvers*: Parry, Riposte OR Commander's Strike, Brace (Tasha's Cauldron) OR Rally
*You learn more at specific levels, but if you're starting at 3rd, you only get 3 - outside of Parry, pick whichever is most helpful to your group.
1st Level Feat: Dual Wielder
=Bought Gear using Starting Gold=
Required Gear: (2) rapiers, (1) Studded Leather Armor,
Optional Gear: (1) shield, (1) explorer's pack, (1) Dragonset chess/tool (1) instrument [dependent on your proficencies]
-Standard Gear-
leather armor, longbow, 20 arrows; (2) rapiers; light crossbow and 20 bolts; (your pick) dungeoneer's pack OR explorer's pack + the gear granted by the background
=Ability Scores=
STR: 8 (8)
DEX: 15 (15)
CON: 15 (14)
INT: 10 (10)
WIS: 10 (12)
CHA: 13 (13)
For this build you won't NEED Strength, I put it as a dump stat since the others are kinda more important for Neon J's character. The important part is getting your Dexterity high and having good Constitution - you don't wanna get hit, but if you do, no big deal, you should have a decent enough health pool for that.
Details
The Soldier background is a no-brainer, both for Neon J and for Warforged in general. For his actual backstory, if your GM allows it, Neon J could have had Reincarnation used on him or have some sort of other soul-magic shenanigans happen to him - having initially BEEN a human, but then reborn as a Warforged.
When making the custom background using the PHB rules, I usually make minor changes to better fit the character as a whole: instead of taking Athletics since Strength is the dump stat this time, Acrobatics can mostly serve the same purposes (especially for being grappled).
Warforged makes the most sense for Neon J (as well as 1010 but this isn't about them right now), though you could ALSO use Variant Human to get an additional feat; I'd pick Fighting Initiate with the Defense Fighting Style if you choose to go that route - in the long term though, for your 4th level, you can forgo the immediate boost to your Dex with increasing your Ability Scores, and do the same. Either way, it works out. Warforged just also happens to get a +1 AC AND a +2/+1 score increase which is better in the long-run for this build (which in standard it's +2 CON/+1 Any, so you can reverse and pick Dex to increase in case your GM is strictly not using Tasha's for... some odd reason).
If your GM allows the 1st level feat (which most do), immediately go for Dual Wielder - you gain +1 AC for having melee weapons in separate hands, you don't need to be holding weapons with the light tag, and you can draw/stow two one-handed weapons when normally you can only do that with one. This is important for the class build.
Fighters tend to fall into two categories: standard melee STR fighters and ranged DEX fighters (though at that point you're usually better off playing as a rouge/ranger). However, the setup before allows for a melee Dexterity fighting style without sacrificing much of what most people think of STR-based fighters.
First, your Fighting Style needs to be Two-Weapon Fighting: this makes it so when you attack with your off-hand as stated for hitting with two weapons you CAN add your ability score. This is great - it gives you more times you can attack overall. The more the better.
Second, when you pick your Maneuvers as a Battle Master, go with Parry, Riposte, and Brace if you're intending to do more solo fighting on the get-go. If you want to instruct your teammates better or give your Barbarian more times to hit, replace the last two with Commander's Strike, and Rally (This is why we didn't dump Charisma, or any other stat for that matter.)
Finally, I HIGHLY recommend using starting gold instead of standard gear if you can: buy studded leather armor and rapiers - those are the most effective light armor and versatile melee weapons you can get at the start. (Versatile meaning you can use your DEX score instead of STR for your attacks)
End Results
AC = 12 (studded armor) + 1 (warforged) + 3 (ability score and racial bonus) + 1 (dual wielder) = 17
You are legitimately almost on par with plate armor without any of its drawbacks. If for some reason you absolutely need to with optional gear, you can add a shield to surpass it with a 19. Is it as great as just plate+sheild? No. Not at this level anyway - later levels you can add the feat I described above AND increase your Dexterity score, later on, to make it even better and definitely surpass it.
Your initiative is +3, meaning you're a speedy person comparatively, AND if you need to use stealth and/or acrobatics you're not at disadvantage with heavy armor (also your rolls, without being proficient in them are better in general for it.)
You get 3 attacks per turn - each dealing 1d8 +3, and a potential 4th attack in the round with Brace/Riposte. OR if you're going the more co-operative route, giving your teammates a chance to do more damage (which in turn could be MORE damage than what you can put out solo).
With a minimum of +2 to your Con AND a d10 hit die, you also have a better HP pool than other classes that use light armor - at minimum, you're getting 8 per level up (3 if your GM is evil and doesn't allow average on lower rolls) and at maximum 12.
Oh, and if you get hit, you can reduce the amount of incoming damage with Parry (even though it's only for melee, but that comes up more often than spells when you're getting in someone's face.)
The downsides are that you're not as strong as others that are playing melee generally, and with the average stats in INT and WIS you're basically doing flat rolls for most spell saves (at least they're not negative, and your passive perception doesn't suffer for it).
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I wasn't going to reply, because what I have to say is a bit charged, and the least thing I want is to make you uncomfortable in your space, but your tags indicated you wanted us to interact so I thought I might as well. I do have to apologise in advance in case of anything, it is really not my intention to upset, but I also feel this needs a reply. I think in retrospect, having read what I wrote back, this might not have even been about reluctance as much as I'm starting to think that post triggered my fight or flight response.
That anon that complained about Yashahime, I can understand the gripe to some extent, and no one ever really said the season is perfect, there were moments in the season that could have been done better, especially partaining to pacing, but especially now when we know there will be more coming, and that what we got is hardly the whole deal, to act like sessrin is reduced to just that first season is ridiculous. Quite frankly even so, their dynamic wasn't impacted at all, they're the same dynamic we all fell in love with, but they're put in a difficult situation... which, sure, ok... but... that's just... storytelling? There needs to be a story... to tell? I'm not sure what exactly people expected honestly.
Maybe not necessarily this case, but most times when I've seen people say that, what they mean is they see Sunrise's portrayal of Rin as a "complacent breeder", which honestly is offensive, false, and also just weird in the context of both the plot and the dynamic, especially if and when you understand it. Or they call Rin useless, apparently that's a thing too now... in any case, it sets some of my alarms off, I think valid critique is most welcome, but the things thay I've seen spewed around here under the guise of "criticism", hardly really qualify as that at all and are said in bad faith.
On a personal note, and this is more why I was reluctant to reply, people who are overly obsessed with fictive characters' ages make me uncomfortable, and dare I say, outright give me the creeps. If you have that much trouble distancing yourself from fiction to the point where you need to know pixel ages down to the last second since their "birth", that you can't even enjoy a character dynamic lest it abides by the bible, that to me is a big red flag, and more often than not people who are so concerned with them are antis/fancops, in other words, abusers. If the person who sent that is who I think they are, then for sure it's a fancop, and when they say "bully", they mean they were called out for harassing artists and spewing terfery, and despite them outright hurting people, and overall being harmful, when that was called into question, rather than hold themselves accountable, they took to fleeing and painting a narrative.
Returning to topic and to the characters' ages business, I'm also suspicious of anyone at all who allocates time to argue about Rin's age any one way or another, because Rin has never even had a canon age as per the original material, and quite frankly it's irrelevant. But I guess that's a hot take, to say that the fake numbers slapped on a fake, nonexistent character, are fake and have no real importance. It just makes me very curious how some are so certain Rin is 16 or younger when there are no sources to be cited either pro or against. Even with assumptions of her age in Inuyasha, which are for the most part a consensus across the whole Inufandom, and subsequent calculations based on Kagome's age and the timeline, most of the time Rin's age results around 17 if you read an analysis done in good faith. The only ones who age her down, and can't even settle on 1 single age for her, since depending on which of them you ask they'll say anything between 12-16... are yet again the fancops. Most people ship things because they enjoy a dynamic, characters' personalities that compliment each other and so forth, it's never about character ages™ or shipping the right™, most realistic™, most morally coherent with our real life views™ thing, and being perfomative and trying to turn it into that has singlehandedly hurt more people, and been the most dangerous turn fandom could have ever taken.
Okay! Let's dive in!
I agree with you. The first season wasn't perfect. it did have it's flaws, but that's what a first season is. It's to set up the characters and the world they live in. I'm not saying next season will be better, but it has room to grow. There is still story left, it's not finished yet.
You are definitely right about this! Rin is in no way a "breeder" or "useless". It's extremely rude to call someone a breeder just because they want/have children. That is very misogynist and reduces women to basically nothing. What's worse is that some of the people who say that are also women so they are saying that themselves and all women are worthless and that is not the case.
Yes, Rin's age was never specified. At the end of the day her age is basically a headcanon. We don't know how old she was when she married Sesshomaru or gave birth to the twins. She could have been 14 or 16 or 17. It was super common back then for people to marry and have kids at a young age. Even today people are having children at that age. But again we don't know how old she was! It shouldn't be a problem and it shouldn't be obsessed over. Just say what you think her age is and go.
Obsessing over a fictional ship/characters isn't healthy. Other than liking sessrin I have responsibilities in the real world. I have a life outside of fandoms that I'm in. I also agree with you, people who obsess over her age or actively showing their hate for a ship makes me super uncomfortable. It's like "okay we get it you don't like sessrin. We don't care as long as you don't harass us just because of lines on a screen." It's nice to like shows and ships but people shouldn't only be contributing to hate. It's unnecessary and a waste of time.
To sum up everything, and to the people who keep spreading hate, here is a quote of my favourite meme:
"Calm down son, it's just a drawing."
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