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destinygoldenstar · 8 months

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I want to talk about THIS scene from the episode "The Forgotten Element" in Season 4

This was the scene that spawned many Evil Kai AU fanfictions.

(And like... I get it)

As a kid, I was always jaw dropped by this scene, but I didn't understand this scene too much.

Like, what was the point of this Evil Kai AU if it was for a minute and it was resolved so quickly?

They were building this up the entire episode and even before it, so was that all for nothing? Did it not mean anything? What was the point of this anyway?

And then it clicked with me WHY that was.

The problem was that I was only focusing on what's present in the moment and not all around it.

In the moment itself, Kai is holding the staff, it holds too much power, it corrupts him and spills all of is bottled up negative emotions about destiny and the Green Ninja, how he feels about it all being wrong, that he was somehow 'not good enough' compared to a child, and how he should've been the one with all the power all the glory and all the abilities in is veins.

"You had all the power, now it's my turn!"

"Nothing that I don't already feel!"

"I should've been the Green Ninja!"

That's straight up TELLING.

And it makes sense. Kai wanted to be the Green Ninja more than anyone ever since he heard of that prophecy. Ever since he was told he was the Master of Fire by Wu he went from 'do everything for Nya and be a parent' to 'I can be special and worthy in a way I couldn't ever see in myself'. And then it all turned out to be for nothing, Kai being 'special' was all a lie, and the prophecy went to this bratty kid that Kai was tasked to babysit. Then Lloyd would proceed to be very well recognized and Kai was just... the forgotten member that nobody understands the motives of. 'You wanted to take the place of someone who did something sacrificially heroic? How dare you. SELFISH.'

BUT WE ALL KNOW THAT.

This all sounds like a villain origin story that would happen in the season, right?

The build up is all there. The bottled up emotions. Skylor's influence. Chen taunting him in this episode about it and getting into his head about his parents, something that is VERY PERSONAL to Kai.

So if it ended up being just ONE MOMENT and that's it, then this was all for nothing, right?

NO.

Why? Because that's not what this aspect of the episode is about at all.

This was all NOT build up to Kai becoming a villain.

This was about Kai REJECTING that villainous side of him.

He's been 'on the villain's side' at the start of the episode when Chen decided not to enslave him.

Another motif of this episode is what gets said over and over again in the B plot of the episode, that being the prison escape from the Noodle Factory. "The power of positive thinking"

Kai is learning this as well, but it's his own personal battle to come to that. Part of being positive is being positive about yourself.

He's been scolded for being selfish constantly. Again, how dare he want to take someone's place, someone who was better than him in every way and they all knew it. These people are oblivious, they can't read his mind, they're misinterpreting his words, and for some reason nobody apologizes for that.

We've seen him be insecure of his own abilities. When he feels like he can't do something, he goes 'If only I had this ability'. An example being the Digiverse.

Part of the lesson there was that he had to allow himself to have the power he needed to get out of a tight spot. As an old fashion and a devoted brother, makes sense why he'd struggle with this.

And then when Chen gets in his head, it's the same thing again, he's selfish and he wants the power and that's all he cares about.

Everyone is saying you're selfish, therefore it must be true.

And this is the first time Kai ever actually CALLS THE PERSON OUT for accusing him of being one dimensionally selfish.

Yes he falters back when Chen mentions his parents, but that's still a notable step. (And he would continue to call out their accusations in Possession)

The episode consists of Kai being on the villain's side and playing the role of the deceiver. Him being smart by playing the emotions of Chen and Skylor rather than be a logical thinker. (WOW. An episode that doesn't make Kai dumb and instead makes him smart in a way that fits his character. That is sad how rare that's shown anymore.)

And to do that he had to convince everyone that he was on the villain's side and that he has turned.

So THIS moment is not build up to Kai becoming a villain truly, it's a test on this own side of him that he must acknowledge exists. How this way of thinking isn't healthy, it's petty, it's not worth it, and he shouldn't be lingering on something when he himself is capable of so much.

And then NO ONE EVER TALKS ABOUT HOW KAI WAS THE ONE WHO BROKE THE STAFF AND I DON'T UNDERSTAND THAT.

He could just grab the staff again and be corrupted again, and that's it. But HERE, there is no one paying attention to him to tell him what to do.

Which means this is all Kai's choice.

This is Kai CHOOSING to REJECT that villain inside him, and instead proceed to a more positive outlook, one that would benefit everyone.

That's countering all the selfish accusations more than anything else.

As a kid I was confused as to why there wasn't a scene where Kai acknowledged what happened when he was corrupted and how you go from that to 'Kai wants to protect Lloyd'

Him breaking the staff IS that scene. (It's just so fast that it's hard to see on a first couple viewings) He NEVER wants to see himself as that corrupted figure again, and is willingly choosing what role he wants to play now. That's the transition there from that Kai to Possession Kai. (Possession Kai = Best Kai)

This is one of my favorite episodes of the show because of how much justice was done here in so many ways.

#ninjago #ninjago tournament of elements #ninjago kai #kai jiang #kai smith

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characterdevelopmentobsessed · 4 months

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Winter Anime 2024 That I'm Watching

The Apothecary Diaries - continuing from last season, I love it and I am obsessed with MaoMao

7th Time Loop - This one actually surprised me with how much I love it. So far it's a fun story with beautiful art and the OPness of the main character actually makes sense. I love an OP character, especially a female OP

A Sign of Affection - THE FEELS!!! SO CUTE!! MY HEART IS MELTING!!!! I am absolutely adoring this love story

Solo Leveling - I am super intrigued by this show, I kind of feel like we are just getting to the meat of it and the whole first 4 episodes were all set up, but I am really enjoying it so far!

The Wrong Way to Use Healing Magic - Solid isekai

Doctor Elise - This one feels a bit like it is lacking substance, especially when it is sharing a season with 7th Time Loop. But it's cute and I am enjoying it so far. The whole advanced medical instruments in a medieval setting is a bit suspect though

Cherry Magic - Cute romance with actual adults in the workforce *gasp* shocking. I love it, it's cute and I am totally shipping the main couple, KISS ALREADY

The Witch and the Beast - Loving the vibes and characters, not entirely sure what is going on yet and they definitely don't give you enough clues with the mystery so it always feels like they are pulling the solution out of their ass but I am enjoying the ride enough to overlook that flaw

Villainess Level 99 - Not really sure where the plot is going but I'm enjoying it

The Weakest Tamer Begins a Journey to Pick Up Trash - MUST PROTECT! The main character is so sweet and I want to see her and her slime buddy grow up safely

Tsukimichi season 2 - The season is off to a slow start, but I enjoyed season 1 so I will give it a chance

Shows I Have Already Dropped

The Strongest Tank's Labyrinth - Why did he have to be a siscon? The show had a promising first episode and then episode 2 was all siscon and random childish looking girls fawning over him. DROP

Mr. Villain's Day Off - I may have kept watching this show in a less packed season, or a season where I had too many serious shows, but with it's slow pace and repetitive humor I decided it didn't make the cut when stacked up against shows like A Sign of Affection of Cherry Magic

The Demon Prince of Momochi House - Interesting concept, subpar delivery, DROP

#winter anime 2024 #current watch #currently watching #a sign of affection #yubisaki to renren #the apothecary diaries #solo leveling #the weakest tamer began a journey to pick up trash #the witch and beast anime #the witch and the beast #the wrong way to use healing magic #doctor elise #surgeon elise #cherry magic anime #villainess level 99 #tsukimichi #7th time loop

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familyagrestefanblog · 6 months

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Clarification I definitely should have done ever since season 4 and the Ladynoir conflict started escalating, but hey, let's just get it out:

There are reasons why I'm harping down so badly on Miraculous' Girlboss feminism and defend Adrien as much as I do.

To get the feminist (in-universe) explaination out of the way first:

I would be lying if I said that I like the direction the show has taken Marinette's character and the story in general. But regarding her specifically I simply have to say that most of my problems with her are how she is written as Ladybug, Guardian, and especially leader & partner. Not in her civilian self. Hence why you won't find that alot on my blog, only when it contributes to the overarching double standards problem from s4 I take issue with.

I simply cant deny it, Ladybug is a kind of leader I just came to not be able to respect alot anymore in how she operates most things bc she doesn't really ever look passed how things look & stand for herself, and what SHE needs & wants. Marinette is a very low empathy person in the sense that she struggles putting herself in other people's positions, or remembers considering that at all.

But that's not the reason why I can't respect her as leader. I have ADD, that would be really hypocritical of me.

What leaves me unable to respect her as leader though (& honestly kinda even wanting Alya to take her position) is the fact that the show doesn't see much wrong with Maribug doing that.

They don't properly depict this as flawed leadership she actually NEEDS to grow out of by making up for her shortcomings by, for example, making other people her official co-leaders. Instead the show since s4 (& kinda s3) will proceed to put it's feminist foot down if Maribug isn't actually in the end 100% correct and "totally girlboss justified" in any given case - with CN & authorities specifically - no matter the context. Ergo she's barely ever truly improving her weakpoints in partnership skills for example & continues doing the same mistakes over n over.

like she genuinely would benefit from having Chat Noir as her co-leader too, not just Rena Rouge. But no. The neurodivergend low-empathy girl can't have a high-empathy boy co-leader bc apparently thats misogynistic now, huh ?

Again, I have ADD and I'm also a woman. In fact, I actually have alot in common with Maribug (hence why it hurt so much once s4 took her away from me), so forgive me when I still say: I am NOT going to lower my standards of my believe that neither of those aspects get to be an excuse on everyone else's expense regarding LEADERSHIP (which I do also am in the position of in my life).

And I repeat: LEADERSHIP. Not Marinette herself as a person necessarily & esp not her civilian life.

People always say that her critics wouldn't be so hard on her if she were a man, but I strongly disagree. In my experience, if Marinette were a boy people would actually draw a line nowadays and call out that Mariano is too stuck in his own head to be a good leader (& partner). And maybe even demand that he shouldn't be in that position anymore either at all or until he's in a better head space.

Bc with male characters people are actually drawing lines now in important factors when it comes to power & the accountability coming with it, bc in the end being in change means it ain't about you

Hence why e. g. Steve Rogers (Captain America) was then a fucking fugitive from the law when shit got real in the MCU. They had to do that bc of his leadership morality not being able to exist well within a corrupted & complex law system under fire and attack. My man's an amazing battle leader, but the MCU did VERY well leaving taking care of all kinds of social & political matters to Tony Stark. This kind of nuance ain't Steve's strength. Marinette & Steve are actually a EXTREMELY similar type of leader and it's interesting that I don't exactly vibe with him too much either in that regard, but like him as person the way I did Marinette. So for me it's definitely an issue with their type of leadership.

But the mainstream female leader characters are often still "too female" to get held to the same regular standards bc telling a female leader character in a complicated and not entirely beneficial situation & position 'yeah, it's sucks but you're not the center of the universe'' is now more often than not still "too mean/ sexist"

again, Steve was made an outlaw for a reason and you can bet if he had been a Stephanie people would have made all her struggles about sexism & called the 'outlaw leader' route after Civil War misogyny, merely bc "society doesnt respect women". This is whats happening with Maribug & it clashes with her leadership style.

Hence why there AREN'T ALOT of mainstream female leader characters. And if we get some, most of them are narratively defined by how powerful & in control they are for THEIR OWN BENEFIT and it being depicted as 100% right & just in general (like with Marinette) which goes against what a normal leader should be, so alot of people don't like them (ignoring the actual sexist people for a sec)

The first Wonder Woman movie for example was so well-received for a reason. They did it RIGHT (& may I please also recommend Wakanda Forever? Fuck, that movie was GOOD)

But yes, it's notably how Maribug treats Chat, who is supposed to be her partner and friend, that I take alot of issues with.

And yes, I would say the same if LB were male and CN female. Ladynoir is so rooted in toxic femininity that this "partnership" (or just the entire LS) the way it is could NOT exist today in gender bend. S4 and the s5 finale in particular are unthinkable in gender bend and they sold it as "justified female empowerment" & "unparalleled loving treatment" from Ladybug's side Chat Noir needed to learn to be GRATEFUL for.

All while, and I will never stop stressing this: the show has never stopped writing Marinette to treat Chat Noir as if he basically just spawns into existence once he puts on the mask. He's HALF a human being. Even once she falls in love with him in s5.

This is the fundamental and deep seeded problem of where my issues come from here. It never stands in question if Adrien views Marinette and Ladybug as full human beings, but the other way around that very much is the case. In whatever way it's depicted. Yes this is a line I draw, especially because of the whole Sentihuman thing.

I personally am alot more like Adrien regarding Friendship and partnership (or what his character initially started out). They are heavy & meaningful topics for me. So seeing Marinette being utilized to girlboss all that into the ground with Chat Noir, esp in s4, while she apparently barely ever even noticed anything wrong with how she treats him in the first place as she literally replaced him with Alya/ Rena in everything but name

cause buring him under a wall of secrets & lies meant she can still 100% benefit from his eternal devotion by letting him believe she's too alone to be a partner anymore AT ALL. (Kuro Neko onwards and then NEVER stopped letting him think she's just as alone as he is. NEVER. She's still doing it in s5 while leaving him 100% isolated which was then his demise in the s5 finale.)

and gives Alya the deluxe partnership entirely on his expense, while barely ever sparing him even the most basic thought in anything; & by "Risk" then literally having them switch status. Rena is her actual partner she fully treats that way and he's merely her favorite temp hero with no rights, which Rena was previously.

And the only reason why Chat was treated with something resembling to fairness or dignity again in season 5 (& finally wasn't a rag doll for her every little mood anymore...) was because Maribug plainly had no other choice and had her team & position of power taken away by force while Alya renounced for her own safety. And yet she's still treating him as half a human being even by the end of S5. AFTER her character development. He's Chat Noir and that's where his existence ends in her leadership & friendship. CN and Alya in s5 are literally 2 halves of ONE PARTNER.

All that was painful to watch to say the least. Bc it's imo honestly a disgrace to friendship and partnership. I can't put into words how ashamed I would be of myself if I treated someone the way Marinette treats Chat Noir (again, HALF A HUMAN BEING).

Much less a friend I claim to love dearly and don't want to loose (another thing the MCU did better regarding Steve's fall-out with Tony over Bucky... I should really make that comparison post why Steve works for me & Marinette doesnt)

Just the mere fact that Marinette in "Elation" even told Chat "It doesn't matter who's underneath your mask" is honestly outrageous.

Because thats simply what it is for me. If s4 & 5 Marinette were portrayed from a similar morality angle to Emonette in the Paris special I would have much less issues with her. Cause thats ironically an angle female characters barely get & is mostly used to redeem the broken bad boys with a hidden heart of gold™.

Double irony: s1-s3 actually DID put civilian Marinette often into that angle, hence why I really liked her, but then s4 suddenly said "well, her methods & actions really dont matter. She's wrong, but actually not really; ergo she should get rewarded in the end. Always. But with a few exceptions. Here n there she loses to claim otherwise. But actually the world just needs to learn how right & amazing she is."

She makes countless mistakes but often either doesn't really learn from them anymore or they just don't "count" bc that's 'what makes her quirky & loveable', so having any issues with her now means you hate women. And she's a very flawed leader but actually never did anything wrong. Ever. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

I will be VERY blunt now: The moment you put a female character into the leader role the FEMALE aspect is supposed to be of secondary importance. And a leader, by the nature of the position, ALWAYS has to be questioned morally wise in my opinion bc of the fatal blindspots that will automatically occur in every leadership.

And it happened here too: Chat Noir's treatment. But they demanded that her being the (female) leader means she's OWED to treat him badly & gets to keep him as blindspot on HIS expense bc she doesn't like thinking about him existing as civilian person.

A leader is ALWAYS somebody who is NOT going to sit well with everybody regarding their approach. That's a normal instinct, and in fact it would be highly dangerous if that wouldnt happen at all. So if I, or other people, don't respect her as one that simply means she has an opposition the way every leader has & is being held to normal standards a leader should be held to, regardless of gender.

Sorry if you think thats sexist, but in my opinion that's a YOU problem. I personally respect female leaders too much to not acknowledge them as anything else but the potential threats they are. The same way I do with male leaders.

You're leader first, woman second. If you can't handle that get out of the leadership position (yes, oc that also applies the other way around). Feminism was about making sure that women cant be excluded from e. g. position of power just bc we're female. The goal wasn't to have yet another group of people stomp their foots, now claiming that they are OWED power once they wanna have it to feel powerful. But that's what Marinette was used to teach an entire generation of children, especially girls.

The last thing you will EVER get me to do is accept that I should be holding women - specifically for equality, female empowerment and leadership - to LOWER (moral) standards as I would the men in her position.

Buddy, I am NOT gonna fucking do that. Just the thought is pissing me tf off, and has ever since s4, cause it directly plays into the misogynistic thinking of:

"Women can't be given power, status or even too much focus as human beings because they're too irrational and immature to be able to then lay proper priorities & take rightful accountability for their shit like a man in power could; and not just scream and cry while playing the oppressed victim card the moment things don't work out & they aren't being given the special female treatment to let them mostly off the hook consequences wise.

Leading to everyone around them, especially the MEN, having to step up, do the work & basically babysit the women like children - while still having to give her the credit as person in charge - turning the women more or less into toddlers wearing a queen's crown"

Which, by all means, Adrichat in every dynamic of the love square by season 5, Gabriel at the end of "Recreation" and even Luka & Félix (& "thankfully" Alya too since s4) had to do for Maribug in alot of ways.

Pick up all of her slack in several major areas & catering to her while simultaneously having to still give most of the credit to HER or else they would be "mean to the female lead" (it's also telling that Alya is treated the best here, & goodness dont get me started on Su-Han...).

And with that out of the way, a few more meta reasons:

1) I'm NOT watching a damn documentary. Marinette is NOT a 14 year old, she doesnt exist & isnt based on a real person or story. She's a fictional main character and narrative tool, so forgive me for approaching this differently than a real life case.

and 2) in everything I watch I automatically look out for the narrative's blind spots and victims of the writings' favorites. I take it this seriously because this is career related for me.

Hence why I have barely ever liked a main character and ironically Marinette/ Ladybug was once one of the few exceptions (alongside Korra from Legend of Korra and Blitz from Helluva Boss)

Look, when I for example watch Helluva Boss or a Yugioh show I will automatically pay extra attention to how the female characters are being treated bc they are obviously treated worse by the writing and much more neglected and scapegoated than the male characters.

Meanwhile when I watch Miraculous and She-Ra, I do the opposite and pay attention to how the male characters are treated bc now they have the gender-biase against them.

And when I for example watch Avatar the last Airbender or Legend of Korra [and She-Ra, that show is great], then I actually get to be mostly fucking happy for once in my life jfc

I'm not going to elaborate too much more on this because I already named by my main point in the beginning: Chat Noir's - not even Adrien's, I mean CHAT NOIR - sometimes honestly awful treatment being the biggest moral and narrative blind spot of the entire show, and honestly where most of Maribug's problems then are also rooted in. Hence why I started focusing so much on Chat Noir since season 4. I look at the overall narrative and circumstances and look for the blind spots that needs to be solved to get to the core of the problem of this whole mess, to get effective results.

And that was and even by the end remained the fact that Adrichat is treated so badly, scapegoated in every possible way in the name of "feminism" and kicked out of the story where HE is at the core of most everything going on, just so the show can force Maribug into everything, make things about her that have no business being about her

Just so she can then be made to constandly turn around and scream, cry and stress about problems - and go about them in the least effective way - that wouldnt be there in the first place if she wasnt the main character of a story that isnt hers.

Mate, I dont know what to tell you here, but the fact that we are following Marinette Dupain-Cheng ,who has nothing to do with anything besides being the cool action girl, is and will always remain of the of core problems of this show. I WISHED that wasnt the case. But for the love of everything, Kagami would have made so much more sense as the female lead, but no.

Anyway, I will leave it at that now cause I already elaborate much further than I initially wanted to, I just wanted to finally have all this stated.

This Blog is not a full representation of how I lay priorities in (feminist) media in general, my view adjusts to the piece of media I'm watching.

And unfortunately, ever since season 4 Miraculous turned into a full blown extreme case and has only gotten better somewhat recently. So I will continue doing what I always do: focus on the fucking VICTIM whose bad treatment pulls down the whole show's quality, and here that's plain obviously Adrien Agreste/ Chat Noir.

And with all due respect: Die mad about it.

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theydonthavenames · 2 years

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Wille's arc appreciation post

I find it truly amazing how much Wille has grown and changed in season 2. At the beginning he was the same dramatic, hurt, chaotic, selfish, whingy (very affectionately) teenager prince we knew from season 1. He wanted Simon back badly, but he didn't have a clue how to win him back. But reality hit him in the face- Simon is still mad and he's actually trying to move on dating someone else- and with a *little* help of the biggest star of S2, Boris the Birkenstock Sossen ™️ he's gone so far and almost became a brand new person. There are a few scenes in the second half of the season where his decisions made me really proud of him. It's gonna be long, bare with!

I think the bravest thing Wille did this season was letting Simon go in ep 4. We of course knew he was so wrong, but Wille truly believed Simon doesn't love him anymore. He didn't see all of Simon's yearning, he didn't know Simon wrote him a love song. In Wille's eyes Simon trying to move on with Marcus and as much as it hurt, he finally accepted it. I think this was the most mature decision he's made this season, and I don't know what sort of strength one must have to let the love of his life go- I was lucky enough I never had to do that- I can't even imagine how much it hurt Wille. But he did it out of love and respect to Simon. He felt broken and hopeless too, but I believe Wille's primal reasoning here was that he loves Simon so much he just wants him to be happy, with or without him. Luckily the story didn't continue that way and it literally took Simon minutes to pull Wille back.

This one surprised me. When Simon decides to report August to the police, despite the potential damage it might have on his own and Wille's life, Wille just respects it. He told Simon he was scared, but he didn't try to change his mind. Season 1 Wille would loose his marbles in the same situation. He would probably end up shouting at Simon and calling him selfish (like he did in S1 piano room fight- which I expected). But S2 Wille trusts Simon's judgement and lets him decide for himself. Deep down he knows it's the right thing to do. And another beautiful thing that happened during this scene is Wille taking initiative to comfort Simon and hugging him. He showed Simon he supports his decision and will be there for him, no matter the consequences.

In this beautiful little scene Wille casually turns up at Simon's house to let him know he can give up the throne for him. First of all, he is so calm and collected, and he doesn't even ask for privacy, he lets Ayub and Rosh listen to their conversation- he knows they would find out anyway, but also he's not embarrassed to show his true feelings for Simon in front of his friends (and also I'm glad they were there because they needed to hear it too). But the best thing that Wille does here, after dropping the bombshell on Simon, he just walks away. He allows Simon space and time for the news to sink in and doesn't demand any answers, not even a comment. He really shows how much he starts to empathize with Simon- he must have realised it will hit Simon like a train, but he lets Simon deal with it on his own terms. S1 Wille would be dying to know what Simon thinks and he would not hesitate to ask. S2 Wille just walks away. So mature for a 16 year old.

And the final scene, my beloved. That 'I love you' whispered in his ear in dark Hillerska corridor worked wonders. The courage he's shown to admit it was him was unreal. But also it proves the amount of love he's got for Simon, that he doesn't want him having to compromise and keeping them as secret. He's grown to understand lies and secrets were not getting them anywhere. He was ready to break that circle and finally be true to his own feelings. Such a brave, beautiful moment, I'm so happy and proud he did that. They both deserved this ending, Wille and Simon.

Side note finally, we now know there is this deleted scene when Wille texts Simon at the end of ep 6, when everything is in pieces again and it almost feels like Wilmon is back to square one. As sweet as the scene is, I'm really glad that they didn't include it in the final cut, because it shows that after Sara's betrayal when Simon is ultimately sad, mad, hurt to the point of rejecting Wille, he just gives him much needed space. He doesn't try to run after him, text him, reach out, I think Wille understood that Simon needed the space and time to think things through. And that paid back beautifully. In my head, this scene doesn't exist.

Wille's gone a long way in season 2. His arc is beautifully written and makes me a proud mum 🥲 I can't wait to see him grow even more in next season- I have no doubt he will.

#that turned out long ooops #thanks to everyone who got till the end #prince wilhelms arc #young royals analysis #young royals #wilmon #prince wilhelm #simon eriksson

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theerurishipper · 6 months

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Back when s4 aired and people begun to feel uncomfortable with how lb treat cn unfairly, many defend her saying "she's not aware she put distance between her and cn because she's too stressed from all the burden" and even now, many still think like that. That she wasn't aware of the distance, that she didn't know she hurt cn all because she doesn't have time to think about it and cn never tell her that he's hurt. But Strike Back proof that it wasn't true.

Ladybug: Why don't you just give up on me? I lost ALL the Miraculous, I'm the worst Guardian EVER! I wanted to control everything, I didn't listen to you, I lied to you, I kept you at a distance! Every time you offered me a helping hand, I never took it! I really made a mess of EVERYTHING. (continues crying)'’

The fact that she just rambled about it without being prompted shown how AWARE she is about what she did to him and it's worse than her did that out of ignorance. She knows she hurt him but she decided to ignore it or in denial about it and she never apologize or explain anything to him and yet people seems to have a fanon that lb apologize to cn, despite it never actually happen and still defend her action as "A 14 y.o who's stressed because of the sudden big responsibility being handed to her and everyone should give her a break"

I hate s5, but if there's something that I like it's that Derision basically said "You can't use your trauma as a justification to hurt people" and yet people want to use lb trauma and stress as justification for every wrong doing she did in s4 lmao while condemning cn for the same reason lmao.

Tbf, I think it was less that she knew what she was doing and more that she realized what she did and how she had hurt him at that point (now how she could have possibly come to that conclusion is a real mystery).

But yeah, that wasn't an apology, just an admission of guilt. And she didn't fix anything in Season 5 either. Chat Noir just ended up accepting his new role and that's how the whole conflict ended. I wish the writers had actually dealt with it instead of continuing their anti-Ladynoir agenda, but they chose the most asinine path to take the story in.

And yeah, people will salt on Adrien for "not communicating his feelings to Ladybug," or some BS like that, acting like that's as bad as what Ladybug did while excusing her for everything she did by saying "she was stressed and traumatized." Like yeah, of course she is. But that's not an excuse lol. Like, I get it. I was defensive of her throughout Season 4 when people were salting on her cause I thought she would fix her mistakes and I didn't want to be harsh. But the fix never came, and I got tired of defending her character when the writers seemed so determined to completely ruin it in their effort to prop her up so much. If they don't care, I don't have to care either.

Thank you for your ask!

#Meta #ML Salt #ML Writing Salt #ML Writers Salt #Marinette Salt #Ladybug Salt #Asks #Ladynoir conflict #My meta

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fansids · 1 year

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Alright, I gotta lotta thoughts on s4, but this is the main thing I'm not particularly happy with.

It's not very organized, I'm writing as I'm thinking so I apologize beforehand.

Spoilers obvi.

I really don't appreciate how Sun Wukong's character has been treated up until this point.

Look, I don't mind the "perfect, heroic mentor is actually not always so perfect and heroic and made mistakes that are still effecting the world now" like fine. Fine. But the way the show goes about it makes SWK look like a worse and worse person. It crosses the line of him making mistakes, to just being generally careless and not learning.

I mean: leaving Xiaotian in s2 and inadvertently neglecting him in the process, keeping the 4th ring a secret in s3 until it's too late, being the reason there was a fourth ring to begin with, the whole Macaque thing that the show seems to be leaning more towards SWK being in the wrong for, and his whole deal with his sworn brothers in s4.

It was already irritating in season 3, especially when he's shown to get yelled at by Xiaotian & Zhu Dachu then continues his usual way, often being unhelpful. I get that Xiaotian is the mc, but like c'mon. SWK is depowered, there are like a million ways to sideline him without doing that.

Season 4 is especially egregious as someone who's read jttw because the Lion, Elephant, and Peng are all terrible villains who spent a good amount of their time eating innocent people. I'm not sure why the show especially seems to be insistent on making the Azure Lion sympathetic and one that feels bad for trapping SWK...then again Macaque exists. You know what no, I don't see why they are insistent on doing that when Macaque exists. He may be one too many times, but once was enough.

Jttw aside, if in Azure Lion's point of view SWK willingly betrayed them and all the "good" they stood for, then trapped his other brothers for thousands of years, and before that was happy to join heaven's courts for like 20-30 years, then I don't know why he'd ever show that level of concern for him. If that happened to me, it would be monkey season, straight up.

(also the fact that he said he'd let SWK go when they completed what they wanted to, I call absolute bullshit. Even if he did feel bad, releasing SWK at any point in time would be a god awful idea)

From what s4 has shown, I think what the show writers wanted to do was build a parallel between Xiaotian and SWK, both having made mistakes that endangered the world and their loved ones as well as Xiaotian learning that his hero is just as human (for lack of a better term) as him. But the execution is lacking as a lot of Xiaotian's mistakes are not really his fault.

DBK taking his staff? It's not like he handed it to him.

Spider Queen using his hair? Is he supposed to stop shedding?

Red Son getting the skeleton key? Again, it's not as if he handed it to him. Also, wouldn't that make it the Bull family's fault, since they opened the coffin?

It wasn't him being careless it was him losing 2 fights and a bit of his hair. Whereas with SWK, it's implied these things happened because he didn't think about the consequences of his actions. They don't really seem comparable.

Also, if you've read jttw (and even if you haven't, but I think the context makes it worse), then lmk SWK is a very miserable character right off the bat. As we can see, he never became a Buddha, his friends are heavily implied to be dead, there are no monkey yaoguai on the mountain, or even a nation anymore, implying that his subjects left, died, or both, and in the midst of all of this he has no support system. Nor does he ever seem to obtain one in the show.

And I think some of these issues could be remedied if he was given the opportunity to tell his side of the story. Everything wrong he does is seen told through the perspective of another person. Not to say they shouldn't be upset, but the fact that SWK just absorbs whatever blame is put on him, never really giving any fair defense doesn't sit right with me. It wouldn't change any of the things he's done, but it would make him a lot more understandable as a character, instead of him consistently being some form of a fuck up.

#lmk s4 spoilers #monkie kid spoilers #lego monkie kid #monkie kid #lmk #sun wukong #qi xiaotian

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marzipanandminutiae · 3 months

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I see you talking about ouat and it unlocked thoughts that have been neatly filed away for years so here I am, yelling them at you.

I assume at this point spoilers arent a problem anymore for you but you said you originally didn't watch past the frozen but a warning just in case.

I kept watching for quite a long time, but I quit after the whole thing with ruby and Dorothy because what? it just felt so incredibly forced and badly written? and I'd gotten so annoyed because before we'd already had the whole thing with aurora and mulan, which I was rooting for but okay, that didn't work out, too bad for mulan. then we get a perfect set up for ruby and mulan. and it's just. never mentioned again???? ruby comes back eventually but wtf happened to mulan? it annoyed me so fucking much let me tell you.

also I remember trying to write out family/relationship trees and stuff for ouat to see how weirdly convoluted everything got. was very impressed that it seemed they managed to avoid accidentally having incest or something in the show with everything that was going on there.

I have so many more things but this has already gotten way longer than intended. do you have a favourite part of the show? I'm assuming your favourite characters is either regina or emma?

Oh man all of that brings back memories. I didn't stick around long enough for Ruby and Dorothy, but I got the sense that they were doing it to try and counteract the "avoiding Swan Queen because homophobia" allegations.

(I actually don't think they WERE avoiding Swan Queen because of homophobia, necessarily. I think it was never their intent to begin with; they just happened to attract a sapphic audience who were deeply on the Enemies to Lovers train. I do think they may have indulged in a bit of queerbaiting, though, because of some Emma/Regina moments that happened after the writers definitely knew the ship existed. I think it was never going to be canon, but they handled it poorly once they realized that people saw it as an option.)

I stopped watching around Frozen for a couple of reasons:

On a personal level, I just got sick of seeing the characters I shipped with other people. That's not an objective problem; it's my opinion and not everyone will agree. But to me, Hook was a whiny insecure manchild and Robin had the personality of Clippy the MS Word paperclip, and damnit, I wanted Emma and Regina to kiss each other instead of them!

On a This Is Bad Storytelling level, I HATED how Frozen was integrated. Earlier stories had been a nice blend of traditional fairytales with Disney adaptation elements- Beauty and the Beast where Gaston and Chip are both kind of there but in subtler ways, for example, or Cinderella where her dress resembles the 1950s animated version but everything else is different. Frozen, though, was just...Frozen. The entire plot of the movie Frozen had happened before the characters entered the OUAT storyline, their costumes were identical to those in the movie, and while I've heard that they added some different backstory- it just wasn't the "Hans Christian Andersen story with subtle Disney touches" that I would have expected from earlier seasons.

Personally, I don't think the initial curse should have been broken in a season. I feel like that locked them into a pattern of having to continually invent a new Darkest Evilest Most Powerful Magic EVER!!!!! to top the previous season, and that took them to some really weird places (I heard they went to literal hell at one point?). The show had a cool premise and some interesting ideas- I loved how they managed to give individual kingdoms distinct cultures and even fashions. You can tell the "look" of Snow White's kingdom from Cinderella's and Cinderella's from Ariel's, etc.

Everyone who would watch an entire season of Abigail's Ancient Greek Steampunk-ish kingdom, raise your hands. Seriously, so cool.

But something went wrong, IMO around season 4. I'm not sure if the show had just outlived its original concept or had outside pressures pulling it in different directions or what. All I know is, as far as I'm concerned, the show ends when Emma and Henry leave Storybrooke in season 3A. Pity It Was Cancelled So Soon, etc.

(although OOC Matronly SnowTM would have been perfect for live slug reaction memes, so there's that)

#long post #ask #once upon a time #ouat #anon

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steve0discusses · 8 months

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Episode 47 S5: Mana Runs too Slow and it Kills 2 People

Tumblr decided to change the way it does image posts so this is going to be my hell. I can only have max 30 "blocks" of images (yikes) and uploading all your images at once and then just adding text in between is actually not possible! (least it's a nightmare on browser. I have not figured out how to drag my text in between images, so I'm just uploading every image one by one and hoping I don't forget one)

thanks, I hate it!

Peeking up at us over the horizon, our end of the world apocalypse has reached the next step of his rampage: which is to shoot glowing missiles out of it's Dragon crotch until Egypt is destroyed.

Seto is doing his best to look productive, but unfortunately this is Sad Seto, who is still buffering.

Just uh...give him a minute. He has to remember how to be Seto.

(read more under the cut)

I'm pretty sure Kissara told him straight up to call her whenever, and considering how few words they've ever said to each other, you'd think he'd remember the words she said like half an hour ago. Then again, he was kind of...sleeping when that happened. Or hallucinating, or dreaming, or all three.

Bakura and Yami are watching this pan out from the Shadow Game Zone, Bakura kind of nodding slowly while Yami becomes overwhelmed with embarrassment over how much everyone around him is screwing it. This is not meant to be funny, but it was very funny to me.

I have brought this up before, but Bakura does bring up a good point, that this entire arc was kind of against the grain of who Yami became over the course of the last 4 seasons.

+++++STAND BACK I'M GONNA RANT, FEEL FREE TO SKIP++++

Don't get me wrong, Yami LOVES to make bad choices that end the world. But why would he continue to go back here and destroy the world of the future he knows and loves so much? Especially since it already went SO south with Dartz the last time he opened pandora's box?

He has a new identity now, he has so many friends, last arc was just so many women throwing themselves at Yugi. His life is really good! I think they could have developed more of a line of logic between last arc and this arc, but like with a lot of things in this arc, it was rushed.

So him giving up his newfound modern identity that he made all himself through hard work and friendship first off feels kinda bad. Like I'm OK with him being a new guy, he worked hard for that! Lets not go backward now.

And then him coming here to regain his old identity is sort of like the show knew what it must do, but the characters were like "nah." and then went and did it anyway seemingly at gunpoint.

And I kind of wish there was any contrast between who Yami's new identity is in the future and who Yami was in the past. It would be fascinating to dive into the fact he's now two people yet again, even though Yugi is no longer in that bean. but eh save it for the fanfiction, because they needed to end Yugioh in a certain number of episodes.

And that happens sometimes. Stories are character driven, and when you try and drive the characters, they become less like people and more like iconic symbols. Here's our hero. He must do this because he's the hero. That's it, that's the reason. Welcome to Shonen Jump.

+++++++END RANT AKA THIS ARC HAS COOL IDEAS AND I WISH IT HAD ENOUGH TIME TO DO THEM BETTER++++++++

Problem is, Yami isn't that meta. He's dumb though, so in a way it does make a little sense why he had to open the box. He dummy thin.

Dummy thin and still can't read.

And like in case you've jumped in here after my accidental hiatus (hello!) and not realized this, I had to binge watch the rest of the season before we cancelled our Hulu subscription. There was the option of watching it for free on the Yugioh website, but I didn't want to change my Photoshop actions.

So get ready for me to talk about how the ending of this show bothered me, for like 8 episodes. I'll try to keep it in, so we can get there when we get there.

But you can't say lines like "We were meant to be together." in the context of this arc, you can't DO that, show.

Apparently the creator of Yugioh got hospitalized while he wrote this arc, hence the dick king demon. But also it got....messy. We have like 3 seasons of development in like 8 episodes, buckle up. They did the best that they could do with the resource's given, and we'll even get to meet my favorite character a few times before it's over (the Storyboarding God that occasionally guest stars on Yugioh, love that guy)

Back on the playing field, Yami is running out of options, when Isis informs us we can just go to McDonald's and get more McGuffins.

Out of basically no where, Mana zips onto the screen because she's ready to have at least one girl's night before the end of the world. The contrasting energy from both Mana and Isis is peak goth babysitter vs the parrot that hides behind the couch and bites your feet.

Back near Pharaoh's tomb, Yugi is still dueling over a deathpit with the child who these kids think is Ryou bakura.

This is not however, Ryou Bakura. It's sideways adjacent evil Bakura.

And it didn't really matter that this plot point ever happened because it's not like Yugi, Joey, or Tea ever catch on that this isn't Ryou anyway. But at least I, the audience can feel a little bit better about the weird twist by the dub there.

Ryou is still passed out on some stone steps. He's fine.

You might be wondering "Oh so what asinine thing is Isis going to have to do to get the items back?" and uh, you're wrong actually.

Turns out we could have just picked up the items in the desert at any time but I guess we forgot. I'll blame it on Shadi.

Joey Wheeler, who can punch out probably anything but a ghost, chooses to hide behind Tea because he knows she can punch a ghost and I believe it, too.

Back on the surface, is a scene that would have been emotional if it hadn't been 3 minutes. it was NOT enough time to give a proper send off to our girl Isis here, and they tried, but if you imagine the Yakety Sax song playing under this death here, that's about the speed at which this girl biffed it.

speaking of Yakety Sax theme, this is what was happening while Mana was crying her eyes out.,

And you may ask, was it really that goofy? and yes, yes it was.

and like I get it, animation and pacing are really, really hard. Parts of me wonder if maybe on paper this seemed OK. If maybe even as a storyboard this seemed OK. But something you learn quickly when doing any sort of narrative art, is that you need like 2x as much space as you think you do. Pause is an underrated godlike skill that takes a lifetime to master.

However, it still had good stills going on, it still had some lovely direction just...I mean they dropped Isis from top to bottom of that frame so freakin fast it was like she was a dropped banana hahaha.

They still have to carry these items physically to the Pharaoh, and so becuase Mana is a slow runner, 2 people freakin died this episode distracting Zorc. Which is also the title of this episode because I want to send home howfreakin funny that is to me.

Ah, back to Episode 1.

So how breathtaking and epic is the Kaiju fight you ask? Well good thing for you, I capped it.

The look on Seto and Yami's faces about sum it up.

And as quickly as he showed up to do a few silly punches, the great Exodia was cut exactly in half. Don't ask me how the card logic works for that, I have forgotten how this game works already.

Mana finally makes it to Yami, cursed puzzle in hand, and that ends this episode.

Can you imagine adding 7 characters to a story knowing you have to kill all of them individually before the anime arc is over? Breakneck deaths going on here.

Sorry for all you people that were so deeply attached to Shimon, the guy who isn't even Grandpa, by the way. A moment of silence for all 4 of you.

And we get back this thing. This horrible thing made out of thousands of dead people's souls. The thing that trapped him for 5000 years and launched him into the future. The only thing that can save mankind.

(If I have used this Mokuba joke like this before forgive me it was like a different lifetime before I caught covid, and I will not be able to regain those memories because I cannot curse myself with a rude ass puzzle.)

The abusive relationship with the Millennium Puzzle is a whole anime college essay I would write if I had half a brain, but alas I have the immune system and fatigue of a sickly gerbil or a goldfish that feels a little bit chilly. So I will not be writing that in depth episode but like...

Think about how far we've come with this jackass puzzle. And yet, I'm supposed to forgive it? Nah I don't think I have yet. Go to hell, puzzle.

This puzzle can go straight to hell.

Anyway, if you just got here you can read these recaps in chrono order at the link here:

https://steve0discusses.tumblr.com/tagged/yugioh/chrono

PS I had to do so much assholery to get that to go to my chrono link and not my main link. They would just. Change my link. They would just change my link every time I pasted it. Tumblr you have GOT to give me my old post editor back omg.

#yugioh #YGO #yu gi oh #photo recap #yugi muto #joey wheeler #tea gardener #seto kaiba #priest seto #demon king bakura #bakura #yami muto #shimon #mana #isis #exodia #S5

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heartstringsduet · 4 months

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in regards to your post about kudos/comments on AO3, i 100% agree with you. i very recently started posting my fics and the hits to kudos/comment ratio is very discouraging and cant help but feel doubt in my writing ability. and i understand i don’t have an established audience like others who have been writing for a while. not to make this about me but i just wanted to say i totally agree. and you aren’t alone in feeling this way.

Hey there 🥰 Thanks for sharing your view and your pain points and your sympathy. 💕 First of all, I did not mean to make it all about me. I'm aware that I at least have a little readership already and that 17 kudos aren't worth much when they clearly still show that people liked and engaged with something I wrote. I still value people 'just' reading and not at all engaging. It's still good to know people care enough to click on something. But now enough about me, just wanted to contextualize it a little to say that I know it must be a lot harder for people just starting out writing or writing for this fandom. I think it's very valid to be sad and doubt your writing. I definitely been and will be there again. But what helps me is to try and really get away from numbers (which I fabulously showed I definitely can't always) and really think of the comments I do get. And even if a chapter 'only' gets two comments when I worked 3/4 of a year on a fic, I truly have the loveliest comments. And I don't even mean the very logn ones though they are surely appreciated. But someone took the time to comment on my story I updated daily "lovely chapter" and it made my day because I knew SOMEONE out there way waiting for that daily update and actually read along every day. My story gets a single kudo a day? Someone out there is reading my story. And is touched by it. That won't solve the issue. I still think both can be true. I can write for me and my five loyal readers; but I can also be sad some days because I really wished more people would engage in some way. Even leave a single heart emoji in the comment just to show, hey I read this, it's nice. And I do hope you continue to write. Maybe it will unburden you too to feel like you don't have to meet expectations of readers if those readers aren't even showing they like it in any way. Write the weirdest, most self-indulgent thing you can think of. Write because you love writing. Find that fandom friend who will go a little bananas in your comments. Write in spite. I'm sure that fandom engagement will pick up in the new season release but even if I'm wrong, please keep on writing. Nothing would be sadder than having less fanfiction. And I'm really sorry you're feeling down. Feel hugged.

#it's 1:40am #I hope this made sense #michelle answers

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rose-bookblood · 5 months

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When the Stars Alight appreciation week — Day 4

When the Stars Alight is @aninkwellofnectar's debut novel, first in the Essence of the Equinox series.

I didn't want to post around Christmas because I could practically hear crickets on my dash, but now that it seems to have revived a little, I can continue with WTSA appreciation week.

Day 4: Parallels to other media or your own work

I've compared WTSA to The Vampire Diaries TV show a billion times by now, so this is the perfect chance for a deep dive.

Of course, the most surface-level parallel is the love triangle between two brothers who are in love with the same woman, which is probably the one thing you've heard of about TVD even if you haven't seen a single episode. The Laila-Darius-Dominus triangle instantly struck me as the more mature and tragic version of that, one that commits to the brothers being monsters. It feels like the author saw the dynamic in TVD and went the "what if" route with her novel, a route I immensely enjoyed. Don't get me wrong, I like the path TVD chooses, it makes more sense for the genre and target audience, but we've all felt that curiosity to know what would've happened if the story had taken a different turn.

Something that, for me, emphasizes the connection to the TVD love triangle is that Laila herself reminds me of a better version of Elena. Darius and Dominus do remind me of Damon and Stefan too, but the line here is blurred. Laila, though, has some of Elena's core characteristics, not just surface-level similarities. In the show, what defines Elena is her compassion... Too bad I've never bought that. Elena's kindness feels very performative and, in turn, what strikes me about her are her manipulative tendencies. In turn, Laila is genuinely compassionate and righteous, always trying to change the world for the better, while also often being manipulative — which is one of my favourite aspects of her character. Laila is both who TVD thinks Elena is and what she could've been if the writers had committed to her flaws, instead of sweeping them under the rug.

Another parallel is how much Laila and Darius remind me of Caroline and Klaus's relationship. While on the surface Laila and Darius parallel Elena and Damon, at a deeper analysis I feel like they have more of Caroline and Klaus in them, both the characters themselves and the relationship proper. This will come as a surprise to absolutely no one, especially not the author, who feeds me with Klaroline quotes over Laila and Darius reels.

Laila and Caroline are both smart but naïve, young immortals, contrasting with Darius and Klaus, who are also immortal, but have already lived for centuries. They offer a counterpart with much more experience and a darkness to them as well (I couldn't go a whole post without mentioning the dark/light theme). Darius reminds me in particular of early days Klaus, during the few episodes he appears in in season 2: the very mysterious, ruthless, charming version we see in Katherine's flashbacks.

Speaking of Laila, even though her story isn't finished, I can see her going on a path of emancipation and empowerment like Caroline. Laila is already a princess, but she's very much subjected to her mother's control. I'm excited to watch her stepping out from under Amira's thumb and fully realise herself.

The last comparison I can make is way less interesting and deep, but the effects of chaos magic and, therefore, Mortesian demons' true faces remind me of TVD vampires: fangs, change in eye colour, blackened veins especially. I don't know if it was a conscious decision on the author's part, but the way vampires look in TVD has always been a cool aesthetic choice in my opinion, so I couldn't not appreciate it.

#wtsaweek2023

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kamyru · 9 months

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My top 10 Voltage Guys. Ordered as favorites and as most likely to get along with in real life (2023 Version)

Now that so many stories I have been waiting for are out, I can continue my tradition with this top. I can't believe it took me so long to do it. Yet, I had a hunch Togo Daimon would be a bias wrecker. So, yes. Here we are again.

P.S. In the “Most likely to get along with me in real life”, the first brackets are the comparison with the results from the last year. The second bracket shows how the characters changed places compared to their rank in my favorites.

P.S.S. You can request fics with all characters on this list.

2021 Version; 2022 Version

My Favorite Voltage Inc Guys

Dropped out from the last year: Taro Akuchi, Takaomi Tsugaru, Toshiki Kasumi

10. Mikoto Amamitsu (New Entry)

9. Jun Araki (-6)

8. Sui Claude Saigu (New Entry)

7. Suzumu Mado (-1)

6. Kuranosuke Kiba (+2)

5. Hyogo Kaga (+5)

4. Hideki Ishigami (-2)

3. Munechika Takado (+4)

2. Toshiaki Kijima (-1)

Togo Daimon (New Entry)

My favorite Voltage Inc. guys ordered as I’m most likely to date/get along in real life:

10. Hyogo Kaga (=)(-5)

Don't get me wrong, I do love him a lot, especially in his newest seasons. I think he has the biggest character development out of all the characters I have read their stories for. However, he is working well with MC. He would work awful with me. I'm stubborn, independent, and bratty to rely on someone else as he wants his love to do.

9. Sui Claude Saigu (New Entry)(-1)

This one is strange. If you ask me about his main story, I will struggle to answer. All I know is that I loved him the most out of all PLUST members, which was unexpected because I didn't even want to read his story. But from what I remember, he is empathetic and hard-working, with a secret soft side. However, we both are too stubborn to work well together.

8. Jun Araki (-4)(+1)

Wanna laugh? When I started doing these tops in 2021, he was in this place. I won't change my words from last year about us two having a similar approach to work. Yet, the others are too good for this alone to make him higher. Plus, his sex-centered characteristics scare the shit out of me, considering that I don't like touches from men.

7. Toshiaki Kijima (+2)(-5)

Toshiaki is the love of my life, and I adore him to death. Recently, I don't even remember in which story, he said something along the lines that he can also be naughty and full of surprises. And this is what made me put him higher this year. I am the biggest homebody in all my groups of friends. However, I'm that crazy friend who is up for nearly everything. So, discovering his naughty side made me want to "corrupt" him a little.

6. Mikoto Amamitsu (New Entry)(+4)

He is one of the characters I have the most in common. I'll say something strange, but after reading the first three MSs for PLUST (I haven't read Wataru's yet), I headcanon that all PLUST members are introverts. And here is Mikoto, the center, the flirt, the favorite. Damn, this man reminds me of myself due to how many random skills and knowledge he has. Also, his love for literature is gold. Plus, he's super empathetic, smart, ambitious, and ready to help everyone. Can I marry him? He is one of the characters I want to be most like.

5. Suzumu Mado (-2)(+2)

I will never stop yelling from every hill that this man has one of the healthiest ideas about love and relationships I have seen. Okay, maybe only in my opinion. If I were his girlfriend, we would be a couple of lazy cats, randomly helping our friends while pretending we don't care. Can you see the pattern? If not, wait for Kuranosuke where I explain it.

4. Kuranosuke Kiba (+2)(+2)

It's pretty strange how Kuranosuke with his dominant nature is higher than Suzumu & Mikoto, who are more carefree than him. At least they don't show everyone how much they worry. And taking into consideration my personality that dislikes to listen to others' rules, it doesn't make sense, does it? Yes, because we have the same family dynamic, and both are family-orientated (in a way). That's the thing that overturned Suzumu & Mikoto. Also, the reason why these three are so high is that they are a lot like me. I can understand how they are working, their ideas, and their plans. But this also means that we have similar cons and even traumas. We would work well together, but not the best.

3. Hideki Ishigami (-1)(+1)

Is someone surprised? Not me! During every top, he was pretty high on this list. As always, his only problem is he has a dangerous job while I'm a worrywart. But his humor, hidden kindness, and attitude towards MC = gold. Love him till death.

2. Munechika Takado (-1)(+1)

This is where you have to be surprised because for two years he was the first. He is everything I want in a man: kind, smart, funny, stoic but soft with you, serious about his relationship, supportive, and caring. Plus, Takado is taller than me and a doctor! If I met a doctor like him, I would fall for him more than definitely. Poor thing he is fictional. But you know what thing makes him fall from his 1st spot? The fact that the next one isn't as harsh with words. And my "words of affirmation"-craving heart made its choice.

Togo Daimon (New Entry)(=)

For the first time in three years, my favorite is also the first in this top. Don't even dare to tell me that the man who loves you from the start, protects you, is a feminist (at least considering his actions), can do everything for you, can take care of the house, is cute, isn't afraid to admit his relationship in front of others, isn't perfect! But why do I think that we can work well together besides the fact that he is already perfect when I'm more than definitely not? We were the youngest kids who cared for the rest of the family while bottling up their feelings. He is more in control of this trauma than me. He may be the perfect boyfriend, and I may not be the perfect girlfriend. Yet, I'm the perfect boyfriend, too (according to all my friends). There would be a war of who takes better care of each that would be even worse than in his story due to me being a lot more stubborn than MC. Plus, I have a carefree, yet responsible attitude towards life that he sometimes lacks.

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iiruwu · 2 years

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hi can i. can you please map out your bulletin board list on how you think ronance will become endgame. because i also have a bulletin board map in my head and i want to compare notes :)

this is so cute i'd love to! @wrought-tweaks also requested this so :D

im going to first go through all the info i've collected as well as inferred (even though my inferences aren't fact, by any means).

so first, lets consider the undeniable truths. in terms of canonical possibility, i genuinely think ronance's chances are pretty high. not only has robin's sexuality been confirmed - something that rarely ever happens in most shows - but there's also the interviews over the last few weeks that lead me to believe that vickie is probably not going to survive the next volume:

call me pessimistic but i really don't think this is going to end up well. if i were to predict vickie's outcome, i'd say we're going to get confirmation that she is also queer (perhaps through vecna) and then she'll die.

there's also this interview about robin's love life in season 4, whichhhh call me crazy but is kinda???

its obviously not confirming anything but 'a story that gets built' reeks of ronance to me, because i really do NOT see any story happening between her and vickie. vickie's barely even been in the entire season, and robin's screentime has largely revolved around her interactions with nancy. its a little fishy.

so if we're assuming that vickie is dying, and there's going to be a shift of some sort in robin's story, then we also need to consider nancy's whole love triangle going on, which - this is a major source of concern for me tbh. but! let me sprinkle some more interview crumbs that are telling of the possible outcome of that whole mess:

i think it's like 50-60% safe to say stancy won't happen in the end if i were to go off of this, but i'm not the type to put all my eggs in one basket, so - i'm not entirely optimistic about it. what sucks, though, is that i've pretty much scoured the internet over the past month (the autism hit HARD after s4 dropped) and there has been absolutely nothing about jancy's future aside from charlie talking about how jonathon was probably having thoughts about breaking up with nancy. jancy might actually stay strong. still, im trying to look on the bright side :')

there's also this tid-bit from natalia which i might be reading too much into (or i might be overestimating the duffer brothers' attentiveness to her character) but:

like come on. this shit reeks of the whole murray scene where he's like "you like steve. but you don't love steve." tell me not?? i feel like it'd be a little redundant to have her going for steve or jonathon when they've both done very questionable things over the last few seasons. realistically though, her answer leans more towards stancy not happening rather then jancy not happening. jancy has been holding up pretty strong overall, which - good for jancy nation tbh but i don’t exactly think jonathon is the best partner to her either considering the incident with him taking photos. call me crazy but if i were screenwriting nancy’s love story i would be taking this into consideration. who knows, though.

now, all the interviews and articles aside, i'm just gonna be real with you and say i really find it hard to believe nancy would go back to steve. she has been wronged by him and she has wronged him, too. not only that but i think she might connect him to her guilt over barb's death, which i posted abt before. if i were to predict the outcome of that whole weird tension between them during volume 1, i'm betting my money that it's not going to go anywhere.

jancy, on the other hand? iiiii don't know. i think jancy is really one of the only things holding ronance back from actually sprouting and becoming something canon. what i WILL say though is that if nancy were to see jonathon now, and who he has become as a character, i rlly doubt she’s going to look at him and be like “yeah i want to continue dating him” lol

that aside, if we're talking my predictions for ronance if they were to actually, really happen, i don't think it's going to happen this season. in a perfect world where things went like how they do in my insane little head, i think there'd be a few embers of something more in the second volume, but nothing would be acted upon just because it'd be too poorly timed for both of their characters. robin is best friends with steve, who's clearly not over nancy/has some sort of residual connection to her that he might be confusing as romantic, so her feelings might be stifled by that. nancy is still with jonathon, and even though the two of them are struggling relationship-wise, its all just too vague to make out what will happen with them. still, if some mutual interest were to be hinted at in vol2, it'd probably be a while until they come together. it might even be right up to the end of the show until we see anything come to fruition in my opinion.

i'd probably be able to tell you my sure-fire prediction for their potential future after volume 2, just because we'll definitely get a solid answer for nancy's whole love triangle fiasco by the end. either way, robin's whole love progression that has been alluded to is verryyyy suspicious and nancy's love life is just entirely too shaky for jancy or stancy to hold up.

pls feel free to dm me/submit your own bulletin board to my inbox if you'd like! i love hearing other people's opinions/predictions/theories for robin and nancy, both individually and as a pairing. ty for giving me an excuse to basically info dump sjkskjgjk <33333333

#stranger things #st #robin x nancy #robin/nancy #ronance #nancy wheeler #robin buckley #steve harrington

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artificialqueens · 1 year

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I think the fandom is overloaded. Drag Race used to be something to look forward too, but with all its spin-offs it has become this continuous cycle. We don’t get ‘to know’ these queens anymore because there will be a new batch next month. Ships don’t really take-off anymore. It’s sad but I don’t think it’s AQ fault or anything.

I miss the good old days of daily queues, my dash analyzing every interaction between their OTP. I hope one day Ru will go back to maybe 2-4 seasons a year, all stars, US, Europe and Asia or something. And mix all the girls from their respective continents. Whereas All Stars will be all over the world. But that’s false hope probably.

Anyways, rant over. AQ, I miss you.

Hi baby. 😘 I definitely feel your pain. And I agree, somewhat. There's a LOT more DR content these days, which means that people are moving from franchise to franchise quickly and not necessarily getting "invested" in characters and ships the way they used to.

Although, there is still a decent amount of writing going on. It's just that most of it, as far as I can tell, is on AO3 instead of Tumblr. And even the authors who post on AQ are mostly posting on AO3 too - myself included. (I'm 100% part of the "problem," if there is a problem, so this isn't me complaining or blaming anyone, it just happens to be that AO3 is a more elegant place to post fic than Tumblr.)

The downside is most people who send comments are also doing it on AO3, directly to the author. And of course, there's nothing WRONG with this whatsoever either. But a side-effect is that instead of sending a comment/ask here, where it's public, and might get someone else excited about a story or spark more interaction with and amongst writers, the comments stay on AO3, where the lack of community means that people don't really see other comments. Which means that people are, overall, interacting less with fic. In the "old days," there used to be TONS of asks and comments, and people would regularly interact with them and those comments would not only inspire writers to produce more, but often give people ideas that they might not have had otherwise.

In my mind, ideally, this blog would serve as a recommendation blog for the whole fandom, whether those fics were here, on AO3, or elsewhere.

If anyone ever wants to write in to gush about a story they love - especially an ongoing fic, which could inspire the author and give them the boost they need to keep going - they totally should!!

(But that's just MY two cents!)

#asks #anonymous #discourse

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alliumbunny · 5 months

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If I know anything it's that 2012 tmnt is both my least favorite show ever and also my second favorite show. ever.

so.

anyways

so I watched like 4-5 more episodes of tmnt (left off at the season 3 time travel episode, y'know.. with renet aaaaaaa)

um so. I don't like renet.

not really the character itself, but like, how they, depict her. 1. her outfit, idk what it is, but i can't help but think it's fucking ugly. I kinda understand how hard it is to make 3d models of humans but omg you've done semi-good outfits before, casey has a pretty good outfit i'd say, i think, i don't look at him much, april's outfit is... okay... at least... kinda good at most, I think it can be turned into something really good with just alittle bit of change in it, but it's okay. like renet tho, idc how future she is, her outfit, ugly as sin, omg. please omg why. anyways um

2. I fucking hate, the mikey and renet romance, it feels so so so so so so so, how many so's can I put... so so so So, weird. Renet says a line, after mikey implies a first "date" that, isn't he alittle OLD for her, She hasn't even been born yet, and WOW, good point, I was mostly looking at the fact that renet looks like a fully grown adult, like 21 at least, 25 at most, I do not see that women as a teen, she acts like a teen at times, but every time I look at her and her character and what I know about her, it gets more and more unlikely for me to think she's even close to being a teen. and since Mikey is canonly at least 15 and at most 16 at this time(He's 15 in the start of season 3 but leo says that they go at least 16 years in the future so idk if there's a year inbetween tang shen dying and splinter buying(lol) the turtles, that probably is it but incase it isn't, y'know, idk) I personally think their "15" still(although depending on how many months he spent in Dimension X and how many months ago their birthday is, he might genuinely be 16 in canon, but we will never know) from how the show puts it but u can think what u want, either way, still a minor, still weird to me, I just can't get renet being an adult out of my head now that i've seen her in the show. I also just don't like how mikey acts with her tho, All the brothers are slightly similar when it comes to romance, aka... they can be kinda.. creeps, in a way. i don't like how renet kisses mikey(i think on the forehead or cheek, but I skipped that part, ngl) because they have JUST met, not kidding, they have JUST MET. another thing i hate. I hate that they JUST MET and yet they are inlove, i don't like it... i understand the love at first sight trope, it's in like half of the other romances in this show, i just fucking hate it, :) There's probably SO MUCH MORE, I fucking hate this romance aaaaa

3. I don't think there is a three, other then then those two, i think the character is kinda under welling and could've been done better, but they are pretty cool in concept, I will continue hating the writing and design of this character and will probably like them more in the fanfiction side of things. yippee.

I have to remind y'all that this is all my opinion and you should watch the show or at least those episodes before you, yourself, decide to hate renet aswell. I look into this show, WAY too much. If you like Renet, that is totally fine and very valid, you could've taken her character a completely different way than me and that is completely fine. I see nothing wrong with liking the character or the romance/love story between her and mikey, I just personally see it as a really weird choice. that doesn't mean you will see it the same way, and that is completely okay. people see things differently all the time and this is definitely going to be one of them. There's gonna be people who love renet, i'm just not one of them. Tho i wish i could like her ngl.

in the end, umm... i wanted to rant about another tmnt thing, and I did. i wrote way to much, I'm sorry if you actually read all of it, my thoughts run wild, and I am too lazy to fix any spelling mistakes </3

I will continue to ramble about tmnt another day, today, i am done watching tmnt, i got through a tiny amount a episodes and i am mentally exhausted <3

#allium rambles #I can't stress how un-serious this is #I'm just ramblin and ranting teehe #aaaaaaaa #tmnt #tmnt 2012 #tmnt renet #tmnt 2012 renet #tmnt mikey #tmnt 2012 mikey #i hate this show so much #i also love this show so much #it's one of my favvoritteee showsss!!! I hate it <3 #teehe #aaaaa #idk if i should tag anything else #brrr

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emletish-fish · 2 years

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Frankly, I feel Amanda should've been way more conflicted about helping Tory. Like, she should be like, "Yes, these kids deserve better influences, but on the other hand, Tory here twice committed premeditated assault on my daughter and she's broken into our house".

(For Tory to be redeemed, and any sort of reconciliation to happen, she needs to learn to be empathetic to those she's hurt, and she needs to be shown acknowledging why her prior behavior was wrong)

It's a YMMV with the how people see the Mom-Triangle. If you found it unsatisfying, that's valid.

I also think the reason why everyone's mileage varies so much with the mom triangle will depend on whether people have a solution based outlook (what will solve the problem/get the best outcome is the priority) or a more punitive punishment orientated outlook (has the wrong-doer being punished sufficiently is the priority).

I unironically love it as a storyline. It was refreshing for me to see a female-centric storyline that was in many ways kinda removed from the karate drama and was instead focused on the relationships between women, and the role of a good female mentor/mother figure.

(I'm trying not to make too many predictions for season 5 aside from 'it will be batshit insane' BUT I think we will see Tory torn between two very opposing view-points, role-models and example of womanhood between Amanda and her new female sensei, (who in many ways will embody a potential cobra-kai embracing future that the old Tory would have aspired to. Whereas Amanda is presenting a much more compassionate example of adult womanhood and shows Tory that it is possible to be both powerful and peaceful).

I do think Amanda showed sufficient ambivalence towards Tory and some uncertainty about helping her during their second interaction at the dealership. It's implied that Amanda backed off helping Tory then and only resumed to do so after the girl approached her. During their third interaction, she is careful to give Tory space and only encourages her to seek help but makes no overtures of direct involvement until Tory asks.

I think, given the time-constraints, more time on Amanda not wanting to help Tory wouldn't have served much purpose.

Season 4 was an immensely crowded season, story-telling wise. With such limited time, I don't quite see what having Amanda pile on the Tory-sucks-train beyond their first two interactions would serve.

Because TV is a visual medium - so we already know that Tory has severe anger issues. We've seen her do unhinged things. We know that Tory is an angry and messed up kid in a terrible situation - so Amanda spending more time complaining about her misdeeds only be re-hashing what we already know, which isn't the best use of screen time.

Also, in the storyline, if Tory didn’t receive any help, there would be absolutely no driving narrative force for her changing her behaviour for the better. Without Amanda;s intervention, then Tory would most likely continue feeling like the entire world was out to get her and lashing out accordingly.

Amanda meets Tory when she directly confronts her at work, taking full advantage of their power-imbalance and contributing to Tory getting fired. Yes - Tory gets herself fired by her angry outburst, (Tory having anger issues is well established), but Amanda can see she had a role to play in lighting the dynamite and feels contrition.

Amanda can choose to continue being shitty to a girl who already has an immensely hard life (that Amanda just made a whole lot harder) - but what would that ultimately serve the narrative? Seeing another adult bullying Tory/assert their power over her wasn't necessary for me. It's not something I would have found satisfying as a viewer.

We've already see Tory be sexually harrassed, propositioned and financially bullied by her landlord, fired without ceremony by her boss, and mocked cruelly about her dying mother by her aunt (her only living blood relation). We know money is extremely tight, her father is absent and her family had periods where they were starving and had food denied to them by cruel bosses (who also then fired her sick mother). It's implied she was sexually assaulted by an unknown adult male and had to physically defend herself.

(like enough already.)

As a viewer, I did not need to see another Adult mistreat Tory.

Tory has definitely made A LOT of mistakes. So Many. All the Mistakes. But when we look at her life, it's not hard to see why she's gained a 'It's a dog-eat-dog world' kind of cynicism and a layer of anger armour as she goes through life.

I actually think this direction, showing that Amanda also had violent anger issues but was able to work through them, is a much more positive one. Amanda is showing Tory here are other options aside from violence and compassion isn't weakness. She treats Tory gently, and considering how harsh Tory's life is, just being treated kindly by an adult without ulterior motive causes a huge change.

Tory's outlook completely shifts from 'No Mercy - there are no rules' to 'No. I won't cheat to win.'

What we didn't know at the start of the season is that Amanda had a rich history of Violent Teenage Rage and could see part of herself reflected in Tory's anger issues. Amanda identifies with Tory as a result. And she knew from experience the best way to break a pattern of violence and anger is with its opposite, kindness and understanding.

Rather than fighting fire with fire, Amanda chooses to try and take the heat down a notch.

Young!Amanda was treated with compassion and guidance, so she was able to grow past her anger. She's still feisty and assertive, but her rage no longer consumes or controls her.

Tory does not have anyone to show her this kind of compassion and guidance until Amanda comes along.

(For Tory to be redeemed, and any sort of reconciliation to happen, she needs to learn to be empathetic to those she's hurt, and she needs to be shown acknowledging why her prior behavior was wrong)

I don't think Tory needs to reconcile with Sam to be redeemed. Tory's attempts at being a better person should continue whether or not Sam eventually forgives her.

It would be great if the girls can eventually bury the hatchet, and Tory definitely should apologise to Sam at the very least - but I also don't think her 'redemption' should revolve around Sam.

You've said that Tory needs to learn empathy, but for me, considering absolutely no one in her life treats Tory with any sort of empathy, this will be a hard thing for her to learn on her own without any kind of lived experience or role models.

(This is not a dig at Tory's mom, who we've never even seen, but her illness has thrust the full weight of keeping a family of 3 running on her 16/17 year old daughter. Tory is responsible for earning rent money, preparing food, paying bills and supervising her brother. No matter how warm and loving their relationship, the physical reality of Tory's situation is unchanged).

But who else could teach Tory about morals and ethics and how to make amends and live a better life? Kreese? Her creepy and inappropriately sexual landlord? Her spiteful, greedy addicted aunt?

I will say that Tory suffers from very uneven writing, depending on what the writers want to do with her in that particular scene (eg her yoyo-ing concern about her family is very dependant on her proximity to Sam), and this can hurt her character arcs as she engages in some inexplicable dramatics for the sake of The Dramas!

However, showing that Tory will respond equally as emphatically to a positive role model in Amanda as she did to a negative role model in Kreese, is actually a really interesting step. Tory has an incredible amount of respect for Amanda and really takes onboard everything she says.

She isn't immediately a better person and she still makes bad choices, but overall, she shows that she is extremely receptive to Amanda and is beginning to absorb her world-view.

Learning the importance of conducting herself honourably in a fight was something Tory clearly learned from Amanda, (not Kreese or Silver). Amanda wanted BOTH girls to be able to move on and find peace and they were never going to be able to do that if Tory cheated (something she was later pressured directly to do by the other adult she respects the most).

It was easier for Tory to believe in the importance of fairness when she finally had a taste for it herself, when she wasn't broke and overburdened by the weight of caring for her family, when she didn't feel like there were no rules in life. Amanda helping her was instrumental in Tory growing. Finally getting a bit of sunlight helped her bloom.

Tory's life has been very unfair, and she's a poverty stricken and vulnerable young woman who easily embraced a 'no mercy' mindset because that was how she had always been treated, so this worldview slotted neatly into her lived experience.

Amanda showing her mercy caused her to re-evaluate her deeply held convictions. Tory's actions in the final prove that, at her core, Tory does want to be a better person and live a better life.

#Emletish Answers #Cobra Kai meta #Tory Nichols #Amanda LArusso #Sam Larusso #The mom-triangle #Do I think the mom triangle was perfect?#no there were definitely some messy bits #but in general it was such a suprising and optimistic and refreshing storyline #so I forgive it all the foibles because the overall arc is great #like tory has fucked up a lot #but she has also being shat on completely by life from every angle #how is she ever going to learn compassion if no one ever shows her any #how is going to learn about justice and mercy and honour if she never experiences it for herself directly #her behaviour towards sam is off the charts #but more punishment and an even shittier life isn't going to help her learn how to let go of her anger at Sam #which I would argue is more rooted in her resentment of Sam's privilege than anything else #Like Tory's done bad things but Amanda treating her with respect really turned things around for that girl #Tory could definitely benefit from more consistent writing #She has treated Sam absolutely terribly and Sam is completely justified in her unforgiving stance regarding Tory #But Tory is still just a kid in a totally shitty situation with no support #but when she's given love and support she really blossoms #And i just kinda like all the kids and want the best out come for all of them #tory and amanda #tory and sam

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