I found a one shot of Luffy with braids and I absolutely adore the concept, especially when it was described of him having the beads of his crew (I think??) within the braids that circles his head like a crown. I thought it was adorable. It’s A Story in Braids on AO3 by @islenthatur if you haven’t read it go read it ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ

A short essay about how Caspian is mathematically not a mole (ep. 115 spoilers) (and for the whole series for that matter)

Okay, alright guys, I saw your concerns. I saw it all, and you are right to be worried that your favourite blue wet man's blue and equally wet best friend may turn out to be a traitor. And so am I, trust me. Which is why I went through every single bit of Caspian's past I could dig out to create an unltimate timeline of his entire goddamn life to see it it'd be plausible for him to become a mole at any point in time and ultimately prove his innocence! If that's something you're interested in reading, then buckle up!

"Jay, you come from a division of soliders that were purposely put to infiltrate pirate crews, especially the new and upcoming ones. This is totally seperate from the Black-Ops situation that you learned about in the Stronghold. And you, in this book, can tell that there is a plant on Lizzie's crew."

This, of course is something I need to point out first. Whoever Lizzie's mole might be, they are not a doppelganger. They are not a clone, or Black-Ops, just a solider of the Navy, a person that must have gotten into the Navy via regular recruitment, be trained by them and then put into a spy division. Jay ofc had this entire process sped up, due to her grandma's influence, but no one other than her, especially an Undersea citizen, who would probably have to put in extra effort to be trusted given their shaky political situation few years back, would get the same treatment. What I'm trying to say, Caspian would need time, at least few years of training to become a mole they'd trust to infiltrate a crew, and not just any crew might I add. More on that later. Let's go back to his most early years for now. This is a fragment of episode 84 in which Caspian talks to Gillion abt his early life:

C: We all have family. I consider my life up here, this crew to be my found family. But my previous…tribe with the water genasi in the Undersea, where I was growing up…sort of in a [illegible]... remember me telling you about the outskirts? We um…was very nomadic, quite a, quite a peaceful, tranquil life, but it was always, you know…mixed with this life of poverty and my family wasn’t very…wouldn’t really have much but the water around us, and each other, I suppose, so uh…You know...I mean my mother didn’t make it past old age, and uh…

G: I’m sorry…

C: When my sister left the tribe, my father sort of fell into a depression of sorts and he stopped moving around. And when we stayed in one place, I was 18 or so, maybe 16, it was a while ago, and then…that’s when I left as well. Ventured to the Oversea, and um…and it’s history, so that’s my family. Not sure what they’re up to these days, I mean…I know my sister went to the capital, where you were.

G: Pirating is a pretty lucrative business, maybe if…we managed to find them or run into them, we can give something back, put them in a better situation.

C: …Well um…I mean this was 10-15, 10 to 12 to 15 years ago, quite some, quite some time, so I don’t even know if my father is alive still, I mean I don’t really have the desire to go back to the undersea, Gill.

G: Wha-why not?

C: Because I like my life up here. This is where I’m happy.

So, before we go to what all of that entails, one more quick crazy thing to mention: so, Caspian's sister is an Elder of the Undersea. Like for sure. This is confirmed by this part from ep. 79:

The Triton who you remember as the Elder Odolaf, who looks like he is about to speak, but is cut off by the water genasi, who has been doing a lot of talking thus far, who is Elder Celeste. They stand up and there is a familiarity that you notice now in their face. It’s like you have met them before, but not in the way that you know them because they are the Elder, but in a way that it’s like, they look like somebody you know. And she has sort of these uh, white tied-up like dreads that are tied up in like a bun and they come across the face and then one side is shaved. And there are beads and piercings in her hair, her ears are a little bit more sea elf-like in the way that they are pointed and they kind of like gradient into pink. They all kind of wear the same sort of ornate robes, though hers is more, I guess faded and like cut a bit, look a bit more warriorous, or like tribal, but still very well-made and professional.

Tribal clothing, a water genasi, that looks like someone Gillion saw before in the face. The only water genasi Gillion met after leaving the Undersea is Caspian. Elder Celeste is Caspian's sister. Wild. Anyway, not what we're here for, but I needed to mention that.

The crazier thing is that Caspian left to Oversea when he was 16-18, and it has been 10-15 years since then. That means Caspian is currently 26 at possible youngest, and 33 at his oldest, which was surprising to me, I did not imagine Caspian as a man in his 30s! But that's straight up facts, so holy shit, you know?

Okay, so I'm going to list a lot of small facts that determine a lot of ages in quick succession. I hope it's not gonna be too scary to look at, I'll simplify it all at the end. [Deep inhale]

Right now Gillion is 22. So when Caspian left the Undersea, Gillion was 12-7. Jay is 21 and Ava was 2 years older, same age as Lizzie. So Lizzie is 23 now. When Caspian left the Undersea, she was 13-8. Chip is 19, so Lizzie is 4 years older. Hole in the Sea happened when Chip was 9, so Lizzie was 13. So Caspian left the Undersea around the same time Lizzie crashed on the uninhabited island with Chey after the Hole.

It's a lot, I know, I know. So let me clear this up a little.

Hole in the sea was 10 years ago. Chip was 9, Lizzie was 13. 10 years ago Caspian was in the age between 16 and 23, and he left the Undersea when he was 16 or 18. So roughly at the same time the Black Sea happened, Caspian came to the surface for the first time.

(also pls note that we are talking in estimates, casue in ep. 36 Lizzie says she was 11 when the hole happened, but in ep. 101 she says she was the same age as Ava which by the power of math would put her at 13. Either way, somewhere around that age)

After that, Lizzie spend some time on an uninhabited island with Chey, the Black Rose cook, who sacrificed herself for Liz, so she could survive and died shortly after. We do not know how much time passed, but I assume no longer than few months, and after that she was saved by Captain Shadowbeard where she met Caspian. They were a part of Shadowbeard's crew, Caspian saved her from the massacre where Shadowbeard was killed, and then Lizzie went on to create her own crew, Grandberry Pirates with Caspian never leaving her for a second since he met her. That means that the only time Caspian could have joined the Navy would be RIGHT after he came to the Oversea for the first time, roughly at the same time Lizzie was stranded on an island, and in that short period of time (between Lizzie's crash on the island and her being found by Shadowbeard) he would have to find the time to be trusted and accepted by Navy, get trained specifically for infiltration AND infiltrate not anyones BUT FUCKING SHADOWBEARD'S SHIP. Not a NEW crew. A crew of one of the most legendary pirates on the sea. Cause before Lizzie, Caspian was Sadowbeard's crew member, and since then he never stopped being a pirate, so if he was a solider, he would have had to be one before Shadowbeard. And remeber what Grizzly said in 115: "Jay, you come from a division of soliders that were purposely put to infiltrate pirate crews, especially the new and upcoming ones."

Shadowbeard was not new. Not upcoming. He was dangerous and Navy must have had the balls of steal to send a rookie solider, which Caspian would have been at that point in time, to infiltrate him. The numbers say it's impossible. Guys, the numbers! They don't add up!

Anyway, so basically Caspian could not be a mole. He is not a new pirate, he was not a member of a fresh crew, becaue his pirate journey did not start with Lizzy, it started with Shadowbeard. Grandberry Pirates is a new crew, but Caspian is not a newbie in it. You know who is? Rudith. I mean what kind of doctor lets a bunch of rowdy pirates have a secret base under a place where sick and vulnerable rest??? Like ANY other place would have been better and more respectful! Also you know what's interesting? Gillion could heal these people with lay on hands easily, and yet the only thing Rudith did for them was give them potions that didn't seem to help and look after them on purely non-medical level. Bro didn't do shit. Like, why would you even become a doctor without having access to healing magic? The answer, you are not. You are a Navy solider in disguise.

Okay, okay, I'm done, that's all. If you got this far, you are a hero, thank you for reading this insanely long ramble, but that's kind of the conclusions that I came to, of course, any counter-theories and discussion in general is very much welcome! I'd love to hear your opinions! Love you guys, bye~

Secret Sorrows || 3 -B.Barnes

Summary: Former special ops, Bucky, seeks solace in a cold refuge to escape his past. However, his haunted history catches up, unraveling mysteries that persist relentlessly.

Series Masterlist

Thank you to anyone who gave a like, reblog, and left a comment. It motivated me to write more. 

Main Masterlist || support: Ko-fi

It had been several days since the elder of the Astons had visited Van Alen's residence. Bucky found himself continuing his duty as a bodyguard for Ethan Van Alen, the sole heir of both conglomerate families.

If someone had said that Bucky would protect his ex-girlfriend's son, he would have laughed. But life worked in impossible ways. Here, he was doing just that.

While Bucky was on duty, he couldn't shake the need for answers about Y/N Aston. Despite learning that Iris and Y/N were identical twins, he still found it hard to believe. It was Iris, who had been with him back when they were young.

Yet, why did Y/N's actions mirror Iris's so closely?

If Y/N were more approachable, perhaps Bucky could find the answers. She might even tell him he was crazy. But with her busy schedule, stepping in for Ethan's father and managing both family businesses, she seemed almost impossible to talk to.

Y/N didn’t have time to comfort her only nephew. Since Bucky had to guard Ethan 24/7, he knew the kid wanted to talk to his relative. Both aunt and nephew lived in the same house, yet they rarely spent time together.

Bucky remembered Ethan's words, "My aunt is married to her job."

He thought it was a shame. Y/N was beautiful. With her status, she could have any man.

Wait, was she still single?

He shook his head, realizing how absurd it was to even entertain such thoughts considering Y/N was his employer.

Clearing his throat, Bucky walked towards Ethan's room, glancing at the kid's schedule. There were so many classes: foreign language, investment, fencing, public speaking, IT, swimming, and more.

Ethan was only 7 years old; he didn’t have time to play, especially since it was only a week after his parents' funeral.

Bucky knocked on Ethan’s door.

“Come in,” Ethan called out.

Bucky entered to find Ethan practicing the violin. Though classical music wasn't his preference, Ethan's skill didn't sound like that of a beginner.

Ethan stopped playing and placed the violin back in its case. “What class do I have next?”

“Swimming class,” Bucky replied.

Ethan sighed. “Can you teach me instead?”

Bucky hesitated. “If you want, but you know everything has to go through protocol.”

Ethan pouted. “At least, today, you have to accompany me.”

Bucky's instincts told him something didn't seem right. “Alright.”

Ethan went to his wardrobe; even at his young age, he had already been taught to pack his things. Bucky still found himself in awe of the kid's wardrobe room; it was bigger than his own bedroom in Antarctica.

While Ethan searched for his swimming goggles, he asked, “Has my aunt already left?”

Bucky replied, “Yes,” noticing Ethan's shoulders slump at the confirmation. He asked gently, “Do you want to talk to her?”

Ethan shook his head. “No, she’s busy. I don’t want to bother her.” Having prepared everything, he added, “Let’s go.”

When Bucky arrived at the swimming pool, he saw an athletic man. From the first impression, Bucky could already read him: overly proud and cocky.

“Bucky, right? I’ve been informed you’ll be the new guard. I’m alright if you want to join us,” the coach said.

Bucky gave a slight nod, glancing at Ethan. “Ethan, I’ll be standing here, okay?”

For a brief moment, Ethan's face brightened. Bucky wondered what made Ethan seem to not enjoy the class.

Ethan and the teacher did warm-ups before getting into the pool.

The coach instructed, “We will start with the freestyle and work on improving your lap times.”

When the teacher blew the whistle, Ethan began swimming to the other side. Bucky was impressed; for a kid his age, he was quite fast.

The coach checked his stopwatch. “1:50. You could do better than that.”

Bucky couldn't understand why the coach expected the little kid to go faster in a 100m freestyle.

"Again," the coach commanded.

"Again."

"You're getting slower."

Bucky held back his emotions when he noticed Ethan looking drained.

The coach looked down at Ethan and shook his head. "Your father would be disappointed with the result, Ethan."

Seeing Ethan sniffle and wipe his eyes, Bucky couldn't take it anymore.

He kicked the coach back and pushed him into the pool. The coach wasn't prepared and struggled to resurface before gasping for breath. Bucky held him under the water again.

“Can’t you see the boy is already breathless and exhausted?” Bucky questioned sharply.

The coach sputtered, "Wait… wait…"

"Do it again. I want to see how long you can hold your breath."

"Ugh."

Peter couldn’t believe what he saw. He rushed over from watching the CCTV to stop Bucky. "Bucky, what happened—"

Bucky shot Peter a warning look. "Get Ethan out of here. I need to talk to this guy."

Peter hurriedly escorted Ethan away, wondering why Bucky was so furious with the swimming coach.

Once they were gone, Bucky removed his black suit and throw it.

He pulled the coach from the pool like a fish. The coach coughed and caught his breath. "Are you trying to kill me?"

"A moment ago? Yes," Bucky admitted bluntly.

The coach's eyes widened. Never in his life had someone admitted to wanting to kill him straight to his face.

"I have a question: will Ethan enter the Olympics?" Bucky asked.

The coach shook his head. "No."

"Then why do you have to make him suffer like that? If that boy could talk, he would ask you to stop. But he can’t. As a teacher, you should know your students' capabilities."

"I only do what my employer asks me," the coach defended himself.

"Who? Miss Y/N Aston?" Bucky questioned.

"No! The Van Alen family," the coach confessed.

Bucky's grip on him loosened. This information was shocking. Why did the Van Alen family treat Ethan like this?

"Get up, gather your things, and never set foot in this place again," Bucky commanded.

The coach protested, "You have no—"

"Miss Aston hired me to protect her nephew. It’s better if you resign before you lose your teaching license. You know what I’m capable of," Bucky warned.

The coach ran away, leaving Bucky to ponder the situation.

On the other side, Y/N had just returned from the company. Spotting Peter and Ethan, her nephew walking with a towel draped around him, she observed Ethan's eagerness as he ran toward her, wrapping her in a tight hug.

Y/N asked Peter for an explanation, her expression remaining stoic as she listened to the summarized account.

Her heart ached hearing about her nephew's ordeal. Despite her typically reserved demeanor, a flicker of concern flashed in her eyes. She instructed Peter, "Tell Mr. Barnes to meet me at my office," her voice firm yet tinged with an underlying worry, before walking away.

Concerned, Ethan tugged at Peter's clothes. "Is Bucky in trouble because of me?" His voice carried a hint of apprehension.

Peter patted Ethan's back reassuringly, his tone gentle. "I'm sure he'll be alright. Don't worry." He tried to offer comfort to the young boy, knowing the weight of responsibility could be heavy on his small shoulders.

In Y/N's office, she was signing documents while Bucky stood before her, his presence commanding attention. She remained so engrossed in her work that she didn’t even lift her head when she spoke, "You want to explain why a half-naked man in a speedo ran away screaming from my house?"

Bucky answered casually, "Well, yeah, since I threatened him." His tone was nonchalant, but there was a hint of underlying tension in his voice.

Y/N looked up, her expression unreadable, a mix of surprise and curiosity flickering in her eyes.

Bucky still wasn’t accustomed to looking directly into her eyes; there was something pulling at him that he couldn’t quite describe. "The way I do my job may be different from anyone here, but I can't let the person I'm protecting feel unsafe. Do you know Ethan's swimming coach did it on purpose, and it was ordered by the Van Alen family?" His voice carried a note of frustration, a rare glimpse of emotion from the typically stoic man.

Y/N didn't respond immediately; it seemed like she already knew.

Gritting his teeth, Bucky wondered what was wrong with wealthy people. She had everything, so why didn’t she want to mend her relationship with Ethan? His frustration simmered beneath the surface, evident in the tenseness of his jaw.

Bucky said firmly, his voice tinged with determination, "If you have at least 5 minutes, I suggest you talk to Ethan." With that, he left the room, his footsteps echoing with purpose.

Y/N's secretary clicked her tongue, then turned to her boss, her expression reflecting concern. "Do you want to fire him?" There was a note of uncertainty in her voice, wary of the potential repercussions.

Y/N's gaze remained fixed on the closed door, "No, just fire the swimming coach." Her tone was decisive, yet there was a hint of resignation in her voice. She looked at her secretary, her gaze unwavering. "Cancel the rest of my schedule today."

“But, ma’am, you have an important call this evening." The secretary's voice held a hint of concern, recognizing the significance of the upcoming call.

"I will call them tomorrow. Send a formal apology letter," Y/N ordered, her tone final, a sense of determination underlying her words.

*********

Y/N went to Ethan's bedroom, her footsteps echoing softly in the hallway.

Ethan, who was playing blocks with Bucky, was surprised to see his aunt, his expression a mix of curiosity and anticipation. As she entered the room, there was a subtle shift in the atmosphere, a sense of tension dissipating.

“Auntie,” Ethan greeted her, his voice tinged with uncertainty.

Looking nervous, he turned to Bucky, who gave him a reassuring nod, his silent support evident in his expression.

Approaching Y/N, Ethan said, “Aunt, can I change my swimming coach?” His words were hesitant, a mixture of hope and apprehension lacing his tone.

Y/N replied, her voice calm yet distant, “Sure, I’ll call the Olympic coach.”

Ethan hesitated, his gaze flickering between Y/N and Bucky. “No, can Bucky teach me?” His voice held a note of pleading, a silent plea for connection.

Y/N responded, her tone neutral, “I don’t mind. You should ask him.” Her words were measured, a reflection of her reserved nature.

Ethan turned to Bucky, his eyes wide with anticipation. “Bro Bucky already agreed, I just wanted to ask for your permission first.” There was a hint of excitement in his voice, a spark of hope igniting within him.

Bucky felt relieved that they were finally communicating, his expression softening with understanding.

Ethan continued, his words tumbling out in a rush of excitement. “And can I ask you another favor?” His voice was eager, his eyes shining with anticipation.

Y/N encouraged him to speak, her expression remaining impassive, yet there was a flicker of something in her eyes, a hint of warmth beneath the surface.

“For foreign language class, can I just study German and Korean? German engineering is great, and South Korea has good products, it's good for my future. For investment class, can I learn how to trade with real money? And can I study martial arts with Bucky instead of fencing?” Ethan's words poured out in a rush, his enthusiasm palpable.

Bucky couldn’t believe what he was hearing, his surprise evident in his expression. These weren’t typical requests from a 7-year-old, yet there was a sense of determination in Ethan's voice, a silent plea for understanding.

Glancing at Y/N, who didn’t seem surprised, he realized both aunt and nephew shared the same traits, a sense of resilience amidst adversity.

Y/N asked, her tone measured, “Anything else?” Her words were neutral, yet there was a hint of something in her voice, a subtle shift in her demeanor.

Ethan shook his head, his excitement palpable. “That’s everything.”

Y/N assured him, her voice distant yet tinged with a hint of warmth, “I’ll instruct my secretary to change your teachers, and give you the money for you to invest.” before leaving the room, her footsteps echoing softly in the hallway.

Bucky couldn’t shake off the feeling of Y/N being distant from her nephew, his concern is evident in his expression. He thought Ethan felt abandoned again, but it seemed he was mistaken.

Ethan ran to him, his eyes excitedly shining, exclaiming, “Bucky, did you see that? My aunt smiled today.” There was a sense of joy in his voice, a silent celebration of a small victory.

Confused, Bucky probably needed to get his eyes checked, as he hadn’t seen her smile at all. But as long as Ethan was happy, he would agree to anything.

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Nikaposting Pt 2: Symbology & Syncretism

This is the second of a series of posts about Nika & associated religious practice in the One Piece world. As I write and post the rest of the series, I’ll add links to this header.

Pt 1: Crypto-Religion | Pt 3: Joyboy was Shandian | Pt 4: Sun God Tropes

Enormous credit to @oriigami for being my discussion partner through all of this and having a substantial influence on the final product. Check out our ao3 series Joyful for a narrative rather than analytical take on the Nika tradition, and definitely go read her OP blog @kaizokuou-ni-naru for meta and translation fun facts.

-

So About That Sun Symbol (and all those sun gods)

Context note: This post assumes you’ve read pt 1. If you haven’t, the TLDR is that the Nika cult is best categorized as a crypto-religion and may not ever have existed outside of a cryptic and oral form.

There’s a lot of sun gods in One Piece. And there’s a lot of appearances of that sun symbol we discussed briefly in pt 1, with the disconnected rays. This post will cover that symbol, the survival of non-Kuma Nika cult branches, and the proliferation of sun gods across the One Piece world.

The sun symbol can be found everywhere, in what seems at first to be a wildly disparate collection of places. There are a number of borderline cases, so I’ll be defining the “Nika sun symbol” as being any symbol with a central circle, disconnected rays, and four- or eight-fold radial symmetry. This leaves us the below list (images of the majority of these instances can be found in this very helpful post):

The Kuma-Bonney/Buccaneer version found in his church and on the amulet he left for her (8 circular rays) ; this is our basic template for the symbol

The Alabasta national symbol (8 droplet-shaped rays; the droplets seem to be drawn at various different orientations depending on the panel)

The Kozuki crest (8 circular rays in the center of a bird in the center of another circle also there’s some sprouts or something)

The Shandian crest (8 circular rays inside a larger circle, also the central circle contains the kanji for kami/god)

The Sun Pirates’ mark (4 more traditional flaring rays; the rays seem to be drawn inconsistently, especially in the anime)

There’s also Ace’s dagger, which has the basic template version, but one can assume he bought that thing in Alabasta or something like that.

From this we can conclude that the sun with disconnected rays is not exclusively a Nika symbol- in fact I would be surprised if it was, because of how prominently it was displayed in Kuma’s church (see the discussion in pt 1). However, Alabasta, Shandora, and Wano are all poneglyph countries, and were all involved in some way or another in [incomprehensible void century muttering]. I would be extremely unsurprised if the sun with disconnected rays wasn’t a more widely-spread popular symbol among [void century muttering] countries back then, which was adopted by Nika worshippers as their secret symbol around that time and simultaneously retained in more benign form by certain nations as an element of their national symbology.

(Sidenote: If you were unaware, Oda snagged this symbol from a castle in his hometown and clearly just seems to enjoy drawing it. However that doesn’t matter to us in meta analysis land. We continue.)

The Nika cult absolutely survived outside Kuma’s family: at the very least, among slaves on Mariejois. There’s a very high chance Fisher Tiger heard Nika stories while enslaved- the compositional similarity of the Sun Pirates’ mark to the base Nika symbol, Jinbe’s pissed off refusal to answer any of Who’s-Who’s questions, Fisher Tiger’s own status as a warrior of liberation, and of course, the Sun Pirates’ name and the importance of the sun to the residents of Fishman Island all point in this direction.

The proliferation of the Nika sun symbol across the world also points, to me, to at least pockets of the Nika cult potentially surviving in cryptic form across the world, like Kuma’s family did, with various levels of conscious awareness about what their rituals and symbols actually mean and what secret seditious knowledge they’re actually carrying.

However! All that said! Not all sun gods are Nikas- At least, not completely.

Upon their arrival at Egghead Island, Dorry and Broggy identified Luffy as the Sun God. However, I contend that Nika was not originally Elbaf’s sun god.

In expository Nika dialogue, Nika is specifically cited as a god of slaves (& as an ethnic or cultural god of the buccaneer people), and the giants as far as we know are (1), not a traditionally enslaved people nor particularly easy to enslave, (2), are based on Vikings & have their own pantheon which includes a god of war, & (3), while I can absolutely see how a tradition of a prolonged fast > feast festival would have evolved around a Nika figure, it does still feel a little strange. That’s supposed to be a Luffy-alike!

Besides this, the Shandian pantheon also includes a sun god, and I think it’s reasonable to assume that the sun god in question existed prior to any awakened user of the Nika fruit running around causing issues (although, more on my thoughts about Joyboy and Shandora in pt 3). Human sacrifice traditions also feel about as odd for a Luffy figure as fasting does, and while obviously Luffy, Joyboy, and Nika aren’t the same person, with the way One Piece’s narrative conventions work they’re probably quite similar.

Solar deities are the lynchpins of many if not most traditions in the real world. Sun’s a very notable noticable thing that follows a set course across the sky and brings light and life! And especially in One Piece, where the sun is also a critical thematic element and motif, I would be surprised if the majority of One Piece cultures hadn’t developed their own sun gods at some point or other.

So, all that said, why were Dorry and Broggy calling Luffy Sun God? Syncretism.

Not every god has a mythical zoan or the things would be wildly more common- only gods and figures with, as @oriigami put it while we were talking about this, a particularly potent wish attached to them. Even fewer gods have awakened mythical zoan users around. So when an awakened user of a sun god’s mythical zoan is running around (and particularly, a sun god with an incredibly potent wish attached, because Nika is a god of liberation as well as the sun, and it’s a god that people wish they could be and emulate as a matter of course), it’s easy to fold them into your mythology as your sun god. Tradition is very malleable! He’s the sun, even if he’s not exactly how you traditionally pictured it.

Traditions are very good at working with what they get, and at the moment what they get is a smiling, laughing pirate captain and liberator of slaves. What could be better?

Sorry OP, feel free to ignore this ask but I need more context. I watched a playthrough of the dlcs, and I'm now checking the wiki, and the reactions to your post really confuse me. Why are people talking about Carmine as if she's this awful person. People are talking about Carmine like she is constantly bullying and belittling her brother??? When she actually goes out of her way to try to not make him feel bad??? Which is really hard because Kieran has a lot of insecurities and it leads him to assume people want the worst for him???

Am I missing something? Is there a secret subtext of "Carmine is actually really mean to her brother behind our back and that's why he's Like That" I missed or are people just making stuff up?

lol, i think you've understood more than most people who've played the game

now, to be fair to those people: Carmine REALLY does have an attitude problem, as well as a terrible temper lol (but that's what makes her so entertaining!... in my opinion) and since Kieran is the character she interacts with the most that's who has to bear the worst of her bad traits, especially when he pushes back at her. in addition, Carmine is the older sibling, so i think we have a natural instinct to side with or at least feel sympathetic towards Kieran since we see him as the "weaker" party in the dynamic. their designs and animation only reinforce this- Carmine is tall and has a lot of aggressive body language and poses. meanwhile, Kieran is introduced peeking out from behind his sister, like he's literally hiding behind her. he's short, hides under his hair, has a lot of more drawn-in body language, he's a scrunky scrimblo wimbo meow meow wet little so on and so on

so, for the record, i think it is by at least some design that we are meant to "root" for Kieran, but i think that also ignores a lot of more subtle writing- "subtle," i say, but in my opinion, it's pretty obvious, lmao. Pokemon is a series for children. but yeah, the big one is that after time it becomes really apparent that a lot of Carmine's attitude is born out of deeper things- she's harsh and kind of controling towards Kieran in a misguided display of her protectiveness towards him, her hostility towards visitors to Kitakami is born of a worry of tourists turning their home into some sort of attraction

this is dipping into headcanon territory, but i think it's also a little subtextual that Carmine's overblown pride is her trying to overcompensate for what she inteprets as being looked down on or mocked. my big thing for this is the fact that Kieran speaks with a "Kitakami dialect" (based on real Japanese dialects associated with rural areas) but Carmine doesn't. (supposedly there's some random dialogue where she talks about this but i haven't seen it myself yet) since Carmine has been at the (ritzy, attended by a lot of students from important families) Academy longer than Kieran, i've always interpreted this as her trying to intentionally not be the kid from the sticks that talks in an "uncool" way

(incidentally i looked up 'Kieran dialect' and found someone else talking about this https://twitter.com/PokeSuutamie/status/1698625784775430234)

and finally- this may just me speaking from experience- but i always thought that a lot of Carmine and Kieran's issues clearly are really heightened by the fact they're teenagers? lol? puberty dials all your emotions up to 110% and smashes all delicacy with a sledgehammer. Carmine is TRYING to help Kieran but all of her feelings are constantly at a boil. and meanwhile, as you said, Kieran's self-esteem issues constantly lead him to project on other people and assume that everyone's mocking him or looking down at him, and i think that makes people forget that he has problems with being overdramatic and lashing out too (THIS IS NOT ME SAYING KIERAN IS A BAD CHARACTER DON'T YELL AT ME)

and for the record, as much as i love Carmine, i think that GF really dropped the ball on her reconcilliation with Kieran and her overall role in Indigo Disk, which may also be a factor in players being less sympathtic to her, but i already spent way too long on this and talking about my mixed feelings on Indigo Disk will probably double this post's length lol

in short, while i have some mixed feelings on Scarlet/Violet's overall story, i definitely can't say the character writing is bad. i think they're really making an effort to think about why each character acts the way they do and what they're actually thinking/trying to do. so i think we players should, in turn, approach them with the nuance they deserve

100+ REASONS TO WATCH AND ENJOY RWBY

Let’s put this as simply as we can.

Now, I understand you’ll need further reasons to look into the show that was created by Monty Oum, Miles Luna, and Kerry Shawcross.

SO! Here is 100+ Reasons to give RWBY a shot, plus a resource list link at the end. ENJOY!

1) Sci-fi/fantasy show that balances the two aspects very well 2) Endearing characters 3) Deep underlying messages about the importance of human connection 4) Constantly improves on itself 5) Writers actually try to listen to what the fandom wants 6) Creative setting 7) Actually handles difficult topics, like communication, privilege, and the cycle of abuse in a way that is sensitive to the audience 8) Ending is already set, meaning the show is not at risk of selling out to corporate overlords 9) God-tier foreshadowing 10) Top notch fight choreography 11) EVERYTHING IS A GUN 12) RWBY unambiguously avoids Depraved Homosexual tropes - no evil LGBT characters

13) No surprise plot twists for the sake of shock value 14) The soundtrack Not only does it slap, bits of lore and characterization can be found in the series music 15) Character design 16) Symbolism and metaphors and hidden meanings abound Can make for an enriching experience if you have knowledge about color theory and fairy tales and historical/mythological figures 17) Nuanced portrayal of morality between heroes, villains, and those who are neither 18) Layered writing where not everything, especially conflict, is clear-cut and easily resolved 19) Portrays trauma without over-dramatization 20) Production values improve with each volume 21) Hopepunk 22) Female-Centric main cast All the “Fix-it” fanfics and “Rewrites” involve Male-Centric Casts and/or taking time away from female main casts to focus on male characters, especially male side characters. 23) No surprise plot twists for the sake of shock value meets Thanos snap. 24) Good bits of humor sprinkled throughout without being overbearing 25) A few villians that while irredeemable, are interesting to watch in how they act. 26) Masterpiece of a comedy spinoff 27) You can legally watch the show for free 28) Subverts narrative tropes common to both "western" hero stories and anime 29) Gender dynamics and expectations are well-balanced Gender  tropes subverted, and addressed directly at times 30) Comfortably addresses class warfare, alcoholism, and other "mature" topics in approachable ways 31) Corgi 32) Combat Skirt 33) Women get to have pockets and pouches... 34) Women not requiring a man to save them 35) Large number of POC portrayed positively 36) LGBT are neither creeps nor villains, instead the straight people are. 37) POC are neither creeps nor villains as a majority...instead the white people are. 38) The “White Male Savior” with the mask, trenchcoat, and katana is the villain, while the underdog protector of the lower-income is a POC woman who may or may not be lesbian. 39) Meaningful facial expressions (that is, the animators spend time creating mood and reaction to elevate the storytelling) 40) Main antagonist is a woman, as are several of the other antagonists and they are NOT ditzes or idiots, nor are they fanservice. 41) The women are as intelligent as the men, where most anime try to have men be superior than women for the sake of shounen, the women are equal to men in screentime, plot relevance, intelligence, strength, personality, etc....though RWBY tries to have the women take precedence. 42) Men are support characters with their powers, while Women have more protagonist superpowers. 43) Positive half-sibling and stepmother representation 44) Positive honorary family member representation 45) Gay shipping and Lesbian shipping is encouraged by the writers and voice actors/actresses 46) The Main female protagonist's blood-based superpower is not broken or OP and has limits. 47) Well-executed humor (usually, ha). Basically trying NOT to make it fanservice or toilet humor or cringe. 48) Creators at least try to fix its less than stellar/problematic parts, which is more that I can say than the majority of entertainment. 49) Female characters are complex and interesting, also for the most part don’t woobified female villains. 50) Terrifying Villains and Monsters There is a difference. V1-V3 involved Monsters , V4-V8 involved Villains. 51) Every Character is based on a fairy tale/myth/legend/story and looking for those breadcrumbs just adds to the show 52) Already said, but emphasizing the fight choreography and the soundtrack. If you love over-the-top video game style fights this is for you. If you love epic metal playing over those fights this is for you. 53) Plays with tropes and story telling norms to subvert expectations in the best way 54) Not afraid to have tonal shifts to tell the story they want to tell 55) Not afraid to have the heroes lose sometimes 56) And plot points have consequences!!! None of this "bad thing happens and 1 episode later the status quo is restored" 57) Emphasizing foreshadowing again. Things that happened in season 8 were foreshadowed as far back as season 2. 58) The main characters are proactive. None of this waiting around for them to get up the courage to do something about the bad guys. Don't give me the “manor tea” stuff, they were trying to recover, Ironwood had it out for them and would have shot them for helping while refusing to obey him. 59) The Main characters are smart. They notice things (and come up with really cool strategies) 60) At least one villain does NOT underestimate the main characters 61) Everyone doesn't let characters use false justification for their actions regardless who it is! Everyone gets a consequence that fits! 62) Soundtrack is LIT 63) Gay Gay Homosexual Gay 64) Because I'm still on this, two autistic-coded main characters whose traits aid in their heroism! Ruby and Penny...possibly Marrow Amin 65) Kdin Jenzen, a Transgender VA, plays May Marigold, a transgender heroic side character who does not get killed off. 66) Chaotic teens saving the world with the power of stubborn optimism 67) Opposites Attract Tropes 68) Goth Uncle 69) Goth Milf 70) Himbo Dad 71) Non-sexualized Catgirl 72) Cat Cougar Milf with Tea Tray defeats Bat Assassin 73) Panther Dilf 74) Blonde Brawler Female who is also smart and can work mechanics 75) Female protag uses scythe and cape/cloak 76) It Portrays several different types of abuse ranging from romantic relationships to familial abuse along with accurately portraying them 77) Shows how harmful Alcoholism is 78) When/If a a character dies, it’s for a reason and isn’t for shock value Penny cheated death once...she would not cheat death again. Ozpin's immortality is a curse, and he is truly dead, a ghost. 79) One of the the main-main characters is disabled and isn’t treated as/seen as lesser 80) Male/Female friendships are a thing and abundant Normally if a man and a woman engage, its shipping, not friendships. But with Naruto and Sakura we have friendship. With Ichigo and Rukia its friendship....now that is abundant friendship in RWBY. 81) LGBT Voice Actresses Voice LGBT Characters. Kdin Jenzen is Transgender, Arryn Zech is Bisexual, and so are their characters. 82) All Romantic relationships, heterosexual or not, are given attention and emphasis on their interpersonal relationships 83) Balances tragedy and comedy, there are SEVERAL episodes where you both end up laughing your ass off and crying 84) Never goes all out depressing, the message is clear, it takes it to heart, and it shouts it for all to hear. Sometimes bad things happen. But you have to keep moving forward. 85) Has a variety of characters, each with their own themes/allusions (e.g. Ruby = Red Riding Hood, Team RWBY = Fairy Tale Characters, Team JNPR = Crossdressing Historic Heroes) 86) Amazing Music that builds on the characters' motives 87) You won't suffer vision problems after watching an entire cast that's blindingly white (shounen anime in general) 88) Gay doesn't suddenly die to leave heartbroken love interest Straight and angstily going back to the white guy who killed Gay out of possessive jealousy, which is super romantic. 89) Partners of dead Gays, should a Gay die, will not obligatorily be paired with someone str8   90) Character designs reference various fairy tales and stories, so you can get things like Mulan and Thor being a childhood friends romance, Beast and Beauty being one and the same and in love with Goldilocks, and Red Riding Hood maiming Cinderella, who is evil. 91) Everyone; good, bad, and the minor characters...are all hot. 92) You WILL get attached both to the good and bad characters. 93) All characters have very unique designs that fit their personalities and fighting styles. 94) Emotional/Physical Abusers get killed AFTER being humiliated 95) The Entire Show is full of metaphors and symbolism. The backgrounds, character clothing, the weapons they use... it's fun to analyze! 96) Stresses the importance of just being a nice person above all other stereotypical morally gray anime tropes 97) The people who work the the show. Seriously not just the main people; I'm talking about all the unsung heroes who do amazing background and scenery to sound design, etc. RWBY has some of the nicest, most hard working, and supportive crews I've seen. And considering the amount of harassment the anti-fandom can throw at them, they take and handle it so remarkably well. 98) Every character looks amazing from main to one-off. How their outfits convey who they are so well and sometimes subtlety. Also how the creators and character designers make it so cosplayers can have pockets on their outfits. 99) No  stupid twists for shock value, the twists that do happen are foreseeable but executed in a way that is still shocking. 100) Enjoyable Comedic Spin-off far better written than Teen Titans Go. 101) Awesome weapon concepts 102) Awesome growth of story, plot, and transition of it. 103) People hate it when you have fun watching RWBY....is that not enough?

Need to come up with a list of good youtube channels next.

I forget I can just ramble and rant my thoughts!

I try to focus on sharing just my art but I also do writing and try to have a bit of a critical mind when it comes to media I consume.

Now that it has been a few months since I watched all of TMNT 12 I do have some thoughts and opinions and kind of want to just ramble about it before I forget, in an informal manner.

I at first really liked it, it was the second TMNT show I watched after Rise, now that I've been watching the 87 and 03 shows my opinions on 12 did change just a bit but I still do like it!

Literally all the turtles are my son's now. Especially Leonardo (he's blue coded so-). I just think they're so cute and neat!!!

I'm going to put thoughts to spoiler stuff of 12 so if you plan to watch the show then don't click beyond this point!

🐢💙🐢♥️🐢🧡🐢💜

So in the last season of TMNT 12 it kind of feels like all the scrapped ideas or random plots that couldn't be fit into the prior seasons were put in this one? I really like the new op it gives of Cowboy Bebop vibes. The op song change is really nice to because I never really looked the tmnt 12 op song before.

However, the plots feel all over the place? There's a mini ark where they're jumping through time meeting Halloween monsters and then another ark where Mikey defeats Satan? Then we get another really tiring ark that's this implied alternate madmax fury road parody that is honestly so depressing? Donnie is just dead.

Which btw, the show likes killing ppl off for dramatic effect. They killed Master Splinter three times and had Mikey and Donnie get scattered to atoms on two separate occasions. I should also mention Leo was in a coma for 3 months with no IV or anything and he woke up relatively fine.

Anyways, going into the last season and stuff leading up to it... They kind of ended with the 87 turtles and the 12 boys finding new passion and inspiration from teaching the 87 boys. I didn't really vibe with it because it just made the 87s the butt of the joke and made them out to be incompetent silly little guys.

They ARE silly little guys but the thing is they're not incompetent. The 87 boys have done some insanely incredible things even when unarmed. Especially when unarmed. I actually think the angle of finding a new way to help people as a means to end the series on an inspired note is fine, the 87 boys even carried on the will and told Bebop and Rocksteady they can be more than Shredder's mutant henchmen. It is very cute and wholesome. I just think they could have maybe done it differently?

Why not set up for them to teach Chi arts? The turtles of 87 don't have any mystical abilities and it would have been interesting to do a set up like that? There are ways to write the finale without just dumping on the original source.

Focusing back on the ending of 12, we also leave on a seriously alarming note. It's just a big mixed bag. After Master Splinter went to run on the hamster wheel in the sky, Leonardo was handed the reigns of the family. He was told "You're the teacher now Leonardo. You're the father. Look after your brothers" and Splinter then willingly walked into his own death. I think the writers maybe thought this was amazing and inspirational or something but I found it incredibly messed up? We start tmnt 12 on all 4 boys birthday. Meaning Splinter himself considers them all to be the same age. And since the series was running they haven't on screen celebrated a birthday and from the implied weather changes most of the seasons 1-4 seem to take place over just a year??? We don't get a definitive timeline (or I'm a bad audience and didn't notice).

So one can only assume Master Splinter was telling his...15 year old son to be the father to his other 15 year old children.

Why do I bring this up at all? After Leonardo takes over the family and he KILLS shredder they go into this rushed cult demon resurrection arc that culminates in the classic dead walk the earth and Mikey defeats Satan. In this arc we meet a ghost splinter who does not even go to see his kids, he just helps Casey and April. But throughout and the lead up to this we have moments of Leo having conversations with what we can perceive as Sensei's ghost in the dojo.

But the climax of the arc cements splinters ghost has not once visited his son's.

So Leonardo is quite literally having full on conversations, in the dojo for his brothers to hear, with a hallucination of his dead dad. He's coping this way. His family does nothing about this.

Tmnt 2012 has the worst Splinter. He ignored his son's and chose favorites. He told Leonardo to die (season 1 finale). He calls Mikey dumb and insights the others to do it too. He told Raph his anger makes him exactly like Shredder and never elaborates or teaches him how to better work through his issues. And he straight up calls Donnie useless.

None of that is even an exaggeration. Adding context just makes it worse.

Here's a list:

Do you know the turtles are the equivalent of helicopter raised homeschool boys? They've never stepped foot outside of the lair except at the start of ep 1.

They learn ALL of their lessons from old shows and cartoons. The show writers even sometimes use the cartoons to set up the theme of the episodes!

When Leonardo rescues Mikey he pats him on the head to comfort him.

Literally almost all of their ninja weapons have hidden weapons. I love it I wish I saw more of them using them.

Michelangelo is the family chef because somehow none of the rest have any life skills. Not even Splinter (explains so much).

They all have such cute shape language. I love bean pole Donnie, blocky buff Raph, perfect pear Leo, and round freckled Mikey.

They also now have unique eye colors. I love their eyes. Donnie with his big beautiful brown eyes (sometimes they look red). Raph with his acid green stare into your soul eyes, they look like they would glow like mako eyes in ff7. Mikey with bright blue eyes all big and round. And then Leo with the cunning dark blue eyes!

I just want to pinch their cheeks and kiss their foreheads and give them hugs.

Also, Leo is so affectionate to kids and his brothers??? My heart??? Couldn't take it??? He just randomly hugs them?? He had a tea party??? He wore a pink feather boa? The way he just immediately held baby Miwa??? Too good. Too good. He's such a good big bro.

Raph is also such a soft guy. Like yes he's a Butthead that beats up his brothers and takes every single violent urge out on Leo when he's even minorly inconvenienced but he does learn to do better. He helps Leo a lot and he even is there for the others a lot too.

Raphael also does art and seems to like fine arts.

Raph, like Leo, is a resident baby man. He loved tiny helpless creatures. He had a pet turtle he loved with his entire being and then later on adopted a space alien baby turtle that he also loved with his entire being.

I love Donnie in this, his cute little tooth gap, his gentle demeanor, the fact he'd rather be in the lab than training. I feel bad for him tho cause he clearly wants Splinter and Leo's approval with his inventions and efforts but very rarely gets it (Leo is the only one to really praise him and get what he does). He's also a good team player but he has so much stress and no confidence.

Donnie needs a big ol hug.

Mikey is so cute. But he is so weird. Why did they write girly pop collecting underwear. Why did they have him cannibalize a mutant pizza man? They do the most random things with Mikey. I like that he avidly tries cheering ppl up. He tries so hard for his bros. He's just a sweet little guy. I wish they did more with the baby bro.

Mikey should have kept his lightning powers.

They fight a lot but all the brothers love each other. I think they're just stressed and cooped up too much.

I like drama tho it's juicy when they argue.

I read on the wiki that Donnie is supposed to be canon OCD and Mikey canon ADHD and it makes so much sense in the show.

I really like all their voices. I miss Leo's first voice he was so dorky and sweet. The new voice is all sad and serious. Raph sounds perfect. I like Donnie's voice but instead of him always yelling why not have him do the low angry science rant because that's a good time. I like Mikey's voice he sounds like a high pitched beast boy.

But despite the occasionally baffling writing choices of the show I still like it. It's entertaining in the same way as a telenovela or kdrama. They literally have a plot where one of the turtles falls in love with his secret half sister. Something I've seen in telenovelas and kdramas.

2012 tmnt makes a great dogblooded drama.

I think the CGI art can get pretty bad at times but other times it looks great. The music is pretty good and I really like the voice cast. I actually totally see why so many people like this show but I definitely don't think it's the best one. From what I've seen thus far, I think the 2003 TMNT show might actually be a masterpiece. Better than Avatar the Last Airbender levels of masterpiece (not a competition just giving an example of another show I find monumental).

That's it, that's the rant, thanks for reading!

Btw if any one has any good 12 fic recs pls hand them over. I need 12 hurt comfort, or fem Leo, or transfem Leo, or anything introspective, or just anything with a fun plot. Pls I'm dying here send fics.

Thank you :)

I just wanted to point out what massive hypocrites themarysue.com are because they just released this article New 'Loki' Season 2 Promo Confirms that Loki Has Found His Fam | The Mary Sue

The way marvel studios has been using The TVA image is really awful and gross and despite the sight previously making this article about how Sylvie was right and suggesting otherwise was arguing for fascism they have never said anything about the series use of the TVA for advertising. The don't care about the problematic aspects that the show actually has they are just obsessed with defending Sylvie.

OMG what is that article and who on earth wrote that... I'm getting second-hand embarrassment from it.

So a bunch of TVA agents and a variant who betrayed him are his found family now? But the best part is that they then explain what found family is and they write:

What is found family? It’s the people who love you for who you are, especially when you’re smarting from a family or community that rejected you. It’s the people who don’t want to change you, and who stick by you even when you mess up or make mistakes. The trailers and featurette make it look like Loki’s TVA crew will be filling that role in his life.

People who love Loki for who he is?

Who don't want to change him and will stick by him no matter what?

These people care for him?

Season 2 would need to be a complete rewrite of Season 1 to make these people even remotely close to being a close family to him.

The OP says: "Season 1 was about Loki [...] realizing he could be more than a heel for the Avengers". Is it though? What is he told to be in S1 then?

Submissive.

And those words from Hiddleston are even worse: “He’s found a new family. There’s a new capacity to make connections. He realizes that those connections are all that matter in the end.” Connections to abusers who continue treating him as bad if not worse than his adoptive family. But hey, the TVA are just such a bunch of good guys, right? Ugh, I really don't like that guy.

But yeah, you're right on the money. These articles and a lot of fans follow the "who has done what" path. The TVA and its agents are awful when it comes to fighting Sylvie or disagreeing with her, and if she kills them she's always right to do so. But if Loki does the same? He's such a villain, he needs to be taught a lesson, they're just following orders, why is Loki so mean to them, bla bla bla.

They're so desperate to villainize him that they're trying to claim a bunch of fascists are "not that bad". My, my, they really hate Loki do they not?

Hurricanes / Hummingbirds: IV

Series Synopsis: As the years go by, you find that it is incredibly difficult to survive wars and fight storms, especially when the only thing you have by way of a cursed technique is the blessing of a tiny bird.

Chapter Synopsis: You, Nanami, and Haibara take on a mission to help Gojo and Geto.

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Hajime Kashimo x Female Reader; slight Kento Nanami x Female Reader; slight Satoru Gojo × Female Reader

Chapter Word Count: 4.3k

Content Warnings: swearing, enemies/rivals to lovers, character death, canon-typical violence, angst, gore, original characters included

A/N: the found familyest found family

“This does not seem like the kind of mission that first years should be assigned to,” Nanami said as you trudged through the airport, the veins of his hand standing out from how hard he was clutching the strap of the bag carrying his characteristic blunt blade. “It’s definitely inappropriate for them to have called us here.”

“Maybe so, but I’m still psyched. I really want to show Geto that I’m reliable and strong!” Haibara said.

“Plus, he and Gojo are working so hard to protect that poor girl. We should do whatever we can to help them in their cause,” you said, absentmindedly stroking the Sword of Syrinx, which hung from your belt as always.

“I doubt they’re doing anything that serious,” Nanami muttered. “Knowing them, they’re probably slacking off as usual, leaving us to do the actual hard work.”

“I don’t know about that. If they specifically were called on the mission, that means it’s special grade worthy. They probably won’t even have a chance to slack off, and whatever they’re dealing with must be worse than what we have going on. Otherwise, they would’ve offered to trade positions with us,” you said.

“Whatever,” Nanami said with a frown. “It’s still way more work than I was planning on doing over the weekend, and you know what the worst part is? Since it’s their mission, we won’t even get paid for the hours of our lives that we are losing.”

“I’m sure we can get Hinode to convince the higher ups to give us a bonus if we do a good job,” you said. “But regardless, we came here as a favor to our upperclassmen, so getting paid should be the furthest thing from your mind.”

When Gojo and Geto had texted you and Haibara respectively, asking for yours and Nanami’s help on their mission, you and Haibara had jumped at the chance to make yourselves useful. Nanami had been far more reluctant, but that was just how he was, so it was to be expected.

Though you had begun the mission thinking it would be difficult and dangerous, things were slow and there was little to do but people watch — this was at least somewhat interesting, given the number of eccentric people filing in and out of the airport at any given time.

You and Haibara began a game where you tried to imagine lives for the various travelers. Nanami thought the game was ridiculous and chose not to participate, leaving the two of you to giggle like schoolchildren over the increasingly over-the-top backstories you came up with.

“I bet she’s on the run,” you said.

“From the law or from gangsters?” Haibara said, eyes wide and voice hushed as he glanced at the woman you were surreptitiously motioning towards.

“From her former lover,” you said.

“Why?” he said.

“He only married her to inherit the family fortune, but she found out in the nick of time and is now absconding with her wealth to reunite with her childhood best friend, who has secretly been in love with her for years,” you said.

“How romantic!” he said. “I bet that guy is in the middle of a heist.”

“Jewels or art?”

“Probably the glass eye of a famous politician.”

“What does that even mean?” you said. Haibara shrugged.

“First odd thing I could think of. How would he even pull that off?” he said.

“Maybe when the politician was in a deep, deep sleep — you know the kind where your lids are fluttering and all? Yeah, that stage — he snuck into the room, used his fingers to manually open the politician’s eyes, plucked the glass one right out, and then escaped before the politician could wake up,” you said.

“Would it be slimy?” he said.

“The glass eye? Probably, but I’d assume he rinsed it off for storage purposes. That briefcase looks like leather,” you said. “If you mean the politician, I’d have to say that’s an outdated joke.”

“But you probably found it funny anyways,” he said.

“Maybe a little bit,” you acquiesced.

“Say, do you think we’ll have to stay here for the night?” Haibara said.

“Probably not,” Nanami said, finally deigning to speak to you all. He was currently perusing a rack of magazines idly, though you knew none of them would interest him very much. At that moment, your phone buzzed, and when you flipped it open, you saw that it was a text from Gojo.

‘extending trip for an extra day xoxo.’

“It looks like they’re staying for an extra day,” you said, showing Nanami the text. “So probably, yes.”

His face turned green, and he grabbed your phone as if he could not quite comprehend what he was reading. “That’s cruel. We’ve been here the whole day.”

You scoffed. “It’s not that big of a deal. The girl’s going to have to merge with Tengen; don’t you think she at least deserves a couple of days of fun before she essentially loses her life? What they’re doing is a good thing.”

“Why’d you have to go and make it a question of morality?” he said. “Ugh. We’ll take turns sleeping.”

“I’m not tired yet,” you said.

“Neither am I,” he said. In unison, you turned to look at Haibara, who was already slumped against the wall, snoring lightly. You smiled fondly at him, and even Nanami relaxed a bit, taking off his jacket and draping it over Haibara like a blanket.

“I guess he’s first, then,” you said. Nanami leaned against the wall beside Haibara, and you did the same. Although you needed to remain vigilant, both of you allowed yourselves to take a moment to breathe. After a day of nothing happening, it was hard to believe that anything would actually attack you.

“Do you ever wonder what our futures will be like?” Nanami said, some time later. It had gotten to be late enough at night that the airport had quieted a bit, or at least gotten as quiet as an airport could get, and it almost seemed like the two of you — plus the sleeping Haibara — were the only ones in the whole building. It would’ve been eerie, but with Nanami and the Sword of Syrinx at your side, you found you were not scared.

“Sometimes,” you admitted. “But also, not really. I expect it’ll just be an endless cycle of exorcising curses until I’m killed or retire.“

“Besides being a sorcerer,” he said. You tilted your head, gazing out at the night sky through the glass windows of the airport.

“What else is there, besides being a sorcerer?” you said. “It’s all I have left for me, since my parents clearly want nothing to do with me and I don’t really have any friends to speak of back home.”

“I wish there was something else,” he said.

“Do you not want to be a sorcerer or something?” you said. It was the first you had ever heard of such a thing; though Nanami hated having to do any work, he also was a model student and excellent at his job.

“It’s a shitty life, that’s all. You said it best — an endless cycle of exorcising curses until you die. Maybe you’ll get to retire, if you’re lucky,” he said. “There’s not even a point to it all.”

“That’s true,” you said. “But…no, I can’t argue with that. You’re right.”

“It’s probably the hour,” he said when your dissatisfaction became clear. “It’s so easy to slip into depressing thoughts during the night. Let’s talk about something else. Look, the moon’s already so high in the sky. It’s pretty tonight, isn’t it?”

“It is,” you said. It was bright and full, a silver dollar in a velvet sky, peering down at you benevolently. “I miss the stars, though.”

It was because there were too many lights. Cities never slept, after all; it was never fully dark enough to see anything besides the moon and the winking of planes passing by overhead. For some reason, it made you sad, though you could not recall ever caring much about the stars in the past.

“They’re still out there somewhere,” he said. “Even if we can’t see them, it doesn’t mean they’re gone.”

“I suppose not, but it’s hard to believe in things without the proof of their existence,” you said.

“As long as they were there at one point, I can do it,” he said. “That’s enough proof for me.”

A manager came to pick you all up when it was time to go back. Contrary to Nanami’s complaints, it really had been an uneventful mission. The most excitement was when a shop owner accused Haibara of stealing the book he had, in fact, paid for, but it was all smoothed over when you showed her the receipt. Otherwise, you all had done little more than laze around and do what you would’ve done back at the school anyways.

“Were Gojo and Geto successful?” you said as the manager started the engine and pulled out of the airport parking lot. You were sitting in the backseat with Haibara, as Nanami had claimed he would get carsick if he could not be in the front — whether this was true or not, you weren’t sure, but neither you nor Haibara were willing to risk it.

The manager cleared her throat. “Well. No, not exactly.”

You cocked your head, for certainly you must’ve heard her wrong. Haibara seemed similarly confused, and even Nanami stiffened a bit, though this might’ve been due to nausea.

“I think you might’ve misunderstood what I was saying,” you said, as politely as you could manage. How was it that Geto and Gojo, the strongest sorcerers, the best of the best, had failed? It was inconceivable. You could not imagine a world in which they were not the pinnacle of achievement. Nothing was supposed to be impossible for them, so how could one simple mission have gotten their better?

“I didn’t,” the manager said, turning the car sharply, throwing you against your seatbelt, which instantly turned taut so that you didn’t smash into the seat in front of you. “Gojo and Geto failed. The girl was killed by an assassin before she could merge with Tengen.”

“An assassin?” Haibara said. “Are the upperclassmen okay?”

The manager did not say anything, and your stomach dropped. Your nails sunk into the black leather seat, and your toes curled as various scenarios ran through your mind.

“Geto was in critical condition, but the assassin supposedly left him alive for fear of what would happen to his gathered curses should he die, so Ieri was able to heal him,” the manager finally said. “As for Gojo —”

“No,” you said immediately, cutting her off before she could finish. “He’s alright. Don’t lie and say that he’s not.”

How was it that even in your worst nightmares, you hadn’t imagined Gojo harmed? He was supposed to be untouchable. He had the Infinity that not even his counterpart Geto could claim, he was that rambunctious boy that had effortlessly exorcised the curse about to kill you and then bought you food. You could believe anything else. You could believe that Geto had been beaten, though even that was fantastical, more fiction than reality, but at least you could envision it. But Gojo? You could not. You could not even picture it. He was so full of vitality, he was life itself, and the absence of it, emptiness in what ought to be whole, was wrong.

“He is alright,” the manager said. You, Haibara, and Nanami breathed a collective sigh of relief. It was more than just caring for Gojo that fueled it. If there existed a being that was Gojo’s superior, then none of you were safe. Gojo’s power was monstrous and unprecedented, but if he was a monster — and of course he was not, but even if he was — he was a monster that was on your side. It was easier to be alright with impossibility when it was to your benefit. It was harder to accept when it was an unknown, when it wanted to harm you, even.

“So, then? Why’d you hesitate and frighten all of us like that?” you said, hugging the Sword of Syrinx to your chest. It sent out a pulse of warmth, its attempt at soothing you, and to its credit, it worked, the cursed energy mixing with your own and raising your spirits just a bit.

“He was killed,” she said. “And left for dead. Somehow, that situation managed to unlock his reverse cursed technique, and subsequently his cursed technique reversal. He healed himself and used his newfound discovery to utilize a secret technique, the Hollow Technique Purple, before using it to kill the assassin.”

“Um?” you said. “I don’t know how I should feel about that.”

“It’s like I’ve gone through every stage of grief at once,” Haibara mused.

“That’s a dumbass name for a technique,” Nanami said with an air of finality. “Especially one as difficult and powerful as that. The best they could come up with was Purple?”

“I’m just glad he’s alright,” you said, grateful to Nanami for lightening the mood. “Also, Purple makes sense. It’s a combination of Red and Blue.”

“Which, by the way, aren’t much better,” he said. “Whatever. Good for him for learning to use it.”

This was how he expressed himself, so you didn’t reprimand him. No matter how much he claimed to dislike Gojo, it was nothing more than surface-level, and when it came down to it, he had been just as worried about him as you and Haibara had been.

There were still slick sanguine stains covering the stone courtyard of the school, fly head curses buzzing around, sticking their proboscises into the puddles and growing fat from the blood they sucked up. You paused by the deepest well, staring at the depths of the liquid, half-mesmerized and half-sickened by the sheen of power glossed over the top.

“This is Gojo’s,” you said, a sour taste in your mouth. “But there’s so much.”

“Let’s go,” Nanami said, lightly touching your shoulder. “Don’t dwell on it. He’s fine, you heard the manager say so.”

“But there’s just so much,” you repeated. It was everywhere, rivers and rivers that the curses were feasting on without care. It didn’t matter if the manager said Gojo was okay. You weren’t like Nanami. You couldn’t believe in anything without proof, and the only proof you had was what you saw in front of you.

There was a faint voice in the back of your mind.

Would you like to…would you like to…

When you tried to discern what it was saying, however, it disappeared. You ground your teeth in frustration. Because now anger had taken over your feeble terror, and before you could really think about it, you had drawn the Sword of Syrinx.

“What are you doing?” Haibara said. It was not accusing; he was just curious, and you squared your shoulders before you responded.

“These curses,” you said, pointing the sword at them. “They don’t deserve it. They don’t deserve to get stronger because of someone else’s pain.”

“There’s nothing to be done about it,” Nanami said. “Come on, I’m sure Hinode is waiting for us.”

“There is something to be done about it,” you said. “And I will do it. I will exorcise them.”

“Me, too!” Haibara said. Maybe he had also been thinking along the same lines and was glad you had spoken up, or maybe it was a novel idea you had had, but either way, you were glad for the support.

“You guys are such a headache,” Nanami said, but he was already taking out his blunt blade and activating his technique on a nearby fly head.

There were so many curses crawling around the campus that it was already high noon by the time you had exorcised all of them. In an effort to calm your temper, Haibara had proposed a competition, and then the fighting actually became somewhat fun, each of you tallying up the amount of curses you took out and trying to get rid of more than the others.

“I got 360,” Nanami said.

“Weak numbers,” Haibara commented. “668 for me.”

“What the hell?” Nanami said. “Where did you even find that many? And why did you go that hard?”

“I had to win!” Haibara said. “Let’s hear it, Y/N.”

“672,” you said. “How does it feel to lose?”

“It was only barely,” Haibara said. “So I’ll take it.”

“At least you did better than Nanami,” you agreed. “Nanami, were you even trying?”

“No,” he said. You looked at him and then at Haibara, who made a face as if to remind you you couldn’t really expect much more from Nanami.

“Fair enough,” you said. “Now, we should really go check in with Hinode.”

“If he’s upset with us, I’m blaming you,” Nanami said.

Hinode was in his classroom when you three walked in, drawing something on the chalkboard that resembled a swarm of fly head curses. When you shuffled into the room, he did not even turn around to greet you, continuing to draw, digging his chalk into the board passive-aggressively.

“It’s good to see my students showed up,” he said. “I was beginning to think they’d skip the entire day.”

“Sorry, sir,” you said. “It’s my fault.”

“I’m a relaxed teacher, but even I occasionally have things for you all to do,” he continued. “I don’t know what you were so busy with, but in the meantime, the campus has been swarmed with fly head curses. If we let them wander around willy-nilly, they’ll multiply into a real problem. Even this much time having elapsed means it’ll be harder to get rid of them once and for all.”

“More fly heads? But we just exorcised so many,” Haibara said. “What gives?”

“I already got rid of 360,” Nanami said. “That’s my quota for the day. Anything more and I want to be paid a bonus.”

“Hinode, sir, I’m sorry we were late to class, but we were busy cleaning up the campus from all of the fly heads that came due to the assassin’s attack. If those are the fly heads you speak of, then rest assured that they have already been taken care of,” you said.

“You three exorcised all 1,700 of those fly head curses without even being asked to?” Hinode said, the chalk dropping from his hand and turning to dust under his foot as he took a step towards you.

“Yes. Should we not have?” you said. “It was just really gross that they were sitting around and drinking Gojo’s blood like that. Speaking of which, you should send someone to wash that whole mess up. Oh! And, um, is Gojo around?”

“He’s in his room,” Hinode said. “Did you guys seriously get rid of all of the fly heads already?”

“Do you not believe us?” Haibara said.

“We’re definitely strong enough to deal with a bunch of curses that are so weak, they don’t even qualify as grade 4’s,” Nanami said.

“I’m not doubting you, it’s just…no, never mind. Good job; I’m sorry for being angry earlier. You can take the rest of the day to shower and do whatever you want. I’m proud of you,” Hinode said.

Proud. You, Nanami, and Haibara had made Hinode proud. The three of you barely made it out of the room before you and Haibara squealed, grabbing Nanami into a group hug.

“We made Hinode happy!” Haibara said.

“Can you believe it? Kaito Hinode, the Kaito Hinode, he’s proud of us!” you said. Nanami rolled his eyes but did not even shove you off.

“Yeah, yeah, I guess it’s pretty cool,” he said. Even though Hinode was never critical and was actually pretty liberal with his praise, it still felt different this time. It wasn’t like you had succeeded at doing something you had been assigned — you had exceeded his expectations, made him proud just by being yourselves. It was the most validation you had ever received.

“Now, I’m going to shower and nap until dinner time,” Haibara said, letting Nanami go.

“Skipping lunch? That’s so unlike you,” you said.

“It pains me to do so, but I’m just exhausted. We barely got any rest at the airport, and then the sheer number of fly heads we had to exorcise took more out of me than I initially realized it would,” Haibara said with a yawn.

“I agree,” Nanami said. “I might eat, but then I’m getting in bed for a bit. I need to catch up on my rest, and my back hurts.”

“I guess I’ll see you all at dinner, then,” you said.

“You’re not going to sleep?” Haibara said.

“I would like to, but I want to make sure Gojo is alright first,” you said.

“You’re such a good underclassman,” Nanami said.

“Send our well-wishes!” Haibara said.

“Yes, please do that,” Nanami said.

“I’ll be sure to,” you said.

Gojo’s room was locked tightly shut, and when you knocked, the only answer you received was a muffled go away. It was enough proof that he was alive, so technically you should’ve been satisfied by it, but you knew all too well that being alive and being alright were two separate things.

You returned a few minutes later with the necessary supplies, and then you braved knocking again.

“It’s me, Y/N,” you said softly.

“I’m busy,” he said.

“I brought sweets?” you tried, crinkling the paper bag of convenience store snacks you had gotten to bribe him into opening the door. They were nothing like what he had treated you to on your mission together, but they were enough that a few seconds later, he cracked his door open, a single suspicious blue eye peeking out at you.

“Come in,” he said, replacing his glasses and opening the door wider after affirming that you did, in fact, have sweets with you. You slipped into the room and set the bag on the desk. He was on it like a vulture, unwrapping packets and shoving the food in his mouth, hardly even chewing before he swallowed and reached for more.

There were so many things you wanted to say. You’re alive. You failed. How did it happen? You’re the strongest now. What does Hollow Technique Purple even mean? Are you alright? No, really, are you alright?

What you actually said was this: “You’ll choke.”

“No, I won’t,” he said between mouthfuls. “That’d be a stupid way to die.”

“There are very few stupid ways to die, and that’s not one of them,” you said.

“Is being attacked by a flock of geese?” he said.

“They are notoriously aggressive birds,” you said.

“Is slipping on a banana peel and breaking your neck?”

“Banana peels are serious threats to society.”

“Is —” His blithe tone dissipated in an instant, his throat bobbing as he swallowed. “Is being one of the strongest sorcerers and getting beaten by someone with no cursed energy at all?”

“Even the strongest sorcerers are still human,” you said. “If I were such a being, I would do well to remember that. Even if the world called me a monster or a god, I would have to keep in mind that I am only one person.”

“Then it doesn’t count as a stupid way to die in your mind?” he said.

“Heavenly Restrictions are no joke,” you said. “If I went out like that, I’d be proud.”

“Proud!” he said. “What pride is there in losing?”

“There’s pride in having fought at all,” you said. “That’s the important bit. If I’ve learned one thing from studying and from Nanami and the others, it’s that there’s no real winning in this life. There’s just those that continue to struggle and those that give up.”

“Things should be easy if you’re the strongest. I shouldn’t have to struggle,” he said.

“Then maybe that means you aren’t the strongest yet,” you said.

He contemplated this. “Well, I haven’t mastered the Domain Expansion.”

“Hm,” you said. You did not know what a Domain Expansion was, but Gojo seemed to think it was important, so you pretended like you did. “Massive shortcoming.”

“Exactly,” he said. “And I still need to work on my Infinity.”

“Oh, yeah,” you said. “You’ve gotta go to infinity and beyond.”

He did not even recognize the reference. “Yes! I need to go beyond the normal limits of the technique and take it to the next level if I want to be the strongest.”

“Sure,” you said. If he found solace in it, then who were you to tell him that that wasn’t quite what you had meant to say?

“You’re a helpful girl, Y/N. I knew there was a reason you were my favorite of the first years!” he said. “Also, thanks for the sweets.”

“Anytime,” you said, unable to keep up with his changes in mood and finding no point in trying. “Oh, it looks like Hinode just emailed me, so I should probably see what that’s all about, but I’m happy we could talk for a little bit.”

“See you around,” he said. “Expect a sandwich for your troubles.”

“I look forward to it,” you said, leaving Gojo’s room and opening up the email Hinode had sent you.

Subj.: URGENT Mission Alert

In the wake of Satoru Gojo’s power increase, curses with unprecedented levels of strength will begin to manifest. One such curse has already appeared at a nearby animal shelter, and we have been assigned with exorcising it. Bring the Sword of Syrinx.

Thx,

Kaito Hinode

hhhhhhmhmmhmmnnnnmmh Buddy Daddies is making me Think Thoughts and Feel Feelings

but i’m not gonna be doing any analyzing of the show or plot itself since 1. i know absolutely nothing about Japanese family/culture/norms/society in general and there’s plenty of amazing posts that talk about that already and 2. the show doesn’t really keep things hidden like a series like bsd does, so there’s not much to theorize about. so i’m not going to go searching for things that don’t exist in the story

however, what i am going to do is over analyze and look for things that probably don’t exist in the songs in the OP and the ED of the anime. yep. my brainrot is that bad

listen episode 7 did something to me okay

i think both songs symbolize Rei and Kazuki in their own ways, especially the OP since i think it encompasses both of them from the first to second verse of the song. the ED is where it really gets interesting, since for now it only really symbolizes one of them

🔺spoiler warning for episodes 1, 3, 6 and 7 and also basically the entire premise of both Kazuki and Rei's characters lol🔻

also long post warning. like, really really long post. i pulled out all the stops in my analyzing for this thing

The opening - SHOCK! by Ayase

fun fact Ayase is the vocaloid producer for the duo YOASOBI

So for this song I’m taking both the translated lyrics provided by Crunchyroll subtitles and the translation on the Miraikyun website I found while digging for reliable translation sources (I found… almost none for this song tbh). But I’ll include screenshots from the OP mostly for the first verse of the song that’s actually used for the opening of the anime.

So at first this song came off as lighthearted to me because the music itself is pretty upbeat and pop-ish, and while yes it is both of those things, the lyrics definitely tell another story of their own. The overarching theme is essentially the contemplation of what love is and what it means, and how the person singing isn’t able to understand love when they see it. They also don’t know what’s going on in another person’s head (who is potentially experiencing said love that the singer doesn’t understand). Immediately this makes me think of Rei’s character, in a couple of ways.

In his character PV it explicitly says that he’s someone who “doesn’t know love”, specifically using the character 愛 (ai) which is used for a more general type of love (could be family or other long-term relationships) and doesn’t necessarily have romantic connotations. This is a perfect example of how Rei, as a person, doesn’t understand the concept of “love” in general. It’s foreign to him, and it’s pretty obvious after episode 3 that he wasn’t raised as a normal child by his parents, he was raised to be a hitman by his father who wanted Rei to only refer to him as his “boss”. I don’t think I need to explain how much that would mess up someone’s perception of love in any sense of the word, and the anime actually does it for us by showing Rei as unfit for taking on a proper parental role in the makeshift family in the first few episodes. Hell, even in the beginning of episode 7 he seemed more like another kid in the house instead of Miri’s caretaker. He’s not used to being responsible for another human being, and it shows, but it’s because he genuinely has no idea about any of it since he doesn’t have any parental figure to base his standard of being a ‘parent’ off of. Kazuki is arguably the same in that regard, but he’s much more mature as a parent compared to Rei because he knows what it’s like to not have any parents or caretakers at all, and he wants to make sure Miri has good parental figures in her life so she doesn’t go through the same thing.

The lyrics in the first half of the song and the lyrics in the chorus can absolutely be used to symbolize Rei’s character here.

Rei does want to be a part of the family here, we solidified that in ep3 when he declared that he was Miri’s Papa. That was a key piece of character development for him, since before this we don’t see them interacting during the episodes as much as Kazuki and Miri do. So the lyrics about ‘wanting love’ is symbolic of him admitting to wanting to be a part of the family. The part about the city being ‘madly in love and excited’ is just how he sees things, since he was taught to never smile or really express any emotions for that matter, so everyone else is automatically more expressive than him. He stays home a lot to play video games nonstop and chain smokes through all-nighters when Kazuki isn’t there, and he also tries to go home before ultimately being dragged outside by Kazuki. The next few lines could symbolize how Miri entering his life turned everything he was used to upside down, and his perception of life is slowly being torn down by Miri as he learns what it means to love and be loved in a parental way. The chorus just further drives in the fact that he truly has no idea what ‘love’ is, literally saying ‘How the heck should I know?’, but also that he doesn’t entirely understand Kazuki and why he’s so adamant on being a good parent. The ‘I don’t know what’s going on in your head’ line is perfectly fitting for ep6 when Rei was questioning a lot of the things coming out of Kazuki’s mouth (same. ‘our genes’ bro what). He’s also dragged through shenanigans time and time again by Kazuki and despite his complaining, he goes along with it anyway. The line about being unfairly friendly could be towards Miri or Kazuki, since sunshine Miri accepted Rei as he is and she loves her Papa no matter how emotionally dead he is, but also because Kazuki is probably the only real friend Rei has (which is something I’m sure will be explored in a future episode. Hopefully). The last one is directed at Miri, since Miri is also able to drag Rei into playing with her and doing other things despite his reluctance (just look at ep3). However, he still very much acts like an irresponsible child and more like Miri's sibling that Kazuki also has to take care of, so he has a long way to go before he's any sort of model parent…

Kazuki on the other hand is 100% symbolized in the second verse of the song.

I will die on this hill because there’s literally no counter argument after ep7, where we are explicitly shown that Kazuki is clinging on to his past to his own detriment. He’s scared of changing because he’s scared of forgetting Yuzuko if he’s fulfilled by something else (his family). He also calls himself pathetic in ep7, connecting the line about laughing ‘at my pitiful self’. This part of the song truly captures how Kazuki feels on the inside for the first 6 episode and the majority of ep7. The chorus could be a bit different in regards to 'it's not fair that you're so friendly', since that could be directed at Karin because she wants Kazuki to be able to move on and be happy with what he has since she believes that that's what Yuzuko would've wanted.

The ending lyrics symbolize that changing and looking towards the unpredictable future is okay, but oh my god did the ending hit like a freight train after episode 7. Just. Just holy emotional damage. Oh. My god.

The ending - My Plan by DURDN

I was able to find a translation that was basically the same as the Crunchyroll one on Genius Lyrics to reference the second verse yipee but I also included screenshots from the ED itself of course

I cannot get over how impactful this song became as the ED, especially at the end of episode 7. It’s basically an entire episode dedicated to Kazuki’s backstory, which we were shown glimpses of back in ep1 for crying out loud. And oh my lord it did not disappoint, that’s for sure. Emotional damage for everyone. So much character development in one single episode. I just--it's just great. That's all I can say.

I love this image and it lives in my head rent free. Sleeping Rei is always 10/10

The song has a theme of accepting the future and that things are going to change, but that it’s okay because there will always be something consistent there, like a home to come back to every day. It also has a lot of references to love, like the 'I softly whisper a lullaby' and 'let's try to share our love together', which is symbolic of Kazuki as a father. It doesn't really have any romantic connotations at all, it's just wholesomeness. Plus 'I chased after you as you ran barefoot' is reminiscent of the few seconds in the OP where we actually see Kazuki running past other people going the opposite direction, and then following behind Miri with Rei at his side.

Also episode 7 really brings out the last 5 lines, from 'and it'll shine down on our sadness' to 'when the future is unpredictable'. That scene where Karin told Kazuki that he should move on and be happy with what he has because that's what Yukuzo would've wanted, and then the rain stops so the sun can come out and shines on Kazuki's new outlook on the future and accepting change... It's so fucking beautiful and symbolic. Not to mention it's taking place where he and Yuzuko first met, where she was his proverbial ray of hope when he was wounded in the rain, now the rain stops and Kazuki is able to see hope in his future with his new family. I just cannot express how impressive that is from a storytelling standpoint, and it's all literally just using the changing of the weather.

Also the line of 'maybe one day, you'll surpass me' could be referencing how Kazuki wants Miri to be able to have the things he never did: a family, stability, and that familial love. Kazuki is painfully self-aware that he became a hitman (and a malewife) because he grew up with no parents and had to fend for himself his whole life. He wants to make sure Miri never has to go through any of that, and have more opportunities that he never did when she gets older.

The ending song doesn't really fit Rei as a character, even in the part not used in the ED. The second verse is still very much relating to Kazuki and Miri's interactions day-to-day and him enjoying raising Miri, and knowing he'll be endeared by everything she does no matter how old she gets (like any other parent, I assume. idk I'm a Rei kinnie). But we know that Miri is changing Rei slowly, from ep3 when he begins to see what being a Papa means to ep7 when he learns that sometimes taking care of another human being can make you feel powerless in the face of a 'crisis'. Most other times we only really see him being a real parent to Miri when he's dragged into it by Kazuki, but ep7 showed him going from irresponsible second child of the household to going to Kyu-chan in a panic because Miri is sick and he has no idea what to do as a parent. Hopefully we get to see this built upon further in the coming episodes, even if we don't get to explore his backstory as much as we have Kazuki's this season.

More KHR recs

Ao3

The Decimo's Husband by The GreatTribbleEmpire

Desperate to not become 10th, Tsuna offers to abdicate to Xanxus. When that won't work, Tsuna doubles down and proposes marriage. Xanxus accepts.

Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story by Little_Lady_Otaku

When Xanxus is defeated by Nono after the coup attempt, his Flames are sealed and is shipped off to Japan. How can the girl next door help him? Ghosts Whisperer!Tsuna. The scenes with the ghosts are great, especially when they haunt the Varia.

Light Up the Sky by Millarca

Naruto. Naruto is reborn as Tsuna. At least the freeloader in his gut is along for the ride. Tsuna gets into the Mafia early, makes some genin teams, founds Konoha, and fucks with everyone's minds. Also, Kurama is utterly delighted by all his grandkids.

In Which Only Tsuna Is Surprised by OnceInABlueMoon

In which everyone except Tsuna knew about Tsuna and Enma's marriage.

Accidentally Courting Your Assassin by LadyHallen

HP. Fem!HP/Reborn. When trying to get in contact with the Vongola, Harriet mistakes who is the boss and how to contact them. This leads to series of escalating attempts to better court the other.

Mission Failed by IWP_chan

The Shimon Family had a Plan. At least until the target decided he had something better to do: Enma. Tsuna/Enma

Ruminant by AlunaGray

Naruto. Hibari Kyoya is reborn as Nara Shikamaru's older sister. The Nara Clan blames Shikaku for this.

A Collector's Guide to Caring For Your Pets by Ourliazo

7 yr old Kyoya enjoys making herbivores spontaneously combust. Also Known As: Kyoya collects all the Flame Active kids in Namimori because they have pretty colors.

La belle dame sans merci by Dissenter

Kyoko has a smile full of knives and Tsuna loves her for it desperately. Takes inspiration from the War Sky/Home Sky trope. Kyoko the War Sky and Tsuna the Home Sky.

When the Nightingale Sings by Sanjuno

Those with access to the Flames of Dying Will all have a bit of Other in their ancestry. Something that is both more and less than Human, and Skies are the least Human of all the Flame Types. Putting a Sky under a Seal puts their Flames under pressure. Like the Nightingale in a cage who refuses to sing, a Sky under a Seal suffers in silence... ... until that seal breaks, and the Sky roars to cast the heavens down.

Renew by readerdreamer5625

BNHA. Izuku just got diagnosed Quirkless and his life is rapidly degrading. Then he meets a man in a fedora in his dreams and his life changes once more. Izu taught by Reborn. Sun User Izuku.

Crossover Fixits to Make Westeros Less Miserably Doomed by Sanjuno

Series where other characters are reborn into Westeros and how they improve it. Natuto, Star Wars, FFXV & VII, Code Geass, Avengers, KHR and Transformers

Karma and the Repercussions Thereof by Sanjuno

Series of Naruto characters being reborn into KHRverse. Main story about KakaObi and sidestories have MadaTobi and Mada's brothers as Hibaris, along with a funny little AU about MadaTobi accidentally being sent back to Warring Clan Era during a battle. The KakaObi story is beautiful. Kakashi torments Obito so wonderfully. Kakashi's new Aunt is a Queen and I love her.

Made of...by Seito

Made Of... is a universe where (usually) these things happen: 1) Canon Guardians are not Guardians 2) Most likely a crossover 3) Reborn never wins 4) Vongola can go die on a hill. Xover with many fandoms. OP, Avengers, Kaito Kid, Persona 5, and more.

Alaudidae by AmbroiseFrambroise

BNHA. Kyoya has been reborn in a world of Quirks. Thank God he's quirkless. In this world, Inko marries a different Hisashi. No Izuku.

The War of the Heavens by Dissenter

War Sky Tsuna and Home Sky Kyoya declare War on the Vongola.

Now in the Errant Sun by Dissenter

Reborn come to make Tsuna into a Mafia Boss. No one told him he was going to have to wrangle a bunch of student hippie activists.

Kuwabara is Tired of this Crap by Snowywinter1

YYH. Kuwabara is Skull. The aftermath of the Arcobalenco Curse. Be afraid, Luce.

Revisionist History, the Vongola Way by Dissenter

Time travel fix it series. Kyoya (complete fic) declares a new world order and all shall fall before him. Gokudera (wip) is determined to find his Sky once more. Wacky road trip feat. Mukuro, Ken, Chikusa, Spanner and Dino.

Don't Hold Your Breath (we're going to live) by SilverRoseAri

Zombie Apocolypse. Bamf!Tsuna Even with the end of the world, Tsuna still gathers his Gaurdians.

Cat's Paws by Sanjuno

Drabble series. When the 10th Gen die, the Box Animals decide that this is Unacceptable. So they turn back time and leaves the world a little... different. Youkaiesque world. Flame users have a more animalistic traits. In Tsuna's snippet, he completely transforms. Even Nana can't just accept this without a few questions.

You Can't Take the Sky From Me by Lilymoncat

HP. Oleander Evans, also known as Skull de Mort, had no idea that visiting his sister Petunia was going to fuck up his life.

The first time as tragedy, the second time as farce by Dissenter

Naruto. The 10th Gen and the girls are reborn into Naruto a year younger. Mukuro fucks with Danzo as a ROOT member, Chrome's an Uchiha, Gokudera's a Nara (his Clan hates his dad so much for his whoops baby), Lambo's a sickly (thin) Akamichi, Kyoya is related to Lee, Ryohei and Kyoko are Harunos, Haru's a Aburame. It's just so good. Great meta. Has women being awesome.

Snow Leopard, Not Lion by RinRin

Naruto. Tobirama is reborn as Tsuna. As are a number of Naruto characters. Madara as Kyoya.

Say Boys, Don't You See Them Bones by Adel Mortescryche(Mortescryche)

Crack treated seriously. Tsuna's a Corpse Whisperer. Everywhere he goes in the Varia Mansion, he finds bodies.

dead anime moms by exocara

Tsuna's mom wears her hair in a side pony tail. He knows what that means and he's not having it.

All According to Script by PurpleButtons0203

Tsuna is raised knowing he's a main character. Nana teaches her son to be genre savvy. Cracky.

Grapes of Wrath by WOFWalker

After Xanxus is frozen, his spirit begins haunting the Vongola lines. Tsuna is the first to see him. Xanxus decides that Tsuna should be Varia Quality, to the boy's despair.

Ok, that's officially all of my best bookmarked fics.

I hope you all love them!

You feed me so so well, darling

Got some more :D

1: what apps do they like to use? I can see them using twitter & maybe TikTok; probably do silly videos on there.

2: did Nightwing & starfire, plus mar’i tried to hide their superhero identity from Jake? (Probably did the same before mar’i got her powers too.)

3: how would a starburst duo movie start?

4: besides spider-man, do they like other spider-man stuff like the venom movie?

5: do they play battle royale games? I can see them both playing Fortnite (& doing the dances both in & out of costumes) but Chris likes COD Warzone & Jake like apex legends.

6: silly question, since they are pre-teens almost & have girlfriends, what do they prefer: butts or boobs? or personality XD

Sorry for the wait @gothicghost2000 But Here we are XD

1. They have three primary social apps: YouTube (the first one respectively), Twitter and Tumblr. All three apps have specific tools The Duo can use for their particular hobbies and interests, Tumblr for example being the blog space where they can give their predicts and hypotheses about their favorite ongoing shows and where it can go from there.

YouTube is their video library place, for all sorts including live streams, recaps of favorite shows/games, and yes thank to the Shorts function, TikTok style videos. Chris and Jake thankfully have both Jake’s tech expertise and even Oracle on some occasions to help them make sure they don’t get busted for copyright by the algorithms.

2. Not entirely actually. Even as a toddler, Jake was a relatively smart cookie and everyone knew it so before he was able to piece it altogether by the time he was 3 to 4 in his own way, Dick and Kory came clean to him about everything and even Mar’i pitched in about her training to one day be a great superhero like Momma and Daddy are since she has powers while Jake’s are still not kicking in.

I can just imagine little Jakey looking at his family, taking it all in and then finally breaking the silence saying “Does that mean I blast lasers from my eyes too later?” Akin to when Marky found out his powers at the end did the original Invincible comic

3. Basically I’d have first a colorful and detailed title sequence that through simple comic panels and even some motion comic elements, details the basics of how the Duo were born, Chris’ arrival on Earth and adoption by the Kents, the two first meeting as little kids who look up to their parents as their heroes, Jake’s power first kicking in when fending off a bully at school, the Duo training on their powers together and gaining renown slow but steadily, then once the title scene ends, we open with a bang as we are catching up with the Duo in the middle of a massive superhero battle in Metropolis against all sorts of baddies and villains, something akin to the opening shots of Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith

4. They have a good laugh and thrill at the first and second Venom movies respectively. They also are big time fans of the Spiderverse films; there actually is a strongly passionate debate between Chris and Jake over which Spidey films are better. Chris vouches for the Raimi trilogy while Jake sides firmly with Spiderverse. Other than all that though, both also watch every single Spidey animated series, good or bad, collect what their friends online consider the best runs in both Marvel Prime and the Ultimate Universe (the latter Jake is really into thanks to his Uncle Tim(my) loving Ultimate Spidey) and regularly playing co op on the Playstation games

5. Only once a month really and it’s mainly Fortnite. I can’t really see them playing COD or Apex not just because those two are more FPS centric which even if fictional in universe doesn’t sit that well with them for various reasons, but also for COD especially there egregious money practices from all that miscellaneous DLC, Lootboxes when they are a thing, battle passes, etc. it just doesn’t sit right even if technically Jake can be considered a millionaire’s kid at best

6. Personality. Full stop. Even if they’re aware of the more scandalous and fanservice side of true love, they have the content of a female’s character above physical appearance of any kind. Chris and Jake respect girls and women, plain and simple.

This or That? Tag

Thank you for tagging me @writernopal ! You can find her post here, go read it ! 💜 I had a lot of fun developing the answers, sorry if it's all over the place ^^

|| HISTORICAL or FUTURISTIC ||

I love to read historical novels but writing them is waaaayyy above my competence level and I know I would get lost in the research part of it instead of, you know, actually, writing it. So futuristic it is because I can bullshit my way through it.

|| OPENING or CLOSING CHAPTER ||

CLOSING CHAPTER!!! I can't wait to get to the one in La Fledgling! I'm gonna break my own heart, it's going to be great!

|| LIGHT+FLUFFY or DARK+GRITTY ||

I wish I could write light and fluffy things but I can't. It might be pathological at this point. I tried to write a fluffy mermaid AU and Lou drowned in the first chapter, so now I give up. I'll accept my fate.

|| ANIMAL COMPANION or FOUND FAMILY ||

I have to choose animal companion because one of my favourite character (Lorelei, immortal witch, high priestess of Némésis goddess of revenge) has a familiar named Doll. It's a raven who believes himself to be a bird of prey but is actually just... broken. It once tried to incubate a skunk and to eat a cat, so. He can't see windows and can cut through steel with his beak (through sheer determination and will). I love it with all my heart. I've only had him for twelve years, but if anything ever happened to him, I would kill to get him back 🤺🤺🤺

|| HORROR or ROMANCE ||

Romance that becomes horrifying, where you would do anything for your partner, even betraying your values and your faith, to the point where you can't recognize the person looking at you through the mirror. Or where your lover becomes something other and you're not sure how to love her anymore.

(On this not, there's a great novel Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield where one of the woman is marine biologist and comes back to her wife *wrong* after six months lost at sea. It's terrifying, it's great!)

|| HARD MAGIC SYSTEM or SOFT MAGIC SYSTEM ||

Fuck rules. Do whatever you want! Why do dragons exist in my world? Because the god of poison had children with a crocodile metamorph and she gave birth to the dragons, next question! Why is Lorelei's magic different from the others'? Because she's OP and I love her and she's my chosen one! Why can Jo [REDACTED] because. That's it. That's my justification. I do what I want as long as it's fun 💃‍

|| STANDALONE or SERIES ||

I always say I'm gonna write a standalone and I rarely succeed. I blame it on my favourite books I read as a child which were all super long series with like 50 books in it, spanning generations and thousands of years (hi Heralds of Valdemar and The ballad of Pern) I also blame them for making me write dragons and over-powered women. I love you, you're the best, mwah!

|| ONE PROJECT AT A TIME or ALWAYS JUGGLING 2+ ||

I'm always switching between WIPs depending on my mood and my motivation. I can put aside a project for months (hi book 3 of WsT... I'm coming back for you baby, I'm coming back for you!), start three new WIPs, and then go back to one of my ancients projects. Every time I try to persuade myself to only work on one thing I get frustrated and end up not writing at all so I just let my creativity take me wherever. I'm not even a passenger anymore, I'm stuck in the trunk of the car, scribbling madly and trying to understand what's going on. It's not going well.

|| ON AWARD WINNER or ONE BESTSELLER ||

I don't really care about awards. Like sure it'd be nice to know critics and judges liked mu book enough to give me a Hugo or a Nebula or whatever, but what I really want is for *actual people* to love my stories. I hope I can touch at least one person with my silly little characters and their struggles. (Also, I want the fanfics and the fan-arts 😂)

|| FANTASY OR SCI-FI ||

I love sci-fi, especially sci-fi stories where humanity has to leave earth and terraform/colonize other planets, I love exodus. I also love to just write whatever like an archeology student getting kidnapped but an alien sect because they think she can resurrect their leader. And I love fantasy because I love swords, and dragons, and magic, and lesbians (and lesbian dragon shapeshifters with a sword), and prophecies. I love being able to craft a world and society and to just... have fun.

|| CHARACTER DESCRIPTION or SETTING DESCRIPTION ||

I don't do it enough, but I love setting descriptions because it helps paint a picture and you can leave little nuggets of foreshadowing in it. (You can also do it with character description but I think I might be too obvious when I do that XD)

|| FIRST DRAFT or FINAL DRAFT ||

First draft is a pain in the ass but I actually love the process of figuring out what the fuck is going on, who the characters are, what they want, what they need. It's like getting to know someone but sudoku like. If you don't put the numbers in the right order you understand nothing. (It's a bad comparison, I hate sudoku, but you get what I mean). Also, what the fuck is a final draft? I've never met her. i always want to change something even after I'm done. Which is also why publishing scares me so much : what if I want to change something and can't because it's already been printed? Nightmare 😱

|| LOVE TRIANGLE IN EVERYTHING or NO ROMANTIC ARCS ||

I'd rather have no romantic arc ever again than suffer through a poorly written love triangle once again. I'm tired of love triangles. Be original at least and give me a love octagon or something. I don't know dude, make one of them die in a war, her wife mourns then starts dating again and then, she comes back after being MIA for years. Don't make it bland between the dark-haired bad boy and the blond boy next door, please I'm begging you. And if you really can't write any other romance, then please just give me an action novel or a fantasy novel or a horror novel without any romance. Please. No more love triangles.

|| CONSTANT SANDSTORM or RAINSTORM ||

Rainstorm if I'm inside! It's so soothing, especially at night. I love thunder and lightning, I love being comfy in my bed, listening to the rain 🥰

Gently tagging @liv-is, @ladyniniane & @autumnalwalker if you haven't done it yet 😊

so i found this post of urs on pinterest https://at.tumblr.com/redrobin-detective/so-ive-been-rereading-some-parts-of-red-robin-and/pftgo9w6odsd

and someone commented that ‘op is being dramatic actually everyone was worried about tim and wanted to help and tim pushed them away’ and it made me a little angry bc like yea to some extent thats true but also they legit made him think he was losing it lmao like did we read the same comic

(why am I on pinterest lol) OP is very dramatic but aside from that the commentator also has a point too. Yes! Previous set up from Robin and other comics showed that Tim was having problems with the Batfam. But!!! Like that comment said, they were worried about Tim and very much did not want him to run away. In the 3 issue Batman special of Blackest Night, Dick expressed worry about Tim being away, about how good it was to see him again. If I remember correctly he directly asked Tim to stay in Gotham, I think coded as 'to help with Damian' which Tim dismissed.

That's what makes Red Robin so interesting and what sparked my jumping ship from a Dick to Tim stannie. Tim is an unreliable narrator in his story. Especially in the first arc of RR, you can feel Tim's exhaustion, paranoia and desperation to be right affecting his perspective and actions. I knew the batfam hadn't overtly abandoned him (no matter what I say when I'm being Dramatic), I knew the decision he was making were bad despite his justification. It was watching a trainwreck in slow motion to watch a character be so lost in their own neurosis that they misinterpret a lot of what's happening around them. And it also makes the continuation of Red Robin very satisfying, watching Tim pull himself back together, lean again on the people in his life and be a little more sane. That was what drew me to the series and Tim's character in general. Also what 17 year old emo hasn't accused all their friends and family of hating them?

RR, like Robin before it, is filtered all through Tim's POV including all his biases and feelings and mental illnesses. Reading Red Robin, one only needs passing knowledge of the Batfam to know there is something deeply wrong with this kid and he should Not be on his own. Thats what makes the story so interesting :)

I trust your opinion on The Flash most of all, so how did you feel about Cecile’s character trajectory? I was not a fan of what they did with her character, but I also thought the level of hate she ended up getting seemed unjustified? Everything from the way she was dealing with her grief over Joe’s death during Armageddon to her getting a super suit, she was torn apart for. I never understood the hyper-focus on her in later seasons, but I also think the hate the she gets is insane.

Thank you for asking me this. I'm actually excited to write another Flash essay-response. I missed this.

In short, yes, I found Cecile's meta arc frustrating and confusing but I do not hate her character nor do I have an issue with a middle-aged hero existing.

The problem and fandom obsession with Cecile is multifaceted. She was a doomed character of inherently flawed writing, but her fall from grace through fandom's eyes is nothing short of misogynoir.

The Seal ??? you're going to compare a black woman to an animal for your satisfaction? In a world where black women are constantly described as animalistic and primitive? There is only one character who gets just as much ceaseless vitriolic hate as Cecile and that is Iris.

First and foremost, I would like to raise that where I have seen the absolute worst treatment towards Cecile and Dani N is Twitter--I left Flash Twitter 5 years ago (though I was never truly fully on it) because of the sheer racial animosity I felt on there as a biracial person. I've read so much disgusting racialized hate towards Dani N (including from fans of Candice and Iris, no less and it saddens me to see the community disillusioned into believing that to be protective of a black lead means that any other black character is an enemy destined to be pitted against her) especially in terms of questioning or diminishing her blackness. It was disgusting and it still is.

The problem with empaths/telepaths/mind control powers is that they become limitless very quickly when no boundaries are set in place. Her powers were confusing and used for exceedingly expository purposes that felt like a cop-out the longer it went on. I cannot tell you how many times I have lost my understanding of the "science" plots in the last 3 and a half seasons and that is a good chunk of Cecile's meta problems.

Season 4 worked because Cecile's powers were bounded to her pregnancy. She served as an adequate neutralizer against The Thinker which was needed at the time. Her powers should've had an expiry date and ended when Jenna was born. Or, more accurately, her powers should've been Jenna's. Cecile's powers manifested upon Jenna's conception, it would've served that the source of her abilities came from the baby, not herself. Without going into too much detail, this could've nicely allowed Nora (and Bart) to have family closer in age to be a part of their eventual Flash Fam team roster. Of course, it didn't pan out that way. They needed to give Cecile's powers concrete limits without evolving or "levelling up" in a way that overshadows the titular character. This is a given! They gave her everything and it was ridiculous, empath/telepathy/mind possession/emotive projection - like yeah. It's too much. It's annoying and it's too much!

In Stargirl, the Brainwaves were eliminated early on in the series because they were OP. Those writers were cognizant of that fact and woven in a compelling story that served to ensure that the empath/mind control characters were set in their place without overthrowing the entire capacity of the main heroes of the show.

Cecile made a great lawyer, but she failed spectacularly at all of her crucial lawyering post s3.

And it's a writing problem. Lazy effort went into how to include any in-universe plausible legal processes in this show. S4 Barry trial and S7 KF trial are glaringly obvious examples like this. But we should have known that the majority of the responsibility of these flaws lays in the hands of the writers inability to do justice to ANY of their female characters, which goes exponentially for the black women. So of course I am not surprised that they blundered with Cecile as she was promoted from supporting to main cast.

Nora Allen? Murdered (x150). Tess Morgan, the founder of STAR LABS name? Murdered & never revived unlike the 500 Wells. Linda? Disappeared. Francine? Dead. Tina McGee? Disappeared. Jesse? Erased from existence. Caitlin/Killer Frost/Crystal Frost/Khione? Murdered three times, reduced to repetitive abusive love interest storylines and retconned storylines into oblivion. Cynthia? Murdered. Kamilla? Treated like dirt & disappeared. Marlize? Same. Sue? Disappeared. Joanie? Disappeared. Jenna? Disappeared. Carla and Cisco's mom? Both also awful. Meena? Disappeared. Alexa? Who? Esperanza? Murdered. Allegra was okay ish, and I know there are more (Ralph's mom, Becky Sharpe, but really, I think I've made my point...) but that literally leaves us with Cecile, Iris, and Nora I/II as our black female leads who had to face the brunt of the worst writing (and most hatred when it was their "time" to shine).

This show cannot execute motherhood properly. It refuses to. See: Iris s5 and literally every mother to ever mother on this show except for Nora Allen...

But also, both the creators and the fandom seem to hold this ideology that motherhood is the end all and be all of life and value? Show runners have said again and again that The Flash would have to end when Iris is pregnant because that's when it's "over" ??? I did not understand that when it was first said and I still do not understand that. This concept of femininity directly tied to the merit associated to motherhood is a good chunk of the reasoning behind people claim to hate Cecile--Because she is a superhero who has sacrificed as a single mother and now struggles with balancing her desires vs her obligations? Cecile, who has been written as a black woman who canonically struggled to society's standards of excellence causing her stress and anguish to the point of mental break? I appreciated the s7 psycho-pirate and mental health struggles she had - so I wasn't horrified to see that she struggled with grief in s8's plot. The type of mental health issues that these storylines explored is a real lived experience that many women have, and I find it fascinating that there is this double standard here. This is a superhero show. Like...we're hating her for, what, exactly? For being a superhero and wanting to help people?

I mourn Cecile's "downfall" because she was a great addition to the West family as a supportive cast. I mourn the fact that Iris and Cecile never really had a great relationship despite both being mains. I mourn the fact that she was given more weight than Iris in the last season instead of supporting and encouraging her. Because that's why her role was elevated in the last season, to replace Joe in his absence as Iris' number #1 cheerleader. But it never properly translated that way and that is a shame. That said, her role in the show shouldn't have been strictly reduced to "Mother" and "Grandmother" --That isn't fair. I adored the way she spoke to Nora I in s5 but she did deserve to go on adventures the same way Joe has since s1. Why shouldn't she? I think this is what Eric Wallace was trying to achieve and I applaud him for the idea but have to criticize the execution. The show has failed her in her area of expertise of being a successful lawyer, mocked her by putting her through a pregnancy for a child they couldn't commit to, and then kicked her character into the lion's den for death by turning her into an OP'd meta at the mercy of a prejudiced fanbase already notoriously well-known for mistreating black talent. This could've easily been avoided with more clever solutions that positions Barry--the creator of Gideon--as the focus and true mastermind behind Team Flash plans.

phew it's been a busy week! in between life stuff, prepping for an exam on sunday and finishing all these books, i feel like i've been in go mode all week!

i started and finished the house in the cerulean sea by tj klune, about a inspector for state-run orphanages for magical children who gets sent on an assignment to an orphanage with the antichrist and learns what found family means. t only took me a few days to read, it's incredibly easy to sit with and just read for long periods of time, which i think i needed after some dense sci-fi. it's a bit heavy handed in its message in places (the word groupthink was also used at one point), but if you can look past that this is a perfectly pleasant way to spend an afternoon or two. not mind-blowing, but it brought a smile to my face.

worth mentioning is the accusations that the (white) author was using (specifically canadian) residential schools for his own gain. honestly, without knowing that going into it, i'm pretty sure i would never have made the connection (though that might be on me) and i'd bought the book before i found out about this. there's a (positive) discussion of it in this reddit thread (which i'm not linking because i necessarily agree with op, simply that it's comprehensive) and (a negative) one in this one and it's worth looking into on your own before deciding to read the book.

i also finished left-handed booksellers of london which was fine? i enjoyed it enough that i'm interested in reading book two, but i *despise* susan as a character asdfghjkl she spends the entire book going 'what? what?' and doesn't really grow from this. she had so much potential (a shaven headed punk girl in the 80s!) but fell very flat for me. cos of that the romance between her and merlin also felt like an afterthought. the world is great tho, and every time a new character or thing came up i was always interested to see what it was. as a YA book, it was enjoyable. the audiobook performance was occasionally annoying (which maybe contributed to my dislike of susan), but on the whole it's pretty good. she does accents well.

for manga, i read watashi no tadashii oniichan vol 1 again, the manga about a woman looking for her older brother and falling in love with the cute insomniac she works with, but properly this time. still loved it, the building of relationships and reveals is great and i'm really looking forward to finishing the series.

i also read ao haru ride vol 1, which is a classic but i've never actually picked it up before now. it's about a girl who falls in love with a boy in middle school, but then there's a misunderstanding and he moves away, only for them to reunite in high school. it explores their new relationship and how they've changed as people in the intervening years. i *loved* this, i devoured it in one sitting and am very, very sad i don't have the rest of the series. the writing is fantastic, the characters are already amazing, would recommend if you're into character-driven stories and/or romance and haven't picked it up yet.

in terms of stuff i've started, i'm about a third of the way through the traitor baru cormorant and oh my god??? this is amazing???? it's a political fantasy about a girl whose island nation gets colonised by the neighbouring empire and how she's planning to dismantle it from the inside. it's such an angry book, but in the best possible way. deals pretty heavily with colonialism and homophobia (especially in the beginning), with references to sexual assault, so bear that in mind before picking it up, but the writing is exquisite, and it's so cleverly written. also accounting, lots of accounting.

for audiobook i was planning to listen to a guide to imperial china but it wasn't available, so i went with skulduggery pleasant playing with fire (book 2 in the series) which is a nice comforting read. a character will turn up and i'll get hit with a blast of nostalgia, like oh it's you! and i'm enjoying it just like i did the first one.

that's it for me, i'll check in again next week! have a good week everybody!