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pretty-little-mind33 · 1 month

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Kraven The Hunter x fem!reader

Summary: You meet a dangerous stranger in the woods...

Genre: SMUT (nsfm)

Warnings: kinda dark but still tame, cheating (reader), unprotected sex (pls use contraceptives in real life!), oral sex (m receiving), praise kink, degradation kink, rough sex, riding, he spits in reader's mouth 👀, kissing (duh), fingering, light misogyny, ik he has a name but i use Kraven in this, bad russian google translate maybe (I AM SO SORRY I DID MY BEST—if you speak Russian and have any suggestions… please 🙏 ) LISTEN…I'M SORRY LIKE I COULD NOT RESIST WRITING FOR HIM…HAVE YOU SEEN HIM? Probably NOT comic accurate…

You don't know what you hate more at the moment—your boyfriend or the continuous sweat forming on your hairline from the dampness and heat. It's becoming dark outside, which should cool the air and help with the heat but not as much with how pissed you are at Chris.

With a small squeal, you stumble on the roots of a tree, gasping as your ankle twists awkwardly in your hiking shoes and the buzz of an insect flies around your ear. You swat your hand near your cheekbone. You're holding the branches you'd found in one arm now as the stickiness of the air makes your skin feel heavy.

Screw you bugs!

Screw you woods!

And most of all screw you Chris!

You're too immersed in your hatred that you don't realize you've fallen into an animal trap until it's too late. You scream, the branches falling from your arm as your body folds and the net wraps around you, pulling you up into the air. The rope burns your exposed skin as you squirm. This had to be a nightmare, some sick cruel joke Chris is playing on you. You half hope he'll jump out from behind the bushes and laugh in your face.

You wait in silence for a moment but your boyfriend doesn't show up.

"Help!" You scream out helplessly, "Is anyone there? Please, I-I'm trapped," you call.

"Hmm, yes, that is the point of one of those," a deep voice drawls from behind you and you wince. You try to strain your neck to look at the newcomer but you can't move enough to see who it is. It certainly isn't Chris. Chris doesn't sound like that.

"Please, can you help me?" you plead shamelessly now.

Your heart is beating so hard. You hear the creak of leaves and dirt as whoever stands behind you walks closer to you. You feel them turn the entire net around and soon you're face to face with dark piercing golden eyes. A color you can only describe as supernatural.

"Now why would I help you? You stumbled into my trap—that makes you my prize."

The man is tall and strong. His shoulders are broad and his hair curls messily across his forehead. He's wearing an open vest made of brown leather and adorned with fur, thick leather bracers, and a necklace where three animal teeth hang.

You concentrate on the sharpness of the teeth for a while, ignoring how very much shirtless the man is against them, but eventually you lose focus as with a swift motion, he uses a knife he'd taken from his belt to cut the net and you crash to the ground.

Immediately, the dirt sticks to your sweaty skin as you scramble up onto your feet. You brush hair from your face and stumble back, almost falling again until the man's large, calloused hand finds your forearm and he holds you still. "Calm down," he says hoarsely, his eyes narrowing and his grip tightening.

"You don't wanna run from me, gorgeous. Clearly, you don't know your left and right around here but I do. So, stay still for me so I can think about what I'm gonna do with you."

He has a thick accent and you find yourself nodding. He drops your arm and you don't move. You look up at him as he looks around, rubbing his hand over his jaw like he's debating his next moves. You can see his knife, which he has secured into his belt again, glistens with blood and your stomach churns.

"Please don't hurt me," you whisper.

The man stares at you blankly, his eyebrows crease as he looks you up and down. After a moment, the corners of his lips curl upwards and he moves closer. You squeeze your eyes shut, scared, and you gasp inaudibly as a tear escapes you.

The man's thumb wipes it away, his hand cupping your cheek and he speaks a language you don't understand—russian you assume—"Я бы никогда не подумал причинить тебе боль, (I would never dream of hurting you)," His tone seems sweeter than how he'd spoken before but all hopes of him translating what he'd said disappear when he asks:

"Why are you out here all alone?"

You recover from his touch as it leaves you and you try and explain, "I'm not alone. My boyfriend," you turn to look behind you but all you see is the trees and hear the rustling of animals in the shadows, "is around here somewhere," you finish.

"He left you? Alone? Now? It's almost dark," the man accuses as if it had been your choice.

"I- I was supposed to bring branches for the fire," you say quickly, gesturing to the branches that had fallen from your arms. The man looks where you're pointing and chuckles darkly.

"Oh, милый (darling), those aren't branches. Those aren't even twigs."

You glare at him, not finding it funny at all, "Well, I couldn't carry the heavier ones," you defend and the man interrupts with another chuckle.

"Ah," he smirks, "so why was it you who went out? Can your man not care for you properly?"

You scrunch your nose, "What's that supposed to mean?"

The man's smirk turns into a smile, his teeth showing, and you can't help but feel butterflies in your stomach as he smiles. He's handsome—almost too handsome for someone who looks like they live in the woods.

"I mean," he drawls, leaning in even closer, "what kind of man allows his woman to do all his labor, leaving her on her lonesome and vulnerable to bad men like me?" Your breath hitches and your eyes widen when he finishes, "Your man is a pathetic little boy who doesn't deserve a woman like you."

Your mind races. You want to defend Chris, tell this man that Chirs is an amazing, loving, boyfriend—but another part of you can't deny Chris had basically coerced you onto this hike, on your birthday nonetheless, and then promptly abandoned you to fend for yourself.

However, those details weren't what your mind latched onto. No. As you stare at the handsome stranger, his words ring in your ears; "bad men like me"

The man can tell and he chuckles, "Don't look so scared. I like you. You're the most entertainment I've had in a while. Come," he beckons you over, turning around and gathering his net over his shoulder. When you don't follow instantly he calls out, "I can offer you shelter and food, and a fire," he adds with a glance over his shoulder, "Unless you'd rather find your way back to your boyfriend. Your choice, милый (darling)."

So, you end up in the man's home. The man—who had finally introduced himself as Kraven— lives in a small cabin that's obviously been worn out by time and weather. All the furniture looks barely used—as if there hasn't been life inside this cabin for a long time.

Kraven's hospitality is coarse and oddly demanding as he pours you some honey tea he made himself and hands you some bread. You don't complain, you're starving. As Kraven makes a fire, he mumbles things in Russian and occasionally he'll look over at you, sending a shiver up your spine. Your hair is wet from the shower you just had and the strands stick to your cheeks.

Your mind wanders to Chris. Is he okay? It is a warmer night—so he really shouldn't freeze to death. You feel guilty for having accepted Kraven's offer but your thoughts are interrupted by the fire starting and Kraven stands. He runs a hand in his curls and drops his vest on the couch near you. You look up, suddenly extra aware of how shirtless and toned he is.

"Продолжай смотреть на меня так, и у меня не будет другого выбора, кроме как трахнуть тебя прямо здесь и сейчас, милый, (Keep looking at me like that and I'll have no choice but to fuck you right here and now, darling)," Kraven says in a growl and the only word you recognize is the last one since he's used it a few times.

"What does милый mean?" you ask, attempting to pronounce the word but fumbling it. Kraven smirks and tilts his head as he walks closer until he's sitting next to you.

"It's a term of endearment," he chuckles, "like darling—or honey."

You feel your cheeks burn. It's almost worse to hear him explain the term rather than just using it. You look down at your hands, feeling Kraven's warmth next to you. He smells like pine-wood and ashes and the scent is invading. You feel safer near him then you'd ever felt in Chris's arms. Guilt settles in your stomach again.

"Ты так сладко пахнешь. (you smell so sweet)," Kraven says again and his hand comes up to move some stray hairs behind your ear. The air shifts and sexual tension settles around you and the feeling dances across your skin with fervor.

You don't dare turn your head to look at him, afraid of how he's staring. "What does that all mean? The Russian?" you mutter.

"It means I want to kiss you, doll," Kraven chuckles and his hand cups your chin and he turns your head so you're staring at him. Your eyes are round and he chuckles, "what do you say милый (darling)? Will you indulge me? I wanna see if you taste as good as I think you do."

Your heart jumps in your throat and suddenly you feel very small compared to him. Your eyes flicker to his lips and then up to look into his eyes. They sparkle darkly and you wonder if anyone has ever been able to say no to those eyes. You surely won't be the first. You nod.

Kraven leans in and captures your lips with passion so fierce you're afraid your lips will bruise. Still, they slide across his easily and it's as if you've been molded for one another. Kraven's hands tighten in your hair, bunching up the strands so he can control your head movements. Control. His entire demeanor screams control.

"Good girl," he mutters with a smirk against your lips and his hands move to grip your hips. You're wearing some shorts and a shirt you found in the bedroom when you changed from your shower.

You gasp as he helps you up and you straddle him now. With a humph, he lifts up his hips and slides his knife holster to the side so it isn't digging into your thigh or his. He grins wolfishly, continuing to kiss you. His lips trail up your neck and near your ear.

It never felt like this with Chris. Sure, it had been fine—it had been good even in the beginning—but this? No, nothing could compare to this.

Kraven's hands are large and strong against your skin as he kneads your waist and ass. "Ты такая хорошая девушка для меня (You're such a good girl for me)," he whispers, his voice hoarse, and as attractive as it is, you whine and furrow your brows.

"Please, don't talk in Russian anymore. I can't understand you," you pout, pulling him closer as you unconsciously grind your hips into his for more friction. "I wanna understand you,"

Kraven grips your hips harder and rolls them onto him, earning him a soft moan that falls from your lips. "Alright, darling, alright," he smiles and kisses you again. "Tell me, do'you want more from me? Seems like you do," he grinds your hips again, punctuating his words as he teases you mercilessly.

You are at loss for words. This is wrong. You're cheating on your boyfriend, you try to remind yourself, with a man you met in the woods. But if this is so wrong, why does it feel so good? You moan. You desperately want to slide your shorts and panties down to allow even more friction on your clit. Your cheeks burn with embarrassment and you must look so needy.

Kraven hooks his fingers in your waistband, running his thumb over your hip, reading your mind, "Is this what you want, darling? You wanna rub yourself on me like a little slut?"

The insult shouldn't be as hot as it is, but when it's followed by a searing kiss, the word is honey on his tongue. You moan and drop your head in the crook of his neck, grasping onto his shoulders as you lift your hips so he can easily slide your panties and shorts down. "Please," you whisper, nails digging into the muscle of his shoulders.

Kraven smirks and, as he holds your nape with one hand, he uses the other and finds your pussy. He explores your folds, wanting to make sure you're wet and ready for him. He rubs your clit, earning him smaller, more high pitched sounds from your parted lips as your wetness seeps over his hand.

Kraven teases you for a little while longer, murmuring praises in your ear until he suddenly spreads his legs and you fall to your knees in front of the couch. You gasp, looking up at him from the ground.

He looks majestic, sitting there, as if the couch was his throne and he was a King.

Kraven's smirk widens as he fists one hand in your hair, using his other hand to lick his fingers clean of your arousal and then swiftly unbuckle his belt. He stares at you as he does this and tilts his head. "D'you do this for your boyfriend, gorgeous?" Kraven seems amused by the word boyfriend, as if it's some game to him.

You nod, sinking onto your heels as you watch Kraven pull out his cock. He's big and hard and your eyes widen. "D'you like doing this?" he asks, his voice low. You catch his eye and shake your head honestly. You didn't like giving Chris head—but Chris's dick didn't look like this. Your eyes snap up to Kraven's cock.

"You'll like it with me," he adds, smirking, and guides your head to his cock. You let him, having no complaints as you take him in your mouth. You're nervous at first, unsure of what to do, but soon you gain more confidence as you try and take him even deeper.

You gag a little and Kraven just tightens his hand in your hair.

"You can take it. I know you can, doll. There," he coos, clearly enjoying your work as you adjust your mouth around him. "There, yeah. That's my good girl." Kraven grunts out the word "my" and warmth pools in your stomach. You moan around his cock, sucking faster as if to respond yes, I am yours.

With a pop, he pulls your head away and tilts your chin. He helps you up to straddle him again, keeping you eye level as he positions his cock at your entrance. He squeezes your cheeks, opening your lips, and then spits into your mouth before claiming your lips again. Your eyes flutter shut as you feel him against you and he sinks you down onto him.

"Can you feel me, милый (darling)?" he grunts, moving you on his cock slowly, torturing you. He chuckles darkly when you whine.

"Mmh," is the only sound you make as he fills you up. It feels so good.

"You feel full, hm?" Kraven taunts, moving your hips a little faster as his hands grip your hips hard enough to bruise. He pulls one away a moment and rips your shirt, attaching his lips to your hardened nipples as you squeal.

"Yes, oh, I feel so full," you whimper, bouncing up on him, helping him so you can go even faster and deeper. "Shit, you're so big."

"Шлюха (slut)," he groans, the word slipping past his lips in ecstasy as he kisses and sucks across your chest. You whine, wanting him to tell you what the word means so you can understand him but Kraven smirks. He kisses your collarbone and then, using his strength, he easily flips you over so you're laying on the couch and he's on top of you now.

Kraven sinks his cock back into you as he snaps his hips hard. You gasp, wrapping your arms around him and your nails slide up and down his back, and he groans with pleasure at the sting.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck please," you plead, eyes rolling as your body shivers.

"You're so tight around me. As if you were made just for me," he says as he continues to fuck into you. "Does your boyfriend fuck you this good?" Kraven asks, his accent thicker as he loses himself in the pleasure. His hand comes to wrap around your jaw as he holds you in place under him.

You shake your head.

"Слова (Words)," he growls but then curses and says, "Words, darling. Tell me."

"N-no. He doesn't fuck me this good," you whisper as Kraven's cock slides into you. You're so wet and he's so hard and this is so so wrong.

"Yeah? You gonna run back to him now, bunny?" he snarls and nips as your earlobe. He thrusts harder and smirks at the pet name. "Hmm. run little bunny, back to your poor excuse of a boyfriend? No," Kraven grunts, as if he's made a decision, "I'm keeping you, doll. I can take care of you better than he can."

You moan at this and nod, "Please," you whisper, feeling your thighs clench around him as you can feel your orgasm approaching.

Kraven feels it too. "You're squeezing around me, Шлюха (slut), do you wanna come?" Kraven teases and his thrusts slow. You whine and look at him, your eyes becoming teary from need. You nod.

He laughs and kisses your lips with a grin, "Alright, you can come. Go on, let yourself come all over my cock," he smirks against your skin as his sharp teeth nip at your neck.

You whine, letting your body finally relax as you come. You gasp, your eyes rolling from pleasure as your legs feel like jello. Kraven finishes inside you with a grunt and you whimper at the feeling.

He smiles as you sink into the cushions and your eyes flutter. His large hand comes to hold behind your head as he pulls you up and leans you against his chest.

While Kraven's touch is comforting, it's also possessive and claiming. His thumb strokes over your hair and his lips kiss your head. He's holding you so close you're almost afraid he'll never let you go. You sigh when he slides out and picks you up in his arms as he stands.

"Good girl," he mutters as he walks you to the bathroom and adds, "You did so well for me." You let yourself relax in his arms as he promises he'll be here from now on. You're his now.

You're so blissed out from your orgasm that your mind doesn't understand what that truly means. Instead, you shut your eyes and let him take care of you and, with a small smile, you think,

Happy. Fucking. Birthday. To. Me.

#kraven the hunter #kraven x reader #kraven the hunter x reader #kraven the hunter x y/n #kraven the hunter x fem!reader #kraven the hunter x you #kraven the hunter movie #marvel #aaron taylor johnson #aaron taylor johnson fic #aaron taylor johnson fanfiction #marvel kraven the hunter #marvel movies #sony movies #spiderman #tw smut #tw dark themes

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jingchu-time · 1 year

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Spoilers for all of DRDT so far (all the way to the end of Ch.2 - Pt.1)

(This is my first attempt at a character analysis, so forgive me if it's a bit messy, I'll try to fit it up later. Also my first time using tumblr, intimidating but I'll figure it out.)

(TW: Talks about parental death and neglect. Mentions of racism, not talked about in much depth)

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Intro:

Whit is one of the most interesting and mysterious characters in Despair Time. Despite being so well-loved by the fandom, his character is not taken nearly as seriously as I believe he should be. Objectively, Whit has one of the most in-depth characters, which isn't talked about with how often he gets reduced to a possible love interest for Charles. I also love their relationship (and ship it as well), but compared to Charles, Whit's other traits are ignored in favor of their relationship, which is unfair with how complex Whit's character actually is. Likes his backstory for example.

Part 1 - Whit's Backstory:

Whit's backstory is still shrouded in mystery, since it's only Chapter 2, but that isn't to say we know nothing about it. During Episode 4 of Chapter 1 Whit talks about his home life. He reveals that he's an only child, and briefly mentions that he thinks having a sibling would be cool, since he could be friends with them. This will be mentioned again later in the analysis, so keep this fact in mind. He then goes on to talk about his parents. First, he talks about his father, Lin or Steve. Whit says he doesn't see him a lot since he works overseas. All Whit is able to say about him is that he's quiet. Then Whit goes to talk about his mother, Elizabeth. Whit shows actual happiness when he talks about her. He doesn't go in depth, but he does call her pretty and sophisticated. He says he even bleached his hair to be like her. He clearly admired her a lot. He finally goes on to talk about his since nobody is ever in their house for long periods of time, he couldn't have pets. His home seems decent solely based on this information, but we have gained another part of it recently. In Episode 9 of Chapter 2 (what a jump) the secrets of all the cast are finally talked about. During the trial, Whit admits his secret is, "Your mother is dead. You always omit that truth." This isn't all that surprising when you consider how Whit deals with stuff like death (which well talks about in a different section) or his secret quote, "We tend to idolize the Dead."

So that's all of Whit's backstory, right? Insert *Sore wa chigau yo!" meme here. Is it all we've seen in the story, yes, but there was a Q&A done a while back that gave us an even greater idea of Whit's past. Anon asked if Whit was Biracial. The creator said yes, since his father is Chinese and his mother is American. It's also mentioned that for the first part of Whit's life, he was raised by his mom, so he doesn't have many Chinese experiences. What is mentioned next is what I care about the most. It's said that his father was very absent from his childhood (and life in general it seems). I think this makes it safe to say that Whit probably experienced some form of neglect from his father. He could barely say anything about him, the house is so empty that he can't even have pets, the way he talks about having a sibling. His mother is dead, and his father is never around. Whit was probably a lonely kid. The idea of having a sibling could fill the void because of his basically non-existent family. Also, regarding his mother's death, I'm gonna guess it was around his teen years, though I'm not sure.

Why mention his backstory first? Because this fandom never acknowledges anything about his past besides his dead mom when we clearly have more to look at. I also think this backstory can explain a lot of Whit's actions throughout the game. Speaking of…

Part 2 - Whit's role as comic relief, and how he (and Ace) subvert the stereotype:

Whit is easily seen as comic relief by most (I hope). Comic relief is a character used to defuse tension from certain scenes in shows/movies, plays/musicals, or video games. Whit is clearly made for the role, but another character, Ace, plays (or did play) the role as well. How can they both share the same role? You see, all roles have different stereotypes that are repaired with them. Comic relief is no expectation. I would say that comic relief tends to come in two types.

Characters who take absolutely nothing seriously. The lack of seriousness can be so bad that their jokes can fully screw over the tone of a scene, or story as a whole.

Using flanderization, which is just exaggerating a certain trait (or even sometimes traits) in a character. Character traits like paranoia, anger, happiness, or even sadness will become so amplified that you, much like the story, won't be able to take them seriously.

Whit and Ace fit these two stereotypes very well. After Whit's introduction in Episode 4 of the Prologue, Teruko calls him frivolous. A word, when used as a trait, is characterized by lack of seriousness or sense, which is a fairly accurate descriptor for Whit. Ace fits the second very well. Ace is characterized as both extremely aggressive, and as an extremely large coward through the entirety of the Prologue and Chapter 1. It's hard to take either character seriously at first glance.

Yet both Whit and Ace manage to subvert the stereotype and do interesting new things while doing it.

Ace goes through (negative but natural) character development after Chapter 1. He takes on a fully aggressive persona so that he's not seen as someone that can be easily killed off, the more intimidating the better. If he's seen as all bark no bite cowards, then he'll be an easy target. The cowardness is replaced by more anger and now the anger isn't funny now since we see it negatively affecting both the rest of the cast and Ace himself. He loses the role as comic relief by going through his natural character development. He subverts the trope by getting proper development, which leads to him losing the role entirely.

Whit subverts the trope by fully admitting that he's trying to be it. In Episode 4 of Chapter 1, Whit talks about how his constant joking is just him trying to lighten the mood. Whit wants to find a way to make the others happy, or at the very least lessen the stress they have because of the current situation they're in. He does this by joking and teasing. Whit subverts the trope by admitting he's trying to be the trope.

Both Whit and Ace subvert the same trope in vastly different ways, which are both effective for both of them. This does lead me to a question. Why does Whit do this? Well…

Part 3 - Goals vs Motive, actions, and what differentiates Whit and Hu:

When discussing characters' popularity, Hu and Whit are basically opposites. Whit, as mentioned earlier during the intro, is one of the most popular characters in the DRDT fandom. Hu, on the other hand, has gained a distaste by a majority of DRDT fandom because of how she's acted during the course of Chapter 2. This is very interesting, since the two are fairly similar. This is probably surprising to many, since the two seem so, so different. Hu is a serious mom friend, while Whit is a jokester.

I won't deny their differences, but what makes them similar is actually really important. The biggest similarity between the two is their goal. "Help the others through the killing game". This goal is special to these two because while the others are all (mostly) actively trying to find a way to either get out or end the killing game. These two don't though. They don't make any active attempts to find a way to or escape like the others, or their attempts are way more subtle than everyone else. So, if they have the same goal, why do they go about it so differently? Motive. A goal is what a character wants, a motive is why your character wants to achieve their goal.

We already know Hu's motive. Her motive is feeling useful. I'll discuss it more whenever I get to making a Hu analysis, but Hu has self-worth issues, making her believe that if she isn't doing some then she is completely useless. The idea of being useless seems to scare her. The reason Hu wants to help the other through the killing game is because it will make sure she isn't useless. Her actions to achieve her goal are by giving all her love to certain people, since she's aware that she can give equal love to everyone. She'll do whatever it takes to keep those certain people safe and happy, even excusing their bad actions. She plays favorites so that there will always be someone that finds her useful.

Whit is very different in regard to motive, since we don't really know fully what it is yet. We can make assumptions, but we can't be fully sure yet. Our best answer currently is simply, nobody can. This leads me to the next section…

Part 4 - Whit's calm persona, and it's relation to his motive:

Whit likes to make others happy. Whit also likes to help others. I believe these two traits heavily influenced his persona. Whit doesn't show emotion. We've seen happiness, concern, surprise, regret, confusion, and neutrality. He legit says "Jeez" after watching Min's execution in Episode 12 of Chapter 1, which is very tame compared to the others. Then he says, and I quote, "Oops" after seeing Arei's dead body in Episode 8 of Chapter 2. That is not a normal/socially (and morally for that matter) appropriate response to a dead body. What does this mean? Well, Whit doesn't show a real hint of sadness, or what he has is a very closed off version. Why does this point matter? Well, Whit is doing what nobody in the cast can. Whit is able to be a kind while being a reasonable/neutral force in the killing game. Hu and Eden, while kind, are both easily swayed by their emotions. Whit is less swayed by emotions like that and is shown to be logical when it counts. Like when he reminded David that they only knew Xander for a few days, so there was no real way of knowing if how Xander acted was in or out of character during the scrum debate in Episode 8 of Chapter 1. Whit can manage the role of a jokester and calm person very well. However, his calm side has grown a lot over the killing game.

Whit has always been generally calmer compared to a majority of this cast. You can take his dialogue after the killing game was revealed during Episode 5 of the Prologue as an example. However, his persona is something growing in intensity over the course of the series. When Min was executed, Whit showed off at least some form of sympathy, compared to when Arie died. He barely acknowledges her death, focusing much more on comforting Eden. This is all odder considering that while he and Arei didn't always see eye to eye, he still had more connections to her than Min from what saw. While everyone else slowly descends into madness, Whit just keeps amplifying his calm persona.

How does this relate to his motive? At the very least, for Chapter 2, Whit's motive is something along the lines, "Because someone has to". Whit likes helping others. If he doesn't help the others through the game, literally nobody else will. Mainly because this cast is extremely mentally unwell. Also, having a goal and motive doesn't mean they'll be good at achieving said goal. Whit hasn't been particularly helpful despite his efforts, but I'll explain why this is a little later. Anyway, if you compare Whit and Hu's motive to help others, then it makes sense why they're so different. It also explains why Whit is more easily likable compared to Hu. Neither of them are bad, not by a long shot, but we still have to wait for more of both. I would like to move into my next section, since this section does reference something in there…

Part 5 - Whit's ability to see the best in others:

This is one of Whit’s lesser known traits, which is so odd because this trust is seen so much in his character. Whit’s main relationship is with Charles. He and Whit have lots of interactions. Like during the Prologue, where half of Charles’ introduction is him and Whit. Or during Chapter 1, where the pairs' friendship begins to develop. And Chapter 2, where we get to watch their friendship fully develop. At the start, both of them disliked each other. Charles disliked Whit for his jokester person and how often Whit would use him as an object for humor, which didn’t mix well with how much Charles hates being looked down upon. Meanwhile, Whit didn’t like Charles for his very rude and arrogant personality, which make sense considering how much of Whit’s persona(s) are based around being kind to others. What happens in Chapter 1 is what I’d like to discuss in relation to the topic of this section.

During Chapter 1, Xander tries to pin the blame on Charles by using Charles’s hemophobia. Charles’ phobia makes him breakdown when he sees gory or dead bodies because of his unresolved childhood trauma. After Charles gets lured into seeing Teruko’s dead body and runs away, he ends up running into Whit, who was in the cafeteria, mid-breakdown. At first, Whit assumes that Charles is messing with him, but ends up realizing he wasn’t. Whit ends up making the choice to stay and help out Charles. Levi brings up in Episode 9 of Chapter 1 that Charles could have been faking it. In a game where any wrong moves can lead to your death, Whit decision to stay and help could’ve gotten him killed if Charles had been. Yet Whit choice to stay, ignoring his own opinions about Charles at that point, decided to see the best in him. He chose to see the best in Charles despite only really having his intuition as a reason.

To continue this point, I’d like to bring up Teruko and David. Teruko is fairly straight forward, as during the dressing room scene in Episode 2 of Chapter 2, Whit says he doesn’t think Teruko or anyone else in the cast is a bad person. We get a small look into Whit’s thought process. He believes that, despite everyone acting callously, they aren’t bad people. They are human. They are just human with emotions and weaknesses, and that’s fine with him. He believes, even when Teruko herself doesn’t, that there is still a good person in her. That despite the current asshole she is being, she is still a good person, even if it’s a little deeper inside. This thought process also relates to how he handles David. Whit is the one who had David’s secret. David’s secret is, “You exist to manipulate others, others exist to be manipulated.” It is very hard to see this secret and believe whoever it’s about isn’t a bad person. But Whit having it actually makes this makes sense. Whit, much like Hu, likes to see the best in others. Unlike Hu, however, Whit keeps this fact to himself unless he’s having a moment of vulnerability. It isn’t hard to believe that he, despite how obvious the secret is, convinced himself that David wasn’t a bad person. Hell, we get some confirmation of this during Episode 11 of Chapter 2, when after David’s real personality is reveled, Whit makes a certain comment. “I was keeping that secret out of concern for your career. But if this is how you really act, then your career might be in trouble for reasons out of my control.” A majority of the fandom think he’s lying, and I won’t deny the possibility, but I feel like we should look at this comment from more than one angle. If we bring up the idea of him believing that the secret was simply worded badly, then it’s no wonder he of all people wouldn’t wanna take that risk. I don’t think anybody would want to ruin someone's whole career based on a secret that could be purposely worded badly. “...reasons out of my control”, this quote basically confirms that if David hadn’t gone insane in Episode 11, then Whit would have blamed himself for David’s career. Whit is a caring person, so this idea is very plausible.

If it was anyone else, then the idea would be unlikable, but it’s not unbelievable if you consider Whit’s character so far. A person who cares for others and has risked his life holding onto the idea of seeing the best in them. Whit is the only character who would hide a secret like that. Since I brought up Charles, Teruko, and David, that brings me to a different section…

Part 6 - Gaining importance through others:

This section should be fairly brief. Whit, while has not really been a major player, keeps having connections to characters who are. If most had to assign the DRDT cast cliché Danganronpa roles, then it tends to go Teruko is the protagonist (obviously), Charles is the support (stretching but okay), and David is the antagonist. Whit, as mentioned in the section before, is connected to all three. However, that isn’t all when it comes to his connections to major characters (this wouldn’t be a section if that was the case). Let me bring up Eden, Arei, and Hu. Whit has come to Eden’s defense twice now. First in Episode 5 of Chapter 1, when Arei and Arturo are insulting the cake which she was actually really proud of. Whit makes a joke about how cake=birthday song, which is able to distract the group from the insults and everyone becomes much less hesitant about eating the cake. Then in Episode 9 of Chapter 2, he buys Eden some time, since Teruko was asking about the note (that made Eden super suspicious), by bringing up the alibis. In Episode 1 of Chapter 1, we get to see that Whit and Arei were investigation partners. It’s not big, but is still a point of connection. Finally, he and Hu had a a fairly long talk about the killing game during the dressing room scene during Episode 2 of Chapter 2.

Whit keeps being given importance because of his connections with major players in Chapter 2. No matter how big or small. I honestly don’t have a good translation to the next section, so…

Part 7 - He is very different compared to the rest:

Whit handles most stuff in a very special way. Firstly, while a majority of this cast will become aggressive or start fighting with each other. Whit, however, is very different compared to the others in this case. Whit will make passive-aggressive or sarcastic comments. He is also very conflict avoidant, which will be dissected later for reasons. And second, his method of investigation. Compared to the majority of the cast, who go the logical route of investigating the body and scene of the crime in depth, then investigating other areas. Whit is one of the three character (the others being Charles and Rose) who don’t examine the body. This is odd considering that Whit doesn’t really seem to have a reason to not too, I think I know why, but it will have to be talked about a little later (I'm sorry, but this is the last time I promise). Anyway, as mentioned earlier, Whit is a very calm person. His type of calm (yeah type) is different from that of Hu or Veronika. Hu is calm but is very easily angered by her situation and constantly struggles to keep composure. Veronika is much more similar, but unlike Whit, Veronika finds joy in their situation. She finds the killing game fun and interesting, completely fine with her situation. She’s only calm because she doesn’t find the danger frightening. She’ happy because she hates being bored. Whit is only calm because, as mentioned many times, he had to be. Someone has to be calm and kind during their situation. One is more selfish than the other, and that makes them different. All the talk about Whit’s differences reminds me of one thing that only her has…

Part 8 - Whit’s intuition:

Before I get into Whit’s intuition, I want to talk about what intuition actually is. Intuition are just gut feelings. They are ideas that, while there i no logical reason to believe it, you just feel like you do. Whit’s intuition has been mentioned during Episode 4 and 9 of Chapter 1 and during his and Charles’ FTE. He claims, using his intuition, that one day, Teruko will be happy, that Charles isn’t faking the breakdown he is/was having, and that one day him and Charles were going to be friends. His intuition hadn’t been mentioned once through the first part of Chapter 2. I think this mostly because of the calm persona, He has to be more logical. This doesn’t mean his emotions won’t influence situations, but now he had to try to rationalize his decisions based on those emotions. He can’t just say it’s his intuition anymore, not with how the group is currently.

I still don’t have a good way to transition so let’s just-

Part 9 - Whit’s social life and conflict avoidance:

Whit isn’t a fan of fights, unless it for the sake of someone else. In Episode 2 of Chapter 2 (it’s a great scene okay), Hu and Whit are discussing how much the Mastermind knows about them. Teruko, being Teruko, finds a way to twist it into distrusting others. Whit then makes one of his passive-aggressive comments towards her. Then, only a little while later, Teruko is equally rude when Whit tries to call her a good person, and this time Whit keeps quiet. Whit won’t argue with someone unless what that other person is doing negatively effects others. His conflict avoidance is seen during Episode 4 of Chapter 2, where he refuses to try and break up any of the fights. His reasoning is that his talent isn’t couple counseling, therefore he can’t be the one to break up any of the fights. This is an excuse that Charles quickly shuts down. So yeah, Whit doesn’t like conflict, which is probably part of why he became a jokester in the first place, but we’ll come back to this though after the next section. Speaking of the next section…

Part 10 - The 4th wall (and finding information):

Whit is the character that shows the most awareness of the 4th wall. In Episode 8 of Chapter 1, Whit legit tells the audience to pause to read the list, since it would be useful. There is no way that he was directing that at the cast, since they can’t fuckin’ pause their lives. Then in Episode 10 of Chapter 2, Whit breaks the 4th wall, but in a far more subtle way. Whit says he doesn’t remember which secret Eden got, which leads to us, the audience, to be shown the list. Whit gave us a direct way to relook at the secret list, which is very weird since he could have just looked up and silently read the list. Something that Ace points out (kind of). Whit is the only character to show this much awareness of us, The weird thing is why would Whit want to help us? We’re the whole reason that he and the rest of the cast are stuck there, dying for our entertainment. So why would he want to help us? This is a question we’ll have to wait for an answer, since even I’m not sure yet. A downside of only being through half of the 2nd Chapter.

This section is the one I brought up earlier during Part 9, and will be connecting some of the mysterious points I didn’t expand upon earlier…

Part 11 - How does his backstory influence him:

You’ve probably noticed that despite his backstory being brought up first, I haven’t given it much though since. This is because I believed we all need a better understand of Whit before I could describe how his backstory affected all of what we’ve discussed. Before that, however, there is one part left.

If you remember, I said that Whit was a lonely kid. Along with what I said earlier in the backstory section this is also because of his talent and love life. Whit’s talent is something others have to pay for, mentioned in the Q&A earlier. He sets other people up as a way to earn money, which begs the question of why Whit took up the talent in the first place. Since we don’t have a proper answer yet, so we’re going to move one, just keep that as food for thought. Anyway, Whit is said to have a pretty bad romantic life despite his talent. He apparently just can’t find a partner, despite his efforts. This isn’t all that surprising when you consider that Whit isn’t all that socially competent at times. It’s hard to describe, so well use examples instead. During the FTE, Whit is shown to be completely shocked at Charles’ anger toward him. Whit hadn’t even considered the idea that the stuff he did earlier could be seen as negative. Even when it’d probably become obvious to anyone else at that point. Then, during the Computer Lab scene during Episode 7 of Chapter 2, Whit makes a dark joke about Min’s death in front of Teruko and doesn’t even think of the bad implication till Charles points it out to him. He is able to apologize and fix those behaviors, which is an interesting pattern of behavior. Not understanding a wrong till someone points it out to you, and then you improve it. Unless you point it out to Whit, he probably won’t notice the problem. I think these behaviors say a lot about his past and it’s effects on him.

Whit’s past would explain his social incompetence at times. His father wasn’t there to be a good example and his mom probably wasn’t there for his teen years, which is a huge time for development in minors. This leads to him not having the proper role-models.

(This is an off section, but I felt the need to bring it up. Whit is biracial, Asian American, American/Chinese, a race that faces a lot of discrimination in America. The DRDT creator is very well versed in his research of the topic and ideas he handles. Ace is a lovely example, including the higher chances of anxiety and chances for eating disorders they have. I won’t say I know anything, but I wouldn’t completely discard the idea of him facing discrimination in the past.)

So yeah, Whit was a lonely kid, why does it matter? It matters because if he is as much of a former loner as mentioned, then that would also explain why Whit keeps people-pleasing. (I think there is a want for acceptance, but a struggle to believe that it’s possible without the personas.)

His backstory also explains his seeing the best in others' mindset. People tend to think that the only way to look at negative events in life is through negativity, but that’s wrong. When you have nothing, then you’ll leach onto anything to hold onto, like optimism. This idea was used in the canon Danganronpa games with Nagito, and I think a similar principle is shared with Whit. Whit probably attached onto something positive because he literally had nothing else. Optimism, in that case, is the easiest answer. Whit deals with life, and the killing game by trying to find the good. Whit's life might not be great, but that doesn't mean he has to see it that way. It's probably why he keeps omitting the fact about his mother's death. Why look back on the past when there is so much left to do in life. He probably thinks this is what she would've wanted, based on his idolization of her.

This all brings me to my last section…

Part 12 - His belief in privacy:

Whit is very adamant in respecting others' privacy. In Episode 1 of Chapter 2, Whit brings up the idea that everyone keeps the secrets to themselves until they have more time to work through it properly. This gets ignored by Arturo, who does it anyway. I've already gone into depth talks about privacy with Charles and David. What I wanna talk about is why Whit is so big on it. Because that is a question we haven't gotten an answer to. Why? Well, while I'm not sure, I think it has something to do with his past.

I have also lost my mom, like Whit. When I lost my mom, people wouldn't stop questioning me about it. Whit described his mom as sophisticated, so that makes me think she could've been fairly known in the community. Whit probably had a lot of strangers question him about it, despite his feelings about it. Mix this with Whit's pleasing other mentality, then his adamantly about respecting others' privacy. This is the only part of his mentality that goes against his more logical character. Charles even says he gave Teruko the secret he had because he wouldn't trust Whit to sacrifice someone's' privacy when it's necessary. Charles has a strong understanding of Whit's, so I'd trust him. This is the only part of Whit that he never changes, even when he has different personas on. It's consistent.

This concludes the final section to this analysis, so onto the conclusion.

Conclusion:

Whit is a character that gets overlooked by a majority of the fandom despite being pretty much universally loved. His past is so much more than what we've seen or is talked about. His caring nature is something that has so much hidden depths. And, unless he is the Chapter 2 killer, there is so much left to find about Whit.

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(Thanks for reading. Again, sorry if it's a bit all over the place. I hope I could shed some more light on Whit's character for ya'll. Have a good day/night.)

#danganronpa despair time #drdt #drdt spoilers #drdt whit #whit young #fanganronpa #drdt fanart

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hopefull-mindset · 4 months

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do you believe mori is a pedo or a lolic0n? I don't! but I just wanted to ask you about what you thought about it ><

Oh dear, this is the type of discussion I was thinking about but was too much of a shitfest to really dip my foot in. It's an incredibly loaded discussion to have, so I'll talk about this to the best of my abilities.

Let’s start with me saying that there is no good answer to this and it’s not as easy as “the grass is green”. There is no “I'm right” and “you're wrong”. I know the answer looks obvious at first glance, especially if you choose to primarily look at his relationship with Elise that way, but Asagiri makes some decisions that put this belief into question.

However, we can’t blame anyone for seeing Mori a certain way due to Asagiri’s choices in a poor tasted gag, so I don’t think I can ever say someone completely misunderstood Mori’s character (at least, in this regard) when we ask this question. We cannot chalk up this belief about Mori to be the fault of the audience misunderstanding him because of some “translation error” because it blatantly ignores the fact this is a joke Asagiri chooses to make a lot.

I am also not defending Asagiri when I call it a joke because it's obvious to me that's all he sees it as: a joke. Not a great one, but it's there. It's as serious as the Tanizaki siblings should be taken (kinda wish people knew that there's implications about them not being siblings more though, even if it won't make it much better for them).

Just needed to lay that out before I started talking so I'm not misunderstood when I talk about the questionability of labeling him this. I do think we need to talk more about Asagiri’s position in this when this is brought up, so I will be doing that as well.

Firstly, Elise is not the product of sexual desire came to life. That's something people understand the least if they keep looking at her in this point of view. I've seen many frame the connection between her and Yosano to be one where Mori “finds out his type to be younger”, which yuck! Thankfully, I can debunk this by just bringing in Beast Mori.

It's a little comical that people are insistent that they have nothing to do with each other when they have no problem doing so with any other character from Beast. As of canon right now, we have no idea about any specification on how this ability works or how he controls it. My assumption is that it has to partially do with Mori’s need for a companion while not needing to give himself up and be vulnerable with others. He tends to have that problem of looking over his shoulder, like with Dazai and presumably kicking him out because of the typical human fear of death.

I also tended to notice that in the three ways Elise shows up, she forms into someone that Mori might need at the moment and reflective of his mindset. During the Great War, she is at her most subservient and robotic when Mori’s mind was only on gaining the most optimal solution with no consideration for anyone’s feelings.

Post-Great War to the present day, she has been a bratty child and a lot like 11-year-old Yosano with a bow in the same place her butterfly was. She is human and expressive when he can't afford to be and a living reminder of the child he had broken down for the price of an optimal solution. If you were to ask me, Mori has grown in his mindset with the help of Fukuzawa. To consider more heart and comradery than he used to when navigating the Port Mafia. Like how he saw worth in learning about dead subordinates when Ango was insistent on filing them.

In BSD Beast, he is able to roam without considering the need for the optimal solution and Elise appears as a 20-year-old adult bratty as ever. He needs a fellow caretaker to take care of the orphanage he was put in charge of, and has let himself come back into touch with his humanity when caring for these children.

I can’t give you any personal answer for why Asagiri chose to name it “Vita Sexualis” or why her age changes like that. I don’t know what goes on in his mind and we haven’t been given any specifics. We should remember that Asagiri was actually hiding that she was his Ability up until Cannibalism arc, and that this name might not mean anything you think it does.

Why? I have no idea why Asagiri did this. I think he was having fun tormenting us with what this ability name could mean from.

I also hadn’t finished Vita Sexualis because I have a lot on my reading list, but even if it’s described as an “erotica” by public sources, your expectations of what that means might not actually be lived up to. I think one of the most creative answers to her age and this chosen name instead of “Dancing Girl” (the book of which she’s based on) have to do with the real Mori’s love of children as a father and the act of intercourse being what gives life.

But even without those bits of speculation, I have already made it clear why she has nothing to do with sexual influence and I wish people talked about her out of that type of context. She has not been sexualized by the narrative or by Mori himself. If you saw the scene where she was undressed and Mori was begging her to put on some clothes as it it was creepy, that was your choice. She has also never been put in a genuine romantic light by him ever in this story.

The omake where he calls Elise his wife is not definite evidence of some belief he genuinely has of her. If you actually read it and don't look at our context panels, it's obvious that he's doing it to ruffle Fukuzawa’s feathers and get a reaction out of him. Besides poking at his integrity, I would also assume he would do so because he can't just call her his daughter as he'd usually would in these situations since he doesn't tend to reveal it publically. King-in-Yellow made a good contribution in context to why Kafka Asagiri would make this joke with Mori and Elise.

Please note that Elise is also not a real child or his daughter, but another piece of him like all abilities are. Do not separate them in a conversation and act as if she's her own person. Abilities have shown to be able to act on their own and take over their user (Shibusawa, Fukuchi potentially, Gab from 55 Minutes), but that does not mean they have become their own being. They are still restricted by the humanity of their user and these cases only happen when the user is dead or is facing backlash against their own ability’s power.

Moving on, I need to talk about Asagiri and the way he chooses to frame Mori’s fondness for cute little girls because there is no way else to talk about these jokes and not sound like an ass unless I speak about it like this.

Now, Mori has not done anything in his actions to be pedophilic currently except these very vague “maybe, maybe not” jokes. No sexualization of Elise, no praying on Yosano, and especially nothing with Dazai???? Where did that come from???

Cases of these jokes in manga:

Ending of the guild arc where he says about how he only deals with young girls under 12 in repknss to Kouyou (do not bring up the dub, I will stare at you frowning for not acknowledging the fact that Dubs tend to be very off to fit the mouth flaps)

Fukuzawa commenting how he still has his dumb facination with cute girls

Omake (already talked about that)

The first example is where he responds to Kouyou’s words of sticking around to help and protect him in the organization. This is not a joke about sexual attraction, this is a questionable joke about her age as most media does about women at times. The “lolicon” -ness of it is still there of course, but please understand the point of it. The other implies she's flirting with him, and for him to make a joke that pokes at her for somehow flirting would be incorrect. To emphasize this, the manga chooses to translate this as “I only protect young girls”.

To explain the second example, we need to talk about the disconnect between us as an audience and Asagiri’s way of using Lolicon. On a trope basis, lolicon is when the creator presents a prepubescent-looking girl of varying “ages”, but still acts like a child and is continuously sexualized by the creator to cater to the male character’s gaze. Mori… is not written like that or is Elise for the matter like I brought up earlier, but then why does Asagiri joke about it even outside the text?

If you've ever been around this crowd in anime spaces, you would know one of the first things people say to explain it is not what I said. They’d say it's a trope about “cute little girls and fawning over them”, and then everything else is left for you to figure out. I have no idea what Asagiri actually thinks about this (probably pretty indifferent), but I'm baffled by his very surface-level take on Lolicon being presented into his own work.

This is one of those times where you have to think of Asagiri as another anime fan first rather than a creator in that space. Asagiri is just a guy who became internet famous briefly for his Touhou Cthulhu TRPG series and got signed into making his own nerdy manga about literature.

For Asagiri to narratively compare it to Fukuzawa’s love for cats, it's telling to me how this supposed “lolicon” joke is supposed to be seen. I don't think Asagiri would willingly put him in charge of an orphanage of all things and then expect us to actually think of him as a Pedo.

This has had me boggled for a while on what to think, but in the end, thinking of him as one would leave me more baffled than if he wasn't. Authorial intent can't always stop us from actually seeing what looks like, but on top of everything else… well? What am I supposed to think?

So no, I don't believe that he's a pedophile and I hope it stays that way. Sorry this took a bit to write, I needed to build some semblance of my thoughts without gaining a headache. I wish this fandom had a better discussion about him half the time and created their own opinions instead of falling back on “Oh he abused Dazai” or “that he's a nasty pedophile who should be locked up for his crimes”.

Lolicon and Pedophilia are interlocked when you speak about them, so it'd be wrong of me to completely disregard these ideas on Mori. I just thought we needed to have a better conversation on this than some accusations thrown around about who's correct. This topic deserves a bit more maturity and care than I've seen some talk about.

#thank you for asking!#bsd #bungou stray dogs #mori ougai #bsd elise #bsd meta #bsd analysis #oh jeez #im tryinh to rub out this headache #I don't care if people are avoidant on having a decent discussion about these things #christ #just do it for the sake of yourself and entertain that people can have different views for good reason #Mori is a lying liar who lies

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xieyaohuan · 4 months

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Stan Edgar's and Homelander's relationship: my two cents

Tl;dr: Stan Edgar's show-canon relationship with Homelander presumes (and loosely establishes) the relationship between comics Homelander and James Stillwell, including James' Stillwell's extreme confidence vis-à-vis Homelander, which explains a lot of Stan's more insane choices provoking Homelander, but I remain naively hopeful that the show also means to show us in the end that he has miscalculated.

Following up on this post trying to figure out what the hell Stan Edgar's end game is with Homelander, I just want to add a small point to what I think is an excellent discussion because I think you can't really answer the question of Stan's intentions via-à-vis Homelander without establishing what the show-canon relationship between the two is supposed to be (even if the execution is done badly). Personally, I think show canon tries to do one of two things: 1. take the canon relationship in the comics and twist it by having "James Stillwell"/Stan Edgar miscalculate or 2. take the canon relationship in the comics and keep "James Stillwell"/Stan Edgar as the mastermind. My guess (and hope) is that they are going for number 1, but who knows, maybe there's some secret third option.

Either way, what is clear is that the show is trying to replicate, in some form, the dynamic that exists between Homelander and James Stillwell in the comics. That's apparent when Stan Edgar tells Starlight that Homelander will stay in line as long as he is in charge, which is supposed to establish that Stan Edgar is 100% confident in his ability to manage Homelander no matter what.

(It is also hinted at from Homelander's perspective when they replicate the comics plot point that Homelander is confused by/scared of his blood pressure/heart rate/whatever other readings he gets, and when he wonders if Stan Edgar is the headpopper because he thinks he must be a very powerful supe due to his lack of fear.)

Seriously, I think the sentence above is central to understanding the relationship. BUT, interestingly, when he says "and we both know why", the viewer doesn't know why, and this is where the show could have really done a better job explaining it.

This is a problem with many of the points taken directly from the comics because they are casually imposed on the show without properly "translating" them to the new medium and the new storyline to actually make them significant to the show (instead of just mentioning them on the side). Another good example of this is Maeve's alcoholism. We see her drinking in S1E1 during a work meeting, then we don't see her drinking in meetings again though she still has occasional drinks, and in S3, she tells Butcher she's been sober for X months. But that's really all we see of it -- it never becomes a major point in her character arch and gets lost easily. So from a storytelling perspective, that's dissatisfying. Either weave the point properly into the character's arch, or leave it out entirely.

So anyway, back to the main point, which is that the show presumes the relationship from the comics and makes it visible here and there. I think they do a slightly better job with Homelander and his relationship with Stan "James Stillwell" Edgar than with Maeve's relationship with alcohol, but the point is still not translated very well. However, what we can take away from it is that for whatever Stan Edgar does, he always proceeds from the assumption that he has Homelander 100% under control, same as when James Stillwell tells an enraged Homelander, who has come to kill him, to do it already because he is bored out of his mind by his rant.

That is the level of confidence that should be assumed behind every single of Stan's actions that affect Homelander. My personal take is he takes some joy in humiliating Homelander and getting away with it, especially since this person he considers largely irrelevant to the company's bottom line has just given him a ton of extra work.

I did also consider the possibility that Stan is doing this strategically to show who the real boss is and bring Homelander back under his thumb, and I guess that's possible given that he has just had to deal with two Homelander contingencies in a row -- the supe terrorists and HL discovering Ryan. That would seem like a good time to reassess his prior assumptions about his control over HL. But I do think his confidence in his ability to manage HL is supposed to be taken as real and not just an act in S3, so my personal headcanon is that Stan is being petty. Homelander annoys him, so why only punish him once if he can do it -- cost free in his mind -- over and over again?

Anyway, my hope is that the show is going with having Stan Edgar miscalculating instead of masterminding. I don't want a "Stan as puppet master who saw every single one of Homelander's moves coming" storyline, but based on the way the scene between Homelander and Stan Edgar on 99 was done, miscalculation also seems more likely, because Stan does slam the glass down on the table as he leaves the room, which I'm guessing is meant to indicate that despite his blood pressure and calm demeanor, his blasé attitude was an act and he is waking up to the fact that, oops, he did miscalculate.

That doesn't answer all the questions, such as why choose Starlight over Maeve, but I mean, the answer to that one is pretty evident from a storytelling perspective: if you have a central heroine and a character who will leave the show at the end of the Season 3, which of of these two characters are you going to put at the center of a major conflict? Obviously the one who is your main heroine. Bringing in a new person mid-season just for this would be... a very questionable choice in any writer's room.

Anyway, I would also argue that in this case, it doesn't really do much harm to Stan's character building and story arch. It's totally in line with his own and Vought's overall ethics that they would discard a woman who, by industry standards, is old, and go for a fresh face, their rising star, a person Stan presumes to still be impressionable and malleable -- he knows how to work with people like that. Sure, she may not be as young as Vicky was when he got to her, but it's reasonable he would assume he could shape her more easily than Maeve, so I really don't see any plothole here.

Starlight's relationship with The Boys is irrelevant because Stan canonically does not see The Boys as a threat. He may not love Butcher, but he's good enough to form a temporary alliance with, and Stan certainly does not view him as a existential threat to himself or to Vought. That may be another miscalculation, but for the time being, given Butcher's hyperfocus on Homelander and his inability to see the big picture about Vought, it seems fair enough. Stan also doesn't believe that he's giving Starlight a whole lot of power with the new position. The co-captains are performing monkeys in his mind (just like Homelander himself has always been), so the risk, to him, is not much higher than having her join The Seven in the first place.

It certainly doesn't answer the question of why Stan put Stormfront in The Seven given what must be a very complex relationship between the two. Clearly, she's influential at the company, clearly, they work together (she does the high risk stuff for him so that he can maintain plausible deniability and distance himself from the ugliest parts of Vought's medical experiments), clearly, they do not like each other (unless there's something we don't know). But perhaps that's their deal: Stormfront does the ugly stuff for Stan, Stan gets her closer to her beloved Nazi-ideal-conforming potential son-in-spirit. Obviously, their exact relationship is never explained directly. It's either a plothole or a plotline that was left open because it will be closed later, or a plotline that was left open and will remain open because the way shows are written means not all loose ends are tied up in the end. Personally, I don't think we'll see this one resolved.

Anyway, best case scenario, the show will deliver as a twist on "James Stillwell" as someone who miscalculated on multiple fronts (mainly Homelander, possibly Butcher, but that's probably just my pipe dream lol) thanks to his overconfidence, and gets destroyed along with Vought as a consequence. Worst case scenario, this will all fizzle out and not be resolved properly as the show descends deeper into the contemporary American politics non-plotline.

#stan edgar #homelander #stan edgar's and homelander's relationship #the boys #the boys tv #the boys comics #james stillwell #the boys meta #homelander meta #stan edgar meta #I *don't* think the show is doing itself a favor by taking the comics relationship and then establishing it in the show but half-assing it #and coming from the asoiaf fandom I may be too focused on author intentions #but I do think it's relevant to understand what the show runners are trying to do and I'm reasonably confident that #they are trying to replicate the comics relationship when it comes to Stan's/James's confidence (and initially HL's fear)#and that needs to be taken into account

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sardonic-the-writer · 1 year

Text

—the great potato war

SUMMARY | nobody cared about potatoes. nobody at all. well, except for you and your neighbor, who's pink hair and pig skull never failed to catch your attention. it was about time you approached him

PAIRING | technoblade x reader

REQUESTED | no

WORD COUNT | 1.8k+

WARNINGS | none

AUTHORS NOTES | some nice healthy platonic fun times with our boy techno. ive been binging his channel as of late

🥔 Masterlist 🥔 Navigation 🥔 Rules 🥔

Sitting on his knees in an uncomfortable kneeling position, Technoblade felt a trickle of cold sweat work its way down the back of his neck. He could feel the sun beating down from above, its relentless rays doing nothing for his sweaty skin.

Wiping a gloved hand along his forehead line, Techno looked up from his work. The man's fingers and palms were stained with dirt splotches and grass marks. His pink hair had been tied back and tossed in between the back of his shoulder blades with ease, a sturdy hair band keeping it in one bunch.

Technoblade stood up to his full height. He could practically feel his spine elongating already; a few sharp pops even rang out from his tired joints to audibly show how hard he had been working. Although, as he looked out upon the sight in front of him, Techno couldn't help but think that it was all worth it.

Hundreds and hundreds of harvested potato lines laid in front of him with a barren look. Remnants and scraps of the former vegetation littered the scorched ground. Brown spots and dried up greens were what were left of the hybrid's hours of heavy work.

With a haughty grin, Techno walked off his elaborate plot of land. It took a minute too, seeing as he had a ginormous five acres to show for it.

“That’ll put me ahead.” He grinned, taking off the worn leather gloves he had been wearing to garden. In an almost comical manor, he rubbed his hands together like a film villain painted in black and white, smiling.

From the comfort of his secluded property, getting to the hub was easy enough. Just a small stroll on an obscure dirt path and he was in a familiar looking village.

Each time he passed the threshold from lush forest to dusty village, Techno could always feel the strain in his muscles as he tightened them, a feeling of discomfort washing over him in small waves. It wasn't as if he didn't ever like visiting the place. The collection of small wooden houses and abundancy of vendor stands were more than useful in tasks such as expanding his farm and gathering materials. It was the stares he was less than partial to.

Eyes filled with fear and wonder alike followed Techno as he walked stiffly around the place. He should have been used to this by now, more than aware of the titles he had collected over the years. Blood God, the Blade, even the occasional call of potato man was tossed in his direction. The last one made him want to laugh the most, if he was being honest.

The pinkette didn't blame people for staring. He was more or less a myth taken form to them. A pink haired warrior hiding behind a pigs skull, often seen buying the materials needed to reap all kinds of vegetables. In all his years living just a few miles away from the public, the only locals he had ever spoken to were the sellers. Maybe an occasional traveler, interested in what the rest of the world was doing now that he had left it—despite the fact he had vowed he would never return to the life he had been leading before. No. He was much more content growing crops than watering the fields of battle with blood. So yeah, not exactly the type people around here were used to seeing.

"Alright. It was about time I met the asshole that insist on making my life a living hell."

Techno's swift movements stopped in the middle of the sidewalk he had been steadily moving along; an admirable feat from whoever had just caught his attention—something that didn't happen often.

His sharp gaze was hidden behind the bone white skull he insisted on wearing so much, sweeping around until it eventually landed on the source of his brief pause.

It was someone short. Well, at least shorter than him, which was normal for about everyone he had ever met—save for a teenage enderman hybrid he had used to know.

Skimming over the height difference, the second thing that caught his attention were their hands. They were almost as dirty as his, if not dirtier. Even through the grit and grime he could see a few hardened callouses dotting their skin. A detail that almost made Techno tilt his head with mild curiosity. Almost.

Thirdly was their stare. It was scarily memorable of the very same one he saw each time he looked in the mirror. Determined, with layers and layers of vast emotions underneath it.

The stranger approached him, hands in pockets as they bit at the inside of their cheek. Looking far more comfortable than anyone else would have in approaching the infamous piglin hybrid.

"Do I know you." Techno's voice was monotone. Flat. Less than a question, and more of a not so subtle way of getting them to leave him alone. It didn't work.

"Nope! Pretty rude of you, considering we've been neighbors for about half a year now. But I'll let it slide." The carefree tone and amused smile contradicted what should have been the hostility in their words. Their sentences were certainty set up to be directed at him with a different emotion if they so much as pleased. But Techno knew how to read people, be it common folk or kings sitting high above him on a throne as they lied about their sins. And this person before him certainty had no intent to do anything beyond chat.

For some reason that confused him more than anything else.

"I don' have any neighbors." His voice was clear. Slightly raising it for the sake of the people around them doing a poor job of eavesdropping; a silent call to get moving. To which the small crowd immediately did.

"Maybe so you think. But tell that to me and my house I've been living in for six months. If you ever bothered to visit anywhere other than this shithole or your huge ass garden you would know that."

They knew about his garden, along with his traveling habits. If they were telling the truth about being his neighbor, that would be less of a concern to hear. But Techno decided to play it safe, straightening up to his full height and curling his fists as if to insinuate a threat. He didn't feel like scaring off anyone more than he usually did, although this time it would be with intent, but he'd rather continue on his way with a bit of guilt rather than with the possibility that someone from his past had finally caught up with him.

"Oh relax tough guy. I'm just here to talk potatoes."

He stirred at that.

"..what?"

"Potatoes. You know, the thing you spend all your time farming." The person who had still yet to introduce themself carried on with hand motions, blowing out a slight sigh. "I really didn't think the second after I moved some crazy guy would be setting up shop with the same idea as me. I mean come on, how many people in the world have even considered going into potato farming as a hobby. You and your—your incredibly overpowered gardening tools."

It took a second before all of the dots began to connect in Techno's head. The way they had approached him with a competitive tone (albeit it playful), how they only seemed interested in talking about vegetation, the roughness of their hands—

"(Y/n) right?" In spite of himself, Techno found a small quirk in his lips forming. Not quite a smile, but something similar to it all the same. He was rewarded with a joyous nod of confirmation.

"Bingo."

So this was the person who had been after his number one potato these past couple months. Why the hub had such a thing as a leaderboard for who could sow the most vegetables, he had no idea. But it proved a successful way to pass his time. A task that included beating out the only other person on that board who was a threat to his number one title—the very same person who was currently standing across from him.

"Technoblade. Nice to metcha." He held out a hand, surely baffling a few of the people who were still staring at him and (Y/n). It was expected later there would be whispers of the interaction between the infamous man towering over an unassuming civilian, but he didn't mind.

"I know who you are." They took his hand with a snort, laughing. "I've been burning holes through your name on that stupid leaderboard ever since last summer. Your mental, you know, for farming a million potatoes a day."

"So I've been told." A brief memory of an old competitor made its way to the front of his mind, the word squid leaving as soon as it had came.

"I suppose asking you to stop farming would be a waste of time?"

He almost laughed.

"I'll take that as a no." (Y/n) tightened the grip on his hand with a fervent determination before letting go. A silent challenge. The first one that had interested Techno in a long time.

"How about we make a game out of this?" His ears perked up, blood red eyes capturing (Y/n)'s as they proceeded. "If we're to continue in this great potato war, how about we settle around a five hundred million goal. First person to it gets bragging rights. As well as, I dunno, something of the others. We can work that part out later."

"You're going down nerd." He grinned, sharp canines showing excitedly.

"Oh please." You rolled your eyes with the same sort of smile. "his'll be a cake walk for me. Or a potato walk for me, you could say."

"Bruhh."

"Like that one aye? How about, by the time I'm done with you, you'll be mashed potatoes!"

"Anyone else want to be my competitor? Anyone?" Techno pretended to call out to a crowd, scaring the nearby foot traffic as they scurried around the little bubble they had both created in the street.

"Alright fine fine you've made your point. My humors simply too good for the likes of you." (Y/n) returned to stuffing their hands in their pockets now, body weight shifting from foot to foot.

Techno took one more long look at them. Sweeping their figure with a feeling he hadn't encountered in a long time.

He was having fun.

"May th' best farmer win."

"Oh I will."

And with that, he set off in the opposite direction of you, determined to get back to his farm before you did yours.

#technoblade #technoblade x reader #teachnoblade x you #technoblade x y/n #technoblade fanfic #mcyt #mcyt x reader #mcyt x y/n #mcyt x you #mcyt fanfic #dsmp x reader #dsmp x y/n #dsmp x you #dsmp #fanfic #x reader #one shot #skyblock #the great potato war

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genericpuff · 11 months

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I got 3 questions for you

1. So, if persephone can do bad things and get a reward for it, does it mean you can say the same argument for apollo when he SA persephone but he the bad guy for likely persephone and hate hades?

2. Why does everyone still talking about Apollo SA persephone like it 2 weeks ago and not 10 years ago(like it said) plus persephone may or may not forgotten about it?

3. Will you change all the females (not all them tho, but) hairstyles or keep them same because I'm very tired of the same slick back and slick side, it's not that I don’t hate them or anything just it doesn't have unique to the hair like persephone having flowers on hair ( sorry, it hard for me trying to explain).

aight let's do this

1.) this is a question that comes up a lot because it helps us observe the morality line in LO and how it's applied effectively (it is not). one does have to wonder why we're supposed to root for Persephone but condemn characters like Minthe. one has to wonder why people will use "well greek myth was fucked up" as a defense of LO but then still expect people to take the SA plot seriously when SA is something that happened all the time in greek myth. this isn't to say things like the SA shouldn't be taken seriously, they ABSOLUTELY SHOULD, but then the comic will ask us to not think too hard about persephone abusing a lower class person. tl ; dr: lore olympus can't pick a lane and it shows in how it expects us to root for some characters and trash on others even though they've both committed similarly-heinous acts.

2.) i'm gonna apologize in advance because i'm really gonna like, come at you here, but this question comes across as very victim-blamey. I get if that wasn't your intention so I'm not gonna drill into you too hard, but that's often used as an argument for SA victims to just "get over it". There's no timeline as to when or how long it should take for a victim of SA to heal from what happened to them. Speaking candidly an SA victim myself, I still struggle with sex as an adult because of how much it affected me when I was younger (especially considering it happened when I was still in my formative years, like my brain straight up wasn't done developing yet so that had lasting effects that I still feel today). People are still talking about it, not because Persephone seems to have forgotten about it, but because Rachel herself clearly wants the narrative and her own audience to forget about it, as it's the one plotline she clearly never intended to write.

And when I say she "never intended to write" I mean that literally, apparently when she first uploaded the assault episode she didn't even put a trigger warning because she legitimately didn't see what happened as assault. So she quietly retconned it by adding the trigger warning and later expanding on the plotline through Eros explaining to Persephone what happened. Which wasn't necessarily the wrong thing to do, I think that initial conversation with Eros is quite meaningful in getting across that being nagged into sex =/= consent, but it's become abundantly clear that Rachel is just pretending this was her plan all along, when the proof in the narrative and writing shows that it never was. You can't just throw in an SA plot for drama but it's very clear that's what Rachel's using it for and that's where the criticism lies when people talk about Persephone's progress - the comic tries to convince us she's "over it" but we've never actually seen her side of things, we see more screen time and backstory given to the assaulter's POV (Apollo) and the POV of the friends of the victim (Hermes, Artemis, Hades, etc.) than we do from the actual victim (Persephone).

I hope that makes sense? The ten year time skip in and of itself isn't the problem, the problem is that Rachel wrote in a 10 year time skip that she clearly never planned out so she could get Persephone's AOW punishment over with ASAP and so she could artificially retcon things on a whim by inserting them as flashbacks. Rachel doesn't use flashbacks as an actual narrative device, she uses them as a crutch so she can patch together things as she comes up with them because she hasn't written out an actual story. And there's no single plotline that demonstrates that more than the SA plotline.

3.) I'm definitely trying to have fun with the hairstyles, the way the hair is done in LO just goes to show that Rachel only knows how to draw 3 faces LMAO That said, I'm also trying to keep it within the design choices of the original comic as much as possible, so aside from new characters (such as Dionysus and Charon) I won't be changing things too much, just enough to make them feel fresh but still recognizable (ex. Persephone's mid-length hair when she cuts it at Hades' house).

#ama #ask me anything #anon ask me anything #anon ama #lore olympus critical #lo critical #antiloreolympus #anti lore olympus

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bi-bard · 2 years

Text

A Minute from Home but I Feel so Far from It - Tenth Doctor Imagine (Doctor Who)

Title: A Minute from Home but I Feel so Far from It

Pairing: Tenth Doctor X Reader

Based On: The View Between Villages

Word Count: 922 words

Warning(s): mention of bad childhood

Summary: The Doctor showed (Y/n) the beauty of the universe. (Y/n) adored it all. Now, (Y/n) is mere moments from seeing their family and hesitates. The Doctor is curious why going home seems to terrify (Y/n) so much.

Author's Note: Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit. We did it, folks! Last imagine! Let's hope this one's good!

P.S. this is totally not what I think would happen if the Doctor ever tried to drag me back to hometown (that was so sarcastic).

PART TWO HERE

STICK SEASON - NOAH KAHAN WRITING CHALLENGE MASTERLIST

---------------------------

There was something comical about watching the Doctor fly the TARDIS.

It was meant to be flown by more than one person, and since he refused to teach me how to fly, he was left running around the console like a cartoon character. I thought of characters like Tom & Jerry and Wile E. Coyote. I was almost certain there was a little cloud of dust forming behind him as he went.

But then the TARDIS would land, and he would seem so confident and in control. It was like a switch being flipped on and off. Granted that 'in control' thing would fade once we stepped outside and we weren't usually where or when he wanted us to be.

This trip was no different.

He leaned on the console with the same "I'm so impressive" smirk on his face.

"What," I asked when he didn't start rambling about where we were. "Where are we? Or when? Or both?"

"Best place in the universe," he said, motioning toward the door.

I furrowed my eyebrows at him for a moment. "Alright..."

He nodded toward the door.

I scoffed before turning around and going to the door.

I pulled the door open and popped my head through to get a look around.

I almost immediately pulled my head back and slammed the door shut, stumbling a few steps back. I froze after that. It felt like I couldn't move or talk or anything.

"What's wrong," I heard the Doctor ask. "Did I drop us in the wrong place again?"

When I didn't speak up, he walked over to me. He stepped around me to open the door.

"I swear, you try to take someone on a nice visit home, and this thing always ends up dropping into some kind of battle- woah!"

I grabbed the back of his jacket when he went to step outside. I pulled him back before slamming the door shut and standing in front of it.

"What'd you do that for?"

"What'd you bring me home for," I snapped.

"I... I thought it'd be nice to offer you a chance to visit," he explained quickly. "You don't mention it much, but I don't need you suddenly getting homesick-"

"I wouldn't have gotten homesick."

That wasn't a lie either.

There is this weird effect that small towns seem to have on people. It formed two main categories.

The first would be the ones who peaked in said small town and lived there for the rest of their lives. They probably married their high school sweetheart and had three kids with weirdly spelled names.

The second would be the people who ran for the hills as soon as they could. They were often the ones made to feel miserable for not being absolutely obsessed with the town and the people in said town.

I was part of the second group.

Kids were assholes, adults didn't care, and I was trapped.

The Doctor was my escape from all of that. I was convinced he knew that. Apparently, I was wrong.

"(Y/n)," he muttered. "What's going on?"

"I... I should be excited to visit, I know, and I know you meant well," I replied. "But... I can't. I can't be here."

"Hey, hey," he reached out and touched my arms. "Why? What's wrong?"

I couldn't form the answer. I hadn't realized how much shame I had taken in that part of my life. I didn't want him to know about it. I didn't want his view of me to change because of it.

The Doctor let out a quiet sigh, dropping his hands from my arms. He ran his hand over his face.

"I've seen you face some of the scariest things in the universe," he said. "Daleks and Cybermen and Weeping Angels-"

"That's different!"

"Why," he asked.

I looked down for a moment.

"(Y/n)?"

"When I face those things, I have you with me... but here... I..."

I felt myself freezing up again. Whatever being decided my immediate fight-or-flight response should be freeze would have hell to pay when I finally made it to the afterlife.

"I'm still here," he promised after I had been silent for a few moments too long. He stepped forward slowly. "I'm still going to be right next to you."

He slowly reached out his hand, a grin forming on his face. I looked down at his hand. It was like I was studying it, seeing if this was some kind of trick or a trap.

"Just like any other trip," he added.

I looked back at his face. His grin only seemed to grow when I made eye contact with him. I couldn't help but grin back at him.

I reached out and grabbed his hand. He immediately pulled me to the door.

"I want to see everything," he said excitedly as he pulled the door open and pulled me outside. "Every store you used to visit and where you got coffee and where you would run off to read-"

"Doctor," I planted my feet as he tried to lead me down the road. He looked back at me. "I think it's only fair that I get to lead the way on this trip, don't you?"

There was a pause before he let out a happy laugh. He used his free hand to gesture to the road behind him. "Lead the way, please."

I chuckled and started walking forward.

I could tell that this was going to be the best trip home that I had ever had.

---------------------------

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Some Original Characters

#tenth doctor x reader #tenth doctor imagine #tenth doctor fanfiction #doctor who imagine #doctor who fanfiction #doctor who x reader #imagine #fanfiction #x reader

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commenter2 · 3 months

Text

"Hello Rosie" episode review

We see the aftermath of Charlie’s visit to Heaven, and it sounds like Rosie will be in this episode. SPOILERS.

Though it hurts, Husk bringing up if Charlie is actually helping is a reasonable understanding given the things that have happened, some fans have even brought this up in theories. I still wonder if the reaction we quickly see from Charlie is still related to some kind of trauma she has based on a time she didn’t help someone and it ruined that person’s life.

Vaggie said she and Charlie share a room, again like I said for “Dad Bead Dad” it’s still adorable to know they sleep in the same room.

Apparently fans were arguing if Charlie had hooves or not after a sneak peek of the upcoming episode was posted. Since we’ve seen angels/demons change their forms and its confirmed that Lilith and Lucifer and shapeshift, Lilith with her horns and Lucifer was seen in the first episode transforming from a snake to his average appearance, I say Vivize should retcon this a bit and say Charlie also has shapeshifting powers, in this case she can have hooves for walking on harder surfaces but regular feet for whenever she is on the beach or wants to enjoy the grass between her toes. This is one of the few chances where everyone can be right in a (odd) debate, while also being a free pass for the artist if they ever forget this fact. Plus this gives Charlie the power of transformation, good if you are like me and wouldn’t mind Charlie being in an episode of Death Battle one day. The fact that there are shoes near her bed seem to confirm this. That and/or there is shoe wear in Hell for people with hooves, which could explain an old theory I read about Blitzo since people had a similar debate about him since he wears cowboy boots and being possibly a hybrid demon.

Oh here we go. It’s been regularly brought up that Al is up to no good and wants to use Charlie to advance his plans, Alastor even tried to make a deal with Charlie in the pilot, but now that Charlie is emotionally vulnerable and Vaggie isn’t there to stop her, its likely she will make a deal that will come back to bite her later in the series. This is even scarier ever since it was reveled in the Helluva Boss episode “Oops” that deals with sins are “everlastingly binding” and like I said in my review of the episode, this likely means a deal with the royal family of Hell are taken even MORE seriously.

Nice to see Razzle and Dazzle caring for Charlie.

I wonder what would have happened if we got a scene of Charlie getting emotional when she realizes she is in a blanket cocoon, since cocoons tare associated with butterflies and moths.

Woah, even though it’s been show that Charlie will curse I’d never imagine her calling Alastor an asshole…at least not in this season.

I know Charlie is beating herself up, but I think she is overreacting about comparing herself to Overlords, especially after dealing with Val. I think it would have been better if she had said something like “how am I any different than any other evil person/corrupted person/demon out for souls?”

CHARLIE SAID “FUCK YOU’ TO AL XD

Al’s speech about smiling sounds like some The Joker would say. I’m also hearing some clear hints that Alastor is up to something, but luckily for him Charlie is too bummed out to noticed.

Charlie brings up a good question, how long have Charlie and Vaggie been dating at this point? Was there ever a confirmation on this? I mean they met when they wore their outfits from the pilot so it probably isn’t that long, but it would still be good to know. Also before it was revealed she was a former Exorcist, did Vaggie use a made up backstory related to the old ideas of her being sinner who died in an accident/suicide?

I think this is the first time we seen Al’s shadow form take over his body.

For those that recall, in Alastor’s prequel comic he plucked a flower that instantly wilted in his hand. It’s odd that the leaf didn’t do something similar unless it only works when he wants it to or on pretty flows.

I know Al is asexual, but he is getting to Adam and Val level of creepy pervert on Charlie. If this keeps up Lucifer and Lilith will have another name on their list of people they have to beat up for making Charlie be uncomfortable.

I’m loving how assertive Charlie is to Alastor, hopefully we can see this side of her more often soon mix with her nice personality.

Al definitely wants Charlie to hurt someone, though I bet he will trick her into getting someone in a position where they can get hurt.

I knew this deal was coming, but it still terrifying to see.

LOVE that Charlie isn’t THAT mad/holding a big grudge at Vaggie for not telling her she was an Exorcist, as I agree with others who saw the last episode and thought her doing so on a major level would have made her a hypocrite. At least the negativity she is feel is more logical/fair given its still a big shock to her. I also have something to say related to the topic but I’ll save that for the end of this review.

Let’s keep an eye out on the Eggboi’s statement about bank accounts. I strangely feel like it’s going to be related to Mammon. Maybe its foreshadowing something for Helluva Boss as I like the idea of an episode where Mammon tries to get Fizz back and maybe does so by threatening Ozzie’s finances who Mammon owns to a degree through one of his banks.

It was touching seeing Vaggie show care for the others safety. It shows how much she has grown to love them in her own way, and how good of a leader/ 2nd in command she really is.

Confirmation that Charlie and Vaggie have been together for 3 years now. Admittedly not that bad when to keeping secrets, plus can you really blame Vaggie that much. Even if Charlie was okay when she found out Vaggie’s past, there is the chance this could have increased the chances of Vaggie’s identity being caught and make both of them targets by anti-angel haters or worse a hellborn demon in charge of taking care of problems like this, such as my Agent t OC.

You can see that Alastor is totally bored with Charlie’s little rant XD.

We have seen Charlie in Cannibal district a few times, so it’s kind of odd that she doesn’t know how pleasant it can be. Then again last time she was there she got corpse blood in her eye, but I might count it as very small continuity error. Maybe if they had her say a line like “I don’t come here much due to the well..cannibalism”.

ROSIE! The voice is good but I’m surprised they didn’t go for a British/Mary Poppin like voice, mostly cause it would have been another nice difference if we ever get a scene of Alastor hanging out with both Mimzy and Rosie and the same time.

So Rosie is a “butcher” in a way.

Wait was Rosie flirting there for a minute? :3 Eh it’s okay but, I rather/still hope to see a bit of Almimzy next season.

I just want to point out how Alastor identifies Charlie as the child of Lucifer and heir to the throne of Hell, and how he doesn’t bring up Lilith. Yeah I can see it showing that he might want a way to the power related to the throne but I’m more focused on him not bringing up Lilith as there might be something there.

Alastor and Rosie have likely known each other for so long that Rosie probably knows what Alastor really means even from just a few of his words.

It’s a pretty smart writing move to have Charlie deal with Rosie while Vaggie deals is Carmilla, as they are very similar to each other which of course is why they click better than if one went to the other Overlord.

Carmilla has a ballerina like fighting style. Her dialogue also makes it sound like she is going to teach Vaggie on how to fight the Exorcist “Karate Kid” style.

Heh “Cannibettes”

insert “Susan equals Karen” joke here but who cares about that, the bigger question is if she is Rosie’s mother.

I laughed when I heard Susan said Charlie had big eyes, as this reminds me of a Star Trek Lower Decks joke about how the characters there also have big eyes, and it’s the same with Charlie here XD.

Looks likes Charlie took her dad’s advice of “take no shit from demons” a little too hard here XD. I also want to point out that Charlie lost it when Susan called her showmanship mediocre, fitting given her and her father’s ringmaster theme XD.

“Carmilla training Vaggie” confirmed. We also clearly see how Carmilla defeated it (if she really did, I’m still not 100% convinced yet) cause if she can beat Vaggie then she can beat an Exorcist.

I did have a feeling Vaggie would be a bit rusty with fighting, but the idea that she hasn’t fought since she got her long hair is a bit odd. Then again with Charlie not being big about violence, it makes sense that she hasn’t honed her fighting skills as much.

Carmilla looks nice with her hair down. I also noticed that she doesn’t have horns unlike her daughters making me still wonder a bit if her kids are biologically hers or if they were adopted. Odette “horns” do seem to be some kind of hair tie so I could see her being Carmilla’s biological daughter.

Carmilla was channeling Hazbin Hotel theorist energy there for a minute XD.

Carmilla again backs up my old idea from “Overture” about how the writers should have made it so that there were usually casualties in Exterminations but the one from the season premiere was the worst one yet thus leading Adam to exterminate earlier than usual.

So Carmilla is telling Vaggie to “go for the head”. Also again Vaggie supports my previous statement.

Carmilla did kill the exorcist, which is okay to me. Unless she is still lying to a degree, like what if she did wound it but it was only killed when the person Carmilla is covering for came to help. Not all flashback in cartoons/anime are true after all. I mean must I remind Avatar fans of “The Great Divide”? Hopefully not.

Damn “Out for Love” good :D

Now I’m liking the idea of Vaggie and Carmilla being friends.

VAGGIE’S WINGS ARE BACK! I mean it was expected but still damn that scene was intense. That or she always had them but hid them for so long that maybe she forgot how to summon them. Dumb follow up but could this strangely lead to a scene of the exorcist head just regrowing a body Deadpool/Alucard style? Probably not but it would be an interesting twist.

DON’T TELL HER ANYTHING CHALRIE! SHE’S A GOSSIPER! NOOOOO!

By the tell of Rosie’s tone, I’m guessing she did something that hurt someone she loved. Could she have had a hand in the death of the Franklin character from the pilot/Alastor comic and regrets it to this day?

Ooo Alastor is allowing Charlie to use his cane. I once heard that the cane was an extent of Alastor himself, so is this the equivalent of holding hands to him XD.

I wonder if that spotlight is foreshadowing something, like maybe an angel is showing other angels what Charlie is doing. Hopefully it’s a good thing.

Was Charlie saddle comment her flirting? She is canonically bi but I haven’t seen much of that so far.

(Cannibals start singing) There’s the Mary Poppins vibe!

Again did Charlie not hear what Alastor (and Rosie) were just saying?

Aww Chaggie is so PURE!

I don’t care at this point, I’m counting Niffty’s stain friend Fred as a von Eldritch reference.

Love that the episode ended with Charlie and Vaggie holding hands.

Wait we never found out if Rosie and Susan are related or not! 0 out of 10!

That was a good episode. Things are building up to not only the finale, but also in general like Alastor is advancing his still enigmatic plans which is definitely going to bite back at Charlie likely next season.

It was fun seeing the main character interacting with more of the reoccurring ones especially fan favorites.

I really liked how they still had Charlie and Vaggie make amends while also advancing the story for the finale. I mean I do agree that the first season of Hazbin Hotel should have had more episodes, more on that in the finale, but it’s great that they didn’t do a whole episode dedicated to them getting back together. Besides such an episode should be saved when they have a proper fight like Vaggie is tired of Charlie not listening to her or Charlie gets mad when Vaggie keeps trying to warn her that her mother Lilith (or the Imposter posing as Lilith) is up to no good.

The only downsides are minor things like not learning if Rosie and Susan are related, which I’ve headcanoned for a while now or taking some time to explain more about Cannibal Colony like why the citizens there all dress in old timey clothes. The artist also missed out on the chance of having Martha and her family from Helluva Boss making a cameo unless she did and missed it.

I’m also 50/50 on Carmilla killing the Exorcist as I still think it could have been more dramatic if she was lying about it. Maybe she still is and we later find out that someone told her this info as part of a plan in exchange for not telling the truth.

Next time it’s the season 1 finale! Get ready for a review of that VERY SOON! What did you think about the episode.

#hazbin hotel #vivziepop #spoilers #hazbin hotel spoilers #hazbin hotel charlie #hazbin hotel vaggie #hazbin hotel rosie #hazbin hotel susan #hazbin hotel carmilla #camilla carmine

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soleminisanction · 10 months

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How much of Stephanie’s flaws do you think is character flaws and how much is sexist writing? Because while some stuff I’ve heard about her seemed like red flag, but I’m also wary of pointing them out because there’s so much sexism in DC Comics and I don’t wanna fall victim to sexist takes. Do you have any clarity on that conundrum?

That is, I think, a much more complicated question than you'd intended it to be. Let me narrow this down to just one flaw to show you what I mean:

In Steph's original appearance (Detective Comics #647-649), her one real "character flaw" is anger. It's what drives her to move against her father, sure, but it's also what nearly leads her to murdering him, it drives the conflict between her and Batman & Robin, and it's the reason Bruce describes her as being, quote, "on no one's team but her own."

When she's made a supporting cast member in Robin, however, the anger is still there, but it's no longer treated as a character flaw... partially because Chuck Dixon has a tendency to write angry characters as a default. Instead of being something that gets her into trouble, it's treated as a trait that makes her a "spitfire" full of "righteous anger," by which I mean Dixon used her as a mouthpiece to scream insults at anyone with an opinion he didn't like and had her beat up men that "deserved it," both with the assumption that readers will agree with her, because the narrative is on her side and portrays her as being in the right.

This is largely how Steph's anger is handled for the rest of her characterization, when the exception of one storyline written by Jon Lewis, who framed it more as a thing to get Steph sympathy -- it gets her into trouble at one point, sure, but is otherwise written with an undercurrent of, "this poor girl, the world has been so very mean to her, don't you just want to comfort her?"

The thing is, that treatment of her violent anger as something righteous and okay, where she's always in the right and the people she hurts always Deserve It? You can argue that that's a form of sexist writing, because there are scenes where she behaves abusively and it's not treated as abuse or even a bad thing, because she's a girl and women's abuse is not taken seriously. You even see this in how she's treated by the audience -- she's got basically the same anger issues as Jack Drake, and yet while interpreting Jack as a abusive is widely accepted by certain parts of the fandom, the same is not true of Steph.

Other people would argue that portraying her as angry at all is inherently sexist (and I don't agree with this, but I have heard people make this argument, stupid as it is) because it makes her look like a "shrew" or a "woman scorned" or otherwise plays into negative stereotypes of women's emotions.

Which then leads the modern version of her, colored by and primarily based on her portrayal in Batgirl (2009) by Brian Q. Miller, where Steph just, doesn't have anger issues, at all, or at least so the narrative would claim. She gets fired up in a fight, sure, but ~she doesn't have a mean bone in her body~ and is always so ~smiley~ and ~happy~ and just a ~sweet widdle polyanna~ who only wants to do ~the right thing.~

But see, that, ditching the anger issues entirely? That's also sexist! Women should be allowed to be angry and still have the potential to be treated as heroes! Getting rid of it because you can't think of how to make a woman with anger issues into a likable and compelling character is sexist! Especially because it takes away her initial motivation and doesn't replace it with anything.

And that's just kind of how it is for all of the traits you could call her character flaws. The only ones we can say for sure are deliberate are those that wind up contributing to the plot, and even then, they very well might have some sexist writing wrapped up in them.

It's really not a simple black or white situation. But like I mentioned in one of my other posts, I ultimately think that the best way to address both deliberate character flaws and sexist writing is to work them into the plot and make them matter, resolve and explore them somehow, rather than trying to toss them away and pretend they never happened. That option is just as sexist as any other, and it's also unsatisfying and lazy. There's a long history of comics that proves people can do better.

#dc comics asks #stephanie brown critical #apologies if this one is rambly I had trouble getting my thoughts together

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sagesilentfire · 1 year

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it's so weird I personally never saw/considered toffee as evil???? and had no idea that people hated him??????? I thought it was universally agreed he was the best and most tragic thing to happen in the series?????????

even after the rollercoaster that was comet I'm more inclined to believe he DIDN'T murder her (tbf she had it coming)

Oh, I agree with you. I don't think he's evil. But unfortunately, that doesn't erase how the writers, and a section of the fans, treated him. Maybe they were a vocal minority, but if so they were extremely vocal. Here's the breakdown:

The writers: I've explained at length how the writers screwed over Toffee. They change his motives from petty to deep depending on who they're talking to, they ignore all the mystery boxes they created regarding him, and if there's any way they want us to feel about his pointless, horrible death, it's either relief or a dull sadness that the magic wasn't destroyed right then. Not horror or righteous indignation. He isn't explicitly a tragic victim, he's barely even mentioned after, and never in a way that implies Star should feel guilty for murdering him. Explicitly, he's a faceless obstacle to be knocked over by Star after she levels up, and it's totally fine she literally melted him, it's fine! We shouldn't question the morality of our white savior protagonist, it's fine!

But the big one, and the one you were likely referring to, is the fandom. And when I made that analysis, I do admit to one cop-out: the fandom isn't like that now. Nowadays it's mostly dead, with the odd stubborn holdout (like me) posting in the tag now and then. A lot of us are Toffee fans, still posting because we liked the potential the show had and so we're imagining him as a character and not the plot equivalent of a bowling pin. But Back In The Day, when the show was still running, people celebrated Toffee's death. It was so cool that Star Vs. had the guts to graphically murder a character onscreen! Star was so cool, and here you thought this show was for kids! Her butterfly form is so cool! Yeah, so much better than that loser Steven Universe, who just talks about his feelings to the villains and solves problems with love and friendship! Never mind that there's a reason other shows don't do this, and that's because it sends a horrible message. Star should've taken a page out of Steven's book honestly.

But surely after the shock of this super cool and edgy death wore out, people started to see the tragedy inherent in Toffee's character? Nope! I mean, there were some popular analysis posts and such, but the fandom mostly forgot about Toffee, along with the writers. And while we were forgetting about that, Morningmark happened. I've talked about him before, but he's always been both a good barometer for the fandom's opinion of a character as well as a shaper of it. When he rarely goes against the fandom's majority opinion, the fandom seems to bend over backwards to make his headcanon everyone's headcanon. Even when it involves dubious characterization. I have already talked about why Morningmark is overrated, but... he just does not get Toffee, even after the show ended with Toffee kind of acknowledged as being right, even after the fandom slowly began to die. In his urge to make everything haha funny he just made it really flat and made Toffee stupid, boring, and evul, and since his comics were the only thing getting notes in the quickly-dying fandom, it made it very annoying to be a fan of depth and tragedy in svtfoe. Then he stopped making svtfoe comics and moved to making Belos stupid and other The Owl House-related crimes, and at least I don't have to worry about his dreadful takes on Toffee anymore, so that's great.

And from there it was a short hop to the fandom we have today, where only people who got something important out of svtfoe still make content. Now, and only now, do we have the majority thinking Toffee's story, or at least what we saw of it, was the best thing to come out of svtfoe.

Also, yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if Mina killed Comet and blamed Toffee. That would be a much better twist than the whole Moon bs.

#svtfoe critical #svtfoe #svtfoe negativity #star vs the forces of evil #analysis #queue queue #ask #anon #my posts

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buriedalienfma · 10 months

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This week saw the release of yet another episode of "My Adventures with Superman", and I wanted to put out my thoughts on it. It would probably be better to wait for the full season before commenting on the show, but I think its fun to react to each episode as it comes out. Also helps that so far the show appears to have an episodic structure, which makes it more appropriate to judge each episode on its own. And I also have to mention that there's some obvious spoilers here.

Here's my thoughts on episode 3 :

- The opening scene of the show is pure Superman. There's a disaster happening, there are people in danger, Superman rushes in to save the day, while Lois jumps in to try and get an interview out of him. It's great stuff. - I'd like to see more of how the in-universe public reacts to Superman. In the real world, we've gotten so many superhero movies and cartoons, that we've gotten used to superheroes just being an omnipresent thing and that seems to be bleeding into superhero adaptations where the existence of superheroes is taken for granted. But really, the existence of superheroes in fiction should be treated as a big deal in-universe, and I hope the cartoon shows that aspect more in future episodes. It's a good way to make the world and setting feel more realistic. - Clark Kent doing an semi-awkward "Hero" voice as Superman is a nice bit of characterization. It shows that the character is still finding himself and settling into his role as the new champion of Metropolis. - There's a nice bit where Lois asks Clark to do a Superman impression and Clark naturally switches to his "Superman voice", before realizing that he might end up giving his secret identity away, so he pivots to a "Clark Kent doing a Superman impression" voice. And to think that there are people out there who have suggested that the idea of superheroes having secret identities is outdated. Why would you get rid of that idea when you can have fun moments like this one ? - The trailer of the show indicated that the show uses three primary Comic Books for inspiration : Superman Birthright, All Star Superman and Man of Steel (1986). I am...not the biggest fan of Man of Steel, and I hope the influences of that comic are kept to a minimum. On the other hand, Birthright and All Star are solid stories. This episode seems to also take inspiration from Superman Smashes the Klan, particularly in how Superman's powers are manifested by him having visions and strange flashes where his senses are suddenly heightened.

Hey, if the show is taking inspiration from my favorite Superman story of all time, then that's definitely a good sign. - We're introduced to a few more supporting characters here in the form of Steve Lombard, Cat Grant and Ronnie Troupe. They're given a comedic introduction which didn't quite land for me, but the episode moves at a brisk pace, so it doesn't feel like an issue. - And we have Clark, Lois and Jimmy doing some good old fashioned detective work to track down the bad guys. I like how each member of the trio gets to contribute in figuring out the bad guys' plan. It makes it clear that while Superman may be the one with the powers, the other characters are heroes in their own right. - The show introduces three new villains. Rough House, Silver Banshee and Mist. They're given just enough characterization and quirks to not feel generic. So far the show seems to be leaning on the villains being more down to earth and small scale, which works well considering that the show does have a “Year One” feel to it.

- We already have fanboys complaining about how the villains don't look exactly like the comics or how their power sets are different from the comics. It's really funny because both Livewire and Silver Banshee are at best, C-list villains in the comics. They don't have more than five notable stories between the two of them not just in current comics, but just in general. I'm not saying that the characters don't or can't have fans, but lets not act like its blasphemous for an adaptation to change the characters to suit the story. - The action scene is fun enough, though it does kinda feel like a repeat of the pilot episodes. The villains wreck havoc, Superman shows up and gets beaten down by the villains, the villains lose control of their tech, which throws them off just in time for Superman to put them down. Let's hope that future episodes don't fall into that formula. - Like the pilot, there's a scene where Superman gets a vision of aliens and robots on other planets. I know that the show is teasing Brainiac as the possible big bad, and the visions are sure to lead into that. My theory is that Brainiac may be connected to all the high-tech weapons that the villains have been using in the past few episodes. Brainiac has always been a tech-based villain, so it makes sense for him to be involved in this way. As a Transformers fan, this reminds me of the Transformers Animated show. That show had a futuristic setting with all sorts of advanced robots being integrated into the society in some way. This technology was manufactured by the fictional Sumdac Industries, and its eventually revealed that the owner of that company was reverse engineering the technology from the salvaged remains of Megatron, the main villain of the Transformers franchise. This was in turn a plot point inspired by the Transformers movie. I think that "My Adventures with Superman" might do something similar with Brainiac. - We get a romantic flight sequence between Superman and Lois ! I never get tired of those, and the romance continues to be adorable. - When Lois interviews Superman, he tells her that he doesn't know too much about where he came from or who he is, and that's definitely a good thing. I feel like so many Superman adaptations just skip this aspect and have Superman immediately know that he's from Krypton, that his name was Kal-El and that his parents names were Jor-El and Lara, that the planet was destroyed, etc. Usually this is done by having a Jor-El hologram to give convenient plot dumps to Superman. However, you could make a compelling story out of Superman slowly uncovering his origins and heritage, and I'm glad that the show might be going in that direction. - There's still no appearance or even mention of Lex Luthor, Superman's one true archenemy. I'm fine with that. I think there's more than enough Superman vs Lex Luthor stories in both comics and other media. The show feels more fresh and unique by focusing on other villains. And that's episode three. This show continues to be solid and entertaining and while it has its flaws, they're not as egregious as to get in the way of my enjoyment of the final product.

#my adventures with superman #superman #lois lane #jimmy olsen

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