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raven-at-the-writing-desk · 9 months

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twst food culture compilation

Please note: this post does NOT include all food-related lore in TWST (for example, you won’t find a lot of information about individual characters’ food preferences or personal experiences with food here). This post ONLY talks about the food culture, notable locations, cultural dishes, and unique foods of the Twisted Wonderland world at large (ie countries, specific towns and cities, etc).

I did my best to scour for info, but I’ll update if I find anything new or details I missed the first time around.

General and/or Unspecified Location

There is a seasoning called “pure azure salt”, which is said to be rare, even in the Coral Sea.

Twisted Wonderland has a fruit called ruby berries (which taste “like freshly picked strawberries”).

There is frozen mint with a “refreshing profile” that grows in icy mountainous areas.

There exists Walrus-brand oyster sauce. Trey uses this to cook hamburger steak for his younger siblings. He says the oyster sauce provides a "nice savory flavor" with considerable depth. Trey also jokes about adding it to chestnut tarts in book 1.

There are mentions of irl Japanese foods such as konjac and takoyaki, but so far no place of origin in Twisted Wonderland has been sited.

Like in the real world, celebrities like Vil and Neige are used to promote products (including food and drink) in commercials, on social media platforms, etc. For example, in book 5, we see Neige advertising Red Apple Soda and Vil using his Magicam account to promote the apple juice made by Epel's family.

There's a popular dish called "pumpkin carriage stew". The insides of a pumpkin are scooped out and the shell is filled with a creamy stew, which made it difficult to carry over to tables. It would sell out every day at the cafe Ruggie used to work at.

Some restaurants call their spaghetti with meatballs "starry night spaghetti", named after the tale of two dogs who shared a spaghetti kiss under a starry sky. It is said that sharing spaghetti with meatballs with someone outside would lead to true love.

Hunting is sport as well as something done for food.

Briar Valley

General

Cotton candy is a classic snack food sold at Briar Valley food stalls. The way it is prepared resembles spinning threads, which is considered a blessed occupation (as there was a period in Briar Valley's history when no one was able to spin thread, so some clever individual tinkered around and made cotton candy instead).

In the battlefield (~400 years ago, during the human-fae war), soldiers would roast rats and lizards to eat if they didn't have rations or other ingredients.

There is little in the way of modern technology and electricity; typically, one would prepare dishes and/or collect ingredients by hand (such as via fishing) or by using magic.

Magic is used to light fires for cooking. There is little risk for fire accidents since magical fires automatically go out when you go to sleep.

Because Briar Valley is located to the north, it can get very chilly. When the snow melts, it turns into very cold freshwater.

According to Lilia, “berries are a must-have, especially at birthdays parties” in Briar Valley. They are famous for its berry juice.

Coral Sea

General

According to Jade, there are no fires in the Coral Sea. Therefore, most of the food consumed is raw.

A month-long land boot camp first established by a mermaid princess that married a human prince teaches merpeople fire safety and how to eat food as part of its curriculum.

It's rare for merfolk to eat anything sweet, as those kinds of foods aren't readily avaliable in the sea.

The Atlantica Memorial Museum has the mermaid princess's "silver hair comb" on display. This, of course, refers to the "dinglehopper"--a common fork. This implies that merpeople (such as the mermaid princess referenced in many stories) fused to be unaware of the eating utensils on land.

Azul's mother owns the "hottest restaurant" in the Coral Sea. It started off as a small place, but has since expanded to have a large staff.

Couples from the Coral Sea frequently request rainbow dessert soup with trident cookies for their weddings. To eat it, you use the trident cookie to stir the sweet sky-blue soup, which then turns the soup into seven colors of the rainbow. This is a dish that is only served for special occasions in the Coral Sea, and it is typically served warm.

Jade says that he was surprised to see that many land dwellers eat their fruit without the peel; this would imply that those from the Coral Sea typically eat their foods with the skin/peel left on, or as-is.

Playful Land Amusement Park

All food and drink are handed out for free.

They serve food in large quantities, such as tuna, entire tart cherry pies (with cinnamon, clove, and crushed nuts in the filling) and a whole peppery roasted chicken. The park encourages consuming in excess.

Other food items being offered include fried tuna fish and sparkling apple juice. The juice comes with an umbrella stuck in the opening to prevent bugs from getting in. You remove it before drinking.

They have ice-cream in many flavors! We see strawberry milk in the related event.

The park had candy and popcorn in “apple core” flavor. Supposedly, this is a taste inspired by the story of the Generous Fox giving a Puppet Boy an apple core instead of a whole apple because “the puppet wished to have a core”.

There is a “Candy Road”, a street lined with shops that have caramel lollipops, chewy candy, marshmallows, cookies, chocolate crunch, and lots of other sugary treats!

Their chocolate crunch has 12 different charms thrown in.

The third most popular souvenir are pasta snacks in the shape of the Friendly Fox and Gentle Cat. The second most popular is a tin of plain cookies in the shape of the Friendly Fox and cocoa cookies in the shape of the Gentle Cat. Finally, the most popular are apple core flavored candies!

Sage's Island

Night Raven College

Pomefiore holds a welcome party for the freshmen, which includes a fancy dinner.

Scarabia regularly holds banquets, typically at Kalim's request.

Heartslabyul holds so-called "unbirthday parties" whenever it is a day that does NOT fall on a Heartslabyul student's birthday.

The dorm members of Scarabia and Heartslabyul pitch in to prepare for banquets and unbirthday parties.

Mr. S's Mystery Shop stocks food items, such as candies (which Floyd often buys), tuna cans, and ingredients for baking (this is where Deuce and Yuu pick up things for the chestnut tart in book 1). Sam also sells food items that he seems to have made himself, like the Mystery Drink (which Octavinelle eventually buys the rights to).

The school cafeteria is said to have delicious breads.

Once a month, a famous bakery from out of town serves their goods at NRC. Their stock includes items such as chocolate croissants, egg sandwiches, yakisoba bread and cream bread ("cronuts and bear claws"), roast beef sandwiches, red bean buns ("hot dog buns"), and deluxe minced cutlet sandwiches ("deluxe ham and cheese"/"grilled cheese" in the localization). They sell out fast!

The cafeteria at NRC serves food buffet style; the cafeteria is kept warm with magic from fire fairies which are supplied with dry firewood every day.

Master Chef ("Culinary Crucible") is an elective course at NRC that teaches students how to cook. It is meant to curb the expenses related to eating out and to help the boys maintain balanced diets and learn how to take care of themselves. Judges for this course are randomly selected from the students and staff (prior to this methodology, people would bribe the judges for extra credit).

While taking Master Chef, students help with preparing meals in the cafeteria in exchange for part-time pay.

The instructors for Master Chef are ghosts who were professional chefs at five-star restaurants when they were alive.

There are various locations on campus where the students go to fetch ingredients for Master Chef. This includes an on-campus farm, ranch, windmill... and even the dormitories themselves!

Octainvelle has the Mostro Lounge, described by Jade as "a meeting place for gentlemen" where fighting between dorms is prohibited. While dining there, students are expected to abide by Octavinelle's rules. It is run by the manager and founder, Azul, who made a deal with the headmaster to get the rights to open the establishment. NRC gets 10% of the revenue the Mostro Lounge makes.

The Mostro Lounge has a one-drink purchase minimum.

The Mostro Lounge also operates food stalls and/or sells food at many school events, such as the cultural festival in book 5 and the interdorm magical shift/spelldrive tournament in book 2.

It is mostly Octavinelle students who staff the Mostro Lounge, but there are occasions when outside students are brought in as extra help. Ruggie has worked there part-time, as well as Jack, Ace, Deuce, and tons of other students.

NRC opens its school gates to the local townspeople for a period leading up to Halloween; during this time, they distribute candy and other sweets (such as Sam's waffles, served with jam made from NRC's apples) to guests. There's also a party on Halloween night where lots of food is served.

The woods behind the campus have chestnuts, which the main crew collect for an apology tart to Riddle.

The Botanical Garden has some edible plants growing there. These include strawberries, which the Science Club cultivates.

Unbirthday Party Rules (related to food)

Rule 25: There must be a tea party on the 5th of every month.

Rule 29: You must not eat the Queen's tarts without her permission.

Rule 153: The only tea you may drink in the evenings is herbal tea.

Rule 186: Do not eat hamburger steak on Tuesdays.

Rule 256: You must not drink lemonade with honey past 8 pm.

Rule 271: You must get up from the table within 15 minutes after eating lunch.

Rule 339: Your post-meal tea must be lemon tea with 2 sugar cubes.

Rule 529: If you eat steak on the night of a full moon, a cat must play the violin afterwards.

Rule 562: Do not bring chestnut tarts to an unbirthday party.

Rule 648: You must brush your teeth 2 times on nights when you eat turkey.

Rule 703: Whoever comes in 2nd place in a croquet match must serve tea to the Queen (dorm leader) the next day.

If the dormouse wakes up at an unbirthday party, you are to paint its nose with jam.

Coffee is forbidden; tea must be served at all occasions except for birthdays.

According to Cater, sweets are mandatory at unbirthday parties.

Dwarves' Mine & Silent Woods

There is an abundance of wildlife in these areas; Jade often goes hiking and foraging, making note of what he finds. He uses the plants to make his own tea blends (which are sometimes added to the Mostro Lounge's menu) and the herbs, plants, and mushrooms to experiment with in cooking.

There are fish to be found at the lake, including massive catfish.

The Foothill Town

There is a port for mainly cargo ships located at the southwest part of town. It's called Crane Port! The east side has a port as well, but that one is moreso for passengers. Crane Port has been getting fewer and fewer people passing through lately (until Port Breeze Fest, in which the NRC boys run food stalls and help to revive business in the area). Group A makes churros, Group B makes waffles, Group C makes salads, Group D makes cotton candy, and Group E makes clam chowder.

A popular restaurant in the Crane Port area serves foods like french fries and burgers. Their signature menu item is a donut made from potatoes. Actually, this restaurant specializes in potato dishes!

There is a chain restaurant on the island that also has locations elsewhere, including in Ace's hometown. He mentions that there are slightly different flavors to the sauces depending on which location you go to.

The town also has other eateries that are more geared towards students, seeing as it exists on an island with two notable magic schools to the north and the south. Cater often mentions going into town to take pictures at cafes.

There is a famous patisserie there. You have to line up early in the morning before opening time to get your hands on one of their strawberry tarts (or anything, really!).

Scalding Sands

General

The Scalding Sands seems to borrow heavily from Middle Eastern cultures. For example, some of the Scalding Sands’ traditional dishes include, but are not limited to: roasted lamb, moussaka, döner kebabs, shawarma, flatbreads, potato and bean spreads, and seafood sautés.

Tea is a popular beverage; it is had at every meal and break. People can drink up to 10 cups of tea a day!

The Scalding Sands specializes in black tea. For entertaining guests, special tea leaves are used.

In the Scalding Sands, they brew their tea leaves loose and without an infuser. This makes the tea very strong and bitter. To counteract the powerful flavor, people add lots of sugar to their tea and drink it with sweets.

“Luxurious” tea is very sweet, since sugar was once very expensive (due to a shortage of it, according to the localization) and considered a luxury.

Due to the hot weather, people often toss herbs into their tea to make it more refreshing to drink.

Coffee is also popular; there are many cafes that serve coffee and tea. The Scalding Sands is known in particular for their spiced coffee, which has a very distinctive flavor. This coffee is brewed without a filter, and some cafes do “coffee divinations” (reading the shapes and patterns of the grounds and the water droplets that remain after drinking to tell the fortunes of customers).

There are a lot of unique spices in their dishes. This is especially true of banquet dishes. However, a variety of dishes are still served at these occasions.

Kalim describes the Scalding Sands as being “big on stewed stuff” like curries.

In Kalim’s hometown, people love to gather around the table and talk over a meal.

Halloween in the Scalding Sands is celebrated by feasting on a variety of dishes. The idea is that the food must be abundant so that the ghosts that return to the world of the living for the night may also have their fill.

It used to be difficult for the people of the Scalding Sands to obtain water due to the lack of rainfall, hot climate, and expansive desserts. However, Kalim’s ancestors utilized the country’s rivers to reach other countries and to trade their textiles, spices, tea leaves, and other local goods with foreign lands. It was particularly impressive at the time, as they were the first traders from the Scalding Sands to sail (back then, accurate nautical maps were not a thing). This maritime pioneering is what would make the Asim family their massive fortune.

The Asims and other merchants heavily invested in technologies and innovations to make the area more sustainable and potable water more accessible.

The waterways of the country eventually developed into canals and communities formed around them as trade hubs. The canals are also used to host ferryboats for locals and tourists to sightsee, boosting the tourism industry. This also made access to water much easier for the residents, and the water helps to cool the temperature.

Silk City

The bazaars in Silk City are where locals do their shopping for various goods and staple foods like vegetables and fish. There are also stalls with gourmet food that cater to tourists.

Camel Bazaar is named after camels, which were used to transport people, goods, and luggage before Silk City’s canals and roads came to be. There also used to be an oasis where the camels would rest and drink after long treks; this oasis became a center for commerce and eventually evolved into a marketplace. To this day, the name “Camel” has stuck, even if people use trucks, ships, and cars more than camels.

There is also Zahab (”Gold”) Market, which is popular with tourists for shopping (especially for souvenirs!) but also has swindlers and pickpockets mixed in with regular customers.

Many snacks are sold! There’s camel milk chocolate, cookies drizzled in syrup, sunflower seeds, pistachios, chickpeas, all kinds of nuts, dried fruits (including dates), jams, jellies, syrups, starfruit, dragonfruit, etc.

(Lamb) shawarma is described as meat roasted on a spit and served on baguettes or pita bread. Because grease drips off while it cooks, it is “surprisingly healthier” than one expects it to be. Shawarma is also customarily served with vegetables (tomatoes, onions, olives, jalapenos, etc.) and sauces (yogurt, garlic, chili, hummus (a paste of garlic and chickpeas), mayo basil, etc).

There is a vendor that can supply large quantities of sweet and refreshing coconut water; this is because they’re used to providing for Kalim’s extravagant and excessive tastes. They create a hole in the top and provide straws to poke in and use to drink the water. The coconut flesh inside is also edible.

There are a lot of bread stalls; bread is also another staple food, and it comes in many sizes, shapes, and textures. Small roadside bakeries have wood-fired ovens which allow them to serve bread fresh to customers.

One stand sells baguettes that are taller than many children; these “tower baguettes” are a famous Fireworks Festival treat. People say that if you eat a big one, you’ll never go hungry again! The saying comes from a story of a young man that shared bread with hungry children. It’s because of that story that baguettes are considered a good luck food that many vendors sell on holidays.

The Camel Bazaar sells an elastic ice-cream (based on a similar irl frozen Turkish confection). It is kneaded on a pole and stretched out; customers are meant to “catch” it in their cups and cones. It’s food performance art! All the stretching makes the texture very unique.

There’s a fruit stand that is only open on festival days which sells a Silk Melon sundae; the fruit is hollowed out to host ice-cream (of the same melon flavor!) and toppings which make it very photogenic.

Starfruit is usually put in salads, according to Trey.

The dragonfruit sold is recommended to be eaten with honey. You drizzle it on top of a slice and eat!

Silk City’s signature fruit is the Silk Melon. It is called that because of its silky texture and sophisticated sweetness. It can’t be found in many other countries. The man of legend that shared his bread with a starving child is said to split a melon with his friend, even though he did not have much money to spare. It’s because of this tale that people started saying if you share Silk Melon with someone, it would make your friendship or romance last forever. Now the fruit is a festival staple and considered a symbol of good fortune.

In the past, water was only used for irrigation due to its scarcity. Some gave up on farming after years of trying to produce crops and failing—but others refused to give up and cultivated the land to made it fertile, something which future generations would reap the benefits of.

The fruits and veggies sold Camel Bazaar are freshly picked and grown locally. Jamil says this is possible because the arid climate actually helps with growing crops of high quality. Produce raised with less water concentrates flavor since the final fruit will have a higher sugar content. Because of this, Silk City’s produce is prized by chefs all over Twisted Wonderland. Of course, you can get them at an affordable prize in Camel Bazaar!

Shaftlands

General

The Shaftlands are famous for its jeweled pineapples.

The Shaftlands spans a large area of land and has drastically different climates depending on the part of it you're looking at. Therefore, we can deduce that foods and customs surrounding food are very different as well.

City of Flowers/Fleur City

The city’s food culture seems to be inspired by real world Paris, or at the very least, France.

Bread is a local specialty, particularly very buttery kinds. As you walk down the streets, you can smell bread baking. The City of Flowers has 10x (or more) the variety of bread that Sage's Island offers, and has an abundance of bakeries too.

Bread-making is popular in the City of Flowers. The windmills at the edges of the city grind grains to produce fresh flour. There are also watermills powered by the Soleil River to assist with making flour.

Because wheat is plentiful in this area, some of it is also used for desserts. One such confection is financier, which is made from a combination of wheat flour, almond flour, and butter. It resembles a gold bar, so eating one is said to bring financial prosperity.

Lately, gluten-free desserts have been trendy.

A dessert that does not use wheat flour is macarons. In the City of Flowers, they are yellow and shaped like bells to honor the Bell of Salvation which oversees the community and provides magic that helps rare plants grow in the area. The filling is a ganache with dried bits of grapes and apples.

Grape juice is popular in the City of Flowers, as the fruit is another specialty. You can buy the grapes raw and eat them as is, or ask a vendor to crush it (skin still on!) into juice for you. Some buy the grapes to give as gifts!

The grapes are grown in vineyards right outside of the city, and the farmers are constantly experimenting to improve their breeds. They taste very rich, tangy, and sweet.

The City of Flowers is also known for its many specialty cheese shops. Together, bread and cheese are called the staple foods of the city, and are sometimes eaten together. One specialty cheese shop the boys visit sells baguettes topped with ham and rich melted cheese.

The city considers goats a symbol of good luck, so they are treated with care. There are many community goats (which are just as common as domesticated cats or dogs) allowed to roam freely in the city. It is said that if you treat the community goats with kindness, they will come rescue you in your time of need.

Goat milk is used in some of the specialty cheeses produced by the city. The grapes mentioned earlier are also made into fruit compotes to go with the cheeses.

Harveston

This village has many dishes that borrow from a mixture of irl Nordic cultures. There’s also an emphasis on having hometown pride and the community itself being very close.

As expected, many of Harveston's dishes feature apples: apple pie, grilled and roasted apples, apple salad, apple pound cakes, etc.

Epel's family has an apple orchard that has been in the family for generations. They grow different kinds of apples throughout the year. Many of his neighbors are older people who also raise produce, and they help each other out when they're short on hands. The community is very tightly knit because of this, and treat each other like extended family.

Harvest season (autumn) is the busiest time of year; once that's over, everyone comes together to have a party. It's a potluck style celebration where everyone brings a homemade dish or homegrown food to share.

Harveston preserves its produce (such as apples and wild greens) by pickling them and serving them in salads. The bright colors are maintained by boiling the produce in a copper pot, which stabilizes the pigments. It's wisdom passed down from generation to generation.

There is also pickled herring, traditionally eaten on bread. Brining preserves the fish while it is still raw and doesn't dry it up. It's ready to eat right out of a jar, no cooking required.

The local stew is not very thick. It tastes sweet because of the added vegetables and savory because of the tender meat in it. There is also a salmon broth sprinkled with herbs which is described as "melty".

Fruits and vegetables can be packed in snow to keep them preserved. This method is called “snow aging” and prevents evaporation. In the old days, the villagers would build whole farms out of snow. In modern day, they just shovel the snow into a barn. This creates a natural fridge that will naturally thaw in the summers. Snow aging in this manner makes the produce sweeter and more nutritious.

The next town over is a three-hour bike ride. The roadside has many apple trees you can enjoy during the trip.

You can easily pick apples off the branch and eat them fresh! Farmers can snack on apples while picking.

Harveston is surrounded by tall mountains that are snow-capped all year, the most famous one being Mt. Moln. The greenery around Harveston is due to the spring water irrigation which runs down from Mt. Moln.

Most of Harveston’s land is used for orchards, and apples are their main produce. They also make many products using those apples like chips, rice crackers, and cookies.

Fall apples are sweeter, while winter ones are more sour. Winter apples are unique to Harveston.

Harveston also grows a lot of garlic.

Harveston farming is done the old fashioned way, as the predominantly older population distrusts chemical fertilizers and biotechnology.

Some villagers like the mayor and Marja (Epel’s grandma) adjust their accent to communicate with people from outside the village. Marja says she switches up when she’s selling goods in another town, since it can be tricky for non-Harveston locals to understand.

Hand washing before eating is a must! They take the act very seriously in Harveston. Stories say the miners of the past used to get very sick due to poor hygiene, but their health improved drastically once they started washing regularly with soap and water. It was difficult for them to get treatment because the town is so remote and far from hospitals or doctors, so the best thing is stressing prevention. This why the townspeople are sticklers about hand washing now.

To wash the Harveston way, you plunge your hands into ice cold water and make it all foamy with soap. You also scoop the water up and splash your face as well (as the miners from the past would also do this).

Apple Square is the main festival venue; it has many vendor stalls in an area called Kokko (which means “Bonfire”) Market. The Sledathon is the most lucrative time of year for the townsfolk.

Many of their products are made locally by the older folks in town. The goods aren’t trendy or very fancy, but they’re high-quality and made with Harveston pride.

The stalls give apple juice, apple tea (which has fruit pieces floating in it), and apple ginger tea for free. The apple juice is one of Harveston’s most popular products.

Giant five-meter apple pies are made for the Sledathon. They’re considered one of the main attractions, and you can get a slice from them free of charge.

There are other stalls that sell regular apple pie too. Every vendor has their own style, from the apples used to the crust and baking technique.

There are other kinds of fruit pies for sale, but apples are the most popular and “special” ones. The Beautiful Queen had a preference for apple pies, so the townspeople do too.

Harveston apple pies have such an entrancing flavor that the nearest city has stores that stock them. Critics say that Harveston apple pies make anyone drool and that the best way to convince someone to do you a favor is to gift one.

Harveston holds an apple competition to find the reddest apple. This is because the Beautiful Queen prized beautifully red apples. In the past, the townspeople would offer the reddest apple from the season’s harvest to the Beautiful Queen. Over time, it evolved into the apple competition.

Kokko Market makes pancake balls from a flour batter and top it with jam. It’s prepared in a pan and with methods similar to takoyaki, coming out crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside.

Pancakes also come in a square form. In Harveston, pancakes are baked in the oven instead of on the stove. Some people cook pancakes in the fireplace too; this makes them tender, thick, and pudding-like.

There are many grains used for bread: sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, oats, flax seeds, sesame seeds, rye, wheat...

Barbeque is served for large gatherings and celebrations.

Cooking tends to be done in the fireplace instead of on a stove, especially in the case for stews. It keeps the room warm in winter while the food cooks.

Harveston has a bean and fruit soup. Most other places serve it cold, but those in Harveston sometimes enjoy it warm. It’s a thick consistency and the fruit in it has been dried.

When setting the dining table, people in Harveston leave one extra plate out. This tradition comes from a story about a traveler visiting a family’s house and being surprised by the messy state of it. The traveler cleaned the house and cooked a nice meal for the family. From this story came the belief that as long as you leave a plate at your table, you’ll never want for food or go hungry.

Sandwich cakes are common party centerpieces. They are made with bread and vegetables, topped with shrimp, deviled eggs, olives, apples, and salmon slides arranged in a rose shape. The frosting on it is made from mayonnaise and sour cream, making sandwich cakes more salad than dessert.

They sell cherries and other berries by volume. Also sold are vegetables and juice, freshly squeezed.

Because Harveston is located in a mountainous region, there are rare varieties of mushrooms to be found. These can be served in a traditional mushroom soup, which can be finicky to prepare (so usually only experts make it). Mushrooms are also cooked in butter and served in sandwiches.

Mushrooms, herbs, and flowers are foraged from the nature (both public mountains and private woods). Locals usually don’t buy plants that are wild when they can pick it themselves. Instead, they’re sold to tourists.

Good foraging spots on Moln Mountain are kept secret so people don’t overharvest. The mountains are dangerous in winter, so foraging has to be done in spring or summer.

Harveston brines raw fish like salmon in a mixture of salt, sugar, pepper, and fill. In the old days, brined salmon was buried in sand to let it ferment.

Fish is dried to preserve it and to enhance the flavor. Before there were proper roads, it was hard to bring in food for the winter, so Harveston relied on foods preserved in the spring. They last for a long time and have many uses (such as in soup stock or to eat straight up). To this day, preserved meats and vegetables are a local specialty and new methods such as roasting have been developed for preservation.

Sunset Savanna

General

The food here appears to be inspired by African cultures of the real world.

There is floral cacao in the Sunset Savanna. It bears fruit only once every 10 years.

Gummy bugs are popular and a Halloween staple.

The people of the Sunset Savanna value living in harmony with nature and will go out of their way to adapt to the land (due to the high population of beastmen, who have animal ancestors). Because of this, they oppose change that could damage the environment. There are some parts of this arid country that still rely on wells for their drinking water needs. They also hold the Tamashina-Mina festival every year to pray for rain.

Sautéed mutton is a common meal in this country. Leona brags that the Sunset Savanna is top notch when it comes to cooking meats.

The bananas of the Sunset Savanna are starchy and resemble potatoes (similar to plantains). They are steamed and served as a staple food. They’re faintly sweet and are actually very light and easy to digest.

It’s easier to grow fruit instead of wheat and rice in their climate.

Rice crepes, another staple, are served with a stew that you pour over it. The stew comes in variants such as a white fish stew simmered in tomato sauce, spinach and potato stew, beef stew, etc. There are also many side dishes you can enjoy with the crepes. The crepes aren’t meant to be eaten alone, as they taste too sour solo.

The phrase “that’s the Circle of Life” is a proverb that has been around for ages. The strong eat the weak, then when the strong die, their bodies become nutrients for the grass which feeds the next generation of prey animals. Life comes “full circle”, and the proverb indicates this delicate balance.

The Sunset Savanna is famous for its coffee. It tastes spicy, not bitter, because the custom is to add spices to the drink.

Food prep performances seem to be common for the wealthy; Leona mentions seeing big fish filleted before being served.

Yogurt is considered a “healthy dairy” and is typically served for breakfast.

Elephant Graveyard

The Elephant Graveyard, once considered a scary and lawless place (the “shadow lands” which were not a part of the original kingdom), has become a tourist destination.

They are known for selling vanilla cookies shaped like bones.

The hot springs at the Elephant Graveyard have kettles hidden by the steam. The hot water vapor cooks onsen tamago (a traditionally Japanese irl dish) and puddings. It imparts a slightly salty and sulfurous flavor and smell to the foods.

Sunrise City

The Raintree Market is a bazaar that features many foods and drinks.

Many snacks sold in the marketplaces are local specialties, so they’re popular as souvenirs.

Wild and cultivated hibiscus flowers are boiled with sugar to produce a red juice. There is also a white juice, which is made using wild baobab (which is full of nutrients; people call it a beauty elixir you can drink). A legends says that, long ago, members of the royal family would have their foreheads painted with baobab juice when they were born. That’s how the fruit became a local specialty.

In the original tale, the juice for marking foreheads was red. It seems that, over time, the color was changed to white by word of mouth, with the latter description fitting more with the white fruit of the baobab. Because of this change, more and more stalls have been selling a mixture of hibiscus juice and baobab juice.

The baobab fruit is also used to make a particular sour candy. The candy is dyed with res food coloring and is then dusted with sugar and chili powder. It’s described as having a “mature” flavor.

Mangoes are a local specialty! Vendors will happily cut open the fruit for you to enjoy on the spot.

Other notable fruits for sale are tart passionfruit and creamy but smelly jackfruit. The latter is considered the largest fruit in Twisted Wonderland and grows on its tree’s trunks.

The Sunset Villa is a luxurious hotel that hosts VIPs and important guests of the state. They offer a large selection of drinks (fruit juice, black tea, coffee…) and serve whole slabs of steak in front of you before serving at luxurious barbecues. After dinners, they have dance performances.

There is an enormous sausage that’s wrapped up in a coil. If unwound, it’s a meter long. It’s meant to be cut with scissors before eating. The sausage’s herbs make it taste refreshing, and its meat is finely grounded to allow its flavors to come through.

Seafood is fresh and cheap, provided you live by the sea or in a coastal region like Dawn City. In more inland areas, seafood is considered a luxury.

Their seafood tends to be cooked with strong spices.

Ruggie’s yet-to-be-named hometown

Because the residents are poor, their food is usually made from collected scraps (such as pumpkin pie made predominantly from the pulpy parts) or prepared with substitutions and without extra flourishes. For example, Ruggie’s grandma prepares homemade donuts for his birthday but they couldn't afford fancy toppings (until Ruggie started working to bring in extra income).

It’s implied that there were instances when Ruggie (and presumably others from his hometown) had to eat rotten food or out of trash cans to get by.

Queendom of Roses

General

There is reference to some irl UK foods in this region, such as the jacket potato.

The Queendom of Roses is famous for its rose jelly rolls. Roses are the flower the country is best known for, of course, but they also have lavender, rosemary, sweet violet, foxglove, bluebells, and many berries.

People from this country eat flowers (which are specifically grown for eating). Flowers are also used for dried flower bookmarks? potpourri, etc.

The Queendom has a good selection of breads.

Apparently, the Queendom also has a strong “tea culture”.

People in the Queendom of Roses eat a lot of different pastries (pies, tarts, quiches, croissants, etc). Croissant donuts in particular have been pretty trendy lately. They’re donuts made with croissant batter, so they come out super flaky.

Potatoes are a staple food.

Jacket potatoes are common at festivals; they are potatoes baked with the skin (ie “jacket”) still on. The standard topping for them is baked beans, but you can also have tuna mayo corn, bean chili, sour cream, avocado, and other things.

Anyone that grew up in the Queendom of Roses has probably done the “cookie smash” at least once as a kid. (More info on this under the “Clock Town” section!)

Riddle and Trey's yet-to-be-named hometown

Trey's family owns a bakery (called "Patisserie Clover" according to the TWST manga). It seems to be a small "mom and pops" shop with no particular notoriety. However, the manga implies that it was the Clover bakery where Riddle saw the strawberry tarts and became entranced by them. This is also where Riddle would later try his first strawberry tart.

In Riddle and Trey's hometown, people enjoy apple bobbing during the Halloween season.

Before interview: Riddle was worried whether they can start on time and was relieved when Vil showed up and Vil was pretty smug about it lmao

There is a farm not too far from where Riddle lives; it is famous for its ice-cream buns. There is also a cafe located on the farm! It opened shortly after Riddle entered NRC and is so popular that it’s spoken about in magazines and tourists go there just to sample their sweets.

Clock Town

The people of Clock Town value time and punctuality due to the town's connection to the White Rabbit, who was always in a hurry. Many of the foods sold at stalls are things that are easy to hold and eat while walking, such as sliced sandwiches.

The Clock Town Folk Museum mentions a girl that appears in the story of the White Rabbit. She ate cookies that made her grow large; the museum recreates this experiment by projecting a large image of guests that eat cookies they have set out.

The Clock Town Folk Museum also runs a bugle-playing contest. The participation prize is a carrot cookie.

Clock Town sells a brand of potato chips with the White Rabbit logo on them.

The town also sells cookies iced to look like a pocket watch. The icing is made from a mixture of sugar and egg whites (“royal icing”) which hardens considerably. You’re meant to crush the cookie with a hammer to make it into smaller pieces, making it easier to eat. It’s based on the story of the White Rabbit breaking his pocket watch. Others tried to help him fix it by hitting it with a hammer, but it didn’t help at all, only damaged it more!

A lot of people enjoy growing plants, gardening, and horticulture, including stuff that can be eaten like herbs.

Sausage rolls are served in pairs to resemble bunny ears; the container they come in resembles the White Rabbit. They’re sausages wrapped in a pie crust/puff pastry dough, and come in cheese and a spicy sausage variant for the White Rabbit Festival.

There are large mushrooms that grow in Clock Town; eating one side will turn you large, eating the other side will turn you small. The girl in the story of the White Rabbit has eaten these strange mushrooms before. These mushrooms are said to be enchanted and only work in a particular area; its effects last for ~1 minute after eating.

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biioshocker · 11 months

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Why Spider-People Suffer

Subtitled: How “Othering” Miguel Killed Hundreds of Cops

I loved seeing Miguel getting othered by his fellow spider-people so casually during this movie, both intentionally and unintentionally, and I believe it’s the reason he convinced everyone their loved ones had to die.

“Othering” Moments in the Movie

I’ve only seen the movie twice so I may have missed something more subtle, but here are the moments I remember where the main cast othered Miguel:

Gwen (unknowingly) making a joke (from Miguel’s perspective, re: “You’re not funny!”) of the fact Miguel doesn’t have a spider sense by letting him get decked by the Vulture.

Peter B. Parker commenting, “You’re not funny, spider-men are funny.”

Miles blatantly in fear of Miguel, on the tram shouting, possibly half-joking, “You have claws? Dude, are you sure you’re a spider-man?”

These seem like inconsequential, even humorous, moments but I believe they’re a lot more meaningful to Miguel than he lets on. It’s not that these moments are massively consequential in and of themselves, but more so that they are part of a persistent, consistent assault on Miguel's Spider-Man Authenticity™ that began with his very…

Origin.

In the comics, and what it appears to be in the movie, Miguel isn’t a “natural” spider-man. Not in the ‘bit and changed’ sense. There actually wasn’t even a spider surrogate for the virus in Miguel’s origin story. Instead, in Miguel’s universe the lab he worked in was attempting to directly recreate their original, dead-slash-vanished Spider-Man by splicing actual spider DNA with human DNA. This immediately deviates from the “typical” spider-person origin story as, usually, tests were being done on spiders and the subsequent escape, bite, and transformation that followed was a complete accident. The only actual accident within Miguel’s origin story was that it was Miguel at all, every other aspect was more or less exactly what the institute Miguel worked for was actually trying to accomplish.

A pretty notable difference between the comics and the movie is the introduction of Miguel’s injections. From what I know of the comics, Miguel doesn’t need to ‘re-up’ his spider-human powers, but we see in the movie that this Miguel needs some kind of supplement. Whether it be to replenish his abilities or to keep his delicate spider-human balance stable, we don’t know yet, but what we do know is that no other spider-person does this and it seems like a private, shameful ritual. A subtle nod to this theory, in my opinion, is Miguel’s “I’m different than them” line taking place at, or almost at, the exact moment he injects.

So, his origin is “wrong,” his creation was a “mistake,” in some manner he has to supplement is spider abilities, and believe it or not those aren’t even the most obvious discrepancies he has from other spider-people. Actually, some of his most noticeable differences lie with his…

Powers.

Compounding that “otherness” Miguel already feels within spider society, he doesn’t have “typical” spider-person powers, notably lacking a spider sense. This is because he wasn’t made the same way other spider-people were. As a literal spider-human hybrid, Miguel derives his powers — talons, paralysis, fangs, light sensitive eyes turned red by super sight — from just some normal, non-radioactive version of whatever spider breed was used in the splicing experiments. The lab didn’t actually know what gave the original Spider-Man his distinct powers, and so what Miguel ends up with is a lot more off-putting than other spider-people.

Humans, and even other spider-people (re: Gwen feeling she needs to reassure Miles he doesn’t need to “be afraid”) are frightened, or at the very least are put-off, by Miguel. I believe this can be attributed at least somewhat (if not entirely) to his powers. Yes, he doesn’t have a very approachable demeanor, but I would hazard that that wall he puts up is in response to the reactions he gets to his powers (ex: “I’m a good guy!” “You don’t look like a good guy!”). They aren’t the pretty, petite, charming powers that other spider-people have. They’re very gritty and raw, and they’re lifted directly from a species of bug that people are notoriously afraid of. And while it’s true that the other spider-people also have behaviors that associate them with the creepy crawler as well, those spider-people have a way to combat their negative character associations that Miguel doesn’t. They’re funny.

Humor is an under-appreciated, though well-established, part of a typical spider-person. The movie even goes so far as to call spider-person humor a “crutch,” but it's more than just making light of dark situations. Humor is how other spider-people connect with their community. This is why despite a persistent hate campaign from the Daily Bugle and calls of vigilantism from local police organizations, spider-people are almost always able to stay in the good graces of the communities they serve. Spider-people, through humor, are able to reassure, console, and win over the hearts of millions of New Yorkers.

So, it is especially obvious to other spider-people that Miguel is distinctly not funny. He is reminded both in comics and in the movie that he’s not approachable like a spider-man “should” be. Miguel doesn’t have humor to use as a “crutch” to offset his unsettling characteristics and because of that, he’s not well-liked by… really anyone.

These perceived shortcomings take a toll on Miguel, and are why he is so convinced of the importance of…

Canon.

Miguel views canon events as the holy grail of spider-person origins because he didn’t have one himself. I don’t think Miguel fully believes he is a true spider-man. Not only were his (atypical) powers acquired through a (botched) scientific experiment, and not only is everyone constantly reminding him that he’s not a “normal” spider-person, but Miguel’s universe already had its “canon” Spider-Man, and he died.

Or, at least he did in the 2099 comics. We can’t be certain about the movie-verse yet, but on the assumption it and the comics share a backstory, Miguel knows the full extent of his Spider-Man’s life. Beginning, middle, and end. That Spider-Man’s story is over and done within Miguel’s universe, which means that Miguel isn’t a “real” spider-man. He’s a knockoff. He was an accident, a fluke, a recreation.

With this in mind, I feel Miguel’s reasoning for dedicating himself to The Canon is two-fold:

Firstly, I think it stems from the idea that because his universe’s Spider-Man story is “complete” that is how the story must be told. There was a set beginning, middle, and end to the Spider-Man of his universe, and he’s easily able to reference it. There’s no guesswork around his Spider-Man’s story because it’s concluded. And to him, that finality is infallible, so he plays it out over and over and over in other spider-verses.

Secondly (most speculatively, but most importantly), but I don’t think Miguel has told anyone that he isn’t a bitten (or born) spider-person. In his introduction, we don’t get the usual “I’m the one and only Spider-Man” cinematic intro we had with the rest of the main cast (excluding Jess). He keeps his introduction short, sweet, and secretive. This leads me to believe he hasn’t told anyone of how he became his universe’s Spider-Man. He might think that if he did, the other spider-people would shun him. He might think they would hate him. He might think they would leave him.

A very, very prominent theme across many of the main cast’s stories is that they felt alone in the world until they found other spider-people, and I believe Miguel feels this isolation the strongest of all of them. He set up the Spider Headquarters in his own home universe. He recruited hundreds and hundreds of spider-people to join him and it looks like many of them live there for at least some period of time. I believe he’s so afraid of being left out of the social spider network that he has outright lied about his origin story, calling on the only Spider-Man story he knows the entirety of— his universe’s Peter Parker. Then, to cover his tracks he began collecting similarities across every spider-person’s reality, enshrining them in gold, and cementing them as The Canon.

And, unfortunately, what many spider-people have in common is…

Suffering.

Suffering isn’t unique to spider-people. Prematurely losing a loved one isn’t even unique to spider-people. Sadly, it’s not very uncommon at all, and those moments are often defining in people’s lives; they can be even more impactful than the joyful moments. I believe because of their efficacy, tragedies are something that Miguel could most easily use to connect with the spiderverse. Not because these tragedies were meant to happen, not because they’re a part of some greater, cosmic prophecy— but, sadly, because they’re so prevalent in every person’s life.

And most compelling of all, tragedy rarely ever has any reason behind it.

Miguel wasn’t able to find some incredible, world-defining Canon Event among the many hundreds of spider-people he met— he was simply able to find tragedy. The senseless, horrible, incomprehensible moment in every person’s life where they’ve lost someone they cared very deeply for, and no one could tell them why. There was no rhyme or reason to it, their loved one just simply ceased to exist— and what was so insulting about it was that the world didn’t end. The planet didn’t stop spinning, the sun rose the following day, and no closer came. Everyone else’s story just continued to be writ, and that was just as painful because it left them alone with their grief in a moment where they felt helpless, hopeless, and inadequate; in a moment that was impossible to reconcile because they wanted so badly, just like all of us, to understand why it had to happen. But there isn’t a why. The universe is random and underwhelming and every day a few unlucky people will draw a card that ends their game, completely by chance.

And then Miguel came along and he assigned the importance to that tragedy that the spiderverse, and all of us, felt like it deserved.

Miguel told them that their suffering wasn’t random. He told them it wasn’t just another case of wrong place, wrong time. He told them there was a purpose to their suffering. All the pain they endured, it had served to make them better, stronger, more resilient. Finally, there was a reason for it to have happened.

Miguel told them they weren’t alone. He reassured them that this horrible Thing that seemed to happen to all of them was cosmically indomitable, universally inevitable, and entirely inescapable— it was Canon. It was the price of power, it was the universe’s exchange. But now, in that tragedy, they would never be alone in their grief again, and that made all the difference.

When Miguel gave them a reason for their hurt, it became a rallying point among the spiderverse. Not only could they alleviate the guilt and the grief their loss has crippled them with, but they had something more tangible to blame it on— The Canon.

The Canon Miguel introduced to them didn’t have feelings, it didn’t feel anger or resentment or spite. It didn’t hurt them for no reason— it was simply the vehicle navigating them through to the landmarks of their lives. And there was comfort in believing that these tragedies were ordained by some unfathomable, all-knowing narrative. And so the spiderverse seemingly collectively decided it was easier to believe in the Canon than it was to believe in an unpredictable universe, until…

Miles.

Miguel sees his own perceived “flaws” in Miles.

Miles wasn’t supposed to become spider-man in his universe.

Miles has an atypical spider-man origin story.

Miles’ “canon” Spider-Man is dead.

For all intents and purposes, he and Miles are likely the most closely related spider-people to one another, but a key difference between them is Miles… doesn’t care. Sure, Miles is lonely in his own universe; and sure, Miles is overwhelmed by the expectations heaped onto him social and familial; and sure, Miles doesn’t even know he’s an accident. But he’s happy. He’s a happy kid and he was close friends with other spider-people who love and accept him, trained and mentored him. That’s not something Miguel had, and he resents of Miles for it.

We still don’t know for certain if there were other reasons Miguel chose to isolate Miles, but from what we can gather in Part One, it seems like Miguel only had the “original anomaly” excuse. Which he used to prevent Miles from interacting with other spider-people, and other spider-people with him. His reasoning doesn’t really add up though. In theory, the “damage” to the multiverse “caused” by Miles was concluded at the end of the first movie. Outside being an anomaly, Miles isn’t causing any harm to the multiverse by just existing in it (that we know of currently). So why restrict his access to other spider-people? It certainly wasn’t because Miles hasn’t experienced a crucial story beat (Dead Police Captain), because as we saw in the movie, Pav hadn’t experienced his either. Yet, Pav was allowed to join the spiderverse. From this perspective, there was no actual reason to exclude Miles from the spiderverse when he could have helped the cause.

Instead, for what appears to be no other reason than jealousy (or fear) that Miles was (and would be) so well liked by other spider-people, Miguel isolated him in his own universe for a year and four months, barring him from a society he had every right to join, and forbidding any other spider-person from even visiting Miles.

I think that’s what it comes down to with Miguel, really. Jealousy that Miles is an anomaly like himself, but unlike Miguel, people don’t question Miles’ Spider-Man Authenticity ™. They don’t make a joke of his shortcomings. They don’t “other” him. They like Miles. No one likes Miguel.

And on top of it all, probably the most infuriating (and frightening) part to Miguel is that Miles isn’t ashamed. He isn’t ashamed of being an accident; he isn’t pouring over his Spider-Man’s history trying to meet made-up expectations; he didn’t even parody the spider-people who were right in front of him when he was just coming into his own. Miles decided at 14 years old that he wasn’t, and couldn’t, be a Peter Parker copy. He accepted himself as his own, unique Spider-Man, and in breaking that mold and allowing himself to take a leap of faith, he became something incredible.

I think that scares Miguel, not only because his entire organization is founded in the belief that all spider-persons must experience specific events, and not because if Miles refuses to follow his story beats then the entire multiverse will unravel, but because if Miles is right and the multiverse can be as diverse and varied as it wants to be, then Miguel has hated himself for so long for no reason.

And I think that fear and jealousy and resentment all comes to head on…

The Tram.

Miguel’s meltdown during the tram scene felt like it came almost out of nowhere. The abuse he hurled at Miles just didn't correlate with what could reasonably be expected of an annoying chase around the city— and it was completely unnecessary. By the time it happened, Miguel had already subdued Miles. He was pinning him to the tram, he had already caught him. There was no reason to be so viscous at that point.

Except Miles had just moments ago done what everyone else had been doing to Miguel this whole time. Miles had “othered” him.

“You got claws? Dude, are you sure you’re a Spider-Man?”

The skepticism must have felt different coming from Miles, because Miles was supposed to be like Miguel. They were both mistakes, they were both the product of a dead Spider-Man, they were both supposed to be outcasts, but instead, here was Miles acting like all the others. Treating Miguel as different and lesser, and I think that was the final straw for Miguel.

I wouldn’t say Miguel had kept his cool up until that point, but he certainly hadn’t set out to hurt Miles— at least emotionally. In fact, he had previously just been trying to ease Miles into his Canon. Miguel had been trying to console him in the same way he had consoled hundreds of other spider-people before Miles.

But then Miles made a hurtful joke because spider-people make hurtful jokes (a theme, maybe, since hurtful jokes had been what provoked the Spot into a rampage, too: “I’ll become strong enough to be your nemesis. Then you’ll take me seriously.”) and Miguel, who already saw so much of his own story in Miles, was enraged by his audacity— dragging Miles down (to him, to his level), pushing his way into Miles’s personal space (look at me, hear me, respect me), and forcing him to listen to just how “other” he was too (we’re anomalies, carry the shame of it like I do).

There’s really no excuse for it. Miguel was clearly in the wrong. No one should be told they were a mistake, or that they’re the reason someone else died— and especially no one should be made to believe that the value of their life was less than another’s.

It’s horrible what Miguel said to Miles. I do believe Miguel was venting his own self-loathing, but he leveled his abuse squarely at Miles and now Miles is forced to struggle through the aftermath, and there’s no excuse for that.

Conclusion?

I don’t think Miguel is a villain, I think he’s just a damaged man. That doesn’t absolve him of the shitty things he’s done, especially to Miles, but I do think it helps to explain them somewhat. Ironically, as much as he feels ostracized from spider society, I think he’s just like every other spider-person. He’s looking for friendships and acceptance and his happy ending, and above all, he doesn’t want to be an outcast. Much of that feeling probably comes from his unwillingness to accept himself as he is and pave his own way as Spider-man.

I hope in the next movie Miguel begins to consider the similarities he has with other spider-people rather than focusing on the differences, because while the Canon may not be real (or maybe it is, guess we’ll see in Part Two), the connections he made with others through loss and grief were. He helped the entire spiderverse find comfort in one another and because of him, they aren’t alone anymore.

#atsv #miguel o'hara #across the spiderverse #spiderverse #spiderman: across the spiderverse #atsv spoilers #miguel meta for the thirsty soul 😌#corrected this bc i said he didn’t make organic webs but i misremembered lol

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99thpercentile · 6 months

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I get the feeling that I'm in the minority here, but I posit that GLaDOS actually is Caroline, and only "not the same person" in the sense that you'd look at your younger self and be like "that bitch ain't me." I think you actually have to go out of your way to interpret them as two separate people.

evidence:

voiced by the same person (I know the initial reasoning was that Valve didn't want to hire another voice actor for a few lines, but in casting Ellen McLain as Caroline, they incorporated her being the same person into the story).

GLaDOS automatically joins in saying "Yes sir, Mister Johnson" like saying it is permanently ingrained in her. you can interpret this as Caroline taking over, but she says "Why did I just—" immediately afterwards.

when GLaDOS talks about hearing the voice of a conscience, she says "for the first time it's MY voice." I don't think she means that she's hearing the woman she gets her literal voice from. she highlights it as distinctly DIFFERENT from hearing the voices of the cores, and I imagine if Caroline were a foreign entity whispering in her ear, the effect would've been much the same.

the GLaDOS project was originally started because Cave was dying and wanted his consciousness uploaded to a computer. the intent was always for the upload to be the same person. he said if he died first, he wanted Caroline to run the place, to be put in his computer. and that's exactly what happened.

GLaDOS not remembering she's Caroline until old Aperture always made sense to me as the result of a deliberate choice on the part of the scientists. Caroline didn't want to be uploaded, and as soon as they switched GLaDOS on, she tried to kill everyone. it's logical for the scientists to think that if they suppressed her memories, she'd have no reason to try to kill them (but instead, she was just filled with murderous rage and no longer knew why).

the story just doesn't have the same impact otherwise. GLaDOS's reactions to rediscovering old Aperture make more sense if it's her past she's rediscovering, rather than the past of...a human that was shoved into the chassis with her. if it were the second one, I think she would just feel violated, not have any major revelations.

counter-evidence:

"now little Caroline is in here too" lyric from Want You Gone

GLaDOS says she found out "where Caroline lives in [her] brain" and deleted her, like she's a separate entity

but GLaDOS is a habitual liar. she acts like deleting Caroline means she's fully back to her old self and has gotten rid of the part of her that made her want to save Chell's life, but there's...lots of evidence that she still cares about Chell after the fact (letting her go anyway, the companion cube, the turret opera if you think GLaDOS arranged that, talking to the co-op bots about Chell like she's an ex she's still heartbroken over...). I also think GLaDOS would like to imagine her and Caroline as two separate entities, in the same way you might find your younger self embarrassing and want to distance yourself from that person. I think it's notable that both instances where she refers to Caroline as a separate entity are at the end of the game, after Chell has been passed out a while and she's had time to process everything and compartmentalize. her instinct when the revelations are first happening is to refer to Caroline as if she is her.

now I don't like stories where a robot has to become or be seen as more human in some way for them to be sympathetic. but I think Portal 2 is an excellent subversion of this trope, because GLaDOS is a robot that learns she used to be human and then discards that humanity (symbolically if not literally). Caroline may not have wanted to be uploaded, but from the Want You Gone lyrics "one day they woke me up / so I could live forever / it's such a shame the same will never happen to you" I think we can say that GLaDOS definitely prefers being a robot now that she is one.

anyway this post was supposed to be much shorter than this, thank you for coming to my Ted Talk

#GLaDOS #Caroline #Portal #Portal 2 #original #wall of text

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fic-over-cannon · 4 months

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A Soft Touch (pt. 1)

jason todd x f!reader (implied)

summary: when the pit brought jason back, it heightened all of his senses. he learns to live with that.

tags: mild body horror, sensory overload, mentions of offscreen violence, implied future relationship

rated teen | wc: 1.9k

a/n: dedicated to @jasonsmirrorball my beloved, who was just as excited about this version of jason as i was. part one is mostly a retrospective about how super senses would have impacted jason. the romance part of this story (and nsfw) will be in part 2 coming soon!

link to part 2, ao3 link

The Red Hood’s helmet isn’t just a precaution against an exposed secret identity or another piece of armour. It’s a necessity. It filters out sound, keeps out pungent smells and the associated tastes, controls light, and can restrict range of vision. For a regular person the helmet would be sensory deprivation of the worst kind. For Jason, it is the lifeline that keeps him alive to fight another day.

If anyone had asked Jason’s opinion before throwing him into the Lazarus Pit (not that he was in a fit state to respond, mind you) he would have told them that trusting a puddle of primordial green goo to know the limitations of the human body was incredibly stupid. Having come out of the experience irrevocably altered, he would point to his own body as an example of how much the pit didn’t know about humanity. Every scar he received before death had been removed (notably, the scars from after death were left untouched). He was over six feet tall when childhood malnutrition should have left him a good five inches shorter. His strength, rather than the result of packed on muscle and a good diet was definitely being supplemented by something unnatural. For a body built like a fridge, he was ridiculously light on his feet and agile. The physics of him just don’t make sense. Yet despite all of these changes, undoubtedly the worst was how all five of his senses had been heightened.

The Lazarus Pit burned through Jason Todd and woke him up screaming. It was the feel of it that was the worst sensation, the one that brought him up to consciousness first. The rough weave of his training pants grating against his skin like wire, clinging to his raw flesh with the dampness of the pit. Green water, oddly viscous and acrid, drenching his skin and burning like a grease fire. It drips down his nose and throat, the taste of tar and blood seared into his tongue, the scent of burnt hair and flesh imprinted into his nose. It drips into his eyes and brands them. The dark cave only lit by the green glow of the pool now so bright like it holds the light of one hundred stars. Burning and drowning and being flayed alive, Jason has no care for noise save that it deafens him. For those first few moments of awakening, Jason may as well have been truly deaf for the thunderous roar of nothingness in his ears. A rubber band snaps and at once his hearing is another ice pick to the brain. Voices that should have been a whisper ring through his skull and reverberate. The footsteps of shadows several floors away staccato through him. It is a living hell made worse by a screaming that won’t shut up. It is only when a slap cracks across his face (it feels like all the skin on his cheek has sloughed off) and the scream trails off to pitiful whines does Jason dimly recognize that the screaming was him. Two pairs of hands under his arms haul him to standing and it hurts oh it hurts. Iron meat hooks digging and clawing their way into him until he is too pinned to slip away. That is the start to the illustrious second life of Jason Todd, newly gifted.

As much training is dedicated to making Jason a better warrior, twice that is given over to training him to survive his own senses. It is rough, brutal work, dictated by trainers that have never felt the pit’s bite. It destroys whatever sanity he might have had left after his rebirth and he is grateful. He is remade with control, no longer a pitiful broken mind tied to a falling star, bracing to burn up on impact. He no longer aches at the feel of fabric on his skin, can smile and hold a conversation without wanting to claw the other person’s heart out for beating too loudly, can drink wine and not taste every molecule. He is so very grateful. But it is not enough. Talia warns him, in what might be her first true act of uncomplicated kindness to him, that those who have survived the pit don’t do well in places where life is concentrated.

Returning to Gotham is not the triumph he pictured. Within minutes of touching down he is on a safe house floor convulsing from sensory overload. The city, with its people and the machinery that houses them, is too much of everything. There are so many voices overlaid with construction and traffic, the chemical rot of the harbour suffocating him, sewage and putrid fish thick on his tongue, fluorescent lights tearing through the soft space of his eyelids. Gunshots and sirens and the tang of old blood. It takes every one of his years of training to stop seizing. It takes iron will like he hadn’t known since the early days to come back to himself. It takes days before he can control himself enough to come face to face with the shadows Talia sent with him. His first order: to bring him a motorcycle helmet. The helmet is black and stinks of cigarette smoke, visor slightly scratched. It is the most powerful relief Jason has ever known. His plans are delayed by months as he figures out the specifications for the Red Hood’s helmet. Design after design prototyped and discarded. The helmet helps, but Jason refuses to let it become his crutch. He practices, minutes at first and then hours, retraining himself to be able to exist outside the confines of the helmet.

He fails in his revenge against Batman and the Replacement, the insidious demands of his heightened senses unraveling all his patience and planning. Sends him into a murderous frenzy that nearly ends in another dead Robin. Ribs broken and face beaten in by his own father, all Jason can concentrate on is the sensation of drying blood flaking on his skin. Delirious, he thinks, so this is what they meant about the killing rage the pit hands out. It is only by the thinnest of chances that nobody dies at all and that his senses remain a secret.

Reconciliation is hard earned. He never quite gets around to telling anyone about his new ‘gifts’. Let’s them think him much more observant and tactically sound then he really is. Learns to identify the joyful thwip of Dick’s grappling gun, the steady drumming of Tim’s fingers on a keyboard. Jason memorizes the smell of Alfred’s hugs, a mixture of silver polish and baked goods. Starts to categorize all the different ways Bruce’s eyes on him feel physically.

Life doesn’t stop when his revenge does either. Jason rents an apartment as his semi-permanent safe house. Consciously decides to make it a home and learns the art of the DIY renovation. Blackout curtains go up first, followed by a soft blue on the walls (Jason may be sensitive to light now but he still can’t stand total darkness). Sound proofing comes next. He’s had a few close calls when the upstairs neighbour blasted music a little too loud and had had to restrain himself from killing them. The lumpy mattress gets replaced with memory foam and new sheets at a ridiculously high silk thread count he can’t quite believe he shelled out for. Through trial and error he finds a laundry detergent that doesn’t make him nauseous and celebrates with all the loads he’d put off. He finds joy in cooking again, running through all the recipes Alfred had taught him and appreciating them more for the new way the flavours tasted on his tongue. To his chagrin, he also discovers he hates the lingering smell of cooked food in his apartment after he’s done eating. A range hood fixes that problem but causes a new one with the rattle of the fan. Sound cancelling headphones quickly become his new best friend. Piece by piece his little oasis comes together.

Eventually Jason learns to share his little home. Stilted conversations in door frames turn into invitations for a drink turn into semi-regular dinners. Family movie nights start happening before Jason realizes it, all of the Robins, former and current, curled up in his living room. In the top kitchen cupboard on the left, a shelf gets dedicated to popcorn seasonings. Extra throw blankets get added to the sofa after Tim makes a remark about never making it through a movie night because the blankets are too comfy. Dick will show up cheerfully demanding a brotherly talk but Jason has realized that with the strategic application of cereal he can avoid talking about his own emotions. Alfred visits regularly, brings his own tea and a new recipe for the two of them to try together. Alfred never leaves without remarking on how well Jason keeps his home (and Jason never fails to flush at the compliment). Strangely enough it is when Bruce comes knocking that Jason feels the most sure footed in his apartment. Invites Bruce in politely and goes through the motions of hosting. It baffles Bruce a little, to see the Red Hood so domestic but it soothes the part of him that sat up all night with Jaylad when he was sickly. Bruce, in his own way, makes it clear that Jason will always be part of the family no matter where he chooses to live.

This latest point of reconciliation couldn’t have been timed any better. Only a few days later Damian turns up on the doorstep of the Wayne Manor. Bruce brings him by the apartment to introduce Damian to Jason, hoping that the two most recent additions will at least get along better than Damian and Tim’s first shaky interaction. It goes a little too well. Damian, unused to the sensory nightmare that is Gotham, takes two steps into Jason’s apartment and demands to stay with his big brother. Jason, intimately aware of how uncomfortable the transition from the orderly League compound to Gotham was, is only too happy to see Damian too. It takes a whispered fight of yes, I knew him, and no, I didn’t know who his father was before Bruce eventually has to concede that Damian will at least be spending some time in Jason’s home. The split transition makes establishing a life in Gotham much easier for Damian than it was for Jason. Jason can at least recognizes the signs of sensory overload, can guide Damian through it without the cruel methods of his former instructors. In caring for Damian, Jason comes to realize that he deserved worlds better than the torture disguised as teaching that he received. In preparing Damian to be a part of society, he realizes that he wants more out of life than being a controlled weapon too.

Jason waits, and he plans. After all, if he could design and execute a months’ long campaign to take over the Gotham underworld, surely he’s capable of getting a social life. He picks his first target with care, intending only to get used to being around people outside of scripted settings and his helmet. He chooses a small library two blocks from the apartment with an attached coffee shop, sets himself little goals for each day with the option to bail as soon as it becomes too much. In the span of two weeks he’s ready to move from using the library to sitting in the coffee shop. It’s a daunting task. The smell of the coffee beans, the hiss of the milk frother, and the quiet rumble of conversation prove to be too much for him on his first attempt. It’s as he’s leaving that a bright laugh floats above the din and stirs his curiosity. The next day has him right back at the coffee shop staring up at the chalk board menu. Sweat is starting to bead on his forehead and he could swear he can feel the vibrations of the coffee grinder on his skin. He is just about getting ready to leave when he hears the laugh again. Turns around and the owner of it is standing right behind him (how did she get so close without him noticing?!) beaming up at him.

And oh.

#jason todd imagine #jason todd x fem!reader #jason todd x reader #jason todd x you #jason todd fic #jason todd x y/n #red hood x reader #red hood x you #red hood fic #sunnie writes 🌻#jason todd

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swiftispunk · 10 months

Text

in my hometown, part iii | joel miller x f!reader

series masterlist | series playlist

pairing: neighbour!dbf!joel miller x fem!afab!actor(ish)!reader (+ platonic!tommy and platonic!sarah)

rating: 18+ minors dni

word count: 10.7k

summary: pre-outbreak/tlou. joel finally accepts his fate and comes to see you in LA but he’s not prepared for what he finds (or doesn’t find) when he gets there.

*takes place after the events of come back, be here (no avoiding it, folks, you’re going to need the context - and all the foreshadowing)

warnings etc: set in 2002. smut, angst, fluff - aka PURE ROMANCE, alcohol use, drug use, unwanted sexual advance (not by joel), hurt/comfort, unprotected p in v sex, oral (f receiving), fingering, 10 year age gap (joel is 35, reader is 25), OC!adam (he deserves a warning), food, smoking mention, me making things up about hollywood. NO USE OF Y/N.

A/N: well! here we are! i don’t know what to say other than thank you to every single reader who made this series what it is. i hope you feel this is a fitting end for joel and superstar, my favourite babies. dedicated to ziggy @johnwatsn who came into my life because of this fic, katy @midnightswithdearkatytspb for supporting this series from the start, and cat @joelscruff, without whom i'm not sure anyone would care about this story at all

You

I resolve to make new friends I liked my old ones But I fucked up so I'll start again What's the worst that could happen?

Is there anyone here you know?

You look around the room from your place against the off-grey wall. Adam's posh apartment in West Hollywood is filled to the brim with a sea of strangers, a collection of wannabe C-listers, supposedly there to celebrate you, haphazardly assembled by somebody else. Whatever, you let it go.

You have to start making new friends eventually. And you have to admit that your agent's assistant has some fairly notable connections. Around here, that's all that matters.

You clutch the drink Adam had made you (something far too bitter and heavy on the bourbon, not your thing at all). The darkened space overlooks a wall of windows and a sprawling balcony, forty-eight floors above the city below. Bright lights and freeways pierce the black, starless sky.

Los Angeles. Home. Or something like it.

All the while, the memory of your earlier conversation with Joel hangs over you like a rare California raincloud, ominous and debilitating.

"Okay - um, shit - it's asking me for more quarters, I'm all out. Can I call you tomorrow?"

"You can call me any time you want, darlin'."

"Bye, Joel."

"Bye - "

But he'd been cut off all too soon, dial tone ringing out through the speaker of the heavily vandalized payphone.

You'd rejoined the agency brunch party, dazed and depressed.

You'd thought Joel would have been happy for you, now that you'd finally accomplished something worthwhile. He's only heard you crying your eyes out over the phone for the past six months - although admittedly you've been calling less lately - so you’d assumed he'd have more to say than an offhand, "That's amazing sweetheart."

Sure, you'd caught him at work but that didn't justify the worst part of all; Joel had been, of all things, petty.

"Seems like Adam already knew."

Cold, unflinching jealousy, palpable even through the phone, hundreds of miles away. It had left a bitter taste in your mouth, unsure at first how to respond. What the hell did Joel have to be jealous of?

Maybe you have been calling less recently, but you've had good reason. You've actually been trying to accomplish what you came here for, auditioning constantly and working non-stop at a smoothie bar in the meantime just to pay your damn bills. You'd been on the verge of giving up entirely until the TV offer had come, the opportunity finally breathing some hope back into your miserable day-to-day life.

Other than that, it's been nothing but boring, repetitive, exhausting.

You hadn't wanted to burden Joel with that.

Somehow, after filtering through all of that, you'd landed on feeling hurt - hurt because you'd upset him, hurt because you'd made him think for even one second that you wouldn't rather be back home with him than at some meaningless agency party being showered with mimosas by a too-drunk-for-noon Adam.

But that was hours ago. Now Adam's brought you here, to what he'd affectionately referred to as a "real party," not unlike all the other ones he's been dragging you to the last couple of months. Overcrowded, late-night gatherings at his pristine apartment, unrecognizable music blaring, drugs and alcohol abound. It's always the same.

You can’t say you like the guy all too much. He's constantly overdressed to an obnoxious extent, lanky and tan with brown curls that would remind you of Joel's if they weren't constantly loaded with greasy product.

He's older than you, but not so old that he should be as cocky and confident as he is, as though he's somehow wiser to the world than you are. He's just a guy - a guy with good connections and an easy high-paying job. You've met countless people like him since you came here, talentless drifters who cling to the rich and famous, desperate for a shred of their success.

Problem is, you've also seen how much it helps to have people like that in your corner. Knowing people here is everything.

And you know for a fact there are people here tonight that are worth meeting, higher-ups and producers that you should really be shaking hands and making nice with. Instead, you pull your cell phone out of your pocket and flip it open, scrolling absently through the list of recent calls - every one of them incoming from Joel. You sigh.

"You good, Texas?" Adam's voice is saying then, catching you gloomily musing away on the fringes of the crowd.

"I'm fine," you assure him, but your voice wavers, giving you away. Stupid.

Adam smirks knowingly, eyes flitting down to the phone in your hands before you snap it shut. He slyly loops an arm over your shoulders and guides you into the throng of bodies.

"Come on and join the party, what are you hiding for?"

He leads you through the crowd to the plush, ivory couch in the centre of the open room. It's situated around a massive glass-top coffee-table, barren of any notable décor. The couch is large enough to fit you and him snugly between the bodies of four other partygoers. Booming electronic music blares from his sound system so he's forced to lean in close when he asks,

"Who's Joel?"

Fuck. How did he...?

Adam sees the question in your eyes, nodding his head towards the cell phone still clutched in your hand, presumably having caught a glimpse or your caller list. You hastily shove it in your pocket.

"He calls a lot," Adam observes. "Was that him on the pay phone earlier?"

"Uh, yeah," you finally admit.

"So...who is he?"

You freeze again. The question should be simple enough to answer, but you find yourself stumped – who is Joel? Who is Joel to you?

"He's, um...my neighbour."

Adam bursts out laughing, appropriately so, you think. It sounds ridiculous to your ears, too.

"Who calls their neighbour from a fucking pay phone?" he demands. "Who calls anyone from a pay phone, honestly? You're living in the past, Texas."

Yeah, that's probably accurate.

"Well, he's a - a family friend."

It's somewhat more accurate, but Adam's not satisfied.

"Nu-uh, it's more than that."

Your brows furrow, annoyed. You sip your disgusting drink to buy you some time while you decide if you really want to get into this with him. You don't know Adam that well, only brought together by your agent in the last couple of months or so. He's seemed far more interested in you than you have in him, often visiting you at the smoothie bar or parading you around parties just like this.

You've also noticed a sharp increase in his interest since you'd got a callback for the TV job.

So yeah, not really the first person you want to be talking to about Joel but he's kind of got you on the spot so -

"Fine, I mean, we hooked up," you concede at last. "A couple times."

"And?" Adam says, staring you down expectantly, eyebrows raised. You'd hoped your answer would have sufficed. Maybe back home, but not here apparently. You sigh.

"And now it's complicated, I guess."

"Ah, complicated," Adam nods. "You guys, like boyfriend-girlfriend now? You caught feelings? That why it always seems like you're only ever half here?"

How can one man be so fucking patronizing?

"No, we're not boyfriend-girlfriend," you roll your eyes, frustrated. "And I'm not half here. I'm here. All in."

Adam blissfully, doesn't know you well enough to catch you in the lie. Joel would have caught it.

You watch then as Adam reaches into the pocket of his shiny grey blazer to retrieve a small plastic bag filled with white powder. You pointedly avert your eyes; it's not the first time you've seen coke at a party since you got here - and certainly not the first time you've seen Adam do it - but you've still yet to indulge. Frankly, the sight of the stuff still puts you on edge.

You silently sip at your drink while Adam leans over the tabletop and empties the bag's contents directly onto the glass. No one around the table even bats an eye; this is standard for a party at Adam's. He pulls an Amex card from his wallet and crushes the minute clumps into fine dust, lining up two thick, precise lines before inhaling the first into his nose with a hundred dollar bill.

Eye-roll.

The size of the bill you snort coke with is like a dick-measure here, you've noticed. The richest, coolest, hottest men breathe in their poison with the most expensive paper, then they expect you to be impressed when they hand the rolled up bill to you, as if they're offering you the greatest gift in the world.

You shake your head when Adam does just that, leaving him to breathe in the other line himself.

"Sorry, forgot you're not into it," he grins but you don't think he sounds sorry at all.

He leans back into the couch again and swipes at his nose, leaving the bill on the table along with the remaining pile of coke.

"So, what's this guy's deal?" he asks you, pupils now shot as he stares you down with exaggerated interest.

"Joel? What do you - "

But Adam cuts you off, louder and brasher than you at the best of times, but especially so now.

"You said it's complicated, but he's not your boyfriend," he pries. "So...what's the issue?"

"I don’t know, we left things kind of…open I guess. "

"Open's fun. What's the real issue?"

You sigh again, struggling to think of the real answer to his question. Because he's right, there are a million more reasons why it's actually complicated. The hard part is trying to remember why any of them matter.

"Um...well, he's also a bit older - " you start but Adam cuts you off again with a dismissive wave of his hand.

"Non-issue," he says decidedly, before he thinks of something that makes his features contort into a frown. "Unless he's like, fifty. He's not fifty, is he?"

You shake your head - though you have to admit that even if Joel was fifty, you'd probably still feel the same way about him.

"He's got a kid," you admit.

Adam grimaces - a nasty, ugly expression that sparks a sudden wave of protectiveness in your gut.

"That's a problem," he gripes.

"No," you push back. "No, I love Sarah."

Adam laughs disbelievingly, condescending.

"Who you tryna convince here, babe?"

Tragically, it's a good fucking question. You cross your arms over your chest and sit back into the couch, glaring at the table before you.

"Why don't you just tell them to come out here?" Adam suggests simply. Like it’s that fucking easy.

You shake your head again. "I couldn't ask them to do that."

He shrugs then with another patronizing laugh that makes your skin crawl.

"Then go home," he says bluntly. "Forget about the show. Follow your heart."

He places a dramatic hand over his chest, pulling a put-on sentimental face.

It's your turn to laugh now, one bitter exhale that in no way indicates humour. It's clear he doesn't see the complexity of your situation, could never understand the turmoil you've been living under for the past year, how your heart can be in two places at the same time.

"You're making fun of me," you say and he just grins triumphantly, throwing an arm over the back of the couch behind you and leaning in close to your face. You can smell liquor and the distinct scent of something chemical on his breath.

"No, but you see how crazy it sounds?"

You have to chew your lip to keep from biting his head off. You burn in your seat, shifting uncomfortably, utterly cornered between him and the back of the stranger sitting beside you.

He's right, you realize, it does sound ridiculous.

"You should be stoked you got this gig," he says, oblivious to your quiet fuming. "Do you even realize how lucky you are? You'd give it up to go play stepmom for your - fucking - neighbour?"

You hate the way his snarky voice envelops the last word so cruelly. You wish you'd never described Joel that way, reduced him to something so benign.

"I didn't say that," you argue. "I do want it. I feel lucky. It's just been...a whirlwind is all."

It's all mostly true.

Adam grins. "That's how it happens, baby. It's exciting." He places a hand on your knee and shakes your leg, cocking his eyebrows at you till you reluctantly smile back at him.

Maybe he's right. It's not that you don't want the opportunity - of course you do - it's just that you can't let go of all the ways things could be better. Namely, if Joel was here. Or maybe if all of Hollywood was in Austin.

"And I mean, three episodes..." Adam goes on, suddenly sitting up straight and talking with his hands erratically. "That's enough time to establish a fan base. This part's memorable as fuck, it's a popular show; you'll be getting calls, trust me. We'll get you a publicist, send you out to some red carpets. They're gonna eat you up, baby."

He shoots you a wink and you find yourself smirking again; he does make it sound pretty intoxicating. And it is why you came here after all. Still, it's definitely not lost on you that Adam seems far more concerned with your potential notoriety than your actual craft.

Such is the way here.

"Well," you nod, trying to absorb some of his enthusiasm. "Tomorrow I sign the contract officially so maybe it'll feel more real then. But I am...I'm excited."

It could be a trick of the light - it's gone so suddenly - but you think you catch something pass over his features then, a glint behind his eyes and the subtle twitch of his lips upwards.

"You haven't signed the contract yet?"

You shake your head, eyes narrowing at the strange edge his voice seems to take on. You can't decipher what it means.

You should have left a long time ago.

The only people still hanging around the apartment are the ones fiending around the remaining drugs, most of the notable guests having left at a reasonable hour, only Adam's closest entourage still hanging around; about six other men just like him, neatly dressed and high off their minds.

You've stayed fixed to your place on the couch beside Adam all night, watching and listening to his boisterous, meandering conversations, shrinking uneasily each time he places an arm over your shoulder or absently touches your leg.

He's been getting more and more blatant with it, his side firmly pressed into yours for the last hour or so, even though there's only the two of you on the couch now, more than enough room for him to move away. You're too nervous about how he may react if you try to move yourself.

You were never a nervous person till you came to LA.

You wish there was somewhere else you could go, someone else you could cling to. Or maybe that you were brave enough to not have to cling to someone at all.

It's past 2 a.m. when you finally consider calling it a night. But then, as if he can sense your imminent departure, Adam turns to you with wide, beseeching eyes.

"Have you checked out the view yet?" he asks.

You look over your shoulder at the wall of windows.

"I mean - I can see it."

Adam grins.

"Come see it for real," he suggests, standing and holding out a hand out to you. You reluctantly take it and rise to follow him to the balcony.

Goddamnit. It's what you've been avoiding all night, having to be alone with him. You steel yourself as you subtly slide your hand out of his, letting him lead you out through the sliding glass door into the warm, night air. He leans over the ledge while you stand several feet back, cautious.

"Nice, right?" He glances back at you, cocking his head and imploring you to move closer.

You nod, inching forward enough to rest your fingertips on the balcony's edge.

A few seconds of awkward silence pass and then -

"So, be honest," Adam starts. "Like deadly, seriously honest."

"Okay."

Adam turns to face you, leaning coolly with one arm against the ledge.

"Do you actually want this part?"

Your brows furrow, indignance painting your features.

"I have the part," you protest.

Adam shrugs. "Well, I mean, if it's not in writing..."

The fuck?

"What are you saying?" you demand as annoyance begins to prickle hot under your skin. Adam, on the other hand, appears cool as a cucumber.

"I'm just saying, if you wanted to back out, it's not too late. You could still go make your little Joel the happiest man in the world."

You guess it's what you get for confiding in him.

"I'm not backing out," you argue. "I want it, okay? Joel...Joel's not important."

It's a big, stupid fucking lie but it has to be true. You have to let him go eventually, that much is clear.

Adam's shrewd grin widens as he reaches a hand out to move your hair behind your ear. Warning signs shoot you through you at his touch, but it's his next words that truly send you into fight or flight mode.

"No?" he hums, moving in closer. "So he wouldn't mind if I kissed you right now?"

Oh. Fuck.

"What?" Your voice is flat - too flat. Weak with shock even though you could have seen this coming.

"Joel's not important?" he presses, his lips making contact with your neck. Your stomach turns.

"Adam..."

His fingers trail over your collarbone - featherlight and threatening all at once.

"How bad do you want that part, sweetheart?" His breath fans out over the skin of your neck and -

Oh, fuck this.

You push against his chest with all the force you can muster.

"Stop," you tell him, voice finally gaining some power as anger takes over. Anger at the fucking...predictability of it all. The only thing men like Adam crave more than fame is the chance to get their stupid fucking dicks wet. "I'm not doing this with you."

He shakes his head, that same cocky expression glued to his face, however tainted by the film of outrage at your rejection.

"You really don't wanna say that, sweetheart."

"Yeah, actually, I really fucking do," you rage in return. "I'm leaving."

You turn on your heel and escape through the glass door, leaving it open behind you. Adam yells something after you that you barely catch as you storm through the dwindling party and out the door, descending from the forty-eighth floor into your own personal hell.

How bad do you want that part, sweetheart?

His words echo in your mind as you fight for sleep that night, waves of tears and nausea, nausea and tears keeping you awake until the sun rises. You consider calling Joel but what could Joel do? He can't protect you now, he couldn't save you then.

You have to let him go. One way or another, you have to let go of Joel Miller.

And besides, surely what Adam had said hadn't been a genuine threat. Surely he doesn't have that kind of sway.

No. You have the part. You’re fine. You're okay.

And they tell you that you're lucky, but you're so confused 'Cause you don't feel pretty, you just feel used And all the young things line up to take your place

Joel

I bet she told a million people that she’d stay in touch, But all the little promises that don’t mean much, When there’s memories to be made

You only ever sent Joel one postcard. He'd always hoped more would come, but they never did. Just the one, some time in March. He'd been working late, hadn't remembered to check the mail. Sarah hadn't forgotten, though, of course not. He'd come home after ten o' clock to find the glossy image of a California beachside sitting on his kitchen table.

He'd curiously read your little message before folding the postcard in on itself two distinct times and slotting it into his wallet with a sigh and a faint smile.

It's stayed there ever since, though, he can't say he's looked at it again.

At least until today.

Now he examines it carefully in the driveway, glancing over the return address in the corner, burning the information into his brain and committing it to memory.

"You good to go?" Tommy says, finding Joel with one hand on the door of his pick-up.

"No," Joel tells him truthfully, cracking the driver's side door and tossing the postcard onto the passenger seat, right next to his map.

"S'alright, I'll hold down the fort," Tommy assures him with what he probably thinks is a comforting hand on Joel's shoulder. "Get Sarah to soccer camp on time and all that shit."

Joel just gives him a skeptical stare. Like Tommy has any idea what "and all that shit" entails. If Sarah wasn't so self-sufficient, Joel would never feel so comfortable leaving. He barely feels comfortable as it is.

"I mean it, you don't gotta worry," the younger Miller continues, pulling out a smoke from his pocket nonchalantly. "Just go do what y'gotta do."

Jesus fucking Christ.

"Rule number one," Joel grumbles, snatching the cancer stick out of his hand before Tommy can light it. "None o'this shit in front of her."

Tommy holds up two hands innocently. "Alright, shit."

"Don’t see her around right now, but okay…" Tommy mumbles under his breath. Joel pretends he doesn't hear it.

"To be honest, Tommy, I kinda got no fuckin' idea what it is I'm doin'."

Joel leans into the side of the truck, running a tired, nervous hand over his face. He'd barely slept last night, too keyed up after his 2 a.m. epiphany and a decision set in stone after his call to Tommy.

"Well, you got about twenty hours to figure it out, brother," Tommy quips, holding his palm out for the cigarette. Joel deposits it there reluctantly.

"I'm actually askin' for your advice, for once," Joel admits, crossing his arms over his chest and staring at his shoes.

Now he knows he's really hit rock bottom.

"You think I fuckin' know?" Tommy laughs, echoing Joel's thoughts. "I'm worse at this shit than you are."

That's...true, Joel realizes. Still.

"Just...I don't know, tell me if I'm punchin' above my weight here," he shrugs. "M'I wastin' my time? Just forcin' something that can't - or - that - that isn't - ”

He sighs frustratedly, losing his words. He can't even get it right now, here, in front of Tommy. What the fuck is he going to do when he gets to California?

Tommy seems to sense his brother's mounting dismay, his firm hand once again coming down on Joel's forearm.

"I saw the two of ya at Christmas, Joel," Tommy says, finally sounding some semblance of sincere. "Looked pretty damn natural to me. Just go say your piece and if it works out, it works out. If it don't, then, you know...you tried."

The two Millers lock eyes before Joel nods stiffly. It's not much (and it’s hardly the most soothing sentiment) but it's all Joel needs to finally get behind the wheel, to slam the truck door behind him and pull out of the confounded cul-de-sac.

Sweeping desert passes him by as he guns it west on the two-ninety. He barely had time to construct a plan beyond drive, the reality of his decision now setting in with each click of the odometer.

The memory of his pep talk with Tommy fades quickly. He's been grumbling since Fredericksburg, miserable musings that range from, "What the fuck are you doing?" to, "Turn the damn car around, idiot." Of course he doesn't, stubborn to a fault, repelling the urge to back out now that he's committed to whatever the fuck it is he's committed to.

'Course, he makes it as far as the state line before he really begins to question his choices.

He should have called. He should have asked first. He should have waited.

He's tired of waiting.

Eventually (inevitably), his emotions catch up with him. Joel's not ignorant to the way his breath has started to come in heaving gasps, hard as he tries to pretend it's not happening, even as his chest pangs painfully with each ragged inhale, intrusive thoughts moving in faster now.

Would you even still want him? When he shows up on your doorstep, will you even care? Or is he already out of time?

Fuck.

Joel's powerless to stop the tears that well in his eyes then, hot liquid salt streaming out over his cheeks and into his lap, blurring his vision.

"Shit," he curses, voice thick as he wipes the wetness out of his eyes. But the tears don’t stop; he's forced to succumb. He pulls over, hazards flashing as he parks on the shoulder.

Safely off the road, he buries his head in his hands, leaning into the steering wheel as sobs flow freely from deep in his chest. A continuous refrain of, stupid stupid stupid rings out in his mind -

This is the stupidest thing you’ve ever fucking done.

Or maybe, he pushes back on the thought, maybe the stupidest thing he'd ever done was letting you leave in the first place.

He chases the setting sun as far as Phoenix before he finally decides to call it a day. He sleeps in the cheapest motel he can find, in the driest heat he's ever felt, cloying anxiety cloaking his dreams on what he hopes is last night without you.

Dear Joel,

This is NOT the view from my apartment…but you get the idea. Maybe you’ll see it for real one day. I hope so. I miss you.

The postcard sits in the passenger seat, that little return address his only compass as he crosses into The Golden State. There are still miles of desert before he reaches LA, but the hours pass faster now the closer he gets. He's gridlocked the second he enters the city, naturally. The clogged motorways and smoggy skies of Los Angeles only further fog his troubled mind, knuckles white on the steering wheel as he navigates his way through the dense traffic.

He follows the postcard like a North Star, exiting far outside the city centre, in a neighbourhood he'd likely never venture to otherwise. You'd been telling the truth, it's nowhere near any balmy beach. He's not judging, of course (Joel'd never judge someone for having less than someone else, as someone who's barely got much to begin with) but he can't deny the tinge of protectiveness that bubbles in his guts at the sight of the pot-holed roads and condemned apartment buildings that lead to your place; surely this isn't the safest place for you to be living.

Finally, he finds your address - a small one-storey home with a lawn unattended and only two cars parked in the driveway.

He notices, uneasily, that yours isn't one of them.

He checks the postcard for the hundredth time - it's definitely the right place. He takes a deep breath and parks uncertainly across the road, folding up the postcard and stuffing it back into his pocket before taking those final, crucial steps to your front door.

He's imagined every possible scenario - from the most painful to the most perfect. Maybe you'll swing open the door and pull him right into your arms, maybe you'll tell him to fuck off, maybe you'll cry or scream or smile or all of the above.

Turns out, he needn't've worried about any of that, because instead, he's greeted by a face that's not yours and three words he certainly had not prepared for when he asks for you by name:

"She's not here."

He deflates in the doorway, his mind going temporarily blank. He scrambles dumbly to understand.

"'She's not here,' like…she's out for the day - or...?"

The girl stares back at him with confusion.

"No, as in, she's gone,” she says very slowly. "She left. She went home."

"What? When?"

"I don't know, last night?" she muses offhandedly, uncaring. "She got home late and just packed a bunch of shit and left."

Joel's blood begins to boil as she speaks, concern melding with rage at the girl's indifference while his brain tries to catch up with the reality that you aren't fucking here and he is.

"And none of you tried to stop her?" he demands, his voice rising with obvious frustration. "In the middle of the fuckin' night?"

The girl just shrugs. Another girl appears behind her then, blonde and piqued, looking on with dubious concern and a hand on the other girl's shoulder. Joel runs a palm over his face exasperatedly and tries to reign himself in before one of your roommates calls the cops on him for making a scene on their front porch.

"You gotta be fuckin' kiddin' me..." he mutters to himself.

That's when the other girl pipes up, voice high-pitched and cutting, an undeniable fry coating her words.

"Wait - you're not Joel, are you?" she asks.

He sighs, "Yeah, why?"

The two girls exchange a knowing look that makes Joel's skin prickle.

"Well, I see why she can't shut up about you," the blonde one says and the two girls snicker. Joel sighs again, he really doesn't have time for this.

"Have you tried to call her at all?" he presses.

"Why would we do that?" the blonde one ponders cruelly.

"Jesus fuckin' Christ, to check on her?" he growls. "You got a phone?"

A moment of hesitation as they consider letting him in - a moment that ultimately ends when the two share a cursory nod and step aside to let Joel through.

It's a pretty small place, three bedroom doors siphoning off from a shared living area and open kitchen, mismatched furniture and a clunky TV set. Tattered movie posters and a big calendar marking the dates of various upcoming auditions line the walls above beige carpeted floors, stained from the current tenants or past ones, Joel's not sure. There's no sign of you here, no mark that tells him you once dwelled within these walls. Like you'd barely ever settled there at all.

That is, except for the room to his immediate left with the door swaying ajar, giving him a view of the space he now recognizes as undeniably yours. An all-too-familiar purple bedspread lines a twin bed that's not unlike the one you have at home. The cheap IKEA dresser that stands against the other wall though is totally alien, nothing like the one he'd built you, the one that still sits in your childhood bedroom with his initials carved into the top drawer. Discarded t-shirts and a pair of forgotten tennis shoes litter the floor.

He can almost picture you, hurriedly buzzing around the shoe-box-sized room, packing a suitcase and leaving the door swinging behind you. He'd been so close...if he'd have just gotten here that much faster maybe he could have caught you.

Most concerningly though, Joel wonders what it is exactly that could have caused you to leave in such a rush.

He swallows back a sudden lump in his throat, pulled from his reverie by the grating voice of your roommate.

"Over there," the blonde one tells him, nodding her head towards the holster on the wall in the kitchen. The two girls hover for a moment as Joel punches in the number for your cell phone, till he shoots them a disapproving glare and they - finally - scatter.

Well, he sees why you hate them so much.

He holds the receiver to his ear and listens as the line rings once, twice, a third time - fuck. Dread sets in; what if you'd let the damn thing die again?

A click, then -

"Hello?"

Thank fuck.

"Hey!" he exclaims, relief washing over him momentarily. Not for long though. "Jesus, are you alright? Where the fuck are you?"

"Joel?" you ask timidly. He thinks your voice sounds a little tight, like you've been crying. He's heard the sound through the wire enough times to recognize pain in your tone.

"Yeah, it's me, just - where are you?"

"I don't know - I don't know, somewhere in Arizona," you stammer. "I - wait, where are you?"

"I'm in LA."

"What?"

Your voice rises several octaves, piercing Joel's eardrum. He winces at the sting but works to stay focused. You're not far. He can still catch you. He can still get to you.

"Do you see anythin' around you? Anywhere you can pull in?"

"I don't - no, there's nothing, it's just desert I - what do you mean you're in LA?"

"Fuck - "

Depending on where you are, he could get to you in five hours or less...but he can't track you down in the middle of the fucking desert. He presses his hands into fists, prodding his knuckles into the kitchen wall as he wracks his brain for a solution, a way to find you before you got too far - again.

"Wait," you say then and Joel's chest hammers with a brief flash of hope. "There's a - a truck stop and - motels and stuff. Coming up, um, Benson? Does that sound right?"

As you speak, Joel pulls your postcard from his pocket while he feverishly hunts for something to write with, pulling open drawer after drawer in the kitchen, leaving a tornado's worth of disaster in his wake till he finally finds a dull golf pencil buried under a stack of audition sides.

"Just tell me the exit number," he says. "You're on the I-10, right?"

"Yeah, yeah, the I-10...um..." your voice trails as you assumedly scan for the answer. "Three-oh-two, exit three-oh-two."

Joel jots it down on the postcard, a messy scribble beside your original note.

"Get off there," he commands.

"Joel - "

"Get off there and wait, okay? I'm on my way."

There’s been no way for me to say That I felt a certain way in stages, oh I think the story needs more pages, 'cause...

You

I’m coming home from that hardest year, I’m making plans not to make plans while I’m here And this life has been no holiday, a complicated situation I’m fine all my memories, still I could use vacation

It's not romantic. It's not beautiful. It's nothing like the movies.

It's sitting on a bench at a truck stop somewhere in the middle of the desert. It's leering eyes and curious stares from onlooking men and passersby. It's cold gas station coffee, your third since you pulled in.

It's waiting. Waiting for Joel. Hours and hours and years and years of waiting, waiting, waiting for Joel Miller.

Your eyelids are drooping by the time the sun starts to fade behind the vast horizon. You've lost count of how many cars have passed you on the interstate. The cell phone hasn't buzzed since Joel'd called earlier.

You hadn't thought any part of it through last night, just packed all you could as fast as you could and driven out of town. You hadn't even consciously decided you were going home until you'd found yourself driving east on the interstate, crossing into Arizona long after midnight. You'd crashed in the first major city you hit, when the wetness in your eyes had made it hard to see in the dark and the weight of your anguish had grown too heavy to ignore.

You'd slept in too late this morning, only on the road for two hours before that call from Joel had come. You've been here ever since.

"You get stood up, gorgeous?" a brave trucker sneers, demanding your attention, his buddies looking on with vile judgment, mocking you.

"Fuck off," you shoot back, not for the first time today. Not for the first time in your life. Fending off men and the things they judge you for, the things they try to take from you, the life and joy they suck from you so carelessly.

You'd never stood a fucking chance.

Maybe that's why you'd always loved Joel, you muse to yourself as a fresh wave of tears spill from your eyes. Joel takes nothing from you, Joel wants you to live. Joel let you go even though all you'd ever wanted was for him to ask you to stay.

It's dusk now, you notice offhandedly, the air cooling as a canopy of thick, milky stars begin to coat the sky above, the neon signs and headlights dulling their shine from where you sit.

You consider walking out into the open desert, till you're far enough away from Benson that you could clearly see the Big Dipper. Better yet, you could walk north until you see the Aurora Borealis or hit the open ocean and just disappear forever into the frozen water. It would probably feel better than how you feel right now.

But no. You can't. Joel could never find you there. And Joel has to be able to find you.

As if on cue, a familiar truck comes into view, cracking open your reverie and blasting down the interstate at a dangerous velocity. You practically jump to your feet as Joel's truck comes to a grinding halt, sandy dust clouding the air around you as he parks across two spots before you.

You watch, heart in your throat, as he leaps out of the front seat. You're not sure what you're expecting - a longing embrace maybe? A cinematic kiss perhaps. A heroic Joel scooping you into his arms and carrying you home, a vision you'd dreamt about dozens of times since Christmas.

It’s none of the above. Because as quickly as Joel gets out of the truck, you notice the look on his face; jaw clenched and brows furrowed, lips melded into a hard line -

Joel is livid.

"Jesus Christ, what the hell were you thinkin'?" he demands, approaching you fiercely before stopping suddenly, still several feet away, not close enough to touch, as though he's not sure if he's allowed. But he's there - Joel is right there.

The last of the ogling men disperse cautiously, Joel's rage apparently far more frightening than yours.

"What?" you shout back at him, matching his energy instinctively. Exhausted and heartbroken, anger comes easily.

"Drivin' through the night like that? Are you insane?"

You scoff. You're a good driver, more than capable of driving at night. Plus -

"I had a reason." You hate how cracked your voice sounds from crying and lack of sleep. "And I didn't drive all night, okay? I stayed the night in Phoenix."

"Are you fuckin'..." Joel shakes his head in disbelief.

"What?" you press him.

"I was in Phoenix last night," he huffs exasperatedly. "We went right passed each other."

Fuck. It would be funny if it wasn't so goddamn heartbreaking. Joel had been in the same city as you and you hadn't even known. You could have stayed in the same motel. Could have gotten breakfast at the same drive-thru before leaving in opposite directions.

You're at a rare loss for words. Joel sighs and presses a tired fist to his forehead.

"You should've called m - someone," he says finally. "You should've called someone."

You catch the slip-up, of course you do. And you can't even argue because you know he's right. You feel your face crumple, feel that familiar slump of defeat in your shoulders. Meanwhile, Joel is right fucking there, the closest he's been to you in months and for some reason you're still not touching him.

"I'm sorry..." you croak. "I'm sorry, Joel."

Joel's ire dissipates in an instant, his features softening as he finally closes the space between you and pulls you into his arms in a bone-crushing hug. The second he wraps you in his embrace, the sobs you've been containing break free, shaking against his chest as your tears meet his t-shirt.

"Oh, babygirl, it's okay," he murmurs gruffly into your hair, pulling you in tighter. You can hear the strain in his voice, his ragged breath on your bare skin. Joel is just as overcome as you. Sensing it only makes you cry harder.

"What happened?" he asks.

Where do you even begin?

It's too late to get back on the road, Joel decides.

"We'll just stay here tonight, okay?" he suggests. "You shouldn't be drivin' like this."

You don't disagree. He books you a room in the adjacent motel. You park your vehicles side by side out front. You sit with him on the springy mattress while Joel holds you till your tears subside. Several minutes pass like that, Joel lightly rocking you in his big, comforting embrace.

It’s the safest you’ve felt in a long time.

"You ready to tell me about it, sweetheart?" he asks softly, pulling back to wipe the last of your tears from your cheeks before clutching your hands between your bodies.

You nod. He waits.

"Don't get upset, okay?" you begin. His lips instantly turn down in a frown - so much for that.

"Okay," he says anyway, voice hard and flat.

You take a deep breath. "So you know Adam?"

You feel him stiffen, catch the way disdain flashes in his eyes at just the mention of the other man's name. If Joel's jealousy had been palpable through the phone, it burns like a wildfire in person.

"I guess."

"He - kind of tried it with me. That day I called you."

You watch Joel's face carefully. A terrifying muscle clenches in his jaw and he swallows harshly. His grip on your wrists tightens as he nods stiffly but says nothing.

You can probably imagine what it is he's holding back.

"Nothing happened," you go on. "Like, really, nothing. I turned him down and I thought that was the end of it."

Joel listens intently, waves of quiet rage rolling off him while your hands burn in his grasp.

"But then yesterday..." you continue, taking a steadying breath as emotion pools in your stomach again. "When I went to sign the contract for that job - you know the one I told you about?"

Joel nods once.

"They told me I didn't have it anymore."

Joel's brows furrow. "But I thought you already had it?"

"No...I guess...it was never in writing," you shake your head. "Adam - um - he went behind my back. He told my agent I'd backed out before I could sign anything."

"Why would he do that?" Joel asks through his teeth, sounding very much like he already knows the answer.

You don't respond, just stare at your conjoined hands, confirming his unspoken assumption.

"I'll kill that fucker," Joel gnarls then and you think it sounds like a genuine threat.

You snicker coldly. "Not if I kill him first."

He clears his throat, shakes his head and - rather pointedly - changes the subject.

"But there'll be other jobs." He squeezes your hands, this time with more soothing intent. "You didn't need to leave."

You sniff lightly and shake your head, glancing up at him from under your tear-soaked lashes.

"Well, no, actually," you press, gearing up for the pièce de résistance. "My agent dropped me. Said it didn't reflect well on them if I've got 'one foot out the door.'"

"Fuck," Joel breathes.

"Yeah. And, anyway, is that why you came to see me, Joel? To tell me to keep at it? Just keep goin'?" It's a weak impression of his low, gravelly drawl but it makes him fleetingly smile in spite of it all.

But then his eyebrows furrow again and as quickly as it had come, his smile fades.

"No," he shakes his head but doesn't elaborate, his eyes fixed on the flowery bedspread.

It's quiet for a long moment then. You take a deep breath and fill the sudden silence with the truth.

"I'm giving up, Joel," you confess, hysterics rising to the surface once again. "I can't do it anymore. I thought I could do it, but I can't. I can't do it when - "

He looks up at you, fervidly attentive while he waits for you to go on, like he knows what you want to say.

You fill your lungs with cigarette-stained air and finally let slip what's in your heart - "I can't do it because you're back home and I'm not."

You can't look at him when you say it but the weight of your words hangs thick like fog around you both. He doesn't speak so you go on.

"I know it's - I know it's not right," you cry. "I should want it more, I should be - I don't know, like, fighting for myself or working harder or - or - "

You take a steadying breath and bury your face in your hands, too ashamed to admit the rest to his face.

"But I just - don't want any of it without you. I don’t care if that's or stupid or naïve or whatever. Or if you even want me like that, I just - I would choose a life with you over this any day. I'll always choose that, Joel - and I'm sorry."

It's quiet again while your confession seeps into walls around you, drowned out by the hum of the AC and the static buzz of fluorescent lighting above you. You wet your palms with tears while Joel breathes shallowly before you.

Finally, after far too long, his hands find your wrists again, this time to pry your fingers away from your face. Joel sighs, placing two big palms on either side of your face, his gaze unavoidable now.

"Sweetheart, what'd I tell you at Christmas? I never wanted you to go. Baby, I want you more'n anythin'. You know that."

You shake your head. You don't know that. You've never known that.

"Darlin' - fuck - " Joel's palms burn your cheeks as your tears collect on his fingers. His sincere, brown eyes look back at you, wet with his own overflowing emotion. "I want you to come home. So much - god, I want that so much. But you - you can't...you can't quit 'cause of me. M'not...worth it."

You want to argue that it's not just because of him - that every time you'd made any sort of headway in Hollywood something had come along to fuck it up again. That the universe obviously just doesn't want this for you. It's not not true, but it's also not nearly as important.

Because of course it's about Joel. It's always been about Joel.

You swallow back a wave of tears and grip his forearms.

"Joel you're..."

How do you even put it into words? Of course he's worth it - he's worth everything, to you. You decide to show him instead.

"Just tell me," you instruct him with conviction.

He frowns, confused, as he works to catch up with your line of thinking. "What?"

"Tell me you want me to come back. Joel - please."

Now his tears spill over, features tightening as he, not for the first time, visibly wars with himself. Always, always warring with what he really wants and what he thinks he should want.

"I can't do that, sweetheart," he whispers, his voice shattered because you can see how much he wants to.

"Then why'd you come here? Huh?" you demand, voice rising as your desperation grows. Joel flinches at your words. "This isn't the life I want. And I'm not just saying that because of what happened. Joel - there's only one life I've ever wanted."

Your gaze locks with his and you watch him scan your face for any trace of a lie. You know he won't find one.

"Tell me, Joel," you beg weakly. "Tell me to come back and I will."

Joel waits a beat, squaring his shoulders with a steadying breath and a cracked sniffle.

"Come back, superstar," he pleads then. "Come home to me."

A soft gasp and you nod fervently, breathy, "I will, Joel, I will," lost, as he steals the words from your waiting mouth with a bruising kiss.

It's like every other time you’ve kissed him, feverish and heady, always running out of time. His mouth moves against yours with intent, tongue slipping between your cracked, wet lips as his hands tangle in your hair, locking you in place. You're no less impatient, palms wandering the vast expanse of his broad chest, his shoulders, his arms, pressing closer to him with each shared breath that passes between your lips.

"Fuck," Joel groans when you climb into his lap, straddling him and wrapping your arms around his neck. His palms find the small of your back, pressing your hips closer into his, the burgeoning bulge in his jeans prodding into your thigh; materiality at last. Joel is here.

"Is this real?" you find yourself asking anyway, as your fingers coil in his curls and his lips explore your neck hungrily.

"I hope so," he murmurs gruffly into your collarbone, the faintest of chuckles coating his words. He can laugh all he wants but it's a valid enough question - Joel's been nothing but a memory for the past six months, a disembodied voice through the wire, not someone to hold and kiss and love.

He lays you back then but stays comfortably situated between your legs, his pelvis grinding into yours, another stabilizing reminder of his presence.

He's still not wasting time, helping lift your shirt over your head and unhooking your bra clumsily while you fumble with your jeans zipper. He palms your breasts roughly the second they're free, calloused fingers dragging over the soft skin of your stomach before sliding your jeans and underwear off completely.

He's burying his face into your aching heat without warning then, moaning the second his tongue swipes through your folds, already wet with need. It catches you off guard, the sudden contact on your long-neglected cunt. Your fingers scratch at his shoulders but it only seems to encourage him - he braces his hands on your thighs as his eyes flutter closed, savouring your flavour when his lips close around your clit.

"Missed this pussy so fuckin' much," he hums distantly against you. "Almost forgot how good you taste. You miss my mouth, sweetheart?"

He sounds almost needy for the assurance.

"Shit - yes," you promise him. "Thought about it all the time, Joel."

"S'right."

Amid the obscene sounds of his lips on your soaking folds, you're reminded of his needy voice through a cell phone speaker, all those months ago now -

"...Wanna get my mouth on you so bad. Wanna taste you again."

It had sounded true then. It feels true now.

He doesn't need to ask this time; you know he wants to hear you, know how much likes it. And it's hardly a stretch to give him that, the way his tongue is circling your clit has you crying out a symphony over him, quiet curses and repeated refrains of his name tumbling from your lips unabashedly. You find yourself squirming under his touch, grinding your hips upward for more, more, more.

Joel seems to get the hint.

"Let me see you, baby," he implores you brusquely, pulling back to tap your sides, gently coercing you to turn on your tummy. But then he's yanking you back by the hips so your ass is up and your chest is pressing hard into the mattress, his tongue once again invading your entrance, slipping inside with no resistance from you. Your spine arches and you push back into his mouth, his big hands fanning out over your ass and spreading you open so you're fully on display for him.

He hums a pleased little noise into your heat, vibrations rattling your bones and making you dizzy with him, before he's pulling off you with a final languid lick only to replace his tongue with one thick finger. He drags his slick-coated moustache over your skin to nip at the plush skin of your ass while he slowly fucks his finger in and out of you.

"Christ, look at you," he marvels quietly, again, like he's saying it just to himself. "My perfect girl."

"M'yours, Joel..." you vow, drunk on the way it sounds, how it feels to be his. It's all you've ever wanted. Joel, for his part, groans openly at your hushed assertion.

"Say that again, sweetheart," he supplicates raggedly. You peer over your shoulder to see him palming himself through his jeans, index finger of his other hand still slotted securely in your centre.

Fuck fuck fuck.

"I'm yours," you tell him again, breathless and truthful. "Joel - make me yours."

He grunts softly, hearing the request in your words as he quickly strips down, the clinking sound of his belt buckle sending sparks flying to your core in anticipation.

He's back over you in an instant, leaning his naked body on yours so you feel his cock, hard and leaking, against the bare skin of your thighs. You rock into him and the friction seems to effect the both of you, Joel's hands combing harshly up and down your sides, over your perked nipples and down your spine.

"You know how many times I dreamt about this, babygirl?" he breathes, planting fevered kisses down your back, one of his hands once again creeping between your thighs to sink two fingers into your heat, stretching you in preparation for him. "To have you like this again, all wet and open for me. To - fuck - to be inside you."

"Joel…" you whimper, impatience setting in as you drip over his knuckles. "Please."

It's the most you can muster and it's all you need; Joel doesn't seem to be interested in teasing you any longer. He pulls you into his chest and buries his cock into you at last, cursing hotly in your ear as his strong arms engulf you, palms grabbing at your breasts till one finds your face, tilting your chin towards him to lock his mouth with yours.

He swallows each breathless moan from your parted lips as he fucks you deeply, not slow but not rushed either, sloppy with his efforts when he reaches around you to finger your clit, desperate to make sure you enjoy it too - so very Joel.

"I wanna feel you come around me, sweetheart, can you gimme that?" he growls into the hollow of your ear and you nod -

Yes yes a million times yes.

"Good girl."

You moan out his name, his words sparking a reminder of your very first night together, how dark and commanding he'd sounded in the dim light of your bedroom, how similar he sounds now and yet so completely different.

A pool of heat begins to build in your belly, Joel's thrusts never slowing, his fingers on your clit demanding. He's all around you, everywhere, finally.

You try to warn him but it's too late, the heat erupts in your core and you quiver against him, laboured, "I'm coming - Joel," escaping your lips in the form of a high pitched groan. Joel groans too, the feeling of your walls tightening around him turning his movements messier still, his big hand on your chest locking just under your neck as he rides it out with you. He's close too, right on the edge, if the quickening of his panted grunts in your ear are anything to go by.

In the haze of your orgasm, limp in his arms, you recall again his words on the phone all those moons ago now:

"Let me hear those pretty sounds you make."

Your head falls back on his shoulder and you answer his prayers.

"Joel, baby…" you croon, velvet soft and dripping adoration. "Come inside me, please. Missed it so much..."

You feel his hips stutter as he whimpers at your words, his fingers unwittingly tightening at the base of your neck.

"Fuuuck, keep talkin'," he pleads lowly.

"You feel so fucking good, Joel," you go on. "Wanted your cock for so long - shit - wanted to - feel you fill this pussy up. Only you, Joel. Only you make me feel this good."

"Fuck me, baby, I'm gonna come," he groans, an enticing promise. "You want it inside?"

"Pleasepleaseplease."

Two more piercing pumps and then he's crushing you into him, coming with his cock deep inside you, his muffled moans getting caught in your hair and tickling your ear. It seems to last forever, Joel filling you completely with his seed, refusing to pull out until the last of the aftershocks pass through him and you've both properly caught your breath.

Then he sits back on his haunches, keeping you trapped in his embrace so you're sitting in his lap with his arms wrapped around your middle.

It's quiet for a long while as Joel plants tender kisses over your shoulders and cheeks, the back of your neck. Your eyes slip closed at some point, and you think you might fall asleep like that, safe in Joel's arms, finally back where you belong.

But Joel shifts above you to check the time on his watch before you can, stirring you back to life.

"What time is it?" you whisper.

"Midnight."

A smile pulls at your lips then when you realize the date.

"Joel. It’s July twenty-fifth."

You look up to see him staring down at you with bemused confusion. "So?"

"It's Christmas in July," you tell him, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. A full six months since you were last together.

"Shit," Joel smirks, squeezing you a little tighter into him to whisper in your ear, "Happy...birthday in July, Jesus?"

You burst out laughing, your first real laugh in months; it’s probably the funniest fucking thing you've ever heard Joel Miller say.

"I don't think that's how that works," you say.

"Yeah, that was fuckin' stupid, m'sorry. Was funnier when you said it."

But he's laughing too as he finally unwinds himself from you, only to lie back with his head on the superfluous motel pillows, reaching a hand out to you to join him. You curl into his side and he wraps a thick arm around you, both of you sighing when you settle into place.

You close your eyes again but you don’t sleep. You think.

You think about how maybe this could be life with Joel. Mind-blowing sex and stupid jokes and warm embraces. But that wouldn’t be all of it, you know that. Maybe it'll be hard; maybe he'll get distant or angry or busy or scared.

Maybe you'll be all those things too. Maybe you'll wish you'd tried harder in Hollywood or come to regret all that you'd given up. Maybe you'll get bitter or sad or stressed-out or stubborn.

Maybe, though, maybe it's okay.

Because you want all of it. The complications and the dreary Mondays. You could still work, follow your passion in a smaller way - teach snotty, suburban teenagers the Brechtian method or go back to school yourself. You could do it.

You could do it with the man you came home for, the only soul who can tell which smiles you're faking. The warmest bed you've ever known.

It's clearer now, so much clearer than before, your future and all it could be.

You're pulled from your reverie when Joel begins to snore softly beside you, his thick chest rising and falling in peaceful swells.

He's so beautiful. He's yours.

One way or another, he's finally yours.

Sun streams through the crack in the motel's mint green curtains and Joel is already awake.

"Hey," he's saying in a hushed murmur as he gently shakes you to life. You blink in the morning light until he comes into focus over you, standing beside the bed, sleepy-eyed and haggard-looking, but undeniably up.

"We should hit the road," he insists softly. "Long day."

"Mmm," you nod as you peel yourself off the mattress. You're sore, in a lot of places, hours of driving and fucking and crying leaving you achy and weak. You stretch your arms and wiggle your toes. Joel smiles down at you.

"Do we have time for breakfast?" you ask, rubbing the sleep out of your eyes. You really hope you have time for breakfast.

Joel's grin widens. "Not really."

"I know you want a coffee," you press him. He sighs, you've got him there.

"Come on, we're on the interstate, I want a Grand Slam," you say with finality, holding out your hand and letting Joel help you out of bed. "When in Benson, you know?"

Joel rolls his eyes. Yeah, you've got him. Welcome to the rest of your life, Miller.

Twelve-hour drive be damned, you savour your eggs and bacon at the neighbouring Denny's, tucked into Joel's side in the yellow booth in a manner most inconducive to eating. You don't care. Neither does he as far as you can tell.

Joel sips on his coffee and swipes your sausages ("It's like that, huh?" "M'not hungry, just want a bite."), placing the occasional kiss to the top of your head and stealing glances at the news flashing on the TV overhead for traffic alerts.

There’s nothing to fear. It’s all clear on the I-10, as far as Van Horn.

Eventually you have to part ways, relegated to your own vehicles for the long journey ahead. You hate it, hate that you have to be apart from him again after just getting him back. Joel seems uneasy about it too, clinging to you with an arm over your shoulder right up until he's depositing you by your car.

"You'll follow me?" he asks.

"I'll follow you."

He nods, slowly leaning in to kiss your cheek, chaste and sweet. "Drive safe."

Your eyes slip shut when his lips brush your skin; you lean into it, however fleeting it is.

"You too."

Joel takes a deep breath, looking for a moment as though he's ready to walk away, before he's crushing you into his chest for one last embrace. Just a hug - a strong, solid, lasting, fervent hug.

There's something lurking under Joel's grasp, something uncertain. You feel it in the way his arms constrict around you, the tautness of the muscles there, the way he clings to you a little too long to feel comforting anymore.

Is Joel...afraid? You'd been afraid too, in your dreams last night, that the spell would break once you'd left this place. The reality of what going home actually means has been creeping up on you since your exchange of confessions in the motel room. There's going home, then there's going home with Joel.

You still don't know what that looks like.

You hug him back fiercely, nuzzling into his chest and infusing all the love you can muster into your embrace. Whatever it is you're going back to, you're ready for it.

You hope it's enough. Because now you really have to go if you hope to beat the dark. It's already not looking good. At this rate it'll be well past dusk by the time you hit Texas.

Sure enough, the sun is long set behind you when you cross into your home state. Traffic has you losing sight of Joel's truck somewhere near Sonora and although you're not thrilled at the loss, you don't panic. You know your way from here.

It's muscle memory by the time you get to Austin, the way to that old familiar cul-de-sac etched in your mind like hieroglyphics.

You're not surprised to find Joel's beaten you home, standing in his driveway in the glow of a streetlight.

Muscle memory tells you to turn left into your dad's driveway. That’s what you'd normally do, that's what you've always done. Turning right into Joel's driveway isn't something you've ever even considered. Until now, of course.

You're taking too long to decide, awkwardly frozen in the middle of the road. You catch Joel eyeing you expectantly before he averts his gaze, never one to pressure you. Since day one that's been true; Joel's never pushed you, Joel's always waited for you to make the first move.

It hits you then - how it's not a hard decision at all. It's the easiest goddamn move of your life. There's Joel, perfect and patient and kind and caring and waiting - waiting for you. You don't have to think, you don't have to question it -

You turn right, home.

THE END.

in my hometown tag list -

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#joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller x y/n #joel miller smut #joel miller angst #the last of us fanfiction #joel miller fluff #in my hometown #pedro pascal character fanfiction #joel miller fanfiction #dbf!joel miller #dbf!joel #pedro pascal fanfiction #tlou smut #joel miller imagine #joel miller x f!reader

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anghraine · 3 months

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On the one hand, I absolutely love the high tragedy of Denethor's arc in the book, think it's amazingly well-written, and that he is one of the most complex and fascinating characters that Tolkien ever wrote.

On the other, there's part of me that's also a little frustrated by how much it has to happen because Tolkien kind of wrote himself into a corner with the Ruling Stewards. He's insistent on a few things about them:

Their initial rise to power as perma-regents of Gondor was squeaky-clean. Mardil was a paragon of virtue, he tried to prevent Eärnur from getting himself killed, there were no clear successors, and retaining the regency prevented another Kinstrife and created a stable institution that would hold Gondor together for 900+ years after the failure of the kings.

They are a high Númenórean family descended from Elendil, even if they're not formally of the line of Elendil (for unknown reasons, but most likely because they're descended through women).

Denethor is notably very similar to Aragorn, in intellect, wisdom, stature, ability, even appearance. He is a towering and respected figure, and he and his sons are highly popular with their people (even with children).

Denethor's military tactics in the book are very good, and UT says Sauron hoped Denethor would be less prepared than he actually was.

Denethor is proud, unbending, and personally dislikes and distrusts Aragorn. He thinks Gandalf is using him against Sauron for now while planning for Aragorn to take power later (this is filtered through his pride but ... um, is he wrong?).

Faramir, now Denethor's last heir, is a fantastic if reluctant warrior and captain, a super special Númenórean throwback, and a thoughtful, intelligent, and wise person who is humbler than Denethor, but also established as wary about Aragorn.

Gondor formally rejected the claim of Aragorn's family before the Ruling Stewardship even existed.

What all this means is that Denethor, if alive, is someone who will never willingly give way to Aragorn. Denethor has legal precedent on his side, he is himself a perfectly good ruler from a long-standing, stable, legitimate ruling family and a highly capable military leader in war, he is liked by his people, and he even has a viable heir regardless of the personal strain between him and Faramir.

There's just no reason for Aragorn to take power that Denethor, as written, would find remotely persuasive. But Denethor is also too noble and capable and special for a power grab on Aragorn's side to feel right, esp given how destructive it would be in the middle of a war (as Aragorn acknowledges!). Despite the sparkly kingliness and mystical airs, this is fundamentally a dynastic dispute between two different houses descended from Elendil, based on the minutia of Gondorian and Númenórean law and precedent, and a fight over that is ... not the kind of story this is.

Denethor has to be driven to self-destruction by the plot so that Aragorn's rise can happen. It simply would not occur if Denethor was alive and in his right mind. Faramir has to be mystically healed by Aragorn so that his reservations will dissolve and he will voluntarily remove himself from the picture in a way that doesn't feel bad.

And both scenes are fantastic, and make sense for the characters. But I do feel that they kind of get steamrollered by the plot to make way for Aragorn.

The thing that makes that doubly fascinating, though, is that Tolkien didn't have to prop the House of the Stewards up so thoroughly. He could have written a version where the Stewards are inadequate or really sketchy or simply can't be compared to Aragorn's greatness and it's clear why they should be replaced by him and his house. Tolkien could have made this a lot easier for himself! And I do respect the more difficult and nuanced approach Tolkien took with the Stewards by making them genuinely impressive and noble and capable in their own right and not just cardboard-cutouts for Aragorn to kick over.

But, well.

#anghraine babbles #long post #legendarium blogging #legendarium fanwank #húrinionath #denethor #faramir #mardil voronwë #etc #ondonórë blogging

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bonefall · 5 months

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⭕️Hey Bones! Is it ok if you explain and/or elaborate how Crowfeather is abusive to Breezepelt if please?⭕️

I do KNOW that crowfeather is indeed, abusive to Breezepelt, due to the fact that he emotionally and/or physically neglected him - with child neglect being known to BE a form of child abuse - and I also heard that he slashed and/or hit him within one of the books, which I believe is in the book Outcast, in chapter 16.

But I also wish people would talk and be informed about it more within the fandom, because in the parts of the fandom I’ve known portrayed Crowfeather’s neglect on Breezepelt as negative and bad, but not in a way that made me think and/or feel: “Wow, that’s pretty bad. That’s…actually abusive.” I suppose? So I hope more people will talk about it more in that type of way.

Also, please be aware that I have NOT read PoT, OoTS, etc. or barely any warrior cats books, since the majority of the information I got from the series is from the wiki and the fandom, so that probably explains why I didn’t know this part of Crowfeather’s character is as bad as it actually is until now. Also, feel free to talk about Crowfeather’s abuse on Breezepelt I haven’t mentioned and/or don’t know right now as well if you want.

I’m SO sorry that if this ask is unintentionally quite long, and feel free to make sure to take all the time you need to answer it. Thank you!

OH LET'S GOOOO

Breezepelt is both physically and emotionally abused by Crowfeather. I'm not talking about only child neglect; he is screamed at, belittled, and even once hit on-screen.

The fact that Crowfeather both neglected and abused him is very important to the canonical story of Breezepaw. There's actually a lot more to this character than people remember! Even from his first appearances he displays good qualities, a strained relationship with his father and adult clanmates, and is clearly shown to be troubled before we understand why.

As many problems as I have with the direction of Breezepelt's arc (especially Crowfeather's Trial), his setup is legitimately a praiseworthy bit of writing from Po3 which carries over into OotS. To say that Breezepelt was not abused is to completely miss two arcs worth of books SCREAMING it.

BIG POST. Glossary;

INTRO TO BREEZEPELT: The Sight and Dark River

ABUSE: Outcast, Social Alienation, the Tribe Journey.

DARK FOREST: How these factors push him towards radicalization.

For "brevity," I'm not getting into anything post-OotS. I'm just showing that Breezepelt was abused, the narrative wants you to know that he was abused, and that his status as a victim of child abuse is CENTRAL to understanding why he is training in the Dark Forest.

INTRO TO BREEZEPELT: The Sight and Dark River

Our very first introduction to Breeze is when Jaypaw walks off a cliff in the first book of Po3 and is rescued by a WindClan patrol. He's making snarky remarks, and Whitetail and Crowfeather are not happy about it. Whitetail snaps for Crow to teach his son some manners, and Crow growls for Breezepaw to be quiet.

But our proper introduction to him is at his announcement gathering, when Heatherpaw playfully introduces him as a friend,

From the offset something's not entirely right here between Breezepaw and his father. He's cut off by Heatherpaw here, but he's touchy whenever his father is involved, and we're not entirely sure why.

Throughout Book 1, he's just rude, with a notable xenophobic streak. He's a bit of a mean rival character for Lionpaw, as they're both interested in the affections of Heatherpaw and make bids to get her attention, but nothing particularly violent yet.

He participates in the beloved Kitty Olympics and gets buried in liquid dirt with Lionpaw, basically a rite of passage for any arc.

(And Nightcloud has a cute moment where she watches over them until they fall asleep)

As the books progress, the relationship between Crow and Breeze visibly deteriorates. They start from being simply tense with each other in The Sight, to the open shouting and hitting we see in Outcast.

In the very first chapter of Dark River, we learn where his behavioral issues are really coming from;

Crowfeather.

Breezepelt is getting xenophobia from his father. Occasionally he says something bigoted and his dad will agree and chime in, and those are the only positive moments they have together.

(Note: In contrast, Nightcloud explicitly pushes back against xenophobia, chiding Breezepelt for his rudeness to Lionpaw in back in The Sight, Chapter 21. The Sight is the book where a lot of "evidence" that the Evil Overbearing Woman is actually responsible for the rift between father and son but. No. She's not. Though she can be overprotective; Crow and Breeze have a bad relationship when she's not even around in Breeze's first appearance and even his Crowfeather's Trial Epiphany refutes it. Anyway this post isn't about Nightcloud.)

So he starts acting on his bigotry, accusing cats in other Clans of stealing, running really close to the border. What's interesting though, is that this is not entirely his doing. The first time we get physical trouble from Breezepaw, DUSTPELT aggressed it. Breezepaw and Harepaw were just chasing a squirrel and hadn't yet gone over the border at all.

We learn that WindClan is teaching its apprentices how to hunt in woodland, and tensions between the two Clans is starting to escalate as ThunderClan isn't entirely trusting of their intentions.

The second time, fighting breaks out over him and Harepaw actually crossing the border and catching a squirrel. WindClan is adamant that because it came from their land, it's their squirrel. So it's as if Breezepaw is modelling the aggression around him, learning how to behave from the older warriors and his father.

When he joins Heatherpaw and The Three to go find Gorsetail's kits in the tunnels, he's grouchy towards the ThunderClan cats, but very gentle with the kittens. Notably so. When Thistlekit is dangerously cold, he cuddles up next to her, and even assures Swallowkit when she's scared,

Through this entire excursion, he's the one in the comforting roles for the kittens. Breezepaw is the one who is taking time to tell the kits they'll be okay, that he'll protect them, and physically supporting them when they're weak, even when he's terrified.

And it's always contrasted to Heatherpaw who's way more 'disciplined,' as a side note. It's a detail I'm just fond of.

All this to point out,

Breezepelt displays his best qualities when he's away from the older warriors of WindClan, and he's at his worst whenever he's near Crowfeather. Even while he's essentially just a bully character for The Three to deal with. He's gruff but cooperative when it's just him and Heatherpaw interacting with The Three, but mean when there is an adult to please.

We're getting to the on-screen abuse now, but Po3 actually sets up Breezepaw's troubles and dynamics well before it's finally confirmed that he is a victim of child abuse.

ABUSE: Outcast, the Tribe Journey.

In Outcast, Breezepaw's problems have escalated into open aggression towards cats of other Clans, and is now a legitimate concern for his own safety. Yet, he's spoken over by older warriors, and reprimanded at nearly every opportunity, right in front of the warrior of another Clan.

Squilf just asked the poor kid how his training was going, and then Whitetail JUMPS to talk over him so she can complain, RIGHT in front of his face.

They can't even wait until they're alone to grumble something rude about Breezepaw, who is still just a teenager here;

They taught him already that a bit of prey that runs off their own territory still belongs to WindClan, encourage him to blow past borders in pursuit, and started a battle with ThunderClan over this. And then they're pissed off at him for being aggressive, thinking it's deserved to scold him in public.

When Onestar announces that he wants Breezepaw to go on the Tribe Journey, he's devastated by it...

Because he thinks WindClan doesn't like him, and he's right. He's gossiped about, torn into in front of a ThunderClan warrior, and even his own dad doesn't want to be around him. It's clear that Breezepaw's impulsive "codebreaking" behaviors are a desire to prove himself, and once you realize that, the way that he's being alienated is heartbreaking.

But Wait!! Hold on a minute! Where did he get a "patrol of apprentices" from to confront the dogs with, exactly?

Simple. Breezepaw CAN make friends! He actually values them a lot! So much that it's the first thing Crowfeather snaps at him over, out of frustration that his son is also being forced on this journey with him. It's an angry response to his child having emotional and physical needs, resentment that will continue all journey long.

Note that it's plural, friends. Breezepelt has multiple friends, at least one who is not Heatherpaw, and she promises to say goodbye to them.

Up next, they state over and over, Crowfeather and Breezepaw do not like each other. Crowfeather resents being around him and dealing with his rudeness, embarrassed and angry, and Breezepaw is absolutely miserable being sent on a journey to the mountains with a man who hates his guts.

The whole while, Crowfeather is brooding longingly about Feathertail, already thinking about her as soon as he kitty-kisses Nightcloud goodbye, his eyes looking somewhere distant. He makes a jab about loyalty when Breezepaw doesn't understand why they're helping the Tribe.

Breezepaw gets smacked after he's "shoved" at Purdy and acts rude to him, while the other three manage to be polite (while still having internal dialogue about how stinky he is).

Without so much as a, "cut that out," Crowfeather raises his paw and hits him. Breeze is quiet after that.

I don't give a shit how rude your teenager is being. Do not hit kids. Being throttled on the head is not okay.

In spite of the Three not liking Breezepaw, or even Crowfeather, they're constantly noting that their arguments are not normal, and that Crow is a cold, unsupportive father who digs into his kid constantly, and the only time he ever DOES "discipline" his child it's through immediately smacking him.

At one point, the apprentices get hungry, and decide to foolishly hunt in a barn that they know has dogs in it against Purdy's warnings. Once again, JUST like the first two books, Breezepaw is more friendly when Crowfeather is not around.

EVERY time he is alone with cats his own age, he's grumpy but cooperative. Even enthusiastic at times! The minute Crowfeather is in the picture, he's nasty.

Naturally, the dogs show up, but Purdy rescues them. Though Brambleclaw also chews his kids out (and i have strong opinions about bramble's parenting style for another time), Hollypaw is taken aback by the contrast of what a scolding from Brambleclaw looks like vs how Crowfeather reacts.

The narrative is desperately trying to tell you that the way Crowfeather treats his son is not normal.

And then Crowfeather is pissed off that Breezepaw is exhausted from running for his life from hungry dogs,

And he's constantly losing his shit whenever Breezepaw says something as innocuous as "dad im hungry"

Then, Breezepaw is made to watch his dad pine over the grave of a woman who died long before Crowfeather was even considering his mother for a mate. What he feels is jealousy, because he knows his own father doesn't love him anywhere near as much as he loves the memory of Feathertail.

This really goes on and on and on. The ENTIRE trip is like this, with Crowfeather treating Breezepelt poorly, giving him a smack before even verbally warning him, pushing him past his limits and blowing up on him when he asks simple questions about eating or resting.

It all comes to a head in this one exchange, towards the end. Hollypaw ends up snapping at Breezepaw for his rudeness, before having an epiphany.

It's explicit. Crowfeather's emotional abuse, his "scorn" for Breezepelt, is what is driving a wedge between him and all of his older Clanmates. Between EVERYONE in Breezepelt's life who wasn't already his friend. This awful treatment is only making him worse and worse.

Realizing this, she has more sympathy for him, but it's too late. He continues to be rude to her because he feels insulted, and her patience completely runs out. She's just a kid. They're both just kids. She's not responsible for fixing him when he's pushing everyone away at this point.

That's the end of Breezepelt in Outcast. It can't be helped anymore. Any spark of friendship they had together in the barn, or in the tunnels, is gone.

As the series progresses, Crowfeather continues to refuse any personal responsibility for the mistreatment of his son, even pinning all of Breezepelt's behavioral problems on Nightcloud. He is a cold, selfish father who only ever thinks about his own pain and reputation.

DARK FOREST: How these factors push him towards radicalization.

Everyone talks about the Attack on Poppyfrost, which happens in the first book of OotS, in oversimplified terms. YES he is going after a nun and a pregnant woman. I've never said that's not Bad.

But no one talks about "WHY", and that reason is NOT just that he desires power like so many other WC villains. Breezepelt makes his motivation very clear on the page.

Escalating to violence was about making Jayfeather feel the way that he does.

When Breezepelt says that he wants Jay to be surrounded by "lies, hatred, and things that should never have happened," he's talking about the way HE grew up, knowing his father never wanted him, and that his Clan HATES him as a result. Killing Poppyfrost is about trying to frame Jayfeather for her murder, so ThunderClan won't trust him anymore.

When Jayfeather points out the simple truth that what Breezepelt is saying doesn't make any goddamn sense, his hatred "falters." He's blaming his half-clan half-brother for his own treatment because of the reveal, but totally failed to consider that JAYFEATHER'S ALREADY GOING THROUGH IT... so his response is just this pitiful, "s-shut up, man."

Then the ghost of Brokenstar and Breezepelt bounce him back and forth between them like a beach ball for a bit until Honeyfern's spirit shows up.

Breezepelt's childhood abuse and social alienation was a hook that the Dark Forest latched onto, to reel him in. His anger at his half-brother is so obviously misplaced that its absurdity was something Jayfeather pointed out.

We soon learn that it's the Dark Forest who's planting that ridiculous idea in his head;

The narration is SCREAMING, "The Dark Forest is validating the anger he feels towards his father, and redirecting it towards The Three." He's described as 'kitlike,' Tigerstar's eyes are compared to a hypnotizing snake.

This prose could not make it more obvious if it drove to your house, beat you with it, and then spoon fed you the point while you were hospitalized.

At the end of this scene, Tigerstar sends Hawkfrost to recruit Ivypaw. This scene where Breezepelt is being lovebombed, and the command to start grooming Ivypaw, ARE LINKED. That was a choice.

A VERY GOOD choice! Again, as many issues as I have with OotS, its handling of indoctrination is unironically fantastic, and it owes a good amount of that to the outstanding setup of Breezepelt that was done back in Po3. And that setup doesn't work if Crowfeather was merely distant.

Breezepelt was abused by his father, both verbally and physically. It drove him to be more aggressive to prove himself, modeling the battle culture around him. The adults of WindClan judged him based off Crowfeather's responses, shunning and belittling the 'problem' teenager, which eventually drove Breezepelt to the only group that he felt "understood" him.

In a book series that is RIFE with abuse apologia, this is one of the few times that there's any behavioral consequences for abuse and the narrative holds the perpetrator accountable for it.

But people hear Crowfeather's deflective excuse in The Last Hope where he says he never hated him, blames Nightcloud for everything, and just lick it up uncritically.

Gee whiz, I wonder why the guy who never blames himself for any of his problems would suddenly say it was his ex-wife's fault. Real headscratcher!

(Crowfeather's Trial then goes onto, for all my own problems with it, also hold Crow accountable as the reason why Breezepelt turned out like he did. But that's a topic for another day.)

#This is headcanon territory here. But one day I realized I can read Breezy-P with BPD and he became a blorbo.#Never been able to unsee it and it massively endears him to me... Breeze Pelt Disorder...#I actually REALLY hate how his arc was resolved and strongly feel that he should have progressed into a bigger problem #But I equally strongly feel that being redeemed is the ideal ending for him #so if it was between him being pure evil/redemption death or the awful halting we got at the end of oots....#I'd pick the halting over him being pure evil or a redemption death.#I think BB made me REALLY fall in love with him. He's my sweet cheese. My good time boy.#Bones when he sees an angry black cat: ''i can fix you. first i must break you. but then i can fix you''#Like. what i dislike about where he went is that even if your anger issues came from abuse. you STILL are responsible for your actions #but in the end getting that Shitty Dad Approval fixes him. Not his own growth or self-reflection.#it feels like BREEZE gets his agency stripped away for HIS ABUSIVE DAD'S character arc #It retcons in a reason why Breezepelt is not still a problem and then he faded into the background.#while Crowfeather continues to get supporting roles and every now and then Breeze now looks at him fondly #BLECH.#Crowfeather #Breezepelt #Abuse #Child Abuse #Warrior Cats Analysis #And now you know anon!!

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prettyboykatsuki · 3 months

Text

wyll, in my opinion, gets the standard fare treatment for characters that are unequivocally good. i.e. people think he's boring and uninteresting. standard fare might be kind actually given the level of racism and unexplained slander (which is often just more thinly veiled racism). his reputation about being boring is not helped by the very blatant neglect of his storyline post his rewrite and release. as a wyll enjoyer i am hyperaware of the sorry state of his current story in all three acts

despite all of that and the glaring flaws - i still believe that wylls storyline is worth of being engaged with and explored.

one of the reasons (not the most major one, but one) i think wyll experiences so much neglect as a companion stems from a wider idea that "goodness" is always the uncomplicated, easy choice.

it's something i see a lot. wyll is boring because of his archetype as a princely and universally righteous guy. and this is interesting, because it always seems to functions under the assumption that wylls moral character is innate. that his heroic and righteous actions are in some capacity, uncomplicated.

uniquely among the male origin companions, through the course of wylls story - there is never a point in which he is at risk of making a truly 'bad' choice. both gale and astarions story have them at risk of making choices that are ultimately bad for them and others (especially tav when each character is romanced). gales godhood and astarions ascension are their in game moral failings. they are the result of having not broke the cycle and are 'bad' choices for the individual character.

wylls main choice is however his pact and the choice to break that pact. notably - wyll is never at risk of making a bad choice, only a selfish one.

from the critique i see of wyll - it seems like this is the element of him people find most egregious. he's too smooth, not rugged enough, not gritty enough. but i don't think wyll's character needs grit, necessarily.

if you take any time to dissect wyll at all, based on dialogue and character interaction, many of his choices put himself at the forefront of sacrifice. the game strips wyll of a lot of agency, but wyll also always abides by and sticks to his core belief. so often towards his own detriment.

not only does wyll bear the consequence of being turned into a devil (stripping him of the last remaining shred of identity he's ever had and one of the most important things in his life), he bore the burden of being banished when he made his pact, and was willing to do the same for the sake of his father when he is taken to moonrise.

and unlike gale (who i adore, to be clear) who's concept of self-sacrifice stems mostly from a low self-worth - the belief that dying is the best he can do - wyll truly views that it's better him than them.

wyll does not think twice about allowing himself to be the one to take the fall. he can play any part, take any role, even when these choices haunt him so obviously. wyll claims that he forgives his father, but opens up to you about fearing his feelings of missing him are one-sided. he believes that making his pact was the right choice, the one he would make again - but doesn't deny the obvious pain and solace that came along with being a wandering traveler and banished son.

wylls goodness is so deliberate. he is so staunch in upholding and acting on his beliefs that it is always narrative to his own detriment. when you view wyll like this , and view his choices with regards this character attribute, it is imo very hard to hate him.

wyll's goodness is his double edged sword. it makes him heroic, brave, fearless. and it makes him scared, uncertain and lonely. again, the story itself is bare bones and i understand that - but it is so very beautiful to me thinking of him and tav or just his general romance.

as wylls romance partner, encouraging wyll to break his pact is as tragic as it very beautiful. tav is wylls one selfish thing. one of the only reasons that would move him to not give himself up. one of the only reasons he is okay with forgoing his beliefs. he loves tav enough to break his own oaths, and make choices for himself and no one else. not as the blade, or as a ravengard - but just as wyll.

and that aspect of him is in my opinion, enforced, by the mindflayer tav ending. in which wylls monster-hunting and morals are made exceptions with / for tav. my enjoyment of hero corruption might be speaking for me, but i digress.

in every way though - i truly love wyll as a character. and while im well aware of the critical flaws in his in game story state, i think it's both unfortunate and unfair that people call him boring. to me he is anything but

#aristotle.txt #wyll ravengard #bg3 #wyll meta #bg3 wyll #wyll x tav #he is so love of my life coded #this is my experience as a deku defending and lover speaking for me i fear

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tyrantisterror · 24 days

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I think one of the things that gets lost in the big, endless internet conversation about whether or not heroes should kill their villains is the fact that killing villains off robs you of a lot of story-telling potential. The Joker died at the end of his debut story in Batman - imagine what Batman would be if he stayed dead. No Joker in Batman 66, no The Killing Joke which means no Barbara Gordon as Oracle and no The Dark Knight, no Mark Hamill Joker episodes of BTAS (so many of them were based on his comic appearances, after all - the laughing fish is a direct adaptation of a comic), which means no Harley Quinn and no Return of the Joker, on and on it goes.

Like, you can argue the morality of heroes sparing their villains till you turn blue - god knows this site does it at least a thousand times a day - but on a purely pragmatic story-telling level, the minute you kill ANY character, you kill all the story potential they had. And yeah, it's fiction, you can bring them back from the dead if you really need them, but that's a pretty hard story beat to pull off without hurting your story. You don't want to fill your tale with "Somehow, Palpatine has returned" moments.

And you can just make new villains, sure, but again you have a problem with that - a new villain has to establish themselves and has to stand out from who came before, which means you can't go directly to the storylines you could have had with a villain who stuck around AFTER their introduction. A recurring villain is capable of doing things that one-off villains can't.

youtube

I'm going to illustrate this with a character from a fandom I'm not even a part of - I never played the Ratchet and Clank series and am only vaguely aware of it, but one day I saw a supercut of scenes starring one of its recurring villains, Dr. Nefarious, on twitter, and I was like "Oh shit, that's the guy who plays Quark on Deep Space Nine, isn't? This guys a hoot, let's see if we can find more clips on youtube." Which brought me to this hefty video here from one of the more recent games in the series.

And, like, as a person who "doesn't even go here," it's obvious this goofy little fucker has a history. His opening scenes have him ranting about how much it sucks to lose repeatedly - a lampshade on the "flaw" of a recurring villain, i.e. that their threat diminishes the more they come back because, by the nature of their role in the story, it means they've suffered a lot of losses. So how cool is it that as this supercut chugs along you can clearly see this is a theme of the game - that this is a story about the virtue of losing, a story that is enriched by having an antagonist who fans of the series know has lost a LOT?

The true antagonist is an alternate version of Dr. Nefarious who's won every fight in his life so far, apparently with little effort, and I love how they differ on a design aspect. They're both technically mad scientists, but notably, Emperor Nefarious, the winner, has a more imposing and "heroic" build, but a smaller brain-dome for his robot brains. Because winning may make him look strong, but if a mad scientist's real power is their mind, well, which Nefarious is really the strong one here then?

Dr. Nefarious gets this juicy arc about realizing the virtue in his repeated failures that corresponds with the heroic characters struggling to find a way to win against a seemingly invincible opponent, as well as contrasts the true villain, Dr. Nefarious's explicit counterpart and foil Emperor Nefarious, who has never once lost and is a total piece of shit for it. Again, not my fandom, I don't go here, not an expert on Ratchet and Clank, but even as a relative stranger to it who's just watching a big supercut, I fucking love this. This is an excellent story.

And it's one you can only tell with a recurring villain. Without Dr. Nefarious, this story works significantly less. You need a villain with a history the audience has seen to really sell this.

Anyway, I made this post because, ironically enough, I saw another tweet talking about how some fans think Dr. Nefarious should have been killed off in his first appearance, and, like... that's just fucking baffling to me, as a person outside this fandom looking in. Recurring villains deserve more love, man, they give us so much.

#Youtube

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bobbile-blog · 26 days

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Okay so I've finally gotten to Jessicalter's Oprec and now feel qualified to talk about Come Catastrophes or Wakes of Vultures. holy shit. This went straight into my list of top Arknights events. Fantastic event, spoilers will be under the cut so I HIGHLY RECOMMEND reading the event first. It's really good and worth your while.

Anyway, what follows is a scattered mess of thoughts about this event and things that stuck out to me.

First off, plot stuff! I'll probably cover this when I do my next plotline recap post, but what I took away from the end is that Clip Cliff seems to want to make Blacksteel independent, or at least more self-determining than it is now. He seems to be gathering resources and assets like mobile city plates and investing in long-term infrastructure like merc training, so he definitely has a long game he's pushing for. I don't think we know enough go speculate about his goals, but we'll definitely be coming back here again. After all, Tila has an infection monitor in her art, which probably means she's going to be playable at some point in the future.

Next, having looked into this a little on my own, I was interested in some of the previous places Raythean has shown up. Specifically, the ones that stood out were the drones in the Kazimierz Major and arming Silverash's forces in Kjerag, which might be referring to the Tschäggättä. It's not just notable for their apparent level of technology, but also as a faint connecting thread between three separate capitalism plotlines. I don't know if that's going to be meaningful in the future, but I found it interesting enough that I thought I'd bring it up.

Now on to more narrative things. While I love Liskarm and Franka, I do think it was the right choice to give them less screen time in this event. They're both (for the most part) fully-realized characters who understand their own motivations and morals. This is above all else an event about Jessica learning to stand on her own as an adult, so it makes sense that they're more here to support her than they are to play their own roles in the story.

Speaking of said roles, I liked the event's commentary on cops. It pointed out an interesting distinction that I wouldn't really have ever thought of, that between mercenaries and cops. To start: cops exist to protect property, not people. The police exist to protect things and do not have an obligation to err on the side of people over things, and in fact are supposed to do the opposite. This event understands that, and that role os the core of how the bank treats the Blacksteel mercs. CV, however, raises an interesting point that mercenaries are bound by the letter of a contract and not the larger obligation to property cops are, so they can actually raise moral objections and point to their contracts, sort of a Lawful Evil/Lawful Neutral to cops' Neutral Evil. The independence of their position with respect to cops allows for more of an independent morality than you'd get in a cop story and I like that, I think it's a really smart direction to take your writing in.

On a (mostly) separate note, holy shit Arknights is really good at writing cowboy stories. Between this and chapter 9 (and I would argue An Obscure Wanderer), Arknights has repeatedly made it clear that they Do Not Fuck Around with their cowboy stories and I'm surprised I haven't heard more people talking about it. It kinda has everything:

- It takes place in a rural, working-class setting undergoing a larger imminent societal shift that can inform the larger narrative, and deals with a semi-mythologized past that is rapidly disappearing.

- It has a protagonist and an antagonist that serve as foils, both very heavily affected and defined by the (same) violence in their past that they've both had different reactions to. Our protagonist has come to terms with the violence as a tool to maintain order, while our antagonist has used it for personal gain and in some ways lost control of it.

- It's a story about community, and heavily emphasizes local and personal community over larger artificial corporate "community". That's my reading of the recurring motif of the cold btw, warmth represents the close, personal community Davistown used to have and the cold that now pervades it comes from how the bank has systematically dismantled that community.

- And, I'd argue most importantly, it understands the narrative power of a bullet. The Showdown at the end of a cowboy story is powerful because we've spent the entire runtime of our story with these characters, and they are now facing each other down with the intent to end one of their collective two stories. The entire weight of the narrative so far comes to rest on a single moment of tension. It's really hard to gather up the kind of narrative momentum you need to make that hit like it does in CV. For example, it requires a really light hand with actual action in the story, so that it really does feel like it's an even standoff between our protagonist and antagonist. On the other hand, though, you do actually have to establish the relative skill of both parties and actually sell the danger of the moment to the audience. It's really hard to toe the line between tension and actual action in a way that makes for a satisfying resolution, and CV does it extremely well.

Honestly, Arknights just seems really good at getting the vibes of American media right. This is something I noticed in DV and Lonetrail too, and I haven't really been able to put my finger on what it is about them, but the vibes are just really on-point. I want to write more about this at a later point once I actually figure out what it is that I'm feeling, but maybe it's the setting, maybe it's the cast, maybe it's the plot points, maybe it's something in between — it just seems to understand the spirit of period cowboy stories in a way that I can't describe. Good shit.

Finally, I wanna end this with where Jessica is now. The events of CV take place In between the events of Loneterail and Ideal City, so the current "now" of the story is a few months ahead. Jessica left for the frontier along with Woody, Helena, and Miles. They live together in a small new settlement, building the place from the ground up with Woody and Jessica acting as town sherrifs. At the point we're at now, rhe town is fairly well-established and Woody has temporarily left on other business, leaving Jessica the sole sherrif of their new settlement. However, she's risen to her new station, and is growing into a stronger person than she ever was before.

#arknights #come catastrophes or wakes of vultures #jessica the liberated #Arknights thoughts

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ilikekidsshows · 4 months

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The Totally Spies-ification of Adrien

Okay, it's been long enough that I can actually discuss how Adrien's slavery is depicted in the show without anger-fueled exaggerations and hyperbole. I want to discuss how Miraculous treats Adrien's slavery very flippantly and how it is, like everything in this show post-retool, all about Marinette. The show has a lot of stuff that hints that the writers intend for Adrien to be viewed a very certain way. I believe the writers made Adrien a slave for Marinette’s benefit and I will explain how I came to this conclusion.

I’ve joked before about how Astruc has worked on Totally Spies, “one of the kinkiest cartoons ever made”. I’d like to tackle this idea and how it relates to Miraculous more seriously. I’d like to tackle the topic of titillation and how it relates to how this show approaches slavery with such flippancy. My claim is that Adrien being a slave is not meant to be horrifying, which is why the story doesn't treat it as such; it's meant to be titillating.

I usually don't use Read Mores, since they can lead to broken links later, but this is really long. Strap in, folks.

Titillation for the context of this analysis means “content with the intention to excite romantically or sexually”, basically it’s about “kinky” stuff. The purpose of talking about sexuality in relation to Miraculous is not to paint the writers as some kind of fiends, but to present the fact that many teenagers are curious about romance and sex and will think about sex unprompted. This means titillating content in cartoons doesn’t even need to be related to sex to be titillating. And Astruc has a history of putting titillating stuff in his work, with Totally Spies being a very notable example of how you can include non-sexual titillating content in a kids’ show.

It all comes down to expected audience reactions. Adrien is meant to be sexy. I don’t mean that in a “the writers think this is sexy” way, but a “the writers think the projected audience of straight teenage girls will think this is sexy” way. He gets put into bondage three times in ‘Copycat’, ‘Anti-Bug’ and ‘Reverser’ and all three times the camera seems to like to show him off. He is meant to be an object of attraction for the audience. The people criticizing this show have been pointing out how Ladybug's costume accentuates her butt for years, but this is not something that occurs with just Ladybug. When he isn't posing for the viewers, Cat Noir gets whacked around by Akuma’s a lot, but a lot of the time it ends with him in a prone position that is also titillating, in ‘Pixelator’ it goes as far as having his butt jut out. However, the idea that Cat Noir is the one who gets hit when an Akuma needs to show off how dangerous they are is also part of the power dynamic where Marinette or Ladybug gets to show off, so it’s not purely for titillation, which is why other examples, like ‘Stormy Weather’ are more comedic.

It’s likely that Adrien-as-Adrien doesn’t get to participate in the show’s slapstick much, since that aspect of the character is presented as the perfect beauty, a role usually reserved for female characters who only ever get a little bit flustered or banged up to make sure they keep looking attractive. Marinette screams "waack" and runs face first into a wall in the same episode where the silliest thing Adrien gets to do is sneeze (Mr Pigeon). Adrien is meant to be attractive, sexy, titillating, in different ways in his different forms. As Cat Noir he is more active and more sexy, as Adrien he’s more passive and pretty, much like how female love interests can fall into these categories. It’s the Betty and Veronica dichotomy; in the Archie franchise Betty and Veronica are shown as the wholesome and sexy romance options and the reason the writers go out of their way not to resolve the love triangle is to keep the appeal of these both options going. People’s tastes differ, so it would alienate some audiences to pick one over the other. With Miraculous they solved the problem by having the two romance options be the different identities of a single character.

Frankly, as of the season five finale, Adrien is approaching “sexy lamp” levels of replicating sexist ways of writing a female character but just changing the gender. What else do you call him lying on the floor in despair while his love interest gets his superpowers and uses them to beat up his abusive father, while somehow being perfectly fine and happily kissing Marinette later after said father is dead and gone? Adrien’s trauma is debilitating when it serves the writers’ purposes, but stops being a problem as soon as they need him to smile and look pretty. The main reason Adrien’s trauma is so inconsistent is so that he can act as Marinette’s trophy so that Marinette has somebody to kiss in the final shot. If Adrien was despairing about not being good enough for her, or grossly crying about being an orphan, Marinette wouldn’t have a fun time kissing him. And if Marinette isn’t having fun, the members of the audience projecting onto her aren’t having fun either.

Speaking of how Adrien’s depiction relates to Marinette, here comes the controversial part of this post: while Marinette is not depicted as a literal slave owner in-story, narratively, she is very much treated as Adrien's owner from a meta perspective. We, the viewers, are meant to see Adrien as Marinette's property, and the twist of Adrien being a part of a slave race in a dynamic where Marinette holds all the cards is meant to be a good thing. We have been primed to view everything about Adrien to actually be about Marinette, because Marinette is the center of the universe of Miraculous and Adrien belongs to her because he’s the main character’s love interest. Adrien being revealed to be a slave that Marinette could control but then chooses to “merely” manipulate is meant to be glorifying to Marinette and titillating to the viewer. I will elaborate.

Marinette has been incredibly possessive of Adrien since day one and she is only occasionally depicted as being in the wrong about this, when she goes too far by the show’s standards. She stalks Lila and Adrien whenever she sees them hanging out together and she’s unreasonably jealous of Kagami. The only time she is depicted as being in the wrong is not when she's sniffing Adrien's pillow after breaking into his room, but when she actually bullies Kagami out of jealousy, and even that is depicted as more of an unfortunate misunderstanding than Marinette actively doing something wrong. Marinette is more sympathetic towards Kagami when she finds out she and Adrien aren't as close as she thought, that Kagami’s pursuit of Adrien is more hopeless than hers. Basically, Marinette is only in the wrong because Kagami isn't a threat, not because she was doing anything wrong by bullying her to defend her “territory”.

This gets flipped near the end of the season, though. When Adrien and Kagami do start dating, it's depicted as this big tragedy even more so than Master Fu losing his memories. Master Fu going missing is an afterthought, while Adrien choosing someone else over Marinette is the big “darkest hour” moment of the season three mid-finale, the cliffhanger moment of her crying in Luka’s arms while all hope is lost. Marinette isn’t directly crying about this, she is crying from “all the pressure”, but Marinette breaking down happens immediately after a scene of Kagami leaning in to kiss Adrien that has a somber dirge playing in the background. The first part of the finale has everything going wrong at the end; Master Fu is missing, Chloé gets willingly Akumatized, Marinette breaks down, and Kagami leans in to kiss Adrien. These scenes being put closely together is telling us that these are all bad things to happen.

Adrien ending up with Marinette is a given, but it's also taken for granted. Every girl with an interest in Adrien is depicted as an antagonist, while Marinette can do whatever she wants in pursuit of Adrien and will still be morally correct. Chloé and Lila, even Kagami to a degree, are villainized for their attraction to Adrien in a way Nathaniel, Luka or Zoé are not with their attraction to Marinette. Chloé and Lila are full-blown villains while Luka and Zoé are some of the most selfless members of the cast. Kagami is aggressive and socially awkward in a way that is used to justify Marinette's initial distrust and dislike of her (in ‘Ikari Gozen’ Alya voices her pity towards Marinette for having to spend time with her) while Nathaniel is just the pitiful bullied loner who’s still a liked member of the class friend group. Girls who want Adrien are bad for trespassing on Marinette’s territory and trying to “steal” something that “belongs” to Marinette.

The writers thinking Adrien belongs to Marinette is also not just subtext. Later in season five, when Marinette and Adrien finally start dating, Marinette even outright states that Adrien “kinda does a little” belong to her when she’s scared that Zoé has a crush on him. The fumbling of the line means that the writers are aware of how toxic it is to consider your partner your property, but they want to include that sentiment anyway, because that’s how they view the situation. Marinette’s boyfriend is her property and other people can’t even look at her property. ‘Emotion’ continues on this increased possessiveness by having the entire Marinette plot happen because she can’t conceive Adrien keeping things from her, because he isn’t allowed privacy from her while Marinette lying to Adrien (or Cat Noir) is a show staple.

This same attitude of Adrien not being allowed to have romantic options outside of Marinette has also been in the fandom for years. Every time a new female character was introduced, there was a worry that she’d “try to steal Adrien from Marinette”. Marinette and Adrien are endgame, the writers know this and the fandom knows this. The characters don't know this, but it doesn't matter because Adrien was already seen as Marinette's (future) boyfriend even back in season one when he barely knew her. And this attitude the writers and audience have is extended to the characters more and more as the show goes on, as almost every single character becomes an Adrinette shipper in support of Marinette in season five, while no one thinks to ask Adrien what he thinks about this. Only once, in ‘Desperada’ did Alya suggest that Adrien could make his own choice on who to date, but it was implied the choice should be Marinette specifically (Marinette smiles at this, while Kagami frowns). The cast is lucky the writers have decided Adrien already is Marinette's, or he’d be really uncomfortable.

Season five episode ‘Pretension’ goes as far with this as having Marinette basically ask Gabriel for permission to be with Adrien, convinced that she and Adrien can be together with no problems if she can just get him to approve of her. And then Gabriel tells her he’s promised Adrien to Kagami. You know, like a piece of property women were treated as before women were allowed to live without a man to control them. The finale then ultimately does have Gabriel agree to hand Adrien over to Marinette by dying and leaving her in charge of Adrien. Just because she uses the privilege to do some things for Adrien’s benefit doesn’t make what happened any less of a patriarchal transaction. In fact, the writers wrote it that way on purpose, with the knight and princess parallels they set up between Marinette and Adrien earlier in the show being something they are prominently proud of (the “reverse fairytale” as they put it). Adrien is the princess the dashing hero Marinette gets to earn with her feats of bravery; he’s handed to her like a piece of property and Marinette is too happy with her acquisition to even be outraged on Adrien’s behalf. And Adrien wasn’t even allowed to know about any of this, instead it gets handled solely between Marinette and Gabriel, like his opinion on the matter didn’t even matter. And why would his opinion matter, since he already is ready to promise himself to Marinette, even as the writers deny him the agency to actually make such a promise.

The goal of making it obvious that Adrien is cool with being objectified like this is probably why they make Adrien so obsessed with Marinette in season five, constantly repeating her name to himself and saying stuff like: “I can’t stop thinking about you” in ‘Pretension’. They need to drive it home to the audience exactly how okay Adrien is with everyone forcing him to be with Marinette. After all, you can’t force the willing. As of ‘Confrontation’, Adrien’s official goals for the future are: “I love Marinette Dupain-Cheng.” I guess, from the perspective of the writers, the childhood dream of wanting to be what his parents wanted from ‘Wishmaker’ wasn’t sad because of Adrien’s lack of agency; it was sad because he wasn’t forsaking all of his personal pursuits for Marinette specifically. As far as the writers are concerned, Adrien should only care about Marinette and nothing else.

This same entitlement is also present in Ladybug and Cat Noir's relationship. Every time Cat Noir is upset with Ladybug, like in Frozer, Glaciator, Syren, The New York Special or even Kuro Neko, they never talk about what caused it. This is especially blatant in cases where Ladybug has wronged Cat Noir personally, like Kuro Neko or the NY Special, where she never has to face up to what she did wrong because Cat Noir comes back because she “needs him”. Cat Noir will always come back to her without her having to do anything because she is the main character and she says she needs him. He exists for her and her needs. He exists for her; it’s just another way he’s hers.

Speaking of how Adrien is treated affects Marinette, even Adrien’s trauma actually belongs to her in the writing. I pointed out earlier that Adrien’s trauma shows up when the writers need to put him out of commission, but disappears as soon as he needs to be Marinette’s trophy, but it goes further than just inconsistency. The early seasons spend several episodes on how Adrien is being locked up by his father and unable to hang out with his friends and, between him and Marinette, Marinette is the one shown to be more upset and hurt by this. They don’t do this in every episode, as ‘The Bubbler’ actually does a phenomenal job of making Adrien’s upset actually about him, but the big point in ‘Glaciator’ is that Marinette is so upset that she can’t see Adrien that she accidentally leaves Cat Noir on read so he’s upset about that. Adrien is only upset because he didn’t get attention from Marinette, while Adrien’s literal abuse at the hands of his father is only important because it makes Marinette upset. Even Adrien himself gets in on this action in ‘Conformation’ when the writers go as far as having Adrien chastise himself of not being more worthy of Marinette’s love when his dad is once again busy ruining his life. Even Adrien himself makes his abuse about Marinette; him being abused is bad because it’s inconveniencing Marinette and inconveniencing Marinette makes him less worthy of her.

‘Cat Blanc’ is possibly the worst offender of all, though. This episode should be all about how Adrien is abused by Gabriel, culminating with Gabriel turning him into a monster that destroys the world. And yet, what is the episode actually about? It’s about Marinette. The worst thing that could happen to Adrien is about Marinette. Only Marinette gets to remember or even know about the possibility of Cat Noir getting Akumatized and only Marinette is traumatized by it happening. After all that the writers later dare to use this event that didn’t actually happen anymore, that Adrien doesn’t know about, to justify him giving his powers to Marinette, because he’s “scared of getting Akumatized” when something like that has never happened as far as he knows. But the writers had him reason this way anyway, because apparently the culmination of Marinette’s character development in the show means taking Adrien’s power as her own and then failing to win even with that at her disposal.

Another note about ‘The Bubbler’ that has to be pointed out is that it’s also the first example of Marinette being presented as good for Adrien simply because she treats him better than Gabriel. The final scene of Marinette giving Adrien his best birthday present yet and letting him think it comes from Gabriel is done to show how selfless Marinette is by letting Adrien keep thinking good things about his abuser. This idea that Marinette is morally good simply because she’s better than pond scum Gabriel is also present in the season five finale, where Marinette manipulates, gaslights and keeps important information from her abused slave boyfriend. Marinette is presented as being in the right because at least she didn’t literally control him with a magical geas like Gabriel did and gave him the object with which to do so (while notably not telling him what it does). Marinette will do the bare minimum of not taking literal ownership of Adrien and we’re meant to see her as a paragon of goodness for it, while she still has no respect for Adrien’s autonomy and hasn’t had any since the show started.

The way the Sentimonster “reveal” is handled shows this utter lack of respect for Adrien’s autonomy that the writers, and Marinette by extension, have. The reveal is not for Adrien, but for Marinette, just like every other piece of Adrien has been made to be about Marinette. Marinette gets to know and she gets to decide if Adrien gets to know, and she decides “no”. She will manipulate him and lie to him to keep him happy for herself, she will keep important information about him to herself that he might never find out if anything happens to her, because Adrien is hers and no one else’s and she has the right to make that decision because the world revolves around her because the world of Miraculous was created to be her playground. “Adrien” is just a toy on that playground for Marinette to play with as the writers see fit.

Now we’re coming back to Adrien’s role as the sexy, titillating love interest character that I talked about at the start of this essay. If Marinette granting Adrien the bare minimum of freedoms as a slave while manipulating him “for his own good” is meant to be a good thing, why is Adrien even a slave? Well, outside of the writers wanting to add a plot twist that doesn’t come with any messy plot they’d have to write about characters other than Marinette, Adrien being a slave is also meant to be titillating. What really is magical super slavery than very, very off the wall bondage and power play stuff? The idea that Marinette could rob her love interest of his free will with ease but won’t because she cares about him so much is very empowering in two different ways. It gives Marinette all the power in the relationship and it makes her out to be such a good person that even having ultimate power over another person won’t corrupt her. Adding to that, we have Adrien’s people pleaser abuse victim personality, which makes him fawn over the people he loves. If Marinette ever wanted to have control over Adrien, Adrien would give it to her of his own volition, no need for magical super slavery or unbreakable geases.

As I stated earlier, Marinette is meant to be the point of view main character the audience of teen girls projects themselves onto. So, really, Adrien’s slavery and abuse responses are all about that fantasy of having a cute boy you have all the power over but not needing to use it because the boy is so nice and devoted to you anyway. Adrien really is “perfect”, the perfect object of attraction, a being who technically has free will but whose free will you never have to take into account because he’s been designed and trained to value other people’s wants and needs over his own.

Marinette doesn't literally own Adrien within the story, but the writers make it very clear that they think she should. In fact, in all ways except the literal, she already does.

#ml critical #ml writing critical #miraculous ladybug critical #ml meta #ml salt #zagulous fandom #adrien agreste #just like with my 'adrien gets disrespected' post none of these things would be THAT bad by themselves #but it's this much stuff all at once

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