#it's to time to shut up and accept that character development doesn't just apply to characters you like | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

veilchenjaeger · 2 years

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I finished First Kill! I really enjoyed it, but boi, this show sure gets talked about like it's a wholesome lesbian love story when there's so much going on literally all the time. I'm not kidding. So much happens in this show. My head is reeling a little. The teen lesbians are cute too, though.

I'll write up some first impressions under the cut, but I legit don't even know where to start with this. There's so much going on.

I guess that's the first point - I do feel like the show would benefit from having like... one more episode. A ton of plot points are legitimately really interesting and the dynamics both between characters and between organisations/sides in this conflict fuck, actually. I have no idea why so many people are saying the plot is bad; the plot is fucking awesome.

What's a little off imo is the pacing. I'll definitely watch this again, if only bc I need that to understand all the characters' motivations and what sparks some actions they take. That might just be me being really fucking tired atm, but I think it would have been good for the show to let developments and new dynamics settle for a short while before introducing new changes. Cal getting the fantastic idea that Juliette would be safe at her family's house (???) is just one of a few things that didn't quite make sense, and some developments feel rather rushed - Ben accepting Juliette, for example; I get why he changes his mind, but he does go from "Playing with humans doesn't make you a human" to #1 Vampire Ally very quickly.

Speaking of rushed things - I hate that I have to say that, but the relationship between Cal and Juliette is somehow the one I'm the least invested in out of all the relationships in this show. I don't think it's bad! But the criticism that it's weak writing to have characters be so in love they'd give up everything for each other after approximately two days of knowing each other does still apply if the characters are lesbians. The way their relationship is written relies very much on "They're in love because they're In Love", with love being this grand thing that is mostly divorced from what these characters know and like about each other and how they interact in contexts that aren't explicitly romantic.

Now, they are 16 and stupid, and I like their fight in the end because it shows that they don't actually understand that much about each other, which is why I'm not too mad about all this, but they barely hang out. We don't know what they'd enjoy doing together. Juliette has somewhat serious feelings for Cal before or shortly after having talked to her for the first time, apparently? Don't get me wrong, I did like their interactions, but every other relationship in this show is so fleshed out and theirs just... isn't, it's "They're In Love" as a statement rather than a story, and I find that disappointing, especially because I think it could have been easily solved by making them catch the big feelings a bit later in the story, or just showing them interact more.

That being said, I'd be so on board with a "We had a probably ill-advised fling that ended up unbalancing systems that have been in place for millennia, and now we're broken up but shit is still hitting the fan and we actually still have feelings for each other, so that's awkward" storyline for them. Please. It could be so good.

Okay. Negative points... done, actually? The CGI is bad, but that's literally whatever. Suspend some fucking disbelief and shut up about the CGI. The writing in the first episode is awkward to the point that it's bad, but it gets better. There are a few silly and overdramatic lines, and some narrative or writing choices that don't work (How the fuck does turning someone into a vampire work in this universe?), but I don't really mind those. So!! I liked a fuckton of things about this show and I'm gonna have a hard time putting all of that that into words!

First of all, I appreciate what this show is. It's a camp vampire story that plays with and leans into tropes and aesthetics of the genre, and it seems like that's exactly what it wants to be. (I think the most productive way of criticising art is to ask, "What does this want to be and does it succeed at being that?") It is, and this must not be underestimated, a genre story about a lesbian couple that is neither focused on queer issues nor cutesy fluff. I literally needed that so badly. These stories have been popping up lately, but they're still rare afaik, and First Kill delivers on the not being cutesy front. GODS I need to see fictional lesbians kill people more often. It heals my soul.

I also think the central conflicts are so fucking interesting. It's a way more complex web of ties, alliances, and enmities than it appears to be in the first few episodes. Politics are my favourite thing in stories ever, and to have 1) the Fairmonts and their fraught relationship to the Legacy vampires as a whole, 2) the Burns family and their relationship to the Guild, which turns out to be less than ideal, 3) the mostly uninvolved humans around them who end up causing possibly the most damage (the fucking anti-monster mums. PLEASE. This is somehow so realistic) as players on this chessboard where everyone can turn against their nominal allies at any moment - that's catnip to me.

It's a story where so far, no one is truly in the right, and most people aren't truly in the wrong either, everyone has their motivations that are fully understandable, and these motivations are all explored. There's no one truly evil, so far, and that's always something I appreciate deeply.

Next point: Character dynamics. Good shit. The sibling dynamics! The at times tense but still ride-or-die dynamic between Cal and her brothers is really fun, and Juliette and Elinor!!! THAT'S a fucking great dynamic if I've ever seen one! The family constellations in general! Margot and Sebastian, good lord - I did not expect to get this invested in them, but here I am. Sure, kiss your husband right after he ate your mother. You deserve it. The friendship between Ben and Juliette is also lovely; the spooning scene they had was so sweet. Love me some platonic relationships that are portrayed as intimate and extremely important.

I also just love the characters in general. Talia and Margot especially. I can't believe we get two whole flavours of protective mother in this show and they're both hot.

Also :) Elinor :) Elinor gives me brain rot and I really hope they don't fuck up what they created with her in case they get a second season. I could write meta on her - maybe will at some point - but the bottom line is: I LOVE "evil" characters who do absolutely horrible things but care deeply about others. Elinor loves her sister and her parents so much (r.i.p. Oliver tho), and fucking hell, she didn't even kill Theo. "One Burns down, four to go" - honey, you could have killed Apollo as well right the fuck there, but you Did Not. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they let her stay a complex character in season 2 (which I'm speaking into existence) and don't make her a Purely Evil Big Bad. She didn't agree to a political marriage for this.

Also, the sheer amount of IDs she has! What has she been doing? How isn't Savannah empty?

There's a lot more to say bc there is a LOT going on, but that's what my brain latched onto for now. Anyways, the best scene remains the one where Sebastian just straight up eats his mother-in-law. Go off, king. Treat yourself.

#[talk less smile more]#/go watch first kill

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linkspooky · 3 years

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The Hands that Will Save the League

In chapter 321 we're reminded once again of the reoccurring motif of hands reaching out to save someone in need, especially with the double spread close-up of Iida's hands reaching for Deku's hands. I couldn't help but think how this could apply to the league of villains. Hand symbolism has always been associated with Shigaraki (duh), both in the fact that his hands destroy everything they touched, and also his reason for being a villain stems from the fact that not a single hand reached out to save him that day. However, we've also had another character in the league with hands drawn up close and personal reaching out to save the others: spinner.

1. Just an Empty Cosplayer

I'm not the first one to make this observation. @codenamesazanka pointed this out long before me, especially in regards to Spinner's importance to the league, but basically, Spinner's role is that despite being a teenage mutant ninja turtle he's also the everyman of the league. He's not connected to the main conflict of the story by bloodline or legacy, the way Shigaraki, Dabi, and Compress are. He's not someone with an incredibly powerful or deviant quirk like Twice or Toga. He is a victim, but he doesn't have the elaborate villain backstories of Twice, Shigaraki, Dabi, and Toga.

He literally is just some guy with a lizard quirk. He has the weakest quirk in the league and the weakest reason for why he joined the league. Spinner faces societal abuse because of his quirk, but what spurred him to action was seeing Stain appear on TV, and a desire to be a less empty person than he was before. Spinner was pushed, he was rejected by society, but I would say as an inverse to the league who are driven by extraordinary circumstances, Spinner is basically an every man who drives himself to keep up with the rest of the league despite seemingly lacking everything "special" they have.

And I believe this every man quality, and this drive Spinner has is what's going to be the key to piecing the league back together. It's because Spinner sees himself as so far behind the rest of the league, and so much less special than they are, that he's driven to try to understand them.

Not only is Spinner a member who has tried to understand every member of the league in one way or another, Spinner is also someone who similiar to Sihgaraki foils every single character in the league despite just being an everyman.

2. Spinner and Toga

While Spinner and Toga may not have the same level of development to their interactions as Twice and Toga, Spinner reaches out to her once but not twice, and there are a lot of parallels you can draw between the characters.

Both Spinner and Toga joined the league for the same reason, an empty admiration for Stain, without really caring about Stain's ideals. Toga admires Stain because he's covered in blood and fighting for something and she wants to become more like the people she admires, Spinner because he saw himself as pathetic for hiding in his room all day and when he saw Stain taking a stand trying to change the whole world on his own he wanted to become that way too. Which means both of them have a tendency to want to become more like the people they admire, because their own sense of personal identity is so weak.

Himiko and Spinner both define themselves by the way society has rejected them. Spinner has internalized the idea that he's an empty person who can't accomplish anything on his own, every terrible thing other people said about him due to his heteromorph quirk he accepted it. At the same time, Toga was somebody born with a "dangerous quirk" who was told to repress it and then did that living under a fake identity as a normal school girl that would please her parents and the people around her for as long as she could. Both Toga and Spinner are taught by the society around them to be self-loathing and to repress themselves because of their quirks. They're also characters who are both defined by a desire for release.

When Spinner asks if Toga still wants to be in the league because of Stain and she responds, Now I wanna become everyone I love. Spinner comments, "You're so free."

Spinner and Toga both claim they joined the league because of love for another person, they both loved and admired some aspect of Stain, but their real reason for joining, or at least the reason they stay is that deep down both of them desire the freedom to be themselves. Toga wrapping her desires up in language like love for other people, and wanting to become them, is because deep down she believes because of her quirk there's no one who would accept her for herself, as the normal girl she believes she is, no one will let her live as Toga thus she tries to become other people. It's the same for Spinner, who believes he can't be anything other than the Lizard Freak, so he too tries to dress himself up and become a Stain Cosplayer. It's only through the league's acceptance that Toga and Spinner slowly begin to learn that they are good enough on their own, just as themselves, and their priorities begin to shift.

3. Spinner and Twice

Twice and Spinner have several backstory parallels already. They are both characters affected by poverty, Spinner lived in a backwater town plagued by old views of heteromorph quirks, Twice lost his parents and began working to support himself at a young age before becoming homeless. Spinner and Twice were also both labeled in a way that stuck with them, after Twice got a criminal charge in an accident on his permanent record he couldn't find another job after being labeled deviant. Spinner was labeled as a deviant because of his quirk and the idea that he's a lizard freak has always stuck with him the same way that Twice has internalized the idea that "bad people don't get saved."

They also both chose to isolate themselves because of the circumstances they faced. Twice's first response to homelessness was to decide to never trust anybody but himself, and he became a criminal who pulled off heists with only clones of himself as team members until that stopped working for him. Spinner's response was also to shut himself away in his room and become a NEET. They both cut themselves off to the society that labeled them as unacceptable, but in the process they also cut themselves off from other people and became unable to trust others.

While they have major backstory parallels, I believe the greatest parallel between them is going to be that Spinner will inherit that role that Twice had for the league. While Shigaraki is the leader, Twice more than anybody else believed the League to be a family, and encouraged everyone to be friendly with one another.

It's Twice more than anyone else who emphasizes the bond of the league, that they're all strays, that they need to take care of each other and save each other. It's Twice who urges Shigaraki to save Giran because he's one of them. He makes the unspoken bond of the league as a group of miscreants into a spoken one, because Twice wants those things, he's well aware of the fact that he wants trust and acceptance and came to the league to find those things. This is the greatest thing that ties Spinner and Twice's characters together, because they both view themselves as worthless, they define themselves by how they help the other members of the league.

Twice's death so far isn't something that has been really capitalized on by the plot, Hawks has yet to face consequences, we haven't gotten to see much of the league's reaction because they were scattered soon afterwards. However, if Twice's death is going to cause development eventually I believe it will be in the vacuum in the league created now that Twice is gone. There is no longer someone who is urging all of them to be together. Twice's death causes most of the league to become less stable. Toga goes on a killing spree, Dabi attacks Hawks, Compress tries to kill himself in a heroic sacrifice, Shigaraki hasn't gotten the chance to react yet but he's also gotten worse considering he's currently possessed. You could even say that Twice's death has caused other characters to double down on their worst habits.

Dabi's worst habit is that he acts separately from the league and refuses to participate in the group dynamic, believing himself to be a solo avenger. Dabi not trusting or telling the league what he was planning on doing with Hawks, as a consequence of his decision to play solo avenger, caused Twice to trust Hawks which led to his death. Hawks was the one who killed him but Dabi played a part, and when Twice dies Dabi obviously reacts to it, but also his decision is to double down on his bad habit, insisting he's only using the league and he doesn't care about the rest of the group. Toga also doubles down on her bad habit, she runs away from the rest of the league and insists she's only doing this for the freedom to do whatever she pleases, not because you know Twice got killed right in front of her. Compress's arc is less pronounced, but he also does, in fact, try to kill himself in a grand heroic sacrifice for the rest of the league.

When twice dies the league begins to fall apart and everyone acts on their individual worst flaws, ignoring that they were always stronger together as a group. However, there is still one person who wanted the exact same thing Twice did, to be trusted, to belong to a group. This is most likely the role that Spinner is going to grow to, someone who is trusted by everyone in the group.

Notably, when Toga is about to run away it's Spinner who reminds her that the league is a place for them to come back to. Toga who was probably the closest to Twice and spiraling the worst because of his death, and Toga and Twice's friendship was the first time we really saw how much of a "bond" the league had formed with one another, because in the camp arc they barely cooperated, only begrudgingly. It's Spinner who who emphasizes that even though everyone in the league is doing this for individualism "doing what they want" that they are also together as a group. Spinner is set to inherit Twice's role as the heart, because one he tries to understand other people in the league making the effort to reach out, and two Spinner is aware of what he wants just like Twice he wants to be trusted by the rest of the group.

4. Spinner and Dabi

This one is a little bit harder because Dabi's character arc really hasn't started yet. We have just now gotten to the reveal of who he is and what his motivations are, after it being a mystery for so long. However unlike the rest of the league, we haven't really seen how Dabi has reacted and changed by becoming a part of the group. Even if his motivation isn't "I'm only using them" and deep down he really does care, I don't think he's even realized yet that he does care or that he's not just using them. Dabi still believes himself to be alone, and therefore he's still isolated from the rest of the league and flying his revenge quest solo even though he's really not.

In that case, the biggest parallel between Spinner and Dabi is that they both had to be won over by the league. They both joined because of admiration for Stain, probably because Dabi genuinely believed in Stain's ideals of taking down impure heroes because it fit his own agenda so well, whereas Spinner is a self-proclaimed empty cosplayer.

Spinner, however, has already gone through an arc where he was dissatisfied with his reasons for joining the league and didn't believe he belonged with the rest of the group. He didn't have anything to love like Toga. He didn't know yet he wanted friends he could trust like Twice already did. He doesn't have a strong backstory motivation like Compress, or Dabi or even knows what he wants out of society. However, the entirety of MVA is Spinner letting himself be changed because of his interaction with the group.

Spinner failed at life, his quirk is worthless and only good for sticking to walls. He also internalized the idea that he himself was a failure, and locked himself inside believing he couldn't accomplish anything on his own. Spinner says he has nothing he loves, and nothing he wants to do. Not only that he feels unloved and unwanted. However, Spinner finds something to love in Shigaraki, even if he can't find a strong sense of individualism and still believes himself to be worthless he becomes motivated to help others. Spinner, the most normal person in the group with the most worthless quirk, becomes the greatest help to Shigaraki, basically once he gets over himself and his preconceived notions of himself. Because, you don't actually have to be a special person or have a strong quirk to be a hero, you have to reach out a hand.

The same way Spinner was won over by the League, Dabi has yet to be won over. However, if that does happen, it's probably going to look like Spinner's arc. Dabi antagonizes Spinner a lot, but they actually have more in common than they do differences. They both have failure quirks, while Dabi has an overwhelming fire quirk he wasn't allowed to use, Spinner is literally just a gecko. They both also were labeled as disappointments and given up on, Enji gave up on Touya, Spinner never had any potential from the start and locked himself away in his room. However, their paths so far have been opposites, Spinner let Shigaraki reach him and became a part of the group, Dabi at every possible opportunity insists he's doing this all alone. He takes every chance he can to separate himself from others. If Dabi's arc is going to be a mirror to Shoto's arc eventually, then someone has to reach him and convince him he can't do this all on his own, and Dabi can only truly find himself when he's part of the group once more. After all, so far Dabi is the one most resistant to change. Toga's goal has changed, Shigaraki's changed, Spinner has changed, even Compress now admits that while they're just a gang of thieves that he cares more about everyone else's dreams than his own. Dabi is still nursing a ten-year grudge against Endeavor and doing everything he can to take him down on his own because he hasn't let the group in. And he won't improve or change until he does let others in.

5. Spinner and Shigaraki

I love Compress but I'm skipping over him because his arc hasn't been elaborated on yet. If you want a quick summary though, both Spinner and Compress didn't believe the group to be anything more than a gathering of selfish criminals, however, both of them changed because they wanted to see Shigaraki's dream come true. Not only was Shigaraki the one who inspired both of them to change, but also Compress is the one who first sees how close Spinner is to Shigaraki more than anyone else in the group was.

He also sacrifices himself BECAUSE he's come to realize that what he wants more than his own dreams is to see everyone else's dreams come true. I know Compress's backstory is rushed as all hell, but it almost... almost... works because Compress isn't actually doing this because he's Oji Harima's grandson. His motivation changed a long time ago, he just didn't realize it until he was about to lose the league.

There are a few more parallels, they're both dropouts. It's implied that Compress was literally just a retired and failed stage magician before he decided to become a villain. Hopefully we'll become more on that later because the idea of Compress sucking in showbiz so he decided to follow his grandfather's legacy is really awesome. Spinner was a Neet before he saw Stain on television. They also both have more minor quirks, Compress just shrinks people, Spinner sticks to things. They both also are characters who don't seem important at first, but consistently hover around in the background constantly making sure everyone in the group is okay. Compress calls to check up on people, he talks to Dabi a lot, he tries to keep up with everybody in a melee, it's the little things he does that make Compress same for Spinner. They're both cosplaying as legendary villains who are greater than they are, Stein is cosplaying his grandfather, Spinner is cosplaying Stain, but it's unknown whether Compress really cares that much about his grandfather's ideals, I think he cares about the league more. Compress and Spinner are also people who question and try to understand things, Compress lectures the kids that they had their ideals handed down to them for adult, Compress realizes Spinner's importance to Shigaraki before Spinner even did, Compress and Spinner also both try to understand other people's dreams because they're lacking in their own. Spinner doesn't even have a dream, but he's the one who listened to Shigaraki's dream first.

Now it's been directly said by canon that Spinner and Shigaraki's connection is the most developed, and they are the closest to one another. By developed I mean, it changed over time, when it started out they had almost nothing to do with one another. Spinner was just a rank and file league member that Shigaraki used on the hideout raid. They didn't even get a character introduction scene like Shigarki did with Dabi and Toga.

However, Spinner and Shigaraki's characters are extremely closely tied together. Shigaraki's like the main character of the league, his backstories parallel everyone else's, including the main character of the entire story Deku. He's the one who makes the plans, goes through training arcs, he's the one who the league unites around. However, Spinner actually has all of that too. I just spent a very long time showing how Spinner despite not having an overly complicated backstory has strong parallels to everyone in the league. If Shigaraki is the main character, then Spinner is the everyman / the perspective character, hence why he's the narrator of MVA. Shigaraki is a person of extraordinary circumstance, the symbol of society's oppression who everyone in the league deepy relates to because he's suffered the same way that they have and he accepts them. Whereas, Spinner has suffered because of Hero Society too, he's more like a normal guy who makes an effort to understand everyone around him.

However, Deku wasn't saved by his love interest, or even his childhood friend who is apparently his destined rival, he was saved by Iida trying his best to keep up with him.

Spinner and Shigaraki are both the emotional core of the league in different ways. The league all respects Shigaraki, they rally around his ideas, his dreams are what inspire everybody. However, more and more it's looking like Spinner, ordinary, average, Spinner is working to build emotional connections to everyone in a much more normal way. He talks to Toga and tries to understand her love. He even consoles Toga when twice is gone. He challenges Shigaraki directly to his face. Compress who is always sort of watching the league in the background and checking up on them in little ways notices how hard that Spinner is trying to take care of Shigaraki.

Shigaraki accepts people at their worst and gives them a place to belong, but I think by Spinner's efforts to get to know and understand others, we as an audience are shown how humanizing of a presence that Spinner is on everyone else. Spinner, just being a normal guy, brings out the fact that the rest of the league despite their extraordinary circumstances are deep down just normal people to, who want to be loved normally, and live normally. Spinner literally wakes up Shigaraki, because he remembered the one time that he opened up in front of all of them, and cares enough to try to understand Shigaraki's hurt feelings and what he cares about.

If anything from the last arc in the manga, we're shown at great length, how understanding, reaching out, it all takes effort and it's not as flashy as defeating a villain or rescuing someone from a natural disaster.

Spinner is so important to Shigaraki, because while Shigaraki has given everyone in the group a place where they can be individuals, Shigaraki hasn't realized he himself can be an individual yet. He ultimately, shares the same character flaw as Deku. It's because he's decided that he's going to carry out his dreams for the sake of the league and to create a better future for them, that Shigaraki no longer cares what happens to himself, or about his own future. Everyone talks about Dabi's suicidal nature, but this is something that Shigaraki is challenged on over and over again. What are your motivations. What are your reasons. What do you want to accomplish. He always responds with nothing. There's nothing that he wants, there's nothing worth living for, he only wants to destroy and make a better world for the people who are around him. Shigaraki is the most thoroughly dehumanized character, to the point where he just straight up accepts "god of destruction" because that is at least an identity. Shigaraki needs Spinner and his normalizing influence, because Shigaraki can't see himself as a normal person.

Shigaraki shares the same character flaw as Deku, he does everything for the sake of others, with no regard to himself, which leads to extreme bouts of self-harming and fighting alone. Shigaraki faced off against Endeavor, and basically all the heroes alone even though he did call for backup. However, even before that Shigaraki made the decision to get dangerous risky surgery that would be like hell, because he believed deep down he wasn't good enough alone. Shigaraki just does not care about himself and is unable to see himself as an individual, which is exactly why he needs someone to care for him and see him that way.

Shigaraki's greatest challenge to date is that he's been dehumanized so thoroughly, and lost sight of himself to the point where he's lost even his own body autonomy. When Shigaraki is battling for possession of his body as AFO attempts to take total control and make him into a symbol again, denying him his personhood, we're set up directly with Spinner being the one who reminds us that Shigaraki is just a person, who likes video games, and gets along with his friends. It's Spinner who notices right away that AFO is different from Shigaraki and challenges him the same way that he challenged Shigaraki directly in the My VIllain Academia arc. This is all set up most likely, for Spinner being the one to reach out a hand the same way IIDA did, because what Shigaraki needs the most right now, is not a hero who will save him, but rather a normal person who will understand him and remind him that deep down he was just a normal kid too before all of this happened. What Shigaraki is most in need of is a hand that will reach out to him, and Spinner has already done this once putting Nana's hand back on his face when he couldn't wake up, but what he's failed to realize is that it's his own scaly lizard hands that should be doing the reaching out.

#mha meta #lov meta #league of villains #league of villains meta #spinner #shigaraki #toga himiko #higuchi iguchi #shigaraki tomura #dabi #touya todoroki #twice #jin bubaigawara #compress

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thyandrawrites · 2 years

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The ramp-up at the end of the chapter somehow feels.....pretty inconsistent to me? We know Dabi is not planning to live through this, but the point during the last war seemed to be to make Endvr watch the destruction he causes. Even a little before this he says "the tension has dropped" now that Endvr is no longer here. So why is he burning himself out to take out Shouto now?

Mmh, I'll admit that I have very mixed feelings about it.

On the one hand, rather than seeing it as inconsistent, I thought it was rather abrupt and unexpected. It struck me as out of place as what happened two chapters ago, with Toga reverting to her deviant hedonist self who cannot properly connect to others, sort of eating up her character development. It is indeed strange that Dabi is giving up all caution to go out in a final blaze of glory, but it's not as strange when you see that as character regression. Linkspooky recently broke down this concept really well in this meta here. Basically, what's happening right now is that the villains are not progressing towards the eventual resolution of their character arcs, but rather regressing as a result of the heroes' failure to connect with them. The heroes' job here is supposed to be that of exercising empathy and seeing that what made them villains is not some inherent evil lurking inside them, but rather the sum of bad circustances + systemic rejection and scapegoating of those who don't fit in the norms their society is based on. Yet, ever since this arc started, the kids haven't yet reached that point, and are instead parroting the type of language that reinforces the League's oppression, however unconsciously.

So for example when Deku tells Toga that he can't understand emulation as a feasible form of love, he's just unconsciously echoeing the abuse she went through — indirectly calling her a deviant for how she expresses her emotions, just like her parents and society. And when he tells her that he cannot accept how she hurts others for her own sake, without realizing that heroes do the exact same thing to villains, he's just reinforcing the idea that villains aren't people, not in the eyes of heroes. He's saying that only heroes can live freely without consequences for their own violence, just like how Hawks got away with murdering her friend Jin. But the same doesn't apply to her, or to people like her.

Deku condemning Toga's lifestyle but in the same beat seeing nothing wrong with hero society is what prompts her shutting off, and her decision to just fight the two people she previously loved, putting everything behind her. Seeking violence for violence's sake as a result of the umpteenth rejection from society.

I think that something similar is happening with Dabi.

All his life, Touya has been met times and times again with the reminder that he's a failure, that he's not good enough, and that his father will never acknowledge him as worthy of his time. Let's remember that what happened during the war arc was the culmination of a plan that spanned over eight years.

All this time, Touya has been plotting a way to finally get to meet with his father on equal grounds. Becoming a villain was instrumental to that, and so was pushing his body past its limits. Anything to reach a point where his strength would no longer be overlooked or ignored.

Yet, just like how Toga anticipated her meeting with Izuku as the moment she would get a better answer than the one she got from Ochako, and then had her hopes shattered with continued rejection, the same happened to Touya. He put all his money on this fight, believing that he'd finally done enough during the war for his father to consider him a legit threat. Much like when he was a kid, he didn't let himself be dissuaded by Endvr's continued avoidance, but instead fully convinced himself that Enji would show up the next time.

Yet, even after literally returning from the grave... Even after trashing his father's reputation on national tv, after burning his treasured heir alive in front of his eyes, even after the whole hero world is once again gathered here to wipe out the League, his father is still stubbornly elsewhere.

In this light, I don't read his going full out and destroying his body as particularly extreme; in fact, I'd say it's almost linear. Dabi has a pattern of self-harming with increased intensity the more he feels rejected from his father, and being ignored even after pulling off an overarching revenge plot that spanned eight years of his life... I think that would push anyone over the edge. Especially since the idea of "strength" is so ingrained into Dabi's worldview. He spent all this time pushing himself, training his quirk for their final confrontation despite the fact that his body is now even less capable of sustaining it, all because — again, I'm stressing this — he wanted to be as strong as his father and couldn't meet him while he was weak.

To Dabi, being as strong as or even stronger than Shouto was always the key to earning his father's respect back. And in fact, he trained himself to a point where his fire output is hotter than Shouto's,

So by all means, between his quirk prowess and the chaos he wrecked in hero society post war, this time he's not particularly wrong about how Enji should've given him his undivided attention. It's not that Dabi particularly expected Enji to become fatherly all of a sudden and care about facing his son. Dabi was counting on them meeting again as hero and villain. Remember that Enji is a hero obssesed with villain takedowns. He neglected his family for years because his job was more important than them, and Dabi meant to exploit this for his own gain. If he couldn't get his father to look at him by being a good fit for an heir, and if Enji used his job as an excuse to keep avoiding him, Dabi would become such a threat to the status quo that he would give his father no choice but to meet him on the other side of a battlefield. Then he would destroy his career and everything he loved. As a terrorist, he couldn't be overlooked anymore.

Or so he thought.

But the moment the portals close, one thing becomes very obvious. Enji isn't there. Not only that, but there's not even any high ranking heroes on the team assigned to take Dabi down. Just an high schooler (whose flames burn less hot than his), and a bunch of his father's sidekicks.

Now, of course we readers know that there was some amount of planning dedicated to the heroes' formation. Those who are facing Dabi are supposed to be the ones who can handle his flames the best and who aren't needed on AFO's side of the battle. But what Dabi sees is just that Enji didn't acknowledge his strength once again. Not only did he not bother showing up in person, but he also once again considered Dabi second-best to someone else, this time a (stronger) villain, AFO, who got all his undivided attention. Once again, all Dabi hears his father say is "failure, failure, failure. You are so weak, even my sidekicks can deal with you on their own. I don't need to be there."

And that's what prompts the "excessiveness" of those last pages. I think it's meant to read as an excalation, as a worsening for the heroes' odds to succeed.

In Toga's case, her character regression appears less self-destructive at face value because it doesn't involve graphic injuries, but both are shut-downs and thus indicate a negative development.

Now, I'm not particularly worried about Dabi not surviving this fight (or the manga), as I mentioned over and over in the past months. But the reason why I opened this reply stating I have mixed feelings about this is that I'm not thrilled with how things are going so far. I don't really subscribe to the time travel theory (yet?), so the breakneck pace at which any attempt at a conversation between the two sides is going to shit is not very promising. Despite this, I still think an understanding will be reached, because Horikoshi set it up, and Horikoshi doesn't do unexpected plot twists that you don't see coming from a mile away. So there's no way he's put as much narrative focus on the themes of connecting and empathizing only to then go back on all that work to kill them for shock value. But the fact that the heroes so far are doing everything wrong does make me question just how does Horikoshi plan to fix this

I'm willing to give him a chance on it, though. So far, the best writing in bnha always has always been tied to the League one way or another; judging from the great lenghts of sympathy and the spectrum of human emotion he shows us through the villains, I don't think he's about to throw them to the wolves. Not after he so clearly got attached to them too. I will believe that he knows what he's doing and this is happening for a reason

#Ali replies #Meta:dabi #Meta:toga #Bnha spoilers #Bnha 350 #Bnha 349 #My post #Maybe I'm a fool but I'd rather be hopeful than miserable at things that have yet to happen

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spicycreativity · 3 years

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Fanfic Appreciation Week Day 7: A Place Where I Can Breathe

Yes, folks, I'm appreciating my own darn fanfic for the final day of Fanfic Appreciation Week because I worked really hard on it and it was a labor of love for/with one of my QPPs, my roommate, the man who got me into Sanders Sides: @\cadeorade-powercade (That's him in the aesthetic board)

Allow me to present the director's commentary for A Place Where I Can Breathe:

Content Warnings: All content warnings mentioned in the fic apply.

Chapter 1: I actually wrote this fairly late in the game. It's meant to serve as a prologue and orient the viewer in the universe, s opposed to staring on Chapter 2, which just throws the viewer in without context. I think it was a good choice, as it also allowed me to introduce the concept of the Sides having power focuses early on.

The Premise: Cade is a Virgil stan and he was getting frustrated looking for Virgil fic. He was finding a lot of stuff written without nuance by young authors, a sort of "by teenagers for teenagers" type deal. We are not teenagers, so we both have a hard time relating to that kind of teen angst fic, as we're not the target audience. So he asked me to write him a Virgil fic and we worked together to identify what plot he wanted, what the Mindscape looked like, and what quirks the Sides have. So a lot of this fic is quite gratuitous and self-indulgent

The Title: Lizzie McAlpine has a song called "Apple Pie" which includes the lyric "I've been running around trying to find a place where I can breathe." Apple Pie SCREAMS Moceit to me, and I had taken notice of the lyric and wanted to use it as the title for a Moceit fic. I didn't really have an idea beyond that, and when Cade asked me to write this fic, I realized it was actually perfect and summed up Virgil's inner struggle quite nicely. So cheers to "A Place Where I Can Breathe," the Moceit Fic That Wasn't

-Cade asked me specifically to include Virgil having a spider and I wrote nearly the whole fic without doing so, then had to go back and sprinkle some references in. I think I managed 2 total.

Chapter 2:

"Uh, how about I hold off on that until I actually see my room?" Virgil stared expectantly at Roman, who bounced on his toes. "Lead on, Macduff."

"That's not the line and you know it," Roman complained, but he turned to lead Virgil to his room. "It's ' lay on, Macduff,' and--"

-This fic was originally supposed to reach a climax with a confrontation between Remus and Roman, and "lay on, Macduff" would come back as a brick joke. Unfortunately, the original ending was a result of me getting tired and lazy, so I had to go back and fix it, and we lost the Roman-Remus confrontation.

It was hard for Virgil to not shudder at the sudden heat and weight on him. With his senses already open and taking in more information than his brain seemed to want to process, touch was an added stressor, more unwanted sensory input.

-Virgil being touch-averse is a direct shoutout to Cade, who is also touch-averse.

Roman had already transformed the living room: metallic streamers of purple and black stretched across the corners of the ceiling, and shiny balloons spelling out A-N-X-E-I-T-Y hovered above the TV.

-Upon first writing, Virgil had already given the upstairs crew his name, so the banner spelled out "VIRIGL" which is way funnier than "ANXEITY." But then his name reveal became a plot point so I had to go back and change it.

-Let! Virgil! Be! Mean!

-Virgil's line about hearing refrigerator noise when Roman talks is another shout-out to Cade, who has leveled that accusation at me

A small, cruel part of him protested at the idea that he would need special treatment and desperately wanted to throw it back in Patton's face. He wasn't a sweetheart, he wasn't a baby. He didn't need to crawl into a blanket fort with Dad just because he was a little stressed.

-Remus calls Janus "Janus Geminus" because I was tired and couldn't come up with a pun. "Geminus" is one of the Roman god Janus' epithets; another is "Pater" meaning "Father." That led to a conversation about Remus deliberately confusing Patton by calling Janus "Daddy," but I couldn't think of a clean way to fit the explanation into the narrative, so I stuck with "Geminus."

Chapter 3:

"There's nothing normal about that! " Roman stared in horror at the coffee massacre Virgil had orchestrated. What had once been a respectable (if not very tasty) cup of black coffee was now part of a 1:1 coffee to milk suspension, the liquid a tasteful shade of tan suitable for business casual trousers or a show-ready chihuahua.

-Cade is a certified Nightmare Man and came up with Virgil's horrifying coffee order after I asked him about it. Keep an eye out for Janus' equally horrifying coffee order later in the fic.

1) Shouts out the fact that Janus is canonically a Dostoevsky fan

Chapter 4:

Janus smiled at him. "Where reason fails, the Devil helps." He fussed with his gloves and straightened his capelet. "It's showtime."

-I fucking love Crime and Punishment. Look at me. Look at me. I fucking love Crime and Punishment. Janus' quoting Raskolnikov serves multiple purposes:

2) Lampshades the fact that Roman just conveniently happened to be alone in the living room, because I didn't want to waste time getting him there. That makes me, the author, the Devil

3) Foreshadows the impending disaster. When Raskolnikov says this line it is because he had planned to commit axe murder. The axe he was planning to steal had been moved, but he finds another, different axe to use. Raskolnikov messes up the murder and ends up killing an innocent witness in addition to his intended target. Janus messes up his manipulation attempt and ends up murdering Roman's self esteem

-I was going to include a reference to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (Remus' line "debauchery and vomit" was originally going to be "blood, love, and rhetoric") but I didn't because... Uh... Hm. Why didn't I do that. Maybe I just forgot about it???

-Roman is too stubborn to manipulate for long and that is a fact.

"I was pretty much done anyway," Remus said. "There's only so much debauchery and vomit you can fit into one story."

-Cade specifically ask me that nobody cry in this fic, but after I had Janus eviscerate Roman I knew he couldn't not cry a little. I kept it to a minimum because there's already a billion fucking fics about [literally any Side] crying on the shoulder of [literally any other Side] and it's really just not interesting to either of us.

-It didn't come up because it doesn't matter, but Thomas dreamed he was participating in the exact Dionysian orgy that took place in The Secret History because it's my fic and I said so.

Chapter 5:

He just sat back and watched and tugged at his hair while Janus spooned mound after mound of crisp white sugar into his mug and Virgil poured his customary eight fluid ounces of milk into his own mug.

-Cade strikes again. Virgil's coffee order is equal amounts milk to coffee; Janus' is equal parts sugar to coffee. He had asked me to include a scene where Roman catches Janus massacring his coffee and is appropriately horrified, but I uhh... Didn't write it. I still might include it as an omake someday.

-I imagine that Roman feels really strongly about dragons vs wyverns, and Remus just pretends to give a shit because he thinks it's funny to wind Roman up. Fortunately for me but unfortunately for my sense of realism in writing, I can't relate because I adore my sister and we get along perfectly almost 100% of the time.

"You shut us down every chance you get!" Remus said, baring his teeth. "How would you like it if your pens never wrote, hm? What would you do with all those thoughts in your head?"

-I do wish I had developed the concept of power focuses a bit more, established rules and such. Basically, Patton is always on the prowl for wrongthink and actively represses it, which in turn breaks or sabotages the Dark Sides' power focus.

Chapter 6: This chapter really should have been Janus and Roman but I was really tired and didn't want to bother with it. Plus, you know, Moceit. This chapter was meant to demonstrate how the characters would get along without Virgil nannying them. There's friction, but everyone is making a conscious, deliberate effort to get along because they love Virgil, and love is a series of choices you make.

I chose "Leo" as the answer for the answer to the crossword clue instead of "Virgo," because my other QPP is a Leo. She'll never read this fic, but I did it anyway because I love her. (Trivia: My sign is Virgo, so it was really a choice between shouting her out and shouting me out, and the last chapter is self-indulgent enough, thank you).

Chapter 7: I was gonna write a fic where all the Sides watched Cats the Musical because I was going through a phase. Then Cade requested this so I combined the two ideas. By this point I was fucking exhausted, and that's the only thing that saved you and the rest of the world from me writing the Sides riffing on the movie scene-by-scene. I could come up with snarky commentary for almost every, if not every single song from the movie.

Most notably, I cut a Patton-Remus interaction where Remus declares his love for Grizabella and Patton gets all staryy-eyed about Remus connecting with the idea of rising above rejection and being loved and accepted only for Remus to shoot him down and explain that he just likes that she got to die in a tire fire.

Other cut scenes include Janus quietly pretending not to go feral over Mister Mistoffelees, Patton full-on fucking sobbing over Grizabella and the kittens, and Logan experiencing a deep, soulful kinship with Munkustrap during Of The Awefull Battle of the Pekes and the Pollices (and henceforth introducing the phrase "like herding cats" into his regular vocabulary

#spicypost #fanfic appreciation week

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marimopeace · 5 years

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You say that Shigure's love of Akito from that dream wasn't unfounded and out of nowhere but if that's the case why was he the only one to be affected by it in that way compared to the other boys? Even in chapter 111 he wishes he could have dreamed of Tohru, implying that that dream could've been about anyone and he would have fallen for them? I don't know, it doesn't really seem like he loves Akito for herself you know?

hi anon and thanks for the ask!

(idk if you happen to be the same anon who originally asked for my take on shigure but since you mentioned the manga i’ll assume you’re ok with spoilers!)

um so my attention span is terrible so i’m just going to break down your ask really fast, i see one direct question and two points.

1. why was shigure the only one to fall in love with akito compared to hatori and ayame?

2. the counterpoint that shigure said he wished he could have dreamed of tohru instead

3. the main point which is that shigure doesn’t seem to truly love akito

so as for the dream...

it wasn’t the dream itself that made shigure fall in love with akito. the dream itself was a sign that the emperor had reincarnated once more in the form of akito in her mother’s womb and at the time, the older sohmas (shigure, hatori, and ayame), were the only ones around to respond to the call. the dream they had reinforced their zodiac spirit’s promised loyalty to her and inspired the bond that originally existed between the animals and the emperor (or god, i’m just used to thinking of it as “emperor” since that’s the original mythology). this resonated with the young boys, and overwhelmed them to the point where they all cried (and we know that the same rush of emotions applies to all other sohmas upon seeing the emperor for the first time).

shigure described those feelings as a sort of sweet affection. now we’ve all felt that sort of way at some point haven’t we? maybe not as poetically as shigure put it, but that sort of soothing fulfillment when you’re with someone you care about, whether that’s a friend who makes you endlessly laugh or someone you trust whenever you need to vent. the translation of this feeling differs depending on the individual and their circumstances.

that applies to how the dream affected the mabudachi trio too.

this trio of kids (they were like 6 years old?) all got hit with the same dose of longing and adoration, but it resounded with them differently. hatori and ayame saw that affection to be familial, and took on brotherly roles as akito grew up. adult hatori probably felt even stronger brotherly affection since he was the one to look after akito’s health and mental well-being in her older years alongside shigure--remember how he never really lashed out at akito for what happened with kana? it reminds me kind of the dynamic between a spoiled younger sibling and a weary older brother who doesn’t want to cause trouble, but i digress (i tend to tangent a lot, sorry!)

that’s just how the dream affected those two though, as we see in the series that different sohmas have different views of akito.

so for little shigure, he also thought those emotions were something beautiful, and as time passed, he felt something more, beyond the attachment that hatori and ayame felt. he ended up falling in love with akito, hard and true, and this went on for years--to the point where his oldest friends figured that he would do whatever he could to see his end goal happen (make akito his).

and as for why the dream couldn’t have been about anyone...

i think the first part of the answer addresses this a bit too, but it wasn’t the dream that caused him to fall in love with akito. sorry if my other furuba ask didn’t make that clear--the dream was the catalyst for their relationship in general (as zodiac and emperor), but the emotions inspired from the dream are what motivated a young shigure to make akito “his”.

also i could be so off on this since i read the manga a while ago but i vaguely remember the chapter you mentioned and i interpreted shigure’s meaning differently? i thought him wishing that it was tohru he dreamed of instead was him saying “i wish it could have been a person like you” rather than tohru explicitly. that is, that he wishes he could have fallen for. i don’t think he literally meant “dreamed about”, but that someone like her had been in his dream in the first place. i think that in that moment shigure was taking a step back from his obsession and he was seeing his unpleasant dynamic for what it was and he was having a “hmmm what if i had fallen in love with a person who was kind and giving and could fill the hole in my warped heart because i’m the kind of person who needs that” moment. (notice i didn’t use the words unhealthy or toxic which are my go-to for the akito/shigure relationship--shigure has probably definitely realized over the years that his pattern of hate and manipulation with akito isn’t great but i highly doubt he would ever admit that they would be that bad for each other bc the man is obsessed)

tl;dr: rather than that scene implying that shigure could have dreamed about whoever and he would have fallen head-over-heels like he did with akito, i think the meaning of that interaction was to show a small hint of regret over where his life turned. it was a human moment for him, for the scheming manipulative dog to step back and ponder “what if”. it was also a way to show how tohru was changing the sohma’s views on themselves. shigure has always been accepting of the gritty road ahead, believing that a trash person like him (not my opinion i’m just saying he doesn’t think he’s good either) deserves a stained fate since he’s willing to do whatever underhanded thing to get what he wants. tohru’s kindness makes him wonder what it would be like to have someone as wholesome as that to soothe the darker parts of him.

i feel like i addressed your second point throughout this response but i fully understand where you were coming from.

ultimately shigure does love akito fully, all her faults and flaws aside.

that DEFINITELY doesn’t mean this love is perfect though.

// more thoughts under the fold but since i addressed all your immediate questions + if you want to be free from my godforsaken rambling then feel free to scroll past this post lol //

shigure’s love isn’t unfound. we the readers were given a clear backstory on what initially inspired his feelings and we are shown the extent of his love throughout the series as he embarks on his quest to destroy the curse in order to obtain akito.

your point that shigure doesn’t seem to love akito for herself is totally valid in my opinion and i agree because the way their relationship is portrayed in the manga makes it hard to see what he loves about akito other than her, if that makes sense.

we’re continually reminded that shigure loves akito an incredible amount. an obsessive amount. a toxic, overwhelming, and suffocating amount.

and good lord other than shigure saying that he loves akito (which he did say several times) i cannot name a logical reason for his love. and yes love isn’t logical but i’m referring to concrete points about her that make him want to smother her in his devotion so much. this is one of the things that i didn’t like about the manga in retrospect once i let the plot sit with me for a bit. i disagree with some opinions that shigure and akito were a forced couple because i feel like their story have a lot of potential (i have a huge soft spot for redemption character arcs) but their love just felt so flawed and twisted.

there are lots of lopsided relationships in shoujo manga in general but idk for me it was hard to take in all the emotional hits (kureno and ren oy vey) they flung at each other and then not see resolution. :/

i’m going to shut up since this is def beyond what you asked but basically shigure does love shigure for herself but only on the mangaka’s word/face value from what we are shown with him going “i love akito”. there wasn’t enough character development/plot reveal to reinforce his love for her. we can understand why he fell in love with her in the first place but we’re never given context besides that, the story just explains how they’ve been dancing around each other for years (not in an unrequited love way but in a hostile way).

*deep breath* oh god it felt good to write that out but if my long mess of thoughts confused you anon always feel free to send in another ask!

#fruits basket #fruits basket 2019 #furuba #shigure sohma #akito sohma #ayame sohma #hatori sohma #kana sohma #marimoasks #i'm a ranter ik and i'm sorry idk what's wrong with me either u.u

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