Crocodile finds a strange stray cat an 11-year old Nico Robin (AU where they met 13 years earlier. Robin's been on the run from the World Government for 3 years. Crocodile's 27 and has not set up base in Alabasta yet)

It seems like I have become possessed. By some sort of demon.

Bonus:

the mighty nein - critical role

this is a place where i don't feel alone. this is a place where i feel at home.

I need anyone who genuinely dislikes Usopp to take a long look in the mirror because yeah, he can be a bit annoying at times but he is honestly a good and interesting character!!

He is just as loyal as any other member of the crew and fights the strongest when he’s fighting on someone else’s behalf. (See: him fighting for Sanji in Skypeia, fighting for Robin at Eneis Lobby, fighting for Luffy in Dressrosa, fighting for Tama and Nami in Wano.) He is a major player in so many of the battles in the series that it baffles me that people can think of him as an unimportant member of the crew.

And Usopp is a fucking genius??? Hello???? He’s able to make weapons powerful enough to create storms and tornadoes. He is canonically a jack-of-all trades that supports the crew in their daily lives and in battle. The Going Merry only lasted as long as she did because Usopp was around to care for her. He was the only one to see her Klabauterman!! Usopp is not only creative and fun but is able to bring those creations to life, whether it be his drawings or his gadgets, and I think that’s so beautiful. I miss pre-TS because of all his inventions we got to see.

Let’s not forget that Usopp is so, so kind!! He made friends with the kids in his village and told stories to Kaya to help her feel better when she was ill. He fought to protect her and Syrup Village from Kuro. Personally, I will never get over filler ep on Fireworks Island (ep. 134) where he cheered up Kodoma and encouraged her to continue her pyrotechnics, assuring that her parents were proud of her. Knowing he also lost his parents at a young age makes the scene hit that much harder. (And again, he showed his genius by figuring out a way to launch the firework that killed Kodoma’s parents!!) It may not be canon to the manga but but I think that episode is super accurate to his character.

What I think makes him the most interesting is that we see his flaws and mistakes more than any of the other Straw Hats. We see his insecurities in Water 7 and his fear in Dressrosa. But we also see him growing and learning and being encouraged by his crewmates. Aside from Robin, I think Usopp has changed and grown the most out of the Straw Hats. With his goal to become a brave warrior of the sea he has so much potential for even more growth!!

Like I said earlier, some people think Usopp is annoying which he can be sometimes, but that’s also because he’s literally comic relief. And he does so well at it bc he’s actually so damn funny?? He makes me laugh out loud all the time. One Piece wouldn’t be even half as funny without Usopp.

I also appreciate that as an individual he has so many moments with the other Straw Hats. There are a lot of relationships that don’t get explored as much as we’d like, but I think we get to see Usopp’s friendships with the crew pretty often. He fights for Luffy, plays around with Chopper, teases Zoro, is teased by Robin, gossips with Nami, hangs around Sanji, and his whole relationship with Franky has so many layers to it.

Aaahh, I have so many hopes for Usopp in the series that I pray will be fulfilled!! I want him to have a badass arc in Elbaf full of character growth. I want to see him develop and continue to use his Haki (which he gained when trying to save Luffy are you KIDDING me). I want his reunion with Yasopp to be emotional and bittersweet. If he could personally beat Yasopp in a fight I would ascend to the heavens.

Usopp is such an important, complex, and interesting character and I absolutely hate to see him reduced to being a gag character or the weakest member of the Straw Hats. He may not be a monster but he is amazing and I love him.

TLDR; if you disrespect Usopp I wish you a very Die.

we give garp a lot of (rightly deserved) shit but unironically like 90% of the criticisms towards him i see not only ignore the wider worldbuilding context of one piece but also don't acknowledge how sengoku is like the worst friend ever

It's ten at night and I can't stop thinking about Dragon, Kuma and Iva founding the revolutionary army together and how close they were and a lot of fandom only speculated they were close by inference but it's basically canon that they were CLOSE, like those three are FRIENDS and that is just... that makes me so happy. I love that Iva has Dragon and Kuma, I love that Kuma has Dragon and Iva, I love that Dragon has Iva and Kuma. And I love that they all had a hand in training Sabo. He is their legacy 🥺 he is the revolutions legacy. He carries pieces from all of them. I am so emotional over the revs. They mean everything to me.

On the MegOP fandom trend of saying "Optimus should apologize to Megatron"

(Speaking specifically for IDW1, though it applies to a lot of MegOP especially ones that do continuity soup with heavy reference to IDW1)

I was talking to a friend in DMs and they mentioned a common headcanon/fanfic trope that I also concurred with, and both of us said it's something that bothers us: a common take in the MegOP fandom goes basically along the lines of "If Optimus had just apologized to Megatron, the war would've ended" (or other variants including "if he'd tried harder to understand Megatron/work in collaboration with him").

And firstly, this is incorrect for a number of reasons:

There were attempts at peace negotiations during the war, but they fell through. So Optimus WAS trying to work with Megatron to the point of participating in formal diplomatic meetings.

Optimus tried multiple times on page to convince Megatron to just stop fighting and work with him for peace (Autocracy, Chaos Theory) that Megatron rejected. Given that these on-page examples take place at the start of the war and at the end of the war respectively, it makes sense that Optimus asking Megatron for collaboration is something he was trying/willing to do the entire time. So again, Optimus was always willing AND ATTEMPTING to work with Megatron and find a joint solution

Even before the war when Optimus was still Orion, he was very explicitly inspired by Megatron's writing and names Megatron as one of the people who "opened his eyes" to the wrongs of Cybertronian society. So how is it that people claim "the war went on for too long because Optimus never tried to understand Megatron" when OP literally named Megatron as one of his biggest idols, thus implying that OP does understand Megatron's ideals

But the primary purpose of this post wasn't to defend Optimus, actually. Even though I personally think Optimus did plenty (dare I say, everything) to try to end the war, there are some who may still think otherwise, so instead of arguing about whether Optimus did "enough", or who should apologize to whom, or who "deserves the blame" for starting/continuing the war, I'd actually rather talk about this:

No matter who is most "to blame" for the war, it's my firm belief that neither Megatron nor Optimus would even expect/demand the other to apologize to them at all.

On Megatron's side, he would never seek to judge Optimus negatively for the decisions to the point of saying "you wronged me, apologize." Whether it's evil Megatron who doesn't care about atrocities and revels in an opportunity to expose Optimus as a hypocrite, or post-war/Autobot Megatron who knows that his own evil actions are irredeemable, the idea of Megatron judging Optimus and demanding an apology for the war specifically strikes me as out-of-character. Why would Megatron demand or even want an apology from Optimus when Megatron knows fully well that he has his own sins to bear, he prolonged the war for his own selfish/material gain, and that he is responsible for an untold amount of suffering? Demanding an apology would imply that Megatron sees himself as the wronged party and Optimus as the wrongdoer, but by the end of the war, Megatron is too aware of his own part in the war to ever demand such a thing of Optimus. Even if he DID think that Optimus was "equally to blame" for the war (which he doesn't/wouldn't, btw), Megatron's own feelings of guilt would prevent him from trying to seek the petty satisfaction of the moral high ground or making Optimus beg for his forgiveness.

Additionally, Megatron knows Optimus very well as a person: he knows that the position of leadership is full of "loneliness [and] agonizing self-doubt" for Optimus (Chaos Theory) and that "when Optimus hurts others, he hurts himself" (MTMTE). Another reason that Megatron wouldn't demand nor want an apology from Optimus is because Megatron knows Optimus so well that he already knows that being a war leader fills Optimus with immense guilt and suffering. Given that Megatron knows about Optimus' self-doubt and guilt, why would he even need an apology when he already knows how much Optimus regrets the war and desperately wishes/wished for it to end?

Then, as established in the previous paragraphs, Optimus is too full of guilt for his part in the war (both before it started and in being unable to stop it sooner) to demand an apology from Megatron. Again, demanding an apology would put Optimus in an implied position of moral superiority and/or victimhood, but Optimus doesn't see himself as morally superior or as a victim (or rather, he sees himself as being responsible for these bad things happening and internalizes this as a duty to do better/fix wrongdoings). In other words, Megatron and Optimus both share this view of themselves and each other: Their hands are so dirty, and they both feel such guilt over this, and they know each other well enough to know that the other feels this way as well. Because both of them feel blame for the war and are acutely aware of their own flaws/part in suffering, both of them feel far too responsible for the war happening for them to ever blame their archnemesis for "not trying harder" or "being responsible for the war."

Hell, if you even look at the socio-political climate of Cybertron before the war started, neither Megatron nor Optimus were the ones who put this conflict into motion. The corrupt legacy of the Primes, Functionism, class issues-- all of these things existed before Megatron and Optimus did. Even once they started doing things like writing about social issues (M) or fighting against the Senate (OP), both of them were "underlings" in sense that they weren't leaders:

Megatron's writings may have inspired the Decepticon movement, but that movement existed as an independent entity with its own leaders and speakers long before Megatron became the "official" ruler of the Decepticons. He wasn't even the leader of the 'Cons until he took control of the gladiator arena and the nonviolent sections of the Decepticons were (presumably) subsumed into the underground, exploitative battle culture that Megatron created.

Optimus-as-Orion was a police officer to start, but even once he started going against the Senate, he mainly worked in collaboration with others like Senator Shockwave and Zeta (later Zeta Prime), who he either saw as his idols or who were literally superior to him in rank due to government/military structures.

So with this in mind, even from a social level, while Megatron and Optimus may have been "catalysts" of a sort that caused the war to escalate to an outright planetary/galactic level, the scenario is too complex to solely lay the blame for the war at either of their feet. I'm not confident in saying that Megatron/Optimus would explicitly think of this when talking to each other, but what I'm trying to say is that M/OP were just catalysts in a long chain of brewing tension that exploded into a war. Even if one could claim that one of them "started" or "escalated" the war, the social issues that caused the war and the positions of power that allowed them to become leaders in the first place were falling into place before either of them actually BECAME leaders.

In other words, this shared fate of being the final reaction that exploded a societal conflict into outright war... Megatron and Optimus both have that in common. And because of this, I really don't think either of them would even think to ask the other to apologize because they're both in such similar positions, with such similar feelings of guilt and responsibility, that they understand each other's feelings without words. To demand an apology would be akin to taking that shared vulnerability/guilt and stepping on it, attempting to claim that one is right/superior and the other is wrong/inferior, and that the inferior one needs to grovel and take responsibility for the bad things that happened.

Visit our MOTIVATION Blog - www.wordswithloveee.com 🤩‼️

Kids don't even have family computers anymore! Give them a break!

*"Capitalists depend on us relying on them" here specifically is about websites slowly converting to be only useable on mobile, making the "family computer" unneeded and have people only rely on their phones. Less and less children are being given opportunities to learn how to use a computer and customize their online experience. Only accessing the internet through your phone also gives more tracking opportunities, which kids are being taught to think of as unavoidable and not care about.

i FUCKING HATE TRANS MEN. theyre USELESS EVIL MISOGYNISTS. they DONT EXIST IN REAL QUEER SPACES and all they EVER do is BELITTLE AND BERATE TRANS WOMEN FOR EXISTING. i am morally just a nd pure however bc i am a beautiful wonderful perfect trans woman. i see no fault in my way of thinking

It's my burfday today! :D I have another pic in the works that I was gonna post but I won't manage to finish it today so I'm posting this one instead. It's actually for my Riida RP acc on twt. The bonsai tree in the middle is another RP acc I have (it is Saka's bonsai tree lmao yes I RP as a tree) and the pigeon on the right is Riida's PA (cos Riida is disorganised af & needs nudging to do her work often).

Anyway I just wanted to share it here & celebrate my bday with you guys ^^ Thank you for being here with me!

always thinking about the institution-level antagonists in the world of OP, because from our perspective they're the marines, and they're the nobility, but even among the marines there's kobymeppo(among others!), and among the celestial dragons there's mjosgard, and among the minor nobility there was sabo, and every one of them is a character who saw a system of harm and oppression and drew a line where they decided that they wouldn't participate in harming innocent people

and it's a world where pirates rampage almost unchecked, so it's not like the strawhat crew represents the average pirate, most of whom are definitely plundering and murdering. it's been said ad nauseum that one of OP's core themes is that people aren't defined by their affiliation

koby exists so we'll look at akainu and go 'wtf is wrong with you', donquixote mjosgard exists so the audience can look at doffy and go 'it didn't have to be this way!!!'

the way oda brings back arc villains to join luffy when their goals just happen to align is also just, fucking fantastic, because it's not even sending the message that redemption is possible (buggy and crocodile have not become better people in the slightest!! i'd argue they both got significantly WORSE) but more like. 'yeah you hate this motherfucker, but he's on your side on this so you might as well work together'

this is not the most complex analysis or anything, i'm just basking in my LITTLE GUYS being back in the story and how well it ties into the pattern that oda's established, while still being a huge surprise somehow!!

perhaps the reason why aup ended like *that* is because it was not supposed to have a happy ending in the first place, but sayren didnt have the guts to deal with readers' backlash for when they finally kill off the main character so a half baked happy ending is what we get 😔

What if the women in those relationships were the toxic ones?

Then I hope whoever was dating the toxic women in these relationships and saw the Barbie movie together also leave their asses. 💜 I’m pretty sure I said something about that in the tags, but if not then I’ll clarify this here.

If seeing the Barbie movie with a toxic partner makes you realize that you deserve better, then I hope you leave that toxic relationship safely and get on with your life in a healthy way! 💜

sanji for blorbo bingo? i am also so incredibly not normal about him

omggg thank you sm for asking for my bbg 🙏🙏🛐🛐 it’s impooossible to be normal about him fr 😭😭🤝🤝

have you ever seen a man more bbg?? more pathetic?? more squishable?? no <3

(he is innocent <3 oda is making the choices sanji has nOTHING to do with them <3)

One of the funniest examples of fandom memes vs. actual canon is the way people see TFA Optimus. Like don't get me wrong he's an amazing character but I've seen people unironically call him a "working class Optimus" comparable to G1 and like

Did people forget that TFA Optimus is still a Prime which is a high rank in the Autobot military, basically equivalent to being an officer

And he wasn't kicked out of the Autobot army completely, he was kicked out of Elite Guard training which is basically the cream of the crop of the Autobot army, like even more special than Primes

Like yeah he was stationed on a space bridge but like. He's still a member of the military. In real life most (if not all) military members have secondary jobs to being soldiers, like being engineers or navigators or cooks or something, but that doesn't make them "working class" bc they're literally part of the military

Calling TFA Optimus "working class" bc he got kicked out of the Elite Guard is like calling someone in the US military "working class" because he dropped out of Special Forces training and is "just" a non commissioned officer instead sdlkfsjdfs;ds like it's just so FUNNY to me. Sure TFA Optimus experienced a fall from grace/got kicked out of something that was always his dream to do, but in the context of TFA worldbuilding he's literally a high ranking military officer in a kinda fascist regime whose life dream is to become an even higher ranking military officer for a kinda fascist regime so it's just. It's just fucking hilarious to me

Glad I'm aro so I can fucking say some other aros out there are so fucking annoying.