a buncha’ nerds ⛩️

let's talk BL manga lore; on grooming, identity, and racism

spoilers for the official captain laserhawk bl manga ofc, plus brief discussion of grooming I've refrained from speaking about it because of spoilers, but it's been well over a month and I believe that it's time to openly discuss it. if you would still like to read the manga before reading this discussion, here's the link to buy a physical copy and you can search up 'Captain Laserhawk: Crushing Love' in your digital book store for it. okay time to talk about two, basically three subjects; racism, identity, and grooming. i'm starting with the grooming first, because that's the main focus of this manga. i would have to preface this by saying i've already discussed this topic in an earlier post (albeit it is a prediction, but it is a spot on prediction.) i'll briefly elaborate on it right now with what we know.

dolph's very first day with alex was carefully calculated to where dolph would be exposed to the world, but heavily rely on alex. he is shown around to alex's friends and is able to buy his own clothes, but it is under the heavy scrutiny of alex. alex ultimately decides what dolph wears, alex decides how the day goes, alex leads dolph. even when they have a beach day, take note of how alex holds dolph, dragging him around.

even the romance and the events leading up to when alex takes dolph's virginity are calculated. note how alex grasps dolph's hand, grabbing on tight enough to almost press down on his knuckles, loosening his hand, making dolph relinquish control. the context for the fight page is that after their sweet lil beach day, alex takes dolph down an alley where alex knows that he'll come across people who aren't the fondest of him. this event was calculated, alex knew it was going to happen, and he used it to test out his new lil boytoy.

also, alex taking dolph out to fight isn't just so he can get in the pants of a barely 18 year old. while holloway notes during this flashback that adrenaline is the greatest aphrodisiac, this is a test to see how good the new weapon he picked up is. how the new boy works, to see how eden's boy robot can benefit his group, not just him. its literally in the morning panels we get where alex talks with that woman, anna. they're talking about how loaded he is with tech, and while alex does consider that, he still actively thirsts over dolph.

also im jus saying if i personally was talking with one of my greatest confidants and they refer to someone i'm thirsting over as KID, i would personally be icked out. i would have a conscious and not do some weird shit, like literally refer to dolph in passing as kid in the next page. dolph aint even the first one who alex has done this shit to, as evident by this line by one of his friends, grace.

alex is a groomer and groomed dolph, case closed.

anyways! time to get on with what i really wanted to talk about, how racism and loss of idenity ties into dolph's character!

in this manga, during pillow talk between dolph and alex, we get dolph's backstory. dolph literally has only known this man for a day and he's giving him lore because alex treats him more normal than eden did. god. ANYWAYS ENOUGH DWELLING ON DOLPH BEING A VICTIM IN ALL WAYS INCLUDING BEING ONE OF THE OXFORD STUDY, we get to know about his brief life before eden took him in.

now let me turn for a moment to the show, and how we were told about dolph's backstory. this is VASTLY different than what we got in the show, with it being implied that dolph's parents were a white prostitute and a darkskinned immigrant man. this adds onto the idea that this supposedly impoverished, crack addicted boy came into this world not as an act of love, but as a mistake. not just a mistake though, his parents are supposedly the epitome of immoral, a prostitute and a criminal. not to mention that this also ties into the idea of the uncultured brown man and pure white woman, basically a racist idea that the scary immigrants who aren't like us good white christian americans (and honestly jus any homogenous group in general, though in america its ofc more applicable to white people), are corrupting our mother marys, our women. eden takes on this perspective in order to subconsciously frame in the minds of post american viewers the idea of this man as an other that they are helping and didn't at all snatch up from his mother for child experimentation. the concept of other is something that finds it's origins in fascism, and in order to mask the presence of said fascism, someone who is seen as apart of the other is given a seat at the table with the collective us, (as in the majority, or the ones that are supposedly superior), and will ultimately serve as an example of why the other are labelled as such. i go into this more with my rayman analysis. I brought up the specific portrayal of dolph's backstory from eden's documentary to showcase how eden has manipulated the view people have of this man. eden has not only manipulated the view of the in universe audience, but eden has manipulated our view.

in the propaganda documentary, we are shown photos of this man being a captain, someone of relatively high rank in the military. you can't even normally earn that through having an education, you'd have to have years of experience. he's portrayed as older than he is.

another thing, dolph fans, let's be honest with ourselves; before the manga, it was not uncommon to headcanon that man as a FREAK. with both the supposed images of dolph at a nightclub and the flashback of alex and dolph meeting outside a club, it wasn't too hard to think that the hottest man alive in that show who was fully born human was a freak. a sexual deviant. someone that a christian mother would be horrified enough by that she faints. the manga however, shows us that dolph really isn't any of that. hell, he didn't even get to go to a club before he met alex. in reality, he's around 18 years and his only sexual experience is his groomer.

say that again with me, he's around 18. he's just around 18, he's a young adult, and the environment he's grown up in has stunted him by treating him as a subject, a thing, cutting him off from anything that would humanise this child by not allowing him to see his mother. hell, even his childhood best friend serves eden by being the one in his ear, having him at her beck and call all in the name of eden.

we get none of dolph's true backstory in the show for any number of reasons. maybe it's on purpose, maybe it's a result of having to possibly cut down episodes, who knows? what matters though is that this adds a layer to the core problem defining dolph's life; the perspective others have on him warping who he is.

back to the pages with dolph's memories of his mother, we see dolph as he was when he was just a boy. he's his mama's boy, her son, a child. even when eden takes him in, he stubbornly clings to that bit of him that's pure, untainted by the idea of him being an experiment, a tool. this bit of him, this hint towards who he is supposed to be as a person, is something he clings to desperately. it leads him to follow eden's orders again because they promise that they've found his mother.

and yknow what happened with who dolph was told was supposedly his mother?

she was just a random ass indian woman.

wasn't even the right woman. they just used his identity issues because he's indian, and she was indian and in a cult that eden needed to take care of.

this, while admittedly is kind of funny, (like the confusion is funny in the moment look at ts) is actually fucked up crazy racism. they literally said that this random ass woman who happened to be indian was his mother like HELL!?!??!?!?

this insane fr. lucy didn't even double check LIKE GIRL THAT'S SUPPOSED TO BE YOUR FRIEND'S MOTHER WHO HE HASNT SEEN SINCE HE WAS LIKE 6 AND YOU DIDNT EVEN DOUBLE CHECK IF SHE'S THE RIGHT PERSON?!?!?!?

moving on from that, this actually brings up a deeper layer of dolph's identity issues; the lack of cultural identity.

i want to preface this by saying that i am not entirely sure if this is the right term for this identity issue nor am i claiming to be an expert on the type of identity crisis that i am about to discuss. that being said, this specific disconnect of cultural identity that dolph has is actually reminiscent of those adopted from other countries, or transnational adoptees. there seems to be a need within these adoptees to find out more about their own heritage or their own mothers and families that they now struggle to find. while dolph does not actively go out to reconnect with his heritage, he does exhibit desires to find his birth mother. this type of identity issue seems to ask the question of 'what could I have been if...?,' and it tends to mess with the idea of the self. adoptees that struggle with this question hold a desire to go back, to almost reclaim what would have been. yes, dolph is not adopted into a family, but he is still a child under the care of eden, which became like his family, which is why i believe that this kind of identity issue could reasonably be applied to dolph. it explains why he does what he does in the manga, and how it's ultimately wrapped up by him losing this desire and moving forward. albeit he moves forward by alex instead becoming his main purpose, but this serves as the first chain of the past that he leaves behind. with this, he severs a tie that would have made him continue to be stuck under eden's control, and possibly find himself. he answers the question of what could have been with 'it doesn't matter anymore.'

but actually, he doesn't answer that question. he leaves it be.

i am reading way too into this tho lol. i would say that he doesn't explicitly say it, and that we do see a lack of dolph's past being used against him in that way because dolph has freed himself from that part, but in reality, it's because eden can't pull the same trick twice. im aware that the manga focuses HARD on dolph's grooming, but i feel like they really could have properly wrapped up dolph's identity arc with his mother if it was acknowledged at the end, but i fear we are left unsatisfied. that's one of my gripes with the manga. it gives us things that tie up loose ends, but some of these ties have entirely missed the holes they were supposed to secure. but what is done is what's done, and here we are.

tl;dr, dolph was groomed by alex. dolph's identity has also been warped by eden heavily, by how they dehumanised him as a child to be a weapon internally, to how he's shown to the public to be a case that they've saved, and yet he still becomes something that is "disgraceful." textbook example of this poor boy that we have saved that is actually jus like all the others that we know. dolph also suffers under similar identity issues as adopted children do, and this specific issue of his is let go in order to allow him to begin moving on and finding himself.

as always, im open to discussion and critique! my askbox is open as well if you want me to yap abt smth else in the show :P

can’t get my mind off apothecary diaries recently maomao is perfect in every way look at her. ultimate weirdgirl

A trend of a manga series getting a popular seasonal adaptation, but in between seasons, the "anime only" fans start developing their own (Wrong) interpretations of canon, and get mad when the later seasons actually follow the original story, instead of following the weird fanon.

A few cases, a growing trend I think.

....

Pays to READ THE MANGA I guess.

Watch "アニメ『アンデッドアンラック』メインPV／Undead Unluck | Official Main Trailer" on YouTube

BRUHHHHHHHH Im so fucking HYPED

The VA's are such good choices. The animation is beautiful. Im so so so stoked for October 6th. AHHHHHHHH It's finally happeningggg

The original design of this series is a masterpiece.

These two pages from Blue Period made me feel called out...

I too know the feeling of irrational anger at the sound of birds in the morning after an art all nighter.

Dungeon Meshi is Delicious~

My girlfriend and I have this ritual where, every night for dinner, we like to sit down together and watch a video while we eat. Most of the time it's a youtube video we both have an interest in, but every now and then we'll start or continue a series that we're both interested in. We sat down one night a week or so ago and watched the first couple of episodes of Dungeon Meshi, or Delicious in Dungeon.

And this almost never happens to me, but after learning that the manga the show was based on was finished, I felt compelled the binge all 97 chapters, and… my god, this story is so good and goofy and I love it so much.

Delicious in Dungeon is a comedy fantasy manga by Ryoko Kui, about an adventuring party delving into a dangerous dungeon to rescue their comrade who was swallowed by a red dragon. Along the way, in order to keep their strength up, they have to use the natural resources of the dungeon to survive, which involves cooking the monsters that they kill, much to the terror of some of the members of the crew. Meanwhile, while the main focus is on their adventure, everyone around them is constantly worrying about the politics of the dungeon, ownership of the land around it, and the fact that the dungeon itself seems to be getting more powerful as time passes.

This is a fantastic story, with the real highlight being the worldbuilding. Every question that I found myself asking over the course of the series had an answer, and it was always a good one. Characters make reference to dying, and that's because something in the dungeon makes it so that anyone who dies can be brought back to life so long as their body is in decent condition and their soul hasn't gone too far from said body. The layout of the dungeon has basically been thoroughly mapped, to the point where various merchants have set up shop on certain floors, or specialized delvers trade in goods unique to the dungeon. Even the way that the town built around the dungeon functions is talked about, what sort of needs a town has when its main function is to serve as a hub for adventurers looking to get as deep into the dungeon as possible.

And as the story goes on and we're introduced through dialogue and backstory to the world outside of dungeon delving, we're shown a world that has a very strict political structure and a lot of mistrust among its people, centered around, of all things, the various lifespans of each race. It's fascinating.

Enhancing it all are the characters who are all just… god, they are such lovable beans, I love them all. Even the assholes, because we see why they're assholes and most of the assholes have moments where they aren't assholes and it warms my heart to see. Laios is dense in a way that sets him apart from your usual Shonen hero as being unintelligent, instead just being really socially awkward and it is kind of endearing seeing him share his special interest with others who more often than not just see him as very strange and off putting. Marcille the mage of the group and also the one who complains the most about having to eat monsters. Unlike many other shows or stories where this trait might get old or annoying, she actually manages to remain pretty endearing all throughout, and probably gets the most character development in a party that stays pretty static through the whole adventure. That's not a knock, as they do change in subtle ways, but it isn't nearly as pronounced as you see in other stories. Chilchuck is a good example of this, as while he does open up a bit more and let's down his professional guard now and then, he mostly remains a pretty pragmatic and distant hired hand for the party, an interesting change-up for the Hobbit stand-ins who are usually portrayed as pretty adventurous or curious. And then there's Senshi. He's a dwarf and he practically lives in the dungeon, and is an experienced hunter, gardener, and chef, with unusually powerful cooking gear. He's an oddball, like Laios, and the two compliment each other well, and there are some great interplay between him and Marcille given his mistrust of magic.

And then there's the fact that almost every chapter, we get at least one amazing dish made with the remains of slain monsters, and while the Anime goes out of its way to make it look as appetizing as possible (as anime tends to do with food), the manga also has these beautifully rendered pictures of every meal, as well as a list of all the different ingredients used in its creation. It's truly lovely.

I don't want to spoil anything, but once the gang gets to their destination, the amount of twists and turns that the overarching plot takes is quite interesting, and I found myself just wondering HOW it was all going to shake out by the end of the tale. This is an amazingly fun series, and one that is well worth checking out. The anime, at the time I'm writing this, is still airing its first season, and I'm not sure how far into the story they'll make it by the end. I'm legitimately hoping that it gets enough seasons to cover the entire story, because dammit, it deserves it. They'd only need like… three, I think, it's not a super long manga. It's currently airing on Netflix. But if you would prefer to get the whole story now, the manga finished its run back last September, and all except the last two volumes have been released in English by Yen Press, with volume 13 set to release in March of 2024, and the last volume coming at an unspecified date after that (at the time of writing).

It's been a long time since I've felt the need to binge a manga after seeing even a little bit of the anime, so I really think this one is something special. And it's an original fantasy story too! I feel like it's getting harder to get good fantasy anime that isn't dressed up like an Isekai at this point, and this story does not disappointment.

Just make sure you have a snack on hand while reading or watching. It tends to make you really hungry, seeing what they cook up.

I'm here to remind everyone that our very Yasashii Gakuenchou has defensive magic strong enough to withstand an attack from someone that's currently in overblot. Granted a tree was used by the phantom to attack, the damage dealt to the surroundings was no joke either.

Also, I don't know if you've noticed, how good Crowley's reaction time actually is. Because from the looks of it here in these panels, Crowley was already moving away to usher majority of the other students to safety, because see, he's already away from Trey's group when Riddle's phantom split the ground with the tree, but the moment Crowley noticed that the impact was heading straight for Trey's group, he was right back to where they were with his barrier cast instantaneously to shield everyone from harm. Crowley is literally the only thing standing in the way of Trey and the attack's impact. His barrier was strong enough that the place they were standing on wasnt affected, instead, the damage gets split over to the sides where the shield wasn't cast.

So you know, I do believe that Dire is very sincere when he says that his students' well being is his top priority. Which also, allow me to point out, he's a fine judge of what to prioritize, and is quick to make that decision, and the necessary actions needed to fulfil his goals. At first, his priority were the students that MAY end up getting hurt due to Riddle going berserk. Trey's group is trustworthy enough to give instructions to, so he gives them the go signal to seek assistance from the staff, but the moment he sees that that group was in danger, he shifts his priorities to those who need to be protected first and foremost. Since the danger shifted, he has to adjust to it, because his top priority is the wellbeing of his students. And at this point, everyone's wellbeing was being taken into account. From the bystanders and other members of Heartslabyul, to the group he entrusted with a task, to Riddle. He doesn't leave anyone out. Everyone is accounted for. I'm a firm believer that Crowley didn't engage Riddle because as part of the Night Raven College Staff, its Headmaster even, lifting a hand against his students is something that he wouldn't do-- despite the necessity. He well could have fought Rosehearts, but that puts not only every student in the vicinity in danger, but it puts Riddle at the greatest risk. Crowley understands how Blot works, and how Overblot works. IF, If he were to fight Riddle himself, that would cause the Housewarden to expend even more mana. Magic consumption is fast enough when someone is in overblot, so he is making sure that the boy doesn't push himself to the limit. Being in overblot, the negative energy corrupts a person-- as they say, evil Berserker mode. And I believe that it's safe to say, anyone who is hot-tempered and extremely angry is very quick to provoke. In my opinion, he's taking the safest measures, the most optimal course of action so that our overblotee doesn't get any more provoked than he already is.

So yeah, IF IN CASE he was present for other overblots, I don't think he'd be the type to just run away without a reason, or leave everything to MC and company. Because he is there, he will do what needs to be done in order to protect his students, without aggravating the student that was in overblot.

See here, he even takes the blame for it himself. He doesn't blame anyone else. Not Trey for going against Riddle, not Ace for punching his Housewarden, he isn't even putting the blame on Riddle. Crowley takes responsibilities for his actions and his shortcomings in the best way available, and with as little collateral damage as possible. It may not always be the most logical solution to the students, but when he's there and he decides to act, it's for the best. BUT AGAIN. It also stays true to his style of "allowing them to resolve their own troubles by themselves". Otherwise he'd just fix this all himself, but where is the growth for them in that?

I do love that Crewel has a line when he talks about the staff wherein he says that Crowley is always just thinking about his students, to the point that he works himself to the bone. And that, there are times when he flees the scene when it becomes problematic, and that sometimes, it has to be that way. This really shows me how different things are behind the scenes. (Every one of the staff who has exam lines say nice things about Crowley.) When it's just the staff and Crowley vs the students and Crowley. Then again. This is understandable. Since they are all fellow staff and colleagues, there's less thresholds and boundaries, compared to students. But it's not like Crowley slacks either in terms of his relationship with his students... which I will discuss in some other post, just not this one. Feel free to ask me about it, if you feel like it. I love talking about Crowley.

Anyway, I do like that we dont see what Crowley is capable of from the get-go as it gives us a lot of freedom when it comes to what he can do. But I do like what we're currently privy to at the moment. And that's the fact that he can use complicated magic without even missing a beat like it's nothing does say something about him. Crowley even has transformation magic in his arsenal, which is probably one of the more complicated types of magic (if we base it from how difficult form-altering potions are to make, then we can probably make the assumption that transforming/shapeshifting into other forms are just as rare, complex, and complicated to perform). If we take into account the timespace teleportation magic used to summon students, if that's part of his magic repertoire and not just solely the mirror's ability... then I think it's safe to say, Crowley can do so much more, given time and circumstance.

But that's it for me for today.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

FIXING THE TRUTH ABOUT IZUMI UCHIHA

I think it's time to set the record straight on some of the Uchiha clan members, especially for itachi fans who are trying to do some mental gym to figure out why Itachi didn't contract his MS because of fucking Izumi Uchiha and pretend that she was his lover... LMAO.

This will hold on 2 points or maybe 3.

Izumi Uchiha is a non-canon character, used in a specific context.

Izumi was only introduced in the anime to try to push the pill on Itachi being a very introverted kid, who couldn't make friends, let alone date anyone romantically. Itachi, had only one canonical friend, Shisui, who was already much older than him. Itachi not having a friend his own age made so much more sense to the character. Itachi is introduced as a kind of autistic person who lived outside the world in his own mind but had to wear a social mask in all circumstances because people liked to remind him of his genius and this potential should not be wasted. And yes he was the kind of guy who would go for a walk alone in the forest to think deeply about the basis of his life here, or try to throw himself off a cliff to figure out why life is so important. When did you in the manga, Itachi take a romantic turn with anyone? Literally nobody. It wasn't like him.

Izumi is a character created from scratch for Itachi Shinden.

I struggle with this section of toxic fandom quite regularly, lights novels are not canon and do not extend the manga canon. The canon of a story only refers to what its original author writes and that's it. The rest is just stories or fanfiction to try to make sense of a secondary character and why do even? Should we have known that Itachi was actually a little marshmallow heart so that it would ease our pain for the actions he committed? Izumi was a young girl born to an anonymous lambda father and an Uchiha mother, that's all we learn at the beginning. After her father's death, Izumi and her mother are allowed to rejoin the clan but still have a hard time being recognized as true clan members. She meets Itachi at school and literally falls under his spell. He's handsome, smart and powerful, and a full-blooded Uchiha, I can't blame her here but she's just one simp among many. Sasuke will have the same success with women years later. She tries to blame herself for Itachi making him a friend by forcing her friendship on him and making him feel guilty for not giving her time while he repeatedly pushes her away, (hey Sakura) while he is majority busy between a genius, used for his out of the ordinary abilities, between the village and the Uchiha clan. He ends up being a little interested in her when he discovers that she has awakened her sharingan… that's literally it. But when I say he is interested in her, I'm not talking romantically, he is just jealous of the fact that he didn't succeed in awakening his sharingan and how did a half Uchiha succeed before him? Is Izumi the real genius here? And yes Itachi was clearly jealous of her and that's all. Finally he managed to awaken them and the interest in her disappeared again. What a jerk. Izumi trying to find comfort in Fugaku is my favorite laughable section… Fugaku being obsessed by the interests of the clan didn't actually notice by himself that Itachi was an asocial kid and it's only after his wife Mikoto's worries that Fugaku also wonders: Itachi needs friends otherwise he'll end up in a bad way. But Itachi had a friend, the good Shisui, but after his death what does he have left? Izumi has always been irrelevant for him. Itachi Shinden has just softened the horrible Itachi's character with the death of Izumi. Wanting to kill her first and soften her death in a genjutsu in order to give her what he could never give her from the beginning was literally not adorable but just horribly cringe.

Yes, but Obito said that Itachi killed his lover.

Yes, in the translated versions of the manga. But on second thought, what did Obito know? Did he know Itachi well enough to say that he had a lover? No. Obito only made presumptions based on nothing. Then, it is possible that Obito lied to Sasuke to make him gain ground in his own manipulation. Finally, Obito stating that Itachi went as far as to kill his lover, never pronounced a name. Who said that it was Izumi? Nobody, not even Obito.

In the anime, Obito is the one who kills Izumi, why would he refer to Izumi as the lover that Itachi killed if he was implying that Izumi was Itachi's lover? Things lead us to think that Obito was talking about Shisui instead or that he was simply lying.

Conclusion: The lights novels are so flat that even the anime which is more than 40% filler doesn't even come to the same conclusion. What to do? READ THE MANGA.

ps: sorry for the grammatical typos or else, im not an english native speaker.

Dying on the hill that the main, MAIN reason people misinterpret Levi as much as they do comes down to taking him at face value. He is an extremely "show-don't-tell" kind of dude and his actions and expressions are the key to fully realizing him as a character.

And that's not to say that his dialogue isn't also important. Hell, his establishing moment is comforting a dying soldier and saying some really touching inspirational shit. But what I'm saying is studying how he emotes, and looking at his actions as a whole are both vital to really Getting Him, y'know? More than a lot of the less subtle/guarded characters, etc.

Getting Pulled Down

That's not what happens. But i mean, he tried.

I've used the LU design though, I've got used to it already.

One of the best moments in Wano finally has been animated...

...

WTF is this?!🤬

You know, the moment I encountered the manga and anime of Dr. Stone, I just couldn't help but fall in love with it. I loved the characters, the science, the storyline, the comedy, everything.

I love the entirety of it. Even the sad and touching moments like the few amounts I put below make me love the series even more.

Such as Suika growing up with no one around her for 3 years and reviving Senku and the gang again.

The scene where Tsukasa sees his sister again.

Taiju and Yuzuriha entire emotional moment with Senku being dead.

I am now rambling, but basically, I love Dr. Stone and I recommend people to watch it or read it even if you can not understand the science in it.

I join the cream puff club.

I will probably make a cream puff at the weekend.

Does anime also inspire you to cook/bake?