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doctorbunny · 1 day

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More serious summary of the livestream

Unfortunately I can't provide a full translation because the entire time I was watching in autistic excitement like 😊🥰🤩 whilst my brain melted out my ears and didn't pick up on a lot

Luckily, I have a feeling someone will get around to translating this stream eventually since they finally had the BGM on a lower volume so everyone was audible the whole time Without further ado:

We started with introductions seating order is Yamanaka, Yurina (Es' VA), Minami (Amane's VA), Ryouta (Kazui's VA) and DECO (who dyed his hair blonde) They each have one of the 4th anniversary acrylic stands in front of them The actors have their characters but Yamanaka has Haruka and DECO has Muu

Yamanaka admitted to being a Haruka oshi/fan

Then Minami talks about being a Fuuta fan (she calls him cool) and she's handed the Fuuta stand and she pushes the Fuuta and Amane stand next to each other (and jokes about their height difference then imitates Fuuta going zenbu zenbu zenbu!)

But then Yurina sticks her Es stand in between them to separate them

And then they move the Amane stand next to the Kazui one and everyone coos

Before moving Amane and Fuuta back together in front of Minami Then they basically just lift all of the stands up on to the table and continue on

They discuss their thoughts on the trial

Looking at who got voted inno and guilty Minami is happy Amane got inno but has no idea how Mikoto wasn't guilty They note that the audience wasn't very happy with Kotoko for beating up the other prisoners Then they give some thoughts on the MVs from Daisuki to Deep cover They get most excited talking about Cat and Purge March Kazui says that he was able to put the right emotions into Cat because he recorded the voice drama first Yurina and Minami actually caused the microphone to peak with their excited shrieks at one point (ow)

They answer some audience submitted questions One question was answered along the lines of "Be prepared" One was submitted in English and they tried to but couldn't read it Then they got a question (in Japanese) from someone from 韓国/South Korea [side note: I feel like the south korean milgram fandom has gotten more prominent recently, its always been there but it feels bigger than ever and that's pretty cool]

After audience questions they made a few announcements Some things we already knew, the gratte cafe crossover, the Kotoko line stickers, Earbuds are still on sale (and they're making badges and stuff based on the earbud promo art) the 4th anniversary art/acrylici stands literally in front of them Then some new things: Minigram LINE stamps (everyone was especially pleased for the Kazui XP stamp) There's going to be a part 2 to the Karaoke collab (no details yet other than its coming)

They also announce this year's perk for annual members [the pain of being an annual member but living outside of Japan so you can't get these 😭] Blank lamenated cards of the prisoner's interrogations and a whiteboard pen so you can write your own interro questions and answers They bring out the cards for Kazui and Amane and do some examples

"Do you like cake?" "I don't eat it."

"What did you have for lunch today?" "Gyudon." [a beef and rice dish]

Then Minami just writes "Toilet paper" in katakana and everyone laughs (Then she writes Toilet paper rap/lap/wrap and I'm not sure what she means)

Most exciting is script books for the Hallucenation liveshow (scripts of the voice dramas and songs) The live show uses condensed versions of the voice dramas but this is the first time we'll have official transcripts of key moments to help check translations with

Then they start saying that T2 was hellish, but T3 is going to go beyond hell: They're going to send everyone to Super Hell And at this point my brain fries and overloads on eeby deeby memes as they all go back and forth talking about Super Hell

They all start doing their outros/saying goodbye

Yurina talks about upcoming challenges we have as guards meanwhile Yamanaka ominously holds the Haruka stand up in frame

Then that's basically it, not much going on because a lot of stuff (like Hallucenation, the plushes, earbuds) came out right before the 4th anniversary

#milgram #ミルグラム #I probably missed a bunch of stuff but this is just the general overview

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ruporas · 22 hours

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Hey sorry if I’m being annoying but. I see posts of dungeon meshi every so often and I came across your harpy piece (which is AMAZING btw) but why does falin (I think that’s her name) turn into a harpy?? If you know please spoil me I just I have to know if it’s doomed yuri or not

haha not annoying at all! here’s my debrief of it

important thing to note is that Falin dies in episode 1, like first minute, she is dead and the entire journey is about defeating the red dragon that killed her in order to revive her before she gets fully digested. long story short, she DID get digested with only her bones and strands of hair as her remains which makes standard resurrection impossible, but marcille is then revealed to been studying ancient/black magic and is able to revive falin using monster parts aka the now defeated and dead red dragon. falin gets revived, they’re happy for a night and talking about going back to the surface with the rest of the party, yay!

the dungeon lord senses a disturbance after his red dragon is killed though and shows up. in resurrecting falin, the red dragon’s soul had intermingled with hers so she ends up being overtaken by the dragon’s soul upon the dungeon lord’s appearance and strictly follows his orders from then on. next time she shows up in front of the party, she ruthlessly kills/injures half the people they were with and showed basically no falin-ness in battle except for a brief moment with laios (which i assumed was bait).

that’s how falin gets turned into a chimera! there were harpies that showed up with her in the recent ep, but she herself is like. a weird dragon chicken thing.

i should also note marcille and falin are childhood friends, they’re very close to one another and marcille, despite the odds, adamantly joined laios in getting falin back. i think the importance falin has in marcille’s life has been enforced so falin becoming half monster, alive but not as herself entirely and becoming wrapped in a situation where they must defeat the Dungeon Lord in order to get her back (potentially) is kind of devastating. and in the recent episode, laios nor marcille knew how to approach falin, they just knew they didn’t want/couldn’t hurt her. this entire situation is new in their world, it’s not certain whether falin will ever return to herself. they’ll continue onward in the journey, but everything is probable! so not 100% doomed, but still, devastating.

the manga is finished so i highly recommend reading it if you’re curious about what happens. i feel like the yuri is better enjoyed if you know more about the world and of marcille’s character too, because her goals and desires makes everything she has to experience a bit more tragic. if not the manga, then definitely the anime!! watching it is very fun and i believe they’ll stop the anime at a good point. but anyway i hope this answers your question! ^_^

#asks #uhhhhh. iguess this is more in depth ill tag this as #dungeon meshi spoilers #no spoilers of the manga though just the anime #but if u havent read/watch dunmeshi #go do it!! it’s very good. i can’t explain it better than how the author portrays it all

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yamayuandadu · 1 day

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What is your opinion on the article "Mesopotamian or Iranian? A New Investigation on the Origin of the Goddess Anāhitā" by Alireza Qaderi?

He proposes that Anahita is possibly the syncretism of an Iranian Water goddess with Annunitum, and while it largely makes a lot of sense to me, especially with how it points out that we can't treat the Avesta as we know it as identical to the Avesta in Zarathustra's time, it also assumes the Central Asian goddess Ardokhsho comes from Aredvi Sura instead of Arti, and everything else I've seen just says Ardokhsho comes from Arti, although I haven't seen much literature on either deity tbh

Sorry it took me a few days to answer this ask even though it’s basically laser focused on my interests. I had some other stuff to read and unpleasant work duties to perform and couldn’t properly go through the recommended paper.

My feelings about the paper are mixed. I think anyone who remembers Annunitum was a distinct deity as early as in the late third millennium BCE deserves at least some credit. The notion of interchangeability of goddesses still haunts the field, fueled by Bible scholars, Helsinki hyperdiffusionists and the like. Overall the author shines in the sections dedicated only to the evaluation of the broadly Iranian material, but as soon as the focus switches to Mesopotamia things fall apart, sadly. More under the cut. Hope you don’t mind that I’ll also use this as an opportunity to talk about Annunitum in Sippar in general. I've been gathering sources to improve her wiki article further (don’t expect that any time soon though).

The Iranian material

Criticizing the vintage attempts at equating Anahita with Sarasvati is sound and sensible. Same with stressing that she is distinct from Nanaya and Oxus. The criticism of theories depending on lack of familiarity with the historical range of the beaver was a nice touch too, it demonstrates well that the author wanted to cover as much previous literature as possible. However, I also have no clue what’s up with “ΑΡΔΟΧΡΟ has an ambiguous relationship with Arədvī Sūrā”, I’ve also only ever seen this name explained as a derivative of Ashi/Arti save for a single paper trying to force a link to Oxus which was met with critical responses. It’s entirely possible this is an argument I simply haven’t seen though, I’m also not really familiar with this matter.

Overall the arguments against seeking Anahita’s origin in the east are perfectly sensible, and line up with the evidence well - no issues at all with this part of the paper. Following a more detailed list of Anahita’s easter attestations from Shenkar’s Intangible spirits and graven images. She appears on some Kushano-Sasanian coins, but this seems to reflect importing her from the west relatively late on since she appears in neither Kushan nor Bactrian sources. The coins are even exclusively inscribed in Middle Persian, with no trace of the local vernacular.

For unclear reasons Anahita caught on to a degree even further east in Sogdia, but attestations are limited to the period between fourth and sixth centuries. Since they’re largely just generic theophoric names, it is hard to call her anything but a minor deity of indeterminate character in this context, though. I’ve seen the argument that the popularity of Oxus in the east might have been the obstacle to introducing her. Oxus was a bigger deal in Bactria than in Sogdia so it could even explain why Sogdians were slightly more keen on her, arguably, even if they and Bactrians came into contact with her cult under similar circumstances.

Back to the article, the section dealing with the western attestations starts on a pretty strong note too. The need for reevaluation if it’s fair to talk about Achaemenid rulers as “Zoroastrian” is a mainstay of studies published over the past 10-15 years or so. I can’t weigh on the linguistic arguments because I know next to nothing about that.

I’m not sure if I follow the argument that it makes no sense Iranian population wouldn’t need a royal order to start worshipping a new deity as long as they were Iranian, tbh - linguistic or cultural affiliation doesn’t come prepackaged with automatically updated list of deities one is obliged to instantly adopt as soon as they pop up into existence. Following this logic, why didn’t Sargon’s Akkadian speaking subjects in Syria just adopt Ilaba before being obliged to do so? You will find literally hundreds of cases like this, it’s a very weird argument to me.

The Mesopotamian material

The biggest problems start once the coverage of Mesopotamia begins. The rigor evident in the strictly Iranian sections of the article just… vanishes and it’s incredibly weird. Herodotus as a source is… quite something. The phrase “ a goddess with a Semitic character” is… well, quite something too (Reallexikon generally advises against defining anything but languages as “Semitic” in Mesopotamian context - Mesopotamian is a perfectly fine label to use, and accounts for the fact that Sumerian, Hurrian and Kassite are not a part of the Semitic language family). It keeps repeating later and admittedly I’m not very fond of this. Especially when it pertains to the west of Iran, where deities originating in Mesopotamia were worshiped since the late third millennium BCE - they were more Elamite than Mesopotamian by the time Persians showed up, really. The matter is covered in detail in Wouter Henkelman’s Other Gods who Are with Adad in the Persepolis Fortification Archive as a case study.

Cybele was by no means Mesopotamian (with each new study she keeps becoming more strictly Phrygian, with earlier Anatolian, let alone Mesopotamian, influence becoming less and less likely) so I'm not sure what she's doing here, Nanaya’s associations with lions is almost definitely an Iranian innovation and not attested before the late first millennium BCE; despite earlier sound arguments against ascribing strictly Avestan Zoroastrian sensibilities to people in the late first millennium BCE, that’s basically what happens here. Lions were evidently viewed favorably by at least some Persians and especially Bactrians and Sogdians.

The less said about the part trying to link evidence from Palmyra to Inanna and Dumuzi (what does a marginal spouse deity like Dumuzi, entirely absent from Palmyra, have to do with Sabazius, a veritable pantheon head equated with Zeus?), the better. Frazerian bit, if I have to be honest.

I’m not sure about the enthusiasm for Boyce’s argument that it makes little sense for Anahita to simultaneously be a river goddess and to bestow victory in battle. The latter characteristic lines up well with her elevation to the position of a deity tied to investiture of kings, which in turn is something which boils down to personal preference of a given dynasty. The character of deities isn’t necessarily supposed to be one-dimensional and having distinct spheres of activity because of historical factors is hardly unusual.

Stressing that it’s not possible to treat Anahita and Ishtar as interchangeable is commendable. However, I don’t think it’s possible to claim continuity between the religious beliefs reflected in the relief of Anubanini and first millennium BCE Media. The argument is not pursued further, to be fair, but it’s still weird.

The next huge issue is the treatment of the late “Anu theology”. A good recent overview of this matter can be found in Krul’s 2018 monograph (shared by the author herself here).

For starters, it’s completely baffling to declare Anu had no spouse at first; Urash and Ki are both attested in the Early Dynastic period already - and the former appears reasonably commonly in this role in literary texts and god lists. Even Antu might already be present in the Abu Salabikh list.

Attributing Inanna prominence in Uruk and in the Eanna in particular to identification with Antu is utterly nightmarish and one of the worst Inanna takes I’ve ever seen; the fact it’s contradicted by information of the same page makes it pretty funny, admittedly. Inanna’s ties to the city go back literally to the beginning of recorded history (some of the oldest texts in the world are demands aimed at cities under the control of Uruk to provide offerings for Inanna ffs), and probably even further back. Meanwhile, Anu for most of his history was an abstract hardly worshiped deity; Krul stresses this in the beginning of her book linked above. I’m not a fan of ancient matriarchy takes which are often lurking in the background when the cases of earliest city goddesses like Inanna, Nisaba and Nanshe are discussed but I do think the need to downplay Inanna’s prominence and elevate Anu which pops up every few years in scholarship is suspect and probably motivated by sexism, consciously or not, tbh.

Trying to make the “Anu theology” which developed in the late first millennium BCE an influence on the entirety of Mesopotamia and beyond is puzzling. Sabazius appearing in Palmyra with a spouse is tied to Anu, somehow? The fact that deities had spouses is? Atargatis ties into this somehow? I’m sorry, but I’m not following. Also, Uruk was no longer a theological center of the Mesopotamian world in the first millennium BCE. Babylon was, and before that Nippur. There is no need to speculate, there are thousands of texts to back it up. The late sources from Uruk in particular show that Babylon was somewhat forcefully influencing the city, not the other way around.

The Anu theology was a display of local “nationalism” of Uruk and had a very limited impact. There is evidence for some degree of late theological cooperation between Uruk and Nippur, and possibly Der as well (Der itself despite being located with certainty has yet to be excavated, though, so caution is necessary), but nothing of this sort is to be found in the late sources from other locations.

Annunitum = Anahita?

Finally, let’s look at the core idea behind the article.

Right off the bat I feel it’s necessary to stress Annunitum generally wasn’t regarded as an astral deity. In the Old Babylonian period, the Venus role was evidently handled by Ninsianna in Sippar; later on they aren’t even attested there but the regular Ishtar is. Seems doubtful it would actually be Annunitum who got to be an astral deity there at any point in time.

This claim is also highly dubious. There is no evidence that Antu was ever worshiped in Sippar, let alone that she was equated there with Annunitum; she doesn’t show up at all in Jennie Myers’ 2002 thesis The Sippar pantheon: a diachronic study. Paul-Alain Beaulieu stresses her lack of importance all across Mesopotamia save for first millennium BCE Uruk here. There is also no evidence that the late Anu theology impacted Sippar in any capacity. Shamash retained his position in the city until the death of cuneiform. Even in Uruk, Annunitum in the late sources appears only in association with Ishtar and Nanaya, not Anu and Antu. I will repeat how I feel about the need to assert Anu’s importance where there is no trace of it. Overall it feels like unrelated Mesopotamian and adjacent sources from different areas and time periods are used indiscriminately; which is ironically the criticism employed in the article wrt the treatment of Iranian textual sources by other researchers. The Assyriological sources employed leave a bit to be desired, too. In particular Abusch’s Ishtar entry in the Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible is a nightmare (he’s good when he covers incantations but his broader “theological” proposals are… quite something), here are some quotes from it to show how awful it is is a central point of reference:

Of the other authors cited, Jacobsen is Jacobsen and a lot changed since the 1960s. Roberts was criticized right after his study was published by researchers like Aage Westenholz. Langdon’s study from the early 1900s is an outdated nightmare, I guess we know what’s up with the Dumuzi hot takes now. Beaulieu is great but his papers and monographs aren’t really utilized to any meaningful extent, I feel.

Other criticisms aside, I’m unsure if Annunitum was important enough in the fifth century BCE to be noticed by Artaxerxes II as postulated here, especially since Shamash was right next door and definitely retained some degree of prominence. Most if not all cases of Mesopotamian deities influencing Persian or broader Iranian tradition reflect widespread cults of popular deities - Nanaya, Nabu (via influence on Tishtrya), Nergal (in the west, around Harran) - as opposed to a b-list strictly local deity. And it’s really hard to refer to Annunitum differently. Let’s take a quick look at her position in the twin cities of Sippar - as far as I am aware, the most recent treatment of this matter is still Myers’ thesis, and that’s what I will rely on here.

Annunitum is first attested in Sippar in the Old Babylonian period, during the reign of Sabium, though as a deity already locally major enough to appear in an oath formula alongside Shamash. In the Early Dynastic period Sippar-Amnanum was likely associated with an enigmatic figure designated by the logogram ÉREN+X who doesn’t seem to be related to her. When and how exactly the tutelary deity change occurred is not presently possible to determine and admittedly of no real relevance here.

Evidently Annunitum’s cult in Sippar was influenced to some degree by the Sargonic tradition she originated in, her temple was even called Eulmaš just like that in Akkad. It’s not impossible it was even originally founded by one of the members of the Sargonic dynasty, but in absence of pre-OB evidence caution is necessary. There is no shortage of later rulers who wanted to partake in the Sargonic legacy, after all. By the earliest documented times, it was the second most important temple in the Sippar agglomeration, and the only one beside the Ebabbar to have its own administrative structure. Annunitum was even referred to as the “queen of Sippar” (Šarrat Sippar; note that by the Neo-Babylonian period this title came to function as a distinct goddess, though). In Sippar-Amnanum there was a street, a gate and a canal named after her. A bit over 6% of the inhabitants of both cities bore theophoric names invoking her, also. Sippar-Amnanum was abandoned for some 200 years after the reign of Ammi-saduqa, but it seems the clergy simply moved to the other Sippar next door. Next few centuries are very sparsely documented at this site, but supposedly Shagarakti-Shuriash rebuilt Annunitum’s temple (the matter is discussed in detail here).

Inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser I dealing with the conquest of northern Babylonia affirm that Annunitum continued to be viewed as the goddess of Sippar through the Neo-Assyrian period. According to an inscription of Nabonidus her temple, and Sippar-Amnanum as a whole, were razed by Sennacherib (he also blames “Gutians” for it though by then this is a label as generic as “barbarian”). This might be why her cult had to be relocated to the other part of Sippar again. In the Neo-Babylonian period it returned to Sippar-Amnanum under Neriglissar, though her temple was only rebuilt by Nabonidus. It survived at least until the reign of Darius, though it was only a small sanctuary (É.KUR.RA.MEŠ) like those of Adad and Gula.

There is very little evidence for popular worship of her so late on: only two theophoric names have been identified…. For comparison, Shamash appears in 208 (out of 823 theophoric names, out of a total of 1243 total). Nergal, Gula, Adad and even Amurru are all more common. Aya is also absent, but unlike Annunitum despite her prominence in earlier periods she was actually never common in theophoric names, save for the names of naditu; and naditu ceased to be a thing after the OB period.

Offering lists complicate the matter further. From the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, Annunitum started to lose ground to a duo introduced from Dur-Kurigalzu: a manifestation of Nanaya associated with this city and Ishtar-tashme. Why they suddenly appeared in Sippar and why they overshadowed Annunitum is uncertain, perhaps Dur-Kurigalzu just failed to recover from decline after the end of the Kassite period and eventually the decision was made to start transferring local deities to other nearby major urban centers. The process reversed during the reign of Nabonidus, who ordered an increase in offerings made to her. This might’ve been motivated by his general concern for Sin and any deities considered members of his immediate family - essentially, a display of personal devotion. This elevation is still evident in offering lists from the reign of Cyrus, though.

Overall the paper is quite convincing - outstanding, even - when it comes to the Iranian material alone, and between mediocre and nightmarish once the author shifts to Mesopotamia.

#mesopotamian miscellanea #hinadoll39

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droughtofapathy · 1 day

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"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

The Great Gatsby

All the sparkly costumes and grandiose set pieces can't disguise this show's intellectually and musically filthy core. With a creative team that seems to have missed the entire point of Fitzgerald's book, Bad Gatsby is a Vegas spectacle best suited to theme parks and audiences bereft of critical thought. I have no loyalty to the source material. As a lesbian, I didn't much care for the book and its protagonist who seems disinterested in women, and spent pages waxing poetry about the male physique. But even I know it's a classic brimming with intellectual nuance, while this production is anything but. The relationship between Gatsby and Nick is now only ever a passing acquaintance, rather than the very foundation. The show's aggressive heterosexuality sees Nick and Jordan (a forcibly-feminized, pick-me girlboss type) romping about as Gatsby and Daisy, somehow even duller than the book (and how was that ever possible?) sing power ballads at and about each other that say nothing, and move the plot even less.

This adaptation of the beloved classic novel gleefully excises any and all purpose. Nick's idolization and homoerotic love for Gatsby drives the book's narrative. Here, he's doing basically nothing. My kingdom for a dramaturg who seems to actually like and understand the book, rather than someone who just wants to capitalize on it being newly public-domain. Why, oh why, do people keep adapting classics they clearly do not like? I don't like Gatsby, so I'd never bother to write a musical adaptation of it.

And speaking of music, it's ill-suited to both the period and the story. Everything is all contemporary pop ballad, and as someone who doesn't care about or know much of Jeremy Jordan, it's not working. Perhaps it's my blatant lesbianism and pretentious disregard for the allure of youth, but he's never seemed overly remarkable. He's a white male tenor. There are fifteen-thousand who look and sound just like him. But from the constant shrieking up in the mezzanine, you'd have thought the Beatles had come back for a one-night-only reunion. Thankfully, in my front side-orchestra section, I was surrounded by older patrons who politely clapped and refrained from any such screaming. Also, Jeremy Jordan's accent is all over the place, and I can't imagine why.

The shallow production that sits in the (possibly cursed, at this point) Broadway Theatre, has been robbed of its social commentary, its purpose, its depth. The characters are caricatures, the subtext is spelled out on a chalkboard (A song entitled "The Green Light"???) and is in some fascinating way, a meta commentary in and of itself. A massive budget allows for not one, but two working cars to drive around on stage. The glitz and glam blinded the creatives to anything...creative.

And don't even get me started on the baffling decision to cast a Mexican-Asian woman as Daisy, the quintessential image of white privilege. What are we saying by having Eva Noblezada in that role? It's such a thankless role that it's not like her talents are being utilized. And her character is so weak and dull, even more so than the book itself. And she's out here doing a hit-and-run, and yet we're just gonna...gloss right over that, I guess? And Nick's disgusted by Jordan saying they shouldn't tell the police what they know, but then immediately goes to plead with Gatsby to get out of town? Having done no work in the show to justify this loyalty, it's just inconsistency.

Also, and now I'm just jumping around to things I didn't like, the scene where Gatsby gets shot is staged so that Wilson is pointing and shooting that gun right at the front right orchestra section. And staring down the barrel of a gun is not what I want to be doing on a Saturday evening at 10:30 p.m. He shoots that thing twice while pointed at the audience, and no thanks.

Anyway, the Florence Welch Gatsby is at the ART now, so let's hope that one actually understands the damn book.

Verdict: Someone Put This Dumpster Fire Out

A Note on Ratings

#the great gatsby #broadway #welcome to the theatre: diary of a broadway baby #musical theatre #theatre #i'm so tired of bad musicals i just need to see kimberly akimbo today and have my faith restored #and my heart broken...final performance

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possiblyawesometmblr · 10 months

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here's my theory based on the trailer: vanessa is a bold-faced liar. because look at this. this shot right here.

abby is stood well within lunging reach of foxy. she's right there. and sure, this could just be foxy getting distracted in the moment, but look at abby. she's not backed away. her hands aren't thrown up in defense, she doesn't even look scared.

if their goal was to "make her like them", they should be attacking her, right? at the very least, abby should be scared or something, but she's not.

my guess right now is that the animatronics and the kids inside are likely trying to protect abby from becoming like them. but vanessa can't let mike know that. she has to keep him distracted from the real person who's out to get abby --

the same one who got the original five.

#it's just strange to me that there aren't any shots of the animatronics actually attacking abby if that's their goal #you would expect at least one right?#but nope. nothing. she is never in a shot with an animatronic that's actually going for her #granted they did some good editing to make you feel like they are #but if you pay close attention there's always a cut or a scenery change #also if vanessa isn't revealed to be a follower of afton i'll be shocked #that's basically her entire character at this point #i don't see what helping mike does for her and afton unless she's actively laying down red herrings for him #fnaf #fnaf movie #vanessa fnaf #abby schmidt #mike schmidt #mike afton #william afton #theory #but that's just a theory a tumblr theory thanks for reading

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lord-squiggletits · 4 months

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One of my favorite parts of phase 2 (and indeed one of the few moments I resonated with IDW Prowl) was when the neutrals were coming back to Cybertron and Prowl said that he refused to let Autobots be pushed aside and overruled after they were the ones who fought for freedom for 4 million years (the exact wording escapes me atm).

And I mean, that resentment still holds true even once the colonists come on bc like. As much as it's true that Cybertron's culture is fucked up, and as funny as it can be to paint Cybertronians as a bunch of weirdos who consider trying to kill someone as a common greeting not important enough to hold a grudge over.... The colonists POV kind of pissed me off a lot of times, as did the narrative tone/implications that Cybertronians are forever warlike and doomed to die by their own hands bc it just strikes me as an extremely judgemental and unsympathetic way to deal with a huge group of people with massive war PTSD and political/social tensions that were rampant even before the war?

Like, imagine living in a society rife with bigotry and discrimination where you get locked into certain occupations and social strata based on how you were born. The political tension is so bad there's a string of assassinations of politicians and leaders. The whole planet erupts into an outright war that leads (even unintentionally) to famine and chemical/biological warfare that destroys your planet. Both sides of the war are so entrenched in their pre-war sides and resentment for each other that this war lasts 4 million years and you don't even have a home planet any more. Then your home planet gets restored and a bunch of sheltered fucks come home and go "ewww why are you so violent?? You're a bunch of freaks just go live in the wilderness so that our home can belong to The Pure People Who Weren't Stupid And Evil Enough To Be Trapped In War" and then a bunch of colonists from places that know nothing about your history go "lol you people are so weird?? 🤣🤣 I don't get why y'all are fighting can't you just like, stop??? Oh okay you people are just fucked up and evil and stupid then" ((their planets are based on colonialism where their Primes wiped out the native populations btw whereas the Autobots and OP in particular fought to save organics. But that never gets brought up as a point in their favor)) as if the damage of a lifetime of war and a society that was broken even before the war can just magically go away now that the war is over.

Prowl fucking sucks but he was basically the only person that pointed out the injustice of that.

And then from then on out most of the characters from other colonies like Caminus and wherever else are going "i fucking hate you and your conflicts" w/ people like literal-nobody Slide and various Camiens getting to just sit there lecturing Optimus about how Cybertronians are too violent for their own good and how their conflicts are stupid, with only brief sympathetic moments where the Cybertronians get to be recognized as their own ppl who deserve sympathy before going right back to being lambasted.

Like I literally struggled to enjoy the story at multiple points because there was only so much I could take of the characters I knew and loved being raked over coals constantly while barely getting to defend themselves or be defended by the narrative so like. It was just fucking depressing and a little infuriating to read exRID/OP

#squiggposting #and like dont get me wrong barber wasnt trying to make cybertronians the bad guys or whatever #it's just a problem with his writing where like. he has A Message he wants to send #and so he uses the entire story literally just for The Message even if it involves bullshit plotlines #or familiar characters ppl were reading about for the past decade being shit on by OCs made up to fill a new roster #like barber's writing tends to lean way too much on a sort of lecturing tone #without giving proper care towards including moments where characters get to like. fucking express themselves and share their side #sort of like how barber couldnt be bothered to write pyra magna and optimus actually talking to each other during exrid #and instead during OP ongoing pyra is suddenly screaming about how OP is unteachable #even tho she never even tried to teach him bc she and OP never interacted bc i guess barber couldnt be bothered #he just needed someone to lecture OP so fuck making the story make sense or like letting OP get to say anything in defense #this is the infuriating part of barber's writing bc i think he has incredible IDEAS and was in charge of the lore i was most interested in #but most of the time his execution sucks and he's basically just mid with a few brilliant moments occasionally #or like he has a message about the cycle of violence he wants to convey #but his narrative choices trying to convey that theme made his story come off as super unsympathetic to the ppl who suffered #to the point where barber actively kneecapped some scenes that couldve been super fucking intense and emotional #in favor of the characters lecturing each other or some stupid plot to criticize OP #that time in unicron where windblade screamed about how this is their fault and then arcee replied that her planet is build on coloniation #shouldve happened more often than literally the last series of the ocntinuity. like goddamn stfu about your moral superiority #when your own sins are right fhere lol

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