#they still hate each other so bad they just are having identical story arcs separately | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

greensaplinggrace · 3 years

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honestly THANK YOU for saying all that abt baghra bc i thought i was going crazy from not liking her??? bc i haven't read the books and only summaries of them on wiki and like. i dunno why ppl like her actually even in the show bc this guy, her son, is like "i wanna make the world better for us grisha" and she's just like "no." even tho he sees that she's MAKING HERSELF SICK from suppressing her powers! she's literally like in bed coughing in the flashback yet seem much healthier at the little palace. also like after everything, after her disapproval, after the fold, after centuries of waiting for the sun summoner.. he never abandons her. he makes sure she's cares for. he doesn't harm her. and i have to wonder if baghra has ever thanks him for that, for just not leaving her alone. like i dunno how im suppose ro believe aleks is a heartless villain when he still cares for his abusive mom like this. like has baghra even told her she loved him (honestly she reminds me of a classic emotionally unavailable asian parent but maybe that's just me). also im wondering if baghra ever told aleks that he had an aunt.. bc like.. now that u bring up her isolating him it's like hmmmm...

not at me being like alina... why do u trust the bitter old woman who literally beats u with a stick and verbally abuses u every chance she gets.. just bc she showed a bad painting... like.. pls use two braincells to see that who u figured out as his mother... is also using his protection..

like baghra could've upped and left with alina. but no. she stayed bc she knew she was safe under aleks's protection.

alsoim just impressed that after his first friend tried to drown him and harvest his bones... he didn't go into hiding???? he still wanted to make a safe heaven for grisha!!! HE STILL WANTED TO PROTECT GRISHA EVEN AFTER HIS GRISHA FRIEND TRIED TO KILL HIM FOR HIS FUCKEN BONES. like... this is the guy im suppose to believe is the villain???

honestly i feel like part of the reason why LB's plotlines seem so bad and disconnected (and sometimes outright racist but that's another rant) and why darkles is disproportionately more violent and villainous in the later books is bc she didn't expect the darkling to be so popular and wanted to stick with her guns of making him the villain. but also wanted the money from aleks's popularity. but like you can't have ur cake and eat it too.

Well thank you for sending this ask! It's very sweet and very passionate. I'm glad you liked my post! I didn't put as much thought into it as some of my others lol. I kind of just talked. But it was nice to be able to finally talk about some of the problems I have with both her character and the fandom/author's perception of her.

HERE is the post this is referring to, in case anyone's wondering.

👀👀 You've hit the nail on the head for so many things, here!

Baghra is extremely emotionally unavailable, basically to the point of neglect. She's also verbally and physically abusive, traits which I doubt were only reserved for her students and not her son. Baghra claims she would do anything to protect him, but I've known a lot of parents who have that mindset and yet still harm their children because they think it's "good for them".

Aleksander stays at Baghra's side for years, and even when they're opposing each other she's never too far away from him. Idk if you've read the books but he does eventually hurt her. And as much as I don't like Baghra, I think his actions were horrid. But I'm also honestly kind of surprised it took him so long lmao.

Yeah I mean, in terms of isolation, let's not forget that she never wanted to introduce him to his father, either. Baghra's sense of eternity clouds a lot of her judgments on relationships, which means she views most people as dust and therefore teaches her son to as well. The problem with that is that he's a growing child, and he needs those social and emotional attachments for healthy development.

I would bet quite a bit of money that Baghra has either never told him she loves him or she has told him so few times it's practically forgettable.

And everything becomes more complicated because so many of Baghra's actions are understandable because of her life and her history, but the impacts they have on the people around her, especially Aleksander, are permanently damaging. And the fact that that's never gone over in critical depth in the books or how it's glossed over in fandom is just very disconcerting. Like, acknowledging Baghra's failings doesn't mean we're excusing Aleksander's actions, it just means we're holding Baghra liable for her own. Which the fandom should be doing, considering she's the epitome of an abusive parental figure.

And Alina trusting Baghra over Aleksander is even more confusing! Especially in the show!! This is the woman who beat her and abused her and tortured her friends when they tiny little children (and who probably still does so now that they're adults). This is the woman who mocks you and harasses you and insults you on a regular basis. Why does Baghra revealing she's Aleksander's mother make Alina change her mind?! Like fuck, I'd just feel bad for Aleksander. No wonder he kept it a secret, I would too! And that painting is enough evidence?! Really?! A random painting shown to you by this abusive mentor that's been making your life hell. That's what you're going to betray your new lover over?

The friends trying to harvest his bones thing is a good point, too. I think Aleksander, especially show Aleksander, is incredibly idealistic. I think he cares too much for others - those he's deemed worth his care (a sentiment given to him by Baghra). Despite everything she's tried to teach him about hiding and abandoning others and never caring and never doing anything to help or reach out or connect with people, Aleksander still continues to do so. It's likely because he never got it from Baghra growing up, and so is desperate for those emotional needs to be fulfilled elsewhere.

His turning point, when Baghra tells him it was understandable that those kids tried to kill him because the world is such a hard place for them - that's crucial. And the reason it's possible as a motivating factor is because of that idealism and that desire to help and that desire to be everything his mother isn't. Baghra tells him this trauma he just experienced was because of the oppression of his people, and instead of following her lead and accepting that, going into hiding and abandoning everybody to their misery, he goes I can do something about that. I can make it so this never happens again. Which is usually how trauma like that combines with one's core personality traits at a young age, especially when there's none of the essential support systems in place to aid in recovery (ie, the role Baghra should have been filling but wasn't, because she decided to exacerbate the problem instead).

And yeah, one of my biggest problems with the ham-fisted "beating you over the head with a sledgehammer of evil deeds" look-how-bad-this-character-is! portrayal of the Darkling in the later books comes from the impression I get that Bardugo doesn't trust her readers. She's so desperate to have us hate this character and think him an irredeemable villain, not trusting any of her readers to engage critically with a morally gray character, that it feels quite a bit like condescending fucking bullshit. Which ew, I know how to engage with literature, thanks.

She really does seem to look down on a large part of her fandom, and imo, the infantilization of the female characters in her books seems to carry over to her impression of most of her female readers as well. Which is why the Darkling's character arc gets fucking destroyed. But he's still a good cash grab, of course, so she'll shake his dead corpse in front of the fandom for money every time she wants something from it.

Also! Another reason I think her plotlines feel disconnected (I'm sorry Bardugo I respect you as a person, but shit-) is because the writing in SaB is just bad. I mean, nevermind the absolutely nauseating implications of the way she portrays the Grisha as a persecuted group who's situation is never actually fully addressed as it should be, considering Grisha rights is what her main villain is fighting for (imo for a series called the Grishaverse, LB seems to be pretty anti Grisha), but her characters and story alone are just wrong for each other. They don't fit together.

And the ending is one of the main pieces of evidence in that regard! You can’t say the ending where Alina isn’t Grisha anymore is her “going back to where she started” when she’s always been Grisha. She just didn’t know she was Grisha because she denied that part of herself that she was born with.

Alina is reluctant to move forward or change, she struggles with adapting, and she’s very set on the things she’s grown attached to throughout her life. She also has some latent prejudices against the Grisha, and so denies the possibility of being Grisha for those reasons as well.

Alina’s lack of powers in the beginning of her life because she willfully doesn’t learn about them to avoid change versus her lack of powers at the end of the book when she’s accepted them and then they’re stripped away from her by outer forces are two entirely separate circumstances. You can’t make a parallel about lost powers and lack of Grisha status bringing her back to the start when she was always Grisha and she always had powers and she simply refused to come to terms with it because of personal reasons.

The first situation is an internal conflict that indicates a story about growth and a journey of self acceptance. Denying herself the opportunity to learn about her heritage and to find acceptance with a group of people like her because she’s tied to the past and because of the way she was raised is the setup for a narrative that tackles unlearning prejudice and learning how to connect with a part of her identity that was denied her and learning how to grow independent and self assured. It’s the setup for a different story entirely. The second situation is an external conflict that centers around the ‘corrupting influence of power’... for some reason.

In a world where Grisha do not have social, political, or economic power and they are hunted, centering your heroine’s journey of self acceptance and growth around an external conflict about... the corrupting influence of power (in a group of people that don’t actually have any power?!) just doesn’t work. It is literally impossible to connect the two stories Bardugo is trying to push in Shadow and Bone without seriously damaging the main character’s developmental arc.

The only way a narrative like this would work, claiming that she has gone back to where she started, is either a) if the Grisha weren’t actually a persecuted group and instead were apart of the upper class, or b) if the one bad connection between the two instances is acknowledged - that Alina denied a part of herself crucial to self acceptance and growing up, and that losing her powers at the end has also denied her. It is a tragedy, not a happy ending.

Alina suffered because she didn’t use her powers. She grew sick. It was bad for her. This was not a resistance to 'the corruption of power and the burden of greed', it was her suffering because she couldn’t fully accept herself.

Framing the ending as a return to the beginning can’t be done if you don’t address how bad the beginning was for your main character. You brought her back to a bad point in her life. You regressed her. This should be a low point in her arc. It should be a problem that’s solved so she can finish developing organically or it should be something that is acknowledged as a tragedy in it’s own right, for the future the world (the writing) denied her.

This is a ramble and it makes no sense and I’m really sorry, but my point is that Bardugo put the wrong characters in the wrong story. The character arc required for organic development doesn’t match the story and intended message at all. The narrative doesn’t fit the cast. She's got two clashing stories attempting to work in tandem and she ends up with both conflicting messages that fans still can’t comprehend in her writing and an ending that doesn’t suit her main character to such an impossible degree that it’s almost laughable.

So yeah, there's a few reasons why I think the story and the plot feels so bad and disconnected. I hope you don't mind me making this answer so long! 😅 I was not expecting to write this much.

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cant-think-of-anything · 3 years

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I think part of the reason that there’s such a dissonance between what kind of character Matthew is ~supposed~ to have and what kind of poor traits shine through, especially in his treatment of Alastair, is not just because of CC’s poor handling of alcoholism (and, in my opinion, mental health issues and depression) but also because: Our first introduction to these characters happened a long ways before some major changes to TLH.

Namely… Alastair and Cordelia were basically white in CC’s original planning. There’s just no way around that. Their flower cards, where they’re not just whitewashed but purely white, prove that (and they STILL haven’t been updated, by the way.)

Also, Alastair’s hair: in CoG it was dyed blond, and CC wrote it off implicitly as a racism thing when she decided he was Persian (which I guess happened after the short story where we met Alastair and before TLH) , which would have been fine it if it was an arc written better. Except, I don’t think she realized that it would make Matthew’s comments about Alastair inherently and obviously racist, being a white author. And I doubt that it will be dealt with and named or even acknowledged outright in the final TLH installment.

Kind of the same thing with Cordelia. I’m not saying POC can’t have like red hair because obviously POC don’t come in a prepackaged set of five or six traits that are all configured randomly, but something has always rubbed me the wrong way about the way that CC writes the majority of her POC and especially WOC as exotic. I mean, Kamala as a character is to me a special favorite (even though CC did her dirty and didn’t do a good job portraying her character or intersectional identity) but I rolled my eyes so hard when she had lighter brown or “amber” eyes in canon or officially commissioned art. With Cordelia, I know CC once said she uses henna to redden her hair which is great for her, and I guess I have less of a bone to pick with that because it’s semi(?) realistic, but still. Also the fact that so much of her description as a beautiful person comes from her hair. Again that’s cool, and women of color should be loved wholly including being loved for the parts of them that they freely change (such as Cordelia’s hair) but… the proportion of the fixation on her hair as what makes her lovely rubs me the wrong way sometimes. I feel like it’s sometimes an out from CC making the ~scandalous~ decision that a woman of color can be beautiful because of the traits she is born with. Idk it’s just for me I had this long standing repulsion towards my colorings and my facial structure and white girls would tell me I was whiny about it and then I finally began to piece together things like “Eurocentric beauty standards.”

Going on a tangent slightly, but something else that bothered me was when Anna insulted Cordelia after buying her those dresses and everyone kinda treating it as a compliment? And just cause Cordelia, a fictional teenager, didn’t get mad about it doesn’t mean readers of color can’t see the underlying racism behind “Cordelia looks MUCH better in these dresses which are SUITED for her skin tone.”

I think that narrative could have been handled much better: if it was Cordelia picking out her own clothes as an act of maturity and self-realization and ownership, if Cordelia herself said (in a different way lol) “Damn right I can wear lavender ruffles if I want to and crimp my hair but I’m not going to let white fashion prevent me from outshining everyone because dark skinned women INVENTED jewel tones.” And I think some people will argue that Cordelia’s context makes this too self aware of a development but I would say that it would have been a powerful part of her development outside of her relationships, especially considering that she’s supposed to be a main protagonist. Full arcs for the win baby!

But even aside from all that what bothered me about Anna’s dresses was the fact that it was a white woman showing the “truth” or the “right way” or “saving” a woman of color, a trope which I don’t think CC intended but committed nonetheless. I think from a white author POV the thinking was “Anna is such a free bohemian who lives true to herself and she’s going to help Cordelia become that way too,” which irks me because I feel like that just worked against CC in terms of POC rep and also because that same ideology is used in an attempt to make Anna’s treatment of Kamala justified even though Anna as an out person, with racial and economic privilege and the support of an extensive and powerful family network, pressured and tormented Kamala into coming out.

I have a lot of thoughts on that relationship, mainly: it shouldn’t have been dragged out this long because from the beginning, Every Exquisite Thing, it was clear they were looking for different things. And if CC had left it at that and let them go on their separate ways after a week of knowing each other that would have been fine: Kamala can’t do an out and proud relationship and Anna doesn’t want secrecy, so they’ll develop on their own. And then later Kamala’s pursuit of Anna in the actual TLH books was I think meant to be a thing about “the lengths you’ll go for true love” but it felt forced. Honestly… It just feels icky. like this woman of color is just so hung up on this white woman who abuses her repeatedly and can’t handle her own misogyny and internalizations. And I hate that because both had such awesome potential! To me it’s less that I dislike Anna ( I’d need a whole other post to explain that) and more that I dislike CC for wanting so bad to claim sapphic rep but not wanting to put in the effort to portray it effectively- and pretty much all that entails is writing the relationship without acting like it exists in a pseudo-vacuum where the history and realities of interracial relationships and queerphobia don’t exist in the way we obviously recognize and experience.

And characters like Cordelia and Alastair are amazing and have so much potential; I think the true origin of the problems with their portrayal is that they weren’t really intended as POC or even queer representation in the first place. I don’t know if Cassie would have taken a different approach to her characterization had she known Alastair would be a brown gay man when she first introduced him, but I hope it would have at least made her more conscientious of the inherent application of colonialism and racism in her storytelling from that point onward.

I want to finally add that I’m not saying any portrayal of racism is bad. I’m saying that the racism in the story is not part of a conscious framework that critiques racism appropriately. I think CC wrote the beginnings of the narrative, decided she was going to develop the diversity point content, and then either didn’t look back at the older content to analyze it and the other (white characters) through a new lens of race and outsiderness and queer personhood, or she looked at it and didn’t know what to do with it, or looked at it and didn’t care.

Sorry this got so long! Thanks for listening.

- A.

I feel like CC handled everything poorly in regards to characters who had a lot of potential.

The fact that Cordelia and Alastair are both originally white and it's so obvious in the way every bit of racism is handled by the characters. Matthew's comments in CLS are very important and they should've been handled with the same severity that Alastair's words were. CC changing the characters to POC was a big decision and when she did so she should've went back and actually read her own material. I can assure you that it will not be handled in CHOT, my expectations for CC recognizing the importance and gravity in the words she writes regarding racism or any of her "implied racism" bullshit have gone to the ground.

Because while golden eyes are obviously so easy to write when discussing discrimination obviously racism is out of the question /j

THAT'S EXACTLY IT, women of color in these books are so pathetically rare that on the rare occurrence that she does write them they should all be given these features that aren't as common in POC and written as more beautiful because of those features. I read CHOG after I became more appreciative of my ethnic features but if I had read this a year or so ago? Or even if I had read it after just feeling insecure in general? It would've been awful. The implication is that the lighter features in POC are the most beautiful, with Cordelia's red hair being put on a higher pedestal than her dark eyes and Kamala's eyes being focused on more than her hair (because I literally went back and counted the numbers to prove it and it's exactly what happens.)

I'm sure Cordelia's hair is stunning, but it's the way that when she's described (or more accurately being sexualized) it is just her hair and body that is shown, not the color of her skin or the color of her eyes.

God the pastel thing pisses me off so much. It's not even that Anna tells Cordelia that she would look better in darker colors it's that she says it suits her skin tone. Implying that anyone with brown skin should be barred from wearing pastels. And Kamala? In the few times she is described, she's wearing dark colors or champagne gold, never light blue or purple or pink WHICH HONESTLY SUITS HER PERSONALITY. It's also the way that the dresses Anna sent her are described to be more revealing- it's weird. Anna barely knew her when she started dictating everything that Cordelia could put on her body.

“Damn right I can wear lavender ruffles if I want to and crimp my hair but I’m not going to let white fashion prevent me from outshining everyone because dark skinned women INVENTED jewel tones.”

I literally would have loved that. It recognizes that she doesn't need to follow these "rules" on what to wear but still shows her choosing what she wants to wear without making all the darker skinned readers feel like they can't wear a certain color.

I think what some people fail to realize is that these books are also aimed at upper elementary and middle school and a middle schooler with dark skin reading something like that? In a book with characters they love? It's going to be so harmful

Someone else mentioned that CC said Kamanna's relationship was complicated because Kamala didn't defend Anna: Defend her FROM WHAT? Literally what is there to threaten Anna?

These books are filled with tokenism and then praised for it. The idea of Kamala X Anna has so much potential but they're portrayed in such a toxic way. Throughout the last through books Kamala puts herself through so much guilt and regret and turmoil just for Anna to literally use her, blame her, and cast her aside. And it's so fucking annoying because it pushes this idea that this woman of color who was terrified and in an extremely vulnerable position is in the wrong for choosing her safety and presents them as guilty and shameful for doing such a thing.

I would disagree, the portrayal of racism is bad, because it is used at random points in the story and never brought up again, if you interduce racism take it seriously it's not the kind of thing you're meant to half-ass in a book thousands of people will read

I agree on everything else though, so much of these books are incredibly harmful and they are presented to a young audience so it's overall just a gross situation

Thank you for the ask though! I loved answering this, if you ever have anything else you're more than welcome to come back <3

#kamala joshi #alastair carstairs #cordelia carstairs #tw racism #tw sexualization of minors #tw sexualization #anti anna lightwood #anon #asks #tw swearing #long post #tlh #anti cc #the last hours #let me know if i missed a tag #also let me know if i got anything wrong

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ouyangzizhensdad · 4 years

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Phoenix Mountain Kiss and Consent/Boundaries in MDZS

The following opinion, expressed in the recent mdzs controversial opinion thread on twitter, is actually one I’ve meant to address for a while:

Even if most of fans loves the 'stolen kiss scene' in the Phoenix Mountain in the novel, that was a sexual harassment.

People in the fandom, especially those who were introduced first to the novel through cql, have a tendency to criticize the Phoenix Mountain kiss scene, saying it was non-consensual. My problem is not that they are wrong. The kiss is (or starts as, at the very least) non-consensual. My problem with this criticism is that people point this out as if it were a mistake. As if mxtx had meant to write a romantic kiss and had instead fumbled it all up and made it not consensual by virtue of not being woke, not being a good enough writer, or being too influenced by bl tropes. And that readers are too unsuspecting or not educated enough to realize the wrong mxtx committed.

Here’s my hot take: The kiss is non-consensual because it was written to be non-consensual. mxtx is not trying to pull the wool over our eyes. The reason why we, as readers, can infer that, is because the non-consensual aspects of the kiss are important to the events of the plot, some of themes explored in the book, lwj and wwx’s relationship after wwx’s return, and lwj’s character arc. mxtx uses this moment and its aftermaths, amongst others, to make a point about consent and communication in relationships--one of the central themes of the novel. Shocking, I know. Arguing that consent and communication are a main theme in mdsz: now that's a controversial opinion.

Now, I won’t argue mxtx always manages to develop this theme with utmost finesse. You can critique and disagree with her treatment of the theme throughout the novel (taking into consideration, as well, how it’s not just explored through lwj and wwx’s relationship). That being said, isolating events in the novel like the Phoenix kiss scene to mark them as Good or Bad without considering the context in which they happen and are explored within the novel is just bad literary analysis :/.

Let’s first consider this simple statement: the non-consensual aspect of the kiss is not accidental--mxtx knew it was non-consensual when she wrote it, and she wasn’t trying to hide that fact.

By the time we reach the Phoenix Mountain competition, lwj has accepted his feelings for wwx, and that these feelings will not be returned. After all, in the xuanwu cave, wwx took great pains to ‘reassure’ him that he is super-straight-and-totally-would-never-flirt-with-him. Yet, wwx continues to ‘flirt’ with him--tossing a flower at him just before the competition--which we can gather is a source of, um, great torment for him.

We are not privy to lwj’s thought process leading to the stolen kiss. What we know for certain, however, is how he reacts to and perceives his own actions after the fact. Through wwx’s unreliable narration, we can still understand that lwj immediately regrets his actions and feels uncontrollable anger towards himself and his lack of self-restraint. While wwx has more complicated and contradictory feelings bout the kiss, lwj clearly sees his actions as wrong and disrespectful. He is scared of what he has been capable of doing unto another person--pushing wwx away the moment he sees him after the kiss.

The person spun around. It was Lan Wangji after all. However, right now, his eyes were bloodshot, his expression almost frightening. Wei Wuxian was startled, “Wow, so scary.”

Lan Wangji’s voice was harsh, “Go!”

Wei Wuxian, “I just came here and you want me to go. Do you really hate me that much?”

Lan Wangji, “Stay away from me!” [chapter 69]

As readers, we are told that the Phoenix Mountain kiss, nor its implications, is not something to consider lightly. The fact that lwj’s reaction after the kiss is written in, and that it is so intense for someone usually so reserved, or the fact that we learn that more than a decade later he is still ashamed of himself and describe himself as having done something wrong (or, very wrong 很不对 ), all prove that the non-consensual aspect of the kiss is not an accident and is not downplayed as something to expect from someone in love with another person.

蓝忘机闷声道：“我，那时，自知不对。很不对。” [chapter 111]

I can already hear some people ask: even if it was not an accident, why chose to include a non-consensual kiss between the two romantic leads? if not because it is a bl trope/weird kink, why did mxtx chose to put this in her novel? what do we gain by including dubious consent or non-consensual interactions in our fiction?

The long-short answer is: because the act of crossing boundaries is a very productive story-telling device for any piece of media focusing on any type of interpersonal relationships. Crossing boundaries--willfully or unintentionally--is a source of conflict, internal and/or relational, which can drive the plot forward, shape character development and relationships, as well as be useful for certain thematic discussions.

Current discourses regarding consent in English-speaking, mostly-western spheres of the web tend to be very polarized, painting people who cross boundaries as bad. The solution presented (i.e. how to not be a bad person) tends to be an invitation for everyone, within any relationship, to constantly negotiate consent verbally and honestly: to constantly disclose boundaries, to constantly ask for permission, etc. While I do not dismiss the value of these suggestions, it is an ideal representative of certain socio-temporally specific cultural expectations of what communication is, how communication should happen, and how relationships should be like, etc.. Human relationships are messy, people are flawed and hurt each other, and we have complex internal lives (for instance, someone might not realize their wants or limits until they are faced with them). Instead of having media show us only a specific type of idealized relationships where boundaries are never crossed, ever, they allow us to explore the implications of boundaries within interpersonal relationships. Or, sometimes, media and fiction just aim to represent or are influenced by this very real part of human relationships, and use it as a way to create conflict within the narrative and relationships (sometimes in a interesting manner, sometimes in a very gross manner).

In mdsz, the Phoenix mountain non-consensual kiss is a two-fold source of conflict: internal (lwj) and relational. While wwx remains unaware until he and lwj are together of the identity of the person who kissed him, the implications of the kiss ends up shaping their relationship both before and after wwx’s rebirth.

A source of (unknown) conflict between lwj and wwx after he is summoned back from the dead is the fact that lwj believes wwx is aware of his feelings. But this conflict is further compounded by the fact that lwj has once forced his feelings unto wwx, and is utterly afraid that he would dare to ever do it again. That is why, every time wwx initiates physical contact, or flirts very deliberately with lwj, lwj never goes further than what wwx has initiated. Sometimes, he even de-escalates their proximity or level of intimacy (usually by asking wwx to “ 别乱动” or, famously during Drunk#2, by literally knocking himself out) --out of fear that he, again, would lack self-control and do something wrong to the man he loved. He never presumes he has the permission to push their relationship further than what wwx is offering. Without that added source of conflict, would it have been reasonable to expect lwj and wwx to have realized their mutual feelings earlier, even with the issue of lwj not being aware wwx does not know of his feelings?

“In the beginning, the reason for behaving in such a manner was to let Lan Wangji be disgusted with him and kick him out of the Cloud Recesses, and they would never have to meet again, going their separate ways. Lan Wangji couldn’t possibly tell what his real intentions were. Yet, [..] even when faced with Wei Wuxian’s various actions, tricks, and pranks, Lan Wangji never once lost his temper, reciprocating with restraint and courtesy.” [chapter 99]

That is all true, of course, until Drunk 3. Here again, the ghost of the stolen kiss plays a part in accentuating the conflict. Without it, would lwj have jumped to conclusions as quickly? And, plot-wise, the shared perception of wwx and lwj that they have taken advantage of the other is a source of conflict that does multiple things--it gives wwx an incentive to go look at the temple at night to distract himself from his guilt and sadness, instead of going the next day with lwj (at which point jgy would have had perhaps already left) and it keeps wwx in the dark about lwj’s feelings until lxc reveals to him the events of the past he has forgotten. Here again, issues of consent are clearly taken into consideration as a source of conflict, shaping both characters’ motivations and the events of the plot.

Finally, the theme of consent/boundaries is an important aspect of lwj’s internal struggle, particularly in relation to his father’s choices. The kiss is part of his journey.

It is not coincidental that the Lan motto is “Be Honorable”/”Self-restraint,” and that lwj is presented as the model Lan disciple. This element is part of the context that gives narrative and thematic meaning to the non-consensual kiss. When lwj forces a kiss on a blindfolded wwx, lwj goes against the values he holds dear and the teachings that were imparted unto him--prime internal conflict.

But what is also interesting, to me in any case, is how consent is the thing that ultimately differentiates lwj’s choices from his father’s.

How willing was Lan-furen to be saved by Qingheng-jun? to be taken to live in seclusion in the Cloud Recesses? to be married to him? to have children with him? The novel never tells us clearly. However, the novel gives us an idea of how lqr, lxc and lwj perceive their parents’ relationship. For lwj, we are given an insight into his perception indirectly during the following conversation between him and lxc.

[Lan Xichen] spoke, “Wangji, is there something on your mind? Why have you been so tense?”

Of course, in most people’s eyes, the ‘tenseness’ probably looked no different than Lan Wangji’s other expressions.

Lan Wangji’s brows sunk low as he shook his head. A few moments later, he replied in a low voice, “Brother, I want to take someone back to the Cloud Recesses.”

Lan Xichen was surprised. “Take someone back to the Cloud Recesses?”

Lan Wangji nodded, his expression pensive. After a pause, he continued, “Take them back… and hide them somewhere.”

Lan Xichen’s eyes immediately widened.

[…]

“Hide them somewhere?”

Lan Wangji frowned softly. “But they are not willing.” [chapter 72]

Indirectly, we come to understand that lwj draws parallels with his father situation: they both want to protect someone by taking them to the Cloud Recesses, but these persons are unwilling. The unsaid question here is, would I choose to do as our father did?

The non-consensual kiss is part of lwj’s journey, through which he comes to understand that, despite his strict upbringing and disciplined lifestyle that was supposed to keep him from becoming like his father, he is capable of being his father (or at least who he thinks his father is). He learns that he can understand what sort of passionate feelings could bring someone to do something that goes against not only the wishes of his clan members, but the very wishes of the person they love, for the sake of keeping them safe or for the sake of having them by their sides. And at the end of that internal journey, lwj chooses not be like his father--to put wwx’s decisions and wants and needs first. After buyetian, lwj offers his protection and confesses his feelings--and wwx rejects him. lwj respects wwx’s choice, while still going against his clan to protect him. He brings wwx back to Mass Grave Hill knowing full well that wwx would not survive long the wrath of the four great sects seeking revenge against him, and goes home to receive his punishment.

Overall, what I tried to say in many many words, is that the Phoenix Mountain kiss is not non-consensual by accident. It is not because mxtx is an awful person or is not educated enough, or because she thinks dubious consent is romantic. The fact that it is non-consensual is addressed within the narrative, fuels internal and external conflicts, and is as well woven into the plot structure and the themes of the novel. The kiss is not an outlier element, added to titillate a readership--it exists as an integral part of the novel.

I’m not saying it’s not okay to decide that you do not want to engage with any content that includes non-consensual interactions or dubious consent because that triggers or irks you regardless of the way it is handled. It is totally valid to not personally enjoy or have criticisms about choices mxtx made in exploring these themes, in presenting the internal and relational conflicts around consent/boundaries, or even in the way she decided to write the scenes that figure dubious consent. However, it is not really helpful to divorce an event from its context within a piece of media in order to brand it as either Problematic or Unproblematic, Good or Bad.

Note: Much more could be said about the theme of consent/boundaries in mdzs; this is not exhaustive in the least.

Note2: Much more could be said, in relation to the question and theme of consent, about: the cultural limitations of Westerners to engage fully with a text written for a chinese audience; the limits of fan translators to fully understand the nuances and themes of a novel and to communicate them in a different language; about the place dubious consent and non-consensual interactions has had in the romance/erotica genre for a long time, and no, not only because Misogyny or Homophobia.

#re: controversial mdzs opinion twitter thread #mdzs #mdzs meta #excuse my english lmao #wangxian #this is 2k i'm sorry

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peachcitt · 3 years

Note

I've seen a lot of people saying that rot was BAD, what is your opinion?

OH IM SO GLAD YOU ASKED

like most people (im sure) after finishing rise of the titans, after wiping up my tears i went to the rot tag to see maybe some gifs or something. you know, make myself cry a little more. instead, i found a bunch of people saying how much they hated the ending, how it was as terrible as some of the worst big finale bombs (endgame, game of thrones, etc) and uh. im not saying the ending is perfect, but it is DEFINITELY not as disastrous as what people are making it out to be, in my opinion. i thoroughly enjoyed the movie, actually, and i thought it was an effective way to end the tales of arcadia.

warning: rise of the titans spoilers, as well as general tales of arcadia spoilers

were there some things i didn't like? yeah!

the major things i didn't like align with a lot of what i see other people saying:

the weird mpreg plotline with steve. it just felt so strange and out of place, and it was used as a tactic to remove eli and steve from the major action, which i don't like.

and the 'ninth configuration' thing that, once again, excluded eli and steve. i didn't see a reason why they shouldn't have been there, seeing as they have contributed to trollhunting since nearly the start of all of the tales of arcadia. multiples of three are clean and smooth, i get it, but at the expense of two characters that were so lovingly developed in trollhunters and 3below?? yikes

with that being said, though, i don't agree with what a lot of people are saying about the time travel at the end. obviously, they bring up some good points - by changing the timeline so drastically, there's no way for jim to ensure that they'll be able to succeed or if the arcane order will even act in the same way. it's a big 'if' and it is worth thinking about

but people have been saying that the ending is out of jim's character and negates his arc, and i have to say. that's not true.

if you've been following my blog since july 1st, you'll know that ive spent the past twenty one days rewatching the entire tales of arcadia series at a steady pace, and within that time, i've paid a whole lot of attention to jim's arc as a character and how the finale of trollhunters left me feeling as if something just wasn't clicking right. his arc wasn't finished.

because all throughout trollhunters, jim is constantly having to prove his worth - and most of the time, the way he's proving his worth is by sacrificing himself. he takes all the blame when anything goes wrong, and on some level, jim never truly learns the lesson from season one of trollhunters that he's enough as a hero because he has his friends to back him up. like, yeah, he relies on them a bit more after that, but in the end, he still stands in the bathroom alone, separated from all his allies, and shoulders the burden of turning into a troll alone. and he leaves arcadia, the city he was fighting so hard to protect, and he leaves his best friend, the one that has been with him since the beginning.

then we get wizards, where jim lets himself be corrupted to save his friends. and then, because of that sacrifice, he ends up hurting all of them. i believe this fact - that he willingly corrupted himself, separated himself from his allies, and ended up hurting the people he loved - shook jim's foundation as a hero, which is why he can't believe he's the trollhunter without the amulet. the amulet was the physical manifestation of what it meant to be a hero to him, but it was destroyed when he was corrupted - it was destroyed when he hurt his friends.

that's how we see him in rise of the titans; he's still struggling with his identity as a hero because he doesn't have the amulet or the unshakable foundation he previously had of his heroism. literally everyone is looking for him to be the leader and make the huge, world-saving-or-destroying decisions, but he can't shoulder that huge burden knowing he could hurt everyone. and then, just to add fuel to the fire, it's his plan that causes people to die or be permanently separated from the group. and he can't even get the sword out of the stone! why? because he himself doesn't see himself as worthy - how can you think of yourself as worthy when you just got two of your allies killed and two more gone, presumably for forever?

but this is the moment it finally clicks for jim. he looks around at his allies, and he sees them reflected in the amulet. he's not alone, he doesn't have to be worthy just by himself, he has an entire group of people who have fought by his side time and time again that, even despite all the mistakes and missteps he's made, are still by his side.

and what makes the amulet work, in the final fight, is his firm determination to see this fight through, no matter if he has the armor or not. he's terrified, he's probably going to die - but it's that bravery despite the fear that makes him a hero, a trollhunter, amulet or not. and he knows that now - he's had to face it before, in the unbecoming episode, but it's different now. in the unbecoming episode, he was truly alone when he decided to face the fight. and he's alone here in rise of the titans - but not for long! because almost immediately after jim comes to terms with his place as a hero again, toby comes along, and he doesn't finish this fight alone!! he finishes this fight with another trollhunter, who doesn't have an amulet!!

jim deciding to rewind time to back before the events of trollhunters is a bold choice, but it tracks with a theme in wizards - merlin told douxie that what set him apart as a master wizard was his belief that every life was valuable and worthy of being saved. this theme is repeated in the new amulet in rise of the guardians; it's for the glory of all, not just for one person.

and jim deciding to have toby become the trollhunter finally marks the completion of jim's arc. instead of shouldering the burden alone, which is inevitably what would've happened if jim had rewound time, kept all of his memories, and accepted the amulet again, jim is choosing to accept allies into his life sooner. instead of being the trollhunter, jim is letting himself be a trollhunter, alongside all the other trollhunters.

of course, there's some things in this alternate timeline i don't like; mainly that no one stepped in to stop steve from bullying eli. that, to me, was the most out of character, and i can only assume jim didn't step in because he's leaving room for that fight to be toby's; competing against steve was a large jumpstart to jim feeling like he could be strong enough to bear the mantle, and maybe jim was just trying leave it up to toby to establish that on his own. still, i didn't like it.

and, of course, there are people lamenting the fact that none of the heroes of arcadia know each other or that they might not have the same relationships, but i immediately thought of the time loop episode in 3below. in that episode, the trollhunters team and the gang from 3below meet and become friends and ultimately lose the memory of that friendship from that day. however, in that episode, blinky says that true friendship would last against the test of time; if they were meant to be together, then they would be. and guess what? even though none of them remember that happening, they all still became friends. it was meant to be.

i think a lot of anxieties about the changed timeline are because people loved the events of trollhunters so much that they a) don't want to see anything changed and/or b) are trying to project the events of trollhunters onto the new timeline and are upset when they don't fit. toby won't be the same kind of hero that jim is, though - he never has been. inevitably, the story will be different, and that's scary. that was the risk jim took, though, and jim has always trusted in toby, so why shouldn't we?

to me, tales of arcadia has never been about clean endings that make you feel entirely good. they've always left me with a tang of bitter along with the sweet, and i think that's the point. tales of arcadia has always battled with hard questions and difficult endings, and i don't see rise of the titans being any different from that.

like i said before, i don't think rise of the titans is perfect. but you can hate it as much as you want; i still really think it did a good job with the story it was trying to tell. i mean, ending with the idea that all lives are important and worth saving, no matter the risk? that heroism inherently means being part of a collective that you trust and believe in? that through time and space, you will always be able to find and connect with the people you love? that's powerful.

im climbing off my soapbox now, but basically tl;dr: rise of the titans was a good finale, despite it's imperfections, and i think that's all i can ask for.

also if you don't like toby as the trollhunter just because you don't like him breaking out of the 'funny sidekick' archetype you can die by my blade

#anon #ask #rise of the titans #rot #rot spoilers #jim lake jr #rott #rott spoilers #what im trying to say is media does not have to be perfect in order for you to enjoy it #and not only did i enjoy rot i also just. thought it was good? it didn't invalidate any of the rest of toa to me at all #the story we witnessed was still valuable; that was why we were shown this version #i won't get philosophical but like. i am.#all that being said it should've been jim telling the story in the beginning #WBKEBKEWKW I JUST REALIZED THERE WAS NO DOUXIE WITH HIS SICK ASS GUITAR. so that too

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erbezdiez · 3 years

Note

On your Seiya and Usagi post, you had a tag about an AU and YES I WANT TO HEAR please(:

YESSS *RUBS MY GAY LITTLE HANDS*

Click the read more because this post turned out longer than I expected but SEIUSA AU HERE WE GO

Okay, so this is basically just “The Sailor Starlights come to earth at the beginning of the series instead of in S4″ AU. In that specific scene/whatever, Fighter hears Sailor Moon screaming during her first fight and goes there to save her on pure instinct, not because she’s looking for the Silver Crystal or anything.

Honesty in my head I wouldn’t necessarily get rid of Mamoru or anything and the whole thing would kind of follow the same basic beats as the canon Sailor Moon story.

After the first fight, Fighter would get curious about Sailor Moon, and with time she’d end up aiding her too from time to time in her battles. Maybe she can even meet Tuxedo like that, when they both go to save SM at the first time or something safsadgs. Usagi would develop her crush on Tuxedo Mask while at the same time being curious about Fighter as well. Also during all this time Fighter is flirting with Sailor Moon because she’s a big lesbian and I love her, which would leave her feeling ~~confused~~.

Meanwhile, the Three Lights could serve as the standard “popular idol” like Minako does in PSSM, though I do like the idea of their popularity growing through the series exponentially.

Sometime after the senshi go meet Queen Serenity, Fighter would be aiding Sailor Moon and the others in a fight, but then get hurt herself. Then Maker and Healer can make their appearances, introducing the full group. They wouldn’t appear much more, but they would make it very clear that they’re not after the Silver Crystal so the senshi can have the whole “they’re not our allies, but they’re not our enemies either?” thing.

After the finale of S1, I like the idea of the Starlights noticing the senshi have forgotten about their identities and Figher being sad, but deciding that it’s better this way.

They could have a bigger part during the Makai Tree arc because that arc is great and I don’t care if it’s filler, where maybe they can sense something similar to Kakyuu’s light in the Makai Tree or something. Seiya and Usagi could meet while Mamoru is away as their civilian selves, and of course, Seiya falls for Usagi right away without knowing she’s Sailor Moon. Usagi however rejects him, because she’s still hoping Mamoru will return to her. When he does get his memories back and all that, Seiya stays friends with Usagi without telling her about his feelings.

And then during the Black Moon arc. Seiya could become a sort of emotional support for Usagi; she’s not sure why she likes talking to him so much, but it’s like he gets him in a way no one else does, not even her best friends. They grow especially close then Mamoru and Chibiusa go through the whole Black Lady thing. By this point, the Starlights are still focused on searching Kakyuu and only get involved in the other’s fight when they happen to be there or it’s something very serious, but they’ve become a sort of “sometime-allies we can rely on when something goes wrong”.

But then, of course, the Death Buster arc happens, and Uranus and Neptune are immediately wary of the Starlights since they’re from outside the solar system. They could go from suspecting them of working with the Death Busters, to attacking them on-sight. At the same time, Haruka meets Seiya while he’s hanging out with Usagi, and distrusts him right away. Partly because she feels “he’s just dangerous” and partly because let’s be honest she’s a bit mad that Seiya gets better reactions from Usagi than she does. Through this whole arc, Mamoru and Usagi begin to drift apart as she starts relying more on Seiya than on him, but she always denies the possibility of having romantic feelings for him, especially because she knows that Chibiusa existing at all depends on her staying with Mamoru. This however does nothing but strain their relationship even further.

Before the end of the arc, the Starlights would explain to all the senshi that they’re looking for Kakyuu, so Uranus and Neptune can stop trying to kill them for one second.

The Dead Moon arc is all about ChibiUsa and Usagi, and by this point, it’s undeniable that Usagi likes him too. Chibiusa could actually talk to Helios about this in her dreams, and how she’s actually scared Usagi will choose Seiya over Mamoru and either create a paradox or straight up kill her.

I would use Nehelenia’s motivation in this point as a way of separating the current Usagi (and by extension, Mamoru and everyone else) to their Silver Millenium selves. In Death Busters Uranus and Neptune are affected by their destiny in a positive way (they’re soulmates who can finally reunite, much like Serenity and Endymion) but in a negative way, when they think there’s no way to stop Saturn from destroying the planet. Now, when Usagi senses how much Nehelenia hated Serenity and her mother, she would feel sorry for her. Usagi had nothing to do with Nehelenia’s punishment and feels like Queen Serenity did a bad thing she can’t excuse. By creating this crack in the perfect image of the Silver Millenium, Usagi would begin to question if just because Serenity loved Endymion that means she should love Mamoru unconditionally.

And then of course, the Stars arc!! By this point, Usagi and Seiya are very close and both have feelings for the other, the Sol senshi trust the Starlights in varying degrees, and Usagi isn’t sure if she truly loves Mamoru and wants to fulfil her destiny. By the time Mamoru goes to America, he tells her they should “take a break” while they’re away so they can sort their feelings out.

I would also have Mamoru actually get to America instead of being kidnapped by Galaxia. Enjoy your education, boy!

Usagi tells Seiya rather quickly about this development, and they get even closer than before. Chibiusa hasn’t returned to the future yet, either because she senses it’s unstable or because she’s too worried about Mamoru and Usagi to leave them. She can tell Usagi that she knows how she feels about Seiya and that she’s broken up with Mamoru, and that she’s afraid of what that means for herself. For a while, Usagi starts avoiding Seiya because every time she thinks of him, she imagines Chibiusa disappearing and she can’t bear to choose between the two of them.

Then one day, Seiya gets targeted by one of Sailor Galaxia’s lackeys, and Usagi has no choice but to transform in front of him, revealing her secret identity. Seiya is surprised, but before he can say anything, Usagi runs away.

Seiya isn’t sure what to do, and she can’t even tell Taiki and Yaten about it because it would betray Usagi’s trust. One day, Seiya finds Usagi crying under the rain (or maybe the moonlight?) as she feels the weight of the whole world is in her shoulders. Seiya reaches out to Usagi, but she pushes him away when she thinks about hurting ChibiUsa. Seiya takes her hand anyways and holds it to his chest, telling her to look after her own happiness instead of the happiness of others for the first time. Usagi cries, and Seiya wipes her tears off. She then says “you were crying that time too at the jewel shop”, and Usagi isn’t sure what he means. Seiya transforms in front of her, showing her her true self.

This only makes Usagi confused for a second before she realizes that of course, it makes so much sense now. In a moment where she allows herself to think of her own happiness, she kisses Seiya.

She then rushes back home, suddenly afraid that she’s made Chibiusa disappear, but to her surprise she’s still there, alive and well. Chibiusa is suspicious of Usagi’s actions, but she leaves her be.

Shortly after this, before Seiya and Usagi have the chance to properly explore their relationship, the rest of the inner senshi have to transform in front of the Starlights (and vice-versa). By this point their relationship is much less tense than in the canon (both groups think of the other as allies, and now they’re united under the same enemy), and while Haruka still doesn’t like Seiya too much, she accepts her when Usagi defends her.

Eventually, the final battle comes, and in this version, I’d actually like Galaxia to be the villain not because Chaos corrupted her and she doesn’t have a Starseed, but because she became bitter and angry by the mere act of having to fight Chaos over and over again.

Turns out Sailor Galaxia isn’t just the most powerful Sailor Senshi of the universe; she’s the most powerful Sailor Senshi of all universes. Each time Chaos is born, she travels to that universe to destroy it. She’s been doing it since the dawn of time and is now so tired of her destiny that she just joins Chaos willingly.

So during the final battle (which honestly I’d leave almost the same because that battle is amazing), Usagi makes Galaxia see that she doesn’t need to keep on fighting just because someone decided it was her destiny. The existence of the Silver Crystal, the Golden Cyrstal and Kakyuu prove that Chaos can be fought against by other people, and that she’s already done more than enough. By realizing this, Galaxia lets go of Chaos, and by joining forces with Sailor Moon (and maybe with all senshi there present, even if it’s in spirit form), they manage to destroy Chaos.

I didn’t mention her anywhere else but ChibiChibi is here! And in this version, she actually is Sailor Cosmos, who’s awakened after Chaos disappears. She tells Usagi and Galaxia that Cosmos and Chaos will always be in battle, but that as long as people don’t let it consume her, peace will reign through all universes.

So the peace is restored, and the Starlights have to go back to Kakyuu. All senshi share a farewell in the school building, where Seiya struggles to let of Usagi and she has to try her best not to beg her to stay. Mamoru (who was captured during the final battle but is OK now) notices how Usagi hasn’t looked at him the way she looks at Seiya in years, and catches up very quickly. Seiya says that going back to restore her planet with Kakyuu is her duty, to which Usagi can’t say anything, because she feels she too has a duty to fulfil on earth.

But as they’re flying off into space, Yaten Taiki and Kakyuu tell Seiya that she’s already done more than enough. Seiya looks at them for a moment, when Usagi breaks down and cries, begging her to stay. Seiya leaves the space teleportation whatever the Starlights were using and jumps towards Usagi, who only barely manages to catch her. Everyone laughs and they kiss.

Later, they discuss whether or not this changes their destiny, since Chibiusa has never seen Seiya in the future. Setsuna could then explain that they may as well have created a new universe where nothing is set in stone, and that their future is now in their hands.

----

...And that’s that!! SORRY THAT WAS SO LONG asfshkgjhdfgksd. I know this fandom is very small so if anyone wants to idk expand on this idea or change anything or use it for something please go ahead!!! More seiusa content is always welcome. I hope you enjoyed this really long read!

#seiusa #sailor moon #text post #long post #sammbamm72 #asks

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ignitification · 3 years

Text

LoV Colour Analysis Part I: Shigaraki Tomura.

As this analysis would be quite too long to read in one go, I decided to split it into three parts, each covering one of the Three Main Villains of BNHA (Shigaraki Tomura, Himiko Toga and Dabi).

All three do denote a precise and powerful colour scheme, but on today’s episode I am going to focus on the Leader of the League of Villains aka Shigaraki Tomura or Shimura Tenko.

Shigaraki’s colour pattern variates from Red (shoes and eyes), Black (his usual outfits, his hair when younger) to Light Blue, Grey and White (colour of his hair, skin and hands).

The interesting fact is how Shimura’s colour evolve with his persona and Quirk. The third paragraph is dedicated to the colour Yellow, which is not part of the palette associated with Tenko, but I included it because it adds to the detailing of Shigaraki’s character.

(Spoilers ahead! & tw/: mentions of canon-compliant violence; death)

I.) From Black to Light Blue to White

During his growth, evolution as a villain and person, not considering the one spurred from his Quirk, Tenko’s hair undergo a quite big development. While the colour of his clothes stays more or less stable (being black throughout the entire series), what differentiates his eras is the colour of his hair. In his childhood, before manifesting his Quirk, Tomura’s hair was dark (strikingly similar to the one both Touya and Izuku sported). This changed to light blue/grey in his years until last arc, where after being himself an experiment under the hands of Doctor Death (Kyudai Garaki is a very creepy man) to inherit the original AfO’s Quirk, his hair becomes snow white (as a result of the transformation, I would believe - but it might as well mean another thing which I will talk about later).

Beginning with maybe the easiest association: the colour black.

A little note of the fear association: in this case, I would like to interpret it as Shigaraki being aware of his decaying Quirk and freak people out because of that, and because of his external looks, which do look like the one of a decaying child.

Power refers definitely to both his position and his Quirk, in this case - which make him stand out even more. However, the strength in this case, in my opinion, is more a smoke screen: black is also worn as a protection from external damage, as in stress and emotional backlash. This creates a barrier between the subject and the world, protecting internal emotions, and hiding its vulnerabilities, insecurities and lack of self confidence. The emotional trauma, the ‘hands shield’ Shigaraki derived, in a way, from his trauma and from being confronted with something, has shaken him to the core since childhood, and in this case the clothes serve to protect him from himself and his ‘actions’. In this aspect, him wearing black as a child might also stand for him trying to shield himself away from his parent’s judgement and stare, while protecting his will to want to be a hero, despite their negative reaction to any hint of that. These meaning are, in conclusion a full circle: one calls for the other, especially in Shigaraki’s case.

Black is also associated with mystery, evil and aggression. Shigaraki is written as an enigmatic villain, cold-hearted, devoid of any humanity and the will to full front destroy everything in its path. And while the meaning perfectly fit to how Shigaraki should be, I do believe that this is a very superficial and banal description of such a complex character.

One thing which I found particularly interesting about this colour and its relation to Shigaraki, it’s the rocky tie that appears between black and its meaning as in rebellion. This aspect might refer to two different conditions: it might suppose a certain degree of refusal and hate for authority (The society at large), and at the same time the rebellion from his own family/persona/mentor, which could entail a fundamental foreshadow for Tenko’s destiny.

The color black affects the mind and body by producing feelings of emptiness, gloom, or sadness.

I think here again, this might just an extermination of the feeling that have been torturing Shigaraki from the inside since he was a child, and that he himself has not acknowledged, which also stands to explain how he tries to feel that void or to ‘eliminate the scratch’ that has been tormenting him, and that knows no peace.

Furthermore, In Japanese culture, the colour black mainly denotes non-being (apart from mourning) and evil-heartedness in a person. This meaning is consistent with the personality described to us by Horikoshi: Shigaraki Tomura ceases to be a person at one point, when his consciousness gets subdued by AfO for a while. It is important to note here, how White (on the other side of the spectrum) is also the colour of death and mourning.

Not entirely worth mentioning, is that black is the stereotypical colour worn by villains and bad guys in different fictional environments.

(Light) Blue/Grey.

Just a reminder: neither grey nor blue are explicit colour in Tenko’s palette as a character, but I think they are still important and since greyish blue (the precise colour oh his hair) has not its own meaning, I took the freedom to actually associate the two separate colour in association to describe this period of transition between black and white.

The phase in which Tomura has Greyish-Blue hair is the longest one (in terms of years), but also the phase of passage (which consequently is the phase he is exploring, and is in the ‘grey zone’, where things are just getting defined and there are no absolutes). Grey, in this sense, sports both characteristics from White and Black (depending on the shade used), and even if not explicitly used for Tenko, it still represents a landmine in his development.

The colour grey is an ‘unemotional’ colour. It is detached, neutral, impartial and indecisive - all traits that can be reconnected at Shigaraki. Indeed, it is after his encounter with Izuku at the mall where he recognises why exactly (or so he thinks) he rages and wants to bring destruction to the world as known. This indicates how he has been striving for a real purpose, like the one Stain has, in order to actually understand what he is doing and evolve from the child the Heroes define him as, to a Villain with the capital V. He does relate to reality in partial ways, while he tries to define his identity as something that has died inside of him, Shimura Tenko, and at the same time the part that has lived on through the memories he removed and the hands which accompany him. He does not know which part is stronger, and trying to figure it out he tries and fails, only to try again. To confirm the shaping of Shigaraki, indeed grey is a conforming colour and most of all it struggles with identity, which is arguably the most prominent trait Shigaraki presents during the first arcs of the story.

On the other hand, Blue symbolises coolness, passivity, fidelity. Somehow it reverberates the meaning of grey, while at the same time enhancing its other effects (it being emotionless and calm, undecided but also flowing). Blue is also indicator of depth, wisdom, confidence, and intelligence (among others). This also confirms the precedent meanings (of especially white) and it adds another dimension to Tenko’s character. It is clear how he feels deeply, and is still very clever in its own way. Still, this development and phase serves for him to obtain the other characteristics proposed by blue, especially wisdom and confidence (refer to Black where I said how sometimes the clothes are a screen to hide his true feelings).

Blue is a colour that’s constant and unchanging, which contrasts with grey and brings forwconstant struggle in Tenko. Blue is also nostalgic. Curious is how blue lives in the past, relating everything in the present and the future to experiences in the past. I think that this is what blue is about with Tenko: he struggles to look forward, to forgive and let go because he never forgot his dad, his grandma or even society for when they had brought upon him as an innocent child. His bringing up has been focused, after all, on his developing his constant feeling of sadness, rage and gloom and the necessary power to express them in confident ways, which could bring destruction forward. Tenko is a puppet in AfO’s hands since he has ‘saved’ him, so I think this is why the sentence in which Shigaraki tries to break free from AfO’s will is a break point for the story, and for Shigaraki as well.

Blue is also known for being deceitful and spiteful, depressed and sad, passive, self-righteous, emotionally unstable, weak, unforgiving. It can also indicate manipulation, unfaithfulness and being untrustworthy.

Indeed, it is after that Izuku sees Tenko being kneeled over by AfO and his presence that he understands that Shigaraki too, is human and that maybe the reasons for his rage and absolute hate for everything he comes across have deep roots, which is why even if he cannot forgive him for all the pain he has brought, he wants to save him.

Finally, the paler the blue the more freedom we feel - which brings me to my theory on what, throughout the years Tenko’s hair have been ‘decaying’ and bleaching out. I think that as a child, Tenko is caged and tries to break free of his cage, of his ‘itch’ but he cannot because he does not realise what it is, and there is no freedom for him to actually understand. The first time he uses his Quirk, he feels finally satisfied for the first time. He tasted freedom for the first time, and now he wants to do it again and again. Growing up, however his ideals become blurry and he does not understand what he actually wants. He does know that the hands on his body represent what he has lost and what is actually still there with him, giving him strength and will, but at the same time he does not know what is beyond there. Which is why, after he goes through the transformation by Garaki, his hair becomes white: he gets rid of the insecurities, of the shackles that have stopped him from actually achieving his goal, or rather to pursue it freely. His ultimate goal, after all, is to get rid of his ‘itch’, which, in its own way, it’s his language to say that Shimura Tenko wants freedom.

As a note, Blue is also the colour of the Throat chakra. It is located in the throat, but it is linked to the throat, neck, hands, and arms. This Chakra is linked to speech.

Final remark on blue: this colour is one of the most important lucky colors in Japan ( together with yellow, white, purple, green and, red) - and all the colour associated with Tomura, except for black, is indeed considered lucky.

White

White, is an inherently positive colour, is usually associated with purity, innocence, light, goodness, beginnings, possibility and perfection. However it is also described an dperceived as cold, impersonal and bland. Shigaraki after his ‘transformation’ is the perfect soldier: he is very powerful, to a fault, and represents a new chapter in not only his own life but as well in the one which has been conducted by AfO, as he sees him as his vessel. The fact is that the beginning of a new Shigaraki which is flawless, in appearance, is a very well constructed lie. While he should represent perfection, first of all his transformation has not been entirely completed and furthermore, while it does represent a clean slate in his check, is also the possibility, reality coming through for AfO to take advantage of the body new, which Tomura must preserve. As the new Shigaraki however, has his ideals very present and wants to fight for them, to protect his feelings and his ideas, it is anyway a struggle for both him and AfO to juggle through everything going on Tenko’s mind, and emerge victorious. This is also the most interesting aspect of this colour: the goodness and inherent purity which comes from this colour implies a purification process in Shigaraki’s character, who instead gets fixed even more on him not wanting to forgive society and insisting on going on his rampage, because at the same time he cannot let go of these feelings, because now they are the only thing which make him go forward.

White is usually used in contrast to black, and represents the dichotomy of good and bad.

The psychological meaning of white is wholeness and completion. This also refers to the meaning and falls into the category of ‘perfection’: it is a new beginning, but at the same time it represents the closure of a cycle and the beginning of a new one: a perfect one, which represents closure (‘The Circle’). Tomura is supposed to be the new complete weapon at AfO’s will, but as I states before this is a fought point (between the two of them).

White, in cultures that believe in reincarnation is held in high regard. Indeed, they sustain how white is a sign of rebirth.

Technically, Shigaraki has been reborn. What I mean is that he has transformed himself into not a new person, but in a better version of himself, he upgraded - and now of course going back is not an option. He has been held in a womb, breeding his new potential and now he became an individual whose strength far surpasses normal, his quirk control is absolutely insane and as well his memories, ideas and feelings are heightened. The theme of rebirth, which I think fits both Shigaraki and Dabi, is used a few times in BNHA, but as for Shigaraki it is very literal and very clear (after all he has been asleep for a time, just to wake up and fight an entire war against the Heroes). It is clear however, how his personality has been rebirth too: while he was not insecure, but more hesitant, now he is sure of his objective and he thrives on achieving it. What distinguishes therefore the old Shigaraki from this new one is the knowledge of being powerful and therefore being able to accomplish what we wants.

Finally, white inherently denotes death and mourning too in the Japanese culture, as well as black. Here, we are mourning the old Shigaraki, and the loss of the traits that instead made him a little bit more human, and a little less like God himself.

II.) From Red Eyes to Red Shoes (in association with both Izuku and Katsuki)

I already talked about the colour red in regard to Izuku here, but if we take the same meaning and apply it to Tomura instead, we get a different picture. It is no mystery how Izuku and Tenko are foils for each other, and that they resemble each other in different ways (starting from them sporting red shoes, to their characters, being ‘accepted’ and trained by a mentor, and so on).

Red is the colour of extremes. It appears clear how Izuku and Tenko represent the opposite extremes: where Izuku is enamoured of heroes and idolised them to an unhealthy point, even though he comes from a background where he has been discriminated by that same society because he was different, Tenko is disillusioned with the society they live in. He wants to destroy to the ground, because he cannot find it in himself to forgive anyone who could and did not extend him a hand when he needed it. At the same time, both Izuku and Tenko believe that to a certain extent what they had done has been ‘deserved’, and are not entirely focused on their own well being.

Red is also an attention-bringer. As I already noticed for Izuku, it is very curious how both wear red shoes, as a way to try and separate themselves from the rest, trying to escape the opinions of other which have labelled them in a way, and of course at the same time trying to take control and wanting to be the best in their own ways (hero or villain, that is).

Red is also the colour of blood, of rage, anger as well as desire, leadership and strength. I want to make a point which I do not know whether is important or not, however, a fact that struck me hard is how Shigaraki’s irises are very very small, and it somehow seems that he tries to compensate the little quantity of red of Shigaraki with wearing red shoes. This might be an indicator how Shigaraki strives to achieve these qualities, but at the same time he needs to put a lot of effort in it, and furthermore it somehow feels different from when we compare it to Izuku: even if both are charismatic leaders, Shigaraki is very dispassionate about it, while Izuku frequently denies how his influence might be fundamental when it comes to other people (Katsuki, All Might, 1A). However, Shigaraki does reflect in his personality, the venous desire to be angry, aggressive and destructive as it what his power entails, and after all what has been taught to him. I noticed as well a post (which unfortunately I cannot find) where it says that Shigaraki has a very high tolerance pain (again, the parallels with Izuku are insane), which also reconnects somehow to the colour red as we saw how Shigaraki himself even if tired (LoV vs Machia/LF) or absolutely bloody and at the brink of death is instead held up by his will to destroy (Shigaraki vs Heroes).

It relates to danger, power, determination and action. Well, Shigaraki and danger go to hand in hand as well as determination and action. After all, Shigaraki’s Modus Operandi is Trial and Error, which means he is not afraid to be wrong and to try things out, even if he is stubborn and ways things to go his way, every time (when that rarely happens in general).

Red is indeed determined, powerful, impulsive and aggressive. It is also tied to self-preservation. Although true for the most part, the self-preservation is still a massive blank point.

He is bloody, and even AfO is telling him to rest and preserve his energies (even if here, my counter argument would be that it would be easier for him to overtake Shigaraki’s body if he is weaker, so I do not know how reliable this is).

The color red in Japanese culture denotes strength, passion, self sacrifice and blood. It Also stands for good luck and happiness. Which is still very amusing to me, as Shigaraki feels like the farthest character away from achieving happiness, and his passions and strives are all useless unless he gets rid of his master puppeteer. However, Shigaraki embodies the self-sacrificing spirit. Even if it might sound strange, and he is not very willing to be himself in the front lines (at least not always), he does approach ReDestro himself and takes him on, while leaving the League to deal with the rest.

III.) Yellow

Surprise, surprise! Yellow, in the Japanese culture stands for Courage, while usually the Western culture associates it with Cowardice. It is a funny thing that it also stands for betrayal, sickness, egoism and madness on the negative side, however it is rather a holy colour, usually associated with deities on the other side.

Since I am not going to include yellow in the association paragraph, it is not a case that black reacts badly to yellow, and forms a very unpleasant colour, which means that the circumstances which follow either do not mix well together. However, it is also true how the most resonant contrast between yellow and another colour is given by black.

Plus yellow is the colour of the Solar Plexus Chakra and it is the symbol of vitality and will. All these elements, however present in a very limited amount in regard to Tenko, are telling of the aspect of authority (reconfirmed and amplified by black) and somehow, the lack of bright colours of Tenko makes the little yellow details resonating of a sad picture, as it embodies more the negative sides (egoism, sickness - and in part sickness).

Colours in Association.

Black used in contrast–particularly with white or yellow–does create energy (especially the contrast on shapes and just power that the image of waken up Shigaraki creates in the last arc is enough to send this message). It is as well true that black when used in opposition with white, symbolises the eternal struggle between day and night, good and evil, and right and wrong - a thing that for Shigaraki is somehow a metaphor and a literal representation of himself as a character. A perfect example would be the struggle he has with AfO for his body, where he struggles between his internal feelings and dreams and instead the evil will imposed by him by AfO, as well as in terms of consciousness where him being present and conscious is the day, while being subdued to AfO’s will in the Night.

Black usually represent the end, but the end always implies a new beginning. So when the light appears, and black transcends to white, it instead the colour of new beginnings. I already talked about how rebirth theme and the new beginning on new ideals and dreams is represented for Tenko by the colour white, however it is interesting also to note how his change in personality brings him from his childhood dream to being thankful to AfO who raised to him, but wanting to be even greater than AfO himself,- metaphor for Tomura’s life as being free from shackles of reality.

Bluish-Grey is also defined as ‘livid’, an adjective used to describe anger or decoloration of the skin (caused by bruising). This colour gives a sense of detachment - which also goes to review the colour grey and blue, in them being interpreted together as an entity, and how Tomura feels a detachment from his own memories, and past life, as well as his future (When Did We Ever Need A Future?) and instead seek meaning in everything that surrounds him.

Red and white are prominent traditional colours in Japan. Both colours are used in decorations at events which represent happiness and joy.

On a non serious note, Shigaraki’s date of birth is 4th of April, and casually the colours associated with April are Burgundy (deep red) and White (according to the Japanese etiquette).

And finally last remark for this post: it is very funny how Shigaraki’s palette is somehow almost the same as Bakugou’s (with the exception of green - which I would like to interpret as if Bakugou did not have Midoriya as his side, he could have ended in a far worse position, with no hope and no one to compare to).

Thank you for reading.

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thatblondeperson · 4 years

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So I learnt from that Tim Drake Guy's tumblr that Steph is a bully and abusive with Tim is that true. I ask since I know you seem to agree with a lot of the thoughts expressed on that blog. Can you help me find some examples of Tim/Steph comics. I was going to get YJ but the same tumblr blog says it's bad

So I want to preface with some very solid advice I've learned from being in fandom. It's really hard to learn anything from any blog because so much of it is opinion based, that the line between headcanon and canon gets far too muddied too often, and there's also always going to be biases that come from very personal spaces. It's important to take everything that every blog says ESPECIALLY in the DC fandom, with a very large grain of salt because half the fandom really doesn't actually seem to source their information with anything other than out of context panels, shitposts, or their own perfect ideals of what they want to gleam from the pages of each comic. It's all interpretive, and I'm sure that sounds a little bit petty, but I'm adding myself in here too because I have my own opinions separate from others, despite my firm ideology in staying as close to canon as I possibly can.

As far as that blog, I actually strayed away from them because I no longer agreed with a lot of what was being said. It got to the point where it was getting very unnecessarily negative all the time, and I want no part in this ship war that drives practically every bit of drama in the Tim fandom. I think that there is a lot of merit to some of the opinions on that blog, and they're clearly an expert on Tim in many ways. I knew them personally, so I can attest to that. But I think they also read only what they WANT to read on every page, and I think that makes for a lot of gaps where misinformation can leak in. That got filled with a lot of straight up wrong assessments of Stephanie Brown, and unfortunately that blog was already prime traffic for antis to spew unnecessary hate, so once the blog itself got on board, I tapped out.

No, Stephanie is not an abuser or a bully. I think tumblr throws around the word abuse far too casually. At most, Steph teases Tim, but never to a malicious or purposefully hurtful extent. She pokes at him, just like you would with a best friend. He barely even protests. A simple "Steph..." every now and again, but he even teases her back often and jokes with her. She's not an abuser, in fact, she herself is a victim of severe abuse in her childhood. Her flirting at the beginning of her and Tim's relationship is a bit intense, but she's 15, and doesn't know how to catch his attention. Her boyfriend was clearly way older than her and did not treat her well, her father abused her mother, and she was sexually harassed by her father's friends. She's never seen a healthy relationship to know how to act. Once they get together, she mellows out and is actually very compassionate and kind with Tim, and especially supportive.

A lot of haters throw around all this terrible stuff she did.

They say she stole Robin from Tim. He stepped away from the mantle, and she thought she caught him cheating, and Bruce opened up the opportunity for her.

They highlight a time when she almost blew Tim up. Bruce told her to do something drastic to force Tim to be a better Robin. Should she have thought it through? Yes. But she was young, and still desperate to prove herself.

Steph is a loose canon throughout a lot of her appearances. She doesn't always think before she acts, and that is one of her major flaws. She gets into trouble often, and that causes a lot of tension between her and Tim, often from him becoming overprotective of her.

Steph starts out fairly cynical in the beginning and softens up over time. After the explosion stunt with Tim, she does get her act together and she goes through a fantastic character arc where she really improves upon herself. She becomes a beacon of hope, but she really already was one. She's always been a source of light for Tim. She's a constant tether for him throughout their relationship, and she constantly bringing him back to reality. I think their dynamic is really great, and it does hurt me a lot how often she gets dragged through the mud now. It's tumblr, what can you do?

It's also interesting to me how often Steph is called out for being the unhealthy one, and they never talk about how Tim was the shitty boyfriend way more often:

Kept his identity from her but didn't respect keeping hers private

Kissed her when he was dating someone else at the time (he's actually kinda known for subtle two-timing, but this is hardly brought up by fans)

Essentially stalked her for a while

Often told her she needed to stop being Spoiler (overprotective nature yes...but still)

Interesting how the relationship is only toxic because of Steph. Hell she even gets shit for getting upset that Greta straight up tried to kill her in Young Justice, because they think it was selfish of her that she was desperate to learn Robin's identity. Yeah sorry...murder vs wanting to know your crushes name? Which is worse?

I'm also not going to sit here and demand that everyone love Steph. It's ok that people don't like her, I could give 2 shits, but if they're gonna spew hate, I'd prefer it be rooted in truth. Some of what I see written about her is just so so wrong...there's a trend in anti culture to even write her as Tim's rapist which YIKES. That's so beyond a healthy amount of dislike for a character.

Anyway, comic recs!!!

Detective Comics 647-648. (First appearance of Steph/Spoiler with classic "love at first brick" moment.)

Robin 57-65 (First date issue which is the cutest thing ever. Robin does a little flip at the end because he's so happy. And the chronology of Steph being pregnant which Tim was supportive of the whole time. Super sweet)

Robin 100-104 (Steph gets sick and Tim brings her soup. Lots of cute domestic moments, and you get more into Steph's past)

Robin 111 (more about Steph's past with Tim being super supportive, also the infamous piano issue which is a personal favorite of mine)

Robin 116 (very cute moments after Tim forgets his bday and everyone, Steph included, surprises him)

Robin 119 (supportive bf Tim, strikes again)

Robin 120 (Steph being an amazing supportive gf)

Batgirl 8 (Steph's run, where she and Tim collide again for the first time in a long time. Awkwardness and tension ensues, Tim tries to make a move)

Red Robin 10 (more crossover, very fun. More awkwardness and tension)

Convergence Batgirl (Not the best run, but a nice bit of closure for the pre flashpoint universe. Very sweet and wholesome.)

There's way more that I could list but I'm awful with issue numbers tbh. I know the stories, but I don't have the catalogue memorized. Better people than me have probably made a masterlist of TimSteph comics lol

I don't think you should let any blog turn you away from any particular series. I think if you wanna try out the new YJ, go for it!! I'm very cynical to anything published post 2011, but YJ is the only thing I've consistently read that's NEW, in years. I find it fun. Is it the best? No, not by miles, and it gets stuck with a lot of nonsensical filler often. But it's still a very cute and fun run.

I hope this ask gave you a lot of good info! I also recommend the very long post that should be just below this that goes into a lot of fandom misconceptions about Stephanie brown with more picture examples to highlight everything. Thanks for the ask, anon! I hope you have a lovely time reading these comics and hopefully many more!!

🖤💜❤😊😊😊❤💜🖤

#TimSteph #stephanie brown #tim drake #robin iii #robin iv #spoiler #batgirl #red robin #dc comics #batfamilly #batfam #personal #ask tbp

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themountainsays · 4 years

Note

👤- Favorite character?, 👗- Favorite outfit? One you’d like to see?, 🍂- Favorite scene in either film/ trailers?, 🛷- What would you like to see in the future? for the Frozen Fandom Asks :D

Thank you so much for sending these! I love you!

👤- Anna. Anna forever. Anna Anna Anna. Elsa is cool but she's not Anna. You know how all 13 years old lesbians had their gay awakening with Elsa? Yeah my gay awakening was with Anna. Idk she's just exactly what my type is like irl. I saw her and I knew she'd be my favorite character ever. I just think she's very well developed, and has this different kind of angst that Elsa doesn't posses. Elsa is all about wallowing in Angst but with Anna, it's like they're stabbing her and she doesn't even realize because her brain has broken and refuses to process it and somehow that hurts even worse. It's easy to comfort Elsa if she's sad, sure, just hug her and shit. But Anna doesn't even know she needs to be comforted even though the kid has gone through so much trauma. Idk my protective instincts go wild with Anna. She's my baby and I love her.

👗- oh boy. Ok ok so I'd love to see some traditional norwegian bunad some day. Like, actual norwegian bunads. The fantasy outfits are neat but... bunads are already so Disney princess-y it's unbelievable.

I'm just in love with how these look. Oh! And real sámi gávttit as well! The clothes the northuldra wear in the movie look pretty historically accurate I think, and I think they look really good, but they all look the same and that in itself makes them a bit boring i think Disney could have a bit more fun with them.

I think the blue and red colors are a bit more modern so I understand Disney keeping their outfits with more brown-ish colors, considering they couldn't trade for 34 years, but as the last picture shows, there's still a lot of stuff you can do while keeping brown as the main color (and white! White fur looks so pretty!).

If we're talking about my current favorite outfit, they have to he Elsa's Dark Sea dress and Anna's post-coronation dress w jacket and her hair up. I love whoever designed that dress. I like the low key military vibe it gives, and it makes me wonder if it's somehow foreshadowing the plot of some future installment 👀 ngl i love war stories and I want to see Queen Anna leading an army of giants into battle.

🍂

Oof dude i LOVE Anna leading that army of giants. I love the dam scene and I love The Next Right Thing. And I really love For The First Time in Forever (Reprise?) that scene was like ANGST. AAAAAA. Oh and that time when Anna looks up the stairs and sees her hot sister being hot and she gayly low key stutters-- or when she HIGH KEY gayly stutters during the coronation ball because her hot sister called her beautiful... yeah that's when I started shipping Elsanna. My heart felt something there. It was too sweet for me. But seriously, my favorite scene must be when Elsa watches Runeard's memory insult magic and the Northuldra, and you see her expression slowly shift into sheer horror because she realizes this man, her grandfather, hated everything she is, and he would have killed her-- his own family-- because of her ethnich background and magic (for better or worse, Northuldra identity was strongly tied to magic in F2, and they became two concepts impossible to divorce, and I'm actually writing a longer post about it). I FELT that ok? My own grandfather on my white said of the family has said some very fucked up shit to me. Ever since it was revealed Elsa and Anna were mixed I deeply identified with them, even more than before. They're the closest I have to mestize representation since fucking Balto. And then you start to observe and think about what the movie has said so far about Runeard and magic and the Northuldra and it culminates with Elsa learning the truth about her Arendellian side of the family and... God i think I needed to see a character go through that. It's the highest point of a long process that recontextualizes the whole Frozen franchise (at least to me lol) and I love it for everything it does.

🛷-

Mmmm well I'd love to see the girls physically together again, but not in a coward or bitter way. I don't want Frozen 2's ending to be meaningless. I think Frozen needed these three stories to be told, right? A) The story of Elsa and Anna finding each other again, B) the story of Elsa and Anna learning to be sisters again and work together after being reunited, C) and the story of Elsa and Anna finding themselves, on their own. Now, as I see it, Frozen 2 is either a very tragic resolution to the franchise, or an awkward way to squeeze story C) in the middle of the saga as to not turn it into the final resolution. I firmly believe the story of Frozen 2 needed to be told, and finishing the movie the way it did makes a lot of sense, but I honestly don't want this to be the final note the story of Frozen ends with. Think about it, if you had stories A, B and C in order, the logical conclussion would be.... httyd 3 😭 if you tell the story of Anna and Elsa having their solo arcs as the season finale, then they remain split up. Goodbye. Having it in the middle is weird and uncomfortable but I believe Frozen 2 could work a lot better as an in-between movie than a single sequel. I would like Frozen 2's ending to be used in an inteligent way to proppel the story of Frozen 3, to give it strenght and meaning. I don't want it to be shamefully swept under the rug, as if the writers regretted it and want to desperately backpedal on their plans. Even if they do regret it, they have to make it seem like it was part of a bigger plan all along and make it work accordingly.

Ik this sounds like I think the final episode is so bad there's a secret episode with the real ending somewhere in there, and I recognize Frozen 2 might very well be the ending of the franchise. I think both are equally plausible options. I mean, can you imagine a Frozen 3 in which Elsa and Anna are not spending time together? Can you imagine the writers giving Frozen 3 the exact same ending as Frozen 2? It's not even about the separation, you just can't end a movie in the same place it began. What? Anna and Elsa team up one afternoon to fight their monster of the week and then say goodnight and go to their respective homes? A sequel needs to somewhat challenge the status quo. The status quo of the F2 ending is the girls going on their separate ways. Good for them. I think their solo arcs will be healthy. But the separation is not an afterthought or a sidequest, like Kristoff's propposal. Frozen 3 doesn't need to challenge Kristoff's propposal because it's not central to the story, but it does have to somewhat interact with the hearts of Frozen and Frozen 2 and that means it needs to build upon them. Honestly, I don't think I'm delusional. I think my predictions for a hypothetical F3 are pretty sensible.

#thank you so much for sending these!

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yunsoh · 5 years

Text

yuki’s character arc: gay subtext edition

this has probably been a while coming but i’m finally here to talk about the gay subtext in yuki’s story.

[a lil note before i get into things: i know takaya didn’t intend to include this subtext in his story, and with that this is very obviously getting into “death of the author” matters. however, the subtext, though unintentional, is still prevalent, and leads to both an interesting analysis of yuki’s character and, for many, a deeply relateable storyline regarding gender, compulsory heterosexuality, and being closeted.]

yuki’s character arc is, in large part, a story about self-understanding and self-acceptance. he starts off as a character unsure of his true qualities, or of his place in the world; he is self-conscious and driven by other people’s acceptance of him, which causes him to have deeply different private and public personas. he hides away his “real” character in part out of a fear of being disliked or ostracized, and in part because he is still struggling with accepting himself. the result is that he puts on an act to please others, playing a role that is not true to him, and a role that he knows is false, in order to be accepted. his story bears a distinct resemblance to stories and lives of people who struggle with accepting their sexuality: matters of hiding the true self out of fear of being misunderstood or abandoned, dealing with gender and gender expression, coming to terms with compulsory heterosexuality, and finding people who both accept and cultivate his true identity.

from the moment we’re introduced to him, we’re to understand that yuki has a distinct persona for his social and school life, which is in direct conflict with the persona he leads in his private home life. before even introducing our main protagonist tohru, takaya first introduces us to yuki in an omake -- he’s presented at home, surrounded by trash, and not bothered enough by it to take it out or care that it’s expanding.

it’s a short, but apt intro for his character. we know that people outside of his home circle call him “the prince,” and that he’s actually kind of a mess. we don’t know yet why people call him “the prince” (if it’s because of his looks, his family’s status, if he has a personality that seems princely in some way), or if his school friends (if he has any) refer to him this way, or what his family views him as in contrast to how he’s viewed at school. regardless, we do get to see the crux of yuki’s character and story straight away, even before the story has really started. yuki is someone who has conflicting personas between his private and social life, and considering that these do conflict so heavily, we can assume that the persona he shows at home (his “real” character, in a sense) is hidden from his peers.

we learn rather quickly from tohru, and her interactions with other girls at school, that he’s considered the “reigning prince” because of his beauty, his mystery (caused by him being rather distant from his peers despite his popularity), and his polite nature. we also understand him to be somewhat socially isolated, not of his own accord but because of his fan club “protecting” him, as well as the curse, which keeps him from being close to the girls who adore him anyway. this isolation is something that tohru herself doesn’t immediately perceive, but she comes to realize that he’s someone who not only bottles up his emotions, but cares deeply about what others think of him. he then admits to her his isolation, feeling caged by his family, and his struggles with getting close to others, saying:

“I wanted to have a ‘normal’ life, surrounded by ‘normal’ people. So I applied to a co-ed school and left home. But I couldn’t get out of the cage after all... I just wound up at another Sohma house. And I still can’t associate with ‘normal’ people. I don’t mean to turn them away, but some part of me can’t deal with people. I cut myself off from other people because I’m afraid of getting hurt, and because I’m [cursed]... I’m only being nice because I want people to like me... My being nice is entirely selfish.”

from this, we understand how he perceives his curse: it’s something distinctly socially isolating for him, and as it’s something he was born with and can’t be rid of, he feels unable to navigate his social life without leaning into the persona given to him, and expected of him, by his peers. however, although he feels as though the curse is what keeps him from associating with “normal” people, this is not a mutually understood feeling among all of the cursed sohmas. while the curse is something physically isolating (as they’re unable to hug or be closely intimate with the opposite gender), we see that the curse is interpreted by the zodiac members in different ways outside of this physical isolation. for kyo, it’s not an isolation from his peers as it is for yuki, but rather an isolation from his family, both cursed and immediate; for momiji, the curse isn’t socially isolating, as he doesn’t struggle with his peers, and he instead views it as something that bonds him to the other cursed sohmas when he has been abandoned by his parents. there are varying levels of accepting the curse among the family, and though they are bound by the same manner of physical isolation, how it manifests outside of that is different for each zodiac.

this is to say that yuki’s curse, and how he perceives it, follows the sentiment of being closeted. he feels unable to associate with “normal” people because of a part of him he is unable to control. he views his family, and his curse, as a cage, as something he wishes to escape but cannot run away from. this cage follows him when he attempts to integrate himself into a “normal” life, and thus causes him to further struggle with feelings of resentment towards the curse, as he perceives it as being central to his struggles of achieving social normalcy. meanwhile, from viewing how other cursed sohmas do not have this issue of social isolation, and can lead social lives that yuki would perceive as normal -- even if they, too, resent the curse, such as kyo -- we can take this to understand that yuki’s struggle with social isolation comes from a fear of being socially ostracized for this part of him that he can’t control.

he attempts to repress it via leaning into the social persona given to him by his peers, as acting as “the prince” retains his connection to others despite it being isolating in and of itself, via his fan club deeming him untouchable and harshly dissuading others from getting too close. his performance as “the prince” is as much a means of protection as it is to his detriment; he takes comfort in being liked by others, even though it is both superficial and goes beyond normal reasoning by encroaching on his personal boundaries (his fan club taking photos of him without his permission, stealing flowers he made for the culture festival, etc.), but is to his detriment as he feels he has to live up to this persona, which causes him to then hide his real self, and even become unsure of where the “real” yuki ends and “prince” yuki begins. by this i mean, he is shown to view the attributes given to him by his peers as false, because they aid in his false persona, and that he uses these attributes to gain the trust and liking of others -- this includes his kindness.

yuki’s low self-confidence and insecurity causes him to be unable to see the positive attributes that others see in him. as he understands that the attributes that lend to this princely persona include his kindness, he takes this to believe his kindness isn’t genuine, and that it’s merely a part of the act. it’s only when tohru, who is involved in both his social and private life, and has thus been the recipient of his kindness at school and at home, explains to him that his kindness is very much real and a part of him that he begins his journey in trying to understand himself.

it’s important to understand the intricacies of how yuki goes about viewing his personas, as he shows to not only hide his true self from others, but also lacks an understanding of himself. he struggles to find the precise line at which his true self ends and the prince begins; he believes that his bad attributes are his truth, while his positive attributes are reserved for the prince. this lack of personal understanding, and viewing himself in such a harsh and negative light, stems from his emotional and mental abuse sustained by his mother and akito. his mother insists that yuki is unable to make decisions for himself and, in making all of his major decisions for him (his attending prestigious compulsory schools, her adamance on selecting his college) gives him no foundation for building his self-esteem. akito’s possessive, cruel, and belittling attitude towards him further damages his self-esteem, as he believes her when she tells him that he is worthless and hated. in addition, both are the basis of his isolation and abandonment issues, which then stems into his need for his peers to like him -- causing him to repress his true self as he has come to believe it’s no good, and hanging onto the prince persona that is given to him even though it is, in itself, isolating. although the prince role makes him lonely, he hangs onto it because it is less isolating than the social isolation he experienced through his compulsory education, his isolation from his mother and brother, and far less isolating than the physical isolation he experienced from the “special room” akito kept him in.

it’s only when tohru coaxes him away from the idea that he isn’t genuinely kind, and becomes his friend, that he can begin to understand who he is outside of his family, the curse, and how his peers view him. rather than separate himself by private and social personas, he begins to grow into an identity that is applicable for both his private and social spheres. by the end of the story, the yuki who is shown at home, and the yuki who is shown at school, are much the same person.

included in this journey, too, are yuki’s issues with how others perceive his gender.

we see multiple times how people regard yuki’s appearance: they call him pretty, they question whether he’s a boy or a girl, and some are convinced he’s a girl until told otherwise. he’s dismayed by his looks, with kyo saying that he’s “really self-conscious about his pretty face,” but despite this isn’t against using them when the situation calls for it -- which is never for his own want or gain, but always for others. we see this in particular during the first culture festival, when he agrees to wear a dress as a means of appeasing the third-year girls. he agrees to do it in order to avoid breaking his social persona, and in doing so disregards his own wants and comfort levels. he clearly doesn’t like the attention he receives from this act, but at the same time uses his beauty in order to protect his family:

when kyo suggests that yuki actually enjoys this type of attention, in which people call him cute, pretty, “womanly,” and the like, yuki reacts violently, solidifying that it’s something he is seriously uncomfortable with (though he admits to tohru that he doesn’t mind when she, a friend, perceives him as such, and this is perhaps because he has a level of trust and comfort with her, and at this point feels she sees more of him than most do). he acts on his beauty a few other times, such as distracting the postman when kagura transforms, and even gets out of situations when he’s perceived as a woman without acting on it, such as when he and kyo retrieve tohru from her grandfather’s house and her male cousin, who displays an attraction to yuki, is stunned to the point of inaction at learning yuki is a boy.

this distinct discomfort of how people perceive his gender seems to come from multiple channels. there is the general viewpoint of a teenage boy trying to fit in socially, while also giving in to what his peers expect and create of him -- the pull between acting masculine, as that is typically expected of his gender, and acting polite and soft with his “prince” persona, which is socially perceived as detracting from the former. he takes a long time to come to terms with how he wants to present himself, as he doesn’t want to come off as un-princelike to his peers, but also often gives in to these more masculine traits outside of school (getting in physical fights with kyo, having little to no sense of keeping tidy surroundings at home, being short-tempered and harsh-tongued with shigure and haru, and the like). while his at-home persona is never quite as tough as how kyo or haru present themselves, it’s still more masculine than the personality he shows while at school.

his relationship with his brother ayame also weighs on this matter, as ayame is someone who is extremely comfortable in his flamboyant gender expression and doesn’t care how others perceive him. while yuki doesn’t necessarily dislike him for this reason, it is something that puts a wall between them simply because yuki cannot relate. this is shown as ayame and yuki are perceived by others quite similarly, as we see people question ayame’s gender and see how others fawn over his beauty. the difference is that ayame doesn’t have the distinct personal and social personas that yuki has created -- ayame’s true self is being someone who is quite comfortable blurring the lines of gender expression, and is someone who truthfully leans into his androgynous beauty, regardless of how others view him. yuki, on the other hand, is uncomfortable with his androgyny, but frequently leans into it due to social pressures. he doesn’t quite understand how his brother can so easily be the way he is.

it’s not until later, after yuki has befriended kakeru, that we see his true expression begin to emerge. interestingly, it’s in part because kakeru both sees him for who he is, as tohru does, and teases him over his beauty and princely status at school. kakeru calls him “yuki-chan” after first meeting him, and even more frequently calls him a princess as a means to denounce and poke fun at his prince status. though this is a sore spot for yuki at first, and causes some resentment towards kakeru before they’re able to befriend each other, kakeru teasing him by calling him a “princess” in some ways validates yuki’s emergence into becoming his own person; beyond teasing yuki for being pretty, kakeru is making fun of the princely persona that his peers have put onto him. it’s part of how yuki understands kakeru to see him -- he’s able to see that yuki really isn’t this prince that people believe him to be, and that the moniker is unfitting to the point of being laughable.

however, considering that being called a princess still denotes that yuki is in a way girlish, it’s still something that yuki fights kakeru about, but in a far less severe manner than his fights with kyo over the same words. his fights with kakeru are far more playful, and come from kakeru’s penchant for pushing yuki’s buttons out of fun rather than a point of unkindness, as is the case for kyo. this is similar to how yuki doesn’t mind if tohru calls him cute -- he has a level of trust and understanding with kakeru, and feels that kakeru really sees him rather than a false persona, and fights kakeru more because he’s being teased. his fights with kyo are more defensive as kyo says these things as a means of belittling him, while viewing him as someone who he really isn’t.

gender expression, and how one’s gender is perceived, is often another point of contention within lgb+ narratives, as there come certain social stereotypes for how gay people are to express their gender. by which i mean, gay men are often stereotyped as coming off as effeminate, lesbians are stereotyped as being somewhat masculine, and the like. this in turn causes society (in a general sense) to believe that boys and men who deviate from the straight, masculine norm must be gay, and similarly that girls and women who deviate from the hyperfeminine norm must be lesbians (though, it is generally more socially acceptable for women to take on boyish or masculine traits than it is for men to take on feminine traits). as being gay is socially ostracizing, boys and men who are perceived as such due to their feminine traits may then reject or deny them.

for yuki, this struggle with what others perceive as his femininity comes at a crossroads, as he both finds these traits to be embarrassing, but doesn’t fight against them as his peers seem to enjoy his unmasculine beauty. in the series, the only person who really disparages yuki for his more feminine traits is kyo; he is otherwise not socially ostracized for it, and instead feels a deep insecurity around it simply because he doesn’t enjoy the attention (from both boys and girls) and just wants to present as more masculine in his social life. however, as he hangs onto the acceptance of his peers through his femininity, he struggles to really present his more masculine traits in social settings -- that is, until he joins the student council and befriends people who see him for who he is rather than who he is expected to be. it’s through his socializing with the student council that he begins to bring the more typical masculine traits he presents in his private life to school (through being more physical, raising his voice, etc.).

this is not to say that yuki is gay/non-straight because of his femininity (we never see other characters assume he’s gay, but rather see other male characters seem to question their own sexuality upon realizing that yuki isn’t a woman, or otherwise by admitting to being attracted to him because they focus on his femininity). to say so would be stereotypical, and narratively wrong. rather, this is more to do with how expected gender presentation can be in conflict with personal gender presentation (this can occur regardless of sexuality, however tends to be particularly prevalent in lgb+ circles due to the inherent subversion of expected gender norms that comes with being non-straight; this is part of a much larger dialogue in how heterosexuality is the basis for expected gender conformity, and how “masculine” and “feminine” traits are perceived as being applicable to men and women respectively, when in truth these traits are applicable across the gender spectrum.) in typical narratives, the expected presentation for men is to take on masculine traits, and a deviation from that towards the feminine brings the subject’s sexuality into question (even if the subject is straight).

for yuki, the matter is more complicated, as his expected gender presentation actually falls into both masculine and feminine -- he’s expected to present masculine traits on the basis that he’s a boy, however is also expected to present feminine traits due to the social persona of the prince that his peers have placed on him. for yuki, the matter of gender presentation is in constant conflict, as he feels uncomfortable in being perceived as feminine, yet leans into that presentation in order to appease the expectations of his peers. again, his conflicts with gender presentation alone do not necessarily make him non-straight, but the presence of such a conflict is prevalent in lgb+ narratives.

it’s important, too, to recognize the matters of sexuality that present themselves in yuki’s immediate circle, namely through haru and ayame. when we’re first introduced to haru, he tells tohru that yuki was his first love; when we’re introduced to ayame, he tells a story of his youth where he told the boys at his school to “direct their passions at [him]” in order to keep them from getting in trouble for being intimate with girls. the matters of talking about the sexuality of these two characters becomes difficult if only because they’re presented as a means to shock or joke, rather than as something that is discussed seriously. haru and ayame’s attraction to men isn’t meant to be taken seriously by the audience (the reveal of these attractions are met with shock/distaste by our main cast), and as such yuki’s response to their sexualities is that of annoyance. if we’re to remove the (maybe less than gentle) mockery of non-straight identities, yuki’s reactions to both haru and ayame could instead be read as him internally tying their sexualities to their odd and outlandish demeanors -- and yuki, as a character who by and large tries to keep his head down and do what is expected of him, pushes the notion of homosexuality away because he finds it to be in conflict with his character. he doesn’t consider it, because it doesn’t fit with his expected personas.

(compare these moments, which happen early on in the series, to a much later scene where kakeru openly discusses how attractive the men in the sohma family are, and yuki isn’t annoyed with him despite kakeru also being in a close relationship to him and having a similar outlandish behavior to haru and ayame; the line for how acceptable it is to discuss the attraction of and to the same gender becomes murky, and because so much time has passed and yuki has gone through some personal growth, it’s unclear if he has become more accepting of these attractions or if he just perceives them as being different.)

but, again, the discussion of how homosexuality is presented in the series is difficult to analyse, because it’s not presented as something to be taken seriously. it’s fair to say that yuki’s reactions to haru, ayame, and kakeru are more about the context they’re presented in than just their attraction to men alone -- he gets annoyed with haru because haru insists that he was his first love (an unrequited attraction, and one he doesn’t take seriously), he gets annoyed with ayame because he finds ayame’s person to be too outlandish as a whole to even begin to understand, and he doesn’t get annoyed with kakeru because he knows kakeru is in a committed relationship with a girl, and that saying that men are attractive doesn’t necessarily imply an attraction to them.

the matter of sexuality, though, is prevalent in yuki’s story despite the narrative’s dismissal of it, and this comes to light through his discussion of his compulsory heterosexuality towards tohru.

chapters 83 and 86 primarily deal with this matter, and it starts off with the quite literal scene of yuki being trapped in the student council’s storage closet, thinking about both the trauma of his isolation in the dark room and having a moment where he imagines akito belittling his feelings towards tohru. while not immediately apparent, it’s here that he internally faces his true feelings for her after having ignored them for so long. at first, he continues to feel pathetic and demonizes his feelings, imagining akito saying these words instead of hearing them through his own internal dialogue (a means of filtering his negative thoughts through the image of his abuser). these have been the personal demons he’s been fighting since after kyo’s true form arc (numbers-wise, that’s roughly fifty chapters out of a 136 chapter series), and in that period we’ve seen him struggle with whether he should “open the lid” on his feelings

then, in continuing the visual of yuki being in the closet, the door is broken down by machi, at which point she says that she thought he “wouldn’t like being alone and helpless in there,” mirroring the sentiments he felt being physically isolated and mentally abused under akito’s care. and in leaving the closet, he finally admits to himself, kakeru, and the audience, that he isn’t romantically attracted to tohru, and his attraction to her was compulsory. he loves her, but views her as a mother figure.

this is one of those moments in the series where the subtext is almost so, so blatant that it’s just text, but i digress.

the acceptance that tohru gave him in the very beginning of the series, when he was incredibly conflicted in his identity and buried in his low self-esteem, cultivated his growth into finding out his own worth and who he is. as mentioned, his family life growing up did not give him this foundation, and so in her giving it to him instead, he received from her what he should have received from a parental figure -- his mother in particular, as his father wasn’t present.

however, being that she’s the same age as him, and finds this relationship to be strange, he attempted to warp his own feelings towards her into something more acceptable, and has this conversation with kakeru in explaining those feelings:

Yuki: “I needed a mother’s love. And before I knew it… I found it in Honda-san.”

Kakeru: “Even though she’s a girl you can be attracted to?”

Yuki: “Yes. Well… before she was someone of the opposite sex, she was really more like a mother to me. And that’s what I’d been looking for. But I panicked. When I realized I was thinking of her that way, I got confused. Very confused, actually. The whole thing was embarrassing, and I didn’t want to admit to it. I pretended not to realize, at first, anyway. I put a lid on my feelings. I told myself it wasn’t like that. I tried to talk to her, like boys do to girls. But I was wrong. That’s not the way it is with us.”

admitting that he tried to bury his real feelings, and attempted to force his feelings to be romantic for her instead, can be at face value read as him having a sudden understanding of his sexuality -- here, becoming confused to the point of panic when he realized he wasn’t romantically attracted to her -- in a way that indicates that he isn’t straight. his embarrassment here comes from his seeing her as a mother figure (and with that, his feeling that their relationship isn’t balanced), but still follows the narrative of compulsory heterosexuality. he assumed that, because he was a boy, and she was a girl, and he was experiencing intense feelings for her, those feelings should have been those of romantic attraction.

compulsory heterosexuality is just about as it sounds -- the “straight until proven otherwise” argument. acting under the assumption that one is heterosexual, there’s the sense that strong romantic or sexual feelings towards the opposite gender must be cultivated, and when those feelings fall short (such as coming to the realization that the feelings aren’t romantic or sexual in nature), there comes confusion; as compulsory heterosexuality is cultivated by a heteronormative society, it also creates a confusion on a social level. we can see this here with kakeru questioning yuki’s feelings, asking why he can’t view tohru as both a mother figure and someone he can pursue romantically, and telling him that he’s essentially giving up for no reason. yuki, in turn, tells him he’s not giving up -- it’s just that he truly is not, and cannot, be romantically attracted to her.

in a similar manner, as yuki comes to terms with how he understands his own romantic feelings, he’s rather blind to when girls have romantic feelings for him. this comes to light when he realizes that the leader of his fan club, motoko, has also been harboring romantic sentiments for him, alongside the many third-year girls who he has had to turn down as they attempt to confess to him before graduation. he remarks that he’s dense, and that he feels bad because he can “do nothing but hurt those girls.” this more or less goes along with his coming to terms with understanding how he experiences romantic attraction, but is also an interesting reveal of how he has misunderstood his role as the “prince” -- though he sought after the affections of his peers, and got that tenfold from his fan club (despite their overbearing and obsessive mannerisms), he never believed that the girls in this club liked him to the point of romantic attraction. he’s confused when he navigates his non-romantic feelings for tohru, and confused when he realizes motoko loves (or, loved) him, despite her creating the prince yuki fan club, and being its dutiful leader for two years.

at this point in his story, though he is at a much better point in his self-confidence and identity, he admits that he still holds the same weakness as he always had. this includes his self-worth, and being unsure of how people really feel about him. that wraps around to a part of him that is still socially isolated, that makes him feel unable to fully associate with “normal” people, in this case, girls in particular: his curse.

this is going back to my earlier sentiment that the way in which yuki perceives his curse closely follows narratives of being closeted. at this point, he has found a confidant in kakeru, and finds kakeru to be the one person who he feels safe discussing personal matters with -- not just his relationship with tohru, but also talking to him about some parts of his family life. he did, in a sense, “come out” to kakeru when telling him that he doesn’t have romantic feelings for tohru, and for a relationship between two boys, this seems apt. he was closeted by the “lid” he kept on his feelings for tohru, and is closeted still by his curse. he doesn’t consider going to kakeru about the curse because that doesn’t affect his relationship with him the way admitting his lack of attraction to a girl does; rather, it affects his relationships with girls, and still leaves him somewhat stunted in understanding the give and take of emotions between him and them. machi becomes an outlier, if only because she’s the only girl who has ever seemed to view him differently (sans tohru; and even then, kakeru points out that yuki is slow to understand machi’s feelings for him). she had always rejected his prince persona, and was extremely slow to warm up to him. but, as he reaches out to her and becomes her confidant, she reaches out to him in turn and actively seeks his presence above anyone else’s. he feels seen by her, and feels needed by her.

he and machi start dating at the end of chapter 125, and it’s a few chapters later that he begins to question whether he should open up to her about the curse. in his thought process, he directly reflects the language he used with tohru in the beginning of the series, when he told her he struggled with associating with “normal” people:

“Honda-san knows that Kyo’s not a normal person. She already knows, and she has for a while. But… in my case… I have to tell [Machi]. If I want to stay with her… then I have to tell her the one thing that she may or may not accept.”

similar to his “coming out” to kakeru, yuki now has to “come out” again with his secret of the curse to machi. although this is an essay about gay subtext, it is important that it’s machi who he’s coming out to, if only because the mechanics of the curse are inherently straight, and, well, he’s dating a girl who this directly affects. there is still the distinct story of hiding something so integral and important to your very being away in order to avoid isolation, ostracization, and abandonment -- and this comes to a head when it affects one of the very relationships that helped him grow out of his shell and into his identity.

in a twist, we never actually witness yuki “come out” to machi. the curse lifts just before he is able to do so. instead, he feels freed from the last wall of isolation that kept him from her, and in the moment says “right now, this is enough” as he’s finally able to hold her. and i don’t think this is something to feel cheated out of by any means -- while it would have been interesting to see machi’s reaction, at this point in the story, he already has been accepted by her, as she is one of the few to take him as he is without any presumptions attached. and this reflects an earlier thought he had of her, in which he said:

“Crowds used to make me wonder: how many people would notice if I disappeared? I used to mull over that kind of thing constantly, once upon a time. But now… I’m a little different. It’s not like that. It doesn’t have to be a lot of people. Even if it’s just one person, that’s enough. Having one person is an incredible thing, because then it can’t be zero. I was happy. I was happy then, too… In the midst of all those people, she singled me out and found me. Having someone other than yourself thinking of you, looking for you… you can’t take that for granted.”

this isn’t meant to be an argument that yuki “should have” ended up with someone else, or should have been canonically non-straight -- the story is what it is, and at the end of the day the story is predicated on basic heteronormative social aspects, centered around a curse that, while it symbolically goes deep into abuse, trauma, isolation, and the problem of those things being cyclical, mechanically functions as hetero isolation. for yuki to come to terms with his curse, and his ever-present anxiety over not being able to fully integrate with “normal” people, it was narratively necessary for him to be pushed by his relationship with machi. while he experienced social isolation on all fronts, his ending up with a guy likely wouldn’t have created that same sense of urgency (hence, why he never so much as thinks to tell kakeru about the curse, despite their closeness and his ease with him in opening up about personal matters), or resulted in a finality of his curse that allows for a physical act of symbolism to announce the end of his isolation.

it’s regardless of the heterosexuality of it all that makes yuki’s story so very relateable on the basis that it can be interpreted as gay-coded. it doesn’t really matter that he ended up with a girl** -- what matters is that his curse, the thing he needed to “come out” to her about, in itself is easily read as his struggles with accepting his sexuality as part of his long, winding road in accepting himself fully. his similar “coming out” to kakeru about his comphet feelings, his long-standing struggles with his gender, and his overall struggles with understanding himself in the face of his fears of abandonment and social isolation, all come together to make yuki’s story one that is easily read as coming to terms with one’s sexuality in their journey of self-acceptance and self-love.

**here, i mean ‘matter’ in terms of narrative -- gay representation in media is of course necessary, and even though yuki can be so easily read as a gay or otherwise non-straight character, that doesn’t mean that the story upholds positive gay rep.

#fruits basket #yuki sohma #im done hyperfocusing on this im sleepy #anyways sorry if its uhhhh a mess LMAO i guess i've forgotten how to format like.....essays #anyways if u wanna know how i managed to not mention like the yukeru-ness of a lot of this story.........#idk u can ask but it just didn't feel right to put in this essay ig #the gay subtext of his story in large part doesn't even need to be explained by his relationship or chemistry w kakeru #shocker i know #this thing is like 6k words long and i still feel like there are major things i'm missing lmaooo #o well #yunsoh meta #fruits basket spoilers

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randomfandomimagine · 3 years

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End Of The Year Faves

Rules: It’s time to love yourselves! Choose your 8 (ish) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. Tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome work!

I was tagged by @myriadimagines and @musicallisto, thank you, lovelies!

10. Zack Fair (FFVII) gif imagine

I really love this one because it’s like the definition of short and sweet. It’s adorable, warm and I think I got Zack’s characterization pretty well and I often reread it when I need a smile. I just love my boy Zack and how this little thing turned out.

9. Connor (DBH) prompt (”I shouldn’t be in love with you”)

The reason I love this one it’s because I wrote it as one of my favorite things to write: a character study. I tried to express Connor’s struggle as he develops feelings for the reader and how conflicted he would be to have fallen in love with someone, having developed such a human thing as feelings. One of the many reasons why I love Connor is because of his arc in the game, because of how guilty he feels for becoming deviant despite being the very android that hunts them, it just gets to me. I’m just really glad that I could explore that in this prompt and that I managed to show it properly as well as make this more angsty, since my specialty is usually fluff.

8. Yennefer (Witcher) prompt (”I shouldn’t be in love with you” “Are you jealous?” “I’m so scared”)

This is the only Yennefer request I’ve ever gotten (besides one for a dating would include that I had already written), and I had so much fun writing it! Yennefer has appeared in my Witcher writings a lot, but never as a main character and never as a love interest, so that’s why this was so cool! I think she’s a very interesting character, so I really enjoyed getting the chance to explore her personality. I love how it turned out because I think it’s the perfect balance between her being sly and also being loving and showing her feelings for the reader.

7. Too Nice (John Ambrose McClaren, TATBILB ficlet)

John Ambrose is another character I really like writing for. What can I say? I fell in love with him and it was great to write something for him. This is somewhere between love and almost hate, with a lot of misunderstandings and complex feelings that ultimately lead to a happy fluffy ending. He’s just the sweetest and it was curious to write his reactions to someone who doesn’t always respond well to his kindness, even if because it flusters them.

6. Special (Howl Pendragon, HMC ficlet)

And yet another character I love. It was a bit hard settling on just one version of the character, because I love both the movie and book versions, so I tried to make it a little bit of both... even if this Howl is more suave and charming like in the movie rather than the absolute endearing disaster that book Howl is. Still, I always have fun getting other characters involved with the reader and their love interest, so I loved adding Calcifer and Marko to the mix. As well as the cute interactions Howl and reader have, I love the ending in which he hints at the fact that the reader unlocked something in his heart that he didn’t think was possible.

5. Kind (Jesse Pinkman, Breaking Bad ficlet)

I don’t often get to write about Jesse, so this was awesome! Peekaboo was one of my favorite episodes and it was amazing to get to explore it. While it’s not perfect, I really like how the connection between Jesse and reader turned out, how kind (:D) he is and patient and respectful, and I think I also poured a lot of emotion to the reader with that background.

4. Separated (Zuko, ATLA ficlet)

By this point, it’s obvious that I’m more proud of ficlets (because they’re longer and take more planning and more time and effort) and about characters I love because I think the passion I have for them is more obvious. I wrote this one right when I was watching ATLA because I loved (and still love) Zuko so much. It’s sort of a character study as well (it’s established that I adore writing them) and I’m so glad that I had the idea of getting Iroh involved because he’s awesome. This ficlet just has a lot of pining and repressed emotions that come out in the end and I love it.

3. Weight On His Shoulders (PS4 Peter Parker ficlet)

This one if pretty recent, as I wrote it after beating the game myself. This game is just awesome, and this is my favorite representation of Peter ever. He’s cute, charming, nerdy, loving, kind, a bit awkward and just everything that Peter and Spidey should be (at least for me). I wanted to represent both his personas in this one, and I like the balance I achieved with it as well as the emotions, the pining, the secret identity and in the end the understanding of the reader. The part with Spidey saving reader is great and I’m very happy with how reader is prepared to confront him about it once they learn he’s Spiderman only to change their mind when they see how much it’s weighing on him so they decide to relax with him for a bit.

2. Reunion (Cloud Strife, FFVII ficlet)

I’ve written a lot of things for this fandom this year because I was super inspired after beating the remake with my brother, I loved it (honorable mentions to Heal My Heart and Stars In Your Eyes, two other ficlets that I wrote and I’m very proud of). Cloud has always been one of my favorite characters, and in this one I got to examine a side of him I usually don’t. Not only does this ficlet include Zack Fair (another one of my favorite characters) but it also goes along with an idea I had been thinking about for a long time of a female reader pretending to be a boy to get into SOLDIER and becoming friends with them, but it also shows Cloud as the meeker and shy boy he is in Crisis Core. It was so cool to write about him back then and after once he had joined AVALANCHE. His relationship with the reader was also bittersweet because of their past and it’s just so complex and emotional that I love it, especially their reunion at the end.

1. Soul of a Warrior (Jaskier x Nissa, The Witcher Fanfiction Series). This was a big project, as series always are. I spent several months planning and plotting the story and even more months writing it, and also revising it once it was finished before posting it. I put so much effort, love and time into this series that it absolutely had to be number one. Soul of a Warrior is probably the thing I’m most proud of (that I have written) in 2020.

As most of you know (my mutuals definitely do, as they have gifted me amazing things with him), Jaskier is probably the character I fangirled the hardest about this year. I wrote many things for him (the ficlet What Would You Do Without Me? deserves another honorable mention because it’s probably my favorite thing I’ve written this year along with the series) and working on each of them has brought me so much serotonin. Jaskier is just such an amazing character, loving and compassionate but cheeky and selfish while at the same time being charming, optimistic, bubbly, extroverted and a huge flirt. So many layers!

But back to the series... Soul of a Warrior had one of the best faceclaims I’ve found, the sweetest friendship between my OC Nissa and Geralt and the slowest of burns romances with Jaskier. Him and Nissa are very similar in some aspects, so much so that they’re both too blind to realize the other’s feelings (idiots to lovers, am I right?) but they care so much about one another. The three of them were strangers, but they become family (found family, another one for the fandom bingo!) and I’m the proudest of how real and organic their relationship feels. Not to mention that their dynamic was super fun to write because Geralt is the only one that knows they’re in love and is so fed up and exasperated with their obliviousness. As well as this, I think I managed to mix action, emotion and depth really well. My secondary OCs feel more alive than others before them, Nissa was pretty complex and coherent and had a true voice of her own, and their part on the story feels important. There are tense moments, cute ones, sad ones, tragic ones... a little bit of everything. I think this one as a lot more angst and whump because I was in a bit of a dark place when I wrote it, but it still has hope and light in it, which I really love. The series also has a lot more violence than what I’m used to, but it was interesting to get out of my comfort zone a bit.

Overall, not only do I think it’s fun to read, compelling, funny and emotional all at once, I’m just very proud that I managed to write something a little different from what I usually do and feel like I did it well. I put a big part of me in this series and for that reason Soul of a Warrior will always have a special place in my heart 💜

That it’s, sorry if I ranted a bit! I tag anyone who wants to do this!!

#tag game #faves #myriadimagines #musicallisto

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neuxue · 4 years

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Wheel of Time liveblogging: Towers of Midnight ch 4

Perrin goes hunting and we consider the problems with zero-sum solitaire, and Galad... is Galad.

Chapter 4: The Pattern Groans

We’re with Perrin, but it smells like corpses and the grass looks infected and it’s not the first time this has been brought up, so… how sure are we the Blight is staying put?

Oh, the Aes Sedai agree. Is this part of the Pattern fraying and the Dark One reaching out into the world, then? That the Blight sort of crops up in those stretched spaces?

Especially because at this point in the timeline, Rand’s not exactly counteracting it.

Light, Perrin thought, taking the leaf as Nevarin handed it to him. It smelled of decay. What kind of world is it where the Blight is the good alternative?

I don’t know, ask Lan.

“It’s probably not dangerous,” Perrin said.

Presented without further context. Famous last words, Perrin. Right up there with ‘a trap’s not a trap if you know it’s there’ –Rand al’Thor.

Meanwhile Perrin’s still dealing with Office Politics: Epic Fantasy Edition on a constant basis. Well, you and Egwene will have plenty to talk about when you finally meet in Tel’aran’rhiod or maybe for that dance you owe her on Sunday.

(I have absolutely no expectation of the latter happening; I just like to remember it sometimes because it’s the right kind of sad. The former though… please).

If only those clouds would pass so they could get some good sunlight to dry the soil

Given where you seem to be relative to Rand’s timeline, Perrin, you… might be waiting a little while. Might I recommend an umbrella? Or perhaps some fire insurance?

A strange village with an architectural style that seems out of place? Shiota again, perhaps? Either way, You probably do not want to go into that village. You may not ever come out. Well, okay, you’re a protagonist so you’ll probably be fine, but all the same.

Light! How bad were things becoming?

The thing with the timeline misalignment is that it takes away from the effect of this a little bit, for me. Because while I get that the Pattern itself is being strained and the Dark One is drawing closer to the world and all that, and Rand’s revelation on Dragonmount isn’t going to immediately fix everything, some of the tension there is gone. When such a major arc has finally passed its darkest point and reached a kind of catharsis, it’s a little weird to then go back to ‘okay but pretend that hasn’t happened yet’.

So, yes, I think this is probably not specifically related to Rand (inasmuch as anything at this point can be said to be not related to Rand, given his power and his role and his Fisher King-like link to the entire world), and therefore isn’t just a ‘oh don’t worry this will fix once the timelines are caught up’ but I can’t help feeling some of that anyway.

“Burn the village,” he said, turning. “Use the One Power.”

Should’ve invited Rand.

WOLF DREAM WOLF DREAM WOLF DREAM!

Even in Tel’aran’rhiod there’s a storm. But again, I can’t help but feel that some of the impact that should have (‘I am the storm’) is lacking a little, now. It’s not a major criticism and a lot of it is probably just me, but… I don’t know. It just feels ever so slightly off.

The wolves are calling to Perrin and so of course we come back to his central conflict with himself but surely this, too, must be approaching its point of crisis soon. There’s just not that much time left, and he’s been circling this one for so long, and especially after Malden he’s constantly being forced to look at it, just as Rand came closer and closer to that necessary confrontation with himself and the part of him that was Lews Therin and what he’s doing.

The invitations awakened something deep within him, the wolf he tried to keep locked away. But a wolf could not be locked up for long. It either escaped or it died

This touches on a particularly ironic aspect of this conflict: Perrin tries to lock the wolf aspect of himself away, to shut it out and refuse it, because he is afraid of losing himself to it. But it is a part of himself, and so by shutting it away in order to keep from losing who he is, he is in fact trying to kill or lose… a part of who he is.

Again, there’s the obvious parallel to Rand here, and the whole question of how to accept a part of yourself you’re terrified of, a part of yourself you hate or fear or cannot reconcile with the rest of your self-perception. The whole struggle of identity, of acceptance and denial, of answering that age-old question of who are you?

And I like how we get to watch so many different characters take on that struggle, from slightly different directions or with slightly different variations, but at the centre of it all that same question of identity, and what it means to be who you are versus who you must be versus who you choose to be, and how to find that balance. So many characters at war with themselves one way or another, and ultimately they all have to find some way to make peace, and so we just get Identity: Theme and Variation across the series.

(Of course, there are also the characters who aren’t at war with themselves, and whose stories of identity take on a slightly different flavour – Egwene being an obvious example – but I’ll just… save that one for another time or else we’ll be here all day).

“No!” Perrin said, sitting up, holding his head. “I will not lose myself in you.”

(Said Rand to Lews Therin).

Except by denying them, Perrin, you only lose a different part of yourself. And if so much of your energy and self is dedicated to fighting yourself, are you not also then lost? You can’t win a war when you are your own opponent.

He’s looking at this as a zero-sum game: himself against the wolf, and only one can win, and the other must be lost. And so he chooses himself, and tries to suppress or defeat the wolf, but it’s not a zero-sum game, for the very simple reason that there is no other player. He just thinks there is. Much as Rand viewed Lews Therin as an opponent, rather than as a part of himself.

In summary: don’t play prisoner’s dilemma with yourself, because that way lies madness.

You are invited, Young Bull, Hopper sent.

An invitation, not a demand. A gift, an offering, and of course a choice. It’s not something trying to consume him or fight him.

“Hopper, we spoke of this. I’m losing myself. When I go into battle, I become enraged. Like a wolf.”

Like a wolf? Hopper sent. Young Bull, you are a wolf. And a man. Come hunt.

I like the way they talk almost across each other here; Perrin is so set on viewing this as a fight, as a zero-sum game, as an either-or. And Hopper doesn’t understand what he’s on about, because as far as Hopper is concerned, Perrin is a man and a wolf and the two are not mutually exclusive. (Rand and Lews Therin are one and the same).

“I will not let this consume me.” He thought of a young man with golden eyes, locked in a cage, all humanity gone from him.

Except that as he is now, the wolf-aspect of him is effectively encaged, and that’s probably not healthy either. Still, though, so long as he insists on seeing it as something separate to himself, something invasive or antagonistic or other, some part of him will always be trapped.

Which… we’re given Noam as an example, and I do think there’s a path down which Perrin could theoretically end up being ‘consumed’ by the wolf, just as there was a path down which Rand could have ended up, as Moiraine put it, calling himself Lews Therin and Lanfear’s devoted lover. Or, you know, killing his father and the world and himself, and succumbing to the exact fate he pushed Lews Therin away in fear of in the first place.

Because when you’re that committed to framing it as a fight, and suppressing one side or the other, it’s hard to keep it from becoming that, even if that’s not what it ‘should’ be. Not all battles against oneself end in reconciliation. But there’s a bitter kind of irony to it, in that I think the only way Perrin would end up truly ‘losing himself’ to the wolf would be because he framed it as something he could lose to in the first place. (Or, I suppose, if he specifically chose that path and chose to suppress the human side of himself instead).

“I must learn to control this, or I must banish the wolf from me,” Perrin said.

Except that perception, right there, is the entire reason it’s such a struggle in the first place right now. It’s not an either-or. They’re not two separate things, and it’s not something that needs to be leashed.

It's that whole… the more you fight against some part of yourself, the harder it becomes to actually keep it in check, and so we arrive back at something very like ‘surrender to control’. Or, perhaps more accurately, ‘accept in order to control’. Control being also not quite the right word here, because that’s also part of the point.

Basically, throwing up a wall against parts of yourself you’re afraid of rather than understanding them and figuring out how to integrate or improve or work with or channel or grow past or whatever-else them is not a sustainable solution, Perrin. Because those parts of you aren’t just going to go away if you deny them strongly enough; you have to at least understand them, and acknowledge them for what they are, and then you can figure out where you want to go from there. Which, likely, will mean recognising that they’re neither as simple-black-and-white nor as terrifying as you think. It just also means having to do some introspection and maybe realise some things about yourself that challenge your existing self-image. It’s good for you. As Rand could perhaps tell you, once he’s done picking apples.

I do sort of wish this could have been done in the previous book, aligned with Rand’s own last stages of his fight with himself and eventual realisation – sort of the way the cascading ending of characters coming into their power was done in TSR – but also I get that sometimes it’s just not possible to fit everything in exactly the way you want. I promise I’ll stop complaining about having to play timeline catch-up soon.

Anyway, Hopper’s bored of this and wants to go hunting already. Especially because he’s looking at the calendar and realising they have maybe half a term to cram at least a few years’ worth of learning into, so can we get on with it already.

In a previous visit to the wolf dream, Perrin had demanded that Hopper train him to master the place. Very inappropriate for a young wolf – a kind of challenge to the elder’s seniority – but this was a response. Hopper had come to teach, but he would do it as a wolf taught.

Yes. And I think the point there, beyond anything to do with a challenge to seniority, is that if Perrin is going to learn how to walk the wolf dream, he’s going to have to come to terms with the part of him that brings him there in the first place. He can’t learn if he’s holding half of himself back at the same time.

“I will hunt with you – but I must not lose myself.”

But this is you, Perrin. And okay on the whole issue of hunting, I think Perrin sees it as a kind of… succumbing to base instincts, which is part of why he fights it. But I really don’t think that’s what we’re talking about here. I don’t think it’s ‘sure, go for murder breaks whenever you get bored’; I think it’s about… finding a balance in the side of himself that is capable of violence and that thrills in a fight, not by just letting it run wild but just by… understanding that it’s there, because once he does that, he can decide how to direct it.

I mean, we all have parts of ourselves that maybe aren’t always fit for polite company, but pretending they don’t exist isn’t going to make them go away, but understanding them and accepting them sometimes makes it easier to find another way to channel them that’s more… well, I suppose the word Perrin would want here is ‘controlled’. But really, I think it’s more ‘conscious’.

To use his own analogy, it’s the whole ‘the iron in front of him, not dreams of silver’ idea. Work with what you have; understand the components for what they are. That doesn’t mean you can’t work them at all, or reshape them, or hone them, or turn them into something better; it just means seeing those pieces, those starting points, honestly. And understanding what will and won’t work in terms of shaping them. He’s been given these pieces of metal but he insists on not using some of them, or on not even looking at them closely enough to see what metal they are, and I don’t know anything about metalworking so should probably stop this analogy here before I break it.

Anyway Hopper is just enjoying the opportunity to drag Perrin repeatedly, for his own amusement and that of the other wolves.

Meanwhile Perrin’s getting stuck in the long grass, which is absolutely not a metaphor for anything.

I can’t ignore my problems! Perrin thought back.

Yet you often do, Hopper sent.

Well and if that’s not a perfect summary of Perrin’s arc pretty much since the Two Rivers, I don’t know what is. ‘I can’t ignore my problems,’ says Perrin, ignoring at least five problems he doesn’t want to acknowledge in favour of the one or two he can do something about.

Or, as may be more accurately the case, ignoring his own problems in favour of the external ones he can hammer out a solution for.

Credit where it’s due: Perrin knows Hopper’s right.

There, lying on the ground, were the three chunks of metal he’d forged in his earlier dream. The large lump the size of two fists, the flattened rod, the thin rectangle.

Those are oddly specific. Shame there’s not twenty-three of them.

I’d say it sounds like the makings of a hammer except I don’t know what the thin rectangle would be in that case, and he already has a hammer.

Oh hey his prophetic dream-visions are back! It’s been a minute.

Mat stood there. He was fighting against himself, a dozen different men wearing his face, all dressed in different types of fine clothing. Mat spun his spear, and never saw the shadowy figure creeping behind him, bearing a bloody knife.

So the immediate association I have between Mat and a knife is, of course, the ruby dagger currently in the hands of our good friend Padan Fain. Though I suppose we’ve also now introduced the Seanchan Bloodknives to the scene, which would fit with the whole ‘shadowy figure’ as well.

But it’s the rest of this vision that has me intrigued, here. Because my immediate thought – that he’s fighting himself in the sense of all the men whose memories he now holds – doesn’t really make sense at all, because Mat accepted those memories a long time ago; they’ve not felt like a challenge to his identity in nearly the same way as the wolves have been for Perrin or Lews Therin was for Rand.

So then… more figurative? Is it still an identity thing but more about reconciling all the different roles he holds, that pull him in different directions (and some, like his status as Prince of the Ravens, that he has perhaps not quite so fully accepted)?

Or is this some Eelfinn/Aelfinn shit? We know he’s headed there, and it’s another dimension so all bets are off, really.

Or are we going to get into some kind of… decoys strategy? He’s being set up as a general for the Last Battle, so maybe someone or something turning his own strategies or forces against him?

Perrin’s not sure either, and next up we get wolves chasing sheep into the woods full of monsters. That… could honestly be anything. The wolves look wrong, so Darkhounds, maybe? Though in that case I’d expect him to recognise them. As for who he’s chasing… I mean, you can hardly swing a cat in here without hitting a malevolent force these days, so your guess is as good as mine, Perrin.

Hopper doesn’t have time for prophetic movie screenings and would very much like to get on with this hunt now, please, seriously Young Bull it’s been two years, I’m not getting any younger here.

(Hopper, you’re dead; you don’t even age. ‘NO BUT MY PATIENCE DOES’).

Perrin remembered the time; it had been during the early days of Faile’s captivity.

Had he really looked that bad? Light, but he seemed ragged. Almost like a beggar. Or… like Noam.

Oh okay this is a really interesting realisation from Perrin, and a perspective I hadn’t actually considered from this angle. There’s more than one way to lose yourself, and in giving entirely in to the very human side of him (and, perhaps, what Hopper might call a human need for control), and fixating on a single task in that sense, he came close to the same kind of loss of self that he associates with becoming entirely wolf.

And that this version of himself came not as a result of ‘giving in’ to the wolves at all. That maybe, Perrin, the wolves aren’t the source of the problem you’re having with finding a balance within yourself; they’re just a convenient scapegoat, something to project the division within yourself onto.

“Stop trying to confuse me!” Perrin said. “I became that way because I was dedicated to finding Faile, not because I was giving into the wolves!”

Which is… kind of the point, Perrin. There is more than one way to lose yourself. And your dedication to finding Faile was just… another form of focusing only on aspects, and neglecting all the other parts of yourself. But how is neglecting the wolf part of yourself going to solve that? Is that not just another way of fixating on what you think you should be, or on a single task, to the exclusion of what is there?

Hopper’s decided to move on to an object lesson: if you want to keep up, you’ll have to figure out how to run. No more holding back.

I want Hopper and the Wise Ones to meet, sometime. I just think that would be entertaining on all sides.

And so Perrin runs. Finally.

The forest was his. It belonged to him, and he understood it.

His worries began to melt away. He allowed himself to accept things as they were, not as he feared they might become.

Now, the next step: do the same for yourself. Accept yourself as you are, not as you fear you might become. You’re so close, Perrin.

It was exhilarating. Had he ever felt so alive? So much a part of the world around him, yet master of it at the same time?

There’s a surrender/control kind of feeling to this, as well. So much of this is so very, very close to what Perrin needs to learn – or rather, learn to apply to himself. This idea of being part of yet master of at the same time. Master of my fate, captain of my soul, that whole deal. That he can accept and be the wolf, but not be lost in it, just as he is not lost in this world around him that he allows himself to be part of, yet still retains himself and his control.

Whoops caught a whiff of a stag so no more time for existential crisis because that means DINNER.

The stag, I mean. Not the existential crisis. I don’t think they make edible versions of those.

He was the herald, the point, the tip of the attack. The hunt roared behind him. It was as if he led the crashing waves of the ocean itself. But he was also holding them back.

I cannot make them slow for me, Perrin thought.

And then he was on all fours, his bow tossed aside and forgotten, his hands and legs becoming paws. Those behind him howled anew at the glory of it. Young Bull had truly joined them.

ROUND. OF. APPLAUSE.

But actually the main reason I quoted this is because it strikes me that Perrin is, perhaps more so than any of the other major characters, a very Sanderson-esque character in some ways. I’ve compared him to Kaladin before, but even without trying to draw a like-for-like relationship to one of Sanderson’s characters, his character concept feels very much along the lines of what Sanderson would write.

Anyway, I thought of that here because this reads a little like – again not like-for-like but just in the same vein of – some of the other discovery-of-magic or acceptance-of-power or learning-the-scope-of-one’s-abilities scenes Sanderson has written.

I don’t mean it as either criticism or praise; it’s just something that struck me here.

The stag has twenty-six points on its antlers, so that’s not the missing twenty-three from last chapter either.

And we’ve shifted to Young Bull in the narrative now, so Perrin’s actually going along with this wolves-do-guided-meditation class for once.

He needed to be ahead, not follow.

Definitely not a thought applicable outside of this hunt, nope, not at all, nothing to see here, nothing more abstract about needing to act rather than react, or claim the wolf thing and all the aspects of himself he hides from rather than let them drag him along or anything like that.

The stag bolted to the right, and Young Bull leaped, hitting an upright tree trunk with all four paws and pushing himself sideways to change directions.

I am quoting this solely because WOLF PARKOUR.

Sorry.

He howled, and his brothers and sisters replied from just behind. This hunt was all of them. As one.

But Young Bull led.

Leader of men, leader of wolves, LET’S DO THIS.

It’s interesting as well because for all that it’s a hunt, there’s a rather meditative quality to this scene – the simplicity of it once he fins his place, allows himself to be a part of this world around him, acting almost on instinct and leading a perfect chase, not thinking or faltering or hesitating, every movement fluid and precise and beautiful – that actually reminds me of that scene way back in TDR when he worked at the forge in Tear.

Just these few simple moments of Perrin being… himself. A kind of beautiful economy of motion and a meditative sort of rhythm and the absence of doubt or uncertainty.

Which is perfect, of course, because that first scene is for Perrin as he was, for the part of himself he knew and knows and now fears to lose, the part of him that he linked so closely to his identity. It was a reminder of who he was, at a time when he needed it – this whole story just beginning and Perrin away from his home and out of his depth and not sure who he was or what he was becoming. It was a grounding in his foundations.

And now, nearly at the end, we get something with a kind of similar feel to it, but this time it’s the wolf, the part of himself he has yet to accept. There’s almost a bookending here of past and future. One scene to ground him, and one to carry him forward. Once for acknowledgement and once for realisation. Name him true and set his path, I suppose, if I really want to shoehorn another character’s quotes in here.

Anyway.

Perrin – or rather Young Bull – brings down the stag and is looking forward to that sweet sweet venison.

There was nothing else. The forest was gone. The howls faded. There was only the kill. The sweet kill.

A form crashed into him, throwing him back into the brush. Young Bull shook his head, dazed, snarling. Another wolf had stopped him. Hopper! Why?

The stag bounded to its feet, and then bounded off through the forest again. Young Bull howled in fury and rage, preparing to run after it. Again Hopper leaped, throwing his weight at Young bull.

If it dies here, it dies the last death, Hopper sent. This hunt is done, Young Bull. We will hunt another time.

Oh.

Why, Perrin wonders here. And I think the answer here is, because this is how we do not lose ourselves. The hunt is about the joy of it, but it’s not just mindless violence. That’s Perrin’s fear, and Hopper here is teaching him… nuance, I suppose. Control. Restraint.

Because there is a difference between the hunt, between being a wolf, and just succumbing to bloodlust and violence. And I think part of Perrin’s fear comes from conflating the two in his mind, but they’re not the same thing. But without letting himself ever know or be the wolf, without understanding that side of himself, it’s hard to distinguish. And so we come to this, where he sees the wolves acting with this restraint that still does not tarnish their joy, and can perhaps understand it himself and see that ‘joining the wolves in the hunt’ does not mean ‘losing all humanity and becoming a mindless killer’.

“That,” Perrin finally said, “is what I fear.”

No, you do not fear it, Hopper sent.

Thank you, Hopper, for being absurdly wise and also for your patience.

But this is the crux of it all, isn’t it? That Perrin fears – or does not quite fear – what lies at the end of this hunt for him. And hasn’t yet learned to… I suppose trust himself? Or understand that it’s not an all-or-nothing black-or-white kind of thing. To hold on or to let go. But it’s about, as so much of this story is, a more nuanced kind of balance, and an acceptance.

And self-awareness. That too.

Worry, worry, worry. It is all that you do.

“No. I also kill. If you’re going to teach me to master the wolf dream, it’s going to happen like this?”

Yes.

You do kill, Perrin, but it’s not all you do. And I think part of this hunt was also about learning that there’s nuance even in that, maybe. That he can kill and not be monstrous.

But he had been avoiding this issue for too long, making horseshoes in the forge while leaving the most difficult and demanding pieces alone, untouched.

YES! THANK YOU PERRIN AYBARA! YOU’RE GETTING IT.

Man I love when characters finally stop fighting themselves. (I’m me, so I have a slight preference for when that surrender actually takes a much darker ‘so be it’ kind of form but listen, the heroic side is also lovely and this has been such a long time coming).

I also do really like that Perrin comes to these realisations himself. Yes, it’s taken him a long time and yes, Hopper has been pushing him and pushing him to try to get him here (along with Tam, and various others), but ultimately it has to come from him. From an understanding of himself, and an acceptance of that.

Much like Rand’s own realisation, though so many others played into it and guided him along the way or pushed him towards the edge, anchored him or tried to cut him loose, ultimately came down to him, on a mountain, thinking.

Or how Nynaeve breaking her block happened alone at the bottom of a river, in a moment where at last she understood surrender.

These books do self-realisation well, is what I’m getting at. Giving characters those chances to see themselves, and to reach these understandings, and then letting those moments – those quiet, unwitnessed, outwardly unremarkable moments – carry such weight.

He relied on the powers of scent he’d been given, reaching out to wolves when he needed them—but otherwise he’d ignored them.

YES! THIS IS! SO GOOD!

(Like Rand with Lews Therin’s memories, and knowledge of the Power).

But he gets it now. You can’t use this if you’re also trying to fight it. You have to accept it, even when that’s terrifying, even when that means confronting parts of yourself you’d rather pretend weren’t there. Because the reward, ultimately, is that you’ll actually be able to wield them, rather than being at their mercy by virtue of being constantly at war with yourself.

You couldn’t make a thing until you understood its parts. He wouldn’t know how to deal with—or reject—the wolf inside him until he understood the wolf dream.

YES THAT’S EXACTLY IT I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS.

“Very well,” Perrin said. “So be it.”

HERE. WE. GO.

And now over to Galad. Fine. If we must.

Those Light-cursed swamps were behind them; now they travelled over open grasslands.

Because they’ve figured out their leadership situation and murdered the corruption from their ranks, get it?! So they’re not mired in the swamp of their own indecision and division now! They’re united and can move forwards in a cleaner direction!

If there was no danger of death, there could be no bravery, but Galad would rather have the Light shine on him while he continued to draw breath.

I mean, fair enough, and same, but that’s almost a surprising thing for Galad to think. Not that I think he’s the type to want martyrdom, but…hm. I don’t know. Maybe it’s the whole bravery thing here, but it just feels a little odd for Galad. Then again I will be the first to admit that there’s a lot about Galad that just Does Not Compute for me, so…sure. Lawful Good Paladin and all that.

He wanted to know what kind of traffic the highway was drawing

Refugees with a chance of wolves, most likely.

He remembered well the words that Gareth Bryne had once said: Most of the time, a general’s most important function was not to make decisions, but to remind men that someone would make decisions.

I just find it weirdly endearing that all three of Galad, Gawyn, and Elayne end up relying on Bryne’s wisdom from time to time, quoting him in their thoughts. Of course, it just as likely leads them in entirely opposite directions because this family is a bit of a mess, but still.

“The letter must be sent,” Galad said.

Okay but if we’re on the topic of shared family traits, evidence suggests letter-writing is not exactly a strong suit. You sure about this, Galad?

Ah, it’s a letter to the Children with the Seanchan giving them the bullet-points version of everything that’s happened. Well, far be it from me to criticise open and honest communication in this series, I suppose.

And he still plans to ally with Aes Sedai, which understandably is going over as well as a pile of Blight-mud with some of his men.

“But the witches are evil!”

Says a member of an organisation perfectly willing to overlook the torture of innocent people in order to wring confessions from ‘Darkfriends’, but…sure. Just, you know, glass houses and all that.

Once, he might have denied that. But listening to the other Children, and considering what those at Tar Valon had done to his sister, was making him think he might be too soft on the Aes Sedai.

Listening to other Children and thinking about his sister but consider this, Galad, have you ever thought of listening to her, maybe? Or, like, actually trusting her judgement when you do? Just a passing thought.

Seriously, what is it with Elayne’s brothers and continually underestimating her, her ability to look after herself, and also her reading of her own damn situation?

“However, Lord Harnesh, if they are evil, they are insignificant when compared to the Dark One.”

Well… alright, sure, at this stage I guess if that’s how you have to look at it to make this work, then fine. We don’t have time to solve everyone’s problems with everyone else before they all need to at least act as allies, so if uneasy ‘enemy of my enemy’ trust is what it takes…

Then, as Bashere said, there’s always another battle. Or as Rand said, they can all go back to killing one another once it’s done. A sad way to look at it, but for all that Rand has come a long way and is no longer looking at this in quite the same way, I think some of those things are still true. The great battle done, but the world not done with battle.

Tarmon Gai’don’s alliances won’t solve all of that, even led by a Dragon Reborn who truly has a purpose now. It may be enough to see them through, but after…?

The Wheel of Time turns.

“We need allies. Look around you, Lord Harnesh. How many Children do we have? Even with recent recruits, we are under twenty thousand. Our fortress has been taken. We are without succour or allegiance, and the great nations of the world revile us.”

Wow, I WONDER WHY.

I mean, good on Galad for taking on the task of redeeming the Whitecloaks but… it sure is going to be a Task.

“The Questioners are at fault,” Harnesh muttered.

“Part of the blame is theirs,” Galad agreed. “But it is also because those who would do evil look with disgust and resentment upon those who stand for what is right.”

Uh.

Sorry, Galad, but you’re leaving out a very large slice of the blame pie, which is: maybe the Questioners were the worst of the lot (or at the very least they make a convenient set of scapegoats), but the rest of you didn’t exactly object, or do anything about it. And plenty of you went right along (Two Rivers, anyone?) – or, sorry, were you Just Following Orders?

I mean morality is a grey area and all that but trying to pass off widespread hatred of your borderline-fanatic organisation with an unfortunate habit of killing innocent people as ‘evil people hate the righteous’ is maybe a bit of a stretch.

“In the past, the boldness – and perhaps overeagerness – of the Children has alienated those who should have been our allies.”

Euphemistic but…not wrong, I suppose. And to be fair to him (if I must), he does have a rather difficult line to walk, as the leader of this organisation. He maybe can’t just denounce them completely, but he also has to get through to them that some thing are going to have to change. And that this isn’t going to be an easy path ahead.

He's trying to enforce what they should be fighting for, underlining their stated principles and trying to get them to shift direction and also preparing them for what they’re going to face, without… undermining their foundations, or challenging them in a way that might break them.

And I suppose he actually believes some of this as well. Which is still just… sure, Galad. Okay.

I do love that he’s quoting Morgase to them. So much of her legacy has been tarnished that it’s nice to see these moments of… recognition, I guess.

“We follow no queen or king.”

“Yes,” Galad said, “and that frightens monarchs. I grew up in the court of Andor. I know how my mother regarded the Children.”

And yet! Look where you ended up! Quoting Morgase’s own thoughts on leadership to the Children, whom she hated.

See, the problem with Galad in this chapter is that he’s neither being a deadly-graceful swordsman nor defiantly enduring torture, which means we’re back to plain old annoyance with him on my part.

“Darkfriends,” Harnesh muttered.

“My mother was no Darkfriend,” Galad said quietly.

Yeah, Harnesh? If you value your life, do not insult Morgase Trakand in front of Galad. He can and will end you.

“You speak like a Questioner,” Galad said. “Suspecting everyone who opposes us of being a Darkfriend. Many of them are influenced by the Shadow, but I doubt that it is conscious.”

Oh, not just them, Galad. As Egwene said, “I think we all are serving the interests of the Shadow, so long as we allow ourselves to remain divided.” Or, for another and more recent example: “I think he almost had me, Egwene.”

But Galad does know his audience here. The Questioners do provide a convenient scapegoat, and a way to sort of… point out all the problems with the Whitecloaks, but slantwise. Deflected just slightly so that they do not sound like accusations, but rather like a very pointed ‘we are better than them, right?’ A kind of oblique warning, and a reminder of all that they must no longer allow themselves to be. A way of criticising indirectly, and allowing them to maintain their pride and convictions and certainty.

Which is also interesting in contrast to Egwene’s approach with the Aes Sedai, of being incredibly direct in her criticism of both the rebels and the Tower Aes Sedai. It’s interesting, because both approaches work. Because these are two very different organisations and situations, despite their occasional parallels.

“We cannot become lapdogs to kings and queens. And yet, think of what we could achieve inside of a nation’s boundaries if we could act without needing an entire legion to intimidate that nation’s ruler.”

Whitecloaks: ‘we’re a paramilitary organisation answerable to no monarch or nation!’

Galad, son of a literal royal house: ‘sounds good’

Then again, I suppose you could say much the same of the Dragonsworn and the Band of the Red Hand (leaving aside the fact that Rand rules or has ruled at least four nations in fact if not always in name), and in terms of facing Tarmon Gai’don as unified forces of the Light, that’s fair enough. But that’s the sort of thing that tends to cause, er, problems domestically.

A group of travellers on the road! I wonder who this could possibly be!

Galad sighed. Nobody could deny Byar’s dedication – he’d ridden with Galad to face Valda when it could have meant the end of his career. And yet there was such a thing as being too zealous.

Let it not be said that Galad doesn’t have his work cut out for him. That much is for sure.

Though Galad calling anyone else too zealous is, of course, mildly entertaining.

“Peace,” Galad said, “you did no wrong, Child Byar.”

Depends on the timeframe…

There was talk of a gigantic stone from the sky having struck the earth far to the north in Andor, destroying an entire city and leaving a crater.

…Shadar Logoth? Not quite a meteorite, no, but I can see how someone might arrive at that explanation. Especially if all the forces at play there were enough to leave traces of stishovite or coesite.

The talk among the men revealed their worries. They should have understood that worry served no useful function. None could know the weaving of the Wheel.

In which Galad Damodred discovers the cure for anxiety. Seriously, Galad, that’s all well and good for you, and I personally see where you’re coming from, but not everyone is going to just logic away their fear; it doesn’t always work like that.

Yeah this sounds like Perrin’s group. Well this should be fun.

Wait a second.

Morgase is with Perrin.

Oh man.

The man in the cart gave a start upon seeing Galad. Ah, Galad thought, so he knows enough to recognise Morgase’s stepson.

The man in the cart is Basel Gill and definitely knows enough to recognise Morgase’s stepson given that he’s currently travelling with Morgase, yes.

Basel Gill also really, really needs to work on his poker face. Though I don’t think even Mat’s ability to tell a lie would get Perrin’s entire caravan past Galad without arousing some kind of suspicion.

So Galad’s giving him the airport security treatment, Gill is trying his best to lie like a rug, and there’s only one way this is going to end.

“Anything else I will sell, but the food I have promised by messenger to someone in Lugard.”

“I will pay more.”

“I made a promise, my good Lord,” the man said. “ could not break it, regardless of the price.”

“I see.”

I have to laugh here because yes, Gill is lying through is teeth and Galad knows it, but he’s also chosen the one lie that Galadedrid ‘do the right thing no matter the cost’ Damodred can’t actually directly challenge.

So instead he’s just going to separate the group and see if they all tell the same story.

“After all, what it seems like to me is that you are the camp followers of a large army. If that is the case, then I would very much like to know whose army it is, not to mention where it is.”

WOULDN’T YOU JUST.

It occurs to me that Perrin is the only one of the ta’veren boys – and, actually, the only one of the original Emond’s Field crew – who Galad hasn’t met.

And while it might be kind of funny if it were Mat’s army and he and Galad had a ‘….you?’ moment, given their last meeting, it’s all kinds of appropriate in terms of actual story and characters that Galad, new leader of the possibly-soon-to-be-reformed Whitecloaks, is the one meeting up with Perrin ‘Whitecloaks were my first kill’ Aybara.

Because Perrin is the one with the most… messy history with the Whitecloaks, and so it is fitting that if there really is to be a shift, and if they really are to move forwards, it would be by turning that, somehow, into alliance.

“We may have a situation here,” Bornhald said. His face was flushed with anger.

Uh oh.

Speaking of Perrin’s history with the Whitecloaks. Bornhald (mistakenly) thinks Perrin killed his father, Perrin (somewhat less mistakenly) thinks Bornhald let his home be ravaged by Trollocs and betrayed him when he had promised to help… you know, just a few disagreements between friends.

“Have you ever heard of a man called Perrin Goldeneyes?”

“No. Should I have?”

“Yes,” Bornhald said. “He killed my father.”

Prepare to die.

Well THIS should be fun!

Next (ToM ch 5) Previous (ToM ch 3)

#FINALLY #wheel of time #neuxue liveblogs WoT #Towers of Midnight

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plays-the-thing · 3 years

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The Mandalorian S2: Style Over Substance – A Companion Piece

This is a companion piece to this video where I examine the strengths and weaknesses of the first two seasons of The Mandalorian. It’s a collection of ideas and evidence that were cut for time or focus reasons from the main video. I’ve included both timestamps and quotes of what section of the video each idea refers to. Under a cut for length.

[1:48] Akira Kurosawa, whose movies would be very important in the western genre was very big on complete and realistic sets and effects because it helps the quality of an actors’ performance.

“The quality of the set influences the quality of the actors' performances. If the plan of a house and the design of the rooms are done properly, the actors can move about in them naturally. If I have to tell an actor, 'Don't think about where this room is in relation to the rest of the house,' that natural ease cannot be achieved. For this reason, I have the sets made exactly like the real thing. It restricts the shooting but encourages that feeling of authenticity." – Akira Kurosawa, Something Like an Autobiography

[2:27] Like the original trilogy, The Mandalorian has its fair share of humor. The sequel trilogy also had a lot of humor, and was criticized for it, but it wasn’t the humor itself that I think people had a problem with, it was how the humor was done. See, in the original trilogy humor never changed or undercut the overall tone of a scene. If a scene is tense humor might lighten or even break the tension but never undercut it. The original trilogy would never, ever, make fun of the plot, character, or scenes in its own movie. The Mandalorian follows this mold of lightening or breaking tension without undercutting the scene itself which also helps it feel like the OT.

Just Writes video on Bathos is a good expansion on this idea. Personally, I find that particular brand of humor, popularized by the Marvel movies, extremely off-putting because it just screams at me to not take the story seriously and that makes it pretty hard for me to stay immersed in it. My three favorite marvel movies are Guardians of the Galaxy, Black Panther, and Thor Ragnarok because Black Panther doesn’t really do that kind of humor and Guardians and Ragnarok manage to make it seem natural by genuinely being comedies.

[7:18] This brings us to Episode 4. Last time I criticized this episode, but I wasn’t very specific, I just mentioned that we were starting to get away from showing and towards telling. Let’s take a closer look.

The first part of this scene, where the kid was being a nuisance, was actually really good. It kind of seemed like it was going to lead into some genuine frustration with him being a nuisance and therefore maybe some drama in their relationship.

[9:51] Cowboy Bebop is another space western with a strong style and a mix of vignettes and episodes which advance a characters story. But every single episode builds up the themes of the overall story even if the plot has nothing to do with it.

To be fair, not every episode builds up *Spike’s* story and themes, but Cowboy Bebop has four main characters and every episode works towards at least one of the characters’ stories, characterization, or relationships.

[12:20] Mando’s mistrust of IG, when they really have quite a lot in common, speaks to something about his character.

What does it speak to exactly? Well, everyone might have their own opinion about that but here’s mine:

IG-11 used to be a hunter, but now Queel has reprogrammed him. Mando still sees the droid as the hunter and is adamant that it can’t be trusted no matter how much Queel insists that Mando must trust his work reprogramming the droid as an extension of trusting Queel himself.

Now, why does Mando hate droids so much, and particularly this droid? Well, that’s an open question, but I have my theories. Part of it is the trauma he experienced when he was young, but I think it runs deeper than that. You know how sometimes the traits that really bother you the most in other people are the things that you don’t like about yourself? The IG-11 that Mando met is a lot like the part of Mando that I’ve been calling “The Professional.” IG is efficient and ruthless, just like Mando on a job. They are deaf to moral and personal appeals in the face of a contract. This is also the part of Mando that took the kid to the Imperials in the first place, the part that he conquered and redeemed by the end of the third episode.

But IG has been reprogrammed. Just like Mando, he has changed and now cares for the child over himself. IG even develops a personality, and at one point attempts to tell a joke. But because IG reminds Mando so much of that part of him he had to defeat, he can’t bring himself to trust him. The tension between them persists pretty much up until IG fully demonstrates to Mando that he is there both to care for the child, and for Mando. In this moment Mando begins to really see how similar they are.

This connection makes it hard for him to let IG make his sacrifice, and he even appeals to this by telling IG that he thought his old core functionality was gone. But by reactivating his old functionality as a part of his new core function, IG is also giving Mando a template to incorporate his Professional self into his new self. He shows Mando that those two halves of his self that came into conflict back in the beginning can be synthesized into one new whole. He doesn’t need to reject any part of his identity.

Then the newly synthesized Mando dons his jetpack, fulfilling his only stated desire in the entire season, and defeats a scenery chewing villain to win the day.

But that’s just my interpretation, and I’m willing to haggle over what exact interpretation the evidence best supports.

[15:29] Speaking of Luke, let’s talk about fanservice. Now to be clear, there’s nothing intrinsically wrong with fanservice, what matters is what always matters: how you use it.

This also applies to the other two “Trademarked Star Wars Problems” I mentioned in the last video: repetitiveness and hamfisted merchandizing. These things are not necessarily bad. For example:

I would bet Baby Yoda is the most successfully merchandized product since the OT, but there’s nothing wrong with that because they’re part of the story being told. Baby Yoda doesn’t distract from the story, they are part of the story. On the other hand you have Ewoks, which were originally going to be Wookies. I would bet they went with Ewoks at least in part to sell more cute toys…but at least they still sort of work with the story. In TLJ the penguin things are there for no other reason than to be cute and sell toys. Same with the crystal dog. They have literally no purpose in the story, and their obvious and prominent inclusion only to sell toys distracts from my immersion.

Obviously repetition is part of stories. That’s why we have tropes, and the Hero’s journey, as tools for a writer to communicate information quickly. Just from his outfit we know a lot about Han before he ever opens his mouth, same with Obi-Wan. In RotJ, the heroes need to blow up the Death Star again. It’s kind of annoying that we’re literally doing the same thing we did two movies ago, but at least it’s a little different. In TFA Han Solo reassures us that the Starkiller Base isn’t that big of a deal by saying “don’t worry, there’s always a way to blow it up.” This is an example of a character reaching out from the script and telling the writer to change their story because the repetition is getting ridiculous.

[18:32] So…why is it here? Yeah, I know who Thrawn is. I don’t know why Ahsoka does, or why she cares, or why I should care. If the writer had cared about that they would have made her talk to Mando about it so she could give some sort of story or character-based explanation for why she cares, instead of just dramatically saying his name.

I mean I know the most likely reason it was here: to build hype for her solo show, but they could have done that without punching my immersion in the kidney.

[20:20] So it was no surprise that in the end the Expanded Universe’s greatest hit of all piloted his X-Wing into the show. But, I didn’t mind this. They had been seeding that a Jedi would be coming to collect Groghu for a while now, and if you had been running through the timeline in your head you were probably at least half expecting this. It’s foreshadowed well, it’s part of the story, and it triggers our emotional climax.

The reveal is quite well done too. First it’s an X-Wing, then we see a Jedi dressed in Luke’s RoTJ gear but it’s over the security cameras so there’s no color, then we see it’s a green lightsaber, then they clearly show that it’s Luke’s lightsaber hilt, then they finally have him peel his hood back. Each small reveal builds up the suspicion in your mind that it’s Luke until it’s confirmed.

That being said I would totally understand if someone thought it was obnoxious and hamfisted to shove Luke into another story, even though it did work for me.

[29:12] Parts of it even connect back to Mando’s story and character, though not in a new way because it’s mostly a redo of Mando’s relationship with IG last season.

I understand that Mando breaks his rules a little bit more here, but it’s still a riff on the same theme of: Mando has a conflict with a character, the he sees the similarities between between them, and then circumstances force Mando to take his helmet off in front of the character.

However if his arc with the other Mandalorians was functioning properly than this could work as a synthesis of a change in ideology and a reassertion of his willingness to bend the rules, but instead it just comes across as another redo of stuff in the last season. It’s still halfway functional because by this point it’s easy to forget that Mando had a character arc last season and it reminds us of that right before they pull the trigger on his and Groghu’s separation…but redoing the development from last season doesn’t count as a real character arc.

[31:08] There is so much more I could say about all of the bad writing, plotting, and characterization in this season. There are so many things that just don’t make sense, waste our time, or just plain don’t work.

I’m still confused over what the writer was trying to do with the snow planet. Like they crash land there and Mando decides to go to sleep inside his hull-breached freezing ship and the fish chick is like “Mando this is dumb you should fix your ship” and then he just fixes it. What was even the point of handing Mando the Idiot Ball there? Why not just have him fix the ship without trying to commit suicide by hypothermia first? Like…what?

[31:27] Why are you just listing off a bunch of names that mean nothing to us like she’s a video game character telling us where we need to go next?

I want to point out that even though I’m using this footage of Delphine as a reference she’s actually managing to tell you something about Malborn and why he is trustworthy, so it’s actually better than what Bo is doing. Though to be fair the tidbit about “the forest planet” is cute since it will be a deforested planet when we show up, that line needed some character connection to not sound so weird.

[33:13] That’s what the point of Show Don’t Tell *really* is, it’s not about how much dialogue you use or whether a character is explaining something. It’s about using exposition to tell us something about a character at the same time. It’s about putting the camera in a place that shows us something about the character or the action, not just what’s happening. It’s about packing as much of the story as possible into every choice you make.

In Avatar, the way that Zhao tells us about Zuko’s banishment tells us a lot about both Zhao and Zuko. The camera angle here emphasizes Katara standing encouragingly over Aang’s back as he stares dejectedly at the ground (contrasted with Toph’s angry stare) and tells us about the nature of Katara’s relationship to Aang as his teacher and friend as opposed to Toph’s. In the opening shot of A New Hope, the low angle of the camera implies dominance and the length of the Star Destroyer shows us the long reach of the Empire. Every single time Zuko is on screen it is worth paying attention to which side of his face is dominating the shot: scarred or unscarred. Exactly what each side represents is up for debate: I tend to think of it not as good Zuko vs. bad Zuko but more as Zuko’s feelings of obligation to his family and people and Zuko’s obligations to his own sense of what he believes is right and what he needs to self-actualize.

Show Don’t Tell is just a saying. It’s a saying to encourage writers, particularly new or inexperienced ones, to focus on the *art* of telling the story instead of focusing solely on the plot and facts. I am using it somewhat liberally here to say it’s about “using exposition to tell us something about a character at the same time” but since that is about the art of telling stories, and not just a recitation of facts, it does technically count.

[34:32] With television shows and the way they can go on forever, and with how much money there is in going on forever, it seems like they always become a sagging mess at some point. Some of them manage to bring the quality back, but some of them don’t. So to a certain extent, these problems with the Mandalorian are kind of normal for television shows.

I can’t remember exactly where I stopped watching How I Met Your Mother, the last thing I remember is Ted dating some crazy girl and swearing off relationships. I abandoned The Expanse midway through season 2 earlier this year…maybe I’ll go back but boy was I bored. I made it all the way through the Wire. Season 2 had its problems but eventually got back on the right foot midway through or so, but the problems came roaring back in season 5 which it took me almost a year to finish because it was so agonizing.

Avatar is probably the most controversial choice here of a show in which the quality slipped but I firmly believe that if they cut out the second half of season 2 and the first half of season 3 the show would have been much, much better. Most everything in Ba Sing Se is tonally weird and the whole idea of a city with too many rules and bureaucracy is way too complex an idea for this show to tackle. Avatar does tackle incredibly complicated and adult themes for a kids show but in my view this was one step too far. They get Zuko to a place where he’s ready to join the Aang Gang but then have him backslide temporarily. There’s this whole idea of an invasion on the Day of the Black Sun but it would be such a story cheat to allow Aang to beat the Firelord without actually mastering the four elements and so obviously isn’t going to work. All of these things together just make it feel like wheel spinning where the story and characters aren’t actually growing or developing but just being padded out.

Except for “The Tales of Ba Sing Se” and “Appa’s Lost Days” obviously, those are great.

It’s actually pretty funny because the episode before Aang is supposed to fight the Firelord the first time (the Black Sun time) he’s a nervous wreck and everyone is trying out different psychological techniques to try and make him feel better which is…I guess sort of valuable for kids to see that nervousness is normal. But when you compare it to the second time he’s going to fight the Firelord, for real, it’s *so obviously* for real this time because Aang is having a *character* based crisis about the conflict between his pacifism and his duty to stop the Firelord. The comparison of the two is telling in terms of what was going on in the story of each.

[35:03] Now they are spinning it out into not one, not two, not three, but FOUR different shows all based on the Mandalorian. It’s almost gross how hard they are milking this.

Okay apparently they fired Gina Carano so I guess it’s not four anymore. Or maybe it is who knows. Listen, the point is they *intended* to make four shows okay.

[35:06] Thanks for watching all the way through to the end. These videos take a ton of time and effort so that means a lot. Even though I’ve reset my subscriber count to zero now that I’ve criticized the Mandalorian, I will continue to work on the channel as much as I can, so subscribe if you want to see more videos like this.

I promise to always give you my honest opinion.

Also I know I was shooting for one video a month and, well, I still am but these videos are really time-consuming. I want to make sure I maintain a really high level of quality and so sometimes I get halfway through a video, realize it’s no good and have to start over with something else. Sometimes it takes months of rewrites to get it to a place where I’m happy with it. This one came out pretty quickly, it was about 6 weeks from when I started the script to when I uploaded. Hopefully I’ll only get better and more efficient at it as I get more practice.

#star wars #the mandalorian #plays the thing #video companions

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glowstickk · 4 years

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i wish to know... about your zimverse ocs... they seem pretty neat...

anon u GOT IT i’ve been wanting to talk abt the gang for so long!!!!! when i saw this ask i lost my marbles!!! knowin that someone is actually interested in these guys makes me so happy!!! so!! here they are!!! also!! apologies that it took me so long to actually answer, i wanted to be able to say all of the lore for lizzie (who hadn’t had her chara arc in rp at the time) and by the time i got her arc done i ran flat outta spoons nbfkgb,, but i got my spoons back and whipped up a few lil pictures to go with this so hopefully that makes up for it!!! oki here we go!! under a cut because talking about five separate charas is gonna get long ndfjkv

ZAPPELINE VOLTAIRE

she/he/they | genderfluid | somewhere between 25-37 y/o zap is basically my main character! she used to be a scientist who worked on interdimensional research, more specifically what the theoretical effects of interdimensional travel/portals would be on the human body and the safety of all of that. at one point the lab she worked at lost funding, but she decided to fuck around there before it got demolished because why not! she did a few experiments on herself, including changing her natural hair color and making it so that she could see an extra color. the latter of which did not work out entirely as planned, because the rods in her eyes didn’t grow in quite right. so! now she has red-green colorblindness in her right eye, and something similar to tritanomaly in her left, which is why she wears those funky glasses!

gonna be honest, i’m still working on a way to properly explain the next bit without it getting super boring or incomprehensible, but tdlr the new colors corresponds to a wavelengths that interdimensional rifts emit, so now she can see interdimensional rifts! she noodles out a way to build an interdimensional portal using some leftover notes from one of her co-workers, and jumps through! she ended up getting too excited about the portal and forgets to make sure it’s stable, and it ends up collapsing the second she gets through. so now she’s stuck in the multiverse! fun! after a bit of dimension-hopping, mad science, and the entire plot of polychrome (a game concept im workin on!!), she lands herself in zimcon!

SPARKPLUG VOLTAIRE

he/they | nonbinary | 5 y/o

sparkplug was originally built by zap to be her impulse control! this did not work! for context, zap used to be a really shitty supervillain before zimcon, so i kinda made sparkplug to be her sidekick/henchman? but in the way that’s like, supervillain is really nice and respectful to their “underlings” and basically treats them as equals and as friends, because i love that trope so fucking much. the original joke was “haha the supervillain has pack-bonded with the box!” but then the box turned into a kid and well! here we are. eventually after just. existing for a while they developed their own personality, and pretty much just became a regular kid! they arrived at zimcon as a box, but later on they end up asking zap for an astroboy-style body! as of writing this they haven’t gotten it yet, but that’s just because the rp’s kinda on pause right now. i do wanna say tho i have a special lil bit of art for it ready that hopefully yall will enjoy!!

ELIZABETH VOLTAIRE

she/her | cis (ew) | 4 years younger than zap

god just. i hate elizabeth! i really do. she’s another version of zap who is basically just an evil boomer who can’t even be fun or dramatic about it. in polychrome, she takes over as the big bad of the game. i feel like she works a lot better in polychrome just because that’s what she was made for, tbh. she and zap used to work together at one point, but due to a lot of arguing, many disagreements and some other Events(tm), started hating each other. she’s literally no fun at all and i can’t really expand upon her all that much without going into spoilers territory so that’s about it for her.

LIZZIE VOLTAIRE

she/they | trans gal | 745-748 y/o

lizzie is a ghost! she’s an alternate version of zap that died before she could ever leave her home dimension. after she died, she was quite literally chained to her death spot for over 700 years. when she died though, she was given a contract that said she could be freed if she got someone to sign it, the person signing it would be able to have her do whatever they want, but once she finished the task she could be free. if the person signing felt that she wasn’t doing a good enough job, they could rip up the contract and she’d be sent back to her death spot. it sounds bad, but it was all she had so she tried her best to get someone to sign! unfortunately though, in the few months where there were still people around, she hadn’t been able to figure out how to get herself to be visible again. just before she figured that out, the world underwent some kind of apocalypse, and all the people were wiped out. so she had no choice but to just kinda sit there and vibe for 700 years.

that is until elizabeth came along! liz signs her contract, and lizzie starts working as a henchman for her. the elizabeth arc happens (which is basically elizabeth helps lizzie possess zap and tells her to erase the con members’ memories, she does this, people are pissed, lizzie gets knocked out of zap’s body, zap dies, comes back, and beats the shit out of elizabeth and later sacrifices her to a crab) and liz decides to send her back for not doing a good enough job. so she goes back to her death spot, and after a night’s stay makes a deal with an eldritch blonde twink to gain her freedom.

REGINALD SPECTER

he/him | agender | a few thousand years probably (boomer)

bastard!! bastard man!! reggie is the one responsible for lizzie’s (and a few other peoples’) death(s). he has a job in the underworld which is basically just “take care of this huge monster that eats parts of people’s identity.” he found that feeding it souls worked best, so instead of finding lost souls he just decided it’d be easier to get some new ones. in order to kill people without getting caught, he disguises all his murders as accidents. lizzie’s happened to be a falling stage light that hit her on the head real hard. it’s not a cool or fun death and it makes her real mad ndjvkdf

lizzie was left there for so long because reggie pretty much just forgot about her. he left her the contract to give her some form of hope, which would keep her from fading away completely, but she was chained there so he could come back when he remembered. when liz signed her contract he got some sort of notice about it, and decided to come back to lizzie later for some shits and giggles. when they met up, he told her if she could find a soul to trade he’d give her her freedom. she accepts, and picks zap to trade, hoping that getting rid of her would help her earn liz’s approval (it didn’t). zap gets sent to this weird hell maze, and when a few others get in the way they get sent there too. lizzie eventually gets talked down from sending more and more people to the hell maze, and she lets them out. she’s tired of hurting people, and wants to give helping others a try! at the moment, reggie isn’t aware that lizzie let them out of the maze (and thus, isn’t gonna give him a soul to trade). if he finds out it’ll be bad, but for now she’s just vibing and trying her best to be nice!

reggie’s very much inspired by hate and dial from tpoh, and a lot of lizzie’s story is inspired by my personal theories on blondie/rgb’s death!! its basically “how many tpoh references can i cram into this: the arc.” it’s unbelievable the amount of shit i was allowed to get away with with nobody calling me out nfjdkvsf

aaaand that’s kinda it!!! i tried my best to make this short and readable, i wrote up something else earlier that was a LOT longer and im much more happy with this version. and if something i said doesn’t make sense or anyone wants to ask anything about these guys or polychrome id be more than happy to answer!!!! thank you so much for reading!!!! <3!!

#also MASSIVE shoutout to zimverse gang #if yall r reading this!! i love u guys i honestly never would have even like. gotten confident in my ocs if it weren't for yall #its!! a long and complicated thing that i don't quite know how to put into words but yall have given me so much confidence when it comes #to writing!! and just like. HHOUGH gettin soft in these tags huh #anyways!!! ily guys #and anon!!! ilysm!! thank you for asking abt them this was rlly fun to write up!!#i dunno you like. personally but you seem like a chad #oki!! its like three am as im writin this gonna queue it forrr rtha morninnn #if you're reading this i hope you have a wonderful day/night/afternoon!!#also im gonna get back to postin art soon i got a fuckton of drawings to share #been doin artfight too!!! ill do dumps of those in fours i think? i dont wanna spam dnvjkdfv #and im gonna try to finish the 2k requests soon!! ik its been like 6 whole ass months but im still goin #oki!! enough rambling!!! !!! gotta add my regular tags #ask #zimverse #zimverse rp #oc info post #hopefully that tag will work!#oki. goobnight o7 #glowdart #glowcs

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hellzyeahwebwielingessays · 4 years

Text

Superior is INDEFENCIBLE Part 2: Odds and Ends

Part 1

As a little follow up to this post I want to wrap up some defences I have encountered for both Superior #2 and the Superior storyline in general.

To start with we have more hypocrisy from the man I once admired as he tried to defend his position on Superior.

He was challenged on his primary argument that Peter and MJ’s separation justified her obliviousness now that they are back together; for further details see the above linked post.

In response to this challenge he said:

“I think there is more to my argument then "They've lived apart for a year" and her relationship with him during that time doesn't have to hold relevance to their relationship after being apart.”

Like…this guy was for fucking real.

OF COURSE their relationship back then is going to hold relevance to their relationship after being apart.

Obviously with the benefit of hindsight Nick Spencer’s run proves this to be the case. And you can refer back to my prior post where I dive deeper into the topic.

However, in that post I was talking about the specific nuances of Peter and MJ’s relationship.

What’s mind boggling is that in the above quote he’s making an even bigger reach. Jesus Christ OF COURSE their past relationship is going to hold relevance for their then-current one.

That’s how relationships work!

FFS, romantic or otherwise everyone’s relationship with everyon else is shaped by the past. This is like arguing Peter hating Norman for killing Gwen Stacy doesn’t have to be relevant to their relationship after his return to the Clone Saga.

I mean shit dude, Peter’s high school romance with Betty Brant was relevant to their romance after he graduated college!

This is how all types of relationships work. You don’t just jump in after awhile, start fresh and then nothing from the past has any bearing on the present. Even in the most positive of scenarios the fact that you are getting together again would still be shaped by the fact that you liked each other in the first place.

And for the life experiences those two shared that’d go a thousand fold.

Now let’s move on to some over miscellaneous comments sent to me a looooooooooooong time ago.

I’ve had this stuff in my drafts for years!

For the sake of catharsis I’ve decided to clear it out. It revolves around Superior Spider-Man and the comments I’m responding to were made before the original volume ended in 2014.

“Rob Wrecks wrote:Why would Aunt May even react to it? She doesn't even know the identity of Spidey now.”

In Civil War she was able to tell that the Chameleon, a MASTER of disguise who was being more subtle than Otto was, was not her nephew.

Whilst she might not know he is Spider-Man she knows her nephew so she should react and become questionable regarding his change in demeanor and behavior. What’s the old saying ‘A mother always knows’.

“As for MJ, they aren't even married anymore either. Sure she remembers who is under the mask. But I doubt she's gonna bring trouble on herself for prying.”

I address a lot of this in this post.

Basically, not being married anymore has nothing to do with it. This woman lived with this man for years (five to be precise) and had a very close relationship with him which involved countless tragedies and traumas. That doesn’t just go away. This is to say nothing of the fact that she has known this man for about 10 years and has been his friend and girlfriend during that time. In fact in Stern’s run when she knew who he was but didn’t let him know, she was depicted as knowing him better than anyone and was able to read him as a book. This was back when they weren’t as close as they are now, hadn’t known each other for as long and she didn’t know him as intimately as she would later come to down the road. In ASM #290 Peter himself says MJ knows him as well as he knows himself and this was before the marriage.

Even in Slott’s run this depiction of Mary Jane knowing Peter better than anyone else was highlighted in various stories like Spider Island, a time travel arc, Alpha, and a Lizard arc at HORIZON labs.

In JMS’ run Peter and Mary Jane were shown to be somewhat in synch even though they were separated at the time and had been for a long while going back. This was showcased in ASM V2 #50 and they had been effectively separated with minimal interaction as far back as ASM V2 #13; arguably even issue #1.

And yet she understood him and knew him very well, falling back into synch with him when they reconciled. Yes there was some awkwardness and them getting to know each other again but it was not on the same level of Otto guzzling champagne, creating spider bots, talking in a manner which was unlike the way he’s ever spoken before and MJ just wondering passingly then dismissing it. This woman has lived through the Chamelon, robot parents and clones and lives in a world where friggin Skrulls have invaded.

This out of character behaviour should send off alarm bells. She DOES clock something is off in Superior #10 but only when he says a phrase she’s never heard him say before. He was doing shit MUCH more out of character before then and she was dismissing it.

Later she was STILL dismissing the notion that Peter wasn’t himself as merely crazy on her part.

Again this woman knows Peter can be/has been cloned repeatedly. This woman even for awhile believed Peter himself was a clone so she knows even memories can be replicated. But Peter is acting so obviously NOT himself that it’s practically SCREAMING at her that she should get this. In fact Peter’s ghost point this out which is Slott lampshading the situation. That doens’t make it good writing that’s just pointing out how bad your story is.

“Hasn't she (I'm guessing he's referring to Aunt May?) been focused lately on her new marriage though? I don't read enough of Spidey these days so I'm only going with bits and pieces I've read about here and there.”

What does being married recently or focusing upon it have to do with anything?

In Civil War she was focused upon not dying because Peter’s ID reveal had upended her life.

If you are someone’s MOTHER and have raised them all their life you will absolutely be able to tell when something is wrong, when they are in fact not the real deal.

“As for MJ, who would she go too? Not like anyone would likely believe her unless she had a telepath scan her mind.”

Who would she go to? I dunno maybe the fucking Avengers or Fantastic Four who are Peter’s friends and team mates. Or maybe not go that far why not go to Black Cat, Human Torch or Daredevil . These are all people whom she knows (at least vaguely in regards to Daredevil) personally and have access to technology that can prove things one way or another.

Even if you argue that it’s not fair bringing in the wider Marvel Universe, Black Cat, Carlie, HORIZON labs, the Bugle staff and Scarlet Spider are all Spider-Man franchise characters.

“Now there could be a possibility she's making a list of his behavior and the like and is just waiting for the right time to say something when she knows she's less likely to die from it.

Maybe Slott's just got something going that'll eventually be revealed? Who knows.”

Oh boy, that didn’t stand the test of time did it?

This is just shitty analysis on principle. It hinges upon blind faith and writing stuff in your head about what characters are doing behind the scenes.

There was NEVER an indication MJ was doing anything like that and her actions actually contradicted event he idea of her doing any of that stuff.

The net responses are to the statement that Doc Ock was a gentleman who would treat women with respect.

“Keyword there, 'was' a gentlemen. I can imagine after years of defeats at the hands of Spidey, certain habits would change and he wouldn't care anymore.

It could have just been a subtle change that no one really noticed. He did try and end the world before #700 if I recall right.”

You need to SHOW those habits changing. The last major Doctor Octopus story before BND was in JMS’s run when he was very much a gentleman. You can’t just say his illness and defeats suddenly transformed him into a would be rapist. It’s utterly out of character for him. It’d be like bringing back Ben Reilly and making him a mass murderer. WHY is he a mass murderer.

(Fun fact. The stuff I bolded about Ben Reilly was something I wrote at the time. I kept it in because of how sadly ironic it wound up being…fuck Clone Conspiracy seriously)

Ending the world before #700 is one thing IN Doc Ock’s character. He is egotistical and wants acknowledgement of his genius.

Superior depicted him going against a character trait he’s always had. In his origin story, when he was ‘courting’ Aunt May, when he was involved with Stunner and Lady Octopus and the like he has always been show to have a respect for women and not had to resort to cheap ploys to woo them.

In Superior he was trading off of MJ’s relationship with Peter and Peter’s memories to basically abuse this woman. That is beneath Doctor Octopus. He is an intellectual a man for whom such actions are debase, the realm of the common thug whilst he is much more he is DOCTOR OCTOPUS.

BTW in Web of Death it was established that Doc Ock probably would not target MJ or Peter’s family even though he knew Peter’s identity.

So for him to suddenly switch to ‘I’m gonna fuck his girlfriend to get one over on him” is again utterly out of character.

‘Web of Death’ was co-written by Tom DeFalco btw, who established Otto’s origin. Thus the argument is flying in the face of someone who helped define the character with no explanation at all.

Slott had done this with other characters like Ashley Kafka.Suddenly the most naively compassionate woman in the world who believed she could redeem CARNAGE is saying this lesser serial killer is a complete monster. That is piss poor writing.

Even if Slott WERE to establish and show how Ock went from one extreme to the other it doesn’t make it a good idea. Doc Ock would be rapist is a lot less interesting than Doc Ock the lone super villain who is part gentleman and part humanitarian with a respect for women. If this was Norman Osborn in Peter’s body, or Electro, or Shocker I’d believe these actions.

The topic then changed to Carlie Cooper’s depiction in Superior as a goddam idiot who isn’t even telling MJ Peter might be evil. “Red Hood wrote: Carlie and Wraith followed Ock’s paper trail because she knows for fact that peter parker doesnt have the money to fund his own private army, the reason she hasnt said anything is because it's not such a good idea to go pointing fingers without absolute truth, remember eddie brock and how he was so sure about the sin eater?”

Carlie’s investigation was going incredibly sloooooooooooooooooowly. Not only was it dull reading, but it made her completely unsympathetic. Why not warn Mary Jane by saying “Look before he died Doc Ock told me he and Spider-Man had swapped bodies. I’m not saying Peter IS Doc Ock but just....be careful MJ”.

Or why not inform the Avengers or Fantastic Four about this. Sure the Avengers gave him a physical but they wouldn’t know what to look for. And why is Carlie Cooper all of a sudden saying “Wait I KNOW Peter doesn’t have this kind of cash so this is a big clue that he isn’t himself.” When her first big clue should have been that time Spider-Man SHOT SOMEONE IN THE FACE!

“also peter and mj arent married anymore.”

See above.

You don’t just suddenly fall out of knowing someone if you’ve been THAT close to them and known them for that long just because suddenly you are not married anymore. She has deduced subtle differences in the Chameleon and clones before this but Ock is NOT being subtle whatsoever. He isn’t even talking the same way he normally does. And Mister Red Hood even says so himself, Carlie can tell right way. His co-workers whom he’s known for LESS THAN A YEAR can tell something is up. But the woman who’s been closer to him than ANYONE in his life, she can’t tell. That is bullshit of the highest order.

“1. mj and peter arent married anymore, idk if they were married in identity crisis but remember how after the deal with mephisto they were separated for x amount of years before she even came back to new york, i can see her not being able to tell peter is acting different at that point. aunt may and the avengers though don't get a pass especially when carlie who knew him the least could tell right away.”

See above.

When you separate from someone you’ve been that close to those feelings don’t just disappear. This is especially true of people who’ve been through immensely traumatic events together. Soldiers often find that only fellow soldiers, specifically ones who were with them in combat, can truly understand what they went through and how they felt. It creates an emotional/mental bond. Same thing here. Peter and Mary Jane went through Venom, Kraven’s Last Hunt, the death of Harry, Gwen, aunt May, Ben Reilly, the clone saga as a whole, Civil War, Peter’s OWN death, Maximum Carnage and so on. They’d have that kind of connection I was speaking about, you don’t just forget it to the point where you let MASSIVE differences in behaviour slide, especially massive differences in behaviour which are different to the way he was acting LAST WEEK!

“3. Also i don't think his [Doc Ock’s] actions are entirely out of character, i mean he was dead, then revived, beat down for several years into a dying body. given time to think about all the things you would do if given another chance i dont think its out of the question for doc to say "great, second chance at life with a movie starhottie gf". also if you'll threaten the city, then the world, then mind swap with someone i dont think having sex is that big a stretch.”

See my comments above why this IS out of character for Doc Ock. Again this isn’t just him wanting to get laid this is him potentially date raping an innocent woman. You need to SHOW the progression of that change

And rape in comic book fiction is understood to be worse from the reader’s POV than the various Saturday Morning Cartoon style crimes he’s pulled.

The next comment was in response to the public’s indifference towards Spider-Man shooting Massacre in the face! “7. As far as no one caring about massacre, didn't he break out a few times and inflict his namesake? no one is going to care that a killer like that gets shot, humans aren't dignified at all. i can see aunt may saying something but no one else is going to be like "oh great that killer is back in jail, too bad all criminals break out" no they're going to be like "finally someone put down this thug, maybe my life or someone i care about will be spared from him at least in the future" and maybe it was caught on security cameras or phones but maybe they deleted it, i mean spider-man just shot a dude in the face and if he wanted there would be nothing anyone could do to stop him from putting the hurt on someone else”

This is just rubbish.

No one is going to care? For God’s sake the police in real life get reprimanded for using unnecessary force.

The law is the law you CANNOT publically execute an unarmed man. And my point was no one, not even Mary Jane or Jonah, were reacting to this mind-blowingly out of character action on the part of Spider-Man. Maybe they do not care that Massacre was killed but they should be wondering “Jesus that’s not like Spider-Man at all”. This was Spider-Man becoming absolutely EVERYTHING Jameson ever falsely accused him of and no one reacted. And I am sorry but the attitude of ‘human’s aren’t dignified so they’d react like THIS” is extremely broad and generalised. This would be a major talking point and a major issue. This is EXACTLY what the entire ‘Civil War’ debacle was about. Super heroes running unchecked doing as they pleased. It’s been what, a year tops Marvel time since Civil War? If that stuff was deleted YOU NEED TO SHOW IT. The cover story is that EVERYONE in that massive crowd covered for him. That is in no way shape or form how humans actually act. And who would there be to stop like a teenager or a kid or a lone person in the crowd from tweeting “OMG Spider-Man just shot this dude” or uploading a video or picture. They were CHEERING him on they wouldn’t be afraid of him being reprimanded. Once something like that hit the internet it’d spread like wildfire, it wouldn’t be something that if immediately taken down would die away, especially when THE NEWS was stating Spider-Man had ‘neutralised Massacre’ and then Massacre shows up dead, WTF would the public THINK happened?

“Aaron Alexander Luthor wrote: Superior is an excellent title, but I feel you approached it having already made up your mind. Doc Ock NEVER attempted date rape, and I don't know where you get that from”

Boy, I wonder where I got the idea of Otto trying to rape MJ from? What an obviously ‘excellent’ title.

Trying to sleep with Mary Jane whilst tricking her into thinking he is Peter Parker then that is categorically trying to date rape her. He didn’t go through with it because he discovered he could just wank off to her memories (I can’t believe I wrote that) but that is exactly what he was trying to do. Maybe to HIM he didn’t think of it as rape but yeah that’s exactly what it was.

“He ripped off his own shirt, not hers.”

I honestly have no idea what he’s talking about here btw.

“Mary Jane had/has mentioned several times that there is something wrong with him and that she thinks there is something strange going on, he also hasn't spoken to her in weeks in the time frame of the comic.”

Yes MJ has noticed passingly things are wrong but then he feeds her a line and she buys it or otherwise she dismisses it herself. This in monumentally out of character for her given her history and makes her incredibly stupid, which is the ONLY way this title could have worked out. Again, she lives in a world of Skrulls, clones, LMDs and shape shifters one of which is literally an enemy of Peter’s and has tried impersonating him multiple times (targeting her specifically twice). But she either doesn’t clock anything is wrong or doesn’t really react when she does. And he HAD spoken to her within weeks by the time or Superior #2.

“Same goes for Aunt May, he visited her the first few weeks as Parker, and hasnt spoken to her since. He is basically ignoring the people in Peter's life, and they have taken notice.”

See my response about Aunt May not knowing. Again, this woman RAISED him and she could tell when the master of disguise who was being a lot more subtle about impersonating Peter was not her son/nephew.

Also he wasn’t exactly ignoring the HORIZON labs staff was he?

“When he killed Massacre, some of the civilians were shocked and appalled, but when the police investigated all the officers on the scene lied for Spidey, because they think he did the right thing. That is why the only officers still interested are Carlie Cooper who does know, and is ACTIVELY trying to prove it isnt Peter, and Captain Watanabe aka The Wraith”

My point about NO ONE taking photos, tweeting, facebooking or whatever still stands as does the security cameras thing and the fact that Massacre was TRYING TO GET PUBLICITY. Again with Carlie why is she not warning SOMEBODY at this point. It isn’t like they wouldn’t believe her after Massacre. It isn’t like Spider-Man isn’t acting weird. It isn’t like body swapping is a legit THING in the Marvel universe. For God’s sake this happened to Captain America!

Kaine, the CLONE of Peter Parker with identical memories and everything. In the Sibling Rivaly crossover between Scarlet Spider and Superior Team-Up even HE couldn’t tell that Peter. Was an imposter This guy doesn’t just know Peter well, he IS Peter. And Otto was ranting none too subtley about how Kaine has bad blood with HIM. He doesn’t say he’s Doc Ock but he’s conveying unsubtly to Kaine that he is not Peter Parker and he is not TALKING like Peter Parker either. When his CLONE is still operating under the delusion that he is Peter Parker that’s put it beyond doubt this was ridiculously contrived.

“BTW, Carlie and MJ have talked about the suspicious way Pete has been acting, Carlie just hasnt told MJ directly.”

WHY didn’t Carlie tell MJ! And WHY were she and Peter noticing Peter’s different actions yet being totally blasé about them.

FFS in ‘Kraven’s Last Hunt’ MJ and Peter had been married for just 2 weeks and in that time she was able to deduce from his actions that the guy in the Spider-Man suit was NOT Peter. In the Mark of Kaine an identical clone of Peter approaches her and she is ultimately able to tell (twice) that he is not her husband. And she did this whilst pregnant and stressed out from a life or death situation to say nothing of the fact that Aunt May had recently died which would be weighing on her mind. Yet in Superior her mind was clearer and she was still buying this was Peter. This is enormously bad out of character writing for her

“As for the Avengers scans, it wasnt that no one could read them, its that they all came back NORMAL.”

No, the scans DID NOT come back normal at all. Doc Ock looked at the scans and could TELL something was not normal because he saw ghost Peter was in his mind. Yeah there was a tiny inconsistency in the brain waves but why the heck weren’t there people on the Avengers team that day to take note of stuff like that. Cap, Wolverine, Black Widow and Thor are obviously NOT going to be able to properly read this scientific equipment like Iron Man or Hank Pym or the Beast. ANY of those guys would’ve been able to tell but no only the Avengers who categorically would not be able to properly read the brainwaves were there. Why? Why get the unscientific Avengers? Because of plot contrivances is why.

And where were the telepaths? One telepathic scan from SOMEBODY should have told all. And again these tests come back normal....no one thought he could be a clone? Spider-Man has joked to these people about his clones, they know about them. Correct me if I am wrong but at the time of the Avenger’s physical of Peter wasn’t there a character involved with the Avengers who was supposed to be the living universe? SHE couldn’t tell Doc Ock is Spider-Man? The universe literally didn’t know this?

“Even Dr. Strange and Wolverines tests all came back regular.”

If Dr. Strange with all his power wasn’t able to deduce the truth that’s even MORE contrived!

And what the heck were Wolverine’s test? That he smelt the same? Of course he would.

“There was a tiny inconsistency in the brainwaves, it wasnt that no one could read it, its that it was so small that no one would even take notice of it, except for Peter or Ock if they were to look for it.”

See above for why this is bullshit.

“And the Avengers are STILL very suspicious, if you read the current titles.”

At the time a ‘current title’ was Superior Team Up #1.

In it the Avengers told him they were wrong to put him in probation and are still just ‘suspicious’ when he INVADED SHADOWLAND WITH AN ARMY!. Because THAT’S so usual for Spider-Man right?

“You're entitled to your opinion, but you cant just make up facts and call it a discussion. I get the impression that you a)Havent read the whole series; b) Had already made up your mind before reading the issues you have read; and c) Havent read the companion stories (i.e. Avenging Spider-Man, Superior Team-up, Hickman's Avengers titles). If you look at the story as a whole, its actually quite good.”

Said the guy who got all the above information I outlined WRONG.

From a technical point of view it doesn’t make sense, it uses contrivances and out of character writing to keep it going. You want to write Doc Ock as Spider-Man. Okay then don’t surround him with people who should be able to figure this out. Or say there is some kind of device redirecting their attention.

Don’t have Doc Ock not act like Doc Ock because that defeats the point of the exercise. Don’t go for deliberate sensationalism or crass storytelling which was essentially everything revolving around him hooking up with Mary Jane and then the oh so lovely page of the Superior Spider-Wanker.

That issue in particular even resolved itself in a contrived manner. Doc Ock begins uttering gibberish which recalled One Moment in Time about “we cannot be together because it’s an unsolvable equation blah blah blah”.

Basically he is saying “I can never be with you because of the danger I put you in”; which is Slott using the character as a mouthpiece.

In the next issue Otto began courting a student at his college because consistency rocks. Even Ghost Peter is out of character at this moment “WOW Ock you did the one thing I could never do and walked away from Mary Jane”. Peter is right he probably can’t walk away from Mary Jane but...does he WANT to? Where the heck is this coming from? What is worse is that it’s so unnecessary. There was a MUCH better explanation for Ock breaking up with MJ. If Ock were in character he could just come to the conclusion that sleeping with MJ under these circumstances would be wrong and beneath him hence he wouldn’t go through with it. If Ock was out of character as he was in their issue but still vaguely in character he could just come to the conclusions that since accessing Peter’s memories he’s begun to have genuine feelings for MJ and doesn’t just want to fuck her, it would involve him having a relationship with here which at this point in time he is incapable of, he doesn’t know how to handle it. I will wholeheartedly admit I was not jazzed about the concept of Superior from the outset. If nothing else I want to read about Peter Parker not Doc Ock and if I did want to read about Doc Ock AS Doc Ock, not as Spider-Man and not as an rotting body.

An arc in a comic is one thing doing this long term all the problems I foresaw have come up as well as some I didn’t even predict. This could have worked if Doc Ock was separated from Peter’s supporting cast who should be able to tell something is amiss but then that defeats a lot of the point of the story. It was a lose-lose situation.

People can enjoy garbage if you want but don’t call it gold.

Part 1

#The Superior Spider-Man #Superior Spider-Man #Dan Slott #otto octavius #Doc ock #Doctor Octopus #mjwatsonedit #mary jane watson #Aunt May #May Parker #Mary Jane Watson Parker #MJ Watson #Peter Parker #Spider-man #Civil War 2006

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linkspooky · 5 years

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Medaka Box top 2-5 because number 1 is obvious

I LOVE TO TALK ABOUT HOW MUCH I LOVE MY FAVES. IF YOU EVER ASK WANT TO ASK ME WHO MY FAVES ARE FOR A SERIES FEEL FREE TO SEND ME AN ASK.

1. My love was Real - Kumagawa Misogi

No, shush I’m going to talk about Kumagawa Misogi. The only time he gets a chance to be number one is in popularity polls and my faves lists.

My favorite thing about Medaka Box out of all of Nisioisin’s works is that the weirdoes are not just weirdoes who are accepted as weirdoes, but they’re also challenged to grow more human.

What I really like about Kumagawa is that he gets his ass kicked constantly. You come to understand just how he developed his broken method of coping and seeing the world, but it’s also something he ultimately has to let go of. The story never lets him win and challenges him to grow. Which is why you end up rooting for Kumagawa because it’s far more interesting seeing him fail sometimes than the main characters succeeding.

Kumagawa’s just this insane person who seems to be doing whatever he wants, the embodiment of edgy loser characters, but at the same time he’s eventually revealed to be quite human. He’s grounded in basic human desires, he wants to be happy like everybody else, he wants to have security, to protect his friends. It’s that humanity in the character you get attached too. He’s a loser, not because he’s a monster, but because he has so many very human flaws. At the end of the day, for all his flashiness he kind of just acts like a regular good for nothing.

Underneath it all I see Kumagawa as a character whose broken in kind of an ordinary way. Nisioisin writes a lot about broken geniuses, people who are insane but also talented to some degree. Kumagawa is just like, an average ordinary guy underneath it all that’s been subjected to a shit ton of trauma and noen fo that trauma really made him better as a person and he doesn’t have some kind of special talent to balance it out. Normal people, ugly people, worthless people can be broken too, there’s no such thing as suffering beautifully. And yet, Kumagawa’s still trying to be a person, he’s trying to struggle and do better even though he’s not someone who would ever be the main character of the story. Which is why I think he’s grounded in something really relatable.

2. I don’t care what fictional characters call me - Ajimu Najimi

Ajimu’s great because she’s literally the most talented, all knowing character in the manga, but in the end she’s just as shitty as Kumagawa. Often I end up liking these two as a pair because they’re just so integral to each other’s character arcs.

Ajimu is a shitty person. You get all these reasons like she’s actually seven million terminals, or that she’s trillions of years old, but beyond that she clearly has a personality, and that personality is bad. She just doesn’t really care about anybody besides herself. She drags along other people with her whims.

She’s a mastermind but at the same time she’s kind of just a petty child. For all of her grandiose reasons for manipulating people along, it’s more that Ajimu doesn’t really want to live as a person. There are characters that Nisioisin made up that are like, actually not meant to be human but some incomprehensible entity. Like, the story goes out of its way to say that Yodzuru isn’t human. In Monogatari, oddities and aberrations are not meant to be human, they’re meant to be inhuman and different. But Ajimu always struck me as a character written to be human underneath it all. Her constant announcing of “I’m a non-human” is just kind of her running away that psychologically, she’s still pretty much a human despite her weird origin story.

Which is why my favorite part about her is how little she actually knows about being a human. She understands people like they’re toys to move around in her toybox, or roles in a script but you get the sense she doesn’t get them as like, thinking, feeling entities separate from herself. She doesn’t really understand love, or friendship or anything like that, and she doesn’t want to bother to learn anyway because she already knows everything. Ajimu literally has the script handed to her, and yet like Medaka says, she doesn’t know anything. She has to start all the way from the beginning.

3. So let’s get married! Marry me, Marry me, Marry me! - Emukae Mukae

I used to hate Yanderes until I met Emukae. One of the differences I noticed is that Emukae is definitely not written to be anybody’s fantasy. She’s her own character all throughout. Which is what i disliked about most yanderes to begin wtih, they were always obsessed with some dude, but like never as a flaw or a character arc it was supposed to be appealing and not ugly.

Emukae is very ugly when she’s introduced, and we get to see her just like Kumagawa work her way back into being a human being again. The reason she has to let go of her romantic feelings is because she was using them to entirely define who she was, which is why her personality appears so shallow at first.

By the end of the manga Emukae is probably the character besides Kumagawa who has changed and developed the most, and another thing is that she does this without really abandoning parts of her presonality. Emukae is still a minus towards the end, she’s still manic at times, she just doesn’t use love as a substitute for everything anymore because she’s learned to grow an identity outside of that. She’s kind of growing into her own person over the course of the manga instead of attaching herself to either Kumagawa or Zenkichi to define who she was.

4. I’ll become the main character - Zenkichi Hitoyoshi

Zenkichi is a send up to classic shonen protags and a subversion of them at the same time. He’s the guy who never gives up, who always makes friends, and who tries to earn everything with training, effort, and hard work. I admit a lot I like about Zenkichi is his foiling with Kumagawa (Kumagawa existing as his shadow, Zenkichi’s hard work is always rewarded, and Kumagawa’s is never rewarded).

However, there is something unique about the character himself. That is, getting stronger never actually gets Zenkichi what he wants. Despite being the main male lead, he almost never technically wins any fights. He wins against Munakata at the beginning but that’s about it. He’s actually usually the weakest character in the group and surrounded by super strong women.

What’s interesting about Zenkichi as a protag is that his arc isn’t about gaining strength, but actually letting go of the idea of gaining strength. He wins against Medaka in the end not by beating her in a fight, but because he’s better at making connections with other people than she is. He finds his place eventually in learning to make connections with others rather than building his entire life around protecting Medaka.

5. I’ll kill you - Munakata Kei

Munakata is fun, because he’s an interesting character concept. Every time he looks at a person he wants to kill them. Unlike Hitoshiki Zerozaki, rather than choosing to give into this urge he’s actually spent his whole life fighting against it. Which is what makes him unique, he’s basically every other serial killer that Nisioisin has ever written (a serial killer, but they’re lonely) but this time he hasn’t actually killed anybody.

Which under the surface makes him feel like much more of a normal dude. He’s actually a very human person who just happened to be born with a weird obsession with killing people. I guess one thing that makes me like this character so much is I’ve seen similiar attempts to make this character work with the same concept, but they all come off as unrelatable and weird.

Munakata is a fully fleshed out character. He wants to have friends, wants to fight for those friends. He sometimes get self righteous. He’s serious and straight laced. He’s overprotective of those friends. He just also happens to be constantly seeking out a reason to kill someone. Munakata is even mentioned to have a bad attitude on purpose. His showdown with Kumagawa is also one of my favorite scenes in the manga, with the two of them fighting with their contrasting philosophies.

It feels like the fact that he wants to murder every single person he meets is just an asterisk on his character, instead of having his entire character built around that fact. Which is fun. He’s actively resisting becoming the murderer who kills people for no reason because they’re obsessed with killing people trope, and it gives him a satisfactory arc over the story. Also, once again how normal he is is just fun, the second he did finally kill someone his first response was to just walk to the police station. What a dude.

#kaibutsushidousha #medaka box #spooky speaks #kumagawa misogi #ajimu najimi #hitoyoshi zenkichi #emukae mukae #munakata kei

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