born to fag out over jack delroy but forced to be one of the highest rated Upset Reviews on letterboxd

I'm on ep5 of LOK and remembering why I have never gotten past the first season of this show. The love triangle shit is driving me INSANE in the worst of ways. It feels like fucking high school drama.

I will stick it out... because I have heard the show gets better... and also the promise of endgame Korra and Asami.... I will stick it out this time....!!!!

But God. It's so annoying 😭😭😭😭

;c

ooh the bolin ask got me thinking and i’m curious as to how you’d rewrite/edit asami’s character and specifically korra and asami’s relationship if you had full creative autonomy. obviously we would have to retread some familiar points here (like, lok’s entire unfortunate politic and the often shoddy secondary character work) but i’m always interested in hearing what you think on the korrasami front!

this is such a good question to ask me specifically (the ghost of tumblr user bloodbenderz pointed out in my bolin post that i was the wrong person to ask abt his character bc he’s been the bolin champion since day one whereas i. do not care for him, but i have been asami’s champion since day one so YES HELLO) i have thought extensively about asami like truly so much, especially post finale wherein i reevaluated my entire weltanschauung because korrasami simply broke my brain. asami’s position within the narrative is almost paradoxical in the sense that she is established as a primary player but her inner life itself is afforded very little room for exploration. atla does such a great job of fleshing out characters and giving them these truly human dimensions, which is probably why it’s had such a chokehold on me for well over a decade, but lok fails abysmally at this with pretty much every character except korra herself (my baby my angel light of my life etc etc).

but asami is interesting, at least conceptually. obviously id give her more narrative space to figure out her shit, but also it’s a matter of understand what kind of narrative space is the right space to afford her. as ive gestured to in other recent posts, the most interesting facets of asami’s character are her relationship to her father (ie patriarchy, the nuclear family structure, systems of interpersonal abuse), her wealth (ie the guilt that stems from possessing capital built on exploitation and violence and how she reconciles with that as a deeply principled & ethical person), and her latent feelings for korra (ie actually going further into the implications of homoeroticism in a way that doesn’t veer straight into the mawkish heavyhandedness of the comics but also doesn’t leave it entirely subtextual until the last minute).

I think korra and asami’s relationship is actually one of the strongest aspects of the show, and i like that it’s largely lowkey instead of employing the shallow trappings of heteronormative romantic troping that turned me off other relationships in avatar (eg aang and katara, korra and mako, mai and zuko). there’s a poignant subtlety to their development that i appreciate, even as i also recognize that it was largely due to network restraints. i think that korra and asami kinda have a utenanthy thing going on but like. obviously not as profound. (also korra is utena and asami is anthy dont be racist.) so a lot of what rgu does with their largely unspoken, hidden feelings that are nonetheless evident to any viewer with a brain is what i would also employ to make korrasami more powerful. obviously lok (and atla, yes i voted rgu in those polls) pale in comparison to the masterpiece that is utena, but you get it.

that said, if i really wanted to improve asami’s character, i would focalize her relationship to her father. at no point in the show does lok ever state that hiroshi was abusive, despite concrete evidence that he tried to kill his own daughter. asami loves him unconditionally despite his role in funding a terrorist movement (let’s not get into that rn ok) and attempting filicide. we’re told that asami and hiroshi fostered a sort of codependent relationship after yasuko’s death. hiroshi retreated into his grief, and asami, an isolated heiress further isolated from her peers by her staggering genius (again, her being a genius is largely only implied but like. heavily), was left to depend on him financially, physically, and emotionally, while also sort of playing his pseudowife/caretaker as he failed to take care of her and himself (and of course it’s no coincidence that she’s the spitting image of yasuko). so in some ways, asami has been very independent from a young age, and in other ways, she is completely dependent on her father in every way. the subtext simultaneously goes unaddressed and is also thoroughly evident to anyone who bothers to tease it out. asami was, in some ambiguous configuration, abused by her father, and it culminates in him trying to kill her once she asserts her independence. her taking him down with the glove is literally a direct parallel to zuko redirecting ozai’s lightning, it’s not even subtle! it’s just. ignored!!!

moreover, asami’s struggle as she inherits the company in book 2 is handled so poorly it’s almost crazy. i have a post where i compare asami to azula and shiv roy (love seeing tags on these posts that are like “who the hell is shiv roy?” shiv my best friend shiv) and talk about each of their relationships to their fathers and how it informs their relationships to power. obviously lok refuses to acknowledge that asami was abused and operates on a psychological platform of paternal abuse in any real way, but it’s honestly one of the more logical readings of her character considering her actions. so again, if i had the power to write her well this time, i’d tease that out more, exacerbate those implications in a similar way to how azula, zuko, or even toph and sokka operate psychologically. and of course, that also would inform her relationship to her wealth and position as ceo, as both a great burden and a responsibility she feels she must adopt (it’s her biological destiny lol). and of course doing a better job to illustrate how that crisis of identity parallels korra’s, because, you know, it’s like the whole point? also (and this is tangential) but asami needed to hire zhu li and then they should’ve both killed varrick with hammers. but in general asami’s character needed to better serve as a critique of capitalism and patriarchy through her unique role in the system. like, it was really so close to achieving that anyway, but they continually dropped the ball so that the implications of her character were always fascinating, but her character itself was simply. there.

in summary, if mako’s character should function as an interrogation of intertwined structures of family and class within the society lok establishes, asami should have a similar function through different means. mako implicates the role of the impoverished orphan in a neoliberal patriarchy (and bolin, ideally, further complicates the dynamic by being more visibly earth kingdom than fire nation), whereas asami implicates the role of the abused yet wealthy girl in the same neoliberal patriarchy. in a good show, each character supplements the broader critiques being made by the narrative. but while mako, bolin, and asami all have the right pieces set in place to do so, they never quite stick the landing. because liberalism, or nickelodeon, or obama, or girlboss feminism, or whatever.

Treasure is a Rosegarden Song

HEAR ME OUT OKAY. I've known for a while it could be sort of linked back to them, but it felt easier to brush it off as a general whole team reunion song... Until today's new episode.

⚠ SPOILERS AHEAD, YE HAVE BEEN WARNED ⚠

We got a very big win today with the Bees, they even got a whole new song that Casey has confirmed is bmblb part 2 (check her twitter, i'm not linking it lol). Which... really makes you wonder if they'd have that many Bees songs back to back, right? An argument can surely be made for it being a song about Yang and Ruby as that's the first reunion in Ultimatum that we see, but the lyrics don't really imply a sisterly bond. It could be Renora as the other couple that had a hint of a reunion that scene... but they didn't have a proper one. We got it and their confession in the following episode.

Which leaves the only other focused relationship dynamic in that moment: Ruby and Oscar

And why would it be an RG song? Well, they're the only 'pair' that got separated in v8 that didn't end the volume together. The teams were split down the middle with very clear foils:

Yang to Blake Ren to Nora Weiss to Jaune Ruby to Oscar (Also Ruby to Yang but this ain't about them)

But when Atlas fell, Ren and Nora were together in Vacuo. The bees made it to Ever After. Jaune and Weiss did too... but Oscar and Ruby? They're the only ones that are still apart. And this song is one about absence of another and awaiting a reunion. So lets dive into the lyrics proper, shall we?

Night and day, I've waited

For starters, the sun and moon symbolism that's been thrown around for them since their introductions. Yes, the Bees also have a celestial union going on, but again please bare with me.

All alone in crowded rooms I'm incomplete, my life is paused When you're not here

This is the longest portion of the analysis as the line "all alone in crowded rooms" is so heavy.

It gets tricky when we can't see Oscar's state rn (i will come back to him in a minute tho), but we do know Ruby's. We know that she is preoccupied with a lot of things. She's weighed down by Penny's death, by the internalized expectations she has to be just like Summer, this perfect hero from a fairytale, and is alone in her burdens as a leader. Romance is likely the last thing on her mind. But she is feeling loneliness, isolation, and left behind. We can see that in all past volume examples quite literally (like the above photo, the dance, Brunswick farms, her team not wanting to explore Atlas after their first mission, etc.), but it's really being driven home in recent episodes between the Blacksmith (Carpenter?) and Ruby's reaction to the Bees.

"You're doing this all alone?"

Also just... the way they're all positioned in this scene is so intentional. Yang and Blake are together and they are warm by the fire. Weiss is drinking some piping tea and smiling at them. And Ruby is sitting alone at a table with an empty chair, draped in a teal/green cloth, furthest from the fire. Remember the song "Cold" and how it's used as a metaphor for loss, loneliness, and grief throughout the show? Yeahhhh.

Recognizing Ruby is alone in crowded rooms begs the question of who in the cast makes her not feel that way. Well, anyone that's spent any amount of time looking at RG knows their entire dynamic is built on relating to and respecting each other for their similar positions. That out of everyone, Oscar has been the one to see through Ruby's mask and got her to actually open up about her grief. On the opposite side, Ruby helps Oscar in much the same ways he does her. By constantly watching his back, standing up for him, and reassuring him that despite the merge he is his own person... but he is also someone familiar with this feeling.

By virtue of being an Oz, he's already alienated. He joined the party late and doesn't know everyone as well as the others. He's also the youngest of the bunch and that's a lot of pressure that Ruby is familiar with.

So out of every pairing in the cast, these two are the ones that feel the most alone in crowded rooms and, by extension, less alone when they are together.

Though I walk this world I am nowhere to be found Every thought's of you And for now, you're not around

The singer here is saying that they don't feel present or grounded because of the absence of someone else. Their thoughts are with the person they are missing... but the wording about 'walking this world' is so specific when RG is the only pair split between worlds.

If this is from Oscar's POV, then he isn't found on Remnant. He's found in Ever After because that's where Ruby, and therefore his thoughts, are. The reverse POV also works, but in Ruby being very prioritized with the state they left Remnant in and her team consistently trying to pull her back to what's happening right in front of them.

But that's alright I'll be just fine I'm not concerned With sands of time

Sands of time is another very specific wording choice. Hourglass being associated with time is a give-in... but knowing what we know now it could be a lot of things. The Ever After is messy with time; we're seeing that firsthand with Jaune. But with Ruby and Oscar being the only ones still separated, there is an anticipation and a 'waiting' happening.

Beyond sands of time, Oscar - who has clock gears as a constant motif for his character design - is surrounded by sand as far as the eye can see in the deserts of Vacuo.

If forever comes and goes, I won't pay it no mind

Oscar is Oscar, do not misconstrue me here. But who, out of everyone in the cast aside from Salem, is most familiar with the concept of 'forever'? The one currently merging with a man who's lived a thousand lifetimes.

Hour after hour, I spend Dreaming that your voice will wake My slumbering ear Numb and lost I wander with No place to go, just aimless 'til You reappear

This is much like the earlier verse talking about loss and being directionless without their light to guide them. This song has some parallels to a few others, but for now I want to talk about Sky is Falling, which we know is an Oscar song:

Our world, lost without a soul Losing all control, not getting closer Every day is just another dose of torture (Torture) Now we pay the cost, the race is lost This nightmare's our real life

This can easily be linked back to wanting to wake from a bad dream and feeling lost without a (smaller more honest) soul being present. Later in that same song:

Lost all my hopes and dreams

Being numb and lost without hope. Ruby being the embodiment of hope.

Watch my life flash by in scenes And it seems there's no soul on the video screen

I am aggressively reminded of Arkos and Jaune watching Pyrrha's training video on a loop. Would bet actual money Oscar is doing the same of Ruby's broadcast back in Vacuo... because he was the only big name in the cast that wasn't shown watching that video when it went live.

Cold soaked as I'm standin' in rain Feelin' nothin' but pain until I see you again

Once again tying into feeling lost without the other.

Back to Treasure:

'Til you come in view I keep watch with these sore eyes Looking through the tears As the days creep slowly by

Emphasis on seeing each other again which can also be linked to the above stanza from Sky is Falling as well as Until the End with rain and tears being almost synonymous. (Until the End and Treasure have SO many parallels that I can't talk about all of them here without it becoming a whole separate post. Maybe later tho!)

Nothing's gonna shake my faith I know you're coming back real soon to my embrace

The emphasis on embrace when RG was the only pair that didn't get a hug.

Though time goes by so slow I'm never letting go I won't give up, if I spend my life I know

The time motif again followed by "I won't give up" paralleled to Ruby's line in her broadcast where she says "Even if Atlas falls, you can't give up."

"Atlas" also meaning Ruby. "You" being Oscar and the rest of the people still fighting. Oscar, who took up her mantle of leadership in a way through his costume change and actions in v6 after Ruby stepped into Oz's role.

And then lastly, the song's namesake:

'Cause the treasure of my life Is being by your side

Treasure, by definition, has two different meanings.

noun 1. a quantity of precious metals, gems, or other valuable objects. verb 1. keep carefully (a valuable or valued item).

The song at face value is talking about treasure as the verb. The act of treasuring or cherishing something precious. But much like some other double meanings in this song, a very strong argument can be made for the noun definition as well.

Ruby, who's first name literally means 'precious red gemstone'. Ruby, who's eyes are Silver and how that has tied into Rosegarden since their very first meeting. Oscar, who's eyes glow Gold with his own magic. Who's first name can also be easily associated with the colour by way of the award show statues of the same name.

If those are symbolisms associated with Oscar and Ruby, while Yang and Blake get a song called bmblb for being the same colour as bees and having a confession in a garden... then I think there is no other duo that the song Treasure can be about.

“The titan said Belos is evil tho! Are you stupid the show said he was evil!”“Masha said lil’ bro just got jelly that his brother got a girlfriend! He doesn’t have depth and his ending was supposed to be unsatisfying!”“But James Ironwood losing his arm is supposed to represent him losing his humanity”“Jason Rose said that James could’ve always become evil and sided with Salem”“They literally called him genocide general!”“But in this Q&A they said the puppies survived they just lost their laser powers! And in the tie-in material, they showed everyone was fine! You just hate Starco!”“The show/tie-in material/a fucking Q&A said blah blah blah!”These arguments are shit. TOH- “God says witches are evil so it is his duty to kill them!” is a pretty horrible justification for killing someone except when the titan says it to Luz. I don’t think Luz is in the wrong for killing Belos, he was a genocidal maniac and child abuser and genuinely irredeemable- nobody who hates the ending of The Owl House complains about Belos being irredeemable, they complain about the show flopping the cult critical message, how hunter’s possession felt like needless shock value, the show not properly setting up the collector or how the coven system/conformitorium’s writing is a mess or how Eda becoming a teacher makes as much sense as Toph becoming a cop and you can go ‘but the show said-’ what the show said had unfortunate implications, was uncomfortable to abuse survivors, and I can’t forgive the ass-pullery of the trailer-bait nightmare sequence or how in the hexside crew became irrelevant! When people complain about how Belos was handled nobody complains about him not getting a redemption arc- they complain that hunter should’ve been there to see belos die or how they hate Luz’s power up. RWBY -James Ironwood’s and Penny’s character arcs and deaths felt so ableist it’s actually uncomfortable to watch, I have ASD my sister, and like half of the people I know have PTSD, I don’t know any amputees but I’ve seen plenty making noise about how shit the writing was. Good, they should be mad! The show’s message about prosthetics/amputations was toxic! Not mention for all the hopeful messages Team RWBY screams at the top of their lungs about trust they knowingly broke Ironwood’s trust for very poorly defined reasons! while I do think ruthless pragmatism is a bad thing, team RWBY offered no alternatives, he wasn’t a villain- he was facing an ethical dilemma and got fucked over. And SVTFOE- I shouldn’t have to buy tie-in materials to understand the show- tie-in material should be a bonus not a supplement or requirement, I Don’t have to buy the ATLA comics inorder to understand the show, I don’t have to read all of Lord Of The Rings to understand the movies. It doesn’t matter how the show was supposed to be interpreted or how the audience is supposed to feel, and It’s perfectly valid for the audience not to care about damage control spinoffs (cough cough Steven Universe) or Q&A’s or whatever. I’ll admit sometimes the audience is fucking stupid and completely media illiterate but can we stop acting like anyone who doesn’t blindly consume product and go with what the writers said are stupid? I know im not articulating this well but I’m pissy rn and I’m having trouble deconstructing whats wrong with those kind of arguments but god there is so much wrong with these arguements

"The Fortuneteller" is such an interesting episode to me because like? Aunt Wu is never wrong in the end, kinda like how in "Jet" Sokka's instincts are always right as well- the show tries to play it off in the end by saying "sometimes they're right and sometimes they're not", but throughout the whole episode his instincts led him to eventually save an entire town! If they never ran into Jet, he WOULD have destroyed that town, not to mention how Jet does eventually change through his experiences with the Gaang, but! This isn't about Jet rn

Aunt Wu not seeing anything about romance for Aang while she DOES see it for Katara is strange to me if we're to assume he's the man she's ought to marry, because like? Wouldnt their fates be intertwined? Which is why it's a good thing I fully don't believe she WAS talking about Aang, and this episode unintentionally serves the anti-Kataang narrative so well its not even funny (well, okay, it's a little funny, seeing Aang get subtly rejected over and over is very healing). Even if we take out the fact that I believe she was talking about Zuko because, c'mon, he's a fantastic bender who already loves Katara a bunch by the end of the show (platonic? romantic? nevertheless they share an incredible bond)... The Avatar isn't the only "great bender" in the world by a long shot, and I'd argue Aang doesn't even qualify because of his poor work ethic and lack of interest in bettering himself, like- Aang is acknowledged by more ATLA fans than just me to be the weakest bender in the group (until he enters the Avatar state, at which point, he's just the weakest Avatar because he has no control of it) and? Yeah being born with the Avatar Spirit is never gonna be enough to become a great bender by itself, which is something even all the other Avatars aside from Aang seem to recognize, y'know?

I forget who it was, but I saw a post saying that in a better written show, this episode that has such a big focus on unreciprocated feelings would be when Aang recognizes his situation for what it is, recognizes seeing his own lack of interest in Meng when looking at Katara and her lack of interest in him, and have him start to accept that and move on, but... Aang ALWAYS shows himself to either be incapable of understanding or just straight up ignoring Katara's nonverbal cues, not to mention how he goes on to ignore her express vocalization of her discomfort with him, so.

This episode also has Bryke use Sokka as a mouthpiece to give a very incel-y feeling pick up artist lesson and? Yeah, what could I have possibly expected? For Sokka to show some consistency? He fr never takes his own "advice" here, it's so weird! He's always been very forthright about his feelings, so him teach Aang to play coy is so ooc for him unless the point they want to end up making is "love makes fools of us all", which. Doubtful

It's yet another episode with a morality lesson about "Destiny", but fr this one feels so weak when compared to Zuko's whole thing later on about CHOOSING his destiny, where we actually see him do it when he defies and upends his harmful legacy in favor of peace, because here? Here everything plays out as foretold, with a "you control destiny" messaging tacked on at the end- the cloud bending was cool, but I hate the implication that Aang legit goes on to twist and bend Katara to a shape he sees fit, right by his side forevermore, but... Yeah, that's fully what he does, so? Thanks a lot, I guess, Aunt Wu! Look what you did! He was the closest he ever comes to giving up in this episode, some tough love would've done the trick!!! But noooo, god forbid Aang has to face and acknowledge any sort of REAL rejection, Katara simply... Doesn't yet understand that her ultimate role in life is to end up as his trophy wife, that's all! God, fuck comics and LOK Katara!!!

super duper important cuz im working on a fic rn and i need to know what u think zuko’s fav colour would b

aa im not sure?? like im inclined to say red and he probably would at the start of atla but i feel like thats too obvious

blue would be another one id say only because itd mean azula has even more of what he wants with the blue fire

i would honestly go with blue though, because i feel like red would have some strained memories attached to it and we know he associates with blue

Bravo gives me so many mixed feelings. I want him to come out of this ok. I want him to trip and fall on his face. I’m rooting for him. I think he’s an asshole and deserves to be smacked repeatedly.

I want him to have a happy ending. But he needs to work for that happy ending, y’know? Because he is not a very good person rn but I believe he can do better. He can become better if he choses. He can reflect on his biases and just, do better.

I believe in him. But I still wanna see him trip and fall on the way there.

HAHAAAAA oh i love to see asks like this, bc bravo was written to be a complex character. he’s a very different kind of antagonist to tango than atlas is, and i have a lot of fun drawing parallels and contrasts between them. all the focus i put on his part at the start of the au wasn’t just so people would pity him, it was to show how someone who was (by the simplest of definitions) a decent guy could be made worse by the circumstances he found himself in- the same way tango was made better.

the point of that was so when bravo showed up at the ranch all those years later, we could see just how far he’d fallen. the question that remains is whether or not he’ll be willing and able to climb out of the hole he’s dug himself. and if your conflicted emotions are anything to go off of, it’s a compelling question indeed.

Hello?

So I noticed a huge influx of followers, I kind of thought they were all bots, but after seeing some other posts from some of the blogs these accounts were following (thanks @bob-artist ) I think some of you may just be super new accounts and tumblr recommended me? (I’m very confused rn, my posts have found some people who like the things but they haven’t gotten THAT many reblogs or notes, this is a fairly new account itself)

ANYWAY if you are a real person welcome I guess, if you’re a bot I’ve been taking measures to do my best to protect my art from ai learning software and that’s gonna keep happening. If it turns out everyone’s a bot I’m gonna feel a little silly but I’ll survive.

——————————————————————————-

So now I’m making an introduction post.

I’m Fairmer (The name is both because it’s my name in my stardew save with my sister but also cause I grew up with my dad being a farmer) I’m staying anonymous-ish for now, that may change. But being perceived on social media is scary so we are starting here.

I’m a graphic designer and illustrator living in Manitoba, who burnt out insanely upon graduation and stopped doing illustration outside of my job. I’m new to actually posting on tumblr, or honestly anywhere. Sometime I may link my portfolio here, but right now it’s under construction/being updated.

I’m also queer/bi, and have unexplained chronic pain that’s most likely from endometriosis but I keep most of my complaining about pain on my other blog.

I post mostly fanart so if you like:

- Nancy drew, PC games or otherwise. These in particular have motivated me to get back into actually drawing again.

- other games like Stardew Valley, Spiritfarer, Hollow knight, Hades, etc. (cozy games or otherwise) (also I was a teenage exocolonist except that’s gonna take me like a few business months if I decide to do art for it)

- Narnia, Lord of the rings, fantasy in general (Dnd?)

- Smosh, (current) dropout tv, starkid, tin can bros, shipwrecked, BDG,

- shows like ATLA, Ducktales 2017, ROTTMNT, The Owl house, Tangled the series, Hilda, Over the garden wall, etc.

- HTTYD franchise including riders/defenders of berk and RTTE, mostly rtte.

- like anything else, idk Barbie probably, maybe good omens or dr who? oh also I’m a theatre kid, big fan of hadestown and legally blonde.

You’ll most likely find me posting something at some point involving any of the above. I may post some originals too, but I’m not putting too much pressure on myself here.

Anyway, this is a pretty new account so I don’t have much stuff yet, but If you like my stuff you’re welcome to stay, apologies to any not-bots that attempted to follow me.

I may get into being open for commissions in the future, but for now it is what it is.

Also free Palestine

idk of it's just me but i don't understand, the atla fandom, from all ships existing would just slander zukka out of nowhere. like mf i just want to see my boys being silly and in love in fanwork, why they need to be so mean lmao

I think it's because for close to 20 years, Kataang and Zutara were reining supreme in ship wars and fandom space. Jetko was the main mlm ship before but it didn't have nearly the same popularity. No other ship could even touch those two and those two continued arguing about what's best for canon.

Now though? Zukka's the second most popular ship on ao3- all of those fics and content showed up in 3 years. And suddenly the Netflix actors are pushing for Zukka practically every interview while actively dissuading Zutara(and hinting strongly at Kataang- thanks Gordon & Kiawentiio going "he/she's my.....family, yeah let's say family *wink* *wink*"). They're getting extremely popular and now fucking Netflix, Entertainment Weekly and Deadline are tagging #zukka in the year of our lord 2024(thank you for your service Dallas Liu, braver than the marines). Popular ships unfortunately get hate, especially queer ships, like just as a baseline regardless of if it's a canonically supported or unsupported ship, if it's "morally correct or incorrect".

This 'crackship' that no one took seriously suddenly feels...like a threat to these people??? Like we can joke about hahaha zukka gayyyy but we all know that's just silly gobbledygook right? (Not saying Zukka should or could be canon, but just the fact that people are seriously considering it as a ship option in fandom makes people act weird)

A lot of the the points made for "why Zukka is bad actually" are so funny though, that my initial irritation is fading and I'm just laughing at it. Some highlights that made me actually lose it:

Zukka is misogynist to Katara because, and I shit you not, they think that we think Katara is homophobic sdjfhbbgvh. I was shook when I discovered this was a thing.

Zukka bad because Klance bad (war flashbacks to Voltron)

"Everyone just wants a gay ship smh the chronically ONLINE FANDOM BRAIN HAS ROTTED THE SANCTITY OF HETEROSEXUAL-[EXPLODES]"

Zuko is a colonizer who's oppressing Sokka by dating him (i have no stats but this sounds like a white person trying very hard to sound like they're super inclusive and understand the plights of the colonized and oppressed. and the best way to do it is shit on a fake ship about lines on a page)

Zukka bad because it makes no canon sense

I think people who are Big Mad don't get that we're genuinely just chilling and making silly stuff without thinking too much about what SHOULD happen in canon. Everyone in ATLA fandom takes the show and the fandom far too seriously, like losing a fan discussion is somehow a slight upon their personal morals.

We coasted along without much hate for a good while but the increasing popularity means Zukka as a ship is going to get bashed ;_; I think the best we can do is block and ignore instead of engaging(very hypocritcal of me rn tbh, I'll try to stop).

I don't think you expected this....giant wall of text but thanks for sending me the ask and I totally get your frustration" Just let us enjoy our silly hcs and content!!!

hi there

can you write idia’s reaction to his fem or gn s/o singing “good riddance” from Hades (the video game) pls? this song and idia both live rent free in my head rn lmao

have a nice day 😸

OMG You literally made my day with this ask, darling <333 I love Hades, and the first time I heard Eurydice singing it I was nearly brought to tears ToT Of course, I'll be more than happy to fulfill your request, and I hope that you enjoy!! For anyone who hasn't played Hades or just wants to listen to the song anon is referring to, here it is! (The audio comes out too loud for me, so I'd recommend lowering your volume a touch just in case! When I was testing it, the sound was just blaring into my ears and I don't know how to make it quieter;;)

~~~

~Idia Hears Fem! Reader Singing~

[Tw: Soft angst to comfort] *Don't need to know/play Hades to read*

To say that today has been a bad day for Idia Shroud would be an understatement. It's been one thing after another, each terrible thing piling up on his shoulders heavier than the last. They say that when it rains, it pours- and Idia feels that this statement could not be closer to the truth. He feels exhausted just thinking about how long this day has been, and it's barely even 3 pm! But he's had enough social interaction in all of today to make up for a lifetime of self-isolation. He's tired, his battery has run out- there's no chance that anyone's going to be seeing him leaving his room at least for the next week, and even when he does leave it'll be with his floating tablet.

At last he makes it back to his room, but he's far too tired to do anything but to crawl into his bed and lie there, doing nothing but hope to start feeling better. He doesn't want to see anyone, doesn't want to hear anyone, he just wants some peace and quiet, away from everything that's making him anxious. But apparently he can't even have that, as a sudden knock on his door pulls him away from his sulking. "Big brother, big brother! I have something to show you!" Ortho says excitedly, "I know you'll just love it! Can I come in?"

'I can't have Ortho seeing me like this,' Idia thinks, 'I'm just a useless Housewarden who can't do anything... Ortho doesn't need to see his brother being so cowardly, so utterly worthless that it'd be better if I'd just go back home to the underworld and never see this place again...'

"If you don't wanna open the door, I'll just play it for you from out here!" Ortho exclaims, and suddenly Idia is pulled from his gloomy thoughts when he hears a golden tune ring out from behind the door.

'Farewell, to all the earthly remains,' wait, Idia knows that voice... 'No burdens, No further debts to be paid,' that's the voice of the one person who could make his day even slightly better.

'Atlas, Can rest his weary bones, The weight of the world, All falls away, In time,' That's right, it's you. You're singing. To him.

'Goodbye, To all the plans that we made,' Wait, are you actually outside of the door with Ortho? You're actually here? To see him?

'No contracts, I’m free to do as I may,' Idia heard your voice continue to sing, to ring out beautifully as if your voice was weaving gold through a spindle.

And he couldn't take it any longer. He wanted to hear your singing, not through the door of his room, but right next to him, and he wanted to hold you and have all of his worries from today melt away with you in his arms. He rushes out of his bed and opens the door, his eyes glimmering with hope of seeing you behind it, only for the small smile that was invisibly growing on his face to extinguish when he realizes that Ortho was the only one there.

Ah, and now he feels even worse. His disappointment was so apparent, he didn't even try to hide it when his eyes met Ortho's big, bright, and innocent ones. He felt bad that he was so disappointed that it was his baby brother, because don't get him wrong, he absolutely adores Ortho, it's just-

It's just that today's been really long. He already felt shitty enough. But he should have known that you weren't going to actually be there, after all you were travelling outside of the college for once to see the world of Twisted Wonderland. You had told him before you left that you were going to be gone for a while, which makes him even more miserable, knowing that he won't be able to be with you when he's already so stressed out.

But is it really so bad that he had even a glimmer of hope? The hope that maybe, just maybe, you had decided to come back early and surprise him with a visit?

"There you are, big brother!" Ortho says, unaffected by Idia's visible disappointment in seeing him, "I know that you've been missing miss (Name) a lot recently, so I've got this recording of her singing for you!"

"U-uhm, thank you, Ortho...Where did you even get this recording from?" Idia asks timidly.

"I came across her one day when she was singing on her own in the woods! So I used the recording feature you installed in my programming so that I could show it to you," Ortho states, and even though his mouth was covered, you could basically hear his radiating smile. Idia smiles softly and his eyes soften as he replies,

"Thanks Ortho, would you mind sending me the file? I wanna listen to it through my headphones for a while."

"Of course, big brother! I've already sent it to your phone." Ortho 'smiles' brightly as Idia thanks him and closes the door. And without a second thought, Idia pulls up his phone, finds the recording file and starts to play it through his headphones, drowning out the rests of the world in preference to the sound of your voice.

'No hunger, No sleep except to dream, Mild and warm, Safe from all harm, Calm....' As you sing these lyrics in particular, Idia feels pounds of his anxiety and stress wash off of him in waves. As if your voice itself was a spell, Idia was in a trance. And he feels mild, and warm...He feels safe from all harm...and calm.

'Good riddance, To all the thieves, To all the fools that stifled me, They’ve come and gone, And passed me by, Good riddance, To all...' 'Farewell To all the earthly remains...' 'No burdens No further debts to be paid,'

'Atlas, Can rest his weary bones, The weight of the world, All falls away, In time...' And by the time your lovely song is over, he's already manually repeating the recording. It looked like there was probably an extra two or three minutes of empty sound at the end of the recording, and Idia wanted- no, needed to hear your voice right now, he didn't want to wait like 3 minutes before the song automatically looped, after all he could have listened to your whole song again in that timeframe!

It came to no surprise to him that he accidentally fell asleep listening to you sing. Again, it's been a really, really, long day, and just,, being able to listen to you like this was just what he needed to begin to relax and calm down.

What did come to him as a surprise though, was when he woke up early the next morning and your song was still playing through his headphones. And he felt good, he never knew that this is how feeling truly rested feels like. So as he's lounging on his bed, staring at his ceiling as your song continues to ring through his head like silk, and he figures that he'd listen to the rest of your song one last time, and then he'd get up and get something to eat, or perhaps he'd go take a shower or something.

So the song ends, and he's left with the empty sound at the end of the recording. He sighs and stretches out languidly, and then he starts to move to take off the headphones before he's surprised to hear a startled gasp, followed by the sound of you talking.

"Ortho! Geez, you nearly gave me a heart attack there! How long have you been there for?" "Sorry miss (Name)! I heard you singing and I wanted to come and listen!" "My singing? Oh, it's not that good, really." "I disagree! I heard your whole song, your voice is so pretty!" "Why thank you."

Idia hears you chuckle breathlessly. 'Your laugh is beautiful' he thinks.

"Actually miss (Name), do you mind if I keep your song as a recording? I'm sure that big brother would be ecstatic to hear you sing!" "I don't mind. As a matter of fact, I was thinking of him when I was singing it anyway, so it would be nice if you did show it to him. I don't know if I'd be able to sing it in front of him perfectly like that without knowing what his reaction would be.. Oh, but are you going to keep this conversation in?" "Don't worry, I'm not going to!" "Actually, do you think you can leave this in? I wanna leave a message for him, if you don't mind." "Okay, sure thing! I'll make sure that he listens to it."

He hears you walk closer to Ortho, and he's holding his breath as if he wouldn't be able to hear your message if he took even a single breath of air. But what you say, though, knocks the wind right out of him, because he realizes that he's been asleep listening to you talking to his beloved younger brother (and he's so, so happy that you care for Ortho as if he was your own brother too), and that he's been asleep listening to you say these last few words saved for the very end of the recording.

"Idia, I love you."

~~~~~~~~~~~~

LITERALLY this was so cute to write TwT I think this might be my favorite so far.... Eurydice is my comfort character ngl and I spent like this whole morning listening to her sing (even singing along myself to get a feel for what kinds of emotions she's trying to convey) and just generally I had so, so much fun with this prompt. Thank you anon for the request, and I hope that you all enjoyed reading!

Atla update part 4!! I HAVE SO MANY THOUGHTS RN. I loved the first two episodes of book 3?? Zuko visiting iroh in prison broke me tbh, i wasn't expecting him to turn on iroh so quickly but it fits. He was waiting so long for his dad's love and he finally had the opportunity to get it so he did. I actually am uper excited for this season since the firenation characters (Zuko, mostly) resonated so much with me and this whole book is fire nation focused?? So it's a treat for me lol

Zuko bringing in food for iroh was just :((( but how did bro have the audacity to ask for advice after he practically threw him in jail lmao 😭

I like how ozai's face is finally revealed after two seasons of them hiding it? It added to the eerie element, that's why this books called "the awakening". I found it super funny that they kept showing his face throughout the episodes tho lmao (the flyers, the statue of him in aangs school, etc) like they're just dumping his face everywhere lol

azula is genuinely so smart wtf like her telling ozai that aang was killed by Zuko is just mastermind behaviour. She knew that Zuko was lying about having no doubts of aang being completely dead. And also knew that there's a possibility aang will be back, and if he is back, Zuko would be punished by ozai for bringing shame. Genius.

Also?? Idk how to feel about Zuko and Mai?? That was soo... random?? She was just randomly making out with him in the first episode and that had me CONFUSED as fuck. I would've preferred if we got a reunion scene between them first, I don't know if I like it. Mai is a generally good character ig but with Zuko?? Their personalities don't seem to 'fit' but I won't judge just yet cuz I haven't watched all the episodes. Maybe I'll like it idk. But I'll admit, Zuko and her making out shamelessly in front of azula was boss behaviour LMAO.

I love how aang got everyone in the fire nation school to dance, it was so cute <3

I don’t know what it means but.

Ruby talking with Qrow (I believe) in V7 when she compares herself to Oz, and Qrow saying “No you’re better than him you’re waiting to see who you can trust vs never giving anyone the chance to be trusted”

And now Ruby saying what’s the point of anything if Salem has the relics now and Yang saying “That’s how Ironwood thought. You don’t mean that”

The WAY Oz and Ironwood carried out their plans was Bad but they didn’t start at the deep end. Their thoughts didn’t spawn all of their actions. Ruby having doubts and seeing Oz’s perspective of being wary of who to trust doesn’t mean she’ll turn out like him. Ruby showing she’s upset and mad that things seem to be turning out useless despite their efforts doesn’t mean she regrets saving the people they saved. Or trying to save them.

The way Ruby hasn’t been able to openly doubt herself around others or say things that others see as “thinking like Ironwood” or “you’re better than Oz” is so prominent in episode 7. And I’m not saying she was wrong in anything I’m on her defense squad rn from ppl who are doing what the characters in the show did. They are Hearing her words but they aren’t Listening. WHY is she better than Oz when she thinks she’s doing the same thing. WHAT has caused her to Think like Ironwood. Why can’t she mean what she says why can’t she be negative. Where is the person to lift her up about herself. Not the plan not the team but just Ruby Rose

I don’t think I’m explaining this properly I’m not mad at anyone bc they didn’t know how she felt. I’m just trying to point out connecting things in the show and how “We’ll be better than blank”, in Ruby’s mind, can’t just be something to say when Qrow is mad at Oz (rightfully) or Yang is worried she sounds like Ironwood (the man they just had to save a kingdom from)

V9. Misinformation. Miscommunication. Blinded by your own emotions. Resistant to change. Not listening. It’s felt so Real it’s been so good I hope what I said makes sense it’s just the Be Better Than The Old Mentors vs just bc we won’t do things the same way doesn’t mean we won’t ever feel like they felt or have the same doubts or worry that what they did might’ve been The Best in their mind at the time. Lack of perspective. How you can be the villain to those you’re trying to save. It’s a lot sorry I rambled so much

pushing pause real quick here, anon, the anxiety pouring out of this ask about being misinterpreted as bashing this or that character is really palpable and bc of that i just want to like directly affirm that analytical discussion of character flaw or the narrative construction of a conflict isn’t accusatory or condemnatory of the characters themselves. in this household we go buckwild for characters whose human imperfection is fully and honestly realized by the narrative <3

anyway yeah yeah exactly like

ever since these kids got looped into ozpin’s cult they’ve just been in this emotional vortex of—don’t be negative, don’t spread negativity. salem wants to divide us. we can’t let salem divide us. LOOK at how terrified they were in V8 of not being in unanimous agreement about whether to prioritize a long-term or short-term goal, how much jaune’s proposed compromise scared them. it’s profoundly dysfunctional. they don’t know how to differentiate normal, constructive debate and infighting, or critical self-reflection and harmful negativity, so they are constantly hyper-vigilant constantly monitoring and policing each other for the smallest sign of bad thoughts, bad feelings, because this war they inherited isn’t a war against salem, not really, it’s a war against this nebulous idea of division, of conflict, of negativity, of the bad things that will see humankind condemned to extermination when the gods come back.

and like:

YANG: Okay, Ironwood wants Penny, otherwise Mantle is done for. So, how do we stop him?

BLAKE: Qrow and Robyn are still in his custody, and May said that the Atlas security drones are watching the crater, so they’re trapped too.

OSCAR: And Salem isn’t going to stay gone forever.

RUBY: So then it’s impossible.

EMERALD: See? If Miss Hero with all the answers doesn’t have an answer, then we have ours.

WEISS: Shut up.

YANG: Why don’t you just leave?!

OSCAR: Can we please just give each other a chance? Emerald’s not with Salem anymore, and Ozpin is back. All this doubt and worry and distrust, it isn’t getting us anywhere—

RUBY: Then nothing has CHANGED! We’re in the exact same spot we were yesterday, arguing what to do while the kingdom waits to die.

^ she ran away then, too. and yang went after her thinking that ruby needed a pep talk, needed to be told that sure things are bad and risks don’t always pay off, but the mom who abandoned them both for the world’s sake is still her hero—when what ruby actually, desperately needed to hear, what she’s PLEADING for now, is for someone to tell her it’s okay to feel bad, it’s okay to have doubts, it’s okay to just be overwhelmed. that it ISN’T FAIR for the fate of the world to sit on her shoulders and that the world will not end if she admits that it’s too fucking heavy, if she asks for help, if she puts it down.

and that’s what makes it sting so much when her doubts and fears and frustration get brushed off like those feelings don’t matter or aren’t true or, worse, like it’s wrong for her to feel this way at all—it’s a manifestation of this, like, existential terror of Innate Badness that lurks in the heart of ozpin’s cult, don’t feel bad don’t think bad thoughts or else—or else what? “salem will divide us” but it’s so easy for that line of thinking to shade into “only bad people have bad thoughts,” because feeling bad IS bad in and of itself, right. like fundamentally this is how the strict ideological delineation between hero, villain, and passive narrative object enforces itself: the villains surrender to negativity and so become themselves agents of this Badness while the heroes stand as beacons of hope and inspiration to the defenseless masses—who otherwise would of course succumb to negativity (“panic”) and be obliterated. baked into the cult’s ideology is an unspoken but perilously thin line between feeling bad and being bad.

you don’t mean that. that’s how ironwood thought. (you can’t mean that. only bad people think that way.)

and the real world just doesn’t fucking work that way—the world of remnant does not work that way—so this is an emotional poison, it’s toxic, they’re swimming around in a noxious soup of unspoken ideas that seeped into all of them to varying depth but percolated right down into the very bedrock of who ruby is—and while it killed them slowly it ate ruby alive. and now the bones of her are poking through the cracks and she has nothing left to give so the only way to move forward is to claw herself out of the soup!! (<- this metaphor ran away from me a bit.)

which somewhat ironically given what the first layer of her crisis is about, means ruby is going to lead the way out of this festering mess of a fairytale cult. by way of the desolate howl that this way of thinking is dehumanizing and inhumane

hello! I’m rewatching atla atm, and I’m on the s1 finale. I was wondering if you’ve ever imagined what an extra northern water tribe ep could look like? personally I feel like they could’ve easily scrapped the great divide and added another ep to this mini arc, after the ep where katara slays paku. I’m just not sure what the conflict would be. a sokka ep would be great, maybe some of his warrior training & socializing with the average nwt man. the way this could contribute to sokka & masculinity & protection I would Die. ofc more time with yue. but anyway, I’m interested in your thoughts

oh this SUCH a good question!! the nwt is my favorite mini-arc in the show (yue being the absolute scene-stealer that she is) and i have always secretly wanted an extra episode set there, whether by removing “the great divide” (objectively bad episode apart from the aang lying stuff which is great) or by simply adding one extra episode to s1 at no cost.

if i could rework those episodes as self indulgently as possible, i would make “the waterbending master” more katara (and kanna) focused and then make the extra episode more sokka (and yue) focused. yue could still be introduced to us and sokka in that episode, but time spent on sokka’s subplot could instead be afforded to flashbacks of kanna in the nwt. we only get very limited glimpses of kanna, in flashbacks or otherwise, and i think seeing more of her, especially in an episode that sheds so much illuminating light onto her character & thematic role as she informs katara, would have been really cool to see. kanna as a child, giggling with baby yugoda as she would later do with hama. kanna at age 16, looking like a slightly older katara, hesitating over her marriage to a younger pakku, ultimately making a difficult choice. katara’s arc in that episode wouldn’t change (i mean, it’s already so perfect), but for the audience, seeing kanna would help contextualize that chiasmus and further move us.

a common criticism i see from detractors of sokka/yue’s relationship is that it feels too rushed, and i agree to an extent, but we also know that they did develop a sincere friendship during the timeskip between “the waterbending master” and “the siege of the north.” we simply do not know for how long that timeskip actually lasted. we can assume that it was a not insignificant amount of time, considering that katara basically mastered waterbending in that interim, but we never actually see that friendship develop, so to some, it can feel cliched and insincere (because they simply do not understand the power of uhaul lesbianism). so on a very self-indulgent level, i would love to see more of sokka and yue’s relationship development, since we are only privy to the most essential beats (which, granted, we can extrapolate from, but im being selfish rn shut up).

an episode where sokka and yue (both separately and together) comprise the a and b plots (and the c plot can be katara and aang adorable training montage) would be really nice to see, especially, as you said, wrt the gender politics of the nwt. it would be cool to see yue directly interact with arnook and/or hahn to provide a starker contrast between the burdens placed on her as a girl/daughter/wife/princess versus how sokka treats her (because that implication is already crucial, but framing it more overtly would be nice). and then seeing sokka in the throes of his “warrior training” being like “i don’t think any of these dudes have ever actually seen battle…” and having to deal with the tension of being denigrated and disrespected as a southerner, but also clearly having more experience than them and being frustrated by their myopia (realizing that not too long ago, he also had no experience, and oh god is that what he sounded like??????? yes.) .. and then of course sokka and yue together, flirting as “just friends” (over pai sho perhaps????) and being in their own little totally platonic rom com world. but sokka and yue’s relationship is obviously very thematically significant on top of just being lovely and adorable, so using that extra space to explore their parallel commitments to their (patriarchal) Duty, the burdens and expectations placed on them, and how it reflects their societies and the role colonialism plays in shaping them. would love to see it!!!!

ATLA Live Action Stream of Consciousness (Episode 6, Part 2).

THE AANG/ZUKO HEIGHT DIFFERENCE!

This section is basically a copy of the original show which is why I have no problems with it lmao.

Zhao’s poor scribe is just trying to do his job.

Tell me why Zuko is better at sword fighting than all of these adults.

TEAMWORK!! FORESHADOWING!!

I want to marry a Yuyan archer part 2.

Ooh a longer Aang/Zuko convo? It’s all generic and I don’t care I like it anyway.

Aang being cute and funny is everything I need. He needs to do more of it.

Of course Zuko has a favorite kind of pen.

Their friendship is everything to me.

“Of course it’s what everyone expects of me” ME ON THE FLOOR! (I like that we know it’s not what Zuko really wants-what he wants is way more complicated. Same goes for Azula but she’s not here and I doubt they’ll give her something like this).

Oh Aang Zuko isn’t ready to be better yet.

Zuko your trauma is showing.

Agni Kai flashback.

THEY GAVE BABY AZULA BANGS?!?! Amazing decision.

Ozai are you actually mad rn? (In the OG it seemed like he was asserting his power rather than really caring).

Ooh Iroh’s trying to intervene that’s an interesting take.

I knew Zuko was going to fight and unlike the rest of the fandom I don’t have strong feelings about it. It’s clear he only fights back because he thinks that’s what Ozai wants.

Azula definitely looks concerned/in shock in these shots imo. I do like that change from the original show since they’re showing her humanity.

Nice callback on “compassion is a sign of weakness.”

Azula’s expression during the Agni Kai with Zuko and Ozai is the same one she had on when Ozai burned the spy in episode 3. I think it’s dissociation mostly, not wanting to acknowledge what’s happening or having to not process it because she knows it could happen to her. (Or a trauma response)

How did Iroh get his hair bun back?

Zuko does care too much Iroh’s right.

Ozai playing fake nice in this scene is chilling, and a welcome update.

“Sometimes the weak can become stronger. Sometimes you have to give them a chance.” Zuko we know you’re talking about yourself (still a great line though)

URSA MENTION?! I need more fire family flashbacks if they get book 2.

Does Ozai think this is good parenting?

I knew the 41st was Zuko’s crew already but I love that change just like everyone else.

Zuko saying “I’m fine” is peak teenager core.

Zuko and Iroh are giving parent child here.

This is a great scene with the crew it’s so sweet.

This episode has Zuko crying too much it’s not good for me.

I like the theme of friendship in this little monologue. If they’d build up the gaang’s friendship more it would mean more to me.

Wait what happened to Gyatso? I don’t get it.

The parallel father figure narrations in episodes 5 and 6 are good.

Zuko’s mirror bit ofc reminded me of Azula’s mirror in book 3.

THAT WAS A GOOD LAST LINE!