the perennial Tai Discourse is really interesting to track bc, speaking broadly, the two major camps are just:
those who focus primarily on ruby’s recollection of her childhood and relationship with her dad (and filter what yang says through that lens such that “i had to pick up the pieces and keep things together when i was five” gets diluted into “yang had responsibilities as a child”)
those who focus primarily on yang’s memories and her arc in v4 (and tend to just ignore or minimize the things ruby says that suggest a positive relationship with tai, in particular often just flat out disregarding how excited ruby is to spend time with or receive care packages from him)
when it’s like. yeah that’s. literally the point. that ruby and yang had profoundly different childhoods.
they’re half-sisters in a story about fairytales and only one of them had a decent dad. rwby is unsubtly interrogating the fairytale archetype of the Evil Stepmother/Dead Mother with raven (not dead, but absent) and summer (villain, presumed dead) and that archetype quite literally requires its counterpart archetype of the Neglectful Father who remarries and tacitly participates in the Evil Stepmother’s abuse of his child from his first wife
tai is as much an exploration of the fairytale Neglectful Father as raven is the Dead Mom and summer is the Evil Stepmother. that’s. a core aspect of the narrative surrounding the rose xiao long family.
the Dead Mom often reincarnates as a bird or tree or similar spirit to watch over her child; rwby turns this on its head by reimagining the Dead Mom as an absent one. raven watches over yang in her bird form because she is too afraid to be meaningfully present; she isn’t dead, but her absence in yang’s life is so complete that she might as well have been, and the fairytale tension between the Dead Mom’s death and her lingering presence is explored through these cramped and inadequate half-measures raven takes in trying to have it both ways.
the Evil Stepmother is a vehicle for making the fairytale heroine miserable; she has no identity nor any reason for her monstrous treatment of the child who is not her own. rwby, again, flips this over with the mystery of summer rose. who was she, really? did anyone know? she was a good stepmom—she loved yang like her own daughter—but now she’s gone. she left. she never came back. she lied. she joined salem. why? what expectations did she feel on her shoulders? what broke her? why did she do the things she did?
lastly, the Neglectful Father must either be a love-blind fool or a weak, contemptible man with no love or loyalty to his own blood; he forgets his motherless child at the behest of his new love. rwby turns this on its head too by rendering tai as a human being—messy, flawed, fully-realized. wicked stepsisters exist for the purpose of being spoiled by the Evil Stepmother in juxtaposition with her cruelty to the first child, who is kind and good because she remembers her mother’s lessons. the fairytale children of these archetypes function as repetitions of their mothers. rwby makes that the central conceit of its spin on the Neglectful Father: what if he loved both the Dead Mom and the Evil Stepmother so much and then both of them broke his heart in mirrored ways, leaving him a single father to both of their children? if he sees raven in yang and summer in ruby, how does that color his relationships with both girls? if you take away the Evil Stepmother but not her daughter, does the Neglectful Father remember his first child? or are people more complicated than that?
and with all three, the narrative engages with these one-dimensional archetypes by constructing complicated, multi-faceted characters on top of them; by tossing the simplistic moral didacticism of a fairytale and presuming, first, that everyone is trying their best, that bad choices can be made from good intentions, and that no one gets it right all the time, or even most of the time. love and profound dysfunction can coexist.
ruby and yang had very different childhoods. that’s the narrative foundation the whole rose xiao long family is built on, because they’re a deconstruction of the archetypal fairytale blended family.
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you never cared for love. being in a relationship seemed too exhausting, too vulnerable and messy. you were okay with watching your friends fall in love from afar. as long as they were happy you were too.
and yet, everything changed after a project you had with a random partner for your statistics class.
na jaemin was someone you've heard of before. he was kind, smart and incredibly handsome. the last person you'd expect yourself to fall in love with as deeply as you did.
you remember perfectly the exact day when he went from a project partner, to a friend, to a crush and to what you call now your boyfriend.
"alright, i say we share the subjects of the presentation equally and then we meet again to put everything together, is that okay?" you asked with a small smile.
"yeah sure, that's fine by me. the only problem is that i kinda suck at statistics so it may take longer than a few days to finish all this." he says while checking his parts of the project.
"oh that's okay, i'm doing quite well in this class so i could give you my number if you need any help with something! you kindly offer, something that later became one of the best decisions you've ever made.
mark sat back on the sofa with a tired sigh in the apartement that he shared with three of his best friends, after one of the bost boring lectures he's had that week.
"dude i swear this teacher was a grim reaper in another life. how can you suck so bad at teaching at yet have the nerve to judge your students like that is beyond me" he complained to the other two.
"what did he say again? I told you you should've skipped this morning, who else other than you wants to see his bald ass head at 9 in the morning? said donghyuck while playing a game on his phone.
"there was barely anyone bro, the only person i knew was y/n. she was his victim today, I felt so bad for her."
jaemin was barely paying attention to the conversation, still half asleep , but hearing your name had better effect on him than any other coffee he's ever had.
"what do you mean, what did he say to her?" he asked, now fully awake
"he read her essay and pretty much called it shit in front of everyone. I can't imagine how awful that must be, especially for someone who takes their studies as serious as her" answered the oldest of the group
jaemin didn't waste a second after hearing that, got dressed as quickly as he could and ran to the nearby bakery to get you your favorite pastries and of course, a bouquet of flowers to cheer you up.
"oh jaemin, it's nice to see you!" says chaewon while letting him in the apartement she shares with you, her best friend. "y/n is a little bit down right now so I'm glad you're here, I have a class in a few minutes."
"thanks chaewon, don't worry, I'll try to make her feel better. I hate not seeing her happy" says your kind friend
"hm I wonder why" she shot him a teasing look "I'll leave you to it then".
jaemin made his way to your room, knocked twice and waited for your permission to come in. when you gave it to him, he opened the door and his gaze immediately found yours.
"what are you doing here, jaem?" you asked him while sitting up on your bed. your plan was to rot in bed for the rest of the day. being someone with huge academic validation, it was never easy for you to receive criticism towards your work, so on the rare occasions when it happened, your mood would be down for the entire day.
"what do you mean what am i doing here? my favorite statistics partner isn't her usual happy self and you thought i wouldn't come cheer you up?" he says while taking a seat on the bed " here's your favorites. for now i can only give you this but if you want i'll gladly give a punch or two to that asshole."
he brought you your favorite pastries and flowers? how did he even know they were your favorites, you couldn't have mentioned this more than once in the months you've known each other.
"jaemin you didn't have to do this!" you exclaim, feeling something you couldn't quite name yet.
"of course I did." he says while looking softly into your eyes "now move over, I plan on staying here for the rest of the day and I'd rather be comfortable" he lay next to you and started to look for a something to watch " what kind of movie are you feeling? I'm in the mood for comedy or romance."
"romance.." you say while staring at his pretty face, in a seemingly different light than you did before
oh...
"chaewon please, the last thing i want to do is see him today" you nearly cried while saying this to your best friend. ever since that day when jaemin surprised you with your favorites, you've noticed that you feel different around him. he's no longer a friend to you and you don't want to feel more things for him, so you avoid him as much as possible.
"y/n please stop feeling so scared about this. jaemin is an amazing guy who could make you so happy. why would you run away from this special something you have with him?" huffed the blond haired girl
"what if he doen't feel the same way about me,huh? then what? i just make a fool out of myself and ruin what we already have!"
"if you think that he doesn't ike you back you must be the actual blindest person on earth." she says while rolling her eyes "do all your guy friends treat you the way he does? i don't think donghyuck, mark, jeno or anyone else does!" she starts rumming through your closet despite your protests "i don't want to hear it, you're coming with me to the party! besides, you don't even know if he's going to be there."
you catch the outfit that she nearly hit you in the face, not forgetting to glare at her despite appreciating her efforts to get you out of the house.
"alright, we're going but i better won't have to drag your drunk ass out of there!" in spite of your original reluctance, you start getting ready.
"this is definitely the last party we're going to together" you mumble, not even on hour later while running after your lightweight chaewon.
"need some help getting her home?" you hear a deep voice ask behind you.
"shit jeno you scared me" you say, clutching your chest " i actually do though" you answer, offering a smile to one of your favorite friends
"sorry y/n" he return your smile "you don't have to worry about her, i'll take her home, you enjoy yourself here" he says while giving you a pat on the back
"are you sure? i don't want to ruin your night" you say
"yeah of course! i was planning on going home anyway. also, i think a certain someone wants to talk to you." he says, obviously pointing to his best friend.
"is it too late to ask for a ride home too?" you ask him with a desperate look in your eyes
"yes my friend, it is. he's already coming here. but don't be scared alright, i know you worry a lot but you two are good together." he says, already making his way to chaewon
you take a deep breath, already dreading the conversation you're about to have.
"hey you, it's been a while. i was starting to think you hate me or something" jaemin says with an unsure smile on his face "are you okay with going somewhere else? i missed you and i want to talk to you about something"
there he goes again. saying things that you wish he would stop saying, because you fall more and more for him
"yeah sure" you answer, trying to calm your nerves
you two drove around for a few minutes while listenig to music from a playlist that you made for him a while ago. you already knew where he was taking you. there was a park nearby where you two spend a lot of time together. he once called this his favorite place to go to with his favorite person. you tried to avoid how your heart fluttered when you heard that.
"so, are you going to tell me why you've been avoiding me lately?" he asks after sitting on the blanket he always keeps in his car
" i haven't been avoiding you, jaem. i've just been super busy with uni and work." you answer, trying to seem as convincing as possible. "you said you wanted to talk about something, what is it?"
there were a few second of silence, so you decided to take a look at him. he was already looking at you, love pouring out of his eyes
"jaemin.." you whisper
"i love you" he says
you could immediately feel tears in the back of your eyes
"i have for quite a while now. i can't tell you the exact moment i realised it, but i can tell you that i'm sure of it. everything feels so different to me now. there isn't a single moment of my day where i don't think about you. i know how scared you are of being in love, and i don't blame you. i've never felt like this before. i've never had someone consume every single thought of my brain the way you do" he pauses, takes a look at you and then takes your hand in his " i think the reason why you avoided me was because you feel it too. and i want you to know that even if you aren't ready for something more than the friendship we have, i would never hold that againt you. never. i'm happy with whatever you give me as long as i have you in my life"
you take a deep breath while squeezing his hand "it's so hard for me to put into words what i'm feeling for you because a few months ago it seemes like the most foreign concept to me,loving someone forever. i don't know how i would be like in a relationship, but if it's anything like watching bad movies with you , or staying here in this park talking about anything that goes though our minds, i want to try it with you."
at that, he offered you his beautiful smile that makes you weak to the knees, and pulled you into a hug.
"i'm pretty sure that i can love you forever, y/n" he whispered in your hair
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Hey Indie, so I have a question. What are your thoughts on mutant mayhem or the bayverse movies?
I think Mutant Mayhem is incredibly good, while the Bayverse movies are contently mediocre.
Like, don’t get me wrong, the bayverse movies were pretty good (the second more so than the first), but I think in comparison to Mutant Mayhem which is—in my opinion—a masterpiece, the bayverse movies are just pretty good. Like “Not Bad but Not Mind-Blowing” if that makes any sense.
Mutant Mayhem has a well written plot, it’s captivating and makes sense. The characters in it are also well written, hilarious and consistently in character. I love the artistic style of the movie, it looks sketchy and messy, and the animation is smooth yet choppy in all the right ways. The way the dialogue is done too really adds so much life to the movie, it feels very real and in many cases is recorded banter of the voice actors. I think because of the 2D animation medium they chose, the sky was the limit and they took full advantage of it.
The first Bayverse movie isn’t really as good as the second which I felt was better, but I’ll try to judge their vibes as a whole. I think the plots often think they’re more clever than they are, but are not bad per se, like I’d say as far as action movies go it’s probably average. I actually think they did a really good job on the CGI and designs of the turtles. I know many people say the designs are creepy and a bit disturbing, but I think the thing is that the turtles are supposed to look that way. In the cartoons fans always are like “How could you scream at this??” Not realizing the kids animation stylization filter on the world. So yeah, I think that was extremely well done. April and Casey are kinda cringe, but Shredder and Krang are pretty cool. I’d say for being a live action movie of TMNT, it didn’t do too bad.
Hope that’s what you wanted, lol 😂
Good question! :]
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okay you saying Three and Grian would clash makes me wanna see a multi-dimensional smash up where they meet
I MEAN SAME, one of my most self-indulgent desires is this, and i'm trying to remember if i've talked about this before on the blog or just rambled to my friends about it, lol. because it would be INTERESTING. there would be a lot of emotions going on there, it'd be messy!
because like, okay. so on grian's end: three is very clearly the bad ending, to him. this is the ending where the watchers erase grian and leave behind a strange little weapon who does stuff like "starts following orders when stressed", which is like, in grian's mind, the opposite of grian's behavior. and yeah, sure, three insists it isn't grian, but that doesn't make that not fucked up to grian, and probably also like... i don't know how good grian would be at seeing past that, you know? (bonus points if this grian is, himself, a standard "grian is a watcher who left" construction, because, you know, woof.)
but meanwhile, three like, has known identity hangups about grian. three would already be in a frustrated state of "i am NOT grian though" like, from the jump. but three would ALSO be forced to look at the version of the world where grian stuck around. and in some ways, three would look at that and see all the things its existence prevents, which would suck! but it would ALSO be a scenario where... so the thing is, the only version of grian that three knows is the posthumous version. the version that got lionized in death. this idealized image of the man. and i feel like three would see grian and find him... disappointing, in comparison, because ANYONE would be! but that'll also sure be a Thing.
(additional bonus points: grumbot. things that are DEFINITELY on the list of "things three didn't do in its own timeline and if mumbo did three treated wildly differently", and also on the list of "so do you think the human weapon with identity issues might identify with that robot or what" and also given that the rift remains one of the easiest crossover excuses on hermitcraft, oh man, oh boy. anyway.)
how would this end? I DON'T KNOW. i haven't managed to actually WRITE this self-indulgent thing although i have looked at all my friends with wide sad eyes about it in case any of them do, lol. but rest assured I HAVE THOUGHT ABOUT THIS GREATLY.
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does cd's management like raven and jersey dating? bc i just knowww that raven started taking care of himself and looking cleaner
oooooh.
okay, so i am going to answer this through the lens of ravenstan and jerseykyle secretly dating sort of in the middle of rm, after kyle finds out raven is his stan ( which is my second favorite chapter aaaaa!!!! ) because by the time they start actually officially dating/are out to the public, the original corrupt management line-up, namely fartman aka e.t. tenorman, are dissolved/dealt w.
but management...while they don't Know abt it,
…they do naught like it.
At All, tbh.
because, yes, while i do think that kyle be ironing stan's pants and fluffing up his hair...he do be equally fucking it like secretly violently making out with him before shows ahsdlkadsk so, like, as a result, i would proport that stan is cleaner...but his reputation gets Sloppier.
i say this because ravenstan is a 'yes man', lived under managements thumb ( by management i really just mean cartman -- i called him 'management' so as not to give too much away ), was basically a pretty boy rockstar marionette that cartman could get to do whatever he wanted bc he owns raven/all of the cd boys technically.
but when stan starts secretly dating kyle...jersey really bolsters his confidence and rae starts to get very bold and defiant/take his power back. bc kyle watching stan wither is like, you don't need to take that baby! you are in charge, this is your show. you don't have to do whatever they want! they're the ones who have to listen to YOU.
so when management starts ordering stan around, for like the first time since he started being raven, he puts his little combat boot down ( ravenstan having tiny ass feet is so funny to me ) and is like "no, i don't want to do that. i want to do this." literally my man is like "I. SAID. I. WANT. TO. GO. TO. TACO. BELL!" sdhkjsahd go awwhff!
but more than any of that...he just looks so much Happier. :') like he is drinking waaaaay less, he's smiling so much more and it's genuine, its not a shield for his sadness...him and kyle do play up hating each other to divert the suspicions of their friends and the world around them, which is so funny bc they're like "i hate you" and then texting each other hearts and smileys, kickin their feet and twirling their hair.
tldr: stan gets securer, happier and bouncier while secretly dating kyle, but that means his performance as gritty bad boy heartthrob raven of crimson dawn gets a lot weaker, faker and messier. he starts standing his ground and i'm not sure about whether cart knows or not, but i think the wheels are turnin in his head, watching stan and kyle sit closer and closer together, stan racing out of his dressing room with his clothes askew, at meetings on his phone w/ heart eyes.
cartman gets angry/jealous, feels like he's losing control,
ergo...
Enter Call Girl. ;)
-uncle nina, diabolically wringing her fingers together
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