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***SPOILERS FOR THE BALLAD OF SONGBIRDS AND SNAKES (HUNGER GAMES PREQUEL) BY SUZANNE COLLINS***

suzanne collins just repeatedly pulls the best of a given genre, and what i love about tbosas is that it completely subverts the manic pixie dream girl trope.

the story opens with coriolanus snow, small-minded in his outlook, traumatized by war, starving, struggling to make his way in the world where nothing but his name holds value. he meets lucy gray baird, and instantly, she's the classic manic pixie dream girl. she sings, she wears a rainbow dress, she believes in the goodness of people, despite the fact that her life is as difficult as it gets. in standard trope fashion, she and snow are bound to each other by plot devices: he's meant to be helping her with something, but in reality she has more to help him. she says that nothing they can take from her is worth keeping—because everything she has doesn't have a name. this directly contrasts snow's position where his last name is all he has.

over time, snow begins to realise just how dire her situation is, gets actively more and more concerned about her dying, and eventually falls in love with her. she expands his world, she charms him (and everyone else), and quite literally saves his life. snow believes in debts, and when he owes his life to her, he cannot help but appreciate her for it. she falls for him too—she believes he's a good person, possibly because he's the only one in the capitol to be even remotely nice to her, combined with her genuine belief in goodness and apparent tendency for somewhat toxic relationships.

that's where the subversion starts. despite falling for snow, lucy gray's life does not revolve around him. the song she sings in her interview is about her past relationship, which greatly irks snow who has become incredibly possessive of her. possessiveness is often depicted as a desirable trait in stories with a mpdg angle, but suzanne immediately shows it as controlling and somewhat sinister, despite the story being from snow's pov.

they both end up in district 12, lucy gray as a victor, and snow as a disgraced peacekeeper. it's here that suzanne fully veers away from the more tropey aspects of such a relationship. snow enjoys listening to lucy gray sing, but is constantly upset when she doesn't sing about him, possessively thinks of her as "his girl", and clearly wants control over her life. he doesn't even enjoy all her music, disliking the more freestyle non-lyrical pieces that lucy gray and the covey clearly take a lot of pleasure in. when lucy gray takes him to the lake and meadow, snow enjoys it but hates the birds, mockingjays, that lucy gray loves. typical mpdg arcs often involve the the nature-loving girl taking the city boy to a peaceful outdoors place, showing him all the things she loves about it, and making him love them too. snow never loves the mockingjays and even makes a sport out of shooting them, and thus never appreciates the true reason why lucy gray loves that place. he appreciates it for her as his possession, but not for the freedom that it all represents. he gets increasingly uncomfortable as he starts to realise that free-spirited lucy gray no longer is dependent on him in her own turf, while he still owes his life to her.

when snow kills billy taupe and lucy gray says that this makes up for her saving his life, we see the shift truly happen. snow's debt has been repaid, and his love for lucy gray begins to fall apart without the debt tying him to her. her rebellious tendencies aggravate his capitol heart, and he starts being unable to confide in her when he does things such as inform the capitol of sejanus's escape plan.

in the final scene in the woods, we watch it all unravel. they're both equals, having killed three people each, but snow attempts to lie to lucy gray about his third kill and she realises it. she retaliates by running away and setting a snake on him. snow retaliates to that by chasing her with a loaded gun. he drowns the evidence of his second kill, frees himself of any ties to his dark past, and returns to the capitol where he believes he belongs, forgetting lucy gray and anything he learned from her.

the manic pixie dream girl does not save the desolate boy. it was never her intention to and it was not her life's goal. the boy could never be saved by anyone anyway; the only thing that might have saved him was himself, and suzanne displays repeatedly how he was never truly willing to broaden his perspective right from the start.

i love this because typical mpdg stories make the boy a victim and the girl burdened with healing him and saving him from going down a dark path, but here, it is repeatedly emphasized that snow is a victim of his own making and lucy gray goes through his life on her terms only, trying the change him out of care and the goodness of her heart but leaving him and prioritising herself when she realises that there is no point.

to summarize, lucy gray does not wear a necklace of rope besides the dead man; instead, she flees.

#ballad of songbirds and snakes #lucy gray #lucy gray baird #coriolanus snow #my writing #suzanne collins #my thoughts #hunger games #hunger games prequel #rachel zegler #manic pixie dream girl #mpdg #tropes #trope subversion #tbosas #the hanging tree

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happy undertale day!!

#undertale #toby fox #deltarune #undertale birthday #undertale release #undertale anniversary #annoying dog undertale #undyne best girl

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qpr where they cry about their new classes to each other

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update: eight months later, i have two more now. it's like every time i get a tattoo an itch is scratched and i feel like im satisfied but then a couple months later that urge to get another one is back. id heard people say that tattoos are addictive and oh man they were so right.

anyway. i love getting tattooed. i love the process of it, the slight pain and discomfort, the conversations with the tattooist, the look and feel of tattoo parlours. i love the aftercare, getting comfortable with this new thing on your body and gently helping it heal. i feel like aftercare for tattoos is when i love my body the most.

most of all, i love what tattoos represent. i don't mean that in what the individual images represent, although that's important to me too. it's more about the choice, though. i feel like there's so much about your body that isn't your decision. your features, your bone structure, your body shape, your height, your weight. birthmarks, moles, stretch marks, scars. they're all permanent, but you didn't want them to be. you didn't choose them, they just are permanent and you have no choice but to accept it.

a tattoo, though. it's something permanent that you actively choose. you make a decision to add a mark to your body that wasn't there. and maybe, several years later, you won't like the design you chose. you may feel like it was an impulse. but that doesn't matter, because it was still your personal, active choice. you made a decision for your own body, and it can't be taken away from you. and to me, that's something so special.

every day there's a chance that a new permanent mark may be added to your body. you may slip and fall and end up with a deep scar. you may not like how it looks from the very first day you get it, but it will be permanent, regardless. so if you choose to get a tattoo, and you enjoy it even for one day, doesn't that make it perfectly worth it?

i got a tattoo!!

#tattoo #tattoed girls #me #tattoos #queer #pansexual #my life #queertattooartist #my tattoos #body power #body postivity #body positive #choices #decisions #linework #lineart

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i got a tattoo!!

#tattoo #tattoos #tattoed girls #me #first tattoo #first prick #tattoo virginity gone #queer #pansexual #my life #i cant believe i did this

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This might be a bit of an unpopular take but it’s okay to be in love with someone who doesn’t like you back.

I don’t mean being in a relationship with someone who’s stringing you along or never getting over someone hoping they’ll eventually like you back, obviously, but like... the idea that if someone doesn’t return feelings for you then they were never worth your attention in the first place or that they should “look at what’s right beside them” or whatever is so bad but I also see it everywhere. Sometimes someone can be worthy of your love and also not like you back that way.

On top of that is the expectations of perfect love or that being in unrequited love is pathetic or sad, or that you can only be happy if someone you like a certain way likes you back the same way, and I fully blame societal amatonormativity for this. In movies and books unrequited love is always framed as either “they were never good enough for you (and usually there’s an undercurrent of about implication they were ‘using’ you)” or “by the end they realized what they were looking for was right beside them the entire time, they fall in love the end” and like

Yeah, it sucks when someone doesn’t like you back, but I’ve been in unrequited love a few times now and my general experience is that I don’t love them less because they love me differently. All my loves were close friends first, and they all remain close friends to this day, aware of my current or former feelings, and it’s... okay.

It’s okay to not be in storybook love. It’s okay to love someone differently than they love you. It’s okay to love someone who’s aroace or gay or straight and can’t be into you that way. It’s okay to be in love with someone and not want to start a relationship with them because you’re not ready or you’re happy single or you’re relationship types aren’t compatible, and it’s okay to fall in love with someone who loves someone else who isn’t the bad guy either.

Love is supposed to feel good. Loving being in love without it being requited is okay. Nobody has to be the villain or the bad guy or the one that’s missing out—sometimes, they just don’t fall in love with you, and that’s okay! If you fell in love with them for the right reasons, you should still love having them in your life, and love having them in your life while your feelings settle and you can both move forward.

Feelings are valid. Jealousy and pain and yearning are par for the course, but what you do with those feelings matters more than whether or not your feelings were returned. It’s okay to be in love with someone and happy to be their friend, because friendship isn’t a backburner to romantic or queerplatonic feelings or anything else. They can love you as a friend.

Stories can end without romantic or qp or other requited resolution—in my experience, sometimes it makes your relationship stronger, to be able to talk about those feelings and move forward without having them be requited. You can move forward, or move on, or stay in love or fall in love with someone else, and it’s okay. Sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t and maybe we want different things from the people we love, but it’s not a waste of time or a waste of feeling or a waste of a friendship for something to not work out how you’d hoped.

I just don’t think enough people celebrate loving someone without it ending in wedding bells. Maybe it’s the aroace in me too—but the people I’ve loved in my life have taught me a lot, and I think that’s pretty good, too. I like loving, and I really think more people should.

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hand in unlovable hand

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pictures taken moments before disaster

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I JUST REALISED

At the end of Chapter 1 of Deltarune, you get to explore the entire town, including the Librarby, where you see Berdly, Jockington, Temmie, and a Gaster follower.

If you go interact with the door to the computer lab, it doesn't let you go in, saying that you can see a dog through the window.

Toby is in the library making the next chapter of the game, and it seems like you shouldn't interrupt him, because...

You just have to trust the dog.

#deltarune #deltarune chapter 2 #deltarune chapter 1 #toby fox #kris #susie #noelle #berdly #temmie #tem #jockington #undertale #dog #annoying dog #annoying dog undertale

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For some reason I just dislike Ralsei. I cannot fully articulate why but from the moment we met him in Chapter 1 his overly sweet personality just put me off and often made me quite uncomfortable. I honestly do not trust Ralsei one bit.

He consistently behaves too "nice" to be genuine, at least that's how I feel. The random information he just happens to know and brings up only when immediately relevant is also very suspicious. He often comforts Kris by providing reassuring platitudes which seem more intended to distract from the issue at hand than anything else. He also seems to be vaguely aware of you, the player, and the fact that Kris is somehow being controlled, but he does not seem like a benevolent force working only for Kris's well-being, but rather a Prince of the Dark World trying to further his own agenda.

The thing that really put me off was the prophecy about the Dark Fountains and Titans that he talked about at the end of Chapter 2. It comes at a very weird junction. All the Lighteners are talking about how they like the Dark World, and planning to make a new Dark Fountain, when Ralsei abruptly and forcefully interrupts them and narrates the prophecy. Frankly speaking, it seems to me like he pulled the prophecy out of his ass just to somehow stop everyone from making a new Dark Fountain. Even Queen was not aware of it at all. If this prophecy were entirely true, why hadn't Ralsei ever mentioned it before?

And then, there's the ending of Chapter 2. Kris rips out their soul, which I interpret as their way of removing the player's control over them, and creates a Dark Fountain. Kris does exactly what Ralsei very specifically did not want them to do. If Ralsei were really working in Kris's best interest, why would Kris actively choose to spend the brief time they're in control of their own actions to disobey Ralsei? Is it simply because Kris is tired of listening to orders? Or is it because the Dark Fountains aren't quite what Ralsei makes them out to be?

#deltarune #deltarune theory #kris #ralsei #susie #noelle #berdly #snowgrave #deltarune snowgrave #deltarune pacifist #toby fox #undertale #lancer #queen #dark fountain #toriel #deltarune chapter two #deltarune chapter one

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doesnt the titan.. kinda remind you of this statue..

the flavortext said “the structures on its feet seem to be dry” , also , didnt we learn that, Darkners turn into stone when they are in a dark world they dont belong in?

…who is this person?

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The actual funniest thing about the way Deltarune Chapter 2 start isn’t even how it confirmed the “KRIS IS JUST GONNA SLICE THEMSELF A PIECE OF PIE IT’S FINE IT’S FINE EVERYTHING’S FINE” theory after three whole years of speculations (I mean, that is still pretty funny)

But the funniest thing is this:

This isn’t just some random knife they snuck in from the kitchen to eat pie and summon Dark Fountains, it’s specifically THEIR knife, and it’s a knife Toriel can recognize at a glance. It’s just a known and accepted fact in the household that Kris has their own personal trademark knife. 

It’s just… this is the knife of Kris, the knife that belongs specifically to Kris, Kris’ knife. And considering how they pulled it seemingly out of nowhere in the ending to both chapters, it seems likely that -despite never showing up as an Item - Kris just carries this knife everywhere and everyone just had to learn to accept it. It’s their Emotional Support Knife.

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Every Toby Fox game MUST include:

gay dates

knives

fluffy boys and mean girls

not getting to eat the cheese

falling into a dumpster

demonic possession

increasingly fuckable robots

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everything has concentrated into one spot and it's pressing on my forehead and behind my eyes and im going to cry.

i thought i was over you, and god, ive tried so hard to be. constantly. and then you look at me that way, or say you miss me, and i hear your voice and it's all just like it used to be.

and you're gonna be somewhere else. everyone is. except me, alone, at home, barely able to move, just stuck trying to get by somehow. i don't know what to fucking do.

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oh so the words are only going to word at 3 am when i have nowhere to put them down and then disappear when i try to actually attempt to write something? i see how it is.

well played, brain, well played.

#writing #my writing #ramblings #dark academia #dark academia aesthetic #light academia #light academia aesthetic #english #books #booklover #english writing #english literature #literature #where are the words #where are they #pride