#AND i rewatched avatar way of water and also the shape of water

[chintzwife]

the amount of media i have consumed in one week of being sick . . . . i am horrifying myself thinking about it

#all of the squid game reality show plus interview with the vampire the show and both entire seasons of kevin can fuck himself #PLUS rewatched bridgerton s2 and FINALLY watched The Terror #can u tell i used my amc plus free trial #rewatched treasure planet last night and started the hobbit movies again for something to watch while i draw #AND i rewatched avatar way of water and also the shape of water #plus the entire audiobook of infinite country and granted it's not a long audiobook but still five hours #the terror was so good but mostly it was FASCINATING to see the show yall are so insane about on this site #i was so looking forward to wathing iwtv so i could use my trial to also watch the terror bc people are so crazy about it on here #and it's just like . . . . a period piece horror thing with a LOT of white men who all look the same! and it was a blast yeah #truly i love yalls minds i love yalls brains like i would never have thought if i cold watched this show that ppl would be so insane about #anyway god bless someone tell me what else to watch im desperate #started severance and just couldnt get off the ground w it #we never finished sucession bc we just wanted the old man to die and then he did so #idk maybe i'll just keep watching the hobbit movies

[nattikay]

After watching the Avatar: The Way of Water trailer, my brother wanted to rewatch the original (we’ve seen it before but it’s been years) so we did.

I know some people have given the Na’vi designs some flak for basically boiling down to “blue cat people”, but I gotta admit....I fail to see the issue there lol. Big blue cat people with magic hair and glowy sparkly spots? that’s dope bro. i vibe hard. 11/10 alien design imo idc ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  

i also noticed that they look a little bit like troll!jim with the blue skin, black hair, pointy ears, and even nose shape. so. there’s that uwu 

[listentothelittlebird]

Rewatched the first few episodes of Avatar: The Last Airbender with some friends, thinking some thoughts, also some quotes:

Kinda hilarious how they never address the oddly shaped animals in any way. Understandable given to anyone in the Avatar world those are just normal animals, but hilarious when the friend who has never watched the show sees the penguins for the first time and goes “those aren’t penguins”, “why do they have four arms?”

Takes three episodes for Katara to declare that she and Sokka are Aang’s family now. They trauma bonded fr fr

Haru the earthbender too, these kids are all so traumatised by the war! Wow!

Zuko in his cringefail era is so funny

(Friend about aang) “he’s twelve?”

(Friend about zuko) “he’s sixteen?”

Me and my friends cheering Suki on like yeahhh slay girl!!! Knock him to the ground yeahhhh

(Sokka apologising) “Character development!!!”

The contrast between Zuko’s ship vs the other military ships at the dock, where in episode two(?) his ship was so intimidating to the water tribe. Perspective

Also Zuko looking for Aang, like every time nobody answers him about the Avatar’s whereabouts he’s just left in awkward silence and I bet This Teenager must feel so awkward about it

I love the door designs for the Air Temple sanctuary door and the Avatar Roku Temple door!!!! Like both of those look so cool and the mechanics for unlocking them being bending related and just the sequence of the doors opening!!

Roku’s dragon is so cool. Long boi. Danger noodle. <3

Also for the first spirit encounter Hei Bai has such a cool design. Like it looks so otherworldly and it has such odd proportions and also Hei Bai in Chinese is 黑白 which are the characters for Black and White which is shown in the spirit’s black and white colours, which also links to the spirit being a PANDA! Fluffy <3 also that the architecture in that town were bamboo structures now that I think about it (doesn’t explain the acorn but that’s fine there was probably more than one tree around)

Cracking up at Zuko just karate kicking a chain into two like how strong is this teenager???

The intro having Avatar Roku shown in the “when the world needed him most, he vanished”

Bumi is such a wild guy. Like. Oh hey let’s just put my friend’s new friends in major discomfort for shits and giggles. Also let’s screw with said friend. I suppose Aang is a wild kid too though

Also that Bumi is the only one who would remember what an airbender fighting style is like so he kept saying that Aang was not being creative and had nothing new to show him

The pirates have such swag character designs, and also weapons. Those blades look so cool

(Friend, after Katara shouts at Aang) “oh noo you made the twelve year old cry”

#Atla #I really need a tagging system #avatar: atla #avatar: the last airbender

[chocomd]

ATLA rewatch thoughts, Book 1 (eps 19, 20)

Ahh the Book 1 season finale! The season finales are some of my favorite episodes in the series and they never disappoint.

19) Siege of the North, Part 1: 

Seeing the soot-stained snow and hearing Sokka explain that black snow always came before the raids on the SWT...brrrrr. It’s so foreboding. 

Also, wow Hahn is such a jerk??? 

The way that Aang covers his head and says “But I’m just one kid” is so heartbreaking 😭 He wasn’t there to help his people fight off the FN, and he’s determined to make a difference this time in the NWT. But he’s faced with the hard reality that he is just one person against hundreds, and his sense of inadequacy and futility is CRUSHING him 😔 

The scene where Iroh tells Zuko is like a son to him never fails to make me all emotional 🥺

Also Zuko swimming through the freezing arctic water holes is just plain crazy ok. But Sokka is right - he never gives up 💀

Loving the lore of the moon and the ocean and what they mean for waterbenders and the Water Tribes

20) Siege of the North, Part 2:

The way Katara has tears in her eyes as she worries about Aang and blames herself for losing him to Zuko 🥺

Everything about the spirit world in this ep is so cool!!! Roku, Hei Bai, and of course, Koh 

Zuko: “I've always had to struggle and fight and that's made me strong. It's made me who I am.” Iroh echoes this line in the Book 3 finale, but at that point he’s talking about Zuko needing struggle and suffer in the process of understanding and regaining his honor. Here, Zuko only has a very basic understanding of what his struggles mean - and it’s not to make him strong. His struggles do make him who he is, but not in the way he thinks (right now anyway).

I wonder if this episode is the turning point for Iroh, in terms of his role as the Gaang’s antagonist. Iroh is firmly against harming the moon spirit in any way, but Zhao still goes ahead and slaughters the spirit after pretending to let it go. Is this the last straw for Iroh, who can no longer turn a blind eye to the lengths that the FN will go to in order to conquer the world? I’ll see if Book 2 will confirm my hypothesis, but I seem to remember him acting as less of an antagonist in Book 2.

Wow Zhao is totally the reason why Wan Shi Tong doesn’t want humans to use the library’s knowledge for selfish gain. ZHAO ITS ALL YOUR FAULT YOU BASTARD

Aang unwilling to leave Zuko to die in the blizzard - yes, Aang sees value in all life, but he would have been much less willing to save Zuko if it wasn’t for Zuko saving him first in The Blue Spirit

Yue saying that marrying Hahn is her duty, and later sacrificing her life to save the moon spirit is also her duty. How does this fit into the overarching theme of ATLA about shaping your own destiny? Does she use her duty to the moon and the world to escape her duty to marry Hahn? Or is she an example of someone who has a fixed destiny and the option to take another path simply doesn’t exist? Is she a foil to Katara, whose destiny is intertwined with Aang’s, yet she still retains the agency to shape what that destiny looks like?

Aang merging with the ocean spirit and becoming Koizilla gives me the chills every time. EVERY TIME. He’s just one kid, but he’s a very, very powerful kid. I also love this scene because he goes into the Avatar State because of strong emotions - not an uncontrolled, furious rage, but an ancient and profound rage at the unforgivable harm that killing the moon spirit has caused to the world.

Iroh (to Zuko, tongue-in-cheek): “I'm surprised Prince Zuko, surprised that you are not at this moment trying to capture the Avatar.” Zuko: “I’m tired.” Zuko seems dysphoric in this scene, as if his actions to capture the Avatar at all costs is taking something out of him. And he doesn’t know what, and he doesn’t know why he feels so bad, and he wants it to stop. Cognitive dissonance, perhaps? Maybe he’s even questioning himself: Is this all worth it? But what other choice does he have?

The scene with Aang looking out over the water, and then he realizes Katara is standing behind him, and they exchange a look and hug each other because they both need comfort - THIS IS WHEN I STARTED SHIPPING KATAANG!!! They’ve been through so much, they’re picking up the pieces after the battle, and they just need each other. They’re still just friends, but their bond has become so much deeper here and UGH I LOVE IT

#text post #chocomd rewatches ATLA

[caucasianfallactivities]

Something I’ve never really seen anyone talk about in regards to avatar is the really healthy way in which the show portrays emotion and integrity, especially when handling their male characters. Aang and zuko are both really good examples of this imo; when the sand benders steal appa, aang pretty quickly falls into apathy, but instead of being praised by his friends for how “strong” he is in handling appa’s disappearance (like a lot of other male characters in media often are), they’re actively concerned for him. Katara even tells him that “it’s okay to miss appa” when aang starts to abandon hope entirely. A similar emotional struggle happens when guru pathik tells aang he must let go of his love for katara in order to gain control of the avatar state - aang clearly grapples with the responsibility of being the avatar while also knowing that he can’t just repress his feelings for katara and pretend they don’t exist. This happens again when aang is faced with the moral dilemma of killing the firelord and the obvious contradiction this has to his personal beliefs. 

Zuko is obvs another highly emotional character (see: screaming at the sky to get struck by lightning), but I never noticed until my recent rewatch that the only people who ever really try to invalidate his feelings are azula and ozai, aka the villains. Azula is always very quick to tell zuko that he’s overreacting when he questions his family’s actions, something that is supposed to cue the viewer in early on that maybe zuko’s base character isn’t actually that bad after all (azula’s own motivations and decline are also v interesting when considering emotion tbh). And I mean... ozai literally burned and banished him for speaking out against a military strategy that he believed was ethically and morally wrong. Meanwhile Iroh (aka the KING of acknowledging the power and necessity of human emotion) never once tries to tell his nephew that he’s overreacting to anything, even when zuko falls into a full-blown fever after freeing appa. Instead he tells him that his emotional state is a necessary part of going through life changes and isn't something to be worried about. Don’t even get me started about the reunion scene, which tbh is the only scene in popular media I can currently think of that shows a clearly emotional display of unconditional love and forgiveness between a young man and his chosen father figure. 

The depiction of Sokka’s grief for Yue is also something I can’t really believe came out of a show that was marketed for children. Instead of pretending that her death doesn't affect him, sokka talks about how he thinks about yue “every day” and grapples with his relationship with suki in its early stages. Not only that, suki even respects sokka’s pain and boundaries even though she doesn't know exactly what happened with yue - she realizes that he’s obviously going through something and offers support without ever prying too deep. 

If anything, the show regularly equates emotion with strength, which is basically the backbone of katara’s entire character. Even though the ember island players ep pokes fun at her for being a hopeful crybaby, the writers also show over and over again how katara’s emotional nature is what lends her strength and power. They’re pretty literal with this when they show that her water bending strength is directly tied to her emotions - this is clear in what I would consider to be her most iconic bending moment, when she confronts the man who murdered her mother. Here the show also meditates on how katara’s refusal to enact revenge on him shows her strength and fortitude, even though she herself questions whether granting mercy was the right thing to do. 

tl;dr I guess I never realized when I was younger how much this show may have shaped how I view emotions and their importance in life - I hope it’s helped other people like it helped me 

#long post #guess this is the result of my pent up bookclub desire in the past few months #also thinking about how jet's character factors into all of this but this post is already too damn long lmao #avatar #team avatar #a;tla #atla #avatar the last airbender #aang #zuko #sokka #uncle iroh #katara #azula #ozai

[mylordshesacactus]

[cracks back] well I just finished the ATLA rewatch so hey, have some further thoughts on that pre-Kyoshi Avatar plotline I’ve been tossing around. Specifically, since you guys appreciated my boy Black Lotus: I had some expanded thoughts about his rescue mission.

Obviously Our Hero--okay this is getting confusing, I gotta give this girl a name. Anyway. She’s had to go on the run after some kind of dramatic event revealed her face to the Firelord’s son as the true Avatar, stole a Fire Nation komodo rhino to get away, etc. Would have had to somehow barter passage on a ship--whatever ship was leaving first--because this girl does NOT have a flying bison.

When she gets there, she...does not exactly march up to the Chieftain of the Northern Water Tribe and announce the return of the true Avatar. She’s hiding. She has to, in order to protect her girl and the baby sister she left behind.

The Firelord’s son knows her face; but at best he has a hazy memory of her being with a random shepherd girl and a kid last time he saw her, and that’s if he remembers their faces at all. She has to trust to the community not to expose the loved ones left behind.

Her trust is not misplaced. No one gives them up.

Water is fire’s natural opposite; she’s not gonna pick up waterbending just be being around waterbenders, I’m afraid. But she’s also probably in pretty bad shape. She had time to heal a bit from whatever confrontation she fled, on the voyage up; but eventually some well-meaning stranger directs her to the local healer’s training school, where she can get healed properly for free.

Team Avatar grows when she meets a young--male--healing student. He’s the one who earns her undying love by casually healing Red and her stolen rhino as well, and they get to talking. Eventually, over the course of several weeks, they talk enough that...Hero catches herself in a lie. 

She speaks a little too freely, or mixes up her cover stories, and her new friend realizes she’s not quite who she claimed to be.

What it is, is she’s trying to simplify her story. She was going to make it out that she had to flee the Fire Nation after she panicked and used bending to defend herself from the Firelord’s son--

(Her waterbender friend picked up on that. She always calls him “the Firelord’s son” when literally everyone else on the planet calls him ‘the Avatar”.)

Anyway, she told the accurate story about earthbending a barrier to interrupt his punishment...to a young man who knows her as a firebender.

He’s also a nerd with access to a library via his healing training. He becomes the research guy. The one who helps her find legends about how previous Avatars discovered powers, contacted spirits, mastered bending in nontraditional ways...the one who proposes that maybe what she’s missing is an animal guide, who explains to her about dragons.

Hero is not out here planning to “master all four elements, defeat the false Avatar, save the world”. She wants to protect the loved ones left behind; she’s nineteen, she’s scared...no one ever asks to be the Avatar. And she doesn’t even know if her partner and little sister are alive.

Bender guy finds a way. She doesn’t know how to enter the spirit world, where she could find out whether her family is safe--but he’s a healer in the Northern Water Tribe. He knows where they can go to find out.

The koi fish help her bridge the gap, and she enters the spirit world and starts looking. That’s when, drawn by powerful energy and discord, she finds the dragon. She had actually been warned by her friend to avoid dragons at all costs while in the spirit world; they’re powerful creatures with spiritual connections to Avatars and he’s not sure whether or not one might be able to see her.

Something about it is...wrong. She approaches anyway.

She learns then why he hasn’t abandoned the false Avatar--and why the Firelord’s son never rides his “animal guide”.

Black Lotus is bound, chains invisible in the physical world--spirit bonds, pulsing and liquid with horrific, powerful corrupted spirit energy. They’re mostly in the spirit world, where no amount of struggling by the black dragon will do any good; but “phased” just enough into the physical world to hold him. He can’t spread his wings. His tail is pinioned. He can’t stand fully. He can open his mouth, barely, enough to drink.

She came here to locate her family, not declare war on the false Avatar.

The spirits--and her waterbender friend, when she drops back to her own body briefly to report--are sickened but tell her that this abomination can’t be destroyed, even by the ones who created the chains. They can’t be reached fully from the spirit world, because they’re half in the physical realm; but from the physical realm they can’t be detected, because they’re half in the spirit world.

If she even tries, and trying will do no good, there is no way the monster who created these chains won’t sense it. She cannot try to help without revealing herself, and if she’s attacked in the spirit world, she can’t bend.

Of course she frees him. Of course she sacrifices the chance to see her family in order to do it. And of course it works--she’s the Avatar. She’s the bridge. She can touch both worlds.

She pulls Black Lotus into the spirit world via that connection. She tries to talk to him, assumes he’s her animal guide, not understanding--through a brief, regretful contact, a momentary brush of his nose against her forehead, he communicates only that he’s grateful--but she means nothing to him.

They are, in fact, attacked in the spirit world. Lotus hesitates, clearly bound to stay--and she gives him permission to save himself. 

He takes it. She does not blame him; he’s weak, traumatized, terrified, and he never intended to bind himself to the Avatar. He was taken unwilling because he was strong and scary, and all he ever wanted was to be free.

Healer buddy I think is able to realize, through fluctuations in her body’s energy, that she’s being attacked; we get commentary from him, cutting back and forth with the battle in the spirit world. Finally the rapid-fire cuts culminate in him noting that she can’t bend, but--she’s used to not being able to bend properly. She had to hide while she was in the Fire Nation; this isn’t so different. Come on, Hero. You can do this--

(He knows she can’t hear him. That’s not the point.)

Come on, Hero. You can do this. What would you normally do, if you were attacked and you couldn’t bend? You can take this guy. If you couldn’t risk bending--

In the spirit world, Our Hero, pinned and helpless, reflexive: “Red, take him!”

It is not physically possible for her dog to hear her, let alone follow. Love doesn’t work that way. Red has never in her life failed to come when her Avatar called.

Black Lotus will come back someday--in his own time, when he’s healed, when it’s a decision he makes freely. Not in payment of a debt, and not out of guilt.

There was....a bit of a light show, when Our Hero and Red the roosterdog supercharged their spirit bond to a degree that will become a legend in and of itself on the shores of the most spiritually powerful location in the world. 

Hiding the fact that the Avatar’s possibly not actually sitting in the Royal Palace just got a lot harder.

But there’s still Reasons to hide it. In all likelihood--throughout this first season with the spyjinks in the Fire Nation capital, there’s evidence of a massive conspiracy. The team of highly-specialized bodyguards the Firelord’s son keeps around him, two of each kind of bender and all capable of bending at a distance and with minimal movements, to sell the illusion, is damning enough--but that level of horrific spirit work is not bought. That was not a mercenary. This is big.

I think I accidentally set up a plot where the endgame is the formation of the White Lotus, specifically to ensure the Avatar’s identity is never coopted like this again.

Anyway, the point is, they need to Fucking Skedaddle. Bender kid absolutely is not supposed to be at the spirit pool either, let alone fucking around in a manner that causes massive beams of energy to light up the goddamn hemisphere. So he can’t stay behind and make her excuses.

They escape together, and head for the Earth Kingdom. End of Book 1.

#atla thing

[percabeth4life]

Three Old Ladies Knit Socks of Death

First Chapter || Previous Chapter || Next Chapter || AO3

I’m really glad that I have a clue as to what happened, even if the constant buzzing surrounding everyone is driving me nuts.

Someone cast a spell of some sort to trick everyone into thinking that Ms. Dodds never existed. The buzzing kept trying to affect me, but it couldn’t get me through my Purifying powers.

Thank Pontus for those.

But the buzzing is very, very, very, annoying.

One important thing I noticed was that Grover didn’t have any buzzing around him, which means that he is fully aware of Ms. Dodds. That and the fact that he’s a horrible liar.

Mr. Brunner’s buzzing didn’t lower at all, but nor did it raise.

I think he’s the source of the buzzing honestly, still not sure if he’s safe. He hasn’t asked for the pen that’s a sword that’s a pen back.

But everyone is denying that Ms. Dodds exists.

…

I may or may not be using it as practice for my purification powers.

…

It seems like a good idea (and keeps my mind off of…)

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

Okay so one person had to go to the nurses office cause I managed to get rid of the buzzing around her with my purifying powers, and whoops…

Apparently, mortals can’t handle that.

Everyone is saying she had a psychotic break yelling about a Ms. Dodds and how she definitely exists…

So, I’ve decided that I should not test my purification powers on helpless mortals.

Katara would be ashamed of me for testing my powers like that.

I’ve also decided to rewatch Avatar: The Last Airbender for the twenty-fourth time.

Don’t judge me, it’s a great show and my teacher for waterbending!

And maybe I’ll see more about healing with waterbending, I can’t remember all the details and I need a way to learn without hurting myself first.

Purification is still cooler, but healing will definitely be helpful in the future. Besides, it’s practically a signature move for Katara, the whole world would’ve ended in the show if it weren’t for her healing abilities.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

Carl was excited for my experiments with the water holder, I was messing with some ice and ignoring the growing sense of doom that was coming as exams got closer.

Triton would be disappointed in me for not paying attention to my lessons now, but I can’t help it.

It’s so hard to focus when you’re trying not to focus on the fact that you killed someone, sure she was a fury, but she had feelings and stuff too.

I shook my head, nope nope nope, not thinking about that right now.

Work on the magic portable ice fish tank.

I sighed, fiddling with the ice to twist it into the right shape.

I’ll need to add the runes-

“Percy!”

I made the ice shatter into a thousand tiny pieces and melt and nearly fell off the bed.

…

“You okay man?”

I nodded, pushing myself up and pretending like my face wasn’t on fire.

“I’m fine.”

“What were you doing anyways?”

Uh…

“I was trying to do a palm reading on my hands.” Nailed it.

“Baa-ha-ha, you do palm readings?”

“No, but I thought I’d give it a shot. I was trying to see if I could pass my exams.”

“If you study you might,” Grover bleated out.

I sniffed, raising my nose and hiding a smile, “Studying is for the weak!” I declared grandly.

Grover laughed.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

I opened my eyes to an unfamiliar view, fields with misty figures as far as the eye could see.

I frowned.

Where am I?

I wandered forward, waving a hand in the face of one of the figures. They didn’t react.

Yep definitely a dream.

Now I just have to figure out where I am.

I probably should’ve gotten around to reading up on prophetic dreaming like probably dad Oceanus mentioned one of those times I was there, but I got distracted.

I wandered the fields, looking around in confusion, this place was very unfamiliar.

Except, a feeling of familiarity clung to me from one direction, so I started that way.

It felt like a low burn edging my senses, I’m not sure where I felt it before, I don’t really remember this feeling.

The sound of leathery wings made me look up, my eyes widening at the three figures.

Hades’s furies.

I suddenly realized where I was.

The itch of a curse made me want to scratch my arms. But looking up, Ms. Dodds, one of the furies, is alive.

It was like I could breathe for the first time in weeks.

I didn’t just kill someone who could think and breathe and feel like us.

I almost felt like sitting down right there, I let out a breath and held back the tears.

Thank Pontus.

I woke up

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

I practiced my Ocarina more, sitting next to some of the plants Grover has and settling the music book in front of me to try one of the basic tricks. Growing plants.

Technically it’s supposed to be done with coral and sea grass and other undersea plants, but I don’t have those. So, I just have to make due with the plants that Grover has.

Grover came in while I was mid-song, but I ignored him, the plant seems a bit brighter, just a little taller.

I smiled, it’s going alright.

Not as much as it should be, but it’s certainly improving.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

School was itching at my nerves. The constant buzzing was driving me up a wall and I was snapping quicker at people instead of doing it the smart way like Triton taught me.

I watched more Avatar and tried to resist the urge to break something.

I have no outlet, I can’t go practice my waterbending, I can’t talk to Triton, I only have Carl who just plain doesn’t understand.

School studies are getting harder and harder for me to do.

I could handle Pre-Calc thanks to all of Triton’s help in the past, and Latin wasn’t that hard either (why is every language but English easier? Should I try learning Spanish or French?), but otherwise… I kind of just gave up.

The buzzing stayed in the back of my head.

I threw myself into my books from Triton, devouring the information on Siren’s Song that I had been ignoring so far.

I practiced my Ocarina and paid attention to my clubs again some. Triton said they were good for me.

The buzzing filled the rooms when there was even a moment of silence.

I ended up kicked out of Model UN because of my lowering grades but music club had pity on me.

I practiced more.

The buzzing didn’t stop.

I snapped at a teacher one time too many, I’m not welcome back at the school next year.

What an underwhelming way to get kicked out this time.

The buzzing was unrelenting.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

I’m really glad for my starglobe. I’ve just been sitting here staring at it for the last hour.

Grover keeps giving me weird looks, but… It’s just sparkly and pretty and reminds me of Triton. It reminds me of the sea that one time my mom let me “sleepover” at a friends house. I got to see the stars from the sea and it was amazing.

“Did you know your eyes change colors?”

I looked up at Grover.

“What?”

“Well, they’re normally this sharp green, like, sea green, but you’re looking at your sparkly snowglobe and your eyes just turn like, silver-gray?”

I blinked, “Do they?”

“Yeah, I mean it’s cool.”

“Hmm, I guess I get it from my mom, her’s do the same thing.”

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

It was the night before my Latin exam.

As much as I don’t trust Mr. Brunner, I just couldn’t figure out this one translation, and I lost the answer key.

Ugh.

I decided to go ask him, at least he would know I was trying. As long as he didn’t like, try to kill me or something, it’d be fine!

…

Hopefully I didn’t just jinx myself.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

I was almost to the door to his office, but something was off.

I stopped, realization hitting.

The buzzing was quiet.

I was almost to his door, where the buzzing is usually very loud, and there was nothing.

I frowned, was he not there? But the light is on?

The door was ajar slightly, and I stepped closer, as quiet as I can be.

“… worried about Percy, sir.”

I stopped, tilting my head. That was Grover.

My heart sank, so I was right, he is working with Mr. Brunner.

“… alone this summer?” Grover questioned, “I mean, a Kindly One in the school! Now that we know for sure, and they know too-“

“We would only make matters worse by rushing him,” Mr. Brunner interrupted, “We need the boy to mature more.”

“But he may not have time. The summer solstice deadline-“

“Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can.”

“Sir he saw her…”

“His imagination,” Mr. Brunner insisted. “The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that. He may still have the pen, but the Mist over it will stop him from realizing.”

“Sir, I… I can’t fail in my duties again.” Grover’s voice was choked with emotion. “You know what that would mean.”

“You haven’t failed, Grover,” Mr. Brunner soothed. “I should have seen her for what she was. Now let’s just worry about keeping Percy-“

I shifted back, a small creak of my rubber shoe bottom on the linoleum floors echoes through the halls.

Mr. Brunner went silent.

I slipped back, seeing a shadow of something larger than Mr. Brunner in a wheelchair pass the lighted glass. It was holding an archer’s bow.

I moved, sliding into the first door I could find and pressed against the wall by the door.

I could fight if I needed too, my trident charm in hand, but… I need time to process.

A shadow went past, clop-clop-clop passing by. Like muffled hoof beats.

A large shadow paused by the window.

Mr. Brunner spoke, “Nothing, my nerves haven’t been right since the winter solstice.”

“Mine neither,” Grover said. “But I could have sworn…”

“Go back to the dorm,” Mr. Brunner told him. “You’ve got a long day of exams tomorrow.”

“Don’t remind me.”

The lights went out in Mr. Brunner’s office.

I waited there, going through what I just learned.

They’re worried about me, whether about my health of something else to do with me…

The buzzing is probably this Mist that he talked about, I’m not sure what that is, a spell of some kind I suppose. When I can talk to Triton again I’ll ask. Maybe it’s a land magic?

Mr. Brunner, whoever he is, has no idea that I know about gods and mythical beings and the like. I can use that to my advantage if he is actually a threat.

They know about the winter solstice mess, all I know is that there’s been a theft.

I frowned, are they blaming me too? And what’s this about a summer solstice deadline? That sounds bad.

Why do they need me to mature more? What do they need to worry about keeping me from? What’s going on?

One thing I’m sure of, Mr. Brunner is definitely not human. Some human animal crossover based on the sounds I heard. Horse half? Centaur? That’s the best I’ve got right now. I’ll look into it more later.

I stood in the dark waiting.

Grover is working with him though.

My chest hurt, could I trust Grover? Was he just going to attack me? Try to hurt me?

I want Triton, I want Triton so badly. He would know what to do.

But I can’t. Triton said not to contact him until things calmed down.

Based on Grover and Mr. Brunner, things are definitely not calm.

I stood in the dark.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

I returned to my room when I calmed, nodding to Grover and settling back down with my notes.

“Hey,” He said, bleary-eyed. “You gonna be ready for this test?”

I glanced over, trying to bury any emotions, Triton had said that Grover might have empathic abilities and I can’t let him know what I’m feeling.

I forced a smile, “Yeah, I’ll be fine.” I faked a yawn, “I think I’m gonna go to bed now though. Too tired to get much more done.”

And I am tired, I’m so tired of being here.

I just want to go home, see my mom, hug her, talk to Triton.

I want to be back in the still dirty (but much improved) river and cleaning it and talking to the fish and other sea animals.

I want to go to events with Triton and talk to my merfolk friends and trade notes on our powers.

I don’t want to be here wondering if my friend is going to betray me and attack me. I don’t want to wonder if my teacher is going to try to hurt me.

I just want home.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

Honestly, I fell asleep trying not to cry, so when I woke up in my probable dad’s palace, hidden in an alcove, I kinda burst into tears.

It’s like my dreams are trying to comfort me.

I curled up and cried, this year sucks.

Everything first semester was bad, but since the solstice I’ve been so alone.

Everything aches I just want to see Triton, to talk to my friends, to not be so utterly alone.

I can’t trust Grover, I can’t trust Mr. Brunner, I certainly can’t trust any of the other students in the school.

“Oh dear…”

Soothing curls wrapped around me, banishing the cold currents that felt so like my probable dad’s palace.

A hand was on my back, I couldn’t really see through the tears though.

“Hush now little Half-Blood, it’s alright.”

I took a few minutes to calm my breathing, to stop the tears, the unknown person whispering soothing words the whole time.

When I could finally look at them, I finally saw the Titaness Tethys.

…

Oh no, don’t tell me I just cried like an idiot in front of my probable dad’s wife.

I want to curl up and die, why me.

She settled next to me in the alcove, her hand still rubbing my back, “Are you feeling better?”

I swallowed, nodding.

“Yes Tethys-ran” I whispered.

Using the proper terms of respect are important. Ran is for queen, which she is, Ari would be for king.

She smiled at me, “There, that’s better. Let’s get you something to eat hmm?”

I nodded, letting her tug me out of the alcove.

“We still have only caught the beginning of your name little half-blood, starts with a P right?”

I flushed, “It’s Percy, Tethys-ran.”

“Ah, then a pleasure to meet you Percy-tou”

I flushed, tou is used for children regardless of gender, it’s basically calling them cute little one.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you to, Tethys-ran.”

She led me to the kitchens it seems. There’s a lot of noise as they work on making the food.

Her hand was still on my back, it was grounding.

“Do you have any favorites?”

She was looking at me.

“Oh uh, I like water chestnuts? And uh frozen Plumose? Um…”

She smiled, “Any meats?”

“… tuna?”

She nodded, nudging me forward as she spoke rapid Halmaheran.

“Get something -- him to eat, something on the --- end. And something -- snack on. And some --- if you --.”

I couldn’t catch everything that she said, unfortunately, but I’m pleased I caught as much as I did. She was talking really fast and had an accent I don’t know.

It took only a few minutes before she was ushering me out, a few bowls of food in her hands.

I ended up sitting with her in another alcove, nibbling on the snacks she got me. And sucking clean water from one of the plants, usually used for that purpose. Not like you can have cups with drinks underwater.

She let us eat quietly, her gaze on me.

I glanced at her, then looked away again.

“You seem to find yourself in our palace fairly often Percy-tou.”

I shifted, “I’m sorry, I don’t know why.”

She hummed, “It’s no fault of yours, though you should learn how to control your dream walking.”

I frowned, “Dream walking?”

She smiled, “That’s what this particular branch of prophetic dreaming is called, though the technical name is Hioipihaiho.”

I frowned, Halmaheran.

“You mind effectively leaves your body and travels to another place. It is different from Ahioimua, which is looking into the future of the place you are, Imuaireira, which is seeing the future or other places, Ahiomuri, which is seeing the past of your current location, and Amuritereira, seeing the past of another place.”

I wished I had my notebook to take notes.

“Dream walking is simply traveling, it’s the most common form of prophetic dreaming in Half-Bloods. None of them technically require dreaming, though it is the easiest way to receive the visions of the other forms.”

Okay that’s interesting, so I could do this awake… How would that work?

“Though slipping through the shields of our palace to prevent entrance from those trying to come is impressive. I’m very curious as to how you’ve done so accidentally.”

I chewed on one of the nuts in my snack bowl, “I don’t know, I just started showing up here.”

She nodded, “Well, it’s certainly interesting.”

It must be because Oceanus is my dad? Is this more evidence towards that? I have a lot of really solid evidence now.

I kinda want to say that I know, but I promised Triton I wouldn’t ask or talk about my immortal parent. It would interfere with my safety.

So, I kept my mouth shut and resisted the urge to tell her.

“What had you so upset? When you first arrived?”

I nibbled on one of the tuna pieces, “I uh… Just had a stressful week.”

I ducked my head.

“Oh? Anything in particular?”

“I have a lot of big tests, and found out a friend isn’t actually a friend…”

She hummed, “A sad thing to learn.”

“Yeah…”

She ran a hand through my hair, I peeked up.

She smiled, “Friends come and go like the tides, it is good to learn from your time with them, and they will leave a mark on you. But don’t let them hold you back or cling to what has passed. If they are not your friend accept that and move forward, else you will drown.”

I relaxed, she’s not wrong. Grover was apparently not really trying to be my friend, he was spying on me?

Regardless of what he was doing, I just have to accept it.

It hurts, but… it would be better for me to move on.

I nodded, “Thanks.”

“Well, I believe it is time for you to wake. I’ve already held you here longer than you should’ve been.”

She gathered our bowls and flicked away.

Almost immediately I felt the yank at me. Like a strong current tugging me away.

“Stay safe Percy-tou.”

Oh.

I woke up.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

I finished the Latin exam.

I know that I messed up like half the grammar, but the translation to English wasn’t too hard, I could use context for some of the grammar, and I’m good at the word definitions so that was easy at least. The few history questions were annoying, but I didn’t struggle too badly.

The buzzing in my ear made it hard to focus though.

I think I managed a C? Maybe even a B if my guessing for the grammar was good enough.

I’ll just have to wait and see I guess.

I started to head out when Mr. Brunner called me back.

I swallowed back my fear that he found out about me overhearing him last night, he wouldn’t call me out for that in front of the class.

“Percy,” he said. “Don’t be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It’s… it’s for the best.”

My heart sank, I know that I can’t trust him, really, I do, but… I couldn’t help but like him as a teacher.

It hurt to hear him say that, in front of the whole class too.

The other students snickered, Nancy sent me a smug grin.

“Okay, sir.” I mumbled.

“I mean…” Mr. Brunner wheeled his chair back and forth, like he wasn’t sure what to say. “this isn’t the right place for you. It was only a matter of time.”

What does he mean by that?! That I’m destined to be kicked out? That despite the high standards he’s been holding me to he had zero faith in me? That he was going to insure I would be kicked out if it wasn’t something else?

“Right,” I whispered.

“No, no,” Mr. Brunner said. “Oh, confound it all. What I’m trying to say… you’re not normal, Percy. That’s-“

“Thanks,” I blurted, holding back my fear that he could know about my power, “Thanks a lot, sir, for reminding me.”

I bolted, hearing his call as I fled.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

The last day of term had finally arrived.

I gathered up my notebooks, my waterskin, my assorted gifts from Triton and my friends, Carl in his new transportable tank, and carefully put everything up in my two bags, my waterskin on top. My suitcase held the extra and all of my clothes.

The other guys were talking about their plans for their breaks.

They’re all juvenile delinquents like me, kids that can’t manage it in other schools, but they’re rich ones.

Doesn’t mean I have to let them know that I’m not doing much unless Triton can contact me soon. I probably shouldn’t even go to the river until Triton gets ahold of me.

One of them asked what I was doing this summer.

“I’ll be visiting some of my friends overseas. I haven’t seen them since winter break.” I flashed them a bright smile that hid the ache in my chest as they questioned me more.

“Where do they live?”

“Oh, on some islands a bit out. They’re a bit spread out, so I’ll probably move around some.”

“That’s cool, looking forward to it?”

“Yeah,” I grinned, “They’re a lot of fun.”

They went back to talking about their trips but did leave an opening for me to join if I wanted.

I didn’t, they were all kind of jerks to Grover, but I appreciated it.

The only person that I was nervous about saying goodbye to was Grover. Even with Tethys’s advice, even knowing that he may try to harm me, it’s so hard to let it go.

Turns out I don’t have to yet though because he’s coming with me. We have tickets on the same Greyhound bus to Manhattan.

Seems suspicious.

OO OO OO OO OO OO OO OO

Grover is clearly very nervous, glancing around and down the aisles, watching the passengers. It was similar to how he acted every time we left Yancy. I ducked my head and didn’t say anything about it.

“Hey Percy?”

I glanced at him, “Yeah?”

“I uh, I know that uh, that we’re going different ways this summer. But…. I thought, uh, here-“

He handed me a card, “Just take this, in case you need me this summer.”

I took the card, which is in the most obnoxious fancy script that took me a minute of squinting at to read.

Grover Underwood

Keeper

Half-Blood Hill

Long Island, New York

[phone]

My heart almost stopped, Half-Blood Hill.

What does this have to do with Half-Bloods?

“What’s Half-“

“Don’t say it aloud!” He yelped, “That’s my, um… summer address.”

I stared at him, is he trying to trick me into going into some sort of trap?

“Okay, so if I want to visit.”

“Or… or if you need me.” He nodded.

“Why would I need you?”

I couldn’t help the bitter words. How could I trust him after what I overheard the other day?

Grover blushed right down to his Adam’s apple. “Look, Percy, the truth is, I—I kind of have to protect you.”

I stared at him, the likely mythological being that I’m half convinced is supposed to be assassinating me.

“Grover, what exactly are you protecting me from?”

Could I have misunderstood?

Suddenly there was a huge grinding noise under our feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus filled with a smell like rotten eggs. The driver cursed and limped the Greyhound over to the side of the highway.

After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced we’d all have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everyone else, and my senses were on fire.

It was like a web of feeling, fabric flowing over me, almost sparking as it moved.

My head snapped around, on the other side of the road, across four lanes of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand.

There, next to it in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, sat three old ladies knitting the biggest pair of socks I’ve ever seen.

And those old ladies were... dangerous.

The energy I could tell was there, it was overloading my senses.

I couldn’t feel anything but the crackling fabric flowing over me.

The lady on the right knitted one of the socks, the lady on the left knitted the other. The lady in the middle held an enormous basket of electric-blue yarn that made me feel like a knife was pressed to my throat.

The combined feelings made me want to claw at my skin, what is this? Who are they? What’s going on?

The three ladies were looking right at me. I rubbed at my arms.

Grover made a strangled sound and I glanced at him. Just barely resisting bolting from the area.

“Grover?” I said. “Hey, man—”

“Tell me they’re not looking at you. They are, aren’t they?”

I swallowed, oh dear.

“Yeah, why?”

The lady in the middle took out a pair of scissors, massive scissors—gold and silver, long bladed, like shears. I heard Grover catch his breath.

“We’re getting on the bus,” he told me. “Come on.”

I stood still, staring at the old ladies with the scissors that made my head spin, their presence that made electric fabric rub at my skin, and their yarn that felt like knives prickling my neck.

“Come on!” He called, prying open the door and climbing inside.

The old ladies still watched me, and the middle one lifted the scissors.

I could hear the snip of her cutting the yarn from across all four lanes of traffic. Her two friends bundled up the electric-blue socks and I felt the at this point familiar buzz fill my head. The three ladies were gone between one blink and the next.

At the fear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the engine compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life.

The prickling of a knife, the electric fabric, the head spinning all faded, almost entirely gone.

The passengers cheered.

“Darn right!” yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. “Everybody back on board!”

We got back on, the buzzing still nudging me. I pushed my power as hard as I could, shoving the buzzing trying to reach me away.

Grover looked sick, I didn’t feel great myself, but the buzzing had faded almost entirely.

“Grover?”

“Yeah?”

I hesitated, should I? I want to know… I need to know if he’s actually a threat.

I licked my lips, “What are you not telling me?”

He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. “Percy, what did you see back at the fruit stand?”

“There were three old ladies, two knitting giant socks, one holding yarn. The one in the middle cut the yarn, then they left.

He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his fingers, one I recognized from my time with Triton. A symbol to ward of evil. With magic behind it, it can do small things. Otherwise it’s just a simple hand motion.

“You saw her snip the cord.”

“Yeah. So?” Who were those old ladies? Nothing has bothered my senses like them before.

“This is not happening,” Grover mumbled. He started chewing at his thumb. “I don’t want this to be like last time.”

I scowled, “What last time?”

“Always sixth grade. They never get past sixth.”

“Grover,” I snapped, because I just want answers! “What are you talking about?”

“Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me.”

I stared at him, there’s no way I’m letting him know where I live. I’m not endangering my mom like that.

“Sure.”

He continued to bemoan my fate, looking at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I’d like best on my coffin (Forget-me-nots so I can boss people around even when I’m dead).

#percy jackson #powerful percy #percy figures out how to control water young #percy calls himself a waterbender #waterbender percy #Avatar the legend of percy #avatar: the legend of percy #avatar fan percy #grover #Grover underwood #pjo #percy jackson fanfiction #pjo fanfiction #pjo fanfic #smart percy #strong percy

[itszero2hero]

I am very excited for the resurgence in popularity of the avatar series. Which, coincidentally occurs a month after I introduced my partner to the series. We just started The Legend of Korra when The Last Airbender was released to Netflix.

Now, my fiancé introduced me to Wu Xhia, which is a martial arts based serial drama based on multiple books least of all that of Jing Yong, whose world is legendary. It’s only after rewatching do I realize HOW MUCH of that format was used for TLA, and I absolutely love it. Let me know if you want me to talk about that more.

Today, I wanna talk about the viral “bending hands” that went about the internet and my own reaction to it.

I have “Earth Bender Hands” now, it being a genetic trait, I find something like hand size and shape completely plausable as an indicator of a bender’s ability.

I’ll be honest, I was initially really disappointed that this was the case. To me, it was another way to jab at the fact that I wasn’t tall, I wasn’t lanky, and I wasn’t what people considered “ideal” in a lot of ways and I felt I was being punished for it. This was TOTALLY besides the fact that Earth bending is probably one of the most versatile, badass, and most useful styles of bending. I mean. Toph.

But I think the sensibility of Earth Bending is what caused my disconnect. It required one to be firm, grounded and unyeilding. Though, I see myself in that description I’ve always been attracted to flow, and adaptability, and grace. Something that’s always been associated with water bending. Now, I sat with my biases all this time until I rewatched The Avatar with my partner and you know what I realized.

Sand bending. It takes a lot of the teachings of water bending because the fluid motion of sand, and yet you also are able to bend earth like Toph.

I’m not the first person to say this but. DO YOU REALIZE HOW BADASS THAT IS?

I mean literally Gaara

#atla #earthbending #what bender are you #gaara #sand bending

[jyndor]

Cop-thing-anon here:

(I don't believe in the blue lives matter thing by the way)

I do get where you're coming from. I guess I see the thing about cops and cop AUs differently because the police is different and not as fucked up in my country. The thing about the fanart is just..I think you're reading too much into it. I don't think the artist really focused on the skin colour of Sokka, I mean, it's a kids show. Skin colour was never really mentioned or important in atla. But Sokka's personality is most likely why the artist was inspired to draw him as a "gangster", with azula (the villain) being a cop. It is kind of insensitive to draw that with the events going on, but I think that a lot of people in the fandom take some things way too seriously, for a kids show back in the late 2000's anyway.

hey anon, I say this with love and I am being sincere. I'm gonna need you to rewatch the show if you think skin color didn't matter. and it doesn't matter where you live because there is no part of the world, no culture, that isn't shaped by colonialism. I don't mean to be condescending so please bear with me, I truly believe in educating people as a part of allyship and anti-racism.

Anon, please know that I am not angry or anything but sincere in what I’m about to say. Just bear with me because I know that unlearning shit is difficult and can be painful, but we’ve gotta do it. I do appreciate you wanting to have this conversation at all. And I’m not writing this just for your benefit - this is for anyone who wants to learn about why A) race is a part of ATLA’s narrative and B) why critical analysis of mass media is actually important. So I’m not assuming you don’t know basic things about this stuff, I’m not trying to be condescending.

Now we’re gonna fix colonialism and imperialism XD wee okay here we go.

No matter where you live in the world you have some awareness of skin color. Your understanding of race might be different than mine, in fact it probably is. Race as we know it today is a social construct that stems from many things (and I wrote several hundred words on it but it was too much and too far removed from the point I’m trying to make so I edited all of that out. Yay.)

You don’t usually see imperialism, one of the major themes in Avatar, without colonialism. Imperialism is slightly different than colonialism - you can think of it like the ideology behind the practice of colonialism.* Imperialism can be used to describe expansionism in general - which has been going on since the bronze age lol humans, I stg - but usually when people today refer to colonialism and imperialism they’re talking about imperialism starting in the 17th century.

Now imperialism is not just a European concept. ATLA is set in a world that we know is supposed to be like a combination of different Asian cultures (with some influences from the Americas). And the Fire Nation is clearly influenced by Imperial Japan. So briefly:

Japan had a policy of sakoku (chained or closed country) which kept it mostly isolated (out of concerns that Japan would fall victim to something like the Opium Wars in China, among other things) from the rest of the world for a couple hundred years until the 1850s when a US Naval commander named Matthew Perry (I am not kidding) forced Japan to open its borders for trade to the United States by gunboat diplomacy, an oxymoron if I have ever seen one before.

Japan ended up signing unequal treaties with a lot of Western countries, and this bred xenophobia and hostility in Japan. The Emperor who signed these treaties died of smallpox, and after some internal conflict his son decided try to renegotiate these treaties. The US and European countries were not interested in renegotiating dick but the mission wasn’t unsuccessful because the diplomats A) exchanged some islands with Russia and B) were inspired by western economic policy and society to “modernize” Japan. Japan began industrialization and it converted to a market economy with the help of the US and other western powers.

So over many years, Japan went to war with China, Korea, Russia (and took back some of the land they exchanged with them), and others. From wikipedia:

Using its superior technological advances in naval aviation and its modern doctrines of amphibious and naval warfare, Japan achieved one of the fastest maritime expansions in history. By 1942 Japan had conquered much of East Asia and the Pacific, including the east of China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Burma (Myanmar), Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, part of New Guinea and many islands of the Pacific Ocean.

But ATLA is not a Japanese story. The Fire Nation is not Imperial Japan. The Earth Kingdom is not China or Korea, the Air Nomads are not Tibetan monks, and the Water Tribes are not Inuit. The creators definitely drew heavy inspiration from all of these places and others, but ATLA is a story written by American people in the United States for American kids. It is an American story.

And it was created at a time when the United States was victimizing people in Afghanistan and Iraq (and other places) in many similar ways to how the Fire Nation victimized people. In fact, the show starts in the Southern Water Tribe, which represent Inuit people, indigenous people in Alaska, Canada and Greenland, I think it’s safe to assume that the genocide being referenced here is not one by Japan but rather by European colonizers and later by the United States and Canada.

Imperialism is in the show’s DNA. 

And so is racism. In our world they are inherently connected. And visual cues from the show along with things the characters say suggest that we are meant to make the comparison between our world and the ATLA world. Every story has a purpose - it doesn’t have to be political, but for Avatar it is political, it is anti-imperialist.

In this article about how ATLA resonates with us in 2020, Aina Khan of the Guardian interviews Professor Ali A Olomi about using ATLA to teach at Penn State. “One of the things we see with the Fire Nation is the ideological justification for what they’re doing. We are a glorious civilization. We have abundance, we have wealth, we have technological advancement; we need to share it with the rest of the world. That’s almost word for word European colonisation.”

Zuko and Azula both call Katara a peasant. In fact, Azula calls her a dirty peasant. This is one step away from calling her a s*vage I mean come on. While peasant might just be purely classist (lol no) because Zuko and Azula are royalty, um it’s clearly racialized classism because of real life context. There is real history with colonizers calling indigenous people this, dismissing their cultures as primitive and barbaric.

Add into the mix colorism, which is bias against darker skin and privileges fair skin (which is a byproduct of imperialism) and you have clear race shit happening in Avatar.

When I saw that fanart, I was immediately reminded of black lives matter of course, but mainly of the fact that indigenous peoples are also at high risk of being victimized by police. Not just in the US. And how gross it is to depict a colonizer like Azula as an angry cop (representing the state) turning her gun on an indigenous man who is dressed like a gangster which... yike.

Mass media influence everything we do. The messaging we get, our politics, what we want to eat for dinner because we’re hungry and have been writing this stupid essay for three hours LOL. It’s important that people think critically about what they consume. Otherwise you get the goddamn United States with half of our population stanning a racist fraud. You want to know why US Americans are so ignorant? Because our education system sucks, because we don’t have any real media literacy. But apparently the rest of the world has some fucking nerve making fun of Americans** because all of us suck at it. No one is thinking critically about media.

A really terrifying thing about people is our ability to take whatever message we want from stories, even if it is in direct contradiction with the narrative of a story. There’s a movie called American History X which is explicitly anti-fascist, but because it’s a drama and Ed Norton is cut and looks badass and uncucked or whatever LOL, the iconography in that movie is fairly popular with neo-nazis. Yike. This is not at that level of course, this is some random niche fanart for a rare pairing.

For better or for worse, US media and entertainment gets a lot of attention and people around the world eat it up. Maybe you don’t need to know every little detail about US American shit, and I know we tend to dominate media, but black lives matter is not just a 2020 thing. People have known about it for years, since it started. If that fanart was created in 2019, which I think it was, the BLM movement had already existed for six years. If you’re watching an American show like Avatar and you’re making fanart on social media but you don’t know what BLM is in 2019... well educate yourself lmao.

Considering that Black fans have expressed frustration and discomfort in fandoms over and over again, and I am sure indigenous fans have too because fandoms are racist sometimes, it’s important that white fans help make fandoms better. And I am a white fan, and I consider myself an anti-racist. Which means I have to be active about racism when I see it.

btw I found this great essay by @cobra-diamond which you should read if you want more details about the similarities between Japan and the Fire Nation.

* that is very reductive but it’s fine lol

** I am kidding, unless you are english feel free to make fun of americans for non-gun, non-trauma related things pls

#anons #asks #racism tw #colonialism tw #atla #fandom racism #acab #police violence #indigenous right #nazism tw #oh lord shitty discourse tw #imperialism tw #anyway now i'm gonna eat

[krokodile]

Tumblr has decided that one of my posts “may contain adult content” and thus is blocked from public view.  However, after digging all the way back through to February, there’s no indicator that it’s been flagged.  So I can’t contest it.

It’s a fucking movie review post. 

I can only assume the bot spazzed out because it contains a review of the documentary “Fagbug.”

Needless to say I’m reposting everything now because I AM SO FUCKING PISSED.  Gay activist movies with inflammatory titles are “adult content.”  

(I mean, it sucked, but still.)

Aside from that, I can’t find any content that would anger a bot.  I mean, if the bot sat down and watched Take Me to the River, it’d probably get mad, but I don’t explicitly discuss any of its content, so...it included a picture of a child in a bathing suit from the waist up?  Is that it?  Did one of the movie posters look like nudity somehow?  Because I looked at all of them and aside from the potentially triggering flesh tones in Happy Death Day’s poster (that creepy baby face sure is sexy amirite) I, again, see nothing.  

And since you can no longer access the posts directly the only way to get the content back is to either harass tumblr via email until they allow the post back up or crawl through your posts on your own account, which can’t be done by day, just by page number.  I can’t begin to imagine how shitty this is for people who have original content worth preserving.

movies watched in 2018

take me to the river:  guys, here’s the thing.  horror is my favorite genre and i’m pretty deadened to everything with “shock value” in film.  this little indie drama here, though?  this genuinely managed to shock me.  i was sitting there at one point unable to believe i was actually watching what i was watching.

please keep in mind that i don’t think that scene was included for the sake of shock value; it was relevant and likely necessary.  i’m just saying that NOTHING gets to me in that way, and this did.

it’s a fantastic film, albeit one of those annoying enigmas with no real answers.  i would love to have an hour alone with the screenwriter just to find out what they were thinking of in terms of backstories.  every major performance is perfect - logan miller is incredible.  everyone’s performance is understated, natural and authentic.  the little girl who played molly - not sure of her name but i recognized her from “louie” - holds her own with some amazing adult performances and is just as authentic as everyone else.  robin reigert is quietly devastating, josh hamilton is equally quietly terrifying, richard schiff and azura skye disappear completely into their characters.  

the pacing is on the slow side, but it works well for the story.  i watched the entire thing with my stomach in knots, having no idea in hell where it was going.  on several occasions i genuinely expected a murder.  i’m not used to movies this quiet and slow being so unpredictable.  i had to keep pausing it to shake off the tension.  it’s also incredibly beautiful to look at.

this is one of those indie gems that is absolutely not for everyone - it touches on some subject matter than many would find deeply upsetting.  and i think the film means to be deeply upsetting, but again, it’s in a way that’s not for everyone.

i do wish there were more answers, because i have so many questions, but it does guarantee i’ll be thinking about this movie for years to come, so maybe they did that on purpose.

as an aside, i kept thinking that the little girl looked incredibly familiar, and then it hit me.  she looks like a miniature allison case.

change the hair color and she’s an absolute ringer.  

(i also got a smile out of her name reveal, just because it’s her cousin asking her how to spell it and she starts with m, and for whatever reason i’m like “oh wouldn’t it be funny if we had the same name,” and at the -o i’m like trying to guess, “maybe she’s morgan, or -”; -l  “...ha.  awesome.”  -l-y “well i’m glad they spelled it properly.”  dunno why that amused me, but it did.)

it - better than i thought it would be in some ways.  it’s not scary at all and the horror aspects are largely bungled, which is a shame because the dude playing pennywise is pretty creepy and could’ve done better stuff with a better script.  i hate the changes they made to beverly’s character, and she and the kid from book of henry were so obnoxiously precocious and precious.  that said, all the other kids were fantastic, including that kid i generally dislike from stranger things.  he was hilarious, and he and the rest of the pack of boys were so natural in their roles you just started to believe that’s who they were.  i’m vaguely looking forward to the sequel.

mammoth - a rewatch; it’s still the same infuriating mansplainy trash it was the first time around, but i wanted mom to see michelle williams’s performance, so.  the cast really is perfect; that’s the one thing it has going for it.

marwencol - this guy’s photography is amazing, and his story is super interesting, but what kept jumping out at me was how fucking great this dude’s coping mechanisms were, even if they looked a little odd.  for example, he has a crush on his married neighbor, so he added a doll based on her to his little village with the intent of having that doll marry the doll that’s his avatar.  the woman got weirded out, told him it wasn’t cool - so he dealt with the rejection by creating a sorceress character who blinked the neighbor character out of that universe and hooked it up with that guy’s character.  like...that’s the weirdest way i’ve ever seen someone handle rejection, but also kinda the healthiest.  he said repeatedly that he had no interesting in actually pursuing his neighbor romantically because he respected that she was married.  he never said a cruel word to her, or complained to the camera about her being a bitch or ungrateful or whatever dumb shit people come up with.  absolutely no threats or hints of violence.  just “i’m hurt by this rejection, so fuck it, i’m erasing her from this narrative.”  like...that’s honestly brilliant.  don’t know why this stuck with me more than anything else, but it did.  i know there’s a drama adaptation coming out soon with steve carell, and i expect that’ll be great.

maudie - i adore sally hawkins so much.  i haven’t seen the shape of water yet; i really only know her from paddington, but there’s just something about her that makes me like her.  and her performance in this is stellar.  i know nothing about maud lewis (besides the fact that i like her paintings) but sally hawkins was easy to fall in love with.  sweet, smart, shrewd, just a hell of a mind but also a huge heart.  

happy death day - i was NOT expecting to enjoy this as much as i did.  it’s really perfectly executed for the type of movie it is.  great comedy - one of the funniest onscreen kills i’ve ever seen - genuine danger and stakes (a rarity in groundhog day type movies), and a main character with actual depth; enough so that you actually care about her and want her to survive this movie (i don’t recognize the actress, but she does a great job with the role).  and a fucking fantastic red herring that totally caught me off-guard.  i was expecting something dumb, a carelessly written splatterfest aimed at the lowest common denominator.  (yeah i’m a horror snob fuck you.)  actually there’s very little blood/gore, which apparently bothered some viewers, but i don’t think any effect was minimized without it.  i had a ton of fun watching it.  didn’t expect that.

dunkirk - i’m just gonna say it.  it was bad.  i’m generally pretty neutral on war movies - for the most part they’re not my thing but there are plenty i’ve enjoyed and plenty i’ve been able to appreciate as good filmmaking even if the film itself wasn’t for me.  this movie is just not good.  generic war movie created around a truly amazing true story that could have been an amazing film.  wasted opportunity.

fagbug - i completely understand why the gay community had worse things to say about this person than heteros did.  ugh.  stop making actual tragedies about you, stop talking over people and stop acting like an epic victim.  

before i wake - surprisingly not bad, could’ve been better.  liked it better before the last few minutes.  it had some clever ideas and it was fun putting everything together, but having it put together for us takes the fun out of it, and making the kids’ “powers” unambiguous is a little...hard to swallow i guess?  but it’s still surprisingly pretty good.

under the arctic sky - random netflix generator told me to watch this and while cold water surfing isn’t something i’m super interested in, the photography is gorgeous.  i can’t pretend i didn’t cry like a little bitch watching the one guy surfing under the northern lights.  just...the world is just awesome.

original post url 

http://krokodile.tumblr.com/post/170571715555

#movies watched in 2018 #MWi2018: fagbug #gay #MWi2018: take me to the river #MWi2018: dunkirk #MWi2018: before i wake #horror movies #horror movies: before i wake #MWi2018: under the arctic sky #horror movies: happy death day #MWi2018: happy death day #MWi2018: marwencol #MWi2018: maudie #MWi2018: mammoth #MWi2018: it 2017 #horror movies: it 2017

[kristallioness]

Two in one

Summary: Kya receives a gift from a new friend.

Word count: 1,651

Author's note: I was just showering and one thought led to another (apparently I get some good fic ideas while showering).. I was thinking about how Katara never really used much makeup - only during the time she and Toph were going to the Earth King's party and that spa in the Upper Ring, also when she disguised herself as the Painted Lady. Even when there were formal events, such as the government elections in Yu Dao, or when she's 34-35 in their family photo she doesn't wear any, which is a thing I really love about her because she seems to believe in natural beauty like me. But her daughter Kya does, so I thought how she could bond with Asami through that (they'd become closer friends and talk more, ever since Kya told her and Korra that she's there for them and she supports their relationship). By then this story began writing itself in my head because I love my lesbian cloudbaby so much and I'm excited for these bisexual ladies and their new story in "Turf Wars: Part Two" (I've seen spoilers and I want my copy to arrive asap because the first part left me with the most unexpected and best feeling ever: like I'd just watched an actual episode of the show). Also, I had major TLOK feels when I went through transcripts and some screenshots for references of Air Temple Island and some other stuff (I NEED to do that rewatch, the sooner the better).

----------x----------

"I'll get it, mom!" Kya exclaimed to the other room as she made her way to the door. A familiar knock let her know that the mailman was there. She opened their igloo door and the middle-aged man greeted her with a big grin.

"Good morning, Master Kya! You have a package from Republic City," he said as he handed her a medium-sized box, which had been wrapped in a pretty lavender wrapping paper and tied together with a magenta bow.

"Morning! And thanks, Boda! Who's it from?" she wondered as she looked at every side of the package.

"I have no idea, but whoever sent it must be really rich. Look at the tag, it's from Future Industries."

Kya grabbed the white label that had been attached to the bow and looked at the familiar logo on one side, her name and address had been written on the other side. She hummed in curiosity and quirked an eyebrow. There was only one person who she knew from that company.

"Hmm.. guess they wanted to surprise me," she replied with a shrug, a loving smile on her lips. Kya wished Boda a good day and closed the door to not let any more freezing air inside. She gently shook the box as she headed to the kitchen to join her mother for lunch.

"Who was it, sweetie?" Katara wondered as she was pouring the tea into two cups.

"Boda brought me a package," Kya said, taking a seat behind the table that'd been set for the second meal of the day. The smell of sea prune stew boiling in a big pot, steaming tofu, fresh blubbered seal jerky on a plate and kale cookies for dessert filled the home of the two master waterbenders. The younger one placed her package on the edge of the table and began unwrapping it.

"Who's it from?" Katara asked, putting Kya's hot cup of tea next to her empty plate before she took a seat on the other end of the small table and started lifting the food onto her own plate.

"I think it might be from Asami. There's a Future Industries logo on the tag."

"Oh, what's inside?"

When Kya had removed the nice wrapping paper and put the bow aside, she unveiled a darker blue rectangular-shaped gift box. She lifted the top, her cerulean eyes widening in surprise.

"Wow! Mom, look at this!" Kya gasped, running a hand over the gifts inside.

"What is it?"

"It's makeup and jewellery. Lots of it. She really shouldn't have.." the younger waterbender said as she picked up a lipstick. The colour seemed to be quite similar to the one she usually wore, complementing her brown skin tone perfectly. There were four more, both a tad lighter and darker tones, plus three pairs of earrings, some eye shadow to complement her eye colour, something to powder her cheeks with and a couple of glittery blue hair ties that she could use to fasten her long grey hair with.

Kya also noticed an even thinner plain cardboard box hidden underneath the accessories after she'd shuffled them around a bit. She picked it up and pulled it open, revealing a letter and a couple of photographs.

"She also wrote me a letter and there are some photos in here."

"Would you care to share with me if they're not too personal?" Katara asked, slurping some of the delicious broth and chewing on the tasty sea prunes along with a bite of tofu.

"Of course!" Kya declared cheerfully. She raised a hand in front of her mouth to clear her throat before she began reading the letter out loud.

"Dear Kya,

I hope you had a pleasant trip back home. How's everything at the Southern Water Tribe? I've been busy planning the construction of the new suburb in the northwestern corner of Republic City. The first inhabitants have already moved into their new homes, but we still have a long way to go before this refugee problem is solved. The healers were grateful for your help and wanted to send you, and your mother, their best wishes.

I put together a special makeup kit for you, as a way of saying thanks for supporting me and Korra's relationship. It really means a lot, for both of us. I hope you'll like these newest samples and that I got the right tones for everything. Let me know if there's anything else you might wanna try. Next time you visit Republic City or come to stay on Air Temple Island for a longer while, maybe we could get together and share some tips? I'd love to find out more about Water Tribe traditions so I'd be able to surprise Korra with something I learned from you.

Speaking of surprises, Korra found an old camera from Tenzin's attic and we tested it out. We took several shots in some places, so I wanted to send some of them to you. They're kind of silly, but I hope they'll bring a smile to your face.

Korra also wanted to send hugs to your mother. She specifically told me to tell you to give Katara a big hug for her. Can't wait to hear back from you! Much love and hugs,

Asami."

As Kya reached the last paragraph, she stood up and walked over to her mother to actually wrap an arm around her, still reading the last sentences from the letter out to her. When she finished, she wrapped the other arm around her, too.

"Aww! That was so sweet of her. And thank you for the hug, my little waterbender," Katara said, snaking an arm around her daughter's waist to hug her back. She sat back down to have a look at the photos. She started giggling at the first one.

"Oh-oh-oh-hooo.. this is a good one!" Kya laughed and handed it to her mother, who held a hand in front of her mouth as she chuckled, too. It was a shot taken near the meditation pavilion at the far corner of Air Temple Island. Tenzin was meditating in the background, but Korra had jumped in front of the camera and pulled a funny face. He seemed to be completely oblivious to what was happening around him.

"Hey, here's one of Jinora," Kya said and gave it to Katara, who smiled lovingly.

"Oh my, look at that! That's my young airbending master alright."

The second photograph had both Jinora and her boyfriend Kai in it. Korra supported her hands on their shoulders to hold them close to each other, she was standing behind them. It was taken under the wooden pathway, which connected different parts of the temple on the outside.

As Kya stared at the third photo of the happy couple, she narrowed her eyes and released a long hum in thought.

"Hmmm... Why does this seem so familiar to me?"

"Let me see," Katara turned her attention to her daughter after she'd finished marvelling at the photo of her granddaughter. Kya showed her the photo of Korra and Asami, then continued to browse through the other ones.

"I feel like I've seen it before, but I can't put my finger on what it is exactly.. the location or something?" she shrugged. Her mother's mouth dropped wide open.

"Oh my goodness!"

"What? What's wrong, mom?"

"I know why this is familiar to you," Katara claimed as she slowly stood up from behind the table to head to the living room. Kya dropped the rest of the photographs back in the smaller box on the dining table and followed her. She watched how her mother stepped in front of the cupboard where their photo albums were, pondering for a moment before pulling out one of them. She took a seat on the couch, her little waterbender doing the same.

"What are you looking for?"

"An old photo of me and your father.." Katara explained as she carefully turned the pages of the thick album. It was one that contained shots from her early adulthood together with Aang, when they'd already had Bumi. The photos were taken by a prototype that Sokka had later helped develop into one of the first working cameras. Katara flipped through dozens of pages until she found the right one.

"Here it is," she said as she held the photo of Korra and Asami next to one of her own.

"Woah!.. I can't believe it. That's you and dad in the.. the.. same place," Kya stuttered, her mouth remaining agape this time as she pointed a finger to the picture in the album.

It was a similar photo of Katara and Aang together on Air Temple Island, probably taken near the welcoming gate at the top of the hill. Their home was in the background, behind Katara's figure on the left. Almost half of the temple was visible on the right side behind Aang. They seemed to be laughing at the moment the picture was taken, with Katara's hand holding her husband close to her from his middle and his own supported on her right shoulder.

Kya was awestruck because her parents' poses and faces looked exactly the same as Korra and Asami's. The Avatars shared their signature goofy grin. The angle in which the camera had been positioned was practically the same, hence the background looked the same.

"When was this taken?"

"Your father and I were in our early twenties," the elder waterbender replied, a twinkle appearing in her diamond blue eyes as she gazed at the photos surrounding the one she'd wanted to show Kya, of her being together with her beloved. She blinked away a few tears that the memories had brought on, sensing how her daughter wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

"Wow.. I guess his spirit really does live on in her."

"Of course it does, she's the Avatar," Katara said proudly.

#Korrasami #Katara and Kya II #Katara #Kya II #Asami Sato #Korra #TLOK #Turf Wars #my fanfiction #mine #shards of Kristal

[wutislife]

Fair warning: this is not about bashing the Harry Potter series or J. K. Rowling in any way, shape, or form.

I know I’m late to the party, but I read an article about how Rowling was “unnerved” by Draco’s popularity. I take issue with the demonization of the Slytherin house/Draco Malfoy, as well as a lot of what was cannonized. 

The Harry Potter series revolves around this dichotomy of good and bad. I think the world that Rowling created is amazing and beautifully constructed. It’s rich in history and detail, and I love it. The characters are great, but I feel like the story falls flat. Let me explain.

I’m also currently rewatching Avatar the Last Airbender, and I’m amazed at the difference. In ATLA, Zuko undergoes this huge, drastic transformation. Not even just Zuko, but so many characters. The Fire Nation was collectively thought of as “bad” in the first season, but every season thereafter made it a point to show you that there is no good and bad. There was grey area and nuances and it made you question every single character and nation. The promised Ba Sing Se was effectively a cartoon version of a North Korea where Big Bother Government knows best. A water bender who was legit evil and came up with bloodbending. Even Aang was faced with a horrible decision regarding whether or not to kill the Fire Lord to end the war. The “good guys” (Team Avatar) were all for killing the Fire Lord. Hell, even Sokka, said “let me show you how it’s done” and brutally decapitates the melon version of the Fire Lord during training. 

It’s very different from the Slytherins are evil and people keep glorifying bullies like Draco narrative that Rowling seems to be pushing. I think there’s a really strong opportunity for redemption and complexity here that Rowling just didn’t take. Instead of making it a more or less black and white story of good and bad, Rowling could have made it a story about unity in the truest sense of the word. I read a fan theory that absolutely blew my mind. It theorizes about what would have happened if a Slytherin student was chosen for the Tri-Wizard Tournament and died instead of Cedric. You could easily imagine a world where Slytherin students directly defied their families to join Voldemort, gave up everything, because they realize that Voldemort will do anything (even kill purebloods) in his rise to power. It would have added depth to the original stories that I (personally) find lacking. 

Just some thoughts for the day.

Mostly because my master’s thesis is due in like 48 hours and I’ve been procrastinating like crazy. Oops. 

#personal #harry potter #harry potter series #slytherins #why is jk rowling anti slytherin anyway? #draco malfoy #fan theory #fan theory > cannon #avatar the last airbender #complexity matters

[equalmeasurefiction]

Puppetmaster Rewatch

So... I recently re-watched Season 3, Episode 8 of Avatar the Last Airbender--The Puppetmaster.  I was surprised at how my reaction to it had changed since the last time I’d watched it.

The first thing I noticed was the incredible complexity in the interaction between Katara and Hama.  There is so much achieved in such a short amount of time.  It was astoundingly subtle, but it was all still there.

The second thing that I noticed (and what really surprised me) was how my sympathies changed on the re-watch.  When I first saw this episode, I sympathized with Katara.  I recognized her horror and her pain at being pushed to learn a type of bending that was really abhorrent to her.  I felt for her as I watched her struggle with what she’d done at the end of the episode.  She must have felt an incredible sense of shock and betrayal after being put in a position where she felt she had no choice but to perform a particularly violent and brutal form of bending.

I still remember how her reactions shaped my opinions about blood bending.  I was actually surprised when she used the technique to subdue a Fire Bender in the Southern Raiders.

So it was a little surreal when I found myself really feeling for Hama during the re-watch.  But I couldn’t fault the logic that made me reconsider my feelings.  I really felt that Katara’s ‘moral’ reaction to blood bending came from a place of privilege.

Hear me out on this.

Yes, Hama and Katara were both water tribe women and water benders who suffered at the hands of the Fire Nation.  But Hama spent most of her life fighting the Fire Nation.  She was taken from her home, put in a cage, and probably suffered horrendously at the hands of the guards who kept watch.  When she finally escaped, she had to spend the rest of her life (probably) alone in enemy territory, surrounded by people who would turn her in if they ever found out that she was water tribe/a water bender.

Hama developed blood bending as a way to fight back against the people who were actively hurting her and destroying her culture.  She was trying to teach a young water bender the most effective technique she knew to combat the Fire Nation.  Yes, it was wrong for Hama to force Katara to learn the technique, but think of this from Hama’s perspective:

She’s an eighty year old woman.  She probably doesn’t have many years left in her.  She’s been struggling and fighting for sixty odd years to survive in unfamiliar, enemy territory.  She has just met a strong, young water bender who has also suffered at the hands of the Fire Nation and clearly sympathizes with what she’s been through.  She realizes that this could be her only chance to pass on the ultimate technique--this is her one chance to ensure that blood bending is not lost forever, but is still used to fight the people who destroyed the Southern Tribe.

And when she finally introduces the technique to the girl--after explaining that she and her fellow water benders were taken from their homes, kept in cages, and suffered horribly at the hands of Fire Benders... the kid gets cold feet.  The little girl goes so far as to suggest that it’s morally wrong to manipulate people using blood bending.  And she tells this to a woman who has spent the bulk of her life away from home and family, probably fighting for her life, surrounded by the enemy... and (probably) slowly going insane from loneliness and fear.

The Fire Nation came down to the Southern water tribe, kidnapped the blood benders, locked them in cages, and deprived them of water.  The Fire Nation also sent Southern Raiders down and to kill any water bender they found.  Hama fought back using the only weapon she felt she had at her disposal.

True, two wrongs don’t make a right, but is a technique really wrong when it enables someone who has suffered at the hands of an oppressor to finally strike back at the people who hurt them?  Is it really morally wrong to do something ‘despicable’ when you’re doing it for the sake of your own survival and well being?  Is it wrong to offer knowledge of those same techniques to another person to help them survive in an environment that is actively hostile?

It’s an idea that George Bernard Shaw played with in his works (Mrs. Warren’s Profession, for example).  Morality isn’t always a choice.  In some circumstances morality and virtue are privileges.  And it’s not always possible to be a moral or good person when you’re just trying to get by/survive.

So can we really think of Hama as a villain for using the only weapons she had to survive in a place where the population was actively hostile to her continued existence (if they found out what she was)?

Really, I think the worst thing Hama did was kidnap villagers (which was bad, but she didn’t seem interested in killing them... just returning the favor).  But Hama had a point.  And weapon is only as bad as what you do with it.

But for all my sympathies, I still think Hama was a dirty, rotten liar who was actively manipulating Katara for the sake of a larger and far more sinister goal so... :P

#Hama #The Puppetmaster #avatar: the last airbender #morality #Blood Bending #Katara #Sympathies