#I appreciate you trying to explain but in the context of the original post I knew exactly what I was annoyed about :P

[peachymints]

Sooooo just to kind of try and say this once for those who find themselves here because of any reposts, please DO NOT repost my drawings 💀

Some people are sweet to ask permission and even more kinder to respect when I say no 💖

Note: I’ve only ever given permission for ppl to voice act or translate my persona comics and that’s it.

At this point I plan to archive/delete some original OC comics or tutorials from here soon because I’m too tired to explain each time why it needs context from the original posts. Also damn those drawings are so old and outdated?? 🙈💦

For those who have been with me from the old days and enjoyed my older content, I appreciate y’all and I hope you guys enjoy my current art down the line.

#peachymints #peachymints replies

[fdelopera]

reading your response to the ask about Elohim, i found it so fascinating and really wanted to learn more about jewish history. but im kinda scared to try and dive into googling it because like, for obvious reasons there is a lot of antisemitic misinformation out there. where's a good place to start learning about it all from a historical standpoint, aside from taking a college course? i hope this is okay to ask, i really don't want to stumble upon/consume revisionist history out of ignorance

Hi Anon. Thank you for your kind message. I really appreciate it.

I'm glad that you enjoyed my post about the origin of Elohim as one of the names of G-d in Judaism. Studying Jewish history and Jewish religious practice gives profound understanding and context to Abrahamic religions, as well as to the last 3500+ years of history, since at least the Late Bronze Age.

And thank you for wanting to learn more about Jewish history, and for reaching out to a Jewish person to ask about it.

My answer to your Ask is based on this answer about Jewish history, which I posted a few days ago. Not a lot of people saw it, so I feel okay about posting these links here again.

This past month especially has made me realize just how little most gentiles (non-Jews) know about Jewish history. It's been eye-opening, for sure.

And ... you're right, unfortunately. I've seen a metric shit ton of Jew-hatred going around. And so many antisemitic conspiracy theories that originated with the Neo-Nazis and the KKK.

Some people have been spreading this Neo-Nazi rhetoric intentionally, but many others have been spreading it because they don't have the context to understand that they are repeating Nazi dogwhistles.

In talking to gentiles, I often find that their knowledge of Jewish history extends to a few facts about the Holocaust. Some gentiles who have studied European history and political science may also have a general understanding of Hitler’s rise to power.

But that’s only the past several decades of Jewish history! And it's limited almost entirely to Europe!

Jews are a Levantine people. We are indigenous to Judea (the area currently called Israel/Palestine), and our history goes back thousands of years to the Late Bronze Age.

For a good overview of Jewish history, from the Late Bronze Age to the present, I would recommend two YouTube channels. That’s a good place to start. There are many history books on the subject, but a lot of them are quite dense, and the videos from these two historians will give you a good general overview if you want to learn more.

Sam Aronow:

Sam Aronow covers the span of Jewish history, from the Late Bronze Age to modern times. It is an ongoing Jewish history project that he’s been producing for the past three years, and it is in chronological order. He is currently in the early 1900s, and he comes out with a new video every month or so (he's just released a new video this month).

Click here to go to Sam’s YouTube channel, and then you can scroll back to watch his videos from the beginning, or you can decide what time period of Jewish history you’re most interested in learning about first.

Useful Charts:

Matt Baker, PhD runs the YouTube channel "Useful Charts," and he often works with Sam Aronow's channel. He has a PhD in education and religion. Matt has a very interesting story. He converted to Judaism as an adult; when he was a young man, he escaped a Christian doomsday cult, which he was born into. This gives him a unique understanding of Jewish history, especially how the "Old Testament" is often weaponized by Evangelical Christians to advance specific right-wing agendas. (As I explain below, the Old Testament is NOT the Hebrew bible. It is a chopped up, reordered, edited, and mistranslated version of the Hebrew bible.) Matt's videos on the history of Judaism are well-researched, and he breaks down different aspects of Jewish history into easy-to-follow segments.

I) Jewish History series:

Which Bible Characters are Historical.

Kings of Israel & Judah Family Tree.

Maccabees & King Herod Family Tree. (by Sam Aronow)

Classical Rabbis Family Tree.

Judaism and Jewish Denominations Explained.

Jewish Streams (Denominations) Re-Explained. (by Sam Aronow)

II) Who Wrote the Tanakh and the New Testament series:

NOTE: The Tanakh (the Hebrew bible) is an acronym that stands for Torah (Instruction), Nevi'im (Prophets), Ketuvim (Writings). It is NOT the same as the "Old Testament" in the Christian bible. The Christian editors of the "Old Testament" cut up the Tanakh and reordered it in a way that doesn't make any sense for Jewish practice. Many Christian bibles (such as the King James Version) also intentionally mistranslate the Old Testament to advance specific religious, political, and social ideologies of their time.

Who Wrote the Torah.

Who Wrote the Prophets.

Who Wrote the Writings.

I am including links to Matt's series on who wrote the New Testament, because many people who were raised Christian were never given a historical context for the people who wrote the books of the New Testament.

Who Wrote the Apocrypha. (The Apocrypha are later-written Jewish books that are not included in the Tanakh, but do appear in some Christian bibles, like the Catholic bible)

Who Wrote the Epistles. (Paul's Epistles were written before the Gospels, which is why the Epistles are linked first.)

Who Wrote the Gospels and Acts. (The Gospels were all written long AFTER Jesus' lifetime, and AFTER the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD. They were NOT written by the people they are attributed to.)

Who Wrote Daniel, and Who Wrote Revelation. (Matt includes Daniel from the Nevi'im [Prophets] as well as Revelation from the New Testament in this video to discuss apocalypticism in Jewish and early Christian tradition.)

#jumblr #judaism #jewblr #jewish history #jewish #NOTE - I report and block antisemites. If any antisemites comment on this post you will be reported and blocked. You have been warned.

[dreemurr-skelememer]

Greetings Kia!

To give a broad context, I have been a fan of UTMV since 2020. Even though I certainly have a certain level of difficulty in the English language, I will try to express myself in a cohesive and clear way.

As I previously expressed, I have been an active fan of the UTMV community since 2020 when the new Ink!Sans design was made available to the public. The design itself was simply wonderful in my eyes, whose unfamiliar with the original source, so I ventured into the community and simply loved the creativity contained here. So I decided to make my home on this place and have been present ever since

Therefore, something that caught my attention in the design of Ink!Sans was its clear inspiration from Japanese culture, and as a Japanese person with a Latin American nationality, I loved this detail that was so obvious to everyone's eyes (I say this due to the amount of comments in the original post recognizing Ink!Sans as one of Japanese origin). So I recognized this character as an Asian 'person' ever since, due to his *literal* East Asian origins (Although it might have been because of my self-identity, i still have concrete proofs to why he's such).

But recently I have observed a certain flow of people who refuse to recognize and draw Ink in this previously mentioned way, when I say about refusal' I really do mean it that way, one day I was meet with an 'I don't care' when explaining this matter to someone on this community. There are also 'redesigns' people made of his new design that completly erases this aspect to replace for 'French' ones.

I do understand that people can have their own headcanons and such, but going as far to erase that part of his character just really rubs me the wrong way.

Other than that, i've also witnessed cases of people who, after discovering that Ink has French nationality, try to argue that this rules out the fact that he's Asian, or worse, that he's*less* of an Asian because of that.

As an appreciator of cultures and human ethnic diversity, I'm extremly aware that having this line of thinking shows how stupid a person is since Asian people can live outside of Asia. But as a second generational immigrant of Japanese parents, this level of thinking really does affect my own self indentity, putting in mind how often Asian immigrants are considered outsiders because of their race (when they're living outside of Asia of course).

I'm sorry if this sounds stupid or rather too emotional for the matter, putting in mind how this is all about a silly skeleton boy. But this distorted vision on what makes someone 'more' and 'less' of an Asian really does affect me, since it already happened in real life. You don't need to answear my plea but i just wanted someone to talk too about problems in Fandom.

Take care!

i completely see and understand where you're coming from, anon!

it really is a bit of a problem, there's a lot of issues in the fandom when it comes to race and it really sucks to see erasure like this

thank you for telling me your thoughts abt this anon <:) i hear and see you.

it's so frustrating to have your representation be erased simply in favor of factors that don't make sense. you deserve to be seen even in little ways!

#much love anon! #i hope to doodle a human ink for u later #connection to culture and to one's ethnicity is difficult enough when it comes to immigration #along with feeling like youre not 'enough' of this ethnicity or race #you deserve to feel comfortable in your own skin and see yourself in what little representation you also have #i hope other people see this and realize this as well #i love you anon! i hope youre alright and i hope things about this change from now on #Anonymous

[saltineofswing]

Hello! I'm the person that made the rant post about my dislike on the lack of natural dichotomy of the Pyramids and Traveler since the introduction of the Veil that turned into a whole thing. You mentioned a lack of pulp in your reblog and it's stuck with me since then. I wasn't familiar with the term and did some research on it, but I still don't think I get what it is. I tried looking it up but a lot of articles and videos I could find explain the history of pulp and its influences in modern day sci-fi but not necessarily what it is, especially in a way that would give me context to better understand your reblog. If it's not too much trouble, can you explain a little more what the "pulp" is that destiny is lacking?

I’d be happy to try and give you a little more insight into what I feel are important tenets of pulp as a genre/concept! I decided this might be a good opportunity to talk a little about it generally because I am really feeling its absence generally in the past couple years, so I included some historical backing which you’re probably already familiar with – hope that’s OK.

I did a little digging personally, for some good places to familiarize oneself with the basics of pulp as a concept and/or genre. It was nice to re-affirm some info that I’ve felt secure in holding as true without a ton of evidentiary support, and I also learned some cool new stuff as well! I think a good place to start would be to link to the TV Tropes page about pulp magazines, which does a pretty good job of explaining the origins and foundational aspects of the concept in a way that is easy to digest. It also has a lot of examples available to peruse. I also found this cool article on the golden age of pulps, which is an interesting read.

This got long, so below the cut!

To reiterate, the original ‘pulp’ terminology and vibe comes from early/mid-20th century magazines, which were cheap and easy ways to access genre fiction and action/adventure stories before comics, paperback novels, and TV/movies were really on the scene. Pulp magazines spanned a very wide array of genres, but because of a lack of appreciation for the medium, a majority of pulp magazines and aspects of what I would consider to be pulp as a genre have been allowed to fall into obscurity. There are places where I feel it is particularly obvious, especially the superhero genre (don’t get me started we’ll be here all week) but also in fantasy and science fiction – a term which was, in fact, coined by Hugo Gernsback, an editor for pulp magazine Amazing Stories.

They were cheap to make, cheap to buy, and easy to serialize; they could be really schlocky, crass, and unpolished. They could also be fucking incredible! The Shadow is a good example of an early pulp property with screaming highs and frankly peat-bog lows. Lovecraft published a lot of what is considered to be his ‘best work’ in Weird Tales! Conan the Barbarian, too! They kind of came out of the gate with a somewhat negative connotation associated with ‘low-brow’ forms of literature like dime novels, but where other magazines of the time tended to incorporate non-fiction articles and photography, pulp mags tended to be fiction stories only – short stories, or longer stories split into serialized chapters. Early on, not many of them had art, though with the advent of comic books that changed (you could argue that books like Creepy and Eerie are direct offspring of early pulp mags). Similar to what Weekly Shonen Jump does with manga.

If you think of a genre as a toolbox, pulp is a box full of tools that function fine alone, but excel at assisting the function of other toolboxes. I would almost liken ‘pulp’ to the concept of ‘camp’, which are also two concepts that can and do overlap with a high degree of synergy. Pulp has its own foundational attributes that are distinct from camp – for example, camp is gay relies a lot more on its self-awareness, at being able to wink at the viewer or participant, and telling you ‘yeah, we know it, but isn’t it fun?’ Pulp, on the other hand, is the (no pun intended) straight man counterpart to this aesthetic sensibility; pulp is at its best when it is being completely earnest. The quippy lines and dramatic proclamations are meant to be taken on their face. Nowadays it’s the kind of stuff that memes are made of – ‘That Wizard Came From The Moon’, ‘I don’t have time to explain why I don’t have time to explain’, ‘Whether we wanted it or not, we’ve stepped into a war with the Cabal on Mars’. Saying shit that has no explanation with your whole chest. Trying to be cool on purpose, the ultimate cringe move.

Nowadays I think that this kind of thing has mostly died out of modern media, but the counter-motion is still prevalent in mainstream superhero movies. A good example is the ‘Would you have preferred ~YeLlOw SpAnDeX~’ line from the OG X-Men movie. Hey dickhead! The yellow spandex is cool if you, the guy making the movie, believes its cool! Crucially, while a lot of modern superhero stuff is quippy and irreverent, it often uses these tropes in a self-aware or cynical manner – afraid of being earnest, committing the aforementioned cardinal sin of trying to look cool on purpose.

(God damn it, I’m talking about superheroes again. Sorry. Before I get back on task this is why I loved the recent Moon Knight run so much; Jed MacKay is NOT afraid to have the characters say some absolutely batshit thing but it comes off as so, so cool. And yes, a little cheesy.)

And then, where modern sci-fi typically has an ultra-detailed explanation on-hand, I think a lot of early pulp stuff just… didn’t. Ask a sci-fi property for an explanation on, oh I don’t know, ‘where did these super-humanoid sapient machine warriors come from’ and it will likely have a molecule-deep explanation of how those unnamed machine people were created. Ask a fantasy property for an explanation on the same and it might say, ‘no’. It’s not that a pulp-leaning property won’t give you the answer to that question… it just might not have it. The ‘why is it/how is it’ is not as important as the ‘what is it’ and ‘how is it relevant’; a writer had a limited amount of page real estate, as multiple features were typically crammed into a single magazine. Even if a feature was serialized, much like television episodes (before the binge trend), one had to keep information digestible, and not too reliant on a prior or later edition that a reader might never see.

Explanations tended to be in service of an emotional beat, or to a theme, versus as a grounding agent to immerse a reader in the world. For the record I don’t necessarily think of either method as being better or worse, and heavy worldbuilding can still utilize pulp as a veneer or filter to engage audience expectations in different ways. Pulp stuff relies a lot on suspension of disbelief without utilizing a rigid lore-based framework to – though, you know, your story/setting still has to have its own internal logical consistency.

(I feel that it is important to note, as a partial consequence of the time period in which these magazines were being made, and when pulp fiction was most heavily consumed, xenophobia and racism are also heavily present in pulp works. I think everybody knows at this point about how much Lovecraft sucked but it’s a valuable example of how a lot of ‘fear of the unknown’ in that time was transliterated into ‘fear of the different’, in general but especially relating to genre fiction. If you decide to explore material in this genre, in this time period, be forewarned! Some of it was pretty glaring!)

So, let me tie some of this stuff to my previous statements about Destiny. I think that Destiny is an excellent example of how pulp tropes, aesthetic, and genre conventions can be used to enhance and streamline a setting… and how stripping too much pulp away can have a detrimental impact on the depth of a narrative.

The original narrative and worldbuilding of Destiny drew very heavily on pulp aesthetics to create a foundation, both in its appearance and its lore. The ‘Golden Age of Science Fiction’ was a period of time in the mid-20th century that sort of transitioned sci-fi out of pulp magazines and into its own thing, but the foundational structure of science fiction at this time was still heavily pulp-influenced. I think this is very well-represented by the portrayal of Venus as a ‘garden’ (jungle) world, very lush and with sulfurous and sometimes acidic rains. Before advancements in astronomical technology went and fucked everything up for us writers, Venus’s opaque cloud-covered atmosphere was impenetrable enough that there could be anything under there – and a popular portrayal of Venus was a muggy, humid, rain-heavy world that sometimes also included lush jungles. In Bradbury’s short story The Long Rain (WHICH ran in Planet Stories, a pulp mag, by the way!) this portrayal is a central obstacle to the narrative; it’s also used in Heinlein’s novel Space Cadet.

The color scheme that Destiny uses for Venus also matches a common color scheme for Venus in this era – see this cover for Fantastic Adventures. Visually, I think that this comparison between the postcard that went out with the D1 limited/collector’s edition and this Planet Stories cover for The Golden Amazons of Venus demonstrates the influence, at least regarding terrain and biome.

In fact, I think that you can see from this Eververse postcard – which could have been peeled off of any era-appropriate paperback novel – that the influence goes bone-deep. Destiny even refers to humanity’s halcyon age as ‘The Golden Age’.

(Below: Is this image from Destiny dev, or a science fiction paperback from the 60s? Who knows! I know. It’s Destiny.)

In the modern era of Destiny storytelling, though the visual elements of the universe remain largely rigid relative to this early framework, the pulp underpinning of the narrative has been largely left behind. The original game’s story, and the stories of subsequent DLCs, felt very pulp-inspired – this ranged from ‘sort of effective’, like in House of Wolves, to ‘game-savingly effective’, like in The Taken King. Pulp lends itself to straightforward conceptual executions, and brisk narratives, because of its roots as short-form literature. The narrative of D1 was simple and to the point; Light good, Dark bad, humanity is in the shit, think you can kill a god? The surrounding world scaffold was rich but not deep. As I like to say, sometimes a river can be wide but shallow. This is not a commentary on its quality – something can be good but not complex, and IMO, sophistication is not necessarily synonymous with complexity. Destiny managed to pull off a trick that many high-quality pulp stories employ: it made the river look deeper than it was. This is the whole reason that Lovecraft’s oeuvre has the staying power it has: other writers got to play in the space because it felt very deep, even though the stories themselves were fairly straightforward.

I also don’t mean to say or accidentally imply that ‘morally grey storytelling cannot exist within pulp stories’, because that would probably get me torn apart; that’s just not the kind of straightforward foundation that the original Destiny was built on. ‘It is what you see, but what you see could be anything’, you know? The problem that began to muddy the waters in the Destiny narrative is that they started to say, ‘You know, actually, it ISN’T what you see’.

Tentpole narrative additions to the Destiny 2 game employ varying levels of pulp. As I said in the other post, the Hive have a potent pulp influence built into their foundational coding, and so subsequent portrayals of the Hive as a main antagonist have higher degrees of pulp genre naturally present in the narrative – it’s hard to separate the two of them. Shadowkeep and The Dark Below draw strongly on the ‘sword and sorcery’ convention, a subgenre of fantasy that is a heavy (perhaps 1:1) blend of fantasy and pulp; think Conan, or Elric of Melniboné (who, hey! Showed up in a novella feature, in an issue of Science Fantasy magazine, named… THE DREAMING CITY). The Witch Queen leaned away from pure sword and sorcery and more towards noir/detective pulp – though, I think, TWQ is a good example of the pulp slippage in its narrative, resulting in some more bland moments and things that feel ham-fisted in a bad way. Part of it, I think, is the need to make these expansions ‘long’ and complicated without making the player feel like they’re slogging; in a more pulp-forward TWQ narrative, the reveal that Savathûn is actually NOT evil-aligned and is a potential ally would come much earlier in the story, and the central mystery would be MORE about ‘what the fuck is she trying to do/prevent’, leading to the Witness reveal as the centerpiece of the finale and the ‘solution’ to the central mystery.

The decision to start retroactively appending more complex connections between disparate pieces of content naturally leads to a reduction of pulp prominence, in my opinion. If you imagine Destiny as a vessel that is mainly full of three component liquids – Fantasy, Sci-Fi, and Pulp – you can say that adding more of one genre pushes out another to make room. You can always pour more of one genre in to re-balance, but in response to increasing levels of sci-fi the narrative seems reticent to reintroduce pulp back into the mix, instead favoring fantasy. But another problem is that once you take it out, Pulp is really hard to put back; once you solidify and unionize world-lore, every subsequent retcon risks diluting and destabilizing that world-lore until a) nobody cares about it anymore and b) it stops being mutable at all, and becomes sludge.

The lore behind the existence of the Exo was originally very pulp, with no real explanations given for exactly what they were and where they came from, and how they attained sapience. Early hints that Cayde and a few other Exo having once been human didn’t preclude other Exo from having other origins – for example, implications that Exo war-frames eventually achieved sapience as a result of the ‘Deep Stone Crypt’, and that they were originally simple AI-equipped warriors designed and overseen by Rasputin to minimize human casualties. This early mystique around the origins of the Exo is classically pulp: we don’t need to know how the hyper-advanced robots were made, we just need to know what they are, why they are relevant to the story. It allows You, The Player, to engage with it at whatever level you want. In a game where You, The Player, are also being asked to step into the role of You, The Protagonist, this is beneficial to engagement for people (like me!) who like to think too much about the backstory of the your-name-here protagonist on-screen. It is also beneficial to not distracting the player with conflicting information, or accidentally contradicting previously-established lore.

Enter Big-Head Bray. The Beyond Light-era explanation of why Exo were created and how they were made is a retroactive nuclear strike on the Exo lore; it strips away a lot of flexibility and thematic richness from the concept of the Exo, shoehorns them into a single narrow use case, and directly conflicts with early-game Exo lore implying their connections to Rasputin (which they then had to go back and hastily shoehorn back in later) or existence as war machines for the Collapse. If D1 lore is wide but shallow, the D2 lore is narrow but deep. Just because something has a lot of ‘depth’, I.E. many layers to traverse before you reach foundational bedrock, it doesn’t make it good.

Same thing with the Fallen. Season of Plunder felt to me like an attempt to reintroduce pulp genre back into the setting, but it fell flat because of two reasons: it didn’t really want to be pulp, and it was more concerned with its tethers to the science-fantasy exterior world than it was with creating its own cohesive narrative. Why was Mithrax doing evil pirate shit when he was young? Because he comes from a race of fucking evil space pirates! It Does Not Need To Be More Complex Than That! But the exculpation of pulp from the D2 narrative means that if Mithrax doesn’t have a good enough reason, WRT the larger narrative, it would be a glaringly obvious plot hole. By Plunder, Destiny had already undertaken the task of filling out the Eliksni lore with sympathetic science-fantasy excuses for why they were trying to exterminate humankind – the more earnest, pulp-forward explanation would just be that desperate, hurt, suffering people will do desperate things, hurt people, and may perpetuate the cycle of suffering.

Oy. There’s a lot you COULD get into. How the Destiny macro-narrative seems to be decaying the rigidity of good and evil in its original lore vs. how the micro-narrative is obsessed with trying to recapture that good/evil dichotomy in order to give players a reason to like the main characters. How the determination to connect and explain everything has resulted in a general flattening of the background lore, and the subsequent trivialization of many things the game included in earlier iterations of the narrative/lore. How the narrative has basically nothing to do with the Vex because they wrote themselves into a corner by trying to explain them too much while simultaneously not altering the foundational lore of the race, meaning there were too many things they can no longer do without retconning again.

Overall, I guess I will just end by saying that many of the things that Destiny is CURRENTLY doing, feels like the game is straining to rip the part of it out which proudly asks its audience not to think too hard about sweeping, dramatic statements that built a lot of the things people love about the game’s setting and narrative… and in doing so, is just ripping itself to pieces.

#More lore! MORE LORE! #dinklebot sitcom #northbot sitcom #destiny 2 #Pulp genre #Genre discussion #Sorry this got so long! I’m not used to writing this kind of big essay #it may not be super coherent but whaddya gonna do

[stormblessed95]

https://www.tumblr.com/stormblessed95/740646993891917824/httpsxcomkmgoogieministatus17509989912175904

Thanks for this. I love how we can always count on you for accurate information.

But didn’t Tae only record a guide at Jk’s place? I don’t think he recorded the actual song. Plus Jk said he got some new equipment for his studio and Tae asked to try recording but he said Tae didn’t do the final thing at his place.

Also, Didn’t Tae say in one of his interviews that the member who heard his album first was Hobi? I know that Jk might have heard some of the songs first or so but Tae said it was Hobi whp heard the album first.

Also, in Jungkook’s Live, when he said “i heard it first” he didn’t mean like he was the first. The translation took away the context of the statement he made. He teased that he heard it “first” before the fans but that didn’t mean that he was the first to hear it. I hope i am explaining

If he wanted to say he was the first to hear it, he would have said this 내가 처음 들었어 but he said he said this 내가 너보다 먼저 들었어 lol. I mean it doesn’t really matter if he was the first to hear it or not but i just thought i should correct this because when weverse translated it, the context was lost as usual and many people misunderstood what he said.

Yes and yes to what you said about a guide and Hobi (I think).

Lol I think I've spoiled yall with my essay length posts when I correct misinformation a lot of the time 🤣🤣 I say lovingly. I do appreciate and love the add on!!! I was just doing this super quick, like one or two sentences replies to every point in the screenshot sent to me. I didn't want to take too much time doing all that and I knew y'all were smart enough, if provided the original content and even just knowing how shippers twist things, to find, interpret and recognize the context on your own 🥰

Plus when I said it's true JK said he listened to it first, it was! JK did say that! Whether he meant it as a tease to ARMYs about hearing it before us (probably) or just as he meant he was the first one to hear a song or two off the album (also possible since Tae did some recordings at his place) but Hobi listened to the album in its whole first, who knows. That extra context wasn't in the spirit of my super quick true or false game that I didn't want to spend more than 30 minutes doing 🤣

Super happy to talk more in depth with y'all about different points now though with asks like this! Thanks for sending it in and giving more context to those who might not know themselves!

Always feel free to send in asks with corrections or further information if needed!

#shipping discourse #correcting misinformation

[animentality]

I’ve seen some of your posts about Star Trek, and decided that I want to start watching it. Where do you think I should start?

Oh BOY.

See, this is a fascinating question. Technically, there are several places you could hop in. I will give you the pros and cons of each.

The short answer is honestly The Next Generation (TNG) or Deep Space Nine (DS9).

TNG is on the edge of accessible and non-accessible. It's a little dated, but still stands up well to the test of time. Its stories are self-contained and often don't need context from the greater world or previous episodes. It's thoughtful and optimistic about the human condition and highly intelligent.

But DS9 is easier for the modern TV watcher to start with, because it's more realistic, grounded, and it fleshes out its characters and their interpersonal dramas more.

It's also this clean mix between episodic and more serialized, so you'll get the fun and outstanding standalone episodes, like TNG's greatest hits, but mixed in with a fascinating overarching narrative, which will have a lot of fun space battles and space politics and something you can really sit down and get invested in.

so I'm biased to DS9, as you can tell.

But I concede to TNG too.

That's my short answer.

I'll also give you my short answer proposed order too:

DS9 or TNG first

Then watch DS9 or TNG, depending on which one you picked to watch firrst.

Followed by VOY.

You don't have to watch TOS, but if you're invested by that point, it might be fun.

Then skip ENT.

And from there, you get into modern Trek.

I'd give Discovery a try, because it's definitely high octane, easy for a modern viewer to get into.

But skip Picard, which is just...awful.

Then definitely watch Lower Decks, which is really fun.

Then check out Strange New Worlds, which is pretty good.

That's my short proposed order.

But if you care...here is my LONG answer, where I explain the pros and cons of starting at different spots.

TOS: The BEGINNING.

The Original Series, commonly shorted to TOS by fans.

Pros: This is the literal beginning of it all. If you wanted to really get into the lore of Star Trek and be this mega nerd who has a strong opinion about every following Star Trek interpretation, and get your nerd credentials, then this is a good place to start. Plus, some people don't mind the "oldness" of it, because it's simple, it's silly, and it's fun. The characters themselves are fun, and memorable. The episode plots range from ridiculous and batshit insane to thoughtful and somber and philosophical. You get to watch the OGs, Spock and Kirk and Uhura and Scotty and Bones, who are all iconic in their own way. It's also a nice little ensemble of goofballs, and you'll get to understand and appreciate the silly little TOS memes. Plus, I personally find it iconic how the TOS fandom is still going strong...after literally fifty seven years. That's icon status, baby.

Cons: IT REALLY IS VERY OLD. And kind of hard to get into, if you're not looking to watch a show that is VERY dated. I fully admit that I haven't re-watched TOS much. It's just not everyone's cup of tea, you know? It has its great moments, but I very rarely recommend TOS to people because I don't want to scare them off from Star Trek! So I wouldn't recommend starting here. Maybe watch it later, after other series, to get a well rounded view of the world, but TOS is sort of an odd place to start for the modern TV watcher. Ironically.

TNG: The SUCCESSOR

The Next Generation, commonly shortened to TNG.

Pros: TNG is iconic in its own way. It has its own memorable crew of Jean Luc Picard, William Riker, Deanna Troi, Geordi LaForge, Beverly Crusher, Worf, our best robot boy Data. It has aged much better than TOS, with a greater number of standalone episodes and thought provoking plots. It has some of the most brilliant non-serialized writing of all time, with great social and political commentary that hadn't ever been discussed in TV at that point, and honestly aren't even being discussed now. Its highs are peak Star Trek, with some of the most intelligent analysis of what it means to be an evolved human being ever created for television. It takes a serious look at many aspects of humanity through the lens of "alien" troubles, and its philosophical ramblings are deep, rich, and often thickly layered. That being said...

Cons: It's highly episodic, so you won't find yourself really "gripped" by one single or even multiple plot threads. If you don't like non-serialized stories, then well, most of the stories are designed to be enjoyed without the context of the rest of them. Also, some of it is wildly dated. ESPECIALLY the first season, which is a fucking mess, with like...almost no redeeming episodes. The pilot is AWFUL. The female characters are handled...in such a sexist way that it's honestly kind of enraging. Now it DOES get better, much better, by mid season two, and pretty much starts pumping out nothing but bangers by season 3, but... there will still be some dated stuff. Plus, even the really good episodes are still paced rather slowly. So keep that in mind, if you want to start with TNG....

ALSO, extra note: The crew has great chemistry with each other, but it doesn't do much in terms of fleshing them out in the early seasons. Gene Roddenberry, the creator, really didn't want the crew to have interpersonal dramas, or even want to show them relaxing or hanging out at all. Later seasons you'll see more character moments, which are great, but... TNG and TOS kind of skimp out on showing you the human elements. You aren't often allowed to get close to the characters, see their inner lives, their personal feelings about situations, the issues they have, with themselves or others. There's a distance, this professional aura to the show, which can be kind of daunting and a little alienating, no pun intended. So keep that in mind...

But now we come to the show I am most biased towards, and shamelessly.

DS9- The REALIST

Deep Space Nine, shortened to DS9.

I must start this segment by admitting, DS9 is my favorite and I am fucking biased. That being said, I first watched it when I was 9, and didn't have any problem understanding it without seeing the other Treks. There are also a million other things it has going for it that would make it the easiest place for a modern TV watcher to hop in.

So full disclosure, this IS where I would recommend you start. But anyway:

Pros: Like I said, it did away with some of that professional distance that TNG was so well known for. The characters are richer, more fleshed out, more flawed. They don't like each other in the beginning. They have to earn their found family, and that just makes it sweeter and more poignant when they finally begin to see themselves as a family. DS9 is the "grittier," edgier Star Trek, the one that seriously tests the hopeful optimism of the future...but it never breaks it. That's important to note. It still understands the idea that humans have evolved to be better.

It covers more controversial topics in a more straightforward way. War, genocide, fascism, political instability, coups, war crimes, espionage, propaganda, religious dogma, trauma, it can get pretty heavy. But there still is this hopefulness to how characters grow and change and heal from past traumas. It also fleshes out the aliens more than TNG or TOS, taking a more nuanced perspective of them, and even has individuals who fight back against the "mono" culture that was so popular in early star trek.

As mentioned above, it also blends serialized with non serialized. You get standalone episodes, and episodes that follow up on pre-existing plots. That's where you get the nuances and the depth and the richness of the universe, as well as the interpersonal relationships of the crew.

Now for the Cons:

NONE. It's perfect.

Just kidding.

Some people don't like DS9 because of its darkness, but in just terms of where to start...I agree that there ARE some things that come from TNG that you might appreciate more if you watched TNG first. It does mostly explain these things, but the flesh comes after the bones, you know. Also, DS9 has its weaknesses in season 1, same as TNG. It has some real stinkers. It doesn't get going until season 3, and also? You know how I said it's political?

Well, some of the politics are reallllly boring. Not very sci fi, dare I say. You might find it better to watch with a guide that can tell you what to skip, because some of the early stuff is pretty bad. It also took some time to find its footing, which means there are some elements to it that might come across as just bizarre.

But anyway.

As I said, my favorite Star Trek, and where I personally started. But anyway.

Moving on...

Voyager- the Troubled

Voyager, commonly shortened to VOY.

Pros: First female captain, and she's very charismatic. For feminism reasons alone, you could start with VOY. It also has the most interesting beginning concept too. Voyager is a warship that gets dragged out and stranded in the Delta Quadrant, which is far, far from where Star Trek normally operates. So it's about a crew, stranded in what is essentially hostile alien territory, with no one to help them. Their whole mission is just to get back home, which will take them 70 years to get back to. So it has that going for it. It also has its own fascinating little crew, which has great interpersonal relationships and some great sci fi standalone stories. It does have its own overarching stories as well, which makes for some fun action and drama. Also in terms of understanding what's happening without seeing other Star Treks? Pretty good. Less connected than DS9, mostly, with a few glaring exceptions.

That being said...

Cons: Just like TNG and DS9, atrocious first 3 seasons. Also, Voy is sort of known for being a little sloppy. The writing is all over the board, ranging from mediocre to absolutely dogshit to not bad actually to pretty decent. It's a fun premise, but it's squandered a little. Characters are also inconsistent, depending on who's writing that particular episode. Unlike other Treks, it also doesn't quite meet the standard of mediocre, not even by season 3. It also doesn't flesh out some of its characters, and squanders a lot of their potential. It also has a very strange and rushed ending...also, it tries to be as edgy as DS9, but without the emotional depth, which often comes across as distasteful and even dare I say, boorish. So it has a lot going against it.

Moving to....

Enterprise- the Yikes

Shortened name: ENT

Full fucking disclosure. I fucking hate Enterprise.

Its stories are bad, most of the time. Its best episodes are still mediocre, by other Star Trek standards. Its overarching stories are terrible, with only a few even potentially interesting.

Also it got fucking cancelled by season 4, so its finale is baaaad.

Don't start with Enterprise.

Pros: Archer is great. I love Trip. T'Pol is adequate. So that's three good characters. There's one plot that's kind of cool.

Cons: It only has 3 good characters. And they are so waaaasted. As is that one plot.

So.

Moving on.

Now we get to modern trek.

Star Trek Discovery - the Doing Its Best

Nomenclature: DIS

Alright, full disclosure again. I watched two seasons of it, before quitting. But I can tell you this.

Pros: It's exciting and fresh and high quality. No more dorky little alien suits. State of the art CGI. High octane sci fi stories. Lots of death and drama and characters all hate each other and have trauma and don't want to deal with it. It's definitely made for the modern audience, and it has this like...disdain for other Star Treks. So if you haven't seen the other Star Treks, don't worry, it also has not. Not a bad place to start, if you don't care much for older shows and want something fun and new and set in space, and you like seeing phasers blow stuff up.

Cons: If you were interested in Star Trek for its hopeful future, that isn't what DIS is. DIS is more like, what if we had this one character and we focus on just her, and the rest of the crew doesn't matter? It's also sloppily written.

Now extra note: my MOM says Dis gets good by season 3. And I am inclined to believe her, because she is a diehard trekkie, and a true trekkie knows, season 3 is like...always where a Star Trek show gets off the ground.

But again. I have to admit, I never got there.

And I don't know if you'd personally like it. Maybe, if you're a fan of the more..exciting space action sci fis. If you like mega gritty war stuff, and torturing aliens to make your warp drive go fast.

But in terms of places to start...? Again, not a bad place if older star trek seems dull.

Discovery certainly is modern and not dull.

Picard- the Cash Grab

Name: PIC

Do not start with Picard. You won't get much out of it if you haven't seen TNG. You won't get much out of it if you have seen TNG.

Pros: It's good for...if you haven't seen Patrick Stewart play Picard in along time.

Cons: It's kind of terrible and messy. It also relies way too much on nostalgia and preexisting knowledge of TNG. So definitely do not bother with Picard as your first Star Trek.

Lower Decks: The Satirical Love Letter

Just called Lower Decks, I think.

Don't start here either, it is VERY dependent on you having seen every Star Trek ever. It's pretty good, but...it's satirical and to understand it well, you would've had to have seen the other Treks.

Strange New Worlds: the Fixer Upper

Shorthand: SNW

Pros: It's the only modern Star Trek that actually seems fond of the original Star Treks, while also being pretty decent just on its own. It brings back the optimism, while maintaining the high quality CGI. Its interpersonal relationships aren't bad. The overarching plot is only somewhat important, and it goes back to form, on that whole episodic thing. If you were allergic to bad rubber alien masks, and wanted to watch something from this era, SNW is the best place to start.

Cons: It might bore you a little if you weren't already a diehard Trekkie. It does depend a little bit on you knowing preexisting properties, just so far as the little wink wink, nudge nudges. It's also a little weird in that the crew doesn't quite live up to the fleshed out nuances of DS9, nor does it rise to the intelligence of TNG's plots.

So there you have it!

This took me almost two hours to write!

I don't know why I wrote it.

Something is wrong with me.

I love Star Trek.

Even the ones I criticized the most, I still like most of them.

I fully accept the Star Trek fandom's wrath too.

I know some people are bigger fans of the other Treks.

But this is my opinion, you know?

Which means I'm right, and everyone else is wrong.

#star trek #tng #voy #ds9 #ent #tos #picard #lower decks

[decepti-thots]

Ask meme: Rodimus (idw)

one aspect about them i love: Rodimus has this really fascinating combo of being extremely unselfaware in the moment and then excruciatingly self aware after the fact that you can dig into a lot if you feel like it. That really horrible sense of 'I know I keep fucking it up but I can't actually manage to STOP it' which I think explains a lot about him. There's an idea of like, just knowing about the problem isn't enough to fix it. The trap of self awareness is that you can get stuck in a position where you see the problem and how it IS a problem, but you mistake that for actually making progress on it, which I think is where Rodimus is at when we start MTMTE, and it's… a very frustrating place to be in. And because he's surrounded by people firmly in the 'that's just how he is and we Manage him' mindset, he has very little obvious motivation to try and approach it from any other mindset. Yes all this is a GOOD thing, I love him.

one aspect i wish more people understood about them: Rodimus is not just accidentally callous, though he can be. He is absolutely inclined to genuine pettiness and even cruelty. Any version of Rodimus which assumes he is only ever accidentally cruel is, to me, an incomplete one. He's a very compassionate person deep down, but that's just why that inclination towards pettiness bothers him. I think it's really important that this be something he has to work against- because when he does work against it, that means something.

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have about this character: Rodimus partly has so much antagonism towards Whirl because Whirl is terribly good at seeing through Rodimus' bullshit and when he wants he can cut Rodimus down with absolute precision. We actually see Whirl be quite astute about Rodimus a couple of times in canon and it just seems like he'd be very willing to deploy a frustratingly on-point observation of Rodimus' worst issues when it pleased him. Usually even when people do call Rodimus out, they don't do it correctly, they see an issue but not the correct origin point under all his posturing- but Whirl does, and Rodimus deeply resents him for it. For this exact reason, they would be shockingly good friends under other circumstances, in their own way.

one character i love seeing them interact with: Magnus! I fucking love their s1 interactions. I love that there's a sense of them having known each other before and how even though they're so antagonistic, they still demonstrate a sort of frustrated familiarity with each other. Rodimus always feels like he's the only one on board with the context to know Mags is acting out of character during the early issues, and Magnus is one of the only people in the comic to ever seem like he expects more of Rodimus sometimes. Their interaction at the start of 'The Sound of Breaking Glass' is one of my favourite in the whole series, when they discuss Rodimus wanting to change, and how Magnus thinks maybe it's a good thing Tyrest's portal broke. Or the bit after Overlord, where Rodimus talks about why he was ignoring Magnus' memos, and we see Magnus had tried to get Rodimus' help with his breakdown. They're almost... resigned to being a little more honest with each other? I love them.

one character i wish they would interact with/interact with more: Rung. I love the bit we get in the aforementioned post-Overlord scene, where Rung reads Rodimus bang to rights and at first Rodimus gets angry, but later is like. Yeah, you were right actually. I appreciate the honesty. Come help me out on Luna-1? Like, it's such a telling scene. Rung understands Rodimus in some ways and completely doesn't in others, because he knows what Rodimus' real problems are but he doesn't understand Rodimus needs something other than gentle sympathy. And then I think Rodimus has the potential to be... surprisingly insightful about Rung's own issues, his loneliness. I can imagine him seeing through Rung's impartial front quite shrewdly. It would be an interesting dynamic.

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have that involve them and one other character: Rodimus is the only other person on the ship except Tailgate who is interested in Cyclonus' old Cybertronian songs and such. Because, well, he's interested in the "golden age", he wants to hear about a time before Cybertron was as he remembers it, i.e. on its way to being fucked. And Cyclonus remembers that time in a way that makes it sound better, the actual truth aside. He's very embarrassed about this fact and tries to cover it up under a layer of irony or whatever but he sometimes sidles up to Cyclonus at the bar after a couple drinks and. Prompts him. To talk about stuff. And just sort of tries to look bored even as he's listening. Cyclonus will ramble on without the need for much encouragement after he's had a few, it turns out.

#ask meme

[fragiledewdrop]

TOLKIEN, MYTH AND THE EARLY 20TH CENTURY

A week ago I wrote a post about my excitement in discovering just how much Tolkien took inspiration from Anglo-Saxon poetry.

I was so lost in my little over-emotional bubble that I was genuinely a little surprised when a few people expressed their disappointment in discovering that "The Lord of The Rings" wasn't wholly original. It makes sense, though, so I thought I'd address it.

These are @fortunes-haven ' s tags:

@sataidelenn already wrote an interesting reply, but I'd like to approach the question from a different point of view. Why? Because the first thing I thought about when reading this comment was how I myself have grumbled under my breath about having to wade through someone's "personal mythology smoothie", only I wasn't reading Tolkien. I was reading T. S. Eliot.

Now, I want to preface this by making it clear that I am well aware Tolkien is by no means a modernist. He did, however, write LOTR in England in the late 30s. He was part of the same culture, the same society, and above all the same historical context that produced "The Waste Land" and "Ulysses", and I think we should take that into account when we discuss his work.

Because by the time Tolkien published LOTR, Joyce and Eliot and Yeats had already discussed and applied the mythic method. Was Tolkien aware of their debates? Did he read and appreciate their books? I have no clue. It would take some research to find out, research I currently (unfortunately) don’t have time for. But I do not think it a stretch to suggest that Tolkien might have been moved by the same need that drove other writers to look back at myth, although in very different ways.

Why did Joyce and Eliot feel compelled to return to the narrative roots of mankind? Why did Yeats devote so much time to Celtic lore? Why did Tolkien write a new epic and base it on the Saxon world?

The answer is the same: because they lived at the start of a century that posed more questions than ever, but provided no answers; a century when time and the human mind and the very structure of matter had ceased to be solid, defined, a foundation to rely on; a century torn apart by brutal, inhumane, sensless war.

When you can't find answers in the present and the future is so uncertain it's laughable, you look to the past. Because the thing is, we can talk about "personal mythology" all we want, but myths are never personal. They are universal. They are tied to a specific cultural context, certainly, but they exemplify emotions, truths and tragedies that are common (or supposed to be common) to all humankind, beyond space and time. Myths are supposed to be eternal.

They are also a very effective shorthand to communicate rather complex concepts.

I can write five pages telling my girlfriend that she makes me feel safe, that she is something I've longed for and fought to gain, something I've dreamed about but that I'm scared I'll lose. I could, and I probably wouldn’t be able to convey exactly what I mean.

Or I could say "She is my Ithaca" and you would get it, wouldn’t you?

There are whole books that try to explain the symbolism behind "The Green Knight", but Eliot can offhandedly mention a chapel and he has basically evoked the whole original poem plus the centuries of scolarship that followed.

Tolkien could have had his characters recite long monologues about how they feel like their world has been lost. Instead, he has one of them sing a song by the campfire. An 8th century song, about a warrior in exile. He achieves in a couple of lines what could have taken him a whole book to convey, and he does it in a way that goes straight to the heart, even if we don't know exactly why.

And that's the thing: not all of us spend years researching myths and old poetry. Certainly we don't do it when reading LOTR for the first time, especially if that's when we are 13 or 10 or 8 years old. But we get it anyway. We know myths, especially Western myths, one way or another, as if through cultural osmosis. We understand myths from other cultures too- we may need a bit of context, but we do- and often we find that the bones of the stories are similar, across oceans and centuries.

That means that using myths as the building blocks of your story is an amazingly effective way to cut to the quick, to get to the core of what the narrative is aiming at.

I have seen so many people talk about the feeling they get when reading LOTR, or even just thinking about it: that nostalgia? That bittersweet hurt? That longing for something bright and lost, for a star or a jewel or a land beyond the sea? That, right there. That is what Tolkien achieves by telling stories inside stories, by having his words have a meaning and weight that we would associate with a bard or a preacher, not a fantasy writer. And, as I have discovered recently, it's almost exactly the same feeling you get when reading Saxon poetry.

It's almost as if he chose it on purpose, isn’t it?

That's not all, though.

As both people tagged above(and many others, myself included) have already written, Tolkien doesn’t just use myths as building blocks. He alters them.

Yes, Frodo's hero's journey is not typical. Yes, there are a lot of similarities between the last part of LOTR and the Odissey, but they are not quite the same.

That's because Frodo is not, and can't be, Ulysses. He isn’t a warrior crowned with glory and cunning who reconquers his home and that leaves it because a god has promised him peace if he does. He is a mutilated soldier coming home from the trenches, only to find that he no longer belongs in the home he has bled for.

Frodo is a new hero, for a new age (just like Ulysses was a new hero for a new age, which I rather think is one of the reasons Joyce chose him as the model for his novel. The Odissey was already subversive in and of itself. "An odd duck", as @sataidelenn put it.)

We have to understand just how traumatic WWI was. It's a shift, a break so immense that it changed society, politics, culture, family structures, the idea of hero and even of manhood. The Western World was not the same after 1918. Of course art changed too.

Would Tolkien have written LOTR had he not fought in that war? Probably. But it would have been a very, very different book. The way it deals with war, technology, trauma, peace and friendship-all the things we love about it- are direct fruits of that conflict. I think the way myth fits into it is, too.

I can understand being disappointed that not everything in Lotr is wholly new, wholly Tolkien's invention. It didn’t even occur to be to be, though, because I am used of thinking of it in these terms.

All the myths he uses- from Kullervo to Ulysses to Beowolf to medieval fairy tales- are means to tell a new story. They come back to life, and while we perceive how timeless they are, they end up telling us something that is rooted in time. A new English epic, yes, but very clearly an epic of England between two world wars. A 20th century heroic tale which offers a desperate, brave hope for the future. How can we not love it?

And look, I might joke about personal mythology smoothies to myself all the time, but the reason I keep reading and studying Eliot and Joyce and Yeats is that they do have something new to say, something amazing. You can take them or leave them, love them or hate them, but "unoriginal" is not an adjective you can, in good conscience, apply to their work.

I think, in a weird way, Tolkien is the same.

"In manipulating a continuous parallel between contemporaneity and antiquity, Mr. Joyce is pursuing a method which others must pursue after him. They will not be imitators, any more than the scientist who uses the discoveries of an Einstein in pursuing his own, independent, further investigations. It is simply a way of controlling, of ordering, of giving shape and significance to the immense panorama of futility and anarchy which is contemporary history. It is a method already adumbrated by Mr. Yeats, and of the need for which I believe that Mr. Yeats to have been first contemporary to be conscious. Psychology (such as it is, and whether our reaction to it be comic or serious), ethnology, and The Golden Bough have concurred to make possible what was impossible even a few years ago. Instead of narrative method, we may now use the mythic method. It is, I seriously believe, a step toward making the modern world possible for art." –T.S. Eliot, from Ulysses, Order, and Myth (1923)

#tolkien #lotr #tolkien meta #literature #myth #does this make sense? I hope it does #I really wanted to reply earlier but alas life #you can tell I have put a tiny bit of thought in this over the years uh

[sokkastyles]

So that post is a reply to this one, for context. This is the reblog that I was talking about.

And this is a reblog of the above reblog.

I remember reading and deciding not to engage with the original post because I find the interpretation of Ty Lee as a super-smart weaponized femininity girlboss mastermind to be...annoying. Which is not to say that Ty Lee is dumb, but Ty Lee's constant adoration of Azula is a defense mechanism, not a manipulation tactic. It's the coping mechanism of an abuse victim, and Ty Lee breaking free to save Mai is something she's shown to be just as confused by as Azula, because it's a victim who's been finally pushed to the breaking point. I'm not trying to diminish Ty Lee's strength, and this is a minor nitpick, but I get annoyed when people think that feminine or kind girls have to be secret masterminds to be worthwhile. Of course Ty Lee is deliberately saying things that she knows Azula wants to hear for her own protection, but to describe it as manipulation implies that Ty Lee has power over Azula, when it's Ty Lee using a defense mechanism to maintain a relationship that hurts her. See Azula slut-shaming Ty Lee at the party and Ty Lee protecting herself by offering to teach Azula how to flirt, which Azula treats dismissively even as she enjoys the attention being back on her. Ty Lee does what a lot of people who are in these kinds of relationships wind up doing, which is give Azula constant positive feedback to avoid being a target of her, or at least, to avoid being a bigger target, because Azula is still cruel to Ty Lee, but less when Ty Lee is validating her. But Ty Lee admits in the comics that she is still afraid of Azula, so her fawning is less a manipulation and more a survival tactic. She's not trying to control Azula, she's trying to minimize the abuse.

Anyways, I am laughing at the claim that Azula said trust was for fools because she just loved Mai and Ty Lee so much and realized that was a mistake and is now lamenting it. You can only interpret it that way if you ignore that she said this in response to Ursa saying "all your life you've used fear to control people, like your friends Mai and Ty Lee." Azula is not lamenting the trust she put in her friends, she is explaining why she cannot and has never relied on trust, and justifying that in the face of the vision of her mother telling her what she knows is true deep down, that she drove her friends away because she never loved them. Controlling people through fear is what she has always done, throughout the show, in every relationship she has. Azula also further says to her mother "even you fear me," to prove this point. This also gets to the heart of why she could never connect to her mother and believed that her mother did not love her, because she believed that her mother feared her and therefore was someone to be controlled (which is why we see her as a child lying to her mother and resenting her mother trying to correct her behavior, and ignoring Ursa's teaching in favor of pleasing her more powerful father, who was the one with the control.

"Not one of them tries to return the counseling she gave them." Give me a break. Azula does not give counseling in "The Beach," she makes dismissive armchair analysis and then makes it about herself and how she's better than them ("I don't have sob stories like all of you") and then admits her own trauma in the least vulnerable way possible ("I don't care"; "she was right of course") while making sure she still keeps everyone else at a distance and under control. They don't reach out to her because she doesn't want them to and she's just belittled them in really cruel and personal ways. Like, tell me you don't have friends in real life without telling me. Or tell me you're really confused about why no one wants to be around you, if you genuinely do not understand why Azula's friends don't respond to her kindly here.

I like how this person does the "Oh, but they just don't appreciate what a good friend she is" and then backtracks into the "but she doesn't know how else to be" song and dance. I mean, sure, but so what? An abusive person who acts abusively because that's all they know how to do is still an abusive person.

And the claim that Azula was so blindsided because she genuinely thought she was being a good friend is BS, because we already know why she was blindsided. She tells us.

Azula: I never expected this from you. The thing I don't understand is "Why?". Why would you do it? You know the consequences.

Mai: I guess you just don't know people as well as you think you do. You miscalculated. I love Zuko more than I fear you.

Azula: No, you miscalculated! You should have feared me more!

And then after Ty Lee chi blocks her:

Ty Lee: [Runs to a shocked Mai, shaking her from her stupor.] Come on! Let's get out of here!

Azula: [Still on the ground; angrily.] You're both fools!

Which echoes the conversation with her mother later. She explicitly tells Mai that she was blindsided because Mai "knew the consequences." Not because she thinks her relationship with Mai is so strong, but because she thinks Mai is afraid of being punished for not obeying. This is exactly what she says to her mother, that fear and control are the only way to maintain relationships, and trust is for fools, echoed in her saying that Mai and Ty Lee are fools for acting out of love - Mai for Zuko and Ty Lee for Mai - rather than fear of Azula.

And the thing is, this isn't like, a minor quarrel where Azula just didn't realize what she was asking Mai to do might be something she would disagree with. Azula %100 expected Mai to sit there and watch her boyfriend die because Azula thought she had her that much under control that it didn't matter to Azula how Mai felt about it. This shows you exactly how much Azula values and cares about Mai as a person rather than a drone she can control. That is to say, not at all.

I wish we could move past the idea that Azula understands people because she's superficially smart. She's able to read and exploit people's weaknesses, true, but when it comes to what really motivates them, she does not understand at all, because she has fundamentally rejected love and trust in favor of controlling through fear. And that is impossible to do to another person unless you have dehumanized them first. So no, Azula does not understand Mai and Ty Lee, nor her brother, nor her mother. She doesn't even understand herself. That's the whole point, the whole tragedy of it.

Like, honey, Azula ain't gonna make healthy new friendships if we all just continue to deny why those friendships were unhealthy to begin with.

#azula #zuko #mai #ty lee #the discourse

[driftward]

Junelezen 2023: Aftershocks

Last week, I had a masterpost of every single entry I made for Junelezen 2023, which I dubbed Echoes. This week, I am posting annotated entries for every post from there, except this time I am linking to specific entries in the reblog chains, or to posts that others made as responses to Echoes. In particular, one member of my FC, (here on Tumblr as @yzeltia), took it upon himself to create a reblog response to every post.

The previous masterpost can be considered the 'original cut', consisting solely of my entries. This is the 'fat cut' I mentioned there. What parts of all this are canonical? I don't know, come back with a warrant.

As already mentioned, this post will have annotations on the various entries. I could go on for hours about my thought process, things I learned, and I may yet make some other posts about such things, but for now, I am (mostly) restricting myself to commentary here, both on my work, and the work of others.

I have learned a lot during this. One of the things I have learned is that in the future, readmores and reblogs do not necessarily play well together for these round-up posts, as readmores will roll out without the linked reblog, and if you just look at the reblog chain, you'll miss whatever was in the readmore. If I do this again in the future, I think I will stick to making posts, and maybe just link back and forth between them. And maybe if I am responding to someone else's work like this, instead of a reblog, I might just tag OP? I am uncertain. Reblogs keep tumblr alive. The cleanest for archive purposes would probably be reblog the original, then make the follow-up and tag the originator. Still though, that's neither here nor there. What is here is the fantastic work done by others.

And I appreciate all of it. I am humbled by the response.

Final note, these will largely link to Y'zel Tia's responses, since he reblogged almost every response with his own screenshot and words. Click throughs and context should make it obvious which ones are which.

.portrait

Where we got started, with a bit of a literal framing device. Y'zel Tia belongs to @yzeltia; part of his character canon is being a cousin to Y'shtola Rhul, and so that'll explain why you'll often see both of them in his responses. I'm not at all sure why Y'shtola would be interested in what happens to some random feckless adventurer, though...

Special shout out to @matrixdragon and @sabbactroll who both had, uh, opinions on this development. :)

.home

Look, haven't we all had a scientific experiment go a little sideways and light someone's world on fire. This is, of course, the bridge between the Incident and Junelezen: Echoes.

.spring

What strange sights are seen beyond the veil of reality, and what utterly normal places those left behind would go. I picked Coerthas as an early anchor point, since that's where Zoissette grew up.

.new adventure

I was still learning a lot here, both about my tools (gpose+more/Affinity Photo) as well as the posting medium (tumblr). An early goal I had was that the Junelezen 'entry' would be its own screenshot with minimal words, and I would build on the 'story' portion in reblogs or readmores, so that way people who were only interested in the Junelezen part could ignore the rest. This one I used a reblog to expand the story.

Studying Her History (by @yzeltia)

Zoissette would probably prefer they stay out of her room at the Baldesion Annex. Y'shtola is always cute when passed out from studying too much though.

.job

Using a reblog chain to expand the story portion again. I couldn't figure out how to make the jobstone work, so I added a light source to Zoissette's hand to make a kind of 'glow'. Not real happy with how it turned out, but making mistakes makes the learning happen.

Informing Alka Zolka (by @yzeltia)

Okay Y'zel was just trying for emotional damage here. I mean, he succeeded, but still. :|

.mount

I have written about part of Zoissette's mission of mercy before. Look ma, my lore has lore. This event left its mark on her; it did not change her in any great way, just sort of underlines who she already was at that point. In the reblog, Y'zel went for the emotional damage again. Writing in my FC is a PvP activity.

Absence Felt (by @ladyofvoss)

Incredible work here, in the expressiveness of the posture, and the choice of shots taken (at my heart). This is Thalia Voss, belonging to @ladyofvoss. Where she's at is Zoissette's office at Gage Acquisitions (designed by fellow FC member Ghurab)

.friends

Another reblog chain. Compositing the 'shards' to put the faces of friends into them was quite difficult, each one requiring four layers (the way I did it) and quite a bit of manual touch up work. The color scheme was chosen on purpose. Look, Junelezen is also Pride Month, I don't make the rules, but I do make things queer.

1000 words remix (by @yzeltia)

Y'zel has a real fondness for all things music, and that's seen here. As @saesama put it, 'he made an AMV in tumblr form'. Having not played FF X-2, I was not familiar with the song, but I am now. This will not be the last musical piece from our aurally inclined catboy.

.beauty

With this one I really found the problems with reblog chains when making archival posts. This links to the reblog I made to my own post to add story, but in going to the original post, it's actually really hard to fish out the reblog!

We get further hints here that 'Adriané' may not be who Zoissette thinks she is.

Dancing Alone (by @yzeltia)

Dance like nobody's watching. Hey. Why are you watching. Go away, this is meant to be a private moment!

.mirror

Getting to here took a lot of false starts, fiddling with Affinity Photo, getting samples from in game, changing outfits, and it was all worthwhile in the end. I really like the end result. Y'zel went for a more chaotic approach.

Absence Mourned (by @scrollsfromarebornrealm)

For context, the character in these shots is Mathye Bishop, who belongs to @scrollsfromarebornrealm, a character who has been courting Zoissette for over a year by this point. They are close, in any case. The tone provided by the filter and his posture all scream of the devastation he feels in the wake of Zoissette's absence.

.summer

A memory that never happened, but did. Strange things in these echoes, and as has happened before, Y'zel's character visits the 'real' location, feeling a twinge of what is going on out beyond the rift, thanks to his own Echo gift. Klynt Gohtawyn belongs to @saesama, and this hearkens back to the days she and Zoissette may have crossed paths back when they both worked for the Maelstrom.

Klynt's a jerk.

.day

Not much to say for this one. I thought the sun would make more of an arc crossing the sky, making for an interesting dynamic shot, but it turns out it makes kind of a very straight line, which makes sense if you think about it. I had an alternative shot planned that, while it was gorgeous, I just couldn't make the story aspect of it work out. I will probably share that shot, and others, at a future date.

.sun

You can see I am choosing more and more often to use readmores instead of reblogs, and I will probably stand by that decision in the future. Also here is where I found out I had been doing a crime these many years. Due to her somewhat reserved nature, I usually have Zoissette have very subtle almost-nonexistent expressions. Clearly, this entire time, I should have been turning them up somewhere around 11. I love her face.

Echo Disrupted (by @yzeltia)

Looks like in the search for their friend, someone may have overdone it a bit. Overdoing it a bit, in fact, seems to be a bit of a theme with Y'zel, both player and character.

.ancient times

I am not going to take the space it would require for me to say everything that I would like about Atlas, so instead I will just mention that this served as a useful pivot for the story, and provided a path forward. I had actually been juggling several ideas up to this point, and this is where I hard committed to a specific direction. Thanks, Atlas.

Sanctuary remix (by @yzeltia)

Honestly I think Y'zel having his character black out was just an excuse to have a space to put this entry without having to worry about what I was doing. Which, really, is a stroke of genius. Another AMV in tumblr form. Should we make a new word for that?

.night

It was around here that I decided to lean more on my strengths - writing - and less on screenshots. That decision did not last long. Junelezen started as a screenshot event, and I was having fun with those. Here we anchor for everything ever after.

Connected remix (by @yzeltia)

Y'zel introduces me to a new song that lives in my heart.

.romance

Zoissette, no longer losing herself in the echoes, shows up only in the containment suit in shots from here on out. I continue to be cheeky about the colours I use whenever she's in the rift, and Y'zel drops a slick FF8 reference, which just really plays into my love of multiverse shenanigans.

.magic

Not completely sworn off of reblogs yet, though this reblog was pushed out fast, before I had a riot on my hands. This is also where I started hinted more heavily at things to come, with another Lavender PoV piece.

In the reblog chain, where you see the fairies, from left to right, is C'oretta Khell's (belongs to @autumnslance) Lotus, pink-shifted compared to the others; Ryssthota Sundstyrwyn's (belongs to @erickgage) Glitterdust, and Riven Fortemp's (belongs to @scrollsfromarebornrealm) Sugarplum, who I tried to make the little hairtufts rounder for.

.magic response by Y'zel Tia

You can ask Y'zel about this one.

.autumn

And pulled that trigger. This is where I finalized the smoke effect I wanted to use for Lavender, and I'm rather proud of how it turned out, particularly in future shots.

.landscape

I really like this shot, for the utter alien landscape I managed to make using FFXIV assets and some aggressive photo editor work. My only regret is that it does not -quite- look like Zoissette and Lavender are actually in that place, but I think that can be fixed with a few more adjustments.

I'd been leaning on Y'zel's entries to sort of weakly gesture at what may have been going on in the 'real world' while Zoissette was gone, but here I start to make my own narrative about the matter. Judging from conversations I've had, there is one thing I could have made clearer in this story. Zoissette's perspective of how much time has passed is dramatically different from that of the Source. In the Source, it has been a short time. For Zoissette, it has been quite a lot longer.

.travel

I think this is the only one with a single screenshot. I lean more heavily on my writing abilities once more, and I think they speak for themselves.

.dungeon

Figures. Zoissette is having one of the worst days of her life, and the cats are napping. It took me a while to settle on a ghostly effect for the people 'yelling' at her, and I rather like how it turned out. We also are spending more time with Lavender. Hard decisions to be made, but just because they are hard does not mean they are difficult. Lavender and Zoissette are alike like that.

.deity

Some trivia. Zoissette's mom lost her right arm fighting a dragon, back before the Calamity. The Deity is supposed to be a mix of Halone and Zoissette's mother, and so, she, too, is missing her right arm.

.harvest

Reaper job unlocked. Un-edge-lording your edgelord jobs since at least 2016.

.hobbies

So while I was writing a follow-up story for The Incident, I was also trying to follow the Junelezen prompts. And one of my goals was that someone who was just here for Junelezen could just see the photo, nod, go 'ah that makes sense' and move on without having to know a damned thing about the Incident or about Zoissette. I probably did not succeed as well as I would have liked, but I did try.

Having said that, the location of the hobbies prompt in the middle of the others and what I had planned presented some real problems for me, and I did not solve it until pretty late. So we get this moment of downtime. I like how it turned out, but it sure did vex me getting there.

.winter

Back where we began. A lot has changed, a lot has stayed the same. There are a lot of subtle things I did intentionally throughout this story. In this shot, the shift to the skybox and lighting, as well as changing where they are sitting relative to the fence, were decisions I made on purpose.

Speaking of changes done on purpose, Y'zel-the-character's hair goes white as he once again overdoes it. We do recurring themes here, sir.

.cozy

I will stop composing shots of Zoissette and Y'shtola sitting like this the day I die. Also, seriously Y'zel, is NOW the time to be forcing that question??? Ridiculous, now we have -two- casualties.

.relaxing

Under the readmore, we spend more time with the science team, as they try to work out what to do next. But here...

A Relaxing Summary (by @matrixdragon)

I will let @matrixdragon provide the summary.

.fancy clothes

A schematic of the Aurora Laboratories Containment Suit. And two more questions from @matrixdragon, who picked up on my oh-so-subtle (okay no it wasn't) Babylon 5 reference. On that note, I adore the Babylon 5 questions, and I think they serve as an extremely useful framing tool for just about any character in any universe.

Some very touching possible answers from Y'shtola in Y'zel's reblog.

Midnight talk

Things are happening, and faster, now. I did not use a readmore or the reblog chain for these additional entries, which I made sure were scheduled for 2300 in my time zone every night. 1100 for the Junelezen post, 2300 for additional story posts. I keep to this plan for the rest of the run. These special additional entries I refer to as The Eleventh Hour.

.family

Thank you to everyone in these shots. I have a little story in my mind for each one. Maybe I will even write them one day.

The Trapeze Swinger remix (by @yzeltia)

As I go through these entries, I can tell how and where my skills are improving. I can say the same for Y'zel, whose 'tumblr AMV' skills expand. While they are all very good, this is one of his best works, in my opinion, and I found another new song through him.

Recovery plan

Another Eleventh Hour entry. You know, it's funny, this arguably all started because Zoissette was trying very hard to not be a burden on her FC or an inconvenience to anyone.

Sure seem to have inconvenienced a lot of people here.

The Last Contingency: Judgement Call (by @saesama)

This one stabs right in the feeling-parts, but somebody has to think of these things, and Zoissette isn't here to do it.

.holidays

Erick Gage (@erickgage) has something to say about this whole mess.

The Only Exception remix (by @yzeltia)

You may have invented the AMV. But Y'zel tumblrized it. Perfected its new form. And then he unleashed it upon us all.

Reconciliation

And truth, at last. I could say so much here. I elect to say nothing.

.free

The final shot was a pain to composite, and I am so proud of how it turned out.

.begin

One year, from Zoissette's perspective, give or take a lot. Two weeks for the world. But she's home again.

Ma there's a cat on the foot of my bed I don't know how it got there (but seriously, thank you @yzeltia :) )

BONUS SECTION

Imposter Syndrome! (by @starladyquasar)

Ladies, ladies, you're both beautiful. Though also seriously, Squeenix, give us more customisation options.

ELEZEVANGELION (by @yzeltia)

You want to know what it's like being part of the funniest FC? It's pretty great, I tell you what.

Anyroad. Special thanks to all of you - those who stopped to leave a comment, or found me on the moon during a screenshot session (you know who you are), or even those of you who just followed along, in whole or in part. And for those of you who were just here for Elezen shots, I hope you found something you liked in here!

#final fantasy xiv #junelezen 2023: aftershocks #aftershocks #masterpost #zoissette vauban #lavender #gage acquistions and allies #scions of the seventh dawn #y'zel tia #and so many more <3

[disabledunitypunk]

Hey, I'm the OP of the post you discuss here. I didn't write that post in any of those contexts you bring up, I wrote it in response to seeing people talk about disabilities or being disabled and then classifying disabilities into "physically disabled" and "neurodivergent", rather than "physically disabled" and "mentally disabled" (although the distinction wasn't even necessary for the specific post that inspired my vent). It doesn't have anything to do with specific communities, and I'm genuinely a bit lost about where all of this is coming from when I made that post out of mild annoyance that people will use "neurodivergent" as if it's always interchangeable with "mentally disabled", when mental disabilities are just some of many neurodivergencies. I wasn't annoyed about the neurodivergent community or the terms people use for themselves – I was annoyed by how people use the term as half of a binary for disabilities instead of, y'know, actually focusing on disabilities. It feels like it does a disservice to those who don't consider their neurodivergencies disabilities, as well as mentally disabled folks who don't use the umbrella term of neurodivergent. That's what I was venting about. Not about specific neurodivergent subcommunities.

Next time you're confused about one of my posts, please just message me instead of screenshotting my posts to post your own assumptions and comments about it. I'm very hurt by the fact you didn't bother to actually come to me with your concerns and have instead made a post that you admit is an "ungenerous reading" about a vent I would have been more than happy to elaborate on. It feels like you've been talking about me behind my back, which I do not appreciate.

I wanted to thank you for correcting us. I understand your frustration and want to apologize for our misunderstanding. I think honestly we were a bit afraid to reach out personally individually, but tried to at least avoid our platform bringing negative attention to your blog, but we went about it the wrong way. For both that and our misinterpretation, we apologize.

We've been trying to acknowledge where we are biased and ignorant due to trauma and other factors, but we still are sometimes wrong. For all that you were understandably frustrated with us, we appreciate your willingness to be patient and explain to us anyway, and to be kind despite where we screwed up in addressing that. We will do better going forward.

We have saved screenshots of the post that we can add to this ask for context at your discretion (because we very much do want to take responsibility for what we've said), but we've taken down the original post out of respect for your feelings on how we mishandled this. We tried to keep in mind from the beginning that it was a vent post that wouldn't explain every nuance that might be present within the conversation, but we still failed to take the time to really understand your perspective and reach out to you when we were confused.

I can explain further our background on where our response did come from if it would be helpful, but I won't force you to read it unsolicited, because the important thing is that we messed up and didn't come to you out of an irrational fear. While we have had bad experiences in the past, they have been with people who haven't shown the repeated patience and grace you have in the time we've interacted with you, and we should have had the courage to assume that you would continue to be so.

We're not always good at apologies, so if there's anything else that would be helpful to hear or for us to do, please let us know. We're sorry, and thank you for addressing this with us.

We have apologized directly to OP but want to make sure our followers have the opportunity to see their explanation as well, hence also answering the ask here.

-Mod Stars

#mod stars

[luminousbeings-crudematter]

I saw your post talking about Islamophobia but you didn’t explain why you said so

Hi!

I sat on this ask for a full day before responding. Here’s the cliff notes version:

A) You’re right. I didn’t explain why I said that the MW3 campaign was Islamophobic. I have since clarified a bit in that post’s comments to someone else, if you’re so inclined.

B) I am unable and unwilling to take up the moral crusade of explaining why I find something racist, Islamophobic, bigoted, etc. I have enough of that IRL and I am not special in that, because I think most POC do (in some context or another). I can’t do it online. What works for me, mental-health wise, is to not do it on Tumblr. So the simple philosophy on this blog is: I post what I want. I don’t owe explanations for it. (Not trying to be rude, but that’s what it is).

I just come here to write nastiness about pixels on a screen. Is all.

C) This may be a repetition of what I put in the original post’s comments, but people on Tumblr (particularly @\yeyinde and @\halfmoth-halfman) have actually done an exemplary job of explaining the issues with the MW3 campaign. Please read these. They are excellent and I am not half as talented as these blogs at articulating what I think. But they have. They have put in the work, set aside the time, and done it. I appreciate it so much, and I know others do too.

#ask #anon ask

[djnicklesanddimes]

Since tumblr is going to be a jerk and not let me post my cosplay, I'll go ahead and write down my review for the movie.

I'm writing this a couple days out, so sorry (and correct me, i love discussing this movie :3)if something's not correct. I was also writing this in-between breaks at work lol.

There will be spoilers, so you know the deal. I will tag it as such but you have been warned. :3

I'm also putting a read more divider cause it is looooong lol.

My fiancée and I went to go see the dub. He hasn't seen the series since s1 and I made him watch the recap but I felt the recap didn't explain everything to really get a full understanding of the importance of this movie and the characters, but I do appreciate having it. (I think I'll use it in the future for explaining to those I talk to that haven't seen the series, cause have you ever had to explain the series to someone that has never watched it before? Lol)

So we'll start with The Dub

I was favor of the dub in the beginning. I don't mind either sub or dub, but dub is easier for me sometimes when I'm drawing or doing a craft and don't have my eyes always on the screen. I was happy to see that all the original cast came back for this, as I know through their dvd commentaries that they have a real passion for the series. The start of the movie felt a little awkward to me, almost like the VAs were trying to find their way back into their voices. Frederica's voice I think was a little off, a little quieter and softer than I would have imagined hers to be. I know a few people don't like Kate Oxley's voice for Akane but I think she did an excellent job at Akane's break down in the end. It felt very raw and believable.

Plot

Overall I was very pleased with the plot of the movie. After getting context for everything in the movie after reading spoilers from Japanese only showings with no subtitles, I felt that the movie went way deeper than my first impressions. It was a nice surprise to have what feels like a less all over plot that we have gotten in recent years. My fiancée throughly enjoyed it even though he didn't know most of the backstory and I had to fill him in on a few things. His comment for Shindo after the wedding was "nooooo, he kills himself?" Which I replied "yep". There was foreshadowing for both Saiga's and Shindo's deaths but I felt that it was done right. Not too obvious, but enough that it wasn't overdone and you could pick up on it. One piece of context that was filled in for me that I found interesting is that Shindo was an upperclassmen to Saiga, and Saiga warns I think Akane? About Shindo and how he uses people and in sometimes dangerous ways, and that Saiga wonders if one day he'll end up getting hurt from it. And then guess what happens!! I know Saiga warns Akane about Shindo because of his shady methods to get what he wants, and I can't remember when in the timeline, but she asks Mika to do a background check on him.

As for Shindo's foreshadowing, he has a conversation with Akane and invites her to Kei's and Mai's wedding, where he gives that weird speech lol. Sadly I can't remember too many details but I know the way he has his last talk with Akane made me pick up that his suicide was soon, a product of sibyl supplying him with a gun and making him accept responsibility for all he tried to do. You couldn't wait until maybe a day or two after the wedding?? Lol.

I liked that Saiga and Kogami got to talk again. One of the only remnants of shinkane in this film (yeah there wasn't a lot sadly :() comes from Saiga telling Kogami that he shoukd apologize to Akane (which leads to that awkward phone call where it seems like he kinda? tries and fails as they made him a stoic and manly pride type of personality. I don't really like how cold he is at the start of the film either but I almost see a little bit of it as maybe he's been away and around so much violence for so long that this is the only, in his weird Kogami way for him to act. I do think it's no excuse tho for erasing any trace of the shinkane we have, as that relationship is special to many of us and not always for romantic reasons.) I did have a laugh at later when Saiga asks him if he did apologize to which he replies "I don't know what you are talking about". Come on Kogami! You know he can tell you are lying!

I did like that our bad guys had a more religious and cult like approach this time. I feel that's a topic that hadn't been touched in the series yet and finally the movie's title Providence made sense. These guys are dangerous enough to pose a threat, and our heroes get hurt several times. Plus they were a special group for SAD that went rouge, which is so interesting to me. Tonami is the leader of this group and aims to get the Stonskaya documents that can predict wars before they happen or can escalate them to one's favor. He also either helped develop or came across an ai (can't remember details) that he found could pose as a God and he controls his soldiers with a chip(?) in their heads that he can turn on and off at will. Kei's brother Akira is part of this group but is revealed later that he was a double agent( I was surprised at that!) And that he burned his face so he would not be recognized. Shindo sadly kills him later as he fights control for his body from Tonami.

(Trying to finish up here, god this review is long, thank to those that are still with me lol)

I'm gonna try to jump ahead to the end. The scene of Akane's unspeakable deed (lol) was very well done. You have Sibyl forcing her to take Shindo's position, which I got the impression that she didn't want it. And yet it was another Sibyl covering up something bad, sweeping it under the rug and trying to silence Akane more. Akane's whole thing through this movie is that there still needs to be laws, cause Sibyl will and has failed to protect people. So she realizes that she has to do the unthinkable and show that Sibyl is not as invincible as people are pushing for it. Her letter to Kogami was a great scene, with him realizing at the last minute what she was going to do and that he couldn't do anything to stop it as he was locked up. My fiancée was so surprised and it was great to hear his reaction, as he hadn't seen s3 and didn't have the context clues that we all have had lol.

Overall, I thought it was a very good film and great tie in to some pieces missing. I'm still not sure why Sugo and Gino joined SAD tho? That part might have gotten lost on me.

Shinkane

Sadly there wasn't much. I could say that was my only disappointment, along with Kogami's character towards Akane. As other's have said, it seems that he realizes too late. Like maybe he was trying to keep his distance so he can continue to think that she's the same pure inspector he's always known. I love Saiga's quote to him that "she's not God or Budda" so hopefully moving forward there will be something (despite what the writers say!!) as he greats her so warmly at the end of s3. As he swears to get her out and then he's not the one who does it! He might have some competition lol.

I also want to point out that I loved the soundtrack! I was happy to see Ling Tosite Sigure and Egoist back, cause I feel like it's not fully Psycho Pass without them. But! I was listening to the Providence soundtrack before I saw the movie and it's soooo beautiful, so give it a listen if you have always loved the soundtrack like me. :3

So those are some of my thoughts. I will gladly discuss them with anyone if they want. Also to correct anything I got wrong lol.

#psycho pass #my review!

[princekirijo]

thinking about your post on gushing over persona designs and also a reply youve left on one of my posts before... >:3c would you wanna talk about your thoughts on 3rd tier p5 personas because id love to hear em

I WOULD ABSOLUTELY LOVE TO SHARE MY THOUGHTS THANK YOU LEAF >:3c

OK so like disclaimer: I have yet to get to the third semester in Royal myself (I am playing through the game at a snail's pace 😭) so this is more like my thoughts based on a) just the designs in general, b) the designs in the context of the characters and c) what context I do have of the third semester (I know most of it but obvs it will be different once I actually play it). Oh and of course these are all my personal opinions so that's just something to keep in my mind!

For a more general overview of the personas, I actually think the design principle behind these personas slaps so hard. The way that each of them are in a sense, the real, true version of the original character of the initial designs is actually amazing and such a perfect final form for the thieves (considering their whole thing is ripping off their masks they wear in society blah blah blah). And also each of them try to incorporate a part of the character into the persona design (I'll explain that a bit in a minute) is really really cool. However, as with anything there are designs that nail these ideas and then there are some that for me miss it. Overall though, I think they are a solid set of personas and in general I would say I like them as a collective (not as much as the initial and they slightly lose out to the second tier designs but not by much).

Now for a more detailed persona by persona breakdown:

Raoul: Oh boy. Raoul. OK this is tricky for me. As like a design I think he slaps so hard. He looks sleek, cool and I love his head and wing design, I think they continue on from Arsene's monster gentleman look well and bring a more modern vibe to the persona (which a lot of these personas seem to do). And I think its a fitting design for Joker (purely from an aesthetic point of view, I find it hard to comment on it from the point of "does this fit Joker's personality" because that's really down to player interpretation). But hoo boy. There's two major issues with him for me.

Obvious one is that he's a DLC Persona. Instant loss for me. It adds no sentimental factor to him as a Persona (i.e. no awakening scene), all you do is just pay however much it is for him and then bam you have a cool Persona. That was a huge missed opportunity on Atlus' part. However, this brings me into my second issue, is that even if he did have an awakening scene there is no way it would ever top Satanael. Like Satanael is such an underrated persona for me, its a shame he's underutilized in the games too, because like wow that awakening scene. Is there any bigger fuck you to a god then summoning the devil through the power of friendship and humanity's hope to shoot him in the face. Unparalleled. But back to Raoul I just don't think he tops Satanael and he's stuck in DLC which lessens his impact/importance for me even though he's probably one of my favorites design wise.

Diego: I actually really really like him. I don't know why but I appreciate the swagger this Persona has. I think what Diego does best is really capture Morgana as a character. He's cocky, confident, considers himself as a bit of a ladies man (Diego looks like a playboy sorry) and successfully brings a modern twist to Zorro (and you know fits the whole this is Zorro unmasked because well it is literally Zorro unmasked). I can see why the design wouldn't appeal to some people because admittedly it is a bit boring but all in all I think its a solid look.

William: Yeah William slaps. He's a great design. I really enjoy how he's a more punk (might not be the right word but that's the best I can think of rn), cool, sleek version of Captain Kidd. I think he really fits Ryuji in the sense that it actually looks like something Ryuji would wear lol. It fits as well with the whole "Ryuji embracing his role as the delinquent" and again as is with a lot of these designs, brings a modern twist to it. This doesn't really mean much but I really like the sleek boat that he rides on. It just looks cool and honestly that's how I feel about William. He just looks really cool and very Ryuji.

Celestine: My Ann bias might come through here but oh boy do I adore this design. I think out of all of them, this is the one that executes the third tier design principles the best. First: it's a really cool upgrade for Carmen, and it really looks like it was made for Ann. Like the confidence the swagger and yes there is the whole sexy dominatrix thing going on with her but to me it feels like this is much better executed. The men at the end of her pigtails is to be quite honest a really neat design and a nice continuation of the elements we see in the previous personas. Which brings me to my next point: this is one of the two best examples of another aspect of the third tier personas: the fact that they are shown to be a fusion of sorts between the previous two personas. I don't think the ones I've mentioned so far execute this as well as Celestine and one other I'll get to later do. The combination of the Hecate color palette and Carmen's features plus the elements of Ann herself (Celestine is very fashion model to me) is done so well that I actually think it's probably the best designed of all of them.

Gorokichi: Oh Gorokichi. I have seen two opinions on this persona: people either love him or they hate him. I am very much in the later camp. I really hate this design NOT because of the actual design itself but more so the design in context. Look on its own I love how flamboyant it is. The pink fur coat, the ridiculous heels, that Groose looking hair style it's honestly really fun and different. It looks like something out of Zoolander. This all being said, in context... no. Look Yusuke is a flamboyant character. He's an artist he's passionate we know this. But this persona is far too gaudy for him. Gorokichi looks extremely materialistic and honestly way too tacky for Yusuke. Idk I'm sure other Yusuke fans feel differently but for me I just think it's probably the most out of character of all the personas in terms of how the designs relate to the character. There's something about it that just doesn't sit right with me 🤷‍♂️ I will say though I think it does an OK job at being a fusion of Susanoo (who is by FAR the better design btw) and Goemon. Again all of that is just my personal opinion but I think this is probably the weakest of the third tier personas.

Agnes: OK after writing like essays for the others I'll be honest I don't have much to say about Agnes. Like it looks cool af it's a batmobile ass looking motorbike and I think it fits Makoto I just... don't have much else to say. I don't really understand the color scheme for this one I'll be honest considering that up until now Makoto's personas have primarily been blue so this black and gold combo kinda comes outta nowhere, but it's fine. It's just missing something for me.

Al Azif: Star Destroyer. OK but in all seriousness I like the design. Again not much to say, the sleek technology + hacker vibes obviously fit Futaba very well and all in all I like it. Like Agnes it's just kinda there for me. I will say though it does feel like a Pokemon evolution more than a fusion between the previous two. Like the Salamence line (creature -> ball -> powerful creature). Does this mean anything.

Lucy: OK I promise I'm not running out of steam or anything but again, Lucy is kinda just there for me. I've honestly been sitting here looking at it like "it looks cool. It looks like an upgraded Miladay. It's cool. Why a spy I don't know but its cool". And that about sums it up to be honest. I get that the figure she is based off of was a spy but like why a spy for Haru. Was this just a case of them going "well it looks kinda like a modern business woman and looks like a spy which is what Lucy is based on so a spy it is". Is that what's happening here.

Hereward: And here he is the main man himself. By FAR my favorite third tier Persona. Sorry Celestine I love you but have you seen this man. This Persona design hits the nail on the head. Is it a good representation of how Akechi has changed as a character? Yes absolutely (dark hero vibes). Is it a good combination of the previous two Personas? Without a shadow of a doubt knocks it outta the park. Does it fit with the initial Persona unmasked theme? Yes yes it does. I also wanna mention that I like the idea that Akechi awoke to Loki and Robin Hood at the same time (full credit for that idea goes to whoever drew that phenomenal artwork I am so sorry I can't remember their url) and Hereward being a really good combination of both of them leans into that idea nicely (that's more a coincidence tbh cause I don't think it's explicitly stated which one came first). Also this quote from the wiki really sums up how good I think Hereward's design is:

"In a similar vein to how Robin Hood's design was largely inspired by comic book hero Superman, Hereward's design may have been inspired by Batman, hence the black armor and the bat wing-like protrusions on the back of his head. This may be an allusion to Akechi's role in the third semester, symbolizing his transformation from a seemingly-altruistic hero to a feared warrior seeking to see through his own personal justice. It also can be seen as a visual combination of Robin Hood and Loki, incorporating the bow and weapon of the former and the dark aesthetics of the latter."

Ella: um. Yeah I gotta be honest on this one, I don't feel... qualified? enough to give my thoughts on her because I feel like I haven't fully grasped Sumire as a character. I think the whole Cinderella persona thing she has gong on is great and it fits what I understand of her story but as for Ella's design. Why a wedding dress. Like why. It looks appealing but like??? I don't know tbh 💀💀

And yeah that about sums up all my thoughts. I will say that like I feel my thoughts will change once I get the full story of the third semester because already I feel like a lot of these designs are missing (or I'm missing the context) some connection to the actual story of the third semester. Like these personas are supposed to represent the sort of wrapping up of the thieves character arcs and I feel like that aspect is, while the idea of the personas being based off of their original personas leans into this, ultimately underused. I don't know maybe my thoughts will change once I play it properly. Uh hope you had fun reading this because I've been typing for like an hour no joke 💀😭

#asks #nebulaleaf #persona 5 royal #good lord in heaven i went off #sorry to main tag this eheh #but yeah again as always these are just my own thoughts and opinions #i find it harder to comment on the p5 ones in general because my knowledge of the game is not as good as i am with 3 #but hopefully with me finally playing through royal again i'll be able to give fresh new thoughts you know #but ty sm for the ask leaf 🥺🥺🥺 ily <3333 /platonic #can you guys tell i have two favorites #one of them might be controversial cause as ive said people either hate or love that design #but i said what i said #enjoy reading all that LMAOOOO i am too tired to spell check 😭 #man i really come on here and just rant about personas and then poof

[getvalentined]

So I'm explaining to a friend how much I appreciate their input on my original work because I'm super anxious about sharing it at all, whether we're talking art or writing, and I start to say that I'm terrible at marketing myself too so it tracks—but I stop and think about it, because that's not quite right.

I know that sharing with friends isn't marketing, but it gives me the same shaky, almost sick-with-fear feeling as when I get anxious about posting links to my work or reposting art or whatever else. They're very different things, but I get the same feeling, and I lock up the same way. I get shaky and weepy and I hate myself for even thinking about doing it. I hesitate and usually just give up, automatically reminding myself that nobody cares.

And I realize that it's not that I'm terrible at marketing myself—I used to work in digital marketing, actually, I'm really not bad at it—but rather that asking for attention in any context triggers an almost suicidal panic response.

This is very stupid, and I try to figure out why would I have that kind of response—and then I remember being sent to my room as a kid when my siblings had friends over because I was, in my parents' words, an attention whore. Because nobody wanted to interact with me, so I should "stay out of the way." I would sit in there for hours all alone because I was told in no uncertain terms that I wasn't wanted elsewhere, that it would be better if nobody had to know I was even there.

I remember my older sister telling me that nobody ever wanted to see what I drew or read what I wrote because nobody wanted to talk to me. She said that asking if they wanted to see something or offering to share my work just put people in a position where they had to say they were interested—even though they weren't, no one ever was—because refusing would make them feel like bad people. When I said I didn't want people to feel like they had to do anything, she said I was lying and definitely knew I was doing it, because I was an attention whore and that made me manipulative by nature.

I remember my ex giving me the go-ahead to talk about something at length and then responding 10 minutes later with "yeah, uh, my eyes glazed over like fifteen words in, I think it's best if you keep all that to yourself from now on."

I remember the number of friends who've said to my face that they don't care about what I'm talking about, that they aren't interested in what I've done or what I have to say, that if I want to talk about it so bad then I can talk about it once it's finished, once I know whether it's actually worth anything.

And that's the crux of it: I can't bring myself to share most of what I do without sickening anxiety because I already know that nobody actually wants to see it, nobody actually wants to read it, nobody actually cares—if I ever want any kind of attention, that just proves I'm a horrible, manipulative person. That just proves I'm a whore, because I have been since I was a child. It's in my nature.

Figuring this out has done nothing but made me feel worse, so that's great.

#depression diaries

[fischotterkunst]

I’m very aware I’m not the intended audience of this post (rather, I’m in the group expected to agree and further the point by othering the subject of this claim) but this is so fucking pretentious and a huge part of the reason many people actually hate modern art. Having a BFA myself, i studied and thoroughly understand modern art, and that understanding also gives me the insight to continue hating it specifically because of how elitist gallery culture, like that being displayed in this post, is. Attending an art gallery is expensive, acquiring the understanding of art is expensive, and the spaces surrounding galleries are deliberately othering and elitist because of the simple fact that “highbrow” art is funded by the wealthy (who in honesty don’t understand it either but use it as a display of wealth). we’re talking about the original NFTs, if you will. It’s inaccessible and that’s deliberate. These are assholes like the one above who disguise their own lack of understanding by using the age-old argument of “well, you’re just too stupid to understand”. Ok well, then, explain to me, “modern artists”, the majority of which are statistically cishet upperclass white men, just how unfair society is. Clearly my lack of appreciation for their situations is evidence that I’m stupid. Again, i have a BFA with emphasis on printmaking (“highbrow”) and illustration (“lowbrow”) art so this is coming from an objective, factual standpoint.

(Asterisk: obviously this is not including the works of artists like Ai Weiwei, Kiki Smith, and Louise Bourgeois, to name a few modern artists whose art i actually do enjoy because they actually carry messages of value rather than, say, Anish Kapoor or Banksy who actively participate in the exact form of privilege their imitations of “lowbrow” art steal from. Forgive me for not appreciating your PETA-sponsored van of shredded plush toys claiming to be pro-animal rights while one of your other exhibitions involved coating an elephant in toxic paint and subjecting it to severe distress for a shallow pun. I guess I’m too stupid to see the nuance there.)

Also, one can understand something and still dislike the aesthetic. A lot of modern art uses inorganic colors and shapes that, because they are not found in nature, tend to appeal less to the human eye for purely psychological reasons. That doesnt even mean one necessarily thinks its “bad” art, and it certainly doesn’t indicate a lack of education. It’s a matter of personal taste.

I did check out the OP’s blog to gain some context before posting this and to my surprise (sarcasm) it’s full of closed-minded arguments against people disagreeing that do nothing but further cement the points i’m making here. The original context is in defense of gallery culture and elitism and accepting zero rebuttal in favor of repeating the “no youre stupid and im better than you” so. One of those great examples of someone trying to punch down and acting childish when offered an intelligent response.

#in summary fuck this elitist asshole i have an art degree too youre not special #river babbles