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thefanficmonster · 3 years

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Much Cooler

Corpse Husband & Emma Langevin

Warnings: Swearing

Genre: Platonic Fluff, RPF (Real Person Fic)

Summary: There’s always a certain level of uncertainty when meeting someone you’ve only known online. There’s that sense of insecurity that your relationship with them will never be the same or - even worse - that their view of you might change for the worse. But there’s nothing more thrilling than seeing the person you’ve been talking to constantly for the past however long standing across from you.

Requested by Anon. Hi dear! Thank you so much for your request and I’m so terribly sorry for how late it’s coming out but I hope the fic makes it worth the wait! Lots of love, Vy ❤

“CORPSE! Wake up you famous dumbass!“ is the first thing the poor man heard over the phone at 9 AM on this fine Saturday morning.

It’s more than enough to make him contemplate why he even decided to pick it up in the first place considering he wouldn’t have been very able to participate in the conversation due to his sleepiness. He also, of course, made the mistake of not checking the caller ID which apparently wasn’t necessary considering how recognizable that voice and accent are.

“It’s 9 AM, Emma.“ He states as a tired parent would to a child, “I’m concerned as to why you’re up so early. More so as to why you’re calling me of all people.“

He can practically hear her roll her eyes but he still smirks to himself, knowing she can’t contradict him or argue since he’s completely right with his claims. “Whatever. Remind me to never call you to congratulate you on a milestone again.“

Now that pokes at his attention with a stick. Lately, said attention has proven to be a hibernating bear, leaving Corpse with a lack of interest or motivation for anything but damn if that sentence wasn’t enough to roll him out of bed and hop on PC. “What? What milestone? Subscribers?“

“Nope! You got two million likes on ‘E-girls are ruining my life’! I can’t believe I have to tell you this! Didn’t you notice the numbers climbing?!“ Emma, as annoyed and sarcastic as she’s trying to sound, she’s obviously overjoyed on his behalf and is super proud of him and of the project she luckily agreed to take a small part in.

As his PC boots up, Corpse can’t help but roll his eyes at Emma’s comment, “Well unlike you I have better things to do than refresh a page over and over aga-” His sentence is quickly cut off when he sees the number of likes under the song for himself.

Knowing that he’d find it there didn’t change the feeling of seeing it for the first time at all. It’s so surreal and so hard for his mind to comprehend. Seeing as how little he thinks of himself, his content and his art, this is like his success coming to slap him across the face as if to punctuate to him how wrong that mindset is.

“You know, it wouldn’t hurt if you offered to take me out for at least a coffee to celebrate, bro.“ Emma comments sarcastically, joking only halfway from what he can sense.

He smirks, “Trying to even the playing field, I see.” He replies, referring to the fact that he’s still a faceless mystery to her while her face is literally the cover art for one of his songs.

She laughs but is quick to dismiss his claim, “Nah, I might be a curious and nosey little shit on other occasions, but other people’s privacy is not something I dig my nose into. However, if I were to even the playing field between us it wouldn’t be appearance-wise. More personality-wise. For my sake and yours I choose to believe you are way cooler in person than you are through messages or on a call.”

This withdraws a genuine fit of laughter from Corpse who throws his head back, a few strands of hair moving aside to reveal his shiny eyes, “Well then, instead of giving me the benefit of the doubt, how about we settle it once and for all? Tomorrow? I’ll text you the location.”

Emma’s eyebrows shoot upwards as soon as she comprehends his words and the tone that leaves no room for her to assume he’s joking, “Wait what? How come you’re agreeing to this? And so easily? Nah, this a trap if I’ve ever seen it.”

Corpse laughs yet again, “No trap, Em. I just can’t have you doubting my coolness.”

* * *

The main reason as to why Corpse requested for this meeting to be today is because he feared that if he had more than twenty four hours to dwell on it he’d chicken out. Little did he know it was the same for Emma. Their friendship has only ever existed with the bridge of social media connecting them and they both can’t help but fear the other might not like who they are IRL. They fear they unintentionally become a different person or change things about themselves subconsciously when communicating with people online. Bottom line, they’re scared of letting the other person down with who they really are, unaware that their personalities are most likely the exact same because, as the people who know them can confirm, neither Corpse nor Emma are the type to put on a show in order to be liked. They would rather have no friends because of who they are than have friends and fans of their persona instead of the real them.

And so, while slightly afraid and anxious about this meeting, both of them see it as a relief test to see if the friendship is in fact as real as it’s seemed these past months.

Corpse was the one to choose the location of their meet-up, a location Emma didn’t even think twice about agreeing on, and ever since, they’ve both been counting the hours until their scheduled meeting time. It’s not about impressing each other, at least that’s what they’re both telling themselves, but rather proving to the other that they’re worthy of their friendship. They might throw snarky and sarcastic comments at one another that others would give a side-eye glance to and question if their friendship is real, but they know the dynamic best and they sure as hell don’t wanna lose it or each other.

Best friends are the ones who roast each other after all - you can’t tell me I’m wrong.

The nervous Corpse fidgets with the insides of his hoodie pockets as he waits outside the café, having arrived ten minutes early because he couldn’t stand being alone with his thoughts in his apartment, judging every fragment of himself twice as harshly as usual. Emma, on the other hand, could barely bring herself to leave her home. She kept retouching her appearance, despite knowing Corpse wouldn’t judge her even if she showed up in pjs. To be fair she contemplated doing just that several times because her hair pissed her off enough to get her discouraged on her outfit altogether but she did eventually talk herself into pulling it together. She already knew she’d be at least five minutes late, but once again, she knew Corpse wouldn’t care.

He’d wait, cause that’s the kind of friend he was. Cause that’s the kind of friend she was for him too.

And boy did it take her less than a second to recognize him. She wasn’t even out of the car when she saw him and knew it was exactly who she was looking for. He too, as if with a sixth sense that registered her presence, shoots his head up from his phone to look up at her, their gazes meeting. There’s a brief moment of close-to-shocked silence, their eyes a bit widened as their brains comprehend that they’re within arm’s reach of one another.

That’s when Emma’s the first to break the bubble of awe as a wide grin spreads across her face and she runs to Corpse, wrapping him in a hug before he’s even realized the distance between the two’s been closed.

“Hey.“ She mumbles, her face hidden in his hoodie due to the height difference.

“H-hey.“ He replies, hesitantly wrapping his arms around her too.

“I was right.“ She says once she pulls away, “You are much cooler face-to-face.“ She pauses for a second, narrowing her eyes, “You’d be even cooler if you bought me coffee though.“

Earning a laugh from him, she’s guided into the café by the arm Corpse wraps around her shoulders, telling her he’s get her a milkshake cause he doesn’t want to see her high on caffeine. Needless to say, they both are, indeed, much cooler to one another IRL.

@maat-the-prescriptive @simonsbluee @save-the-sky @itsminniekat @hacker-ghost @bi-andready-tocry @imtiredaffff @jazzkaurtheglorious @hereforbeebo @fandomgirl17 @chrysanthykios @maehemscorpyus @loraleiix @letsloveimagines @annshit @i-cant-choose-a-username-help @enigmaticmaze @divine-artemis @waterlilypat @idontknowwhatthisisfam @evi-ka @classyandfabulous00 @redperson58 @lilysdaydreams @solowheein @mythicalamphitrite @axen-gers @luckygirl144 @nj01 @buddyemily @the-albino-lioness @stardream14 @gdhdkfnn @nomadicgypsyy @preciousskye @fluffysuicideunicornsworld @o-kaelin @manacharlotte @awkward-youtube-trash @lolalee24 @bonky-beerns @meme-lord-and-savior-sebastian @strawbrinkofdeath @teenloves @tams0527 @browneyespinkhair @starstruckllamapuppy @daisychains012 @y0ulooked @tinytacosuitcaseflap @supernatural-is-my-only-life @jula-pauline @melodykitty @just-that-bi-girl @crazybutconfidentaf @lowellshade @alphakees @bellero @weallneednamjesus @starryhanji @boiled-onionrings @husherstan @fockingwhore @melaningoddessthings @prettypastelpetals @haleypearce @godwhyamiawkward @y-napotat @daisychainyoonmin @little-miss-rebel3 @free-wheelin-bi-sexual @redmoon261 @darkacademic2 @wiseflamingoqueen @into-the-end @namikhai-i @nastiablr @thelittleplantlover @mirktuan @dont-hyuck @jjk-bunny @vintagegothlover @easygoingtheatre @itsrandombooklover @miiaivi @emmybaybee @befourgolden @jjk-is-my-shit @eternalteaaars @spacebadgerx @princesslunalight @acequinn14 @samm48 @misselsbells06 @simp-lykawa @fo-love @marishimomura-blog @therealglenncoco @cinnamonbun332 @killtherandomness @sanshinexxxsan @fee-btheweeb @press-lay @cathleenpotgieter16 @jazzydoesstuff @moonlxghtbay @forestrain2000 @hyunjinhugs @blood-of-fandoms @lovellylies @ukiyolixx @simpforhpcharacters @chrisdylan17 @parkerjisung @pedernille @theodonyous @wineandionysus @malfoystilinskii05 @morbid-x @coryisagee @jessewa26 @scoobydooluver97 @mindintheskies365 @raeanneinwonderland @indecisive-empanada @gluttonypalace @loriane2503 @btsiguess-kpop @khaoticbunny @lucidlycactus @smiithys @rottenroyalebooks @kpopgirlbtssvt @fangirl-tc27 @fr0z3n-1 @notmesimpingfortechno @shotarosleftpinky @kunoi-chan @idk-whats-wrong-with-me @yikeroonie @goldenstarofthunderclan @poetry-and-tea @ama-do-writing-stuff @wishbonewolf @emeraldxhope @t0xick1tty @kusuinko @speakyourselfloveyourself @sophia902103 @lo-manburg @classsykittykat @dmgama @depressedpuppythatneedscoffee @btsiguess-kpop @akaashi-baby @gun-jong-simp @geschichtenfee @yerapotato-wp @browneyedgirl365 @thysagclub @sparklycloudnight @helloatomicshadow @queentorresstuff @vtte @val-gal @lucy-bunny17 @aaliyahh0 @katluckybear @boyleanti @straybids @franchesca-791 @cosmicstorm19 @averyisbackinthetrashcan @aomi-nabi @xlanawriter @allensimpsforcorpse @sunnyrae-cessh @ladykxxx08 @meowiemari @renupf @booklover76 @sra-verissimo @beatrhizn @blueberrystigma @beatrhizn

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seesgood · 3 years

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can we very gently talk about call out posts / culture really quick? not in a judgmental way, but in like a: i just want to pose a thought and explain why i’m never going to buy into it and why i wish it would become less of a trend instead of more of one? and i’ll add the disclaimer here: i totally get not wanting certain people around you for various reasons, that is all your prerogative. that’s your comfort level. but in emphasizing “your blog should be a safe space” we’re kind’ve losing sight of the fact that the rpc should also be a safe space, and as much as your comfort and safety matter, so do other people’s. and not just the person who hurt you, but the third parties and other mutuals and 99.9% of people who are not at all involved in any way in whatever happened. so, anyway here goes, read it or don’t, we all have different opinions or reasons, i just want to be heard:

people are allowed to change. think back to who you were last year. two years ago. think about the stuff you said when you were seventeen, or twenty-one, or hell whatever age you were. current-you would probably cringe at the kind of stuff past-you had to say. because you grew. you learned. you had life experiences. in hindsight you have the freedom to be like “oof yeah that was not the best version of myself right there damn i don’t want to be like that again.” the growing trend of ‘here’s a 10+ page google doc complete with out of context screenshots that sometimes date back to like 2017 or earlier’ makes this kind of change impossible. because right there, you’ve just frozen a person in time, probably not at their best, removed any and all amounts of context, and put it on the internet and let other people judge it for themselves.

so that leads into another point that i want to just kinda present to the community at large: the act of documenting behaviors and storing them for months / years at a time, in itself creates a super unsafe environment, not just for you, your friends, the people who have hurt you --- but also for anyone else that isn’t at all involved in whatever happened. like, for example, i like to think that i’m a pretty nice person. i actively try to be a nice person. am i sometimes not having the best day? have people definitely caught me in bad moments? oh hell yeah. but am i, as someone who tries really hard to be nice and welcoming, constantly thinking through every message i send to someone knowing that a) i could have a reputation that makes them read into context that isn’t there and that could contribute to them misinterpreting words i meant in a different way, b) very aware that every post i make, ask i send, message i send can at any moment be screenshotted and posted and taken out of context and either serve as someone’s only opinion of me or pile on to someone’s existing opinion of me? yeah. so in my experience, and based on people i’ve talked to, we now have this thing where you can be surface-friends wtih a lot of people, but if you want to survive in the tumblr rpc you should really only have 2-3 people that you really trust that you can actually talk about shit with.

and lately i’ve been seeing a resurgence of posts on my dash about like “bring back xyz in the rpc” or “the reason the rpc is like this is because of xyz” and i both agree and disagree with a lot of this, but primarily i think the reason the rpc is Off lately is because everyone and their cousin has a DNI, which is --- again --- your decision and i understand and respect that, but while you know the context of every name on that DNI, other people don’t. and to be honest: other people don’t really care and honestly maybe they shouldn’t care. --- and don’t get me wrong, your friends should care if someone has hurt you. that’s important. but joe billy bob who just wants to write their character with yours is going to read through your rules, they’re going to see “do not interact with me if you follow with or interact with these people you’ve never heard of and if you want me to tell you why just message me” (which no one is ever going to do, i’m sorry to say). and say, joe billy bob also followed that other person because they were like ‘omg this blog looks cool’ --- now joe billy bob, who just wants to write cool plots, is suddenly the middle-man in some type of drama that they do not understand, and maybe they’re able to remove themselves from the situation, but even then it’s still in the back of your mind.

this is getting long. it’ll be longer, but let’s take a brief break for me to remind you that in some cases, it’s definitely good to give your mutuals and friends a heads up when someone has done something really, really bad. like, remember x amount of years ago when some dude was like ‘i’m gonna make up a new person and say they died by suicide as a social experiment’ or ‘hey this person actively tries to force very triggering plots about abuse / rape / incest onto people and has been doing so for years and does not seem to change their ways no matter how many people try to educate them’ that’s shit people should probably know about. and it’s also okay ( in my opinion ) for your friends to be able to message you like ‘hey i saw you’re writing with x and i just wanted to let you know i had this experience with them’ if that’s something they feel comfortable doing. and if they are comfortable with you still having the autonomy to make your own decision regarding the person.

i’ll be honest, for a second: i’ve been part of friendships and groups that have turned really toxic for one reason or another. a handful of times. there are probably people out there that are like “yeah this chick is really fake and manipulative and etc, i was friends with her back in 2019″ which, okay. yeah. i’ve definitely done shit and said shit that was not the most representative of who i want to be and who i want to become, and you probably have to. because we are human beings and we are a product of our social groups and the community around us. and you shouldn’t be chained to a version of you that isn’t you anymore. people change. they grow. you don’t have to like them, but you should respect that sometimes people don’t mesh, and that doesn’t mean any of them are bad people, it just means the experience was bad.

a few additional notes i would like to make but i’ve already gone on way too long:

90% of the callout posts that i’ve seen and the DNI’s that i’ve seen can, in my opinion, be classified as a friend group thing. you were friends with x, x did something, now y and z aren’t friends with x anymore. pain is a very, very real thing and people hurting you should never be minimized, but at some point i just want you to remember that not every friendship is going to end happily, but both you and the other party should be allowed to move on and grow better, healthier friendships after. rehashing Friend Group Gone Wrong instances removes that ability for not only person x, but also person y and z.

you putting out a callout says just as much ( maybe more ) about you than it does about the other person. which sucks. because i’d like to think we all have great intentions, and i’m not saying that you should swallow your pain, but it might not be the kind of thing that impacts the community at large, and maybe you should try to find a better way of working through it with a trusted friend(s)

i’m going to be very real and very blunt on this one: literally no one cares. i say that with love. i’m good friends with people who have each other on their DNI’s. establish a baseline of respect and ‘i’m not going to say anything to them about you and vice versa because there’s no need for me to do so’ and move on. but seriously. no one cares. most outside people read callout posts because they like being in the know about the drama, not because they actually care.

person a and person b who are mentioned in the DNI / callout aren’t the only ones who are going to be affected. your friends, your mutuals, your writing partners are now all put in a weird spot where you have to pick sides on an issue you know nothing about and shouldn’t have to know anything about. you’re asking people to choose sides on an issue they cannot fully understand, and that’s not fair to them or to you. and it drives great people away. and then we all lose out on having more awesome people in the rpc.

you’re entitled to your safe space, but this is a public platform and you are also responsible for maintaining your safe space. you shouldn’t put it entirely on other people to do that for you. you can block, blacklist, make up funny names for, or spitefully erase from your many anything and anyone that you wish. but you shouldn’t make your friends do it for you.

there’s always an inherent power imbalance when any kind of drama occurs between those who have more followers / friends / connections and those who do not. and the smaller blog is always going to suffer a little bit more because they don’t have people blindly coming to their defense.

bad moments, bad experiences, bad decisions DO NOT equal bad people.

allow people to make up their own mind about something or someone

anywho, if you read through this whole thing i think i owe you financial compensation. but also thank you for reading / listening / considering. even if you rolled your eyes through the whole thing like “stfu lia” that’s fine. i’m just presenting an alternative thought. i’d like to once again state: i’m not judging you if you’ve made a callout/DNI or if you’re on a callout/DNI. like i literally don’t care. and frankly, in my opinion, i shouldn’t have to. because i, and you, and your friends, and your mutuals, and your non-mutuals should be allowed the space to make up their own opinion and mind on something or someone without being told that there will be consequences if they don’t agree with you. set boundaries. communicate in healthy ways. you don’t have to forgive the people who have hurt or wronged you, but you also don’t get to decide that their actions make up 100% of who they are as a person, or decide that that is the only side of that person people should get to see.

#ʟᴇᴛ’s ᴛᴀʟᴋ ɢʀᴏᴜɴᴅ ʀᴜʟᴇs ⸺ psa.#/ long post cw.#when i say long i mean LONG #i could do an entire dissertation on this #i could do a ted talk #but ys know #if anyone wanted to do some ahem non-light reading this morning #*jazz hands*#( if you want to reblog this monstrosity you definitely can )

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true-blue-megamind · 3 years

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FAN THEORY SUPPOSITION SUNDAY: The Warden

SPOILER WARNING! It’s still a thing, and, if you haven’t yet, you still need to watch Megamind. (If you have seen it already, however, you need to see it again. Because it’s awesome.)

Yes, yes, the post is three days late this time. Real life has to take priority and such. So sue me. (Don’t really do that. LOL!)

For that same reason—or more accurately because this week has exhausted me—I will attempt to make this post shorter than usual. We’ll see how that goes. My money is on “not well.” LOL.

Anyway, today we’re going to look at a subject that often divides the Megamind fandom: the Warden and his relationship with Megamind. There are several fan theories—I mean, suppositions—surrounding this, but I’m going to be focusing on a few of the main ones.

The first of these is that the Warden was actually a father figure to Megamind when he was young, allowing him to be raised in jail not out of cruelty or disinterest, but because it was the only way to keep him safe from shadowy government agencies that otherwise would have performed all sorts of experiments on the blue alien. This both accounts for why a child would be allowed to grow up in what is clearly a high-security prison for dangerous adult criminals—something that, admittedly, needs some sort of explanation—and fits with widely accepted sci-fi and comic book tropes. (From Area 51 to mysterious “Men in Black” type organizations, fiction is full of government agencies created to study extraterrestrial life and technology.) Some even go so far as to suggest that the Warden may have tried to adopt Megamind officially, but was blocked from doing so by these same entities. On top of this, such an idea also offers room to re-imagine the Warden as a much more interesting, complex, and sympathetic character. Indeed, there has been some excellent fan fiction written about this pseudo-parental relationship.

Art: Fathers And Sons Day by tabbydragon

There is some evidence to support this. The first is that, although the Warden behaves harshly toward Megamind in the “jail-break” scene near the beginning of the film, Megamind himself seems to be trying to engage in a playful exchange: pranking the older man, wishing him a good morning, and even teasing him. While some say that this is simply Megamind’s personality as well as his determination to always appear indominable, others suggest that, perhaps, the blue man is trying to recapture a lost amiability between himself and the prison Warden. It is possible that, when he was younger and less villainous, Megamind might have exchanged friendly jokes and greetings with the man in charge of the jail he called home. It has even been suggested that the Warden is so hard on the blue man at the beginning of the film not because he hates Megamind, but because Megamind’s life choices have hurt and alienated his father figure. This idea finds some support in the facts that, when Megamind leaves jail to confront Titan, the Warden wished him good luck, and at the end of the movie, that same man seems genuinely happy as he watches the television broadcast of his one-time prisoner being named Defender of Metro City. Finally, there is some evidence from the comics which, although not truly considered canon, as I’ve mentioned before, do offer some material for fan theories. In the “episode” entitled Bad Minion! Bad! Megamind runs into the Warden in a bar, and the latter offers the former advice. There is certainly a somewhat fatherly feel to the scene.

The second theory is exactly the opposite: that the Warden either did not care for or outright disliked the former supervillain. Unfortunately, as fun as the Warden/Father Figure concept is, this second, darker idea has far stronger evidence to support it in the film itself. (Try not to hate me, everyone.) These clues range from the obvious to the subtle, but there are quite a few of them to be found.

During the first scene in which we see Warden interact with Megamind, he doesn’t behave like an angry, disappointed father—at least not a good one. He isn’t merely surly toward Megamind; he is absolutely nasty. The Warden verbally condemns the alien, telling him that he’ll “always be a villain,” and essentially steals what he believes is a gift for the blue man, even taunting him by saying: “I think I’ll keep it!” This hardly seems like the actions of someone who once felt any sort of affection for the extraterrestrial. That same portion of the movie holds another clue as well: the screens monitoring Megamind’s brain activity. Indeed, in original concept art for the film, the system appears both more invasive and more nightmarish. It seems that, far from protecting Megamind, the Warden may have actually allowed him to be experimented upon.

Next, there is the newspaper article at the beginning of the title sequence, which bears the headline “Hometown Boy Makes Bad.” It’s hard to see what the paper says, of course, even if you bother to really notice it, but luckily for us Liz (Demishock) wrote a wonderfully thorough blog post which, among other things, provides a transcript of the “news story.” In it, the Warden is quoted as referring to young Megamind as a born villain as well as abnormal.

You don't know this kid. I've watched the little criminal since he was in diapers. This kid is just a bad seed. I've got experienced, hardened criminals in here who are afraid of him - I mean, have you seen the size of his head?… It's not like he's a normal kid… I mean, have you gotten a good look at his gigantic blue head? I don't know where you come from, but where I come it's just not right.

Granted, there seems to be some truth to what the Warden is saying, as the article also mentions that Megamind, who can hardly have been more than seven years old at the time, has basically been put into solitary confinement for the safety of other prisoners following an unnamed incident, adding that the other inmates “refused to point fingers for fear of retaliation.” (This fits with the fan theory that young Megamind would have had to both fight and develop a fearsome reputation in order to protect himself. You can read more about that in the post How Strong is Megamind?) However, the Warden seems to dwell a lot on the fact that Megamind looks alien, and he displays an obvious dislike for the young boy.

Finally, there is evidence hidden in the school scene, although it’s easy to miss. In an amazing two-part video series, Megamind: A City of Deception. YouTuber The Theorizer illustrates several hidden clues about Megamind’s early life and how it it led him to embrace villainy. (I will very likely write another post going into more detail about that at a later date.) One thing that The Theorizer discovered is a seemingly innocuous detail in the background during the popcorn scene. Take a moment to examine the images below. Look closely at the blackboard and you’ll see a paper cut out of a school bus. Look even more closely at that and you’ll find something odd: the bus is full of crayon-drawn children except for one figure: an adult male, riding in the back of the bus, who looks suspiciously like the Warden as he appears at the beginning of the film.

In a movie where so much attention is given to small things—I mean, seriously, the animation team actually went through the trouble to write a news story for a paper that was on the screen less than ten seconds—this cannot possibly be a coincidence. (You can learn more about the artists’ amazing dedication to detail in my post What’s Hidden in the Animation?) Although it is vaguely possible that Megamind, painfully aware of how much his appearance was despised, chose to draw the Warden’s face instead of his own, most fans believe there is a darker reason for this oddity.

Think about it: the Li’l Gifted School for Li’l Gifted Kids is built close by a jail with a strangely similar name: Metro City Prison for the Criminally Gifted. It’s clearly a small academy, yet the only two known aliens in the city—who, by the way, have extremely different social backgrounds—both just happen to attend there. And now the prison warden appears to be somehow involved with the elementary school? It’s bizarre. Add to this the fact that the young alien adopted by a privileged family—a boy who possessed super-strength and laser vision—seemed inclined to be a bully, (as is made obvious by the kickball scene,) and a disturbing fan theory emerges. Adults realized that Wayne Smith, the child who would eventually become Metro Man, might prove dangerous if left unchecked, and came up with a plan to turn him into a hero instead. Wayne was showered with praise, conditioning him to seek public approval, but a superhero needs a nemesis. The strange-looking, unwanted blue boy who’d already been labeled a criminal would have seemed like the obvious choice. If this is true, then Megamind was purposefully, albeit covertly, groomed to become a supervillain from a young age, and the Warden played a major role in doing that.

So there you have it. Two competing fan theories concerning the Warden’s connection with Megamind. Both have some evidence supporting them, and there are fans who are firmly dedicated to one or the other. Which is true? Did the Warden care for Megamind like a son but distance himself when the boy turned to villainy? Or did he judge and despise Megamind but come around to liking him when he finally realized what sort of person the blue man was deep down? The fact is that those questions can be argued for hours on end. No matter which of these suppositions you prefer, however, the mere fact that even a minor supporting character is complex enough to offer room for this debate speaks to the impressive amount of work and devotion that went into creating this amazing animated film.

#Megamind #Megamind movie #Megamind fan theory #fan theory #fan theories #fanon #Warden #the Warden #connection #relationship #relationships

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mimzy-writing-online · 4 years

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Writing A Blind/Visually Impaired Character: Canes, Guide Dogs, O&M

Wow, back in June I decided to take a few months break from blogging to recharge and focus on my mental health. About a month ago I began writing this specific post, slowly and in stages because of how demanding, detailed, and long it is.

I’m not sure when I planned to come back. I have about 200 posts with tags and image description in my drafts folder, waiting to be queued, but I wanted to finish this guide before I fully came back.

Come back with a bang, right?

But this blog, and specifically, my Writing a Blind or Visually Impaired Character guide, has gotten so much traffic and support that I felt incredibly motivated to come back now.

So I finished the guide, and now here it is. It’s been a year+ in the making. Since the very beginning of this writing advice series about writing blind characters, I’ve promised to write a guide specifically about canes, guide dogs, O&M, and other accessibility measures the blind community relies on.

In fact, if you look at my master post for this guide (now pinned at the first post on my blog) you’ll find that it was reserved as Part Four, even as other guides and additions were added over the last year.

In this post I’ll be explaining

What Orientation and Mobility (O&M) is

How one learns O&M

About canes, from different types of canes and their parts, as well as how to use a cane.

I will be explaining the sensory experiences of using a cane and how to describe it in narrative.

I will include small mannerisms long-time cane uses might develop.

At the very end will be a section on guide dogs, but this will be limited to research because I have no personal experience with guide dogs, being a cane user.

Disclaimer: I am an actual visually impaired person who has been using a cane for nearly three years and has been experiencing vision loss symptoms for a few years longer than that. This guide is based on both my experiences and my research. My experiences are not universal however because every blind person has a unique experience with their blindness

What Is Orientation & Mobility

Orientation and Mobility (O&M) is the specific skill of understanding and navigating the world safely and confidently with vision loss.

I’m going to quote Vision Aware’s specific definition [link]

"Orientation" refers to the ability to know where you are and where you want to go, whether you're moving from one room to another or walking downtown for a shopping trip.

"Mobility" refers to the ability to move safely, efficiently, and effectively from one place to another, such as being able to walk without tripping or falling on steps or elevation changes, crossing streets, and using public transportation

O&M can involve :

-learning how to use a cane, as well as what cane works best for you

-safely navigating obstacles with your cane, including stairs, ramps, elevators, uneven or curved sidewalks, through crowds, around furniture

-learning safe strategies for crossing the street

-planning routes to new or recurring locations

-using technology enroute, including GPS and apps like Uber and Lyft

-safely accessing public transportation

-how to ask for help when needed

-working with human sighted guides

A Note on the Blind Community and Their Relationship with Canes

The Perkins School for the Blind estimates that only 2-8% of the blind community rely on canes for navigation. The rest rely on remaining vision, guide dogs, and sighted guides. Only about 2% of the blind community relies on guide dogs however, and to get a guide dog in the first place, a person must go through O&M classes and use a cane for six months before they can sign up for a guide dog.

What this means is that 90% of the blind community don’t use a cane.

I didn’t know this fact until I begun research for this guide, and that number astounds me.

Truth be told, while I have navigated my life without a cane before, I can’t imagine going back to the way it was before I got it. Even if I only need my cane some of the time, I can’t bear to not use it in the situations I need it. Having a cane made my life a lot easier, a lot safer.

I don’t know what to attribute this number to.

I might attribute it to the concepts of invisible vs. visible disability, internalized ableism, or the feeling of ‘not being blind enough’ for a cane, as well as accessibility to the blind community and knowledge, and access to buying a cane in the first place. I could write a thing about it, but if I try it’s gonna be its own post.

Onward~

How Do You Learn O&M? How Will My Character Learn?

You will have to find an Orientation and Mobility instructor and have them personally teach you O&M skills.

The O&M Instructor is a sighted adult who has gone to school for a bachelor’s degree and gone through O&M training themselves while blindfolded, usually fulfilling a certain requirement of hours (one program required 400 hours of O&M practice blindfolded before you could become certified), and apply for certification to teach O&M.

(Or, as is the process to become an instructor in the United States, where I am from. Becoming an instructor would vary in other countries, I’m sure)

To find an O&M instructor, you would reach out to your local school or foundation for the blind. Finding your nearest school for the blind could be done through…

Google search

Your Ophthalmologist (eye doctor) referring you to a school for the blind

A Social Service Worker reaching out to you and helping you contact the school

Possibly your school (as in grade/primary school, high school, university) reaching out to the nearest school for the blind on your behalf.

Unfortunately, there is not an abundance of schools and foundations, so your nearest might still be a far travel distance. My local school is a 45 minute drive away. For some it might a few hours away.

This is, again, a U.S. experience, because our land mass is spaced out, and something like a six hour drive feels like nothing to most people (although is highly impractical and very difficult to a blind person who cannot drive themselves), but in other countries a six hour drive would mean crossing several borders, and other countries have different social programs.

There is not a full and complete database of every available school for the blind either, no one website to find every possible option. For example, the school I went to wasn’t listed in most of the website resources I found, even though it has seven branches and locations.

This is more a complaint at the real life struggle to find disabled services, that there are few comprehensive resources out there. If you ask me, it should be made significantly easier to find and access your local blind communities. Accessibility and disabled services should be easily available everywhere.

If your story is based in a real world location, googling ‘school for the blind (city/county/country)’ should suffice in finding the one most local to your setting.

What might a school for the blind provide for your character?

Well, on top of helping your character connect to an O&M instructor, a school for the blind might provide other rehabilitation classes and access to additional resources.

Those rehabilitation classes could include lessons on:

-Reading/Writing Braille & using brailling machines

-Technology classes for screen readers, magnifiers, etc on your computer and smart phone.

My local school has separate classes specific to Andriod, iOS, JAWS, Zoomtext Fusion

-Independent Living skills (cooking, cleaning, organizing, planning how to get groceries and medications)

-Self Improvement (dancing, art, music, self defense. These were classes my school taught)

The additional resources form these schools might include-

Referrals to counselors for coping with vision loss

Access to their audio-book and braille library

Access to magnifier devices, brailler machines (think of a typewriter for writing braille)

Some schools also offer grade-school or high-school education, meaning blind children/teens learn there instead of a mainstream school.

Some schools have lodgings for clients to stay at while going through rehabilitation, especially if the vision loss is sudden and severe. They live on-campus and take part in classes. Other schools only have day classes offered and you need to find transportation for every visit. Many schools might have a rehabilitation specialist or O&M instructor visit you in your home.

My local school did the last two. They had on site classes, but the school is a 45 minute drive from me, so I only visited a few times. They were able to send an O&M instructor to me.

On Wednesdays at 3 pm she would drive to my house and give me lessons on using my cane. Those included her driving me to different locations to practice certain skills (like using stairs and escalators at the mall, or crossing a moderately busy intersection, or visiting a bus station to practice boarding a bus safely and communication with a bus driver where my stop was).

She also brought multiple different types of canes for new students to try out and determine which felt best for them.

The Many Types of Canes

Long Canes are used to sweep the immediate area in front of the cane user as they’re walking. This is the cane type that the general public is most familiar with seeing. There are several sub-types of long canes. They can also be called white canes or probing canes.

[Image Description: Man in business clothes traveling on the side walk with a white and red cane. End Image Description]

White cane can be a misnomer for two reasons: One, the concept of the standard cane for the blind can look different in different countries. In America, the standard is white with a red tip. In some countries the standard is an all-white cane. In some countries an all white cane might mean the user is blind while a white cane with a red tip means the user is deaf-blind.

Two, some companies like Ambutech allow customers to customize their cane colors and tips. Example: Molly Burke’s hot pink cane. My white cane with a purple tip. An all black or all sky blue or all red or all purple cane. A black cane with a blue or purple tip. Ambutech also allows customers to request neon-colored reflective tape to make their canes more visible at night.

Probing cane is not a term I’ve personally heard before, but it is a term Vision Aware uses on their website.

There are three main types of long canes:

Non-folding Canes: a cane that has no sections, cannot be folded or collapsed.

[Image Description: stock photo of man in business suit with a non-folding all white cane. End Image Description]

Folding Canes: The cane has 3-6 sections depending on its height. The taller the cane, the more sections it has. The sections are separate pieces that are made to snap together and are held together by a strong elastic rope inside the sections.

[Image Description: a folding cane with four sections, white with a red tip, and a rolling marshmallow tip. End Image Description]

Telescopic Canes: in which the sections slide into each other, similar to a telescope/spyglass, rather than pulling apart and folding. The handle is the widest section, and the tip section is the thinnest.

[Image Description: Three stacked images of a blue telescopic cane. First is of the cane completely collapsed. Second is of the sections partially sliding out. Third is the cane sections completely out and locked.]

Beyond that is also the Identification Cane. The function of this cane is to visibly identify the user as blind. It’s not used for O&M the way long canes are, there is no sweeping out the next two steps. It can be used as a support cane, however.

It’s appeals most to the elderly who not only make up a huge percentage of the blind community, but might also benefit most from having both a support cane and an identifier for their blindness, in case they need assistance.

[Image Description: identification cane with curved handle. All white with red tip. End Image Description]

A note: From what I’ve heard in the blind community, some people prefer solid/non-folding canes over folding or telescopic canes. The reason for this is that solid canes transfer vibration better than folding or telescopic canes. It’s said that the more sections a cane has, the less precise the vibrations are.

Some cane users train themselves to understand the vibrations of the surfaces their canes are touching. It tells them what kind of surface they’re on (wood vs. marble vs. concrete), if there are nearby objects to their cane. While I rely somewhat on cane vibrations to tell me what surface I’m walking on (more on that later), it is beyond my current O&M abilities to use cane vibrations to sense nearby walls or objects.

Cane vibrations are just an additional information-sense to add to the others in use, and extra bit of data input.

Parts of the Cane: Materials, Handle, Tips, Sections, Elastic Band

Material

The three most common types of materials used to make canes are aluminum, carbon-fiber, and fiberglass. Each material has some drawbacks and benefits.

The ideal cane is lightweight and durable. It should be strong enough to withstand hitting something solid without bending or splintering.

Aluminum is strong and durable, but heavy. If it’s damage, it’s more likely to bend than break entirely. A bend can be straightened out, but it takes considerable strength.

Carbon-fiber is lightweight and durable. It’s stronger than fiberglass, and it can bend out of shape rather than splintering.

Fiberglass is lightweight but a bit rigid. If it breaks, it splinters.

Handles and Elastic Bands

While some canes can have specialized grips (plastic, wood, corkboard) the most common handle material is a black rubber handle that is about ten inches long, give or take. In the previous photos you’ve seen, the canes have had black rubber handles.

Here is an example of a cane with a wood-mesh material used as the handle.

[Image Description: a four section white cane with a red tip and a orange wood mesh handle, with black elastic band attached. End Image Description]

The benefits of black rubber handles over others are that it’s easier to hold onto, especially if your palms are wet or sweaty, than a plastic or polished wood handle. It also wouldn’t show the indents or scratches from wear and tear daily use. I’m guessing that is cheaper to make on the manufacturing standpoint, and thus is conveniently the standard.

Pay attention to the black elastic band attached to the handle in the above photo. Notice how it has a tied off loop? That is so that when the cane is folded, that loop can be stretched over the folded sections to hold it together.

[Image Description: a four section folding cane folded up with the black band around them. End Image Description]

Additional benefits or functions of the elastic could be to use it as a wrist strap while using the cane, or hanging it up on a hook while not in use. I tend to have my cane folded up and tuck my wrist under the strap to hold it more securely while carrying it. Images of that ahead in my cane-isms section.

Cane Height

Ideal cane heights depend on the user. For most users, you want your cane height to be to your shoulder, give or take a few inches. You might need a longer cane if you are a fast walker with long strides, or a shorter cane if you prefer to hold your cane at a lower angle than is traditional.

What I mean when I talk about holding your cane at a certain angle is that the standard is to hold your cane handle in your dominant hand and position it in front of your belly button, moving it side to side with each step. Traditional grip methods are holding your hand palm side up with your cane in hand, or to hold the cane at the section joint closest to the handle with what is called the pencil grip, holding the cane like a fat pencil.

Depending on the height, a cane can have anywhere between three and six sections. Longer canes have more sections. The top section includes the handle, and the last section includes the stripe color (traditionally red, unless customized) and the tip.

The sections of the cane are generally slightly reflective, regardless of color. If you hold a cane up to the light you’ll see tiny specks of light reflected back, almost like very fine, tiny particle glitter paint. This detail is important in cane production because it makes the cane more visible at night, especially if something like car headlights reflect off it while someone is crossing.

Additional visibility at night can be added by wrapping stripes of reflective tape along the shaft.

Cane Tips

There are several different tip options for canes.

[Image Description: four different types of cane tips on a blue background with labels. From left to right: marshmallow tip, ball tip, pencil tip, glide tip.]

[Image Description: a rolling marshmallow tip with a blue background. End Image Description]

[Image Description: Bandu basher tip with a white background. For anyone not familiar with the name, the long, curved cane tip that looks like a hockey stick. End Image Description]

Some of these tips are better for the tap-tap method of cane travel, as in tapping the spots where you plan to step. They can also be used to feel out the shapes of objects, stairs, etc.

marshmallow tip, pencil tip,

They should not be scraped over surfaces, the tips will wear down much faster than they should. There are better tips for rolling over surface

Some tips are better for the rolling method of cane travel, which is the method I use. They aren’t great for tapping, but it can be done in a pinch.

rolling marshmallow tip, ball tip, glide tip

The Bandu Basher tip, the hockey stick shaped tip, is best for hovering an inch off the ground and lightly tapping objects. It could be tapped. It should not be scraped over the ground like a rolling tip. It hovers.

After enough use, the tips will wear down and need to be replaced. The part of the tip that has the most contact with the ground, usually the edge of the shape, gets scrapes, sands down, and eventually begins to look like it was shaved off while still having bits of plastic still gripped to it.

Never fear, cane tips can be removed and replaced when they wear out, replacing the whole cane is not necessary.

Some tips slip on or twist on. Others hook on. By hook on I mean that the elastic that keeps the cane sections together also has a loop at the tip end that a hook onto and stay held into place. Look back at the photo of the rolling marshmallow tip and you will see the hook that attaches to the black elastic.

Cane tips sell for about 5 - 10 U.S. dollars, plus shipping, so it’s advised to buy several back up tips with your cane. I replace my rolling marshmallow tips once every six to twelve months. I don’t know if that’s considered too much or too often. The last time I needed to replace mine was June 2019 (It’s July 2020 at the date of writing this, but I’ve hardly left my home for the last six months because of COVID-virus related quarantine/social distancing.)

Sensory Details/Describing What Using a Cane Feels Like

Every surface type feels and sounds different when tapping or rolling a cane over it. It’s this difference that tells us a lot about our environment.

It tells us when we stepped off the side walk onto the grass, when we’ve walked inside because the concrete changes to wood or carpet flooring. These little details become trail markers too, useful for places we anticipate traveling to a lot.

Example: A week before every semester in college, I would travel to each of the classrooms and learn necessary routes. I learned that certain paths had giant cracks in the sidewalk that would be distinct enough to use as a trail marker to where I was on a path, or that certain paths went from cement to gravel, or cement to brick.

Carpet: The sound is very soft, and if you’re rolling your cane across carpet it sounds like a quiet swish-swish-swish. Tapping sounds depend on how thick the carpet padding underneath is, the thicker the carpet the softer the sound. If there’s a lot of padding then taps don’t make much sound, but if the padding is thin or underneath the carpet is tile or concrete then you hear a louder thudding tap. It’s still pretty quiet. If you’re rolling the cane you would feel a little bit of drag, the cane moves slower over the carpet. The thicker or shaggier the carpet is, the more drag it has.

Wood floor: Cane tips make rumbling sounds when rolling over wood floors. The smoother the wood, the less it rumbles. There’s a little vibration moving from the cane tip, through the cane and into your hand as you roll over wood planks. Very small. The more sensitive you are to vibrations, the more you feel it. Tapping makes hallow, thudding sounds on the wood. Sometimes they sound a little snappish if you’re tapping harshly. You feel stronger vibrations when tapping. Older wood feels softer, with more give. New wood is stronger, more vibrations in the cane.

Tile:It depends on the size of the tiles and the wideness of the grout lines, but it’s not a pleasant feeling. Tiles have grout lines, which are little divets between the tiles. The smaller the tiles or rougher the grout lines are, the more the cane vibrates in your hands. Every bump is felt running from the cane to your hand. The sound is a little grating too. Imagine fifty sets of stiletto shoes walking on tile, that’s what it sounds like when you roll your cane over rough, small tiles. Larger tiles with smoother grout lines aren’t so bad. Tapping the tile with your cane sounds like one really loud step of a stiletto heal, one step for each tap. Tile floors are usually found in bathrooms, kitchens, and industrial locations where the room is going to have harder walls (more tile, concrete, etc) and few furniture, so the room echoes more.

Linoleum: is a smooth even surface. It feels like your cane is gliding when you roll it, barely feeling any vibrations. The rolling sounds are very soft because of the lack of bumps, however tapping sounds are a bit louder. Not as snappish as tile or marble, but almost.

Marble: is similar to linoleum in its smoothness. Your cane glides when rolling. Tapping sounds are sharp. Because marble floors are common in high end malls, luxury homes, and fancy office building entries, places that usually have high ceilings and hard walls with minimal decorations and minimalist furnishing, those sharp tapping sounds may echo. Assuming there isn’t too much noise and the environment is relatively quiet.

Concrete: (I’m referring to concrete found in parking garages and industrial buildings, not sidewalk) It depends on the age of the concrete and how it’s maintained. Old concrete with lots of cracks and mini-craters feels very different from smooth concrete that was set less than a year ago. With old concrete there’s a rattling sound as your cane tip rolls over the bumps and those vibrations travel up your cane. New concrete can feel similar to marble or linoleum. The taps are loud thuds on dull concrete and sharper on new concrete.

Sidewalks: are made of concrete, but in my experience they feel a little different than the above example. Sidewalks have a grittier surface, they’re slightly rougher, more dry. There’s a bit more rolling cane vibration with sidewalks and the taps have more of a thud sound. And because they’re outside, you’re unlikely to hear any echoes unless you’re walking in an alley or between buildings.

Asphalt: is one of the worst surfaces in my personal opinion. Asphalt is the material used in roads and it’s made to be rough and gritty so that car tires can grip onto it and not lose traction while driving. The older and more damaged it is, the rougher it is. Because it’s rough the vibrations are much stronger, sometimes irritatingly so. I can’t roll my cane over asphalt because the bones in my hand can’t handle those kinds of vibrations, so I almost always use the tapping method instead. The sounds are gritty and dull. Unfortunately, asphalt is an unavoidable surface, unless you can find a way to never need to cross a street or walk through a parking lot.

Note: the white or yellow lines that have been painted into asphalt sometimes feel smoother because of the material they’re made of and because they’re added after the asphalt has been laid down.

Note: There’s something called tarmac which is similar to asphalt, used for a similar purpose, and more common in the U.K. (I believe) but I can’t say that I’ve ever knowingly walked on it so I have no personal experience to give you.

Gravel: Another one of those evil surfaces. Gravel is just loose rocks and they’re common in rural roads, driveways, some landscaping. The looseness of them is what makes them untrustworthy. It makes a crunching sound. If you roll your cane, you’re likely to end up tossing small bits of rock and dust here and there. If you tap, you’ll hear the crunch but your brain might not translate that into “it’s gravel” until you’re walking on it and only realize when you walk over it and the sharp rocks begin digging into your shoes.

Wood Chips: I don’t have any experience with this since vision loss and getting a cane, so I’m using my memories of being on the playground in grade school because the surface on the playground was wood chips. I’d say wood ships are a love child between gravel and wood floors. The surface is loose and rolling your cane over it would kick up loose chips and dust. It would probably sound similar to walking on sand I think, because wood chips are much softer than gravel but not as consistent as wood. If it’s rained recently, then the waterlogged wood chips sound even softer.

Hard Dirt: I’m thinking dirt roads here, which are a lesser evil to asphalt and gravel. They can be rough like all roads, but the material isn’t has hard and solid. Rolling your cane will kick up dust on a dry day, but if it rained a few days ago you might hear a soft crunch as you roll over wet dirt. Tapping will have a very soft thud.

Soft Dirt: Think gardening dirt. Because it��s so soft, it makes very little sound and is easily kicked up. There’s a bit of drag, about the same or slightly more drag than grass or sand. Tapping has almost no sound but you might feel a slight give as your tip lands in the dirt, a slight resistance as it sinks in.

Mud: Yuck. I’m imagining this getting in my cane tip and how gross it would be after. Sound and feeling depend on how wet the mud is. Wet mud sounds slurpy. There’s more squish if you roll or tap your cane. Your character might not identify it right away until their shoes begin slipping as they walk over the mud. This is a personal experience. Drier mud sounds soft and feels almost solid underneath your cane. Wetter mud has more drag for a rolling cane. Muddy areas are also generally uneven because top soil has been displaced, so muddy hills and fields have unexpected but usually subtle changes in elevation.

Puddles: have both a slurpy and splash-splash sound. The slurpy sound is more common with rolling cane techniques. The splash sound is more common with tapping. The deeper the puddle, the louder is sounds and the more drag you experience. I am not fond of this texture/experience.

Snow: I have zero experience with snow since the development of blindness. So no experience of what it’s like to walk through with a cane. This is something I hope a blind reader can inform me on so I can edit this at a later date. My best guess is that it has a soft crunch, softer than the crunch of shoes in snow. A lot of drag too. Rolling through snow would probably be near impossible, especially if it’s deep snow or hard packed. Again, my best guess. The last time I experienced snow was when I was twelve.

Grass: One of my least favorites personally. Too much drag. Worse than shag carpeting. It’s very soft and doesn’t make much sound either. Like a crisp crunch you can barely hear. If the grass is wet or frosty you hear it a bit more crunch.

Surface with fallen Autumn leaves: Leaves everywhere! This is a bit dependant on whatever surface the leaves are on. It would soften the sound of cement, but there would be a louder crunch on grass. If the leaves are big and very curvy/pocketed then they’re easy to push aside. Smaller, flatter leaves don’t push as easily. The driest ones will crunch under your cane. It’s fun sometimes, if you’re the kind of person who likes stepping on leaves on purpose, but if you can’t see the leaves it might lose some of its fun and be more unexpected.

Sand: I’ve never personally taken my cane to the beach, despite living so close to the coast. The reason is because beach sand is so squishy and loose that it’s already impossible to stay steady on your feet. The sand is always sinking under your feet, unless you’re next to the water line and the dampness has made it firmer. So a cane isn’t very useful to me at the beach. Not to mention that sand isn’t something you want inside your cane joints if you want the cane to last. Sand will erode and damage the joints, regardless of if they’re metal or plastic. If I were to take my cane to the beach, it would make the softest crunching-swishy noise of sand sliding over sand, similar to what your footsteps sound like on sand, but possibly even quieter because canes are lighter.

Side Note: My mother sarcastically asked about rolling your cane through dog poop or gum left on the floor. Can’t say I’ve ever rolled through it, so couldn’t tell you. Use your imagination I guess, Mum

The Invention of Tactile Paving

These are amazing! Tactile Paving are those yellow (or sometimes grey) bumpy squares you see on ramps leading into parking lots or when crossing the street. In 1965, Japanese engineer Seiichi Miyake used his own money to develop a tactile brick that you could feel even when walking over it with shoes, and he designed this because a friend of his was losing their vision and he wanted to help. These are amazing, and accessible to everyone, even the blind who don’t have a cane or guide dog. These are literal life savers. Before I got my cane, if I felt those bumps under my shoes I knew to immediately stop because I was about to walk into the road. Because less than 10% of the blind community uses canes or guide dogs, this is the most accessible form of blind aide available.

[Image Description: a yellow rectangle of tactile paving in front of a ramp leading into a parking lot. End Image Description]

Note: similar detail, most doors in commercial buildings (in my localized experience) have a metal plate on the threshold to hold the door in place so there are no cracks underneath. The metal scraping sound when you roll or tap your cane on it is distinct but temporary and non-repeating, so it’s a good indication that you’ve reached and passed the threshold.

Blind-isms

I have a section in this guide about blind-isms, but these ones are focused specifically on cane use.

-Do. Not. Touch. My. Cane. Don’t. Just fucking don’t.

-The above ism comes from the fact that our cane is our safety net, an extension of our body, our eyes, the one thing that makes sure we’ll get somewhere safely. For that reason, blind people hate having their canes (or their on duty guide dogs) touched by strangers, acquaintances, friends we’re not very close to, some family members.

Important Note: That is a universal thing for disabled people. Don’t. Touch. Their. Mobility Aides. It’s assault. Touching someone’s wheelchair or pushing them around without their expressed permission is assault. Moving their wheelchair while the user is currently standing is assault. (Most wheelchair users are not paralyzed, but they still need the wheelchair because of their medical condition, which is not your business to know). It doesn’t matter if the wheelchair is in the way, the disabled person needs it right there, do not touch it. Touching or grabbing someone’s support cane or their long cane is assault. Touching or moving someone’s walker is assault. Touching, poking at, or tampering with someone’s hearing aids is assault. Touching their oxygen tank or cannula is assault.

Back on topic-

-Idle motions with your cane while waiting in line. I often rest my chin on my cane or lean on it

-twirl my cane like a staff when I’m alone and no one can see. I would not ever do this in front of anyone because I don’t want anyone thinking it’s a toy or they can just touch or grab it. I’m just a little childish and bored sometimes and idle motions are a common thing for people with ADHD.

-When carrying my folded cane inside (like say a store) I hang it from my wrist by the strap.

-Keeping my cane within arms reach at all times, even in situations where I don’t need it currently. Example: if we’re doing a classroom assignment where I need to leave my desk, I know the classroom well enough to not use my cane, but I won’t leave it at my desk, ever. (This does not apply at home. And in the homes of a very few, very trusted friends I will leave it somewhere I deem safe.)

-Having a set, specific place in my home (living with my immediate family, who almost never have guests) for my cane. In my case, it’s the top of an antique dresser in the living room, across from the door. It has a little bowl for my sunglasses as well. If I move out and have roommates, my cane will be in my room.

-Love me a bag or backpack that has enough space to discretely store your cane, but most of my bags cannot do that.

-People with folding canes develop a muscle memory for folding and unfolding their cane, so they can do it without really thinking about it.

-Unfolding my cane: I hold the black handle between my thumb and palm with my other fingers folded over the remaining three sections, cane tip pointing up. I slide the elastic over the tip, loosen my four fingers and roll my wrist to the side. The red colored section unfolds first and snaps into place with its neighboring section. I roll my wrist in the opposite direction so the next white section can unfold and snap into place with it’s neighboring section. Roll it back in the first direction and the third section snaps into place with the handle. My four section cane is now unfolded and straight.

-Sometimes I just grab the black handle and let the sections fall and unfold as they will, but this is less controlled and risks your cane bumping into something or someone.

-Folding my cane: I start with the black handle, lifting it up so the joints unlock. I fold it down, grab both sections in my hand and lift the second section away from the third and fold it over. Wrap my hand over all three sections and unlock it from the red section.

-Because I have a four section folding cane, the cane tip and the handle are on the same side while the metal joints are on the opposite side. Those metal joints are what my elastic slips over.

-A three or five folding cane will have the head of the handle (and its elastic) on the opposite side of the cane tip, and you will be folding the elastic over the cane joints and tip.

-A six section cane has the tip and handle facing the same direction like the four section cane.

-People with non-folding canes like leaning their canes up against walls and other objects when not in use. Corners are popular, the corner of a desk up against a wall too.

-But oh god the frustration when the cane randomly rolls out of place and hits the floor, it’s a combination of “Not again” and “did that really just happen” and “you had one job. one job.”

-Sitting with our cane tucked between our legs. Picture a bit of man spreading, the cane tip leaned against the side of our foot to keep it stable and the cane leaning against our shoulder or opposite knee, possibly also held securely with our fingers too.

-The no-manspreading alternative of that is with the cane leaning against our shoulder, cane tip resting on the toe of our shoe or the outside of it, held securely with our fingers or our arm wrapped around it, elbow hooking it.

(Okay, a while back I was looking for photos of someone using a cane to use as a reference for drawing Ulric. I only found three, and two of them were Daredevil promo photos. Which, no offense to Charlie Cox, but he is not blind and he does not use a cane in his daily life, he does not have that relationship a blind person has with a cane and the concept of a fifth limb, and it shows. So the photos were stiff and unusable, so I had to like use several photo references of different poses and Frankenstein them together to get what I wanted.

And I still haven’t finished the painting... fuck)

-In a car with a non-folding cane:

-Right passenger seat- The cane tip goes all the way into the corner of the foot well to the right of my feet, with the handle resting over my right shoulder or on the seatbelt. It pokes a bit past my headrest. The longer the cane, the harder it is to tuck into a car.

-The U.K. / Austrailian / New Zealand / Japan version of this (because they drive on the left side of the road with their drivers seats on the right side of the car) it’s like this: Cane tip in the foot well to the left of my feet, handle on my left shoulder or on the seatbelt.

Backseat: the absolute worst. There’s less foot well room, and if you’re in a sedan there is almost no room behind your shoulder for the handle. I position my cane diagonally with the handle on the shoulder closest to the door and the tip next to the foot closest to the middle.

-For this reason, no one with a non-folding cane will want to be sitting in the backseat.

About Guide Dogs

While my knowledge of guide dogs is limited only to what I can research and not personal, I will give you some basic facts and practical knowledge from said research.

Guiding Eyes for the Blind estimates that there are 10,000 guide dog teams out there in the world. That makes up 2% of the blind and visually impaired community.

Guide Dog Training

Becoming a guide dog is the most difficult form of dog training there is. The majority of dogs who enter guide dog training wash out and either become family dogs or go into a different type of service dog training, like medical response or PTSD/anxiety response, or possibly become therapy dogs, which is a career altogether different from being a service dog.

Guide dogs go through two or three years of training, which includes puppy training, basic socialization, proper behavior when on duty and actual guide training. Most service dogs only go through a year to a year and a half of training before they are partnered with a disabled handler.

Between the cost of training, the cost of housing and feeding the dog and the cost of vet bills from birth until being partnered with a blind handler, the overall cost of a guide dog is something like 30k to 40k. While most service dog training organizations require handlers to fundraise and pay for the cost of training (usually something like 15-30k), guide dog organizations give their dogs to qualified blind clients for free. These organizations pay for the dog costs through their own fundraising and charities. Fortunately for these organizations, guide dogs are a highly respected field and have a lot more charity directed their way, while other service dog types have less public interest when it comes to charity.

Guide Dog organizations have an application process, requirements, and a wait-list before you can be partnered with a guide dog.

Requirements to get a guide dog are (usually) as follows:

Must be legally blind (as in not visually impaired, but legally blind) and have had at least six months of O&M with a cane and demonstrate enough O&M stills to navigate by oneself. They also require you to be responsible enough to independently care for a dog, able to keep up with training and retraining of the dog, as well as financially able to handle food and vet bills (which are at least a few thousand dollars every year).

The reason for cane training before getting a guide dog is because the dog cannot do everything for you. You, the dog handler, are responsible for knowing where you are and how to get where you need to be.

The dog can’t read stop signs or tell when a light is green or red, nor do they have GPS to find a brand new location nor can they learn that route on the first try, nor will they know exactly where you want to go when you say “Starbucks” or “library” or “school” or “mom’s house” and guide you all by themselves. That falls on you, the dog handler, having enough orientation and mobility skills to know when a street is safe to cross and knowing how to learn new routes and how to keep on route and make sure you make the correct turns. A guide dog can’t communicate with bus drivers for you either, they don’t know which number bus to use or what stop to choose. That falls on the blind person’s own skill.

Other Guide Dog Resources

Molly Burke is a guide dog user and has made several videos about what kind of work guide dogs do, her personal experience being a guide dog user for over ten years, how she got a guide dog, specific commands, unique experiences with things like travel, etc. She has a playlist all about guide dogs, but here are some of my favorite videos.

How Guide Dogs Guide A Blind Person

Guide Dog User Answers the Most Googled Questions about Guide Dogs

How I Met My First Guide Dog

Final Thoughts:

There is a lot more to be said about Orientation and Mobility, such as:

How do you safely cross the street with a cane?

How do you learn new routes?

How does getting a cane significantly change your life?

How do family, friends, and strangers react to you “suddenly” having a cane?

I could also write a ton on other tools the blind community relies on so strongly, such as screen readers, magnifiers, etc. In fact, I originally promised to include those in my master post when Part Four was titled Part Four: What Your Blind Character Needs to Survive and Not Die. However, this guide is ages long and it feels better to focus on this specific topic for here.

Did you like this guide?

Consider checking out my other guides, links of which can be found on the master post here.

Follow my blog, I write and curate writing advice guides outside of blindness, I reblog writing memes with image descriptions, reblog soothing aesthetic photos with image descriptions, talk about disability, lgbtqa+ issues, ableism, and mental health.

If you want to further support me, this is the link to my ko-fi (however there is no such requirement nor pressure to do so, and please don’t worry about it, especially if you are in a financial situation that can’t afford it)

#writing advice #writeblr #writing community #writing tips #blind character #character crafting

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spotofimagines · 3 years

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Rivals Last ~ Jadon Sancho

A/N: So I had this in my drafts before he signed with man united but that's fine, we move, we adapt. A third piece for the @footballffbarbiex summer challenge. Hope you enjoy it :)

Warnings: none - reader is female

Summary: You love both your brothers dearly, but being in the football world with them can make some things a little complicated.

gif by @archivesbvb - gif by @ermuellert - gif by @italynt

Being a footballer meant living in a special world. Being in a footballing family meant living in a special world too. Being the younger sister of Lucas and Theo Hernandez meant living in a really special world. But nobody told you just how crazy it would be for all three of those things to apply to you.

You truly love watching your older brothers play football. They teach you something new during every match you see; even though you play as a striker, their movements and handling of the ball always inspire you to play better. After all, it was their defensive skills that helped you become a good goal scorer growing up since they never let a tackle go unchallenged in the park and you had to find out how to manoeuvre around them. A lot easier said than done.

Currently Lucas is signed with Bayern Munich. In his time there so far, he has learnt the heritage, history, and importance of wearing the badge and defending its honour in every match they play, especially derbies. Having supported Lucas, it quickly became easy for you to support Bayern Munich too and celebrate their victories like it was your own team. You'd always managed to do it with the clubs both your brothers played for, letting the atmosphere of the fanbase carry you away.

You have just finished your second season in England with Manchester City women's team. You'd settled in nicely now, having learnt a lot of the English language and culture already. The experience was made so much easier because of the help given by your welcoming teammates and the staff that translated things into French and Spanish during your first months there.

Fans were a little disappointed during the 2019 summer transfer window when it was confirmed all three Hernandez siblings would be leaving Spain to play separately in England, Germany and Italy, joking that no one could know what might happen with you all so far away. However, to you, it made things easier, as Lucas and Theo would stop making so many awful jokes about each other's clubs, only to join forces to diss your club even more afterward. Now the only connection you have to the clubs you all play for is the want for your sibling to win with them. And it is a great feeling. A welcome change of pace.

But no new change to your life felt as good as your blossoming "relationship", situationship, whatevership, you have with Jadon Sancho.

It all started with you flirting back and forth on social media, which turned itself into countless hours of DMs no one else could see. You congratulated his goals and he congratulated your wins. All the light-hearted teasing and the warm-hearted compliments stayed in your own little bubble. The only thing peeking out was your silly inside rule that if you were going to comment on a post, it had to be emojis only, stretching to a few words if you really couldn't help yourself - but it would earn you taunts from the other for the rest of the night.

Some eagle-eyed fans noticed how you'd been liking each other's posts every time they appeared for a while now, but it just added to the fun and thrill you got from flirting with him so much.

You weren't meant to be forming a bond with Jadon. He played for your brother’s rival. He was supposed to be the enemy. Someone you should dislike with a snap of your fingers. Certainly not a boy to fall for like you have.

You couldn't help yourself. Lucas and Theo had helped you since you moved to England by being the steady rocks they always were, cheering you on from afar. Your new teammates had helped you since you moved to England by introducing fun things for you all to do together and taking you under their wings. But Jadon had helped you in a different kind of way. He gave you a new kind of comfort and reassurance when you talked. He became someone to turn to with all your interesting news and your curious problems. He told you the good places to visit around the city that he remembered from his time there and taught you English slang to make your teammates laugh. You spoke three languages to varying degrees now, and you'd managed to pick up more German vicariously through Lucas in two years faster than Jadon had done living in Germany in four years, so you'd clue him into rude German phrases you had asked Lucas about, alongside the French and Spanish swear words he used more often than English ones now when you text.

Even though a language barrier comes up once in a while, you have both learnt behaviours from each other and crave the contact you share. Jadon was starting to drop everything to send replies to you, a change his teammates have noticed and jokingly mock him for. Little did they know the unknown girl they joke he is smitten over is the sister of their rival.

Theo is the one in your family you usually tell about the boys you go out with; boyfriends and dates have been shared with him since you were 13 and doting on your first crush. He does the same with his girlfriends; asking advice and telling you more than you need to know at times. So, when you all went home for a bit of family time around Christmas, nothing could stop him from noticing the tell-tale signs that you had something going on. He already figured out through persistence that it was another player you were getting involved with, and his insistent questioning hasn't stopped in his search for who the player is.

But you keep it hidden from Lucas, and you don't know when you'll tell him. He has been your protector since you were kids, comforting you on sad nights when no one else was there, teaching you little secrets about how to navigate through the world, he even punched a boy who teased you once at school. The idea of telling him you were chatting romantically to another player would be trouble enough, but telling him it was a Dortmund player might just end up in another schoolground incident. You hadn't wanted Theo to know for fear he'd go dishing your dirt to Lucas, but he discovered it on his own and there was nothing you could do.

Who knows what might become of this thing you have with Jadon, and lord knows your eldest brother owns a hard as nails death stare that just might do Jadon in, but for now you actually quite like having the secret. A little mystery tucked away up your sleeve.

The rush you always get when Lucas calls your phone as you're typing a text to the Englishman, feeling as though the first words from the other end will be shouts of how he knows everything and he'll never speak to you again for keeping it a secret, fills you with dread at times. But it never is the reason he calls, and it turns out he is just making plans or has something funny to tell you. But the way your heart thumps as you go back to texting Jadon, that is part of the chase you have to admit you enjoy.

Hardcore fans online have noticed the past few months that when you do interviews in English, the odd slang term comes up during jokes - terms you hadn't used before and stem more from London boroughs than northen towns - so speculation of how you'd learnt these things easily coincided with dating rumors.

Lucas had seen the speculation online; seen fans trying to put your interactions with the Dortmund player together through both your instagram stories and comments and the tweets you both had liked about the other. Lucas had even grown suspicious of the little questions you asked him about Germany, German phrases and his lifestyle there, not knowing why you would need nor want to know those things. But Lucas doesn't believe it. He knows that you know better to mix with a Dortmund boy.

Sometimes an older brother just doesn't get it quite right…

Soon, the chance will come to really see if your connection is something you can build on. Jadon's new signing with Manchester United has been confirmed and he will be moving back to England. It is a great opportunity to get to see him more often, rather than the odd rendezvous point or clandestine trip during small breaks in the season. You'll spend more time face to face instead of over the phone. You'll get to wake up in his bed and him in yours, without needing to sneak away from hotel rooms afterwards. You'll maybe even get to go on a proper date, just the two of you, where you can flirt across the table your joined hands rest upon. Hanging out with Jadon won't be the first time you've spent time together in person. However, getting a full day with only the two of you where you won't have to pretend you hardly know who he is, and you won't have to pretend your eyes aren't meeting across the group of people you're in - it fills your stomach with knots and butterflies.

A certain pressure has fallen off you now Jadon has no growing rivalry with Lucas, but not completely. You won't be able to take back the way their teams made the other feel in the past, but the fact there won't be more of it next season comforts you a little. The biggest thing that will hold you back from going public before the new season starts will be the media, but that is an issue you can't even begin to worry about yet. You are too caught up in the excitement of being in the same town as Jadon to care. Rumours are spinning crazier than ever about you two as some of your liked tweets about his move got reposted by sports pages and fan blogs - now joking about him being your rival instead of your brother's - and yet it didn't stop you, no longer all that bothered about keeping a low profile now you both will be living away from Lucas. If he gets mad, all he will be able to do is shout down the phone, and whilst you never want that to happen, you know the time to flourish with Jadon and capitalise on the foundation you have already built is better than ever, brothers be damned.

There are big changes coming for the both of you, yet one thing will remain the same no matter the outcome of your relationship. You can't quite stop being football rivals.

#jadon sancho #lucas hernandez #theo hernandez #jadon sancho imagine #jadon sancho x reader #football #football imagine #oneshot #my fic #my og post

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bronyinabottle · 3 years

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MY LITTLE PONY: A NEW GENERATION (G5 Movie) THOUGHTS

It’s finally here. The beginning of Generation 5. Though before I get into the movie in some detail I’m going to reiterate one more time what G5 means for my content and a non-spoilery summary of the movie.

Again, I will say that the movie nor will the G5 series coming later have much of an effect at all on any of my blogs. The revelation in Secrets of the Dragon’s Tear that life itself is also magic means that a world that implied to have no magic for years would mean the extinction of all life (Perhaps resulting in the wasteland we saw in the Season 5 finale). There may be something I’ll probably do at some point on a certain different blog. But even then, that may likely be a one-time thing and probably come around the time the series is starting to air.

That said, just because I’m continuing with mainly G4 content doesn’t mean I disapprove of G5. In fact, my non-spoilers thoughts on the movie is I think it is a good start for this new generation. There are questions I have that I’m not sure will be answered (Though many of those questions are the same ones I had in my Trailer/Preliminary thoughts) quickly enough. But the movie is structured well enough, in fact it’s probably a better movie as a whole compared to any of the movies G4 had (The 2017 movie, Rainbow Roadtrip, and all 4 Equestria Girls movies). As the 2017 movie was fun, but it jumped around a lot, sometimes scenes transitioning too fast. And while Rainbow Roadtrip may have been this on purpose, the entirely slice-of-life story taking up a long length… made it something of a less interesting plot to follow. It feels like some of that special could of been cut to at least a two-parter length and keep the same beats they hit. And while i have a soft spot for the 3rd and 4th Equestria Girls movies, I’ll always say a full-length pony adventure feels better suited for what I want to see out of MLP then spin-off movies with high school movie cliches and weird pony/human world shenanigans.

So movie-wise I’m not a G4 purist. It’ll take some time to see how Gen 5 compares to Friendship is Magic when we get to the series. As I feel it’d take a lot for it to surpass G4 in my mind. But I’m going to try to be as fair as possible and judge on it’s own merits. The implied connection to G4 by referring to G4 being ancient Equestria is going to naturally get the staff and hasbro pressured by fans to tell us what happened in-between the generations. Because that’s the trap they put the writers in when they made it so they want to try to say it’s in the same universe. That’s the double-edged sword Hasbro chose to have, trying to appease the G4 fanbase and keep at least some of them around. But at the cost of questions both nitpicky (Such as character design being inconsistent) or actual honest questions that need to be known (Why did magic disappear, and what happened to the Alicorns) for some of us to truly see this as the same Equestria.

After the break, I’ll have more spoilery thoughts

Even for a brief moment, it was nice seeing the Mane 6 and 2D animation. The former because of course those are the ponies many of us that saw all of G4 loved. And the latter, because while the animation wasn’t bad in this movie. I’m one of those who’d prefer to have 2D animation in an animated film. As in most cases aside from Pixar, it’s just a strong preference of mine. If this had the animation of the 2017 MLP movie but otherwise everything else was generally the same here, I feel that would of have been great.

I wish they didn’t have to have Sunny’s dad die off-screen, as he seems like he could of been a compelling character. And not to mention if perhaps he has any connection the “ancient” days in any fashion. But *sigh* I get it, it’s an old trope where part of the character’s offscreen growth is not having their parent(/s) around.

On a side note there’s quite a few times during the beginning of the movie that somewhat foreshadow what happens to Sunny later. 3 times where she had a fake horn and wings on her. Once in the flashback, then 2 separate times when she’s doing her protest where she has her own costumed wings and horn. As well as the helmet and mechanical wings.

Also, there’s no way around it. Some of the discussions this movie are going to get quite political. (Namely one part of Sunny’s song that could be seen as having a double meaning of a jab at Trumpsts regarding “Building your wall”) From the very premise in the early times, we know that the inspiration for the story was last year’s Black Lives Matter protests. Which honestly, I do support the message they’re going for. Having an anti-racism message to tell kids from the very beginning and making a focus on it is important when in G4 it only got briefly touched upon in Bridle Gossip and the Heath’s Warming Eve play. Although it certainly rose up to some form of prominence with Season 8 and onward. Still, while you can argue if G4 executed the anti-racism message well. it does come with something of a problem that the series finale left Equestria in the least divided it’s ever been.

And personally, I feel it’s a terrible interpretation of time to say “Well, it’s a realistic take. Racism has existed for years in our world. Same should go for the ponies” and while yes, racism is still rampant in today’s world. That said, that ignores that if we went from The Last Problem to the start of G5. There’s a huge difference between our world and Equestria. There is no ancient civilization that we look at like “Yeah, those were the golden days of world peace” when normally the “Golden age” was reserved for the high classes of Ancient Greece or Rome. It was most decidedly not perfect, with slavery rampant and wars for the sake of expanding an empire. While if you look at The Last Problem’s Equestria, you not only have peace between the three main types of ponies. But you literally have non-pony citizens in Equestria. You can see a dragon handing off a flower to a pony which can imply cross-species romantic relations. With the Friendship school still going strong, and was the reason that the world was saved in The Ending of the End. While perhaps it may be too glowing to say that future is perfect for everyone even in-universe. It’s certainly a hell of a lot better outlook then comparing to how we view even the so called Golden age of ancient civilizations. The Last Problem’s Equestria implies it looks to ally with every country outside of Equestria, not conquer them.

So it should still be a valid question on just how this world collapses to the point it gets to where G5 is at the start. I at least assume that it’s not the fault at all of any of the Mane 6 nor Twilight. Or at least I hope it isn’t, as I’d rather the MLP fanbase not have to deal with a The Last Jedi Luke Skywalker situation. (Where after the joyful end of the original trilogy, things go wrong as Luke almost murders the son of one of his best friends and his sister despite trying to hard and succeeding at redeeming his father who at that point in the canon was a galaxy-wide known ruthless mass-murderer.) I assume we’re at a point where everyone of the Mane 6 sans maybe Twilight are presumed dead. And even in Twilight’s case, there’s a chance that G5 decides to say that G4 overestimated the whole Alicorn immortality thing. Though I wouldn’t put it past Hasbro to have some event where the Mane 5 of G5 meet the Mane 6 in some special event whether that’s a a Season finale or a sequel movie/special. Where either the Mane 6 return in a limbo situation similar to the Pillars at the end of Season 7 or Time travel gets involved. They may even string us along on answering just what in the heck happened until they involve a meet-up with the Mane 6 in that way. Though I hope they don’t, I’d really like the beginning of the series (Or I guess this supposed special coming up in Spring supposedly?) starts to answer some questions. G5 should get a chance to stand on it’s own, but I hope the writers are actually well aware there will be so many questions people have and address them in the show. A cynical part of me feels like they’re likely to string us along until at least the Season 1 finale.

Onto the characters for a bit. I think Izzy Moonbow was absolutely the most stand-out character in the whole movie. She was energetic, funny, and aside from “The pegasi are bad news” she along with Zipp and Sunny were the most averse to the way the world was. She was already the most popular due to the tennis ball memes. But now it feels like she legit stands on her own and most certainly deserves to be the most popular character of G5 thus far. Behind her in a bit of a surprise to me was Zipp, who I thought would be mainly a Rainbow Dash-expy. Though she really helps out Izzy and Sunny in Zephyr Heights. Despite having Twilight be my favorite pony from the very beginning of G4 all the way to the end, I didn’t feel as strongly about Sunny for some reason. So she’s in the middle of the pack, she could grow on me later. I just don’t know if I click with her as much as I did with Twilight. As for the last two, while I don’t hate either of them. Either one could be the lowest of the 5 for one reason or another. Pipp (Although I will say she's probably my favorite character design out of the 5) feels like she doesn’t do a whole lot in the movie and it takes until she’s forced to be an outlaw because the other choice was to get imprisoned like her mother was. So she may come off as quite pretentious, though it’s arguable Rarity was the same way early in G4. But she definitely grew later. Could be the same case for Pipp. And as for Hitch, he has shining moments in the film. But what might hurt him is the fact he was such a bad friend to Sunny up until the campfire scene. “I’m the last real friend you have. You really want to lose me too?” is not a healthy friendship. Hitch may have been Sunny’s friend the longest, but it definitely feels like Izzy connected immediately. I don’t know if this show will get into shipping any of the main characters between each other mid-show, but if they do. I hope it’s between Izzy and Sunny currently, cause Hitch and Sunny just gives bad vibes even with Hitch getting better later.

None of the songs I felt were particularly too special. Though I think the closest was Sprout’s “Danger, Danger” song that has similarities to Smells Like Teen Spirit in some parts of the song since I tend towards more rock/metal-esque music.

I touched upon it earlier, but there’s perhaps a stand-out reason for why the G5 movie outdid the 2017 MLP Movie. They have the typical “Our heroic group splits after a sad moment before coming together again for the climatic good end” in Sunny seeing that that the two crystals don’t instantly bring magic back, and when Twilight left the group after an argument that happened with Twilight trying to take a pearl. They perform the same purpose in the movie. But the crystals not working, crushing Sunny’s hope for a little while works better into the story. Where as Twilight’s part frustratingly brought the sea pony scene to an end too quickly and/or doesn’t feel right of Twilight to have done that. It felt forced in the 2017 movie, but works out in the G5 movie. Especially since a part of it is that it’s not the crystals themselves capable of bringing magic back. But it’s the journey going after the crystals that brings the ponies themselves their magic back.

Just a small note on dictator Sprout, he tries to cause a war. Though admittedly the film seems to treat him as a joke the entire time despite his seriously evil ambitions. With the only repercussions is he gets a wishy-washy answer on if he was a good sheriff from his mom. I don’t quite know how I feel about that yet, but I wonder what they’ll have in mind for Sprout given his actions. He and his mom are the only ones that feel like a true antagonist. Though they seem to be ok with things fast when the magic comes back.

But anyway on to the ending, we see that Sunny becomes an Alicorn. Which I guess with no other real Alicorns around, I guess it makes sense to alicornify her since she’s the real leader behind what united the leaders of each type of pony again. Though there is of course this weird thing where her horn and wings don’t seem like as much a part of her body compared to very obvious connected wings on Twilight when she got hers. Sunny keeps her horn and wings to the end of the movie, and has colored streaks in her hair. Though I do wonder if that;s truly permanent. If it is permanent, I suppose at least they got to have a headstart and have it established at the end of the introductory movie rather then have it shock people at the end of a shortened 3rd season. I still feel like Twilight had well earned her alicornhood considering that besides what she did in the series. She has a whole childhood and time as a teenager learning under Celestia. Which had to mean something, and I’m not sure Celestia just leaving her to live the rest of her days with her friends in ponyville was that. Sunny has no doubt been trying countless time to try to spread friendship throughout her life even after the tragedy of her father’s passing. So there’s no doubt she’s been through a lot, and may indeed be worthy of being an Alicorn at this point. Though in terms of screentime before Alicornhood it's definitely a lot less then Twilight had. And it is at least nice to see that it is possible for non-unicorns to become one. (The only case of that we sort of got was a children's book that may or may not be canon that implied Cadence was a pegasus before she ascended)

Though you have to wonder if the visual differences such as Sunny’s alicorn horn and wings, the cutie mark only on one side (Yes I know that’s how it was normally in the MLP generations before G4. But a distinct visual difference between shows is still noticeable even if the context of G4’s cutie marks on both sides of the flank was about it being easier on the puppets for Flash), and how animals can have wings or weird round shapes such as those bunnies when G4 has normal looking animals. There’s enough striking visual differences for any nitpicky G4 to say “This isn’t the same Equestria”. And if someone tries to say maybe some sort of evolution happened. That’s still trying to put a little too much real world logic on this fantasy world. And evolution tends to take millions of years to have such dramatic changes. Not 1000 years or so, there should still be normal looking animals at this point and time. And these small details are probably going to be the things most ignored but nonetheless can build a case that this isn’t the same Equestria. Even if they touch on the important questions like how magic disappeared and what happened to the Mane 6, there will be details they make different that will add to the case that this is it’s own universe if it doesn’t quite matchup with what was remembered about G4. There will be fans who will be that nitpicky to call G5 out of continuity for small details like that. That is again the trap they put themselves in when they decided to try to say it’s the same Equestria.

All-in-all though, I think that’s at least a good enough chunk about my thoughts on the movie to end off here. If there’s something I missed or something from the movie you’d like me to give a particular opinion about or elaborate on something feel free to ask me here. G5 is indeed off to a good start, just I will be along the many hoping some questions get answered sooner then later. And I’m not sure I’m confident in getting anywhere until a Season finale or a 2nd movie. And it’ll be a year before the series starts proper (Though again I guess there’s a 44 minute special coming in Spring to try to hold us over). But I could definitely see G5 finding it's own following, now there's just the inevitable clashes between some of the more vocal fans of each generation bickering at eachother. But hoping there will be enough that take the movie's lessons on divisiveness to heart and be able to enjoy both even if there may be preferences.

#mlp #my little pony #g5 #mlp g5 #netflix #my little pony the next generation #my little pony movie #generation 5

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happi-tree · 3 years

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Sixteen

Hello, lovebirds! Here’s a bit of fic that I wrote inspired by @shima-draws‘ BNHA Distortion Link AU from Nexus’ POV! Check out her blog for more info about it. I’ll put the fic under a read more, so continue on if you’re interested! TW for blood and vague, semi-graphic descriptions of corpses.

Midoriya Izuku is 16 years old when his world is ripped out from underneath his feet.

He awakens to silence - not the peaceful quiet of early mornings that he has become long accustomed to, but to a sheer and utter absence of sound. Not a whisper of birdsong, not a single utterance of cacophony caused by the morning commute traffic in Musutafu. The quiet is eerie, anticipatory, waiting to be shattered, and Izuku gets the distinct feeling that he’s the final character in some horror flick.

His alarm clock blares “The morning is here!” again in a robotic facsimile of All Might’s voice. Izuku startles, badly, slamming his hand down on the alarm to silence it. A breeze outside grows in intensity, slamming into the walls. The ticking of clocks, the groaning of a house in its death throes, and the rushing of blood in Izuku’s ears are the only sounds now.

Something is very wrong.

Izuku picks his way across the room to his window, lifting the blinds, and nearly retches at what he sees.

The streets aren’t clogged with cars or buses; the sidewalks are vacant of pedestrians. Instead, the concrete is dyed red with blood, puddles of it seeping into potholes, into gutters. Bodies, for as long as the eye can see, line the walkways and the asphalt at irregular intervals, their eyes unseeing, their mouths open in shock, their forms contorted and still in pools of burgundy-ebony. Newly deceased, the analytic, detached part of Izuku’s brain observes, noting the absence of stench and lack of buzzing flies.

As much as Izuku desperately wants this to be some horrible nightmare, he knows deep in his bones that this is all too terribly real.

And then he looks up.

Up to the sky, where his fated enemy is silhouetted against the soot-stained crimson of dawn, wreathed in clouds of smoke like the angel of death incarnate. But Izuku knows that this man is far from angelic - there is no mercy in these deaths, no just judgement present in any fiber in his body as he hovers, gloatingly, backlit by the red-orange sun.

All for One, in all his age, has never been a creature of compassion.

With the taste of bile and ash in his mouth, Izuku frantically grabs his hoodie from where it lays across the back of his desk chair, shrugging it on. Throwing open his closet door, he pulls on the boots of his Hero costume, barely managing to fumble their laces into a proper knot and swiping his gloves from where they sit draped over his tool belt.

One for All rockets to the surface of his skin within milliseconds, his racing heartbeat and heightened anxiety calling the Quirk to activation in record time, and Izuku breaks down the front door of his house, sprinting into the streets of the world on its final day with eight souls singing across the lightning in his veins.

It is not enough.

Midoriya Izuku is 16 years old when he opens his eyes to the Beyond for the first time.

The confusion only lasts for a few moments before memories - billions of them, thoughts that are not his, were never meant to be his - shove themselves into his still-growing mind, flooding his neurons until they threaten to combust. All at once, Izuku knows where he is. Izuku knows what happened to his world; rather, the world that was once his.

Now, Izuku knows everything, and it is with absolute, mind-numbing certainty that he knows that his universe is gone.

He is the sole survivor, the lone occupant of this plane of in-betweens, where both nothing and everything is real. He feels at once impossibly heavy and weightless, power sitting leaden in his bloodstream, pulsating in time with his paradoxically-beating heart, countless lives weighted and compressed upon his mind, their taste like copper on his tongue.

Tears flow freely from his eyes, saline globules suspended in the not-air of the Beyond as he weeps and as he feels. Seven billion lifetimes of emotions flash through his mind’s eye like an old film reel, impossibly fast, impossibly hard to differentiate. Love and heartbreak and joy and sorrow and anger and contentment and longing and desperation and too many other feelings to name overcome him, and Izuku cries out, his strangled voice the only sound amidst the deep shifting colors of the void, utterly human and utterly alone.

Even heroes need to cry, sometimes, Todoroki’s voice seems to whisper to him, and Izuku’s body wrenches with the force of his sobbing, clinging to himself and wishing beyond anything for the phantom comfort of a friendly hand upon his shoulders.

How can I ever call myself a Hero when I failed my entire universe?

After a time - perhaps seconds, perhaps centuries - Izuku’s cries pitter out, and he straightens enough that his feet find contact with something solid. Opening his eyes once more, he finds that his tears, spheres of liquified crystal, lay suspended across the not-space, twinkling like so many stars. For all the pain that they had caused him, Izuku finds beauty in their sorrow, trying not to tear up again as he thinks of the shifting constellations of his homeland, their lights forever extinguished.

The memories threaten to overturn his mind again, but Izuku holds firm, pushes past the grief and the sorrow. He is the sole occupant of the Beyond, the Nexus, a realm that oversees every universe, every timeline. The weight of countless worlds rests on his shoulders now, and Izuku cannot allow himself to crumble beneath it any longer. Infinite power - so much that the feeble, human part of his mind can scarcely begin to comprehend its beginning or its end - resides in his soul, stitched into the fabric of his being.

<If I could not be the Hero my own world needed,> Izuku speaks into the void, curling his hands into fists, <maybe I can be the Hero that the rest of them deserve.>

So many lives are in need of protection, in need of saving. And now, here I am, with the power to look after every single one of them. What kind of Hero would I be if I didn’t use this power to help them? For the first time in a long time, Izuku laughs - a hollow, broken laugh, but a laugh nonetheless.

<Plus ultra.> Izuku says to the unspeaking, unblinking void. He cracks his knuckles, takes a deep breath, and then gets to work overseeing the multiverse.

Midoriya Izuku is still 16 years old when he feels the first disturbance in the Beyond.

The new presence feels scarcely like a blip on his radar, as quick and meaningless as the blink of an eye. But after centuries and centuries of absolutely nothing, a spark of excitement - an emotion almost foreign to him, now - makes itself known in the cavity of his chest, bright and white-hot. Alongside it, an equally strange feeling: hope.

The fabric of the Beyond bends itself around him, malleable and fluid as it bows to his whims and carries him to the source of the disturbance.

Izuku watches as a corner of his world blurs green. A figure, human, falling endlessly, glitching in and out between this plane and the one to which they belong. Reaching out with his mind, Izuku nearly reels back in shock with what he discovers.

Because the figure trapped between realms is him.

Well, one of him, Izuku should say. Across the multiverse are countless Midoriya Izukus. For whatever reason, this one seems to have gotten himself into a bit of trouble.

A constant for all Izukus, getting into trouble, he muses as his other semi-conscious self falls infinitely.

Probing further, it looks like this particular Izuku is from a world quite similar to his own. Time slows, solid in his grasp, to allow him to decipher the teal of his Hero outfit, bits of blood scattered across his freckles from a previous fight. Clearly, this Izuku had no intention of coming here, and is likely feeling very out of sorts. How he got here in the first place is a wonder, but not for long.

Memories of his double flash through his mind. The patrol assignment. Uraraka, Todoroki, Ojirou, Shigaraki, Kurogiri’s faces come to mind in consecutive flashes, and his knees nearly buckle at the sight of their familiarity. One for All activating in tandem with Kurogiri’s portal, disturbingly reminiscent of the moment that ripped the fabric of his homeland apart.

Ah, there it is.

Izuku’s power comes to grasp the connection tethering his doppelgänger to the Beyond, and he hears a gasp.

Well, that wouldn’t do. Not that Izuku has ever seen this happen before, but he has the sinking feeling that shoving his other self back into his own universe will not erase the connection entirely. There’s something wild about it, unstable. Dangerous.

Izuku walks closer to his double’s side, time grinding to a halt.

<I’m sorry for this, but you’ll likely see more of me,> he says to himself, taking in the other Izuku’s gaping expression and wide eyes, imprinting the familiar lines of his Hero suit into his vision alongside the spattering of freckles and the smears of dirt.

Gently, Izuku presses a fingertip to his doppelgänger’s forehead and watches as he reappears through the tear into his own timeline.

A universe away, provisional Hero Deku returns to his friends with shaking hands, a phantom warmth between his brows, and an odd feeling of recognition in his chest.

Nexus is 16 years old when he sees the sky again for the first time in millennia.

#baby's first fic post please be gentle 🥺🥺🥺#also I apologize for any wonky formatting I'm still figuring out how posting works asdhsavdvshadks #anyway uh. shima. *hands you this*#y'all don't understand how readily I would DIE for Nexus. hold this eldritch god gently he's fragile!!!#if you read this far I kiss you on both cheeks ty for reading 👉👈#happi scribbles #writing #fic #anime #bnha #midoriya izuku #nexus #distortion link #long post #REALLY long post if the read more doesn't work I'm gonna throw hands #tw blood #tw death #tw corpses #ok I THINK that's all the tags I need

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protectchara201x · 3 years

Text

(ignoring all the other juicy Deltarune 2 stuff to shove Chara Talks into it lololol)

I haven’t been super active on this blog because frankly I have like, three? looong analysis/theorycrafting posts I’ve been putting off working on and it fills me with shame to log in and see them waiting in my drafts.

But.

With the release of Deltarune Chapter 2, I wanted to talk kinda in general about how I thought it could impact the fandom’s perception of Everybody’s Favorite Demon Baby, and also point out something in specific about the Weird Route that might connect back to Undertale.

Putting it under the cut to avoid spoilers and long-winded ramblings for the unwilling. Includes spoilers for the Weird Route.

(NOTE: may update later if I notice more things for to put in section II. I’d like to make a full list of parallels if I can tidy them up.)

I. Pre- vs Post-Release Thoughts (you can skip down to II if you don’t care, it is genuinely Long and Pointless)

Okay, so first off. I got SO worried like, the day before the new chapter dropped? It hit me that whatever new stuff we got out of this, people would connect back to Undertale, and. Honestly, I really do hate connecting everything back to Chara, because I do think of Kris as their own character and I really like them and don’t want to ignore everything they got going on. But, I am first and foremost a shameless Chara stan and they’re very important to me, so I kinda... did spend a few minutes reeling from all the new DR stuff as its own stuff, and then immediately started thinking about how this would reflect back on Chara in Undertale lol.

But that’s ok for me to do here because this is my All Chara, Only Chara, All The Time blog, so I am gonna only really talk about Deltarune here to talk about them lol.

So yeah, I started getting anxious beforehand worrying about how everyone would take any and all implications and apply it to mean “aha, Chara IS evil!” The fakeout with the pie reveal in the anniversary stream was a big relief, but I still got worried leading up to the release about what could be in it.

Because part of why I’ve always thought that “Chara was genuinely evil from the start” and even “ok maybe not TOTALLY evil, but Chara was still a kinda bad person” were unlikely was, even if you throw out all the other popular Chara-sympathetic theories. To me, both these takes just seemed too below TF’s talent and the way he wrote all his other characters with depth and love; a Chara like the one these theories propose just doesn’t belong in a world created by TF, and the way the Dreemurrs talk about them overall, the way TF made a point of having Chara say they were guided and repeatedly, correctly blame you the player for the destruction in Kill-All, I was sure that he never intended them to ever be as bad as the fandom sometimes tried to make them out to be.

... Like, mostly sure. Like, 80% sure? Because he never ever talks about them, so it’s impossible say for sure, and it is still theoretically possible that “Chara was and is bad” was the cold-ass take he’d intended all along. So yeah, leading up to the release, I started getting antsy that whatever new lore came out of it, either he’d directly confirm “Chara was a villain?” “*cocks gun* Always has been” or there’d be something that’d at least heavily implicate them, or could be twisted to implicate them, as a negative force. More ammo to be used against them in the Chara Debate Circles would be a drag, and outright confirmation of them as a villain would honestly break my heart and I’d be forced to disown Toby Fox, My Beloved Cool Dad.

And, right now? Tell the truth, I’m SO relieved and I am SO happy. And not just because of how much depth and characterization it seems Kris is getting! (imo, because rn I just headcanon them as an unhappy teen desperately trying to keep their new friends going on adventures with them and trying to fight back against the player’s control)

I love how this chapter seems to be TF doing course-correcting based on fandom interpretations. Because Kris just isn’t evil, even if they are a knife teen, even if they are the Knight, they’re just NOT evil and that’s canon, baybeeee; it’s made clear in this chapter and the previous one that they love their family even outside of the player’s control, they care about their new friends even outside of the player’s control, they’re established as a weird creepy kid but no one sees them as scary or evil, they’re just Kris, and even in the Weird Route, TF made a point of hammering in the differences between Kris and the player in the Weird Route: Susie and Ralsei notice how distressed Kris seemed after you have Noelle ice Berdly, Noelle heard a voice that she said wasn’t Kris telling her to kill, and the FUCKING Spamton fight: “Kris called for help... but nobody came” again and again, and then “You whispered Noelle’s name”... you, not Kris.

I know TF has never commented much on fans’ perceptions of Frisk and Chara, or who exactly is pulling strings in different routes. But after all this, and especially after seeing all the little winks and nods to fandom jokes in this chapter (what comes to mind: pulling everyone’s leg by seeming to have Kris attack Toriel with a knife only to reveal that pie theory was right, Susie not liking Ralsei’s real face as much as his shadowed one, Ralsei with a gun getting referenced with the ad, Kris getting a joke fixation with knives after the fans made Chara and Kris have knife obsessions as a joke), and seeing what looks like him try to correct some things (what stuck out to me was doubling down on showing that Kris is loved and valued in their family: lots of fans came away from Chapter 1 thinking that Kris was not valued as much as Asriel, but here we see that Toriel is supportive of Kris’ friendship with Susie, and it’s stated that Asriel is the one who used the crappy controller, not Kris) -

I think while he hasn’t commented directly, while he admitted to being overwhelmed by Undertale’s success, while he tends to be pretty tight-lipped about the lore (whether that’s because it’ll be addressed by future chapters or because he prefers to let fans sleuth it out), this chapter convinced me that Toby does keep tabs on fan reactions in Deltarune, so he probably does with Undertale too and would know about all The Discourse surrounding Little Mx Pink Cheeks (and in turn, popular theories like Narrator Chara... Toby if you integrate Narrator Chara into Deltarune being a borderline creepypasta and have the narrator start talking directly to the characters or to the player or the characters start talking to the narrator I will lose my damn B E A N S).

(Kris and Chara not being demonized and the narrator interacting directly with the characters were the only two things on my wishlist going in, I was fine with literally anything else happening lmao)

I even kinda think he’s going out of his way to separate Kris and the player because we didn’t get it before with Undertale, we still insisted that Frisk or Chara was the one doing it, and he’s even using Kris to show that even if this kid can be scary, maybe even mean, and maybe they’re even the Knight (with their reasons unknown), they’re still not a bad kid, they’re still funny and likable, and they still genuinely love their family and friends - which falls in line with Undertale’s cast of complex but likable people who can be antagonists and make mistakes but still aren’t truly bad people, and imo is a direct response to some people fixating on the idea that Chara was always evil because they seem scary/complicated.

... Which is a long way to say that I came out of Deltarune with my confidence fully restored about TF’s intentions with Chara and Kris. Even if he never comments on Chara directly, now I really don’t think TF thinks they’re evil or ever intended for them to be. Deltarune convinced me more than ever that Chara is meant to be complex, yes, and able to be influenced to do horrible things, but they were never intended to be as malicious or shallow as some fans insist.

TLDR:

Toby Fox read your mean fanfiction where Chara is a bad abusive serial killer no one likes, and he made Deltarune in revenge.

... Hm? Ah, you’d like me to get to the point! Right this way!

II. Undertale, Deltarune, and The Point

While no doubt some will still take the voice Noelle hears to be Chara influencing her to turn her into a murderer (I haven’t gone looking for it yet, but I’m sure it’s already a thing because I know this fandom), since it’s made too clear by the game that they can’t blame Kris for this one, I think at this point that’s just being too stubborn to consider other ideas.

If you believe in the totally made up idea used in so many fanfics that Chara is an evil spirit trying to whisper in Frisk’s ear to kill everyone, literally (for some reason) the embodiment of raising stats, and gets more control over people who have increased LV to take over their body... sure. Could be them, they did talk about moving on to the next world and all. I mean, that wouldn’t really make sense because it’s literally never implied in the actual game that Chara encourages you to kill outside of the Kill-All Run or even wants you to, certainly not as the narrator and we get no hint of them doing this as an unseen, unheard third-party either.

Not to mention they’re NOT literally possessing you because of increased LV; they don’t control you even with high LV in any Undertale route other than arguably the Kill-All, and if you fail the Kill-All and it turns into a high-body count Neutral, Chara suddenly stops using first-person narration and showing up in mirrors entirely even though they were showing themself before, the LV remains the same or even can get raised as high as LV 19, nor do they suddenly take over in any other Neutral runs. We can speculate on why (personally, I’d place this either on Chara’s mindset, such as them sinking into shock from the trauma or becoming more assertive as the player feeds their megalomania, or as a sign of Frisk’s withdrawal, leaving Chara alone in the body to take the reins and act out the player’s orders), but canonically, no, Chara does not take over due to high stats.

In fact, there’s even more evidence against this. First-person narration also exists for fleeing your battles in Undertale, even on Pacifist runs with base stats, 0 EXP, and an LV of 1. Since Chara is established to use first-person narration to refer to themself, is the only one who canonically does so, and is confirmed to be present even in all runs through their name and memories always showing up, it seems pretty likely that Chara can take control to flee battle. That means an increase in stats is not a sign of their presence or control, in Undertale or Deltarune.

The most damning blow to the idea that Chara is the voice corrupting Noelle are the lines in the fight with Spamton I mentioned. Kris called for help, but nobody came. You whispered Noelle’s name. Well hold on. If that’s Chara, shouldn’t it be “I whispered Noelle’s name”? As soon as you’ve officially started the Kill-All in Undertale, Chara starts up their “It’s me, Chara” schtick right away, right there in Toriel’s home in the first area, and if they weren’t the narrator before, they’re beginning to speak through the narration now. If the voice was Chara, surely Toby Fox knows it’d be a way bigger “oh shit” moment if the creepy scary hidden route once again switched into first-person, scaring us the same way he did before when we first saw “It’s me, Chara” and knew something was wrong; unfairly or not, their reputation as a villain is still well established and hinting to Chara’s presence with a simple “I” would drive the menace even further, if he intended for them to simply be a demon that possesses player characters when you grind enough. But it’s still just you. The player.

The Weird Route does even more to help Chara’s case than that. Not only is it made pretty clear that Kris and the player are separate, and the player is the one responsible for corrupting Noelle and making her kill... consider how similar Noelle and Chara are, in the Weird Route and the Kill-All Route.

This “voice” that “guides” them in growing strong, compelling them to kill everyone in order to fight for them, eventually driving them to murder people they know. Chara calls themself “the demon that comes when people call its name”, and you whisper Noelle’s name to have her appear to kill Spamton. Noelle’s conflicting emotions towards Kris and the voice as she is manipulated, as she becomes more violent and sadistic, as she goes into shock; does that not sound like Chara, who flipflops between holding you dear as their partner and wanting to move on to the next world together, to be together forever, and them being disgusted by your refusal to accept consequences and the perverse enjoyment you get in killing everyone again and again? Chara, who clings to their quirky narration for much of the Kill-All, but keeps slipping up, who becomes terrifyingly cold, aggressive, power-hungry, and even sadistic, yet still calls Undyne “the heroine”, still seems to still care about their locket, still has moments where they seem to falter?

Noelle does put up significantly more resistance to the voice’s commands than Chara does, and at least much more visibly shows distress and trauma. I don’t think this is a black mark on Chara’s chara-cter either, or an indication of them being more violent or cruel.

For one, while Noelle is still herself with her own soul, it is heavily implied by Chara, Flowey, and Undertale’s lore that Chara was reincarnated without their own soul, at best perhaps attached to Frisk’s (or yours): as I speculate in one of my currently unfinished theories, while monster souls are made up of love, compassion, and hope and thus Asriel was reincarnated without these qualities, it could well be that human souls are correspondingly made up of their own multiple traits, namely determination, patience, bravery, integrity, perseverance, kindness, and justice; if true, a soulless Chara would be lacking these qualities, which would make them less equipped to resist the player’s commands or to feel as torn up about it.

Also, the player has a hold on them both as “party members” to the player’s vessels, but it is also possible that the player naming Chara and having them directly attached to Frisk also gives them a stronger connection to Chara they can abuse, similar to how Kris and Frisk (as the player’s direct vessels) have much less autonomy than Kris’ party members.

(Fun observation: We know that when the thing controlling Kris forced Noelle into becoming a killer and using her to kill Berdly, Kris was horrified and shaken-up according to Susie and Ralsei. How do you think Frisk felt watching Chara be used to slaughter the Underground and then erasing the world when they’re totally corrupted?)

And lastly... look, Noelle and Chara are both minors, but Chara is significantly younger - a small child compared to Noelle’s teen. I know it’s fiction and strong wills and determination and anime is real and all, but a traumatized young child who died two violent and awful deaths back-to-back, may have literally experienced being a corpse in their own coffin/grave for who knows how long, and then came back ”confused” only to immediately start hearing a voice relentlessly commanding them to kill everyone?? I can absolutely see a traumatized kid shutting down and just going with it out of fear at first, before the LV sets in.

TLDR:

What you do to Noelle in the Weird Route is the same fucking thing you do to Chara in the Kill-All Route.

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