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nachosncheeze · 10 months

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Blindspot Finale

Been meaning to post something like this for a while. Never got round to it. Now seems a good time.

BIG SPOILERS AHEAD. Like I will completely and utterly ruin the episode.

Disclaimers: Very Long Post. It's an opinion piece. This is all me; I have no issue with those who differ. 😊

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Blindspot 5x11. It’s rough. I was heartbroken; literally felt like I’d been dumped, and it took me a while. The initial shock of the mere suggestion short-circuited my brain. But over time, and some re-watching, plus thinking about earlier parts of the show more carefully during our weekly re-watch, I came to one (for me) inescapable conclusion:

Whether you view the show as a series of parallels or as a palindrome, “Jane Doe, FBI” died in that square. Jane Doe, the grown woman who was once a child named Alice Kruger, did not.

On the parallels side: Every single season of this show started with Jane in some way lost and adrift without an identity, and part of the journey of every season was for her to find herself again. In season one this is obvious. Season two, she comes back a battered outcast and discovers her past, and has to learn to live with everything that entails. Season three, she comes back having “discovered parts of herself she didn’t realize she was missing,” and has to learn how to integrate who she now knows she is as an independent individual – a separate (and honestly rather chaotic) entity from the husband and family who initially made post-ZIP Jane Doe – with that inter-dependent life she had chosen for herself in seasons 1/2. At this midpoint, the tangram has effectively reopened, and she’s finding where she fits anew. Season four it’s obvious once again – she’s Remi, stuck in Jane's life. Season five, I would argue, is where she finds herself truly split between her past and her future. Here Jane Doe, FBI, the moral and law-abiding, law-enforcing citizen, watches her team blown up by a drone sent by a corrupt government - exactly the situation that made Remi *Remi*. And she’s now forced to call on all the skills and their accompanying memories of her terrorist past – the life she had relatively recently chosen to leave behind – to do the right thing and save the people she loves. Kurt says as much right at the start of the season when he asks her to take the lead – he acknowledges that once again she’s trying to “bring down the corrupt FBI” – and this is when she has to really learn to be both at the same time, and somehow find peace with that. You can see her struggle and thrash between “this is what I know to be necessary” and “this is what I’ve held to be right” throughout the season, but especially in 5x06 and 5x07. (To me she finally resolves this conflict the moment she tells Shepherd she doesn’t care in the midst of her 5x11 “ends and means” hallucination.)

You may get the sense this is the reading I lean towards xD To me, it stands to reason that we can interpret the “death” at the end of 5x11 as a symbolic reset on her identity like she had at the end of every other season, and a literal near-miss, not unlike what she suffered at Keaton’s hands in 2x01 and at Madeline’s hands in 4x22.

On the palindrome side: Death might seem a fitting narrative end to the character, because it’s practically impossible (for me at least) to imagine how this woman could possibly claw her way back to happiness after all of this. But was she happy when we first met her? And who was Jane Doe, before she was Jane Doe? She was somebody before she was “born” from that bag. If the series is a palindrome, we could frame it that Remi “died” and was placed in a bag, only to be reborn from the same bag as someone else. I submit that this woman, on the whole, is only as dead as Remi was when she went into the duffel.

Imo there’s a lot of support right there in the episode for either of these readings. Right from the opening credits, they tell us visually that however you read it we’re going back to the beginning: the number 100 is flipped to 001. The episode is loaded with visual, dialogue, and thematic parallels, especially to 1x01. (I don’t believe it’s an accident that the parallel in the interrogation room to 1x01, 2x01, 3x01, and Jane’s dream in 4x09 is placed after the scene in Times Square. Although they don’t reveal the body bag until later, each of those callbacks represent moments when Jane had to start her life anew, with Weller finding her and effectively saying, “I know you’re lost. We’ll do this together.”) A major theme throughout the episode is Jane’s fear of what’s next. As the mission begins, they’re told in no uncertain terms that whatever the outcome, not only are they out of the FBI, but they will never again be allowed to work for any branch of the US government. That’s every version of law enforcement. That’s every branch of the military. That’s every legal outlet for not only everything this adult woman knows how to do, it’s the end of every life she has ever known. Alice Kruger was at most 12 or 13 years old when her parents were murdered. Whether she’s Jane Doe or Remi Briggs or some amalgamation of the two, this is a woman who literally does not know how to be a grown-up civilian. She must be terrified! The end of “Jane Doe, FBI” can only give way to her most difficult rebirth since that night when a stranger walked her past her mum and dad, lying in pools of their own blood. And as we know, that’s saying something.

That doesn’t mean she doesn’t deserve – or, in my opinion, get – the chance to try.

A few other notes: Martin Gero himself said that dead or alive, both readings are correct. So take it as you will. Applying the bias of my own read on things, I think he was being cheeky – not “whether you think she’s dead or whether you think she’s alive, you’re right,” but literally, “whatever you think you are right, because she is both dead and alive.” It needn't be a binary. Like so many things, from the show's title on down, it's two things at once.

The last shot: One of the things that most gave me pause and did/continues to make me sad is that last visual of Jane. She says, “Yeah, I’m good,” but she sure doesn’t look convinced. Initially, my brain took that as, “Oh my god, she’s dead, it’s like ‘Keaton’ said, this is just her brain trying to give her a happy ending; she’s ‘good’ that she finished the job, but she’s realized that this is all a hallucination.” Now? Well, I’m still sad about it, because although I firmly believe she’s physically alive and that the dinner is real, I see a woman who's lost in this domestic “bliss��. Everyone was worried for Weller losing the job he loves, but he told us all the way back in 1x21 that he had another dream: big backyard, lots of little kids; he just thought it was out of his reach because it wasn't compatible with his job. He lost the job, but he's got his happy ending: that Colorado house, that Thanksgiving table, are in every sense Weller's dream, right down to the shade of paint on the walls (all non-toxic; he likes the yellow). Jane is still mourning for the person she had become, the person she wanted to be. She’s alive, but she’s only about as happy as she was in 1x01, because she doesn’t know who she is or where she fits. Geez, talk about bittersweet.

The episode title: Iunne(n) was a verb in Middle English, meaning “to grant” or “to bestow”. (Written English was not standardized back then to the extent it is now, and the third ‘n’ was sometimes dropped, hence my parentheses.) This is not the first episode title to be a palindrome (see second half of season 2), but if Iunne is NOT meant to be that obsolete verb, it’s the first title that has included a complete gibberish nonsense combo of letters. If it was intentional, then the title of the episode loosely translates as, “To bestow ennui [a sense of listlessness, boredom, dissatisfaction with the state of things, etc.]” This would be a classic Blindspot double-meaning: Jane experiences ennui in her new, quiet life; and what the hell are you viewers gonna do with your Thursday nights now?! Thanks a lot, writers’ room. -_- Cheeky bastards strike again.

One last from Martin Gero: There was an interview somewhere where he said that whichever interpretation people subscribe to, the writers wanted to leave the viewer with a sense that the story of the FBI era of the team’s lives was closed, leaving room for new chapters. Some others on here (apologies as I can’t remember who off the top of my head) pointed out back in 2020 when this was fresh, that if we interpret Jane as being literally, physically, irrevocably dead, then the dinner scene really is a hallucination – meaning we were never really given an end to any of the rest of the team’s stories. Unless you want to believe that Rich and Patterson ended in a hallway toasting over Reade and Mayfair, and Tasha and Weller ended, crying and screaming in disbelief respectively, over a corpse. (Or alternately, if she died in 5x10 and the entirety of 5x11 is a hallucination, the rest of the team’s endings would be where we left them in that episode.) I personally don’t think even this writer’s room could be quite that cruel. :P To the viewers, or to their own creations. (fwiw, MG also noted in the same interview that he would watch spinoffs of Rich and Patterson, or even a family drama starring Kurt and Jane.)

There are of course various hints that support the Irrevocably Dead interpretation, too – Boston having all of his fingers comes to mind – and despite my complete aversion to accepting that outcome (ngl, taking that on board would be bad for my mental health lol), I’m happy enough with my interpretation to also be happy to chat with anyone about the alternatives and the supporting evidence that most days I choose to willfully ignore. \😁/

At the risk of self-plugging, I’m about 24k words deep in a canon-compliant 5x11 WIP that fills in some blanks and brings the parallel/palindromic “Still Alive” scenario to a stronger conclusion. I’ve called it The Antidote both because in it, she does get the antidote “just in time” and it works, and also because it’s proven to be the antidote to my own conflicted feelings about the way the show ended. I’m hoping to have that done and posted [ideally long] before we get there in re-watch, but if anyone wants to chat on that or hear about some of the ways my head has canoned its way out of tragedy hit me up. 😊 I’ve also written several little epilogues set in the first 18 months or so post-series around Jane starting to claw her way back from that ennui and figure out how to find contentment outside a constant state of war. Haven’t printed them yet because I think without the other they don’t make much sense XD but I’m happy to chat about the general arc I see for that, too, if anyone wants to hear about it, and of course I like hearing what others have in mind after the series!

There's a few really good finale/post-finale fics out there already, especially on ffn, and they're always fun. (Except for that one. That very short one. I'm not calling you by name but you know who you are. And I know you hate it too so I forgive 😘😘😘)

There's a ton of really well thought out posts, links to interviews from July/August 2020 and beyond too but I'm afraid I don't have the list to hand; I was meaning to re-compile it eventually anyway (I did bookmark several for my fic research/inspo) so if there's interest I'll try to get on that and add it.

Lastly, shout out to @guadalajara92 for her infamous make-it-better alternative ending edit which really, truly was a comfort for washing that shit right out of my hair in those first post-5x11 hours:

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and her now-legendary fan-trailer for "Newton", the spin off into a series of primetime adventures that we really, sadly never got to see (double shout out for cleverly making it compatible with either interpretation* xD):

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*but with a cheeky lil blink and you miss it elevator shot that however you wanna take it, also made me feel better 🙊

#blindspot #blindspot 5x11 #blindspot finale #blindspot s5 spoilers #blindspot thoughts #entirely my own opinion #(though with a few receipts)

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themuseandantarctica · 2 years

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* 𝒒𝒖𝒐𝒕𝒆 𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒔 𝒑𝒕. 20

change however necessary.

“Life is a sexually transmitted terminal disease.”

“How did I come into the world? Why was I not consulted? And if I am compelled to take part in it, where is the director? I want to see him.”

“The world is disgracefully managed, one hardly knows to whom to complain.”

“The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made.”

“We are born. We eat sweet potatoes. Then we die.”

“Life is short and full of blisters.”

“Life is a moderately good play with a badly written third act.”

“The two entities who might enlighten us, the baby and the corpse, cannot do so.”

“Who knows but life be that which men call death, and death what men call life?”

“Life is a public performance on the violin, in which you must learn the instrument as you go along.”

“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life. It goes on.”

“Life is a beautiful and strange-winged creature that appears at a window, flies swiftly through the banquet hall, and is gone.”

“Have you noticed that life, real honest-to-goodness life, with murders and catastrophes and fabulous inheritances, happens almost exclusively in the newspapers?”

“Life loves to be taken by the lapel and told: ‘I am with you, kid. Let’s go.’”

“You fall out of your mother’s womb, you crawl across open country under fire, and drop into your grave.”

“What an awful thing life is. It’s like soup with lots of hairs floating on the surface. You have to eat it nevertheless.”

“We are living in a world today where lemonade is made from artificial flavors and furniture polish is made from real lemons.”

“There’ll be two dates on your tombstone. And all your friends will read ‘em. But all that’s gonna matter is that little dash between ‘em.”

“In the end, everything is a gag.”

“We all know what light is but it is not easy to tell what light is.”

“There are two kinds of light—the glow that illumines, and the glare that obscures.”

“This world we live in is but thickened light.”

“Prejudice comes from being in the dark; sunlight disinfects it.”

“Light travels faster than sound—isn’t that why some people appear bright until you hear them speak?”

“The difference between pornography and erotica is lighting.”

“Be a good listener. Unlike your mouth, your ears will never get you in trouble.”

“When people talk, listen and listen completely. Most people never listen.”

“The first duty of love is to listen.”

“The only way to entertain some folks is to listen to them.”

“[name] could listen so intently that he exhausted the speaker.”

“If we ate what we listened to we’d all be dead.”

“Literature is news that stays new.”

“A literary movement consists of five or six people who live in the same town and hate each other cordially.”

“Literature is mostly about having sex and not much about having children. Life is the other way around.”

“[name] was mistress of a school where young ladies for enormous pay might be screwed out of health and into vanity.”

“Well, apart from your balls, can’t I be of any use of you?”

“Oh, I can’t explain. I’ve only one way of expressing my deepest feelings—it’s this.”

“Everything has been figured out, except how to live.”

“The art of living is more like that of wrestling than of dancing; the main thing is to stand firm and be ready for an unforeseen attack.”

“The goal of life is living in agreement with nature.”

“Begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life.”

“To live only for some future goal is shallow. It’s the sides of the mountain that sustain life, not the top.”

“I love my past. I love my present. I’m not ashamed of what I’ve had, and I’m not sad because I have it no longer.”

“The world is ruled by letting things take their course.”

“May you live every day of your life.”

“Life is too short to be small.”

“It’s not the length of life, but the depth of life.”

“Try to be one of the people on whom nothing is lost.”

“Life is tough. Three out of three people die, so shut up and deal.”

“Life is not always a matter of holding good cars, but sometimes of playing a poor hand well.”

“Seize the moment. Remember all those women on the Titanic who waved off the dessert cart.”

“Study as if you were to live forever; live as if you were to die tomorrow.”

“This is what you should do: love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown to any man or number of men… re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss what insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem.”

“Life is short, art long, opportunity fleeting, experience treacherous, judgment difficult.”

“A man must swallow a toad every morning if he wishes to be sure of finding nothing still more disgusting before the day is over.”

“Three things in this life are self-destructive: Anger, Greed, Self-esteem.”

“Think nothing profitable to you which compels you to break a promise, to lose your self-respect, to hate any person, to suspect, to curse, to act the hypocrite, to desire anything that requires walls and curtains about it.”

“My formula for living is quite simple. I get up in the morning and I go to bed at night. In between, I occupy myself as best I can.”

“I feel an irresistible desire to wander, and go to [place], where I will pass my youth, sitting under an almond tree, drinking amber tea out of a blue cub, and looking at a landscape without perspective.”

“I have come to an unalterable decision—to go and live forever in [place]. Then I can end my days in peace and freedom, without thoughts of tomorrow and this eternal struggle against idiots.”

“Life is like a B-movie. You don’t want to leave in the middle of it but you don’t want to see it again.”

“If I had my life story offered to me to film, I’d turn it down.”

“If I had to do my life over, I would change every single thing I have done.”

“What we call logic may just as well be described as ‘the way adult Athenian males of the fifth century BC think.’”

“Logic is neither a science nor an art, but a dodge.”

“The use of logic in thought is as necessary and justified as the use of perspective in painting—but only as a medium of expression, not as a criterion of reality.”

“To become truly immortal, a work of art must escape all human limits: logic and common sense will only interfere. But once these barriers are broken, it will enter the realms of childhood visions and dreams.”

“A mind all logic is like a knife all blade.”

“Logic, like whiskey, loses its beneficial effect when taken in too large quantities.”

“There is no logical way to the discovery of elemental laws. There is only the way of intuition, which is helped by a feeling for the order lying behind the appearance.”

“The clinching proof of my reasoning is that I will cut anyone who argues further into dogmeat.”

“No, no, you’re not thinking; you’re just being logical.”

“If the world were a logical place, men would ride side saddle.”

“Music was invented to confirm human loneliness.”

“If you are afraid of loneliness, don’t marry.”

“The more you stay in this kind of job, the more you realize that a public figure, a major public figure, is a lonely man.”

“Loneliness is the inability to keep something or someone with us company. It is not a tree that stands alone in the middle of a plain, but the distance between the deep sap and the bark, between the leaves and the roots.”

“Loneliness is the way by which destiny endeavors to lead man to himself.”

“What the world really needs is more love and less paperwork.”

“Love is metaphysical gravity.”

“Love will draw an elephant through a keyhole.”

“He gave her a look you could have poured on a waffle.”

“Love has but one word and it never repeats itself.”

“Love is a gross exaggeration of the difference between one person and everybody else.”

“Art is love.”

#rp meme #rp starters #sentence meme #sentence starters #prompts #rp prompts #writing prompts

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modgirlyreposts-revamped · 1 year

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Rian lore time + a moodboard I made for him and some extras because ik he’s ur fave

Rian is an autistic transgender man from Ennis County Clare, where he grew up with divorced parents and his childhood best friend Kira. (I’ve been debating if I want Kira to be his sister, or just a childhood friend he sees like a sister whose parents are especially close with Rian’s. Either way, they would have been raised more as just friends than siblings as they would have been distant.) His three main traits are borderline, eccentric, and passionate.

Despite his name’s references to royalty, he grew up middle class at best and feeing completely useless and good for nothing. He has a bad relationship with his parents, and most everyone around him, because he grew up abused by everyone close to him and everyone meant to take care of him failed to help him. He was verbally abused by family members, heavily bullied by peers, and even people meant to be his friends abused him. He never felt like he could tell his parents, and they didn’t know until it had become severe enough anyone cared enough to intervene. He feels like his parents hate him anyway, since he thinks he ruined their relationship. He holds a lot of resentment toward everyone who was in his life in that time, and it confuses him that his writing talent was upheld as some phenomenal thing when he was actively being treated like shit. This is why he views his talent as sort of a separate entity from himself, and doesn’t feel like he deserves any of the accomplishments he’s gotten. See where the impostor syndrome takes hold? He already has a sort of black and white view of the world, and this influences his low self esteem and insecurity.

He believes his writing is the only thing he’s good for, but unlike Kamiko, who pushes herself to be the paragon of intellectual excellence everyone sees her as over being a person at all let alone a teenage girl, it just makes him feel like a failure as a person as he feels such a disconnect between himself and his talent that he has total impostor syndrome. He sees himself as below others, and he has low self esteem and an inferiority complex as a result, and all of this manifests as a lack of confidence, defensiveness, general insecurity, poor relationships and reckless behavior. He shields himself from everything like Kamiko does to prevent himself from being hurt or ruining anything.

But he’s also a very, very emotional and passionate person. He sees this as a fault, being unable to detach and constantly getting “fucked by my stupid heart.” While this makes him feel helpless and is embarrassing, it’s also a strength. When he cares about something he loves it with all his heart, and he will fight to a dying breath for that. His emotional drive gives him the will to risk his own life for a loved one. It’s both a painful thing for him and a good thing that he has to learn to accept, as he has to accept that these talents aren’t everything and at the end of the day he is a person. This is wish fulfillment. I am an extremely emotional person and I wish I could come to terms with that being a part of me. I cannot.

I am very similar to Rian's emotional side especially with willing to risk myself for someone I love, since as I tend to say "I may be a failure, but if I can protect those I care about then I did something right"

People have tried to take advantage of that aspect of me before, which is why I'm a lot more closed off than I used to be

#times like this i realize how bad my mental probably actually is- /lh #asks #answered #valleyfthdolls

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the-nymphvallien-universe · 1 year

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Encounter With Durkuat

And now the moment you've been waiting about two days for. For quite a few of these entries I wrote them in character in a notebook. For funsies I've decided to scan these in-character entries in and add them, for artistry I guess. The only thing is Sonwy's handwriting is canonically borderline illegible (and completely illegible when he's rushing). I can never keep the illegibility consistent though, but I think that's a post for another day. Anyway, here's the first entry, detailing events that happened on Day 7 of Flickering Out.

I don’t think I’d ever run so fast in my life. My lungs were on fire, begging me to stop, but I had to get away from it. I was sprinting as fast as I possibly could. Atsume was lagging behind, and I didn’t even notice until I heard a short scream.

It had grabbed her by the shoulders. I stopped for a moment and it pinned her down in front of me. And then— and then it—

It tore through her back like a fucking paper shredder. Over and over and I just STOOD THERE. Uselessly. USELESSLY. I couldn’t do anything, I could barely even look. All I could hear were her ear piercing screams – and her eyes boring into mine, begging me to do something. To stop it.

I I I didn’t know what to do.

I wanted to scream but my voice had choked up in my throat. And then I heard “HEY YOU! BIRD BRAIN!”

It didn’t feel like mine, but logically it had to be. I didn’t know how I got the words out, or where they came from, or how I got my voice so steady.

I just kept shouting at it until it stopped shredding her and instead focused on me.

It’s so much more intimidating up close. It backed me into a wall and I had nowhere to go. Its eyes either had no pupils or were nothing but pupils. Either way, the soul’s all gone. I saw blood dried onto its dull iron beak, and dripping from its claws.

Whatever bravado I thought I had was gone.

Throat dry. Heartbeat pounding in my skull. My whole body was shaking uncontrollably. Now I had its attention, what was I meant to do with it? “DO YOU EXPECT TO COME OUT OF THIS ALIVE?”

I thought I was going to drop dead right then and there. God knows what I actually said to it. In that moment, my mind and my mouth were completely separate entities, neither really paying attention to the other.

I must’ve said something it didn’t like though, because it raised its front leg and slashed me to the ground.

My chest – the cuts – burning – on fire. I’ve been cut before, nothing could compare to that. It didn’t even occur to me to consider the pain she was in. If I had been struck once, she was struck 10, 20, 30 times.

Knowing that, I don’t know how she managed to do what she did next.

She teleported herself onto its back. I just lay there, again, uselessly, as she grabbed its back with a grip of steel and YANKED upwards. It tried to buck her off but she just— she just—

I’d be staring in awe if I wasn’t holding onto dear life.

And then the beak tore off. And I do mean tore. It took away the skin, you could see the bands of blood where the steel used to be. And—

It started glowing white. Brighter than the sun. The inertia from tearing off the beak caused Atsume to fling into the wall. A sickening smear was left behind as she slid to the ground. She got up. I didn’t understand how but I guess adrenaline’s one hell of a drug. “We need to GO. NOW!”

And I didn’t dare argue.

If sprinting was exhausting before, it was almost impossible then. The fire in my lungs had increased at least ten-fold. We barely noticed the burning remains of Hall 4. How could we?

And then I made the mistake of looking back.

A girl. The demon Tiansei who killed everyone and who was responsible for every bit of Hell this past week had been—

It was a young woman. Or, at least, a young looking woman. I’m fairly sure she’s over a millennia old.

Hand outstretched. Calling for help. A part of me wanted to go back.

The other knew better.

I kept running. The image of leaving behind a helpless woman DEMON.

DEMON DEMON DEMON DEMON! KILLED US ALL! DO NOT LET IT TRICK YOU! DO. NOT.

We got out. Atsume touched the shield and it went down. How weak was it really?

The city. The city was gone. Rubble.

I wanted to give up. To collapse and cry and scream in agony.

But I couldn’t. I had bigger things to worry about.

Such as Atsume leaning on the wall. White as a sheet. Barely keeping her head up.

I didn’t come all this way just to let her die.

Date: 16/11/2020

#writing #pov: sonwy #sonwy's journal entries #tiansei #tiansei durkuat #sonwy koren #atsume sakana #flickering out #nymphvallien universe

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flickeringart · 3 years

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Satanism - a way to embrace Pluto?

My mind has been occupied with Pluto lately, the planet, god and symbol of “the hidden things”, the occult, the underworld, darkness, fate, rage, destruction, transformation, abduction, man’s primitive nature, life and death, power and powerlessness, fear, violation and fertility. There’s so much nuance to all planetary (archetypal) principles and there’s always more to explore. Pluto especially is a mysterious and threatening figure (force) in our lives and in the world at large. I have talked about it in previous posts, here / here and here… I’ve also explored the 8th house, which is the astrological house of Scorpio and Pluto here and here.

Many people understandably avoid anything that has to do with the darker elements of life and human nature until they are forced to deal with them. This is possibly why Pluto has been associated with violence because we are typically dragged into the depths; we don’t go there willingly. Some people, however, have lives that are marked by Pluto to such a degree that they can’t pretend that he doesn’t exist. By deciding to consciously accept him and embrace his influence it is possible to live a richer life. After all, Pluto is not only a god of destruction; he is also a god of riches. It seems to me, that the worship of Satan (as practiced by members of the Church of Satan) is very much in line with Pluto’s gifts and his riches. It’s an attempt to embrace the carnal nature. However, this Plutonian carnality is not as basic as it seems. It has its own intelligence, its own spirituality and its own laws. It seems to me that Pluto has to do with survival – psychological, emotional, spiritual and physical. He stands for survival and life at all levels of the being. As stated on the official website, “To us, Satan is the symbol that best suits the nature of we who are carnal by birth—people who feel no battles raging between our thoughts and feelings, we who do not embrace the concept of a soul imprisoned in a body. He represents pride, liberty, and individualism—qualities often defined as Evil by those who worship external deities, who feel there is a war between their minds and emotions.”

I think, that this philosophy attempts to treasure the whole (hu)man, to recognize his divinity even in his subjective thoughts and feelings. It’s an attempt to honor the darker aspects of human nature – anger, rage, and instinctual responses. It’s essentially to honor the earth, the dark void, and the merciless existence. Putting faith in external deities is robbing the individual of his divinity; it’s separating him from life. Christianity has, at least in part, made people think of Evil as an autonomous force (an external deity), corrupting good souls and creating fear and panic. By avoiding seeing reality as a whole, Christianity perpetuates fear instead of confronting it. As I understand it, Satanists don’t invest belief in any gods (symbolic of human drives and instincts) because they see that these mind-made constructs are part of their own psyche. Satanists place themselves at the center of their own subjective universe without seeking to befriend or worship mythical entities that are separate from them.

It seems to me though, from studying astrology, that there’s no way to escape deity. In the effort to not have any god, to place the self at the center, as is characteristic of the Church of Satan, one is in fact aligning or siding with an archetype. It’s impossible not to. I think this is made quite obvious when using astrology and analyzing natal charts. The archetypal energies are expressing themselves through and as the individuals.

In fact, let’s take a look at the chart of the founder of the Church of Satan, Anton Szandor LaVey. I would expect him to have a strong Pluto because of the emphasis on embracing the carnal side and the spiritual dimension of it. There’s also a big emphasis on being whole (a solar principle) through recognizing the totality of life, facing the strength and power within oneself and using the necessary tools to improve one’s own life. This would include consciously using symbols and images (like the image of Satan) in order to get the desired effect. If symbols are given autonomous power it’s a problem only if it puts the individual in a disempowered position. Personal integrity and liberty is also of utmost importance, which sounds rather Aquarian to me. Let’s have a look.

The chart of Anton Szandor LaVey, as found on astrotheme.com.

The Sun is in Aries, which is not surprising considering his strong faith in individuality, his initiative to start a “new religion”, to provide a contrasting influence, to place himself at the “center”, to go by no other rules than his own, to welcome opposition, the desire to be his own master and a leader of his own life. Aries as a sign is strongly linked to the warrior archetype, of fighting for what one believes in without compromise, to claim authority in spirit, to conquer, to place subjectivity over objectivity (because there’s no real difference from the perspective of Aries). Selfishness is the basis for existence; it is through honoring the self that one can honor other people’s independence. Mars, which is the planetary ruler of Aries, is concerned with personal strength and potency (note; Mars is sometimes referred to as the lower octave of Pluto). It seems like LaVey lived on his own terms, relying on his own natural instincts and gifts to get by in life. This is all very typical of Aries people, to live of off a self-generated optimism and conviction of one’s own ability. “The rules don’t apply to me” is the overall sentiment – the rules originated somewhere and that which originates from my own self is no less valuable or divine, even if it’s raw, ugly or imperfect it is still of “The Self”, the force that animates existence.

To no surprise, Pluto makes a square aspect to his Sun. He would’ve lived with the threat of his own destructive rage, his own inner violence and uncompromising desire. To him, it was probably difficult to consciously accept this side (the square aspect always represents a conflict) but he certainly tried to acknowledge his “darkness” through founding the Church of Satan. A person with a trine aspect between Sun-Pluto would not have been as motivated or pressed to bridge the gap between the self and the primitive and taboo because there wouldn’t have been anything to bridge. The square relationships between two planets usually motivate the individual to try to solve dilemma of conflicting principles within the psyche through external work. Squares usually force work in a very concrete fashion. When a person is serious about something, and is trying to make something happen it’s usually indicative of a square aspect within the personal chart. For example, I have a Neptune square Mercury aspect. I try to read and write and educate myself to some kind of higher state, some transcendent and elevated experience because the connection is not smooth between these planets. I try to articulate things properly in order to bridge the gap between personal mind and the nuance of collective feeling. I try to reflect the essence or feeling tone of energies through my writing.

The interesting thing about LaVey is that he truly took on the appearance of a devil – he was probably aware of the power of looks, the impact that certain clothing or symbols have. He was undoubtedly theatrical. Pluto in the 5th house might have something to do with this, as it’s the house of individual expression. The 5th house is all about personal creation; it’s the realm of children and play. In a sense, he was no different from a child dressing up in costumes and playing “the dark one”, which is probably why people mocked him for it. Even when Pluto is in the 5th house it is never light-hearted, he is all in, ruthlessly determined. Pluto placed in this house takes play seriously. He takes personal expression seriously. His creations are his and he should be at the center of them. The individual should be credited for his abilities, not the other way around, just as the individual shouldn’t be appreciated because his gifts are “of the gods”. They belong as much to the individual as it does to the deities. This is certainly the spirit of Pluto. He answers to no other god than himself and he sees life as it is, in its most vile forms, without flinching. Life is in all expressions, in the primitive as well as in the sophisticated. This is, in many ways, a deeply honest way to live. Another thing that catches my attention is the bi-quintiles Pluto makes to the MC (public image) and the AC (personal image/persona). The bi-quintile aspect is generally considered to say something about a certain talent or style, a mercurial quality or skill. He truly has the style of Pluto, both in his countenance and in his societal achievements. He looks dark and mysterious, preoccupied with the occult side of life. Perhaps he even had a certain talent for “magic”, at least he claimed to.

Satanists believe in indulgence (which doesn’t imply compulsion) over abstinence, primarily because there’s no belief in heaven or an after life. The individual is placed at the center of his own universe as his own master – through and through. Although many people would agree that self-mastery is a good thing, many also tend promote, in the same vein, that “people make mistakes” and that they “should be forgiven”. As I understand it, Satanism as a philosophy would state that mistakes are only mistakes if the self-mastered individual firmly believes it to be so in complete honesty and integrity. Self-deceit is considered to be a sin, unless of course it’s done intentionally - it would then not be a sin. Going along with roles that other people have cast one in is self-deceit – that is, for example, shouldering the role as a “sinner” because other people have imposed that label or role onto you is not indicative of self-respect, it’s a betrayal of your own reality. Notably, LaVey has an Aquarius Ascendant, Lilith in Aquarius in the 1st house and Uranus widely conjunct his Sun (both in the independent sign of Aries). He is definitely not a person to follow the herd – in fact “Herd Conformity” is one of the Cardinal Sins in Satanism. He leads life through the principle of being his own godhead, his own intellectual genius, and his own unique and separate individual, detached from the norms and conventions enough to go against them if he pleases. Aquarius is a sign that considers the map of life in an intellectual sense. This sign is also the sign of the progressive individual, someone who wants to make a difference on a larger scale. He certainly did, through constructing a thought-system that could benefit people. It’s no wonder that the first of the Nine Cardinal Sins (as found on the official website) is Stupidity. Of course it would be to an Aquarius Rising! “Think for yourself; don’t go along with everything you’re told” is the plea.

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onp4012 · 4 years

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Romanian monsters and myths

I’ve seen that some of you want to hear more about those monsters and myths, so I am ready to spoil them.

Moroi

As popular as the Strigoi is the Moroi, an evil entity that comes from the spirit of an unbaptized dead child. In most parts of the country, Strigoi’s and Moroi’s are considered separate entities, but in Oltenia they are confused. The Moroi is the dead who have to return from the pit to bring trouble to family and friends. According to folk tales, an unbaptized dead child is sure to turn into a Moroi. Unlike Strigoi’s, where the transformation came almost immediately after death, the Moroi’s waited seven years to rise from the pit. When seven years have passed since his death(because number 7 is considered a magic number), the soul asks to be received in the kingdom of heaven and cries out "Baptism, Baptism!" or according to other sources "Cross, cross!". If anyone hears him then he can save him by giving him baptism: "The son or daughter of God, John or Mary, is baptized in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen!". The ritual is completed by a piece of cloth that is thrown on the grave of the unbaptized baby. If this ritual is not performed, the soul does not find peace and turns into an evil spirit, known as a Moroi. The Moroi haunts the owners of the land where he was buried. It makes the owner's animals and children sick, who eventually have to leave the land to avoid a tragedy. It is a nocturnal creature that manifests itself especially on New Year's Eve. It is said that it can leave its native land by metamorphosing into a dog. If it receives food, the dog-mule does not cause damage and does not scare those who cut it off. Encounters with the Moroi in the middle of the night are usually fatal. The victim either falls in bed for a long time or finds an end until dawn.

Pricolici

Is a werewolf/vampire fusion in the Romanian folklore. Pricolici, similar to Strigoi, are undead souls that have risen from the grave to harm living people. While a Strigoi possesses anthropomorphic qualities similar to the ones it had before death, a pricolici always resembles a wolf. Malicious, violent men are often said to become Pricolici after death, in order to continue harming other humans. Even as recently as modern times, many people living in rural areas of Romania have claimed to have been viciously attacked by abnormally large and fierce wolves. Apparently, these wolves attack silently, unexpectedly and only solitary targets. Victims of such attacks often claim that their aggressor wasn't an ordinary wolf, but a Pricolici who has come back to life to continue wreaking havoc.

Samca

Samca is a female, grotesque, horror and demonic spirit that ruins underage children and pregnant women’s health. She allegedly has long, disheveled hair, crooked fingers that end with sharp nails, fire-spitting mouth and hands made of iron. Legend has it, she’ll turn up at the end of each month in front of a young child or a pregnant woman and either kill the poor soul or leave him/ her crippled for life. According to the myth, the spirit has not one, but nine different names. Samca enjoys torturing women in labor, sometimes killing them. She also either kills their their children, or blesses them with a disease bearing her name. A children suffering from Samca will have seizures, cry all the time, sigh a lot and eventually die. If one writes all of her names inside his house, Samca will not be allowed to enter. She is thought to be the wing of Satan, and she is said to have tried to kill baby Jesus, but was stopped by Michael ( the archangel, not Jackson). She can also change appearance, in order to deceive mortals.

Pâca (Pafa)

Pâca, also known as Pafa, is, according to Romanian mythology, the spirit of tobacco and smoking. Romanians have imagined her as a woman as old at the world itself, ugly and black, having horns on her head and a big, long nose, swollen eyes, tusks and talons, a tail and a pipe in her mouth. Flames and black smoke come out of her throat and she reeks of tobacco. When Pâca came out from the depths of Hell, death spreading smoke came out with her. Then her sons, the demons (dracii), gave birth to a seed which they sowed. The plant sprung from that seed is called buruiana dracului ( the Devil’s weed) or tămâia dracului (the Devil’s incense). As you may have guessed, this plant is what we call tobacco. Then some other demons invented the pipe, for people to worship Pafa by inhaling the smoke made by the plant the devils had sowed in her name. Pâca‘s children also invented snuff tobacco. The funny part is that God, upon seeing what the people were doing, took their tobacco leaves and instead of destroying them (since he’s almighty according to christians, right?), mixed them with basil (so they could smell nicer?) and gave them back to people, teaching them how to use the new product. (Good job, God)

Crasnicul

Crasnicul, or Crâsnicul, is the child born out of a woman’s union with a demon. Apparently, he looks like a cross between a piglet and a normal kid. However, as opposed to the latter, the first thing this demon spawn does after birth is not crying, but running around the house screaming. I bet it sounds similar to Dani Filth’s work with Cradle. Somehow, my intuition tells me their similarities go beyond sound, and we could also link the two aesthetically. In some areas, people thought you should trap the thing in a stove and burn it alive. Other believe that the Crasnic is born after an eleven months gestation period. It is also said that the Crasnic has a hellish desire to bite and kill the people around, immediately after birth. After he’s done with them, he (it?) will try to go back to where he came from. To prevent all this, the midwife will wrap him in a cloth and call the mother’s relatives to bludgeon him to death. Imagine how many malformed children have been bludgeoned to death just because people thought they were the result of the mother’s union with the Devil. Sad. But a great Horror image, nonetheless. ;-; (Ain’t very proud).

Muma Pădurii (Mother Forest)

Is an ugly and mischievous or mad old woman living in the forest (in the heart of the virgin forests, in a hut/cabin or an old tree). She is the opposite of fairies such as a "Fairy" Zână. She is also the protector of the animals and plants, brewing potions and helping injured animals. She cures the forest if it's dying, and she keeps the unwanted trespassers away driving them mad and scaring them to flee. She can be associated with witches (like the witch from the story of "Hansel and Gretel"), but she's a neutral "creature", harming only those who harm the forest. (She’s my favorite “horror one”, I really respect her.)

Iele

Ieles, evil fairies in Romanian mythology are the most mysterious and fascinating creatures that Romanian legends have been talking about for hundreds of years. Sources of inspiration for poets and writers, who turned them into literary characters, the ieles are also the subject of folk studies in which the authors tried to explain both the origin and the meaning of the creatures. Supernatural female creatures appearing in groups on the plains or in the woods, singing and dancing in steamy or undressed clothes, leaving behind signs of circles of fire. It’s said that they are the result of an incestuous relationship between the Sun and the Moon, so they were cursed to send their daughters on earth. This is the portrait of the ieleles, described by folklorists and folk tales over time. Legends about iele, which differ from region to region, say that the creatures appear in groups of three, five or seven. The stories depict the evil fairies in Romanian mythology as very beautiful, dressed in steamy clothes or simply naked. In the story they appear at night, in the fields and in the forests, far from the eyes of the world. Legends also say that the iels burn crazy and cheerful choruses that the eyes of ordinary mortals should not see. Behind them are signs of circles of fire in the burning grass. (In my region, it’s said that they are wives of unfaithful husbands that cheated on them, at which, the woman committed suicide in a river or was simply killed by her husband.)

#romania #myths #legends #monsters #transylvania #romanianmythicalcreatures #romanianmyths #pricolici #Samca #strigoi #iele #para #crasnicul

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murasaki-murasame · 3 years

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Thoughts on Higurashi Sotsu Ep15 [FINALE]

For better or worse I think Ryukishi achieved exactly what he set out to do with this series, and I guess everyone’s just gonna be forced to reckon with how they feel about his own perspective on this franchise versus how they feel about it, lol.

Anyway, thoughts under the cut, plus Umineko spoilers.

I’m not entirely sure where to even start with this, but I guess the TL;DR is that I honestly think Gou/Sotsu was ultimately just fine despite it’s issues, and part me of can’t help but be like ‘I told you so, lol’ about how this really did end with this episode, and also committed pretty hard to the Umineko prequel elements.

It’s not like all of my theories were correct in the end, but I at least think I was pretty spot on in my prediction last week that this would end with the miracle of them side-stepping the sword issue entirely and choosing the third option of forgiveness and reconciliation. And also them ending it with an epilogue where we go back to the Matsuribayashi timeline and get a happy ending for Rika and Satoko that provides a ‘non-magical interpretation’ for the story while also giving us an idea of how Bern and Lambda formally split off into their own entities and start the relationship we see in Umineko.

I didn’t quite expect them to go down the route of having them agree to just spend a few years apart and accept that they don’t need to literally always be together, but I think that was a really good way to wrap things up between them. It’s pretty much the healthiest compromise to their conflict that doesn’t come across like it completely invalidates one of their dreams. I get why it feels too anti-climactic and convenient for people, but when you pull at that thread you get into wider topics of what the entire story is about, since this was always going to end with Satoko being redeemed and forgiven. People might not have taken him seriously, but Ryukishi was 100% genuine about his regrets about Matsuribayashi’s ending, and how part of why he came up with this new story was to create a better ending, while also doing more with Satoko as a character.

Basically I think a lot of the fandom negativity towards this boils down to people fundamentally disagreeing with the idea that Matsuribayashi was even ‘flawed’ in this sort of way to begin with, or that Satoko was badly written. It’s valid to disagree on this stuff, but at the very least we all have to grapple with how Ryukishi has his own specific relationship with this series.

People like to focus on how he’s a troll who likes to mess with people, but I feel like this is a bit of a wake-up call for people about how he’s actually extremely sincere, almost to a fault, and he likes to use his stories as a vehicle for expressing his personal philosophies and ideals.

This whole story is also a good example of how he just sees this as ultimately being a fictional story about fictional characters, and not literally a matter of real people who need to be sentenced for their crimes or whatever. As early as the original VN he was almost being outright preachy about the message that nobody is irredeemable, and that philosophy carries through to this. But to be more specific, nobody *in this story* is irredeemable. He’s pretty open about the fact that in practice you can’t apply this sort of ideal to real life, but fictional stories are their own separate matter.

I think this whole issue of how he views this as a story first and foremost is also the central reason why this ended in a way that comes across as Satoko being let off too easy for her crimes. One way or another, Ryukishi’s made it clear that he sees this as being no different to how other characters had arcs where they committed crimes but still got forgiven, or how Takano is basically a straight up war criminal who also got forgiven for her crimes.

Anyway, this episode at least committed to the Umineko stuff, so that was satisfying. Sure there’s people that still want to deny it, but at this point I think a lot of people are just being stubborn, so it’s not like anything would have really convinced them, lol. I’m also genuinely not sure what people even would have expected them to do beyond what we saw her, aside from having the two of them literally put on their gothic lolita outfits and turn to the camera and go ‘we are literally Bernkastel and Lambdadelta from the video game series Umineko When They Cry’. I almost feel like there’s some kind of misunderstanding from people who aren’t familiar with Umineko when it comes to the idea of what it even means for this to be ‘an Umineko prequel’, or ‘a Bern/Lambda origin story’. I mean, this is quite literally exactly what I expected and hoped for in that regard. It’s not like I was expecting them to incorporate anything related to, like, Beatrice or the Ushiromiya family.

I think this is also one of those things where you just have to decide for yourself whether or not you want to earnestly engage with the story that’s being told, or if you want to assume that there’s some level of malice or trickery going on.

To be honest, I wasn’t expecting them to literally have Rika and Satoko recite part of Bern and Lambda’s final conversation with each other word for word, lmao. Combined with the scene at the end where ‘Witch Satoko’ talks to herself about how she’s going to give her body back to Satoko while she goes chasing after Rika, it was literally just the exact origin story of their relationship as it’s depicted in Umineko.

I still feel like this would all only really be ‘worth it’ if we actually get something like a full on anime remake for Umineko, but at this point I can’t help but feel satisfied with this part of it all.

It’s not like I think Gou/Sotsu as a whole is perfect or anything, though. I don’t hate it as much as basically everyone else does, but I think Ryukishi’s the sort of VN writer who really struggles with the shift to writing for an anime. I think a big part of the frustration people have is just from how this is formatted as a weekly anime series spread across basically an entire year, instead of being something like a stand-alone VN chapter that you can read at whatever pace you want, even if it ultimately takes the same amount of time to read as it would to watch all of Gou/Sotsu.

There’s also the whole issue of this being a sort-of-remake, which snowballed into a whole list of structural problems. They absolutely tried too hard to have their cake and eat it too, and they should have just committed to it being made for old fans only, instead of trying to sincerely incorporate elements from the VN that old fans don’t care about anymore because they’ve gone over it already.

And as I’ve said several times before, it was a major issue for them to decide to put Nekodamashi in the middle of Gou and then spend like 20 episodes on flashback answer arcs until finally getting back to that cliffhanger. I’ve been waiting until this all ended to decide exactly how I feel about that, and now that it’s all over I still think it was a really bad idea. I don’t think it was an issue for them to reveal that Satoko’s the culprit that early, but having the gun cliffhanger specifically happen that early just gave people misguided expectations and tainted the answer arcs because people were just impatient to get back to the cliffhanger. And then the cliffhanger itself ended up being somewhat anti-climactic, which is what I’d been fearing would happen. It would have worked fine if they shuffled it around so that the cliffhanger happened right before Kagurashi and was followed up in the very next episode, or if this was a VN where you could binge your way through the flashback stuff, but spending like half of an entire real-life year to get back to that point only to have the resolution be ‘Satoko just shoots Rika and the death loops keep going’ just didn’t really work properly.

I’m a lot more generous towards the Akashi arcs than most people are, since I think they really over-estimate how much re-used content there is there, but they still suffer from the central issue of the show trying to be accessible for new fans. It could have been heavily condensed otherwise, without losing anything in terms of Satoko’s whole character arc.

On the other hand I think the first half of Kagurashi was awful specifically because it highlighted how bad of an idea it was to put Nekodamashi so early in the story. They still ended up having to go back to that arc and repeat it anyway, in the most 1:1 recap-y way in the whole show, but that wouldn’t have even been an issue in the first place if that was instead the first time that arc happened in the show.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how I would rearrange the story to make it flow better while still following Ryukishi’s intentions, and I think they could have condensed it into a 2-cour season with this sort of structure if they did something like this:

-First arc where Rika gets thrown back into the loop and quickly figures out that somebody intentionally caused this to happen, and it’s not Takano because at least in this idea of mine she’d try and investigate her only to find out that this version of Takano regrets everything and is planning to flee the village with Tomitake.

Basically I think this could tie into the idea of Satoko initially wanting to just concoct an idea world for Rika so that she won’t want to leave this time, but sort of like what I think happens in Saikoroshi, Rika would still reject it, and this time around there’d be the additional layer of her knowing that somebody did this to her for an unknown reason. Maybe they could even initially market it as a new adaptation or a remake of Saikoroshi, and then reveal that it’s a sequel, to keep that whole element to the series. Either way I think this would end with everything going to shit when Rika rejects that fragment and wants to go back to St. Lucia’s, and Satoko basically snaps and kills her, and that way the audience can find out about her being the culprit without Rika finding out about it yet.

Maybe there could even be some dramatic irony where Rika’s attempts to meddle with certain ‘trigger events’, and her displaying her looper side, inadvertently triggers people around her to get paranoid, and the whole fragment would start to spiral into tragedy from there. I think they could at least use the whole conflict in Tatariakashi about Teppei actually being good this time as a starting point for that sorta thing.

-Second arc, rounding out the first cour, which is basically just Satokowashi. I don’t think there’s much that you’d need to change here, but like I said above I like the idea of her initially trying to just invent a perfect world for Rika and her to live in, instead of jumping straight to murder. But maybe instead of her literally just watching Rika’s loops, she could instead just be stuck using her looping powers to try and figure out how to create that ‘perfect world’ in the first place, by personally investigating all of the different tragedies and how to prevent them.

-Staring the second cour, a third arc where we basically just get to see those loops Satoko goes through, and her whole process of solving the tragedies and ‘purifying’ characters like Teppei and Takano, until we eventually see her perspective on the first arc, and how she reacts to Rika ultimately rejecting the world she tried to make for her.

-A fourth and final arc which is basically just Nekodamashi + Kagurashi, where she just totally snaps and tries to just torture Rika into never wanting to leave the village again, and eventually Satoko gets exposed and they have their direct confrontation with each other.

With that sorta story structure, you’d keep all the relevant bits of Gou/Sotsu as it is now, while being more focused on Rika and Satoko instead of doing kinda half-assed reruns of the Rena and Shion arcs. It’d also push the big cliffhanger between them until near the end of the show, while still revealing to the audience relatively early on that Satoko’s the culprit.

I’d also like them to do more with Satoshi and Shion, so maybe like with how Teppei gets redeemed and Satoko almost gets to have a happy life with him in Tatariakashi, the central question arc of this hypothetical story could also involve Satoko making sure that Satoshi wakes up from his coma, and Shion also gets to have a good relationship with all of them. You could probably do something interesting with the idea of Satoshi and Shion being in the camp of not trusting Teppei and his whole redemption arc.

Honestly I could spend a long time talking about how I would have done things differently, lol. For one thing, I think the Akashi arcs would have been much better if they just changed it so that Satoko used psychological tactics to make people paranoid, and we completely cut out the whole syringe plot device. I get how it fits with Satoko’s whole certainty gimmick, but it made those arcs way too predictable. Even if we knew the outcome, it’d at least be entertaining to see exactly how Satoko might go out of her way to set up the different tragedies. We kinda got glimpses of that sorta plot point in Wataakashi when things seemed to go outside of her control, but they didn’t really do much with it.

Anyway, this is a whole lot of words to say that I think that in spite of the serious structural issues going on, I think Gou/Sotsu as a whole is fine, and was at least working with a lot of perfectly good ideas that could have been executed much better.

Also, on a side note, that one scene during their fist-fight at the start where the art-style changes a bit was kinda weird, but I really liked how it looked, and part of me almost wishes the whole show looked like that, lol. I like Akio Watanabe’s character designs, but I feel like that sort of stylized, almost TWEWY-ish art style would have been really fitting for this series, especially in the horror/action parts.

Oh, and the new rendition of You was so good it almost felt emotionally manipulative, lol.

#murasaki rambles #higurashi #higurashi sotsu #this got kinda long but I still feel like there's so much more I could say about this if I wanted to

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d4rkpluto · 3 years

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𝔣𝔢𝔢𝔡𝔟𝔞𝔠𝔨 𝔰𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔫

warning: a very long feedback

❦ (part one) hi pluto! thank you so so so much for this groom persona chart reading! i did originally purchase this, not knowing how it would resonate as i am currently in a committed relationship with someone, but HOLLLYYY CRAP the way this resonated SO deeply gave me goosebumps. this entire chart made me think of my current partner, and it was INSANE to see all the similarities. for anyone who is debating on purchasing a chart from pluto, i HIGHLY recommend it. first off, it was so easy to message and purchase this reading from pluto through tumblr, and she responded quickly and politely. second of all, the actual reading itself was BEAUTIFULLY organized and aesthetic to look at. the way it was organized made it very easy to understand and follow (houses & planets in their houses). i love that the reading matched pluto’s aesthetic because it felt completely unique.

❦ and lastly, the content. TWENTY FIVE FULL PAGES? plus, it wasn’t one of those readings where the astrologer just listed off each placement as separate entities. pluto referenced other placements throughout the reading which a) not only helped my understanding but b) helped make this reading feel so much more personal which i truly loved. i didn’t want to get too into detail in this first part of the feedback, since this is just general feedback that hopefully any future customer would read this and feel inspired to purchase a reading for themselves :) now onto the juicy details…. i apologize beforehand if this feedback sounds scattered, but i’m going between the reading and this feedback to reference the small details.

❦ i cannot tell you that each detail you mentioned, was so eerily reminiscent of my current partner, J. one aspect of the reading that kept coming up was his relationship to his family and how important it is to him, and that is very very true. i’ve met his family, and the tradition of “family” is SO important to him. i mean, heck he is the FIFTH J, in a line of Js. (meaning his father is the fourth, grandfather is the third, etc.) in the gemini ascendant part, the parts that stuck out to me were: his attractive, youthful appearance, him being younger than me, and a heavier upper body due to mercury being in the fourth house. J is a TOTAL homebody, and pretty introverted. he likes to stay at home, and needs to recharge at home when he’s out, which i feel like was reflected by the cancer houses and the fourth house placements. and you mentioned in cancer third house that his family may be homebodies as well, and that couldn’t be more true. there’s a reason their house is decked out to make being at home as comfortable as possible (newest TV & technology, parts of the home to maximize comfort) leo in the fourth house was SO interesting. “flashy cars”, J’s dad owns a tesla and is in love w it 💀, and J’s mom IS the main breadwinner in the house.

❦ it’s also interesting because J played football all his life because it runs in his family, but he recently changed his career plans to pursue acting and musical theatre, which i think is interesting because it fits this “golden child” vibe. the family all has brown hair and brown eyes, and he’s the only one in the immediate family to have blonde hair and green eyes. they always joke he’s like the ‘pretty’ one haha. ALL of the leo (sun and mercury) was very accurate. he is very talented and whenever i’m over at his house, i never fail to laugh my ass off since everyone in his home is funny. i’m so thankful his family represents the light side of the characteristics mentioned in the reading. they are all charismatic and warm and they’re definitely proud of their family. the venus in virgo and virgo in fifth house makes me think of how J’s love language is acts of service and it has me dead because my love language is physical touch, and i’ve had to get used to him helping me do the dishes as a sign of his love for me lmao. also, he does talk about children 😳

❦ (part two) libra in the sixth house got me DEAD TOO. J always complains that the other men in his house (his dad and his younger brother) NEVER clean up around the house. J, and his mom and older sister are usually the ones who clean around the house and since his sister moved out, it’s just him and his mom who take care of cleaning. sixth house ruling health as well, he does have asthma and shmokes 🍃, and also has ridiculously nice skin groom in scorpio, J is someone i think is always brooding, even when they’re not haha and with what you said about it being in the sixth house, he is a little obsessive over his daily routine and his work. he is very career-focused, and likes to get daily tasks done before he moves on to his ‘routine’ that is more comfort focused (playing video games and unwinding) sagittarius seventh house, weirdly resonated with me?

❦ not to sound like ‘omggg i’m his future spouse 🤪’, but i do have very prominent sagittarius placements (specifically sag mars conjunct sag pluto is one of the tightest aspects in my chart) and i found this page interesting to read. in regards to open enemies, the people who have turned against him have called him those exact words: “arrogant, careless, straightforward, and impulsive” pluto and chiron in sagittarius mentioned something that is also mentioned in aries twelfth house, where they can’t shake the feeling of being watched, and it’s SO interesting that that is mentioned multiple times becauseee the other day when we may have taken some 🍄, he began to feel really paranoid because he couldn’t shake the feeling of being perceived and watched.

❦ as mentioned in chiron, he really is wary of people and i think that is linked to the fact that he was heavily bullied in childhood by those he saw as his friends :( capricorn in eighth and ninth house, J really does bury his emotions deep within, and doesn’t often let his emotions be visible to those around him. he also is a lot more strict with his finances, and doesn’t spend willy nilly. J is also pretty traditional in his philosophical views, and his dad has always been there to help with his own ‘life lessons’. neptune and uranus in aquarius, J is not super religious, so ‘believing in themselves’ is definitely the route he follows. it’s interesting that there’s a lot of mention of turning away from father’s teachings, and it feels like that has manifested in J’s life path. given the same name as his father and the fathers before that who all played football their entire lives, J has talked a lot about how hard it was to pursue what he really loved which was art.

❦ he still mentions how he feels like he should not be the one to pass down the family name, because he is not following the same path. the tradition is that the name is passed down from the eldest son to their eldest son etc, but J actually thinks that his younger brother W should pass along that torch. aquarius in tenth, i’ve only heard how hilarious J’s dad’s parents were. they have passed on, but the stories are truly hilarious. i think it’s interesting that aquarius is pretty prominent in the reading, since in his natal chart, his aquarius moon (in the fourth house funnily enough) is prominent.

❦ (part three) pisces in eleventh was interesting to read as well. J doesn’t have any SOLID friends that he considers his best friends, and kinda floats between friends. he has great relationships with all of them, but still feels a bit separate from all of them which i thought slightly resonated with what was written. a lot of his friends who i am not the biggest fan of do have a victim complex, but his other friends who are chill are super open-minded and intuitive.

❦ aries in twelfth was one that resonated a lot. J is very driven and a “self-made” person if you will. another mention of wanting to escape people’s perceptions. caffeine addiction: LOL, J drinks a cup of coffee a day and when i told him it was an addiction, he always states back that ‘he could stop whenever he wants to’. he also LOVES working out (“addiction to gym”), and he has a secret temper that comes out when playing video games. moon in taurus, J is very close w his mom. his mom is sweet, hard-working, emotional, a little fiery, but overall very dependable and nurturing. it is mentioned he may have gotten taurean traits from his mom, and it’s so interesting because his natal chart sun is in taurus. we love to eat delicious food together and cuddle at home on the couch when we get moments of free time. <3

❦ saturn in gemini, he does not have a tattoo, YET. but he has an idea for one he wants and funnily enough he wants it on his inner forearm. HAHA. the part of this page that talks about being unable to really speak about pain. when we first met (we’ve been together for almost three years) he had a lot of his trauma and pain pent up inside himself, which manifested in a lot of insecurities, and i remember one day, we were sitting together and when i talked him through all of these feelings he burst into tears and expanded on all of those inner thoughts of pain.

❦ since then, he’s gotten so much better at articulating his thoughts and feelings. i also laughed at the “being too witty” part. he definitely has said himself he was bullied for being the kid with a smart mouth, so he definitely holds himself back a little now, but one of my favorite things about him is how witty he is :)

❦ AND WE ARE DONE!! whooo, thank you so much again for this reading. i hope that this feedback made sense 😅. i apologize again that i was unable to get this feedback to you sooner, but i wanted to be able to have time to sit down and write thorough feedback, and not rush anything whilst at work. i absolutely adored this reading, and i hope to purchase another reading from you one day soon. i’m so grateful for your patience and understanding, and for you taking the time to write this beautiful reading. <3

groom chart reading feedback ❦

#plutofeedback #d4rkpluto

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irritatedandroid · 3 years

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The Fire Burns Bright

A Personal Essay From an Alolan Marowak -Jasper (@irritatedandroid, @irritatedDroid)

Summary: Below the cut, this is a personal essay written by Jasper on his experiences with being an Alolan Marowak fictherian and fictionkind. Personal experience, discussion of awakening, shifts, instincts, animality, culture and spirituality are elaborated on alongside a critical view on community narratives and boundaries.

CWs: In-depth look on death, personal experiences with death

I find there isn’t enough discussion on the fact that nonhumanity can be approached from multiple different angles and axis, instead treated like a hard binary of animality vs humanity - or if you’re lucky, a two-way spectrum. I’m someone who is nonhuman through and through, but the way in which I can experience being “other” from humanity can shift wildly. A strong sense of animality is brought on when shifted towards my Alolan Marowak fictotype - enough that I tend to strongly identify with the word fictherian. Though that sense of animality is its own thing, and is a wholly separate scale from the nonhumanity I experience when shifted towards my android kintype. But the experiences drawn from being an android could fill an essay of their own. We’re here to discuss the Marowak.

Both very not human, both very “other”, but a wholly different view upon what it means to be human and not human respectively. And I suspect the scale my Marowak self experiences may be different as well from the scale any given earthen animal may experience. Similar enough to where therianthrope discussion rings loud mental bells of familiarity and understanding, but still something else worth acknowledging. After all, how many earthen animal therianthropes feel the raw instinct of fire breath? Were-dragons however may understand that one well. And yet that animality is not something to be ignored or to set aside entirely even if the axis runs at a slightly off angle in comparison.

My name is Jasper, and some of you might know me, I’ve been around the community for a couple of years. Some folks even remember the internal grapple with identity and understanding that I had when I started being unable to deny I am an Alolan Marowak. The moment when the Alolan Marowak design was teased, and I had pointed out the familiarity as well as the typing before it was actually shown. There was a moment then when experiences and vague, blurry memories I’d held onto quietly for years without the priority of digging in deeper - as I was already busy with questioning and understanding my android kintype - became an absolute priority of mine to understand further.

I often half-joke about how my “awakening” as discussed in nonhuman communities was completely rocky, as it was. It was less a solid awakening, and more multiple years of slowly accepting and embracing aspects of my life that had always been present, which I had denied either to ease my own responsibility to myself or to appease others. Folks in the community may recall seeing me step into denial, and to substitute in any possible reptilian, fire-based creature I could in order to try and understand the experiences. Because how could I be a Pokemon? I’d been critical of fictionkin while diving into the community, something which when looking back was likely a compensation for already having been something odd and to be met with criticism - the android. I ran through a number of species when questioning: everything from earthen lizards, to draconic entities, to the elemental spirits of salamanders.

There were multiple aspects absolutely vital to communicating what I was experiencing, those being a) instinct-driven and wild, reptilian, and b) inherently connected to the elements of fire and spirit. My thoughts could be as unflattering as a scavenger’s instinct, growing frustrated at any leftover food or uncleaned-up animal remains (which sure made living in a populated city interesting, with abandoned scraps of food everywhere and the leftovers of unfortunate urban creatures who tried their luck at crossing Yonge Street), or curious to try and make a meal for myself out of the live insects I keep to feed to my own little old leopard gecko, Saleen. Yes, she was named after a car. No, that is not important. Having her around does however provide an up close frame of reference to draw out my own lizard drives. In terms of food instincts, raw eggs are absolutely another tempter of mine, as my carnivorous scavenger self would have been ecstatic to see a nest of unattended eggs to make a meal of. As I’ve learned due to that raw eggs absolutely suck, please cook them. It’s much better that way. But embarrassing nonhumanity stories will always be embarrassing.

Some of us Marowak - especially the males like myself - could become quite territorial. And that territorial feeling is something I’ve had to settle in my mind over life. Nowadays it’s decently well integrated, but it does now and then try my patience especially when it comes to setting out what is for me and what belongs strictly to me. Renting a small apartment in a populated city, once again, does definitely force you to keep the “this land is mine and it belongs to me, so screw off before you chase off my dinner” thoughts in check. A bit of human humbling for an animal’s self thought. I’ve of course needed to remind myself a number of times that the tourists in the train station on my way to work, while annoying, won’t manage to chase off the Tim Hortons I’ll be eating on my break.

But in the wild frontier of the Pokemon world, predator and prey dynamics were absolutely important to know and understand - and those dynamics reach beyond game mechanics such as elemental types and abilities. Even as a carnivore, scavenger and troublesome predator that I was when I reached the age of a full-grown Marowak, I still was in a dangerous spot on the food chain. The worst predators I’ve had to deal with while working to survive in my ecosystems were other Fire types, intriguingly. Even as a small Ground type Cubone. The fact that Cubones wear the skull of their lost mothers was something I am familiar with, my own having been taken down by a Charizard. This natural order of predation is both a major part of my animalistic experiences as a Marowak, but also did tie into my more sophisticated or spiritually-focused aspects that stemmed from my Pokemon identity and lifetime.

All of this lead to an animality-focused time in figuring out what I was, to the point where when I was in denial of the possibility of being a Pokemon, I identified myself as a theriomythic, fire-oriented reptile. And the animality definitely tends to lead the discussion upon how I live and experience being an Alolan Marowak. I sometimes joke that you could strip that side of my life down to the bare essentials and I’d be a lizard hanging out by a campfire. Though it certainly isn’t every aspect of me, as the Marowak.

At times I think on the term theriomythic, and how it could be extremely valuable in describing more than just “animal but from myth”, but to also communicate experiencing the self on a spectrum of animality and mythicality. In my case this spectrum is very much there, and the aspects of experience that make up me as the Marowak are scattered along it. All aspects are important to me and how I live as myself, as well as how I understand my own fictional animality and nonhumanity.

The Marowak, despite being a wild animal in how I recall and experience my species, do have a displayed aspect of culture and even spirituality. Setting aside the fictional wildness of being able to summon up fire at will to defend one’s turf, we’re shown to be able to interact comfortably with each other when it comes time for rituals, such as fire dancing at the sun rise and to mourn the lost. Mourning the lost is a large part of how one can experience being the Marowak as well, as it’s a pretty integral part of the species’ canon lore, starting from when we’re little baby Cubones. For those unfamiliar with Pokemon lore, a Cubone wears the skull of its dead mother Marowak. Adorning bones in a sort of ritual to mourn is something that I can’t say I’ve seen an earthen animal do. If you have then please do let me know, because it interests me a lot. But all I can say about it in my own drives and thoughts is that it’s just what we do, it’s cultural. To cite the Pokedex, “MAROWAK is the evolved form of a CUBONE that has overcome its sadness at the loss of its mother and grown tough. This POKéMON’s tempered and hardened spirit is not easily broken” (Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire, 2002).

The donning and weaponizing of bones is both symbolic and an act of mourning, but also an example of tool using similar to some of our world’s apes. The Pokedex talks of this vaguely, stating “It has been seen pounding boulders with the bone it carries in order to tap out messages to others” (Pokemon Gold, 1999). The various Pokedex entries theorize on where the bone clubs come from, some entries mentioning a graveyard specifically for Marowak existing in the world, where Cubone and Marowak get their bones. Some entries state this like fact, such as Pokemon Crystal, meanwhile others bring up this as a rumour, such as Pokemon Silver. In my experience, it’s a rumour. I’ve not seen a Marowak graveyard, my bone club first came from my mother. But the main referenced use of the bone club is as a weapon, and also as a method of overcoming grief and turning to viciousness. “It is small and was originally very weak. Its temperament turned ferocious when it began using bones.” (Pokemon X, 2013). In my case, the symbolic use of them is as a tool of war, transforming grief into a vicious will to fight on and survive. Due to this, I hold bones and particularly skulls as a sacred object and have my small collection of skulls I keep as comfort objects. With time, having a large femur bone similar in shape is a life goal.

Though it does then get taken a step further, when peering in through the eyes of an Alolan variant Marowak. A spirituality that incorporates the dead and lost is brought in and becomes an extra step of important, crediting the Ghost type aspect alongside the Fire. Newer Pokedex entries focused on specifically this variant states “The bones it possesses were once its mother’s. Its mother’s regrets have become like a vengeful spirit protecting this Pokémon” (Pokemon Sun, 2016) and “It has transformed the spirit of its dear departed mother into flames, and tonight it will once again dance in mourning of others of its kind” (Pokemon Let’s Go, 2018). Spiritual awareness is very much accepted to be something that the Alolan Marowak possess and engage with openly, even building monuments to the lost as stated in the Generation 7 Pokedex entry: “Its custom is to mourn its lost companions. Mounds of dirt by the side of the road mark the graves of the Marowak” (Pokemon Moon, 2016).

Culturally there is a lot to the Marowak’s experience, comparing and including both Alolan and Kantonian variants of the species. The species as I remember are mostly solitary but I do recall clan dynamics and groups especially among the Alolan variant. These groups were less for survival and more for the purpose of those ritual gatherings, mentioned above. At times I was very foreign to these clans, being a Kanto-born Cubone evolved in Alola (a fact supported in canon and proven in Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon via the ability to evolve a Kanto Marowak in Ultra Space). Behaviorally and culturally there are differences between Kanto and Alolan Marowak, brought on by how each looks at their situation differently. While an Alolan Marowak processes mourning in a more spiritual way, a Kanto Marowak becomes hardened by anger. “A MAROWAK is the evolved form of a CUBONE that has grown tough by overcoming the grief of losing its mother. Its tempered and hardened spirit is not easily broken,” (Pokemon Emerald, 2004). Because of this there was a separation between myself and the local Marowak that reinforced my solitary nature, and also influenced my introverted and almost outright nomadic nature in my current life and self. The fire dance under the sunrise was one known in canon. These rituals and dances are a custom humans in canon have taken notice to, and can even speculate the reasoning for. “This Pokémon sets the bone it holds on fire and dances through the night as a way to mourn its fallen allies” (Pokemon Sword, 2019). The fact that that cultural dynamic prevailed even through the difficulty of communicating is something that may be surprising, but a number of nonhumans know well that body language and tone of animal vocalizations can go a long way in communicating

Ignoring these experiences would be a step towards cutting down and denying important experiences that affect me as a fictherian and as a Marowak. There’s important parts of how I experience being this Pokemon that are heavily grounded in a context of a mystical world where visibly potent acts of fantasy are possible unlike the world we are living in here. Some of these aspects can be emulated in more subtle ways through exploration of spirituality, religion and the occult. To dive deeper into that, I used to identify as Pagan, however now I practice what is called chaos magic. Chaos magic is a magical practice that developed in England in the 1960’s, working off of Austin Osman Spare’s occult practice and ideas. Chaos magic gave me an approach and freedom to incorporate what I know and remember as an Alolan Marowak into my every-day spirituality. Tailoring my spiritual beliefs and practices to focus on working with the element of fire, with spirits and the energy of death, bones, and to the very fabric of fiction crossing over into reality was extremely important as an avenue for me to explore the way my fictotype affects me in the modern day, and in the human body. This practice also gave me a bit of freedom to accept working with an entity from my source - Giratina - as a patron deity in pagan circles, which ultimately proved to be extremely valuable in exploring my own Pokemon identity. Practices like energy work, meditation, spirit work and visualization hit close to satisfying that need to be delved into the magical world we see in animation. And yet, even in these more sophisticated and fantastical experiences lie links back to the animality and to an inherent disconnect to humanity.

One thing I always enjoy in therianthrope and non-humanoid otherkin discussions is an openness to discuss the instincts that are ugly, disturbing or outside of what one’s human morals would ever agree with in this life and time. And in a lot of cases these instincts and memories can become a lot more “ugly” than a scavenger’s drive to eat carcasses or the awareness and cynical eye needed to survive in a completely wild world. At times, a wild creature can have defense mechanisms or behaviors that to our human minds would seem outright malicious. And Pokemon, even in the whimsical canon, are no exception to that. Once again I’ll drag up a few Pokedex entries - as honestly the Pokedex is a wonderful thing for exploring the deeper aspects of a wild Pokemon - to illustrate my point. “When it beats opponents with its bone, the cursed flames spread to them. No amount of water will stop those flames from burning,” (Pokemon Ultra Moon, 2017) and “The cursed flames that light up the bone carried by this Pokémon are said to cause both mental and physical pain that will never fade” (Pokemon Shield, 2019).

Yes, even the fun and magical world of Pokemon is no stranger to wild animals who inflict effects upon others that seem absolutely awful, and in some cases cruel. But, that’s survival in the animal kingdom, or in this case the Pokemon kingdom. It can be surprising to some that a person who’s fictotype hails from the fun and upbeat franchise that defined a number of childhoods may be hardened to the need to survive in a natural world. The things I know I had done to creatures who my childhood Pokemon fan self would have only wanted to hug, at least at a baseline mental state. In a shift, that’s a different story after all.

But ultimately, this blend of experiences causes an interesting time in exploring myself within the general nonhuman community as it can be quite split up. Certain narratives of individual communities I can’t find myself fitting into, or find myself sitting in between. I settle into spaces focused on everything from therianthropy, to mythical otherkinity, and to fictionkinity, though there’s narratives and cultural aspects in every separated community that either are foreign to me or that I might confront as they expect clear-cut boxes between them which individuals can fit into. In therianthrope communities I’ve been one to criticize the expectation of a solid line between human and animal experiences, or in general animal vs non-animal with regards to forcing a further divide from the otherkin community. I’ve also been involved in discussion criticizing therian community narratives such as a shifting focus and the model of integration. The model of integration is interesting to me, as I experienced it in a way that I was unaware of at the time, particularly with my android kintype. My android kintype is almost fully integrated into me - I barely shift at all at least mentally. However my Marowak fictotype provides less integration, and my mental shifting will be a lot more noticeable against my baseline self. At times it can be as stark as appearing like a different person, or more accurately like a wild animal. But ultimately the differences in the closeness of each kintype draws up issues for me with the integration model, as well as having found it normalized a severe mental health issue I had with my traumagenic plurality at the time of “least integration”.

The therianthrope community is far from the only community with narratives that put a barrier between me and relating, especially as members of each community push for further separation between individual branches of nonhuman experience and identity. I have trouble relating to humanoids when heavily shifted towards my Marowak self, and that puts a bit of a barrier between myself and the otherkin community’s more humanoid side - such as elven, fae, divine, angelic, etc. - as well as the fictionkin community’s focus on humanoid or completely story-driven fictionkind. I have no use for prioritized experiences within the fictionkin community such as finding canon-mates and creating aesthetics. Even in some Pokemon fictionkin specific communities I find I cannot relate often. My experience with my “Pokemanity” is heavily wild and animal-based as I was never caught, socialized with a human, or trained. In no way shape or form is my Pokemanity adjusted to interaction with humans, nor is it something that is settled down or subdued for human consumption unlike what my source was created for.

In both otherkin, therian and even fictionkin communities there is a push towards prioritizing the narrative of a solid awakening. That’s one more focus in the communities that I struggle with, as like I said before, mine was a process of accepting bits of myself which spanned multiple years. Every part of me that is nonhuman has always been present within my life, though for almost two decades muted heavily.

To draw back into my spiritual practice here, consider a practice known as shadow work. Shadow work is a practice that hybridizes spirituality and psychology, and describes the process of becoming aware of one’s shadow (the id, shadow archetype, or shadow aspect drawn from Carl Jung’s psychology) and working to integrate it into oneself by accepting the repressed parts of oneself that are pushed back and merged into the shadow. The shadow can be known as the unknown dark side of the personality, and I theorize that more nonhumans have undesirable aspects of their nonhumanity pushed onto their shadow than they might think they do, like I had done to my own Pokemanity for a number of years. In my case, I was slightly forced to tear into and meet my shadow aspects of my nonhumanity due to the fact that even upon immediately breaking into nonhuman communities, the specifics of what I was were already viewed with hostility and disbelief. In a way, it strengthened me. But with my shadow opened wide and not much held back, I can be a bit of a fire-starter in spaces where I speak my mind whether others want to hear it or not. And part of that is directly confronting the forced separation of animal vs non-animal, or the arbitrary ideas of what is a human experience and what is not.

I can only best put forward my experience as a Pokemon through in-depth discussion, which I find tends to come across better in spaces where the experience of being by-and-large a feral animal is allowed without restraint. Ultimately a space I will thrive in most and be most open about my experiences and life as someone who is spiritually and psychologically an Alolan Marowak is one where I can discuss both my animality, my experience with fiction, my spiritual practice and the combination of these things that seem to be pushed into separate boxes. The Marowak serves a lot to my sense of self and to my life, and has psychological affects on me as well. It’s been a part of me that has fought through and survived when my life hit a rocky start early on, witnessing the death of my brother in childhood, and having loss and grief be present all around as I grew. The Marowak is both an inherent part and vital context in my life, as well as a symbol of my own endurance.

Through it all, the fire burns bright.

Citations

Marowak POKÉDEX: Stats, MOVES, evolution & locations. (n.d.). Retrieved April 23, 2021, from https://pokemondb.net/pokedex/marowak

Chryssides, George D. (2012). Historical Dictionary of New Religious Movements (2 ed.). Rowman & Littlefield. p. 78. ISBN 978-0-8108-6194-7.

Jung, C.G. 1938. "Psychology and Religion." In Psychology and Religion: West and East, Collected Works of C.G. Jung 11. p. 131

Roberts, Gwilym Wyn, and Andrew Machon. 2015. Appreciative Healthcare Practice: A guide to compassionate, person-centred care. M&K. ISBN 1907830936. p. 71.

#essays #personal essay #fictherian #fictionkin #fictionkind #otherkin #otherkind #personal log #alolan marowak #death tw

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scandalsavagefanfic · 2 years

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Hi. Um I'm reading your Gods among us series rn. I started like a couple hours ago and I'm on chapter 6 rn but i needed to pause and just say. HOLY. SHIT. this? is AWESOME. Dude. Dude. I can't deal with how good this fic is???!!! Its dark and fucked up i love it. Also the world building is immaculate!!

I'm literally kicking myself for not picking it up sooner. Honestly many many kudos to you. thanks for sharing this!

Hope you have a lovely day!!!

a;dkfjkaljfkal;afhl;dkal;hf

Thank you so much for such a beautiful, glowing comment!! I’m sorry it took so long to respond to these but I kept them so that I could look back on them easily when I needed a confidence booster (which is too often lately). This is such a lovely, sweet comment. Thank you so much, you really made my... well, weeks that I’ve had this in my inbox lol. I’ve reread it so many times.

But one can only be selfish for so long and it’s time to get you an answer.

[Find the series we’re talking about here: GOD’S AMONG US] I’m pretty thrilled when people say they like the worldbuilding because I had so much fun thinking about it. If you haven’t checked them out already, you might be interested in the Appendices. (Also, I am still working on additional stories in this verse! I’ve just been very distracted by other projects lately. One is very close to completion though!)

Re the “War is a growing pain”/dual natures stuff... ultimately this fic was born from some thoughts I’ve had for original work over the years and my musings on the nature of divinity; how living forever and having these insane powers that separate you from the beings of the next closest evolutionary level by lightyears would inform how one viewed not just other life/intelligence but existence in general. I’ve always felt like there was something missing from the way we write and talk about immortality and I still don’t think I fully did it justice but I hope I managed to scratch the surface a little. The idea that we get so caught up in the world around us and all it’s problems that it’s easy to forget all the ways things are better now than they ever were before was kind of the catalyst for “If you had the first hand perspective and experience of history to inform your thoughts, would you be jaded or awed at the potential of humanity?” And at one point someone described a country or a political concept as “young” and I started thinking about international relations as interfamilial relations or even personal growth; how humanity as a species might evolve along the same emotional and intellectual ebbs and flows as a single human... I’m sorry, I’m not articulating my thought processes very well 😭 I’ll move on to the easy answer now 😂

The time period! I did mostly want to leave it open to interpretation, but I did have specific reasons for making certain decisions.

SO while this fictional world is very similar in a lot of ways to ours, there are obviously some major differences. The biggest one is that these gods are known entities. No one questions whether they exist. There is no such thing as atheism in this world because the gods are tangible facts, happy to remind people that they do, in fact, exist. AND many of the gods are in same-sex relationships that produce children, the ones who are part of “fated” or “official” pairings are still ancient beings, monogamy isn’t really a thing for the gods (another one of those things that seemed unlikely for eternal beings). While there is still a lot of religious tension between sects and subsequent moralizing, it’s on a much smaller scale. So while each region of the world still has it’s own history and developed individual cultures, there is a also this massive shared experience with the gods. At the same time, the gods have largely secluded themselves from the world and humans, with all their problems and all their lack of power, don’t have that option. For good or bad, they can’t hide and are forced to deal with their issues.

All this apparently translated to this anachronistic, vaguely WWII era aesthetic on Earth with hopefully little bits from all over the world seeping in (If you’ve read any of the other fics in the series, Dick is India for the celebration of this universe’s approximation of Holi at the beginning of A Love Story and bits of his temple are definitely inspired by Japanese shrines) and the Hall of Divinity was largely stuck in a classic ancient Greek aesthetic.

A couple little notes: jeans and t-shirts have been around for a long time! Jeans since the 1800′s I think and t-shirts actually right around the time of WWII (though I think there were similar garments before that. And the stuff with the computers... that was meant to show that the gods do actually have jobs 😂 The computer in Tim’s rooms isn’t available on Earth. Jason is mesmerized by it. What he thinks of as a computer is MASSIVE and don’t actually have screens. The computer he sees in Tim’s rooms is the future and it’s Tim’s job to figure out how to inspire mankind to use it wisely when they finally invent it (inspiring mankind to invent it is Arsenal's job).

Thank you so much for such amazing and insightful questions! I really do still love this AU and I’m so glad people are still getting enjoyment from it. You honestly made my entire month lol 💖💖💖💖💖💖💖

#asks #you are too kind anon #thank you so much #I'm so fucking flattered #melting from all the sugar in the sweet things you said #watgp #we're all the gods' playthings #fic commentary

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incorrectshantaequotes · 3 years

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Shantae Headcanons - The Half-Genies

This is a bit of a weird one for me, not gonna lie. Mostly because, well...you've kinda seen some of my headcanons already! Aside from Harmony, the half-genies don't really get that much screentime (well, Shantae does, but she's in a different post), so I've had to figure out their characterization myself for their quotes. Don't worry, though, that's not all I'm covering here. In any case - onto the headcanons!

Harmony

Harmony is a lot of things. A mentor figure, a guide, a gentle hand - she does great in a crisis, and does wonders helping others through their own. It's no wonder the other half-genies looked up to her. She does have one glaring weakness, though...she cannot do casual social interactions. At all. The other half-genies figured this out rather quickly when they went into the Half-Genie Festival; she did spectacularly with her performance, but during the afterparty? Harmony was doing her best to either not be seen, and what conversation was sparked between her and the partygoers was rather stilted and awkward. The reason for this? Well, it actually ties back to how well she does as a calm and collected leader...

Harmony's mother was well aware of the dangers of Quake Magic. Used without thought or care, it can cause mass devastation, as Shantae herself can attest to. So, to help Harmony when she was gone, she slipped in some instructions into the scrapbook to tell Harmony how to train herself. The catch was, she had to completely isolate herself from civilization first, to avoid any potential harm to innocents while she was still learning to control her magic. Harmony followed said instructions to the letter, only coming out of her training when she felt she was ready to fulfill her role as Guardian Genie. As a result of this nomadic lifestyle, Harmony's calm, disciplined, and can use her magic incredibly well, but it doesn't really make for a good social life.

Thankfully, the other half-genies have been able to help with that, letting Harmony loosen up and enjoy herself. She's still more naturally introverted, but she is rather open around the other half-genies. She has a lot of time on her hands, as very few actually want to be on the other end of her Quake Magic, so Harmony rarely has to actually step up to defend her town. That's not to say it doesn't happen, of course...

Harmony's town is completely landlocked, so she hasn't had to deal with Risky Boots. Instead, the main threat she deals with is Ammo Baron and his army. See, Harmony's town is in a similar position to Scuttle Town in that it's a great tactical position to launch an assault on the palace of Sequin Land. Unlike Scuttle Town, however, Harmony's town has a mayor who's never even considered firing Harmony, meaning that it's never been in the vulnerable position that let Ammo Baron take over Scuttle Town. As a result, 85% of Harmony's job has mostly consisted of dealing with Ammo Baron's plan B: brute force. Thankfully, her Quake Magic helps tremendously in this effort, frustrating Ammo Baron to no end. It's why he switched targets to Scuttle Town in the first place, and why he was investing in a flying armada in Half-Genie Hero. Easier to deal with earthquakes if you're not touching the ground!

Zapple

Zapple is very impulsive. You'd think that her paranoid streak might make her a little more cautious, but no. If anything, a common reason for her to head off on some crazy quest is whatever conspiracy happens to be in her mind. Thankfully, Vera's always been there to help bail her out when she gets in over her head, with the other half-genies helping in this endeavor as they've gotten to know Zapple better.

As the Guardian Genie of Armor Town, Zapple is an expert blacksmith. Who do you think made that armor? She actually ended up forming an unexpected friendship with Bolo because of this, thanks to their similar backgrounds. She also managed to figure out that Bolo's mom is the Squidsmith (more on that in the post I linked earlier) thanks to her spending some time on Siren Island for the Half-Genie Festival, and thinks it's absolutely hilarious that Shantae hasn't connected the dots yet. She's definitely not telling anytime soon, that's for sure.

After the whole Empress Siren thing, Zapple's relationship with Shantae ended up becoming...something between inspiration and friendly rivalry. Like everyone else, Zapple saw the fight between Shantae and Empress Siren's giant form. Like everyone else, Zapple agreed that it was impressive. So much, in fact, that it made her think, "Well, damn, I better step up." And soon after the dust settled, Zapple started training herself and her magic, hoping to do just as well defending her hometown someday. This also lead to challenging Shantae whenever she visited, as a benchmark of how far she'd come since they first met. Shantae was fine with this, knowing it was all in good fun...even if it was a bit unnerving how intense Zapple could get about it. However, after the return of the remaining Sirens (read here), Zapple's need to prove herself significantly died down, so the "rivalry" part of their friendly rivalry has been kinda phased out.

Vera

As the other resident half-genie on Siren Island, she and Zapple have been friends since childhood. Though from completely different walks of life, they get along very well, with Vera helping to ground Zapple's more manic moments, and Zapple always being there to cheer Vera on with her electric pep. Though Vera's been relieved to have some relatively subdued people in her life with the other half-genies, she does still gets along best with Zapple - even if her spontaneous plans and adventures can be a bit much. Someone has to be there to pull her out of the way of angry Bonk Tortoise, after all.

Beyond Zapple, though, Vera gets along very well with Lobster Siren, helping her understand the surface world better and come out of her (metaphorical) shell. This may have something to do with her Refresh Magic and connection to life making her one of the best at understanding Siren, second to only Shantae herself. She serves as a great translator for Zapple and Harmony, as their Spark Magic and Quake Magic provide little or no help understanding Lobster Siren.

Vera is an excellent dancer, knowing all the traditional dances from Tree Town and beyond. She and Shantae actually had a dance-off during the Half-Genie Festival when Vera saw how good Shantae was at it. Though, at the end, both were so impressed with the other that they couldn't decide a winner, and ended up calling it a tie (although a certain zombie and a certain electric genie were a bit vocal on who they thought won).They agreed to send each other tips when they had the time.

Plink

With her psychic powers, the threats Plink protects her town from tend to be ones they can't see. Specters, wraiths, curses - her Seer Magic gives her a better view on all of them, and she combats it by either seeing if she can talk to the haunting entity or warding off the area to ensure no one goes in by accident and causes something they might regret. It's not really flashy or spectacular, but Plink does her job well, and is one of the best people to talk to regarding the supernatural.

Runs a fortune telling booth in her spare time. She doesn't use her magic or anything, she's just well-versed in the world of fortune telling and thinks it's fun, even if she can't exactly predict the future. Plink does try to make it explicitly clear that she's not an actual fortune teller to those who come by, though, as she doesn't want people to come based on false advertising. It's definitely made for a fun party trick to show the other half-genies, though.

Plink knows Poe and Abner, running into each other when the latter two briefly rejoined the zombie caravan. The zombie brothers were a bit surprised to see another half-genie, to say the least, but were able to laugh it off. They talked a bit, ended up exchanging notes regarding what they knew about the supernatural, and going their separate ways. Ironically, though, Plink didn't connect the dots between Rottytops and the little sister the two mentioned until the Half-Genie Festival was nearly over. She really felt compelled to indulge in a facepalm when she did.

#shantae #harmony #zapple #vera #plink #not a quote #headcanons

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haunthouse · 4 years

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welcome to a meta that, in retrospect, seems glaringly obvious, but that has hit me like a freight train this morning. we’re talking about the lonely as a ghost story.

ghosts as an entity are inherently about disconnect. but kaylee, i hear you say, ghosts are dead people, wouldn’t that make them in the end’s domain? but when it comes down to it, death is a good framing device for ghosts (and yeah, it’s necessary to make ghosts), but people don’t tell ghost stories just because they’re afraid of death. ghost stories are told because ghosts are irrevocably disconnected from the living in a way that terrifies us — sometimes they’re intentionally scary, knocking shit around or yelling boo!, but a lot of the time they’re just... there. and that’s the terrifying part. something that’s there and shouldn’t be; something that can’t interact with the world around it and is completely, utterly, terrifyingly alone.

ghost stories are about isolation, about being a person without any of the framework that being a person requires, without society or connection or love. being unseen and unheard and unknown to all around you — and trying so hard to reverse all those un-words, to be seen, heard, known. that’s exactly the domain of the lonely!

and onto the meat of this meta: all nine lonely-centric statements (and the journey of one martin blackwood) through the lens of ghost stories.

(spoilers for mag170 at the end, but each episode section is clearly marked, so feel free to skip it if you haven’t gotten that far yet!)

MAG013: ALONE

the first lonely statement we get (and also the first in-person statement! which is such a good inversion of the lonely being about lack of connection! jon doesn’t do a great job of comforting naomi, but he does stay with her as she gives the statement when she asks!! that’s beside the point but it is something i really love), and right off the bat, the ghost vibes are off the charts.

truly i am feeling absolutely idiotic for not really thinking about the ghosts-lonely connection before now because this statement? peak ghost story.

naomi’s fiance dies. naomi has several near-death experiences (crashes her car, then is hit by another car and winds up in the hospital), which is also a staple in a lot of ghost stories; nearly dying is set up as a way to get the living closer to the realm of ghosts, able to interact with them more clearly. it was a dark and foggy night in a graveyard, and standing at evan’s (open, empty) grave, naomi hears his disembodied voice leading her home.

when ghost stories are told from a distance, they’re about the horror of it — disembodied howling, faces in the window that keep you up at night. but when they’re told by someone close to the now-ghost, they’re love stories. it’s my grandmother hearing her father’s breathing one last time after his death, giving her a chance to say goodbye. it’s a familiar and loving presence, comforting you. that’s what naomi’s story is — the ghost of evan showing his love for her one final time.

MAG033: BOATSWAIN’S CALL

so, ships are meant to be places of community, right? ron @gerrydelano has a really good post about this regarding shanties. but ghost ships are an established trope of ghost stories: the inversion of what a ship should be, lacking all life and community, silently traversing the waters on its own.

the tundra is a ghost ship. it’s quiet (”very quiet... it was like they were doing everything in their power not to think about each other”) — the people there move around one another as if none of them are there, all so taken by the lonely. their cargo containers are empty. all they’re transporting on that ship is the ghosts of those aboard.

this episode falls into the trope of ghosts want the living to join them — though there’s still a mourning atmosphere when sean kelly is taken fully by the lonely, that final bit of life on the ship extinguished. (”no one said a word, but i could have sworn a few of my shipmates were crying.”)

MAG048: LOST IN THE CROWD

this one’s one of my favorites! andrea nunis’ statement deals with different kinds of loneliness — she begins it with explaining that she prefers to travel alone, but later, that loneliness is something terrifying. she’s in a crowd of unrecognizable people, unable to fit herself into the world she’s seeing — she’s completely separate from the rest of the world. she’s a ghost.

“it wasn’t italian being spoken ... or any other language i recognized. the more i listened, the more i realized it wasn’t a language. there were no words, it was just noise.” “their faces were a blur, each and every one of them.” and, the crowning point: “i tried to talk to them or to shout, to scream at them, but there was no reaction.”

by being taken in by the lonely, andrea’s been turned into a ghost. she cannot interact with or even recognize her environment, and that’s the real horror — it isn’t just being alone, it’s being surrounded by something that should be familiar; a crowd is something she’s been in a thousand times, as someone who travels a lot, and people are the most familiar thing in the world, like looking in a mirror! but it isn’t. everything is strange and she is outside of it all and that’s what a ghost is.

and her connection to her mother is what pulls her out. people have talked at length about how love is the antidote to the lonely so i won’t go on too long about that, but the connection between that & ghosts’ relationships to the living often being what keeps them around is sure something.

also, after getting out of the lonely andrea says “i made sure i was always in sight of at least one other person” — and there’s something to be said there about needing to be seen to be real.

chiara @red-reys brought up this feuerbach quote which fits very well: “that which i alone perceive i doubt; only that which the other also perceives is certain.” being the only one to perceive something (for example, a ghost), or the only one who is utterly unperceived, is a very lonely thing — it isolates you entirely from those who do not perceive it. being perceived, or having someone else see what you see, can give you an anchor.

wow i’m sure that won’t come back later!

also, far be it from me to talk about this statement without mentioning gerry keay. because it means something that he’s the one to give andrea the tools she needs to pull herself out of the lonely. gerry is someone completely lacking in human connection, who is literally haunted by the ghost of his mother and later is seen as a ghost himself. gerry doesn’t have friends; he tells jon “i always wanted my friends to call me gerry,” but in a tone that makes it clear he didn’t have anyone who could’ve. and of course he didn’t. a life so entwined with the entities and cut so short, a life so ruled by the cruelty of others that he certainly did not want to rope anyone else into.

though gerry’s never directly stated to be affected by the lonely, he’s certainly lowercase-L lonely at the very least, and he’s certainly got enough experience with ghosts to understand the lonely.

gerry is the trope of the helpful spirit. he’s the ghost who’ll give you directions on a deserted road and disappear when you turn around. he gives jon the information he needs to understand the entities, he gives andrea the information she needs to not become a ghost.

MAG057: PERSONAL SPACE

alright so this one is, admittedly, more cosmic horror than anything else, but if y’all’ve seen any of my comics you probably know i’m very passionate about space ghosts & haunted spaceships. and as such, i’m extremely interested in how the daedalus mission echoes ghost stories.

carter chilcott’s story pretty directly acts as a ghost story — unable to communicate with the others on the ship even when he tries, unable to interact with the world to the point of looking out the window at one point to find the world entirely missing. this is all stuff i’ve said already about the other statements, so i’m glossing past it, because what interests me more is the daedalus as malicious architecture.

because the daedalus was created specifically for this union between vast, lonely, and dark (all of which i think have significant ghostly tie-ins). everything about how the ship itself and the mission came to be is a mystery, even to those involved — manuela says “i don’t know how he convinced the lukases and fairchilds to help finance the project,” “i don’t know if they were working on rituals of their own,” “exactly how the launch was arranged, i couldn’t tell you.”

a piece of the traditional haunted house is a sort of timelessness, and mystery inherent in its building. hill house in shirley jackson’s haunting of hill house “seemed somehow to have formed itself, flying together into its own powerful pattern under the hands of its builders... it was a house without kindness, never meant to be lived in, not a place fit for people or for love or for hope.” the oldest house in the game control is malicious architecture at its finest, and it’s called the oldest house. it predates people. it exists as a giant piece of brutalist architecture smack dab in the middle of new york, but no one knows why or how it came to be. as a real-world example: the winchester mystery house is wrapped up in mythos about its creation. was sarah winchester just a lonely old woman with a hobby for architectural design, or did she create endlessly spiraling staircases and doorways with a steep drop into the yard to keep ghosts away? who knows! we sure do like to speculate, though.

yes, i’ve talked about this in tma metas before. highly recommend jacob geller’s control, anatomy, and the legacy of the haunted house for more of this content.

even manuela dominguez, the only person on the daedalus mission who actually knew what she was doing and wasn’t just there to be a victim of entities they did not understand, does not know how the mission came to be.

and the entire purpose of this spacecraft is to be malicious to its inhabitants! the very architecture is meant to make the people within into perfect snacks for their respective entities! the station is cramped (”so cramped that i could only fully stretch out in the section used to exercise,” says jan kilbride), but when the vast takes hold it’s suddenly endless — “a hollow pretense of a shell that did nothing to separate me from the void.” (cue me shouting about how much trust we put in the places we live, and whether or not that trust is warranted, how easily it can be turned against us!)

a few other bits of this statement that really echo ghost stories: “twice i was woken up by the sound of the door opening, only to find it as tight as it had ever been. throughout the daytime i would occasionally hear footsteps, which shouldn’t even have been possible in zero gravity.” and then the empty, ghostly spacesuit that floats past chilcott’s window — there are so many stories about disembodied wedding dresses or mourningwear walking the halls silently, so why not a spacesuit?

i started this section saying this statement was more cosmic horror than ghost story but i’m finishing it by saying this is actually one of the clearest representations of haunted architecture in the whole podcast. (other examples off the top of my head include upon the stair & a cosy cabin, the latter of which i actually already wrote a meta about.)

MAG092: NOTHING BESIDE REMAINS

the moment i started thinking about the lonely-ghosts connection i remembered this episode, because it’s so clear. complete disconnect, existing entirely alone in a shadow of the world you once knew, unable to interact with the living in any way.

very small bit but. “as the cab pulled away, it seemed to have no driver that i could discern” vs the theme of ghost carriages in older ghost stories. i am looking directly at it.

barnabas bennett can “almost think i hear the mocking joy of my friends, but there is nobody here.” he can see evidence that life continues around him, unseen — “i know that what is done by those i cannot see might be felt here — i have found glasses broken and pages torn that were not so the night before.” just as a ghost is unseen to the living, the reverse is true: bennett can see others having an impact on the world in small ways, and his letter is found by jonah, but he can’t really affect the world in any real way.

MAG108: MONOLOGUE

this one is so exciting to me because theater ghosts are a huge trope in ghost stories! theater people are some of the most superstitious people you’ll ever meet! especially regarding ghosts having an impact on their shows — there’s the superstition regarding The Scottish Play™, the tradition of leaving a ghost light on onstage to appease the spirits. there’s that time all the kids in my production of brigadoon when i was in middle school circled around the makeup mirrors to play bloody mary and got thoroughly chewed out by the adults in the cast. theater’s full’a ghosts!

(i think it’s something about the intense amounts of history behind it — and how, in playing a part that a thousand people have played before, you’re echoing their exact words, becoming a repetition of those long gone. and on a stage, blinding lights in your face washing out any view of the audience — you could, technically, leave the stage and interact with the people down there, but it seems pretty entirely impossible when you’re up there. you’re being perceived but can’t see in return. you’re essentially a ghost putting on a show for the living on a loop.)

the statement-giver for this one, adonis biros, echoes a lot of those sentiments, actually. “your words heard by no one — and in that no one, an entire universe.” “have you ever had stage lights in your eyes? ...you can look out into the audience and see nothing at all. just you.”

i said before that “when ghost stories are told from a distance, they’re about the horror of it — disembodied howling, faces in the window that keep you up at night.” the disconnect between the anonymous audience and the singular actor onstage makes the distance here extreme — so this is the sort of ghost story that’s unquestionably a horror story, focusing on the most chilling aspects of ghosts. their inhumanity, their anonymity. the theater masks adonis sees in the audience are “empty. it was a hollow shape of a man that had no life, no presence to it.” even adonis himself says he “had no doubt that what i had seen was some sort of specter or omen.”

he sees a “masked mockery of a human figure” in a window while walking at night. ghosts looking through windows is enough of a trope that once, when i went on a ghost tour in williamsburg, at least half the stories were about people seeing ghostly faces in windows, and i completely freaked out when i saw someone moving around in one of the houses before realizing, oh, some of them are still actually occupied.

this one’s undoubtably a collaboration between stranger and lonely, but i think that intersection’s one of the best for ghost stories — something not-quite-human-anymore, if it ever was, haunting you.

MAG150: CUL-DE-SAC

a lot of the bare bones of this statement are things i’ve already covered, so i’m not gonna go too in-depth on it. herman gorgoli’s statement is about disconnect (from alberto, and then from the rest of humanity), about isolation, about houses-gone-wrong (his and alberto’s house in cheadle, which he views by the end as a place imprisoning him, and the titular cul-de-sac).

we’ve seen the malicious architecture trope in the form of the daedalus already, but this time it’s on earth. it’s something that should, by all rights, be familiar. the houses in the suburbs are all the same, but it’s at least a sameness you know. but they’re all bereft of any irregularities, ghostly echoes of what a house should be.”there were no lights on in any of the houses.” he even finds a dead body in one of the houses — but the woman who’s body he finds is not the one haunting them.

it’s herman haunting the neighborhood, until his love for alberto brings him out. herman making his way through houses he cannot interact with in any meaningful way, whos details he cannot interpret. “how many corpses lay waiting behind the placid facade of this endless false suburbia?” he wonders, and i have to imagine he’s also wondering if he’s already joined their ranks, if he’s the haunting in a haunted house.

and connection brings him back and the houses are no longer empty, no longer waiting for a ghost to take resident in their hallways.

MAG159: THE LAST (& martin’s journey in season four, generally)

we’ve all analyzed 159 within an inch of its life but i’m here to do it again, with the context of martin’s whole journey into the lonely. because the lonely turns people into ghosts. the lonely takes away humanity and life and leaves a hollow echo in its wake.

literally the powers lonely avatars have involve turning invisible. what else is often associated with invisibility? ghosts. checkmate. i’m running out of steam a bit but i swear these are good points i’m making. trust me.

what makes ghost stories so good is that even if the narrator is not a ghost themselves, just experiencing a ghost puts them at a fundamental disconnect from society. it’s something disbelieved by so many people. (there’s parallels to be made with mental illness here, but i... don’t really feel like making them right now. they’re definitely there, as is the very potent lonely-depression connection that made ep170 hit so hard for so many of us.) in hill house, the more eleanor is wrapped up in the goings-on of the house, the less she’s able to relate to the other people there. the closer martin becomes to the lonely, the less he’s able to talk to the people around him — he’s told not to talk to them by lukas, but he’s also just... unable to relate. their experiences are different than his, at this point.

nicole @brunetteauthorette99 said something really good in our conversation about this, about ghosts “being stuck in... spaces that have moved on without them, reenacting their defining moments in life over and over again without the possibility of change.”

martin is stuck in the institute. he probably has an apartment, but we don’t see it, and i can’t imagine he as he is by season four has put much effort into decorating it or making it feel like a home. every place is impersonal — somewhere he exists without really living.

and the institute moves on without him. jon goes into the coffin and martin doesn’t know until he’s already in there. and martin can impact his environment only in small ways — leaving tape recorders on the coffin in an attempt to anchor jon home, leaving the tape of jon’s victim for melanie, basira, and daisy to find. he will not or cannot speak to or touch other living beings, just move objects around in a desperate attempt to get a message across, a ouija board of tapes and post-it notes. his moment of rejecting the lonely’s plans in 158 is dropping the knife peter has given him — another expression more through his interactions with his environment than any human connection.

martin says the lonely always had him, and with how much his story revolves around people who may as well be ghosts, that’s true. his father disappeared and left only the image martin had of him in his mind, only the echo he himself provided in the mirror, the ghost of someone who hurt him overlaid on his own reflection. his mother was only present so far as she could be malicious, disapproving; a vengeful ghost, taking out the revenging instinct she had for martin’s father on martin. and then everyone else martin cares about dies — sasha’s gone and not!sasha acts as her malicious echo for a while; tim dies; jon dies. and yeah, he comes back — but he’s different. a ghost of sorts. martin’s already pretty ghostly by then, too.

so martin is, essentially, a ghost throughout season four, and probably beforehand, as well. jon literally! asks martin! if he is a ghost! in season one! which brings us to 159: “are you real?” martin asks the first living person he’s really talked to in who-knows-how-long. because martin doesn’t feel real, so how could anyone else be? “nothing hurts here” may be a contradiction of the literal experience of ghosts we see in tma (gerry saying “it hurts, being like this”), but is a very real perception of ghosts in ghost mythology as beings beyond pain, beyond the suffering of being alive. sometimes they exist to cause others that suffering they can no longer feel, but a lot of the time, they’re just melancholy, having forgotten what it’s like to be a person or hanging on just enough to yearn to return to that feeling of life.

“i’m the reason he... i did this to him as much as you,” jon says. in ghost terms: martin died for him. of course his connection to jon, then, would be the only thing able to bring him back.

mag159 is an orpheus/eurydice story — people have made posts about that before, i’m sure, and i have too, how jon and martin invert the orpheus archetype by being saved rather than damned by the act of sight. and it feels obvious to state it, but for clarity: eurydice dies. orpheus, alive, tries to save eurydice from the underworld, where she is a spirit, a ghost, an echo of herself.

MAG170: RECOLLECTION — (SPOILER WARNING!)

this episode is the reason i’m making this post, but i may as well copy-and-paste the entire transcript for this section, because there is truly not a single part of it that doesn’t resonate as a ghost story.

the lonely house as a malicious location. the chairs are all uncomfortable, the house is large enough that just by wandering it (as a ghost might) martin grows tired enough to sit in them regardless. the decorations are wrong — all the rooms are the same and martin doesn’t like it, said he doesn’t know “why i’d decorate my house like this.”

it isn’t a small house. there’s a reason a lot of ghost stories take place in twisting mansions where you can never quite find your way back to where you started. ghost stories thrive on that isolation, that loneliness — if you see a ghost while you’re alone, are you sure you’ll be believed? doesn’t that just isolate you further? architecture can twist around those within it until they’re trapped, doomed to haunt it themselves. “it's such a - such a big house, my house, there must be other people!” martin says.

but the only others in the house are ghosts like martin.

“hundreds, thousands of lost souls, wandering the halls. hollow memories, with eyes full of tears. i’ve seen them. they’re all trying to remember.”

“i found someone else, wandering around. they were all thin and gray. faded. like they’d been here for ages.”

the ghosts cannot remember their names, why they are there, whether or not it is their house they exist in. they’ve become near-inseparable from the fog around them and the architecture that holds them hostage.

and the house itself, it takes all of that, and its quirks — the size, the chairs, the decorations, all of which martin openly does not like — are all made from the people haunting it. the house is wrong because the people within it can no longer change it. martin’s comment on the decorations sticks with me because it’s such a simple example of this: presumably, he could affect the house in some way in the past, but he no longer can, and he’s stuck with the results of his past mistakes, echoing over and over from room to room. the impacts remain even when the people have faded so far as to be practically nonexistent.

and once again: love is what makes him remember, over and over. he remembers jon, and then the lonely steals that memory — but the remembering is what’s important, because the act of loving anchors martin, and it helps him remember who he is, repeating his name over and over.

ghosts lack identity. whether it’s because they’ve been forgotten by all who knew them in life, whether it’s because it’s too painful to hold onto that when they can no longer do anything with it — we assign names to ghost stories, connect them to the living, but there’s always a disconnect there.

and that’s what helps jon find him, helps martin keep himself from fading out again. and even jon says “you were faint” upon finding martin. martin was a ghost haunting that house.

but not anymore.

the lonely is a ghost story. the lonely is about people who’ve become unmoored from human connection and their own identities, who haunt places, or who’ve been lured into places that are hauntings in and of themselves and have no choice but to take up residence as ghosts within those walls.

and ghost stories, often, are love stories. love keeps us tethered to life, and love is what saves people from the lonely, over and over again.

#the magnus archives #tma meta #martin blackwood #the lonely #mag170 #kaylee.txt #kaylee.meta #dfgkjngfd HELLO i didn't mean for this to get quite so long but ty if anyone actually reads it!!!!#this is longer than most fics i write. whoops.

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steves-strapcollection · 4 years

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my mag172 #thots i will not be swayed from

The tl;dr version:

Fuck the web

Fuck Web!Martin theories (like i cannot even properly articulate why i hate this theory so much now, and I used to subscribe to it)

And fuck Annabelle Cane, I literally hate her with my entire being.

As a recovering addict, I would say... this is the best episode of the show, and I will also never, ever listen to it again.

Now the long version below the cut.

So I hate the Web, and I hate Annabelle Cane. To me, the other fears make sense on a primal human level. The Web is just...pure evil. It was born from the choices of evil people, and is only used for evil. Plain and simple. It is, at it’s core the worst fear and I hate it. There is nothing anyone can say that will make me not hate it.

Because of point number one, I refuse to believe in or subscribe to literally any Web!Martin theory. At all. Listen, MAG170 killed Web!Martin theories completely, imho, and any amount of theorizing in favour of Web!Martin is grasping at straws. But I refuse to believe that my perfect boy, who spent the entire time in the Lonely defending his abuser, who busted his own ass out of the Lonely bc he was in love would be part of something as evil as the Web. Like I just....I feel like there was no way to have had an episode, completely from the POV of Martin, and not gotten any spoken hint at him being even remotely connected to the Web. Just. No.

The argument at the beginning, if you could call that an argument: I have noticed, especially in recent episodes, that Jon seems influenced by the domain and especially the “statement giver” before he even begins his monologue. Like...kinda showing how the forced Knowing creeps up on him? This theory of mine has been in the back of my mind since MAG168 but I don’t know how to fully explain it because it just fully formed in my head after this episode. Something changed after Oliver’s statement, just like it did in Season 1, and again at the beginning of Season 4. In MAG170, Jon got separated from Martin, and I feel like...Jon wouldn’t have just....left Martin behind, even by accident, even during a monologue and I just...I feel like, to some degree, Jon had been at least a little bit influenced by the Lonely and got separated that way. And then in the Flesh, approaching Jared, Jon was confused that Martin didn’t find the flesh flowers beautiful, and the way he said it...it struck me as a very Jared thing to say. And then the way Jon talked in this episode, the way Jon got defensive and sniped at Martin just....it was very similar in feeling to Francis’ own words being mirrored back to them by the spider. Just....i’m not sure where I’m going with this, or even if it has sound basis in canon. It’s just been a pattern I’ve noticed but it was made clearer to me now.

I refuse to see that final interaction with Martin and Jon as anything other than two frustrated and exhausted men trudging through the apocalypse, and whatnot. Like I can just hear the absolutely lukewarm takes ppl will have and just. Nah, leave me out of it.

Loved the explanation about Knowing vs. Understanding.

Also loving Jon and Martin still discussing boundaries, and Martin has a right to said boundaries, and I’m getting where he’s coming from in now wanting to know, or for Jon to Know. I think I would be the same, not wanting to know if my feelings for someone or choices were my own or made for me, especially if I had gone through as much as Martin has. I rly did not see this as an omen of any kind, especially with them having that conversation in the middle of the Web’s domain.

This episode was hard. I’m recovering from alcoholism, I’ve recovered from cigarette addiction repeatedly, and also struggle with binge eating disorder which is often treated the same way as an addiction would in therapy. I relate to Francis as a recovering addict, and I thought this episode did an amazing job in illustrating addiction, and relapse, and the little ways addicts get undermined and undermine themselves in the recovery process. I don’t think this episode compared addiction to being a monster, nor do I think it downplayed the mental illness aspect of addiction. I made a post earlier about how these statements are mad with heavy bias, especially during the apocalypse, and they’re about fear. Recognizing that addiction is a mental illness and showing it as such does not translate fear, and if it did, I feel like that would be more the Corruption’s domain than any others. The Web is about not being in control, it’s about not having a choice or free will, it’s about feeling trapped by the choices you once made and are unable to make choices that contradict those. With addiction, that is a very real feeling. You can tell me all day that it’s mental illness, it’s rooted in depression or anxiety or whatever, and all you have to do is treat that cause and address it blah blah blah. I know. We know. But when you’re struggling with a relapse, or a near-relapse, it does not feel like you’re in control, it does not feel like you are driving your own body. It feels like someone else is behind the wheel, and you hate that person, and you are terrified of that person. That person is ruining your life and you feel like you cannot fucking stop them. But then you do! You can do it. And a lot of us succeed, and I feel like if the world hadn’t ended, Francis would be doing okay. Just like I’m doing okay. And the countless other recovering addicts I know. But in a fictional world, where our fears are actual entities, with physical avatars doing their bidding everywhere, in an apocalyptic hellscape where the fears EXIST ON OUR PLANE of reality, where people are forced to live through their greatest fears forever.

Idk, i just thought this was a really good episode and I’m debating blacklisting TMA until next week lmao.

I just wanted to add this bc I rly don't want ppl to eventually come at me about their personal experiences w addiction and just... Jonny confirmed that he wrote this episode from his own experiences as an addict and his fears regarding addiction, plus that season 5 is about fear not truth so.

Read the following tweets before trying to push your experiences as the "truer" experience or whatevs I've already been seeing.

#the magnus archives #mag172 #mag172 spoilers #tma spoilers #addiction tw #my mag thots #400 notes

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redmoonrises · 2 years

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at this point my mash of mcyt related aus is so complex i’ve made different terms for different parts of it XD

it’s like three paragraphs long so. gonna add the break thingy. but if you’ve found my crossover au/villain trio au stuff fun give it a read!

crossover au refers to the entire concept- characters from hermitcraft, empires smp, third/last life, and possibly others existing in or able to access creaturae (my own story world). this includes all completed seasons of hermitcraft i want to include, empires s1, third and last life, because as completed stories they meet the qualifications to show up in “the end of all stories” that creaturae represents.

(s9 characters can show up in creaturae but as their stories aren’t completed they don’t live there and count as separate entities who just. show up sometimes to cause chaos)

villain trio au refers specifically to the part of crossover that focuses on the shenanigans involving xornoth, evil x, and helsknight. i’ve recently included badtimes (who is also red-name third life scar) in this mix.

gods au i haven’t used yet but i’m gonna start to- it refers to the part of crossover that focuses on scott (who is empires plus past lives), listener martyn (3rd/LL), and jimmy (empires+past lives+canary harbinger thing). other characters who could classify as gods/god-adjacent are included but less so (watcher grian (hc/3rd/LL), watcher pearl (hc/empires), xornoth). ren (hc/3rd/LL) is often associated purely because he’s metaphorically glued to martyn at this point

so far those are the only groups of characters i’ve focused on enough to justify giving them au names however! this list may grow with time.

#gen rambles #crossover au #villain trio au #gods au

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skullsandwineglasses · 3 years

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Lost Romance Final Review (Taiwanese Drama)

I wrote about my first impressions of the drama after watching the first three episodes, and my first impression about it being cringey still stands even after having finished it. But, I admit that I did end up enjoying it despite my qualms. My thoughts about the whole drama are below.

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

The fictional world

The ML’s fictional persona (Situ Aoran) is hella douchey, and the drama only gives an explanation for why he was like that in the final episode. Essentially, Situ Aoran is the worst version of He Tinxing that he’s tried to hard to suppress and overcome over the years. It’s the version of him that’s childish, immature, arrogant, irresponsible, unreasonable. And yet, the FL, Zheng Xiao’en, still falls for this version of him. It’s a story about unwavering, unconditional love no matter who you are. On the other hand, Xiao’en begins as a “villainous” person in Aoran’s eyes, and yet, he learns to fall in love with her as well.

But, this meant that for the first 15 episodes of the drama, which is basically three quarters of the drama, I was constantly annoyed by Aoran/the fictional ML. Even when he got together with Xiao’en in the fictional world, I found it hard to ship them. Yes, Marcus Chang and Vivian Sung have chemistry, but I just didn’t enjoy the romance in the fictional world all that much.

I wasn’t hooked on the drama until episode 8ish when he finally showed some signs of liking Xiao’en, and then it picks up in episode 10 when he finally starts to take more initiative. But for the most part, it was Qingfeng, the second ML was the one who stole the show.

I’ve never had second male lead syndrome before, but I think that’s because in most dramas I’ve watched, even though the second male lead may unconditionally devoted to the FL, the ML still somehow does more.

But in Lost Romance, because the ML keep was dismissive, insensitive, and kept inadvertently hurting the FL, you end up finding that Qingfeng is actually someone who is dependable, supportive, a ray of sunshine, and an all-around better person in Xiao’en’s life. Not only that, but he’s hella charming as well. Simon Lian has such as mischievous glint in his eyes, and he carries himself with easy confidence. He flirts with Xiao’en, and she doesn’t even realize it. He’s a fictional character who’s become self-aware, and this sense of awareness and wisdom that no one else in the fictional world has makes him an even more attractive character since he’s able to see through everyone. What’s more, he goes against the script and falls for Xiao’en even when he isn’t supposed to. Him falling for Xiao’en made more sense than Aoran falling for Xiao’en.

Xiao’en and Aoran’s romance in the fictional world was very predictable. She lives in his house as a housekeeper, and he slowly warms up to her, but denies his feelings. When she leaves, he begins to miss her and gets jealous whenever she hangs out with the SML. He falls for her because she gives him a sense of safety and comfort. He feels at home with her, a feeling that he was deprived of since he was young. But because of this, it felt like the only reason he fell for her was because of what she can provide for him. And Xiao’en fell for him because he at first reminded her of He Tianxing, and then because he’s role as the ML in the story. And then she fell for him for real, flaws and all. But I guess this is a reflection of how love develops irl where both parties are able to offer something to the other in the relationship.

Qingfeng’s feelings for Xiao’en felt more pure and altruistic, which albeit makes it unrealistic, but I guess it suits his character, since he is an idealized fictional character after all.

The real world

Because Qingfeng is a fictional character, he has no real-world counterpart, so we don’t see him again after episode 15. He gets his “happy ending” in the last episode when the author finally finishes his story and he’s reunited with his storyworld sweetheart, but I still felt like there was no proper closure for his character. He finally developed real feelings, but then he’s forced back into his scripted role.

I liked how the ML and FL’s real life personas were different from the fictional world, and the drama takes a more serious tone when they return to the real world. He Tianxing is much more kind, considerate, and thoughtful than Aoran. His costuming also changed to reflect that: he no longer wears an earring, his hair is combed up instead of hanging over his forehead, and he doesn’t wear flashy rings and necklaces. He’s much more down-to-earth and humble, and you start to like him more.

Xiao’en is also much more mature. She isn’t fawning and lusting over him like in the fictional world, and she doesn’t force herself onto him, or to make him remember her. She knows that she loves Aoran, and tries to keep her attraction for Tianxing separate because she still hasn’t yet figured out whether they’re the same person. When her bestfriend asks her why she doesn’t assert herself more to jog his memory, Xian’en says that this is real life. It isn’t like the fictional world where you can be shameless with no consequence.

This means that the romantic dynamics become reversed in the real world. It’s now Tianxing’s turn to pursue Xiao’en, and Xiao’en resists. And I admit, it was cute. We get to see Tianxing fall for Xiao’en for herself and who she is as a person, and not because she’s his housemaid and lives with him. He becomes curious about her: he buys and reads all the books he’s edited, he asks her questions about her childhood and upbringing, and asks her about her feelings and opinions on things, he asks her about her memorable experiences. In the real world, he actually cares about her, not just what she can offer him. We also see Xiao’en learn about Tianxing and fall for his real-life traits. It’s an opportunity for them to truly learn about each other and fall for each other again.

The part when Tianxing reads the novel and regained his memories felt too abrupt and easy. It would have been more fun for the memories to come back in parts over time and him trying to figure out the pieces of the puzzle. It would have also have been nice to see him spend more time trying to convince Xiao’en that he really does remember and isn’t just regurgitating details from the novel. In other words, I’m a masochistic viewer and would have appreciated more drawn-out angst, but they quickly resolved this plotline within through a single gesture in the scene.

Tianxing’s relentless and determined pursuit to win over Xiao’en was cute, but only the context of this drama. He overtly stalks her using a drone, but as payback because that was how she stalked him at the beginning. A part of me knew that in any other drama, this would be creepy and overstepping boundaries, but I still couldn’t help but smile at these antics in Lost Romance. Maybe because Tianxing was reversing their roles and now he’s doing the heavy lifting to win her back, but in any case, it worked and was charming.

The family business drama

Honestly, I couldn’t care less. I skipped most scenes whenever the real-world family drama was shown, and I was still able to understand what happened in the end. The evil sister stops being evil and realizes the error of her ways (and actually has a pretty sympathetic backstory to explain her previous actions and motives) and joins forces with the ML, her younger half brother that she had wanted to kill, in order to take down a once-trusted employee who is now trying to take over and destroy the family business.

These scenes dragged out the story, but I guess they served as a reminder that the real world is still alive and kicking while the ML and FL were in a three-month long coma.

Questions

Like with most fantasy dramas, you end up accepting the plot holes and rolling with them. But there are still a few questions I still can’t get over:

1. How exactly did He Tianxing and Xiao’en end up in the fictional world of a random novel together? Why was only Xiao’en self-aware but Tianxing wasn’t? Was it because Xiao’en was editing the book so she already knew part of the story? Why did Tianxing fall into Situ Aoran’s character and why didn’t he have agency over his actions and feelings until later, while Xiao’en was a self-insert with full agency?

2. Why were only Tianxing and Xiao’en inhabiting fictional bodies, while the other characters only had the likeliness of people from real life but not the “soul” (since the characters were still conscious in real life)? Were Tianxing and Xiao’en projecting their memories of the appearances of the people they knew onto the characters in the storyworld, thereby creating a jointly shared fictional world? For instance, only Tianxing knew Chuchu irl, but Xiao’en didn’t, so he projected his image of ChuChu onto the character that Xiao’en could also see? But the fictional world was shown to be a parallel universe that had real consequences in the real-world, so the explanation for the appearance of the fictional characters can’t just be due to Tianxing and Xiao’en projecting their memories. These characters truly exist as separate, alternate entities in the storyworld. So, what exactly are these characters? Souless entities?

3. Qingfeng says that he floats from one story to the next. So why are some fictional characters fully fictional like Qingfeng, but other characters have real-life counterparts?

4. Why and how does the novel change irl when the fictional world changes? It’s also a pity that the author is completely uninvolved with all of these shenenigans, and it’s unfortunate that her novel is being using as the ML and FL’s playground. She basically lost control of her own story.

Overall impressions

It’s refreshing for a cdrama/twdrama, and they managed to keep Qingfeng’s identity a mystery for good part of the plot to keep you guessing. But for the most part, it’s another predictable, tropey modern romance drama. Even when they tried to subvert the tropes, their method of subversion was predictable. The chemistry and comedy was good, so I’d recommend it only if you have a high tolerance for cringe, since the cringe never really ends but does get better towards the last act of the drama when they return to the real world and gets more serious.

I think I’d give this drama a 7.5, mostly because I gave My Girlfriend is an Alien an 8. So if I gave Lost Romance an 8, I would bump MGIAA an 8.5 to keep it relative.

Both dramas feature a ML who deals with memory loss. The arc in Lost Romance was more serious and emotional since the FL is heartbroken over the loss, but the part where the ML regains his memory was a bit rushed. The arc in MGIAA is more comedic, but the part where he regains his memory had a bigger emotional payoff since memory loss was a major problem that the ML had been trying to overcome throughout the drama.

Might be an unpopular opinion but I think might have enjoyed this more than the Romance of Tiger and Rose. The Romance of Tiger and Rose was good, but it wasn’t very memorable. I watched it last summer, but I barely remember any details about it besides finding Zhao Lusi to be really cute. I think this drama made me feel more emotions: from frustration to embarrassment to relief to having butterflies to angst to sadness to amused.

Aoran/Tianxing and Qingfeng are also more interesting than Han Shuo. I guess I’ll wait 8 months to see if I still feel anything for this drama, or if it fades with time too.

Some other interesting notes

I had thought this drama was filmed in 2019 until I saw a sign on a bus that said “No boarding without a mask”. Turns out it was filmed in April 2020 or so, and then released in June. I was surprised that this was filmed during the peak of the pandemic when most western countries were in lockdown, but I understand that Taiwan already had things under control by then. But still, even if there wasn’t a pandemic, they filmed this in only 2-3 months, which is a quick and impressive turnaround time to film and edit a drama (even if it’s only 20 episode long). There was no indication this was filmed during a pandemic, except for the bus sign, and also the people walking in the background at the temple. You could tell many were wearing masks. Meanwhile, it’s been over a year since the pandemic started, and I’m still stuck at home, schools and outdoor activities are still closed where I am, and it just feels like my life is on hold. And yet, they filmed an entire ass drama during a pandemic. I still can’t get over that.

I haven’t watched a Taiwanese drama in a while, so there are some notable cultural differences I noticed between Taiwanese dramas and cdramas when I watched Lost Romance.

1. The uncensored intimate scenes 2. Swearing (?). Can’t remember when exactly, but I think Vivian Sung at one point said “wo kao” when she woke up and stumbled to the bathroom 3. The casual (and accurate) integration of English words and phrases. You can tell that Taiwan is much more open and comfortable with sprinkling English into their everyday vernacular. Hong Kong dramas do this as well. You see this less so in cdramas. English and other foreign languages are only used when the character is speaking to a foreign character. 4. No use of heavy filters and diffusers. Cdramas tend to look very glowy and dreamy, and they seem to use wide apertures to get a bokeh effect. Lost Romance had a more down-to-earth look. Granted, at points it did look a little dated, but I still appreciated this more toned-down, natural look. 5. LQBTQ+ references. Not only was there an accidental kiss scene between the FL and SFL, but they also mentioned how one of the male characters might be having an affair with a man. While there are BL idol dramas in China, all of the relationship dynamics are usually only heavily implied. There aren’t many explicit references to LGBTQ+ relationships in cdramas due to censorship. 6. References and homages/parodies of kdramas. Have there been cdramas that pay homage to foreign dramas as much as Lost Romance? 7. Original, non-dubbed voices. Yes, there are plenty of cdramas that use the original voices of actors, but there are also a lot of cdramas that use dubbed voices. Sometimes I’d binge watch 3 cdramas in a row, and the FLs and MLs have the same respective voice actors across all 3 dramas. The reason why I chose to watch Lost Romance was because I wanted to watch The Legends, but the FL uses the same voice actress as the FL in MGIAA, which I had just finished, so I needed a drama in between with different voices to help cleanse my palate. 8. Excessive cuts/commercial breaks. Always right before a character is about to say something pivotal, it cuts to a themesong break, which was really annoying. It really ruins the mood and suspense of the scene. And when it cuts back, it replays the last 20 seconds of the scene, while you’re on the end of your seat, yelling at the screen to tell them to get on with it and get to the point.

Anyway. Time to watch Cafe. Waiting. Love for Marcus and Vivian.

#lost romance #浪漫輸給你 #cdrama #twdrama #marcus chang #vivian sung #宋芸樺 #張立昂 #taiwanese drama

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