#about the fact that their father is literally from another planet)

[cantsayidont]

Another dilemma with centering stories around the idea of Superman-as-immigrant is that while Superman is certainly an immigrant, and there is a substantial body of older Superman stories (mostly from 1958–1986) that present his homeworld and its culture as generally noble (and frequently Jewish-coded), it has become very common since the 1986 reboot for Superman media to treat Kryptonian culture as either decadent and corrupt (as in most of the post-Crisis comics) or actively invasive and evil (as in MAN OF STEEL or MY ADVENTURES WITH SUPERMAN).

In these stories, Superman has avoided this decadence or evil mostly by virtue of having been raised by white Americans in Kansas, and his nobility lies in his express rejection of his evil/corrupt heritage in favor of (white) American culture. These are intrinsically anti-immigrant narratives (and sometimes antisemitic as well), regardless of how much feel-good gloss the story may attempt to apply to it.

The first season of the current SUPERMAN AND LOIS TV show, for instance, plays out an alarmingly literal "Great Replacement" plot in which Superman's half-brother Tal-Rho attempts to carry out a genocidal scheme devised by Superman's eugenicist mother to resurrect Kryptonians in the bodies of living humans, while MY ADVENTURES WITH SUPERMAN presents Kryptonians as brutal invaders who have attempted to militarily conquer the Earth more than once. Neither of these series departs from the general details of Superman's origin, but they assert unequivocally that Superman being an immigrant from Krypton is of moral value only because it gives him super-powers that enable him to defend the American Way from others of his kind, and to uphold white culture in ways other Kryptonians do not or would not.

#comics #superman #it would of course be possible for superman to have #a complex relationship with kryptonian culture #but the modern stories have been very reluctant to do that #this is a major flaw of superman and lois #which tries to avoid talking about clark's feelings about his heritage as much as possible #in ways that don't seem realistic #(that show also suggests that clark and lois's sons are weirdly incurious #about the fact that their father is literally from another planet) #as for MAWS #i find its depiction of kryptonians as invaders and superman as a weapon disturbing #for these reasons #and because it's an homage to the iron giant #a movie i strongly dislike

[arepitademanteca]

Transformers Prime has a disappointing fandom

I have never been so disappointed with a fandom as much as now…

After being a part of fandoms like The Owl House and Rise Of The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and having absorbed the endless anguish of their most tragic characters artistically reflected by their fandom, I can say that it is disrespectful to Transformers Prime that it is not made enough anguish.

Where are the Bumblebee fanfics, fanarts, analysis?

HE HAS ALL THE JUICY CHARACTERISTICS OF A TRAGIC CHARACTER WITH EXPLOITABLE ANGUISH:

1) In several chapters the other bots express themselves and refer to him as much younger than them. HE IS A CHILD SOLDIER.

2) He was interrogated and tortured by the leader of the enemy group, with whom he had to continue fighting constantly.

3) As a result of the torture his larynx was destroyed, and the level of damage was so brutal that his voice box could not be repaired for millennia.

4) He was forced to leave his home planet because it had been destroyed and he had to take refuge on another planet. Now he is not only a child soldier, but he is a political refugee.

5) One of his comrades in arms, friend and family member died without him being able to do anything to prevent it. Obviously Bumblebee has lost many more teammates and friends in the past, considering how small Team Prime is.

6) He had to watch his leader/father figure almost die from an infection and the only way to save him was by entering the mind of the guy who tortured and incapacitated him to obtain information.

7) He was possessed by that same guy (seriously, Megatron leaves the kid alone) and forced him to hurt two of his friends, and everything else Bumblebee went through in the middle of the possession is up for interpretation, FANDOM WAKE UP.

8) THE SAME GUY WHO INTERROGED, TORTURED, MUTILATED, INCAPACITATED AND POSSESSED HIM, attacked him for fun and on the spot fatally injured his best friend/protege/younger human brother. Then the child abuser made fun of him in his face for it.

9) Not even 24 hours had passed when the unmentionable went to his hiding place, his SAFE PLACE, in search of an alliance, which he then betrayed because he kidnapped Bumblebee's father figure in front of his eyes.

10) He is mutilated again, he temporarily loses his T-cog, his feelings of insecurity within the group deepen slightly and when he goes to retrieve his T-cog he sees how it is almost destroyed. No one talks about Bumblebee literally holding one of his organs in his hands, it's like you see someone hugging his lung or something.

YOU SEE WHAT I MEAN, that apathy towards oneself and dehumanization (?) has POTENTIAL, if the child did not mind having an organ of HIS in his hands, I can already imagine how he reacts and treats his physical and emotional wounds. He is the type of character who hides his injuries, jokes about his traumas and in doing so traumatizes everyone around him, has a terrible sleep schedule due to nightmares, frequently dissociates, and has zero sense of self-preservation (canon).

11) This is not a trauma, but it also has the potential to cause distress in the fact that he was probably used to getting more attention for being the youngest, but suddenly this guy, Smokescreen, the same age as him, appears, and Everyone expects Bumblebee to be the one to guide the rookie, so every time the rookie makes a mistake, it will be Bumblebee's fault. Also, the new guy who never actively participated in the war, compared to Bee, who was born and fought in it all his life, turns out to be the one chosen to be the next Prime. Actually?

12) The base where he lived most of his time on earth was destroyed. It may not sound that bad, but as someone who recently lost their home to armed conflict, I can tell you that it hurts a lot.

13) He was separated from his team for a few days and when he found one of his teammates, his second father figure tells him to go away, to stay away and discourages him. Bumblebee must have felt bad because the one who convinced Ratchet to help them was not him, but Raf.

14) Other traumatic things must have happened that I don't remember, the last time I saw the series was in 2022, okAY?

15) They kidnapped their second father figure.

16) THE SAME ONE WHO INTERROGED HIM, TORTURED, MUTILATED, DISABLED, POSSESSED, HARMED HIM AND HIS FRIEND FOR FUN, KIDNAPPED HIS TWO PARENTS AND DESTROYED HIS PLANET, shot him three times, almost four, in the chest and killed him temporarily.

17) Megatron deserved it and it was more than satisfying and well done that it was Bumblebee who killed him, put an end to his power and the war, but knowingly killing can be traumatizing. Bumblebee killing Megatron in retaliation is also an ignored trauma.

18) He had to see Megatron's revived body being controlled by a god of destruction, who seemed to have something personal against him. At one point during the chase, Bumblebee thought his friends were dead.

19) He became the team leader in Optimus' absence, he was inexperienced and as a result he had two anxiety attacks in the same scene.

20) Optimus, his father figure, sacrifices himself to revive the planet.

so whERE ARE MY FANFICS? If anyone has recommendations, wants to write something individually or wants to collaborate, please write to me. This can't stay like this friends, Transformers Prime is not going to return as we would like, we the fandom have to bring it back.

Pd: English is not my native language nor do I have command over it, do not judge me for any error or lack of logic

gracias

#transformers prime #Transformers #Tfp Bumblebee #Transformers Bumblebee #maccadam #Tfp Megatron #Megatron #tfp smokescreen #tfp optimus prime #Tfp Ratchet #I want the simulation of torture and the consequences of it #Fandom #you have to wake up buddy

[lux-ishii]

Episode 6 dropped and love is literally in the air... so let's dive in...

We start the episode with an interesting story of a Romeo and Juliette trope. Specifically, a Captain and a Calamari Prince fell in love and run away together, causing danger of war between their species by doing so.

You may think it has nothing to do with either Din or Bo, but if you read my previous post you already know everything is intentional.

They could put here anything, absolutely anything. A pirate, bounty hunter, escaped prisoner... But they put two lovers who with their actions could bring harm to others. It's not truly a happy story, as the woman said before her love confession:

You see, after rewatching previous seasons I noticed that The Mandoverse likes to foreshadow what will happen in one way or another. Mythosaur discovery was foreshadowed by The Armorer in The Book of Boba Fett, for example. So this story here could be a potential warning, or hint at what may happen to Bo and Din. A Princess with a fleet, and a man who isn't considered a true Mandalorian because of his origin (Axe's words). After this episode, I'm pretty sure that Din and Bo are already in love. However, they didn't take any on-screen action to solidify the things we see between the lines. I do believe their relationship will progress further, and...

They may reach the point where things get complicated just because of who they are. You see the lovers from this episode can foreshadow Bo's or Din's dilemma about what they should do for the greater good. They may fall apart if the cause of their interest won't align, or be on the way.

HOWEVER, it may also be used as a future contrast that despite these odds and differences, they would not give up on what they feel for each other. Which I think would go together with true Mandalorian nature. This season is all about what it means to be a true Mandalorian, which is not just a fight for power. It's about caring for one another, especially a family. Mandalorians are stronger together, after all.

More under the cut!

Can we take a moment to talk about how Din IS JUST THERE?

We were making theories if he will go with Bo or not when the show... literally treats them as one already. Whenever she goes, he goes, and vice versa. Without empty promises, they just do it.

And they "moved" to Bo's ship!

To dig into it further, this episode they were constantly walking side by side, to the point of going thru the doors together too if the space allowed it. You can check out this post >here< with more scenes

Glances.

As I mentioned in my previous posts, this form is a subtle tool for storytelling, yet it can hide a whole ton of meaning or can be truly innocent. This episode is full of glances, specifically put in interesting places and I will touch on those later.

Like this one is innocent, just saying "Where the hell we are?" without words.

I mention in the title of this post that "love is in the air" and here's another indication of it, a bizarre one to be sure as ex imperialist and a democrat fell in love despite their differences.

But... Grogu may be the biggest giveaway here:

We don't see Bo's or Din's reaction here at all, only the enthusiastic cooing of Grogu. I asked myself why? Because he matters too, as Din's son. Grogu could be excited about the couple and how happy they are together. He knows both Din and Bo struggle a lot, and they have dark, rather gloomy lives. What if his father was blessed with a love that would make him happy?

In this episode, we also have the first instance of someone recognizing Bo as a Mandalorian Royalty, despite the fact, there's technically nothing to rule for her. No planet, no people.

An indicator that for the outsiders she is still a rightful ruler, despite her own people not believing in her anymore.

Glances. She is not going to make this decision alone, looking for assurance in Din.

An then, at the mention of her ruling Mandalore again she responds with:

Bo doesn't want to rule Mandalore anymore. A theme that goes on since the beginning of the season. But I think just this episode we got a glimpse of the true reason why those plans truly changed.

We got a great sequence with Good Cop - Bad Cop trope. Bo and Din gave us some Detective AU right here, make it black and white and we get a whole Noir setup ready to launch...

But back to the topic. This was yet another example of how they complement each other. Bo's more soft and rational approach would lead to nowhere or would take way longer if not Din's aggressive and hostile take on the matter, and vice versa.

They aren't only a great team, they need each other.

Glances.

Bo for the first time saw the darker side of Din. We knew he had one, but she's pretty taken aback by his hatred of droids. Nonetheless, it doesn't make her fearful of him.

Quite the opposite in fact

as she becomes his voice of reason to hold his horses. She's not scared he would get back at her with this attitude at all.

They had a brief conversation about his hostility, and I'm glad they allowed Bo-Katan to remove her helmet because what Katee is doing with expressing her emotions is phenomenal.

This innocent sentence awakens a lot if you know where to look. And if not I will just show you.

Glances. After the droid, a machine that can outlast probably generations if maintained properly puts importance on human life, and how short it truly is Bo and Din look at each other, accompanied by a romantic melody.

Devil is in the details, as Bo took a deep breath before breaking contact with Din.

What does it mean? As per usual it can mean nothing, or it can mean a thing, and you know me already, I will talk about the thing. You never know when someone's words might hit you, and I think that droid hit Bo and Din pretty strongly. In this lifestyle, they both share, life is even more dangerous than the citizens of that planet. It's a constant battle for survival. Wars, monsters, your own kind... Everything can kill you if you are Mandalorian.

So they might think that there's no time to waste. An indicator that the actions may be taken soon. A way of saying "Life is short so we can as well live together".

The investigation is a success, DinBo detectives can be proud of themselves for solving the issue, and as they came back to the Duchess with the results, we are once again struck with something. The motives of a man responsible for malfunction have their core in his hatred for the ex-imperial husband of the Duchess. So Duchess Lizzo blesses us with this line:

You see, both Din and Bo have past. And those who know TCW know that Bo's past is terrible. She made huge mistakes when she was younger, and she pays for them to this day.

I don't have a gif here, but at this moment you can see how Bo is moved by the exchange of these words, and you can see it all over her face, as her gaze is running away somewhere else.

Lizzo then recognizes the efforts, Bo and Din made, which put a smile on Bo's face. A rare sign, but it only gets better.

You see, I think Bo-Katan is genuinely happy here because she did something good, and her efforts are recognized.

It's safe to say that back at Kalevala, she was severely depressed. Thinking of herself as a failure that caused the doom of her planet and everyone she loved. Everyone left her, no one cared for her, and she was all alone. Then Din needed her help, and from then she was on a streak of doing good. I'm pretty sure that if not for the helmet we would see her smiling similar way after rescuing Rengar. Here, she not only helped people but also secured an alliance with another planet, simply by doing good, with no corruption or violence needed.

Look how proud she is when Grogu becomes a knight! @ladyzirkonia Already noticed in her post >here< that Bo is happier than ever. And It's absolutely true! We haven't seen her as happy ever before. Not when she was getting a new addition to her fleet back in Season 2, or not even when the Armorer announced she is the one to unite them all.

This leads us adress to the bantha in the room...

Where something important happens.

You see, there were many theories that what Bo's doing with Din is just a long play to challenge him when he least expects it, but this disproved it. And later it gets even more interesting.

You see... Axe is accusing Bo of intentionally refusing to challenge Din. Which would mean her people demanded it from her at some point.

Her refusal could be what lead them to leave, claiming she's weak, not only as a leader but also as a warrior, probably thinking she's afraid of challenging him.

However, Bo's motive may be rooted somewhere else.

Bo-Katan had no problem challenging Axe for her fleet, so why would she struggle so much to challenge Din? It was as necessary as getting the fleet back, so what was stopping her?

But she really didn't have to kill him to claim the blade. We saw it as Din and Paz fought for the Darksaber, and Vizsla is still alive.

(gifs by @itberice) Do you remember what I said about love in the air? Now, look back at the Captain and the Prince from the beginning, and Duchess Lizzo and her ex-imperial husband. Do you notice the similarity?

Bo-Katan stands up in front of so-called Mandalorians, that are ready to outcast someone like Din, just because his blood is not Mandalorian enough. Just like Lizzo stood up against Commissioner in defense of her ex-imperial partner.

Again @ladyzirkonia made a great post >here< saying what I'm gonna mention.

This is a great sign of what kind of leader Bo is going to be. She walks both ways, she took her time to understand Din's perspective, and because of everything that happened, he is the one who showed her The Way. The right one.

He let her understand what it means to be Mandalorian, and it's not the blood, but the heart and faith of a warrior.

Din Djarin, with all his adventures, made Bo-Katan the person she is now. And she is really fond of him, to the point of standing in his defense, even if before she was among the people who laughed at him.

I know everyone has mixed feelings about the Darksaber, and I fully myself don't sit right with it either, BUT it happened, and I'm here to make surgery on the symbolism here.

I know a lot of people think if Din gave the Darksaber like that, make it look pointless...

But I beg to differ.

You see, the Darksaber for Din and Bo actually lost its value. For him, it was a burden, and for Bo-Katan a symbol of everything she lost. But for everyone else? It still was a symbol of power.

I may sound here like I'm trying to defend the outcome, but I rather like to think I'm just taking a different perspective on it.

Hear me out, the point of Din getting the Darksaber maybe never was to show him as a potential leader, but rather put him on his path with someone who will make his life... better.

The Darksaber is something that put Din and Bo-Katan on the same way. A catalyst for everything we saw this season. Nothing of it wouldn't happened if Din didn't have the Darksaber. Just think about it, if in season 2 Bo got the Darksaber from Gideon, she would have her fleet, and wouldn't rot in her sadness on Kalevala, so there would be no one to save Din on his way to redeem himself. Giving this one sample to just show how big of a butterfly effect we are dealing here with.

So as much as I don't like the way the Darksaber was claimed, I truly don't think it makes everything pointless. For me, quite the opposite really. It's the reason why everything we see is happening.

#dinbo #the mandalorian #din djarin x bo katan kryze #din x bo #the mandalorian spoilers #the mandalorian season 3 #bo katan kryze #din djarin

[starfreak]

Random Elden Ring Rant (Contains Spoilers, VERY LONG)

So, the Numen. We can choose it as a character preset, which tells us they come from another world, or another land. I say "or another land" because historically, America is referred to as the "New World," but it's not a separate planet. However, translations from the Japanese version of the game suggest that the world they come from is one of spirits, the dead, etc., so it could definitely be a Literal other world.

Marika is (rumored to be) a Numen, as are the Black Knife Assassins that participated in the Night of Black Knives.

If Marika is Numen, then it stands to reason so is Radagon, since they are the same person in the same body. This means their children together, Malenia and Miquella (and now presumably Messmer since he has red hair like Radagon, but Miyazaki said that he's the child of Marika, so unless there's another red-haired hottie running around the Lands Between, Radagon is the father), are also Numen. This also means that other children of Marika/Radagon are half-Numen.

It seems Numen are not a single ethnicity, but a whole race of people, with various different contradicting skin tones and hair colors. The template in the character creator has medium-dark skin and brown hair. Marika has pale skin and golden hair (possibly changed to be gold from the Greater Will's influence) and Radagon has the same skin with fiery red hair. We know from the Giant's Red Braid item description (below) that Radagon was either cursed by the Fire Giants or simply born with red hair. I mean...no item descriptions suggest he was born with it...but if I was born with hair I hated, I would blame it on a curse too. Though, to be fair, it IS the same color as the Fire Giants' hair.

Also the Black Knife Assassins have no physical form, so we can't discern their hair or skin colors.

So skin tone seems like a non-factor, but Hair is much harder to parse, due to half the Numen in the game having fiery hair and pronouns. The game says nothing about Marika's hair changing to gold, so it may have always been that color, leading me to believe that indeed, Numen are just...magic humans from a land far away...she's just blonde.

WELP.

That's all cool, but what is the culture of the Numen like? Well we can see that they have a very strong affinity for women and femininity. Not only is Marika, the most powerful Numen we know, a woman...all of the Black Knives are women. Additionally, if we choose to believe that Malenia and Miquella are Numen, this fact is further evidenced by Malenia's being a strong warrior woman (she is literally a Valkyrie) and Miquella's own complex gender identity. Miquella was (supposedly) born male, but presented as rather feminine/androgynous all his life. While Malenia is a masculine woman and reflects Radagon, Miquella is a feminine boy reflecting Marika. Not to mention that Miquella is ALMOST DEFINITELY Saint Trina, who is exclusively referred to as feminine.

In addition to the stong feminine aspects of Numen society apparent in the overabundance of strong fem-presenting characters, the description of Marika's Hammer suggests that women in Numen society (like Marika) have a role as destroyers and warriors, while men (Radagon) have a role of construction and repair.

"Queen Marika shattered the Elden Ring and Radagon attempted to repair it."

Again, this is just speculation, and the mythological actions of Radagon/Marika are likely motivated by a mutlitude of things (namely, the Greater Will constantly looming over them, the presence of the Elden Beast constantly lurking just under the surface), but I'm making do with what I have.

Also, back to genetics of the Numen again for a second, of all Radagon and Marika's children outside of the ones they had together (Messmer and the Twin Empyreans), most of them seem to inherit Radagon/Marika's hair.

Radagon and Rennala's kids, Radahn, Rykard, and Ranni, (presumably) have red hair. We never actually see Ranni's hair pre-doll form, so I'm assuming it's red lkke her brothers'.

Marika and Godfrey's kids, Godwyn, Mohg, and Morgott, all have either pale hair or no hair (Mohg has no hair visible on account of all the omen horns).

So it seems like the genes of Numen are incredibly dominant, even dominating the gene pool multiple generations after the first. Godwyn's kids, Godrick and Godefroy, have the same hair color as he does. Malenia's "daughters," although not genetically related to her, all seem to have gained her red hair through exposure to her Scarlet Aeonia. This may also be true of the Cleanrot Knights, but they could also have plucked the red hairs from Fire Giants or Leonine Misbegotten and used them as decor for their armor.

Even merely interacting with a Numen as powerful as Marika, or her direct children, can change one's appearance irreversably. Sure, this could all likely be from her status as a God, but who knows how powerful the average Numen could become if granted the strength? We become Elden Lord after all.

#elden ring #messmer the impaler #malenia blade of miquella #miquella the unalloyed #elden ring shadow of the erdtree #shadow of the erdtree #elden ring theory #numen #radagon of the golden order #marika #greater will #erdtree #elden ring lore #mohg lord of blood #morgott the omen king #godfrey the first elden lord #godwyn the golden #ranni the witch #rennala queen of the full moon #praetor rykard #starscourge radahn #godrick the grafted #godefroy the grafted #saint trina

[ghostinthegallery]

Re-reading Twice Dead King, the character I was most struck by on a second viewing was Mentep. Now there’s a tragic figure. Simultaneously a mentor, an ally, an antagonist, someone so terribly understandable who I want to smack upside the head for being a lying liar who lies.

Ultimately, Mentep is a penitent. He has committed terrible acts (that we only get scant details of) and he wants to redeem himself. Thanks to his tampering with his own memories, he doesn't fully know what he is repenting for, which puts him in a bind. However, he knows that he played a role in creating the flayer curse/longing sickness, so he goes to a planet where a high concentration of them have gathered and works on his cure. He's respected, he's able to do his work with only occasional interruptions from the local angsty youth. Things are good-ish (until the armada shows up.)

Mentep and Oltyx have a weird relationship. Despite being his normal asshole-teenager self, Oltyx does respect Mentep more than most. Trusts Mentep enough to let the guy perform experimental brain surgery on him. Twice. And Mentep is able to be much more candid with Oltyx in return. He's one of the few consistently calling Oltyx out for his bullshit. On the surface, it is a standard mentor relationship, but what got me on a second reading is that there is hardly a single conversation Mentep has with Oltyx where he isn’t lying to and/or manipulating him.

It starts early with Yenekh. Mentep knows Yenekh has been suffering from the curse, he hasn’t told Oltyx, and when he finally has to tell him, he conveniently does so right before distracting everyone with the “oh btw, we’re all gonna die to a giant human armada” news. This is done with the best of intentions. Mentep wants to protect Yenekh (and Oltyx, in his way), so he delivers the news this way to get the bad news out of the way and then both of them on the same side. But it is the start of a pattern.

Which we get again when Mentep fails to mention a that Antikef is a flayer den ruled by a “We have Illuminor Szeras at home” Vizier, and boy does that end badly for Oltyx (see the last 60% of Ruin). Naturally, Mentep has a good explanation:

But it is another lie, one that costs Oltyx dearly (put a pin in this, I am coming back to it.)

There's some little fibs and ommissions along the way as they go to Carnotite, but it all builds up to The Big Lie. The one that sends Oltyx spiraling and gets Mentep killed. Because you know what really helps with paranoia? Finding out your mentor and your best friend have been hiding a secret blood pit in your basement! Again, it makes sense why Mentep is lying about this! He has every reason to believe Oltyx would have rejected the flayed ones he and Yenekh were sheltering (he in fact does exactly this), and Mentep's entire goal is to cure the curse to atone for his role in its creation. However...

I think Oltyx is correct to call Mentep out here (Oltyx is wrong about most things, but not this). Somewhere a long the way he became a means to an end for Mentep. Mentep was focused on The Curse and not the person in front of him who was cursed. He used Oltyx's friendship with Yenekh, his need to save his kingdom, his trust, his fears, all in service of admirable goals, but he was using Oltyx. Is it any wonder this is where it ended?

The lies were Mentep's undoing from the start. Remember the lie about Antikef? The one that led to all the events of Ruin? Yes, Oltyx and Djoseras did talk and avoid a civil war, but Oltyx also went through hell. He saw his home turned into an abbattoir, his father reduced to barely more than an animal. Oltyx was literally vivisected and almost consumed by his own dysphoria. And then committed regicide after leaving his brother behind to die. Antikef is where Oltyx truly learned that compassion was weakness and saw how horrific the flayer curse could become. So how was he ever going to accept the flayed ones as Mentep wanted him to? Oltyx experienced the comically perfect combination of traumas to ensure that would never happen, thanks in part to Mentep's manipulations.

I cannot stress enough that Mentep's individual lies all made sense at the time. May have even been the best option, at the time. But the consequences piled up, and even as he is dying he still refuses to give Oltyx even a scrap of the truth. That is the core of his tragedy for me. Well, that and this:

He bases all of his manipulations on his understanding of people's psyche's, which are usually accurate, but it also traps them. It gives them no room to grow or surprise him or for outside factors to come in and intervene. Contrast this with Zultanekh, who is upfront to a fault. He gives Oltyx advice and resources, but what Oltyx does with those things is up to him. Even when he is screwing up royally, he's allowed to make those mistakes. Mentep causes ones of Oltyx's darkest hours (the secret blood pit), while Zultanekh lifts him out of another (the Blood Angel's attack). In the end, Zultanekh is the one who sees Oltyx's true growth and witnesses the birth of his kingdom. A birth that comes not from curing the curse but embracing it.

There was never a sickness to be fixed, which means Mentep never would have achieved his redemption because he was focused on the wrong things. Which does make his death and rebirth as Xott a bit of a reflection of Oltyx. He was too burdened in his first life, but in his second he (or at least a version of him) was able to witness the people he hurt reaching a place of peace.

#warhammer 40k #necrons #twice dead king #oltyx #mentep #shit this one got long #I have a lot of thoughts about the sad robots okay #pro tip: maybe constantly lying to the paranoid teenager with anger issues isn't gonna end well for anybody #side note I do wonder if Mentep's habit of manipulation came from his time on Carnotite #That place got scary man #learning how to work people may have become a survival tactic that he just internalized #poor yenekh stuck in the middle #my boy did not deserve that #zultanekh repeatedly proving that he is best

[beesmygod]

fact check me on this absurd bloodborne father gascoigne deepest lore posting

i'm working on the next "you hunted" update and frankly i feel split between feeling like im doing the pepe silvia routine and partly feel like it makes enough sense to get a soft pass. i know these are so many words to read. but ultimately its about gascoigne and his stupid music box, if that means anything to you:

on our short trek from the tomb of oedon to his chapel, we pass through a weird...sewer...drainage room thing with a ladder leading to a modest library. a note on the table reads:

"The Byrgenwerth spider hides all manner of rituals, and keeps our lost master from us. A terrible shame. It makes my head shudder uncontrollably."

this note is REALLY weird. even cross-checking the re-translation guide doesn't do much but reinforce the literal meaning of the note: there's a spider at byrgenwerth (another rom, we don't know this yet) hiding rituals, even the ritual involving the lost (or, in a better translation, unseeable/invisible) lord. bummer. ahhhh my head is rattling. but...who wrote this? about who? and why?

it's time to be a Fromsoft Lore guy in the worst way: we're going to dissect this note down to its atomic structure in order to wring any and all possible meaning from it in a futile attempt to try to come up with a tortured explanation for nonsense. skip all this italicized text to return to planet earth.

who wrote this note? if we knew that, a lot of things would be cleared up. the potential suspect list comprised of known individuals who have passed through that area recently is pretty tiny. can't be fauxsefka, because she doesn't use this route to reach the clinic. alfred doesn't seem to have much interest in the church, knows little about byrgenwerth, and seems unaware of most things in general. an unnamed and unknown NPC of no consequence? well, maybe. probably, even.

but what about gascoigne? you find this note immediately after defeating him by using a key he drops. it clear he did not progress past the library, as the incense would have driven him off (and the chapel dweller's reaction suggests you are the first hunter they've seen/sniffed). there's a possible clue left in the library that points to a hunter having passed through recently: the blood gem workshop tool. its one of three "misplaced" workshop tools found in the waking world. a hunter took this with them when they left the dream and left it in a chest in oedon chapel. that narrows down the pool of candidates quite a bit. gascoigne obviously knows what blood gems are, he gifted one to his wife. and this is before we've even discussed gascoigne's connections to a "lost master".

who is this note about?  the words used for titles in the english translation are all over the place and "master" could mean anything from "school principal" to "great ones". this has made trying to pin the subject of this note down near impossible. the japanese is more specific: "lords" in this note is translated as "主" and is almost never in the script otherwise. the only relevant usage even remotely close is it's use is in a different note later as a flowery way to refer to whoever has assumed the role of vicar of the healing church (essentially: "lord of blood ministration"). it is also used for micolash ("lord of the nightmare"), the japanese name of the bloodletting beast ("lord of the beast blood"), and for master willem of byrgenwerth ONLY in the graveguard set item description1. in the case of micolash and the bloodletting beast, "lord" can be read as "host" as well. but NOT like a parasite host!!! specifically like, a household host. "host of the beast blood" is intended to be literal.

now time to play "guess who?": willem could be described as "lost" metaphorically, but he's also like, right there. out in the open. he's considerably less lost than our other two options, micolash or laurence/host of the beast blood. willem doesn't use the 主 kanji usually; he's "headmaster" willem or some other title that makes it clear he's from a school. forget willem. it's not him.

i'm pretty sure japanese players were supposed to intuit a connection between the "lord of the beast blood" and the "lord of blood ministration" and this nuance was lost in translation. and while there is a vacuous spider in lower pthumeru blocking access to a secret 4th labyrinth layer where a hunter can find a lost lord of the beast blood, it's clearly not in byrgenwerth. it's not the big doggie.

micolash, head of the rogue school of mensis, is literally lost in the nightmare acting as it's host/lord. access to the corpse of micolash is blocked until rom, the byrgenwerth spider, is defeated. so. having eliminated any alternatives, the note is almost certainly about micolash. but. why? who in oedon chapel gives a shit about micolash?

there are a truly confusing number of connections between gascoigne and the school of mensis (and thus, micolash). the most specific and startling connection is that the music box that gascoigne has a good/bad (?) reaction to plays "mergo's lullaby". this exact song plays during a fight with the wet nurse of oedon's presumed (but like, come on. it is) child, the titular mergo. if gascoigne's daughter is sent to iosekfa's clinic, you will obtain the level 1 formless oedon rune from her body which, as we discussed in the last part, depicts the blood moon descending during a (mensis) ritual; levels 3 and 4 of the rune are found in oedon chapel itself.

gascoigne's garb reads:

The dingy scarf is a Holy Shawl and symbol of the Healing Church, from which Gascoigne would eventually part ways. "Father" is a title used for clerics in a foreign land, and there is no such rank in the Healing Church.

reads a bit differently now...perhaps father gascoigne did not bring a foreign form of worship to yharnam. gascoigne left the healing church in order to start his own, based on the foreign practices of pthumeru.

only today the church is abandoned, and some say that the residents of oedon have all gone mad.

#bloodborne #bloodborne lore

[satancopilotsmytardis]

For your AU question. Space travel fic where one is an alien. Set in the future.

Astronaut Dabi who managed to make it even though his father said it was a stupid dream that he would never achieve Not only does he make it as an astronaut, he ends up on a team that goes on brief missions from their space station to survey different planets for useful resources and to better document everything they can find.

Everything is going fine for about three years until one day Dabi ends up on a planet alone for a very brief scouting mission. He's just popping down to get air, water, and soil samples for this region because it was too dense with jungle foliage for their rovers to get through it. It literally was supposed to take 20 minutes and they followed all the proper procedures. He lands, chit-chatting to the others back at base while he's collecting the samples and being, as Magne says, 'a fucking nerd' about all of the interesting vegetation on the planet. Compress warns him a cloud front is rapidly coming in and he'll need to be back up at base before it hits, so he goes back to his pod. It's literally just bad luck, a freak accident that one of the alien megafauna straight up steps on his pod and strands him there in its own haste to find shelter against the oncoming storm. He's still got communication to the base for a could of days, and based on what he's collected so far, this planet does seem to be habitable to humans if he needs to be here for a little while, and the others should be able to come back down and get him as soon as it stops storming. Okay, this is also not that big of a deal, this is something that happens. He uses his scanners to find a cave system to wait out the storm and turns off his communication device to save power, knowing the others are just a button away if he needs them.

Uh, turns out that cave belonged to a native humanoid species that was previously unregistered. Dabi apologizes to the tall muscular... reptilian?? alien. He looks human in most of his anatomy save for the thick muscular prehensile tail that's twice as long as he is tall, the four fingers and toes on each limb, and the fact that when he opens his mouth it's much larger than it seems with two rows of insanely sharp teeth, extra skin flaps inside and a long forked tongue like a snake. His pale skin also has scales littered across it in patches, and he's nearly eight feet tall. Dabi turns on his universal translator and apologizes for intruding and Shigaraki is amused enough by this little creature that he puts p with him squatting as the tide comes in.

Dabi learns that the storm comes every month on this planet, having to do with the rotation, gravity, and other factors, and usually lasts until the tri-moon comes. He calculates that based on when they know the three moons should be in sight on the surface of this planet and determines that isn't going to be for another three to four weeks. Shigaraki is willing to let him stay and Dabi calls back up to the ship to tell them the situation. It would be very risky to send a pod down through the lightning, so they agree to just keep in touch every two days for timed check-ins to ensure he's alright. And then Dabi gets to spend a month getting to know Shigaraki.

They have a nice time together because Dabi is excited about anything he can learn about and Shigaraki likes having the company he really likes the way Dabi smells. They've been sleeping together (like for warmth and because Shigaraki can't make him a bed of his own while everything is soaked) and Dabi isn't thinking anything of that until during one of his check-ins he is informed by Compress this is a registered species-- it's considered extremely hostile and any planet it's found on is not fit for humans to inhabit because they have a habit of eating them and their skin is weapon-proof (or at least the weapons the scouts are likely to have). Dabi is of course terrified now that he knows and thinks he's being saved until his food runs out. And one night Shigaraki cages him under his bulk and Dabi is certain he's going to die and then nope, oops, turns out Shigaraki thinks that because Dabi smells so good, it must mean that he's a compatible mate and they smash (snake-like biology on that front too 🍆🍆👀)

(bonus) Dabi does get off the planet at the end of the storm, though Shigaraki is very sad to see him go, but Dabi just goes back up to renegotiate his contract, he will become an expert on Shigaraki's species if he's allowed to stay with him for 2-3 months at a time and then come back to base to report his findings afterward. His research ends up getting published and he earns enough to buy out the last of his contract so he can stay with Shig

#tanco speaks #ask #asks #shigadabi #5 fact au

[sarahowritesostucky]

im craving some steve/bucky/reader!

will you ever add to Worth The Wait? pleeese??🌷or maybe write a mfm fic that's set in the mcu? I'm dying for a good stucky/reader endgame fix it, and you write the best m/f sex scenes! 😳

Hi! I will add to Worth the Wait, one day. I have a lot of rotating projects and I'll admit that one isn't at the top of the list.

And I was brainstorming some kind of Endgame fix-it fic idea with an ofc/reader x Stucky pairing, and here's what I came up with:

I wanted to write a fic with more canon elements of the MCU (as I realized that I write very few canon-set fics and almost exclusively AUs). I wanted to write an ofc/reader with a super unique backstory, and hoo-boy, did I ever! I took a lot of inspiration from the galaxy as depicted in the Guardians of the Galaxy movies. This fic will be posted as a one-shot fic, whenever I get around to writing it.

A Stucky x Reader fic, set in the MCU during and after the events of Endgame:

Reader is from another planet - yes, literally.

You're a refugee from a planet that didn't want you (The Sovereign--Aka "the gold people" from Guardians 2.)

Long story short, those people disdain sexual (aka uncontrolled) reproduction. Your Mother was banished for becoming naturally pregnant by an inferior genetic (a Xandarian)

You have mixed genes: slightly gold skin from your Sovereign genes, and blue eyes and brown hair from your Xandarian father. (And since the Sovereign control reproduction strictly, there are no other mixed race Sovereign people like you in existance)

You narrowly escape Thanos' destruction of Xandar, and wind up hitching a ride, post-blip, with Nebula and rocket on the Milano. They take you to Terra to meet their friends after completing one of their post-blip scouting missions.

There you meet Steve, a Terran, and the two of you become friends. He suggests that you consider staying, as you have no real homeworld. You accept.

Eventually, you develop romantic feelings for each other. You decide to be brave and you walk up to him one day, asking if he wants to mate.

"Uh ... do you mean date?" he stutters. Then when you repeat yourself, the two of you proceed to have a long conversation about male-female relationships in Terran culture.

There's a lot to learn about the differences between Terrans and your own kind. For instance: Terrans don't have genders! ("gender" means something completely different on Terra).

Steve has to learn all about what it means for him, as the boyfriend of an omega-gendered woman. (update: he's a fast learner😉)

Steve loves that you're omega. Your nesting and scenting and purring instincts always make him smile. He loves how submissive and touch-focused you are with him, that he can make you melt into a puddle just by gripping your neck.

And he loves your heats. He's fascinated by the way your body changes and the way you start behaving. You can tell it turns him on, to see you getting needy and aroused, and he is very good at helping you through your heat.

He doesn't have a knot, but aside from that part of anatomy, his genitals are a very pleasing size compared to the Xandarian males you've been with in the past. Plus: he has the serum, so he's able to keep pace with the demands of your heat!

When you were at the peak of your heat that first time, half-delirious and begging for a knot, Steve got creative and tried the only thing he could think of: his hand! (fun fact: it's bigger than a knot😉). You now joke that you're a "size queen" in every sense of the word

Your romance with Steve is going well, when Steve and the others figure out a way to potentially reverse the blip: time travel.

You're conflicted, because it's all very dangerous and you're scared of losing Steve and the family and home you've found on Terra. But you know they have to try.

It works. And after the final battle, after you've been scraped out of the wreckage and laid Tony Stark to rest, you finally get to meet the man you've heard so much about: Bucky Barnes.

You can see the change in Steve, with his best friend back. He's happier, lighter, his full self in a way he wasn't before.

Over the course of a few months, you become close friends with Bucky as well. You and Steve don't even have to have a discussion about where Bucky will be staying: It's with you.

The three of you decide to go to Wakanda for a time. You're excited because you hear that the African Terrans' culture is very different from the Terrans in New York.

In Wakanda, you grow even closer with Bucky, and you decide to bring up the idea of partnering with Bucky at dinner one night.

Bucky just about spits his mouthful of wine across the table.

Apparently, three-way relationships are not the norm in Terran culture. Bucky and Steve get very pink in the cheeks at first about it (something you've learned means they are aroused, embarrassed, or both).

Steve splutters and stumbles a lot, but once Bucky shrugs and suggests that the three of you spend a night in bed together, Steve gets very quiet and won't stop looking at Bucky for a long time. (You grin, because you think he looks at Bucky like he want to mate him😉)

Later, after the three of you spend your first (amazing) night together, Bucky privately explains to you that he and Steve have never been intimate before, and that back in "their time" two males weren't allowed to be together like that.

You're astounded by these things about Terran culture and history that you're constantly learning, but you have two very good teachers in your mates boyfriends Bucky and Steve.

Terrans can't bond, but they do hold ceremonies to commit to life partners. So, after a year of living in Wakanda together, you, Steve and Bucky decide to have a "wedding." You are mated married on the palace's grand terrace, under the Wakandan sunset.

That night, you consummate the marriage, and that's the first time that you take both Bucky and Steve inside of your body at the same time. (spoiler: it's amazing😉)

You've already told them about bonding. They don't have glands in their neck like you do, but they've agreed to honor your traditions as well, and they both bite you that night.

You thought it would be purely symbolic, since they're both Terran, but it turns out that Terrans do have pheromones to some degree, and so shockingly, you can feel a euphoric rush when it happens.

You experience that intense closeness and intimacy of a bond with them, and even though it's not the same for them, over time, both Bucky and Steve confide that they feel a change as well.

Maybe it's a bond, and maybe it isn't. Who knows? Who cares? It's love, of that much you're certain. And that's all you need to know.

Yeah, so. This'll get written somewhere down the line. Hope it wasn't too far out there for ya 😆

#xandar #the sovereign #guardians of the galaxy #mcu #marvel #steve rogers #bucky barnes #steve rogers x original female character #steve rogers x bucky barnes #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x female reader #steve rogers x you #steve rogers x y/n #steve rogers x oc #bucky barnes x you #stucky #fanfiction #fanfic #bucky barnes x female reader #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes x oc #stucky x ofc #stucky x reader #stucky x you #stucky x y/n #endgame fix it #avengers endgame #the blip #wakanda

[stacotto]

I shouldn't be surprised when the episode title is, "The End of Hope", but.....fuck. I can barely keep my thoughts together as I write this, but, here we go.

Watching Earth House deal with the fallout of Aerial being the new poster child for the evil Spacian overlords was damn sad, Aliyah pretty much nails how I feel about it, though Lilique going "not our problem" is both a mood and unexpected (not in a bad way ofc). It was really sweet seeing Petra be nice to Suletta, on top of commiserating over their love lives, really added some nice depth. Her dialogue was Death Flag city tho. For those that care, the post-episode radio program hinted that she might still be alive, though just judging by the rubble she was under she might not have working legs anymo- OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Clever.

Love to see Guel finally show off why he's always been an Ace in the making; my man faced off in his still school-spec'd Darilbalde vs a freshly upgraded Michaelis set to full power, and came out on top. Really appreciating his ability to use his drones, he's definitely the series' Quattro. Feeling bad for Lauda tho, dude just learned big bro just killed their father then gets the call at the end probably about what to Petra. Can already tell he's going to have a lot of internalized guilt over this happening because he skipped out on their date (for an admittedly important reason) unless she gets the chance to tell him otherwise.

RIP to the Earth House hangar and Chuchu's Demi, but I take solace in the fact that I called the Barding being her next custom suit the moment I saw the Gunpla images (obviously the Barding we saw in the episode was missing some details from the gunpla like the second head mounted on the backpack which is definitely going to be salvaged from Chuchu's old Demi but yeah, called it). Also now feeling the Felchu vibes, ya'll got me.

Speaking of new ships...why did I have to get so rabidly attached to 5nore only for her to get Anew'd literally one episode later, it's not fair. They were going to run away and see the things she drew then the rest would come later. It's not fair. 5 is either going to have a Guel arc or just go absolute villain mode, and I'm not ready. It's not fair.

Okay I'm going to ramble a bit because I have been absolutely normal about the fact that Suletta has been a rescue pilot for a significant portion of her life and that detail is only really known to those that read Cradle Planet but they absolutely showed that off right at the end because this girl is tearing her hands apart moving heavy concrete slabs because goddammit there are still people that could be saved and she did not memorize the canyon patterns of Mercury, learn to wield a beam saber with the precision of a scalpel and earn Eri's complete faith that if she said she could complete a mission in 4 minutes then it'd be done in 4 minutes for her to not put all that experience to good use. I hope her effort gets recognized. It probably won't, Gundams just attacked the school again and killed likely scores of students if not hundreds this time around, but she's gotta get some respect for this.

"What We Can Do Now" is a hopeful title, and probably another TitleDrop episode like "Not the Best Way", so here's hoping that it's either a breather episode gearing up for a descent to Earth or said descent episode proper. I mean, it's either that or Mio and Prospera coming back up to Plant Quetta to send Quiet Zero...into...oh no.

#mobile suit gundam the witch from mercury #g-witch #g witch #the witch from mercury #g-witch spoilers #petra itta #suletta mercury #elan ceres #elan 5 #norea du noc #5nore #we are in for a wild ride #guel jeturk

[vergencescatter]

The Father, the Son, and the Daughter

In what we're to believe is his great quest, Baylan's only appearance in episode 8 shows him standing on the arm of a giant statue of the Father. (I don't think there is any debate that this statue and the others depict the Mortis gods (or beings, because I don't necessarily see them as gods in the traditional sense), especially with the earlier appearance of Morai).

Observe, on the right, a statue depicting the Son, who, from the Clone Wars [s3, e15-16], we know is aligned with the dark side. On the left, we see a statue of the Daughter, who is aligned with the light side. Her statue has been completely disfigured. This symbolism alone is very curious. One interpretation is quite literal: that Baylan is connected to the dark side of the force, or that his path - his quest - belongs to the dark side in some manner. Another interpretation pertains to the nature of the planet Peridea. As I wrote before, Peridea appears to be marked by some sort of dark magick. As Baylan remarked in episode 6, "Something stirs here". And so, perhaps the crumbling nature of the statue depicting the Daughter is symbolic of this darkness.

One thing I noticed speaks to the first interpretation. As Baylan stands at the hand of the Father, staring into the distance, one sees on the horizon a mountain with what appears to be a pulsing beam of light (edit: since first publishing this post, I realised this could very well be the Mortis monastery). The light is shooting out from the mountain peak upwards into the sky. From the perspective we're given, it appears this is the direction the hand of the Father statue is pointing. Surely, that is not a coincidence; coupled to the fact that we know something is calling to Baylan.

At present, I can't see any of this having to do with Abeloth. I just don't see any sort of Abeloth arc being consistent with the trinity of the Mortis beings. I would not be surprised if it was the Son, who, for whatever reason, had become aware of Baylan and has since been calling to him. We know this has happened in the past. After Ezra discovered the mural of the Mortis gods on the Jedi Temple of Lothal, which led to the entrance of the World Between Worlds, upon exiting the Son spoke to him [Rebels, s4 e13]. Thinking about it now, it could be interpreted as though he was calling to Ezra: "the future can still be changed" .

#Baylan #Baylan Skoll #ahsoka series #the mortis gods #peridea #Baylan's quest #the daughter #The son #the father #ezra bridger #world between worlds #Vergence Scatter #ahsoka show #clone wars #abeloth

[yellowocaballero]

Ok i just started reading your latest chapter and aggsdhipgyidtdiy Bruce, Bruce babygirl, do you realize what you have done? Do you realize the absolute power you have just promised your adopted morally grey nephew-son? Bruce he's going to be unstoppable Bruce, Bruce he'll literally rule the world (Granted i doubt he will go full evil not because i trust Tim, but because i trust Stephanie to smack him and make fun of him into quit being evil, and actually you know what Bruce whould get Tim Apple, it will be so fucking funny)

TECHBRO TIM TECHBRO TIM TECHBRO TIM

You ever want to cut a joke because it has too many worldbuilding implications, and then decide to leave it in because of the worldbuilding implications?

Yes, this would make Tim the richest kid in America. Tim grows tired of hearing about his generational wealth and decides to pave his own way. He definitely drops out of MIT and moves to silicon valley so he can create a tech start-up based off technology he designed for Batman three years ago. Horrifically, he is both a genius and has had a stock portfolio since the age of 13 and it is also 2003, so his start-up does extremely well and he makes even more fucking money. He sells it, makes another one, gets bored, sells that too, decides all of this is boring and moves back to Gotham to start fighting crime from home base again. This makes Tim both old money, new money, AND silicon valley money. This is not a fact you want in a man who's been on an FBI Watchlist since he was 12 and a domestic terrorist since he was 13.

Tim starts embodying the most annoying tech-bro on the face of the planet. He says it's for the Wayne family Bat-cover. It's for fun. Steph decides it's his way of sublimating his latent supervillain tendencies so she encourages it. The Teen Titans hate him but they have to put up with him because he funds them. They do not understand why Robin has the most awful taste in fiancés of all time. Luckily their relationship is 'open' so she's busy having insane lesbian sex with Starfire.

His first start-up is, obviously, Myspace, so he can collect privacy information and user data on his user base and use the information to fight crime.

Tim: "I'm a college drop-out. I started Myspace from nothing: just my garage and an idea I knew would change the world." Jimmy Kimmel: "Didn't you get a loan from your father's multinational conglomerate?"

Tim: "The tech world is the land of opportunity, Jimmy. Anyone can make it." Jimmy Kimmel: "With two trust funds and corporate stocks your father bought you in the 90s?" Tim: "I'm a self-made man, Jimmy."

#my writing #tim drake #the JL is funded by the United Nations so the Teen Titans causes some controversy bc of its private funding #tim tells everybody it's like buying a sports team #he designed their security systems but they don't know that #I like the idea of the teenage team being funded by another teenager #the most obnoxious teenager on the face of the planet #if Tim didn't work with Batman than he'd be unbelievably evil #BEST CHARACTER

[egg-emperor]

I love how Eggman actually exhibits all the opposite behaviors and actions of being a good caring father in Frontiers in literally every way possible. Like everything he does with his selfish self centered approach and reasonings for coming around to Sage as a person and seeing her as his "daughter" is how not to be a father.

THAT'S the type of figure he is if any at all, the opposite of all the healthy and expected ways because that's how Dr. Egoman "I deserve the whole world and all the attention, power, and control and everything should be all about me" rolls! He's incapable of changing that mindset for anyone or anything and we don't see him develop out of this here.

I've gone over many times now about how he only praises Sage for her efficiency, only says he's proud of her when she does something for him, only praises her in ways that can praise himself as her creator/father, and how I love how Ian Flynn confirmed this shallow way of embracing the idea of the dynamic and valuing her to be the intention.

But here's another thing I wanna bring up because even in the couple of scenes that you may know that I'm still not so big of a fan of, at least in the English version, there's even some things I still like about them both- even in the English because while some of the dialogue in it could've been better, the same thing happens nonetheless.

So I still haven't said much about this scene but ever since I've had my perspective and opinion on the overall portrayal of Eggman in this game massively shifted for the better, this scene has grown on me. So oh boy here we go, I'm finally talking about it properly.

Regardless of how it was presented and the line was delivered in English (which I would've changed personally as it can be easily misinterpreted, even by me at first) he still let her go and sacrifice herself for him, once again to protect him and "fulfill [her] function"

From start to finish of Eggman talking about Sage in this game, or even further back if we're gonna include the prequel comic, the main thing he praises her for is for being created by him as a genius and for protecting/serving him efficiently.

This is the reason he praises her in the memos, from protecting him from hazards and carrying out his orders (but the second she strays he snaps at her) and ends up bragging that she's "loyal and efficient" as a reason to value and be proud of her. This is also the same reason he first compliments her to her face on screen as he says he's proud of her.

He values her for the ways he can benefit from beginning to end and the fact this never changes throughout the "development" is the reason he still lets her go so easily. He doesn't beg for her not to leave and risk his life to prevent this, he instead lets her go on her snicide mission to fulfill the function that she was created to have all along!

And why does Eggman want The End to be defeated? Because he couldn't harness and use it in the way he wanted, it was against him, and it was a threat to his life and the world he wants to take over and rule. This is the only reason he's ever helped save the world in any game, for his own ass and the planet that needs to exist to take over and rule.

He values his own life and the world over his "daughter" who he still allows to go and sacrifice herself to save them. Like everything in life, he puts himself and his desires first, just like he's been shown to in every single game. Because the whole point behind his character, behaviors, motives, evil and all is that he's deeply egotistical and selfish.

He let her go. He doesn't consider other options, he doesn't beg Sage not to go. He doesn't spend a moment taking any risk at his potential expense when his creation, his servant, his protector, presents an option that involves carrying out her true purpose that he never lost sight of the whole time in every single way he interacted with her.

I'm personally not a fan of this next line though, it just feels out of place with what's actually happening, which is one of the only ones I'd change about the English version now, aside from tiiiny memo things. I'm not a fan of this and it hasn't grown on me despite everything else because it just doesn't feel like him. But at least the overall context of the scene remains the same.

But with everything I just described above prior, the Japanese version reflects all those points I made in this line so PERFECTLY.

Eggman lets her go because while he's essentially sending her on a snicide mission, he still has a bit of faith that she might make it. And it's for no other reason than for the way that he sees her as a masterpiece. Once again, this bastard is incapable of praising her without praising himself, the creator which made her this masterpiece! It's fucking great.

So even though he doesn't 100% expect her to die, he's again still sending her out to danger which had the possibility but didn't try to prevent it because she's fulfilling her function and she's his masterpiece. So she should do what she was meant to all along in protecting him and saving him and the world he wants to rule, and believes she could because HE created her.

So JP >>>>>>> English for how it gets that second point across so clearly but I'm still happy that the context is at least the same in both regardless, I just think it should've been presented in a way in English that wasn't as easy to misinterpret. Japanese gets it across perfectly in comparison Imo

And right to the very end, Sage also stayed true to her function by protecting and keeping him safe like she was created and ordered to. When she thought she'd no longer be around to do it, she tried to deliver her wish for someone to carry on her role for her (like Sonic would though LOL) because she knows and accepts it's what he wants most.

The only difference is that she just learned to apply feelings of love to it that she learned from Sonic and friends, it just made her even more loyal when emotion became involved. And that leads right back to why Eggman ever valued and praised her at all in the first place and stayed the same to the end.

But I gotta say I like the Japanese version of what Sage says in her sacrifice better for this dialogue:

Because damn. Sage is still asking if he'd praise her, as if she's still not even certain. Why would she have to question this if Eggman was really such a good, loving, caring, selfless and genuine father figure. EXACTLY, because he isn't. We didn't see that happen in the game lol

I also really like how this uncertainty of Sage's also appears multiple times throughout her Dear Father song. With how it says "I hope you are not mad at me" because she isn't certain in getting unconditional love and praise from him, as he only praises her for when she does exactly as he asks for his own gain.

Because even when she does try other options that still have his best interests in mind, he doesn't react well if she doesn't do it in the exact way he asked. Like when it came to suggesting working with Sonic as a solution which enraged him, then keeping him trapped in Cyber Space to keep him safe then trying to urge him to get back in which he responded with anger again. So she has a reason to be uncertain.

The song also acknowledges that she was trying her hardest to make him proud of her and that she knows to do that by protecting and serving him well. And look at the other lyrics also showing uncertainty and questioning of how Eggman feels about their relationship! "maybe we could be a family" and "hope that you feel the same" !!!!!!

Then the most obvious case of uncertainty is when Sage asks if Sonic thinks Eggman cares about her, which I talked about more here.

If Eggman was such a great and loving father towards Sage at any point in this story on screen or not, she wouldn't have to wonder and be so uncertain in this scene with Sonic, the sacrifice scene, and her song.

That's because Eggman's "love", praise, and value of her is conditional and shallow and this is seen all throughout the game. She's praised when she serves him well and he can find use and take pride in her but he can just as easily snap at her. This is exactly how the dynamic should be, the difference between Sage and Eggman's side of it is fascinating.

As for this next moment, I never had that much of a problem with it, even before my big shift in perspective that made me like it all much more. You can't see his face to see exactly how he's expressing himself in this moment but it makes perfect sense for him to be very disappointed in this loss, even though he let it happen to save himself and the world he wants to rule.

Because he had so much pride in his genius efficient creation and what it could do for him, as loyal and efficient as he wishes in his creations. But not only did his plan go wrong but when he finally escaped Cyber Space, he barely got to put use to his creation to its full potential and he's already losing it.

But that's a short lived disappointment anyway as he has a determined look when he's immediately like "oh wait, I can do something about this actually" lol

Then in the post credits scene, you can clearly see that he is indeed bringing her back with evil intent, as the sinister smile on his face says it all! He's going to get to put her to that potential after all.

So there are my new thoughts on those moments since my huge opinion and perspective shift! The more I analyze this dynamic and how it was handled in the actual game, the more I understand and love it for the accuracy and faithfulness to who Eggman really is 💜

#dr eggman #eggman #dr robotnik #sonic frontiers #sage the ai #eggdad #analysis #my post #dr. eggman

[kakiastro]

Astrology of Tyler Perry

His chart

Disclaimer: I want to remind you that if you have a similar chart or placements , this DOESNT mean this is how it will play out in your life, your kids or other loved ones. astrology is complexed and placements have many meanings and theme to them!

So I just got done watching his documentary on Prime called “Maxine’s Baby” Maxine was his mother’s name and it’s pretty much the story of his come up. It’s a classic rags to riches story, it’s also a story about believing in yourself. I wanted to breakdown his chart and the documentary really shows on his chart

Whether you’re a fan or not, this a good way to see astrology in real life!

Throughout this whole documentary, he talked about how close he was to his mother until her passing.

1. Moon Libra 1h. I’m starting to realize that men who has their moon in the 1h are mommas boys. They are the ones who would do anything for their moms even if the relationship is toxic. Now Tyler relationship with his mother was healthy. Libra is the sign of business and his brand started out as representing mothers and women. Libra rules over grandmother and Madea is literally everyone fav grandma lol

Another big thing he talked a lot about in his documentary was the physical and verbal abuse from his father growing up. There’s a few planets that has the “father” archetype (Sun, Saturn and Jupiter). I’m going look at his Sun because that’s the planet I personally look at for fathers, Saturn for father /authority figures and Jupiter grandfathers.

2. Sun Virgo 11h, close to 12h. Virgo is the sign of criticism and harsh judgements. Virgo Suns may be extremely critical and push themselves to the point it affects their health. That’s because at a young age they are told they’re not enough, or you’re not doing this correctly, “that’s good but you can do better.” They develop this perfectionism attitude about themselves and can project that on others if they’re not self aware of this. The 11h rules over feeling outcasted or not knowing how to fit in. He talked lot about how he never felt loved or wanted by his father and been very public about that. 11h rules over the public.

Speaking of Sun 11h. This indicated having well known friends and collaborators. Having a well known networking friend. He’s good friends with Oprah who’s an Aquarius which rules. The 11h by the way.

His Sun conj Pluto. Pluto rules over abuse and Virgo rules the physical health of the body. Yeah he had it rough in his childhood. The thing is, his father was just projecting his own insecurities and hurt onto him with his Pluto in the 12h.

He has a Capricorn 4h. Capricorn is ruled by Saturn. Saturn rules over restriction, career, work ethic and authority figure. He has a huge work ethic and his career is tied into his private life. I remember him saying he wrote 20 scripts in two weeks and had submitted them to get them made. That’s actually insane, if you’re a writer then you’ll know how crazy that is! That’s Capricorn energy for you though. Remember Capricorn is exalted in Mars. The grind is real here. He also have Saturn 6h which indicates being a workaholic.

It’s paid off because he has Saturn Taurus 6h. Saturn Taurus can indicate building wealth or living comfortably later on in life (post Saturn return).

His MC is in Cancer. What did I say about his private life being intertwined with his work life. His work life is a reflection of his childhood and. The people he grew up with, his Moon in the 1h. The 1h is your point of view of things so he’s writing about the women in his world.

He also said he originally wanted to be a pastor before becoming a writer and filmmaker. He also said m, he comes from a long line of pastors that goes back generations.

3. Moon Conj Jupiter. The moon rules over our lineage and where we come from and Jupiter rules over religion and our philosophical ideals. The fact Jupiter is so close to his rising and close aspected to his Mercury, his ideals and message comes through his writing. This makes sense on why there’s always spiritual element to his movie such as gospel music and Madea giving life lessons.

Y’all we are truly our charts!

What is his destiny and where is he going this lifetime?

4. North Node Pisces 5h. Transcendence through fame and creativity. Pisces is that spiritual sign so he may dive deep into that. This is probably me just grasping at straws but he may step away from the industry and let his son take over when he gets older. Pisces rules over isolation and living life like a Monk basically lol. Pisces also rules the ocean, will he start his own cruise? (Just a joke but who knows, he’s rich😅) the 5h rules over fame and children. I believe his son and any other future kids he may have will carry his legacy. More so his eldest because 5h rules children

There’s so much I can probably breakdown but that would take me a week and I have readings to do finish😅

Feel free to comment what you notice, keep it astrology based please

#astrology #astrology community #knowledge #love astrology #astro observations #advanced astrology #celebritybirthchart #fame astrology #birth chart #tyler perry #kakiastro

[asetoblog]

You know, Final Fantasy 7 is one of my favourite games ever (my top favs are HZD/HFW, all games involving FF7 and - although it's getting worse - Dragon Age) and I would like to write about something that doesn't sit right with me.

Warning: this post is a Sephiroth apology‼️🌸

So, remember the end of FF7 Remake, where Cloud & Co get to the end of the Midgar highway and they meet Sephiroth? In that exact moment, Aerith tells him "you're wrong", marking the word "wrong". She doesn't mean he's wrong about something, she literally means his whole existence is wrong and he shouldn't have been there or anywhere else in the first place.

Now, that remark rubbed me the wrong way, because Aerith is the only character connected to the Planet in this story and she's supposed to be very empathetic of what and how people suffer. She also lived in the Shinra building during her childhood and she hated it, she perfectly knows how things work there and she loathes - rightfully so - professor Hojo, because she knows what an unscrupulous and ruthless man he is. This would mean she met a younger Sephiroth at some point, and yeah she was still a child, but she must've noticed he was a kind and actually very submissive guy (maybe I'll get to this later???). I think she knows he too was subjected to experiments, just like she was, but this doesn't seem to bother her and she goes straight to saying something on the line of "you shouldn't exist".

In another moment in FF7 Rebirth, you can get a dialogue with Tifa in which she tells you she is "sick of Sephiroth cruelty [...]" and so on. Now, I agree with her, all she got from Sephiroth was her dad's death, wouldn't you be fucking pissed at him and hate him and want him dead? Yeah.

Thing is, I agree with Tifa and disagree with Aerith, but all of this makes me wonder: have they thought what a horrible and traumatic life Sephiroth had until that point?

Sephiroth:

-was born an experiment

-was taken away from his own mother, never met her

-doesn't even know his father

-as a child, he's shy and submissive, never gets any friends, he thus grows up lonely

-he spends most of his life in Hojo's lab, among Mako energy, needles and treatments

-no one ever showed him affection nor love, he was simply raised like a weapon in the hands of the most powerful corporation of the world

-his only two friends, as an adult, abandoned him

-one of his two best friends tells him the truth about him without the hint of some tact, he also calls him "monster" not knowing he's feeding the "insane gene" (let's call it that) in him

-the only new friend he gets, a recruit, jumps straight to conclusions instead of trying to help him

-he always said he wanted a "normale life" and he was forced into that. He also was one step away from leaving Shinra before the accident of Nibelheim happened

There's actually more to point out, but let's just take a step back and think about how an entire life of traumas, deprivation and loneliness can drive a person wild and cause Personality Disorders, Depression and Psychosis. I'm honestly surprised he even endured so much for so long and that would mean he'd be ok if only someone really cared for him and didn't see him as a "hero", a "star" or someone unreachable. His snapping point was reading all the history of Gast and Hojo's experiments and learning more about Jenova. That, sadly, adds up to the trauma he has to face and he even cries about it, meaning he was definitely still (emotionally) sane. Perhaps, it would have taken only one word of comfort but not even Zack was there for him, instead he acted a little harsh, in my opinion.

By this I don't mean things had to go differently, because otherwise I wouldn't have had one of my favourite stories out there, I'm just trying to point out how deplorable Aerith's comment sounds, especially knowing she's so caring and empathetic. I just don't like tha fact that such a dialogue line was written, but at the end I am but a humble Sephiroth apologist.

"You're wrong". No, Sephiroth is not wrong, all the people who surrounded him were.

#sephiroth #ff7 #final fantasy 7 #ff7r #ff7 rebirth #final fantasy 7 rebirth #sephiroth apology #aerith was harsh man #i love his character

[artist-issues]

Some of You Have Not Seen E.T. In a Long Time

and you think it’s just a semi-weird but cult-classic 80s sci-fi movie, and you don’t revisit it, if you ever saw it at all.

But let me help you with that.

That movie is so good.

It’s about a little boy named Elliott who is immature, and one of the worst parts of his particular immaturity is that he only cares about how he feels. At the beginning of the movie he tries to tell his family about the creature he saw in the backyard, but when they don’t react the way he wants them to, he throws uncomfortable facts about his absent father in his mom’s face. She gets upset, and Elliott’s big brother says,

And what does the backyard creature turn out to be? An ALIEN. A word which means both “visitor from another planet” and “completely foreign, outside of your own experience.”

they literally name him “the EXTRA-Terrestrial.” Because that’s what he teaches the little boy—how to feel what other people feel, outside of himself. Instead of just focusing on his own little world and how he feels.

The alien literally has a heart that you can see from the outside of his body.

The alien literally has empathy powers. He makes Elliott feel exactly what he’s feeling—or vice-versa. When he sees a hurt, the alien immediately tries to heal it. When he starts dying, so does Elliott.

The little boy has to learn to communicate, to care about what someone else cares about, and to let go of someone even though it hurts because it’s what’s best for them.

The E in E.T. stands for empathy, go back and WATCH IT.

the movie is shot mostly from a short perspective, so the audience can feel what the kid characters are feeling, just like the kid characters are learning to feel what their loved ones might feel.

E.T.‘s character design is all big eyes and glowing heart—what else would personify “observe other people and feel for them?”—while the bad guys in the movie, the government, come in dressed as astronauts—and you cannot see their faces. You can’t connect with them.

The leader of the government is only shown from the hip down, accompanied by the sounds of jingling keys, until he talks to Elliott about why he wants to study E.T.—then suddenly, because he’s getting down on Elliott’s level and explaining how he feels, he’s the only one who’s face you can actually see, and you realize that the keys were symbolizing how much he wanted to unlock the secrets of the universe all along. But you don’t get to know that until Elliott connects with this character, who is explaining how he feels.

It is set on Halloween. (When everyone wears masks.)

If you haven’t seen this movie in a long time, or ever, and you think it’s just the weird Spielberg Alien Movie, go and watch it. That’s how you make a movie, people

#E.T. Stands for Empathy Teacher #darn it #E.T. #extra-terrestrial #extra terrestrial #e.t. the extra terrestrial #e.t. #drew Barrymore #Elliott #Steven Spielberg #classic film #classic Hollywood #classic cinema #80s movies #Halloween movies #e.t. Phone home #phone home #empathy #writing #storytelling #meta #analysis #universal studios #rare universal studios meta

[kivaember]

Not sure if you're still taking prompts, but maybe something about how Walter would feel after "Intercept the Redguns"?

i'm always taking prompts! i may not get round to them quickly, but i'll always endeavour to write something for them! but anyways yes, it's some angst time... hrngh

"...our work here is done. Return to the garage, 621."

Walter barely paid attention to his Hound's acknowledgement flashing across his screen. He muted his mic and leaned back in his seat, hearing it creak loudly from his shifting weight, and tipped his head back to stare at the ceiling.

Unlike their garage back in Belius, the forward garage near Watchpoint Alpha was just a hastily repurposed old hangar that had a tiny concrete room stashed in the very corner of it. It was frigidly cold, even when Walter was surrounded by four portable heaters aimed directly at his rickety desk, and there was a large crack that ran from one corner of the room to the other across the ceiling.

Someone fifty years ago had tried to paint it over, but time and the relentless winter that gripped the ice fields had forced the paint to flex and warp, exposing the gaping crack for the dangerous structural flaw that it was. There wasn't anything above the ceiling, at least. It wasn't supporting any part of the hangar's metal frame, and there weren't any piping or machinery parts resting across it. If it caved in, it'd be due to its own weight, and if it held for fifty years, it could hold for the few days Walter needed to see the rest of this mission through.

A few days.

Michigan would've died in a few days anyway, Walter told himself. In a few days, his Hound would find the Coral Convergence, painting a giant target on where he and Carla needed to point the Xylem for the next stage of their plan. It was crude, maybe, but the Xylem was a colony unto itself. Even if the Convergence was mildly dispersed in an underground pocket, the explosive force of the Xylem's Coral reactors detonating on impact would cause a catastrophic chain reaction.

Walter had vague memories, of his father explaining the startling stability yet votility of Coral. It acted a little like flour, really. In open air, a spark did nothing. In condensed environments, where the particles were forced to pack tighter than their nature wanted, then a spark could cause a catastrophic chain reaction: the Xylem would be the spark for that chain reaction.

Michigan wouldn't have survived that, if he lived past this day. Knowing that idiot, he would've been fistfighting Snail on top of the Convergence itself, vying for control even as a literal colony drop was aimed right for him. Either way, now or then, Michigan would've gone down fighting - this way was probably more satisfying for him, though.

Died of a bad fall. Even with his AC exploding around him, Michigan trotted out a bad joke.

Walter made a quiet, frustrated noise, rubbing a hand over his face as he squashed down that- feeling swelling up behind his diaphragm like an immovable object. It wasn't grief, because Walter had stepped onto this planet knowing one way or another Michigan would die due to him. Michigan had been nothing more than an asset or an obstacle, depending on who was paying his Hound to point his gun where, and Walter had emotionally prepped himself for this eventuality.

What they had on Ganymede... that was the past. It didn't exist anymore. That Walter hadn't even been real, a fake fantasy while he selfishly put off his mission for a few years. It was better Michigan died now, actually. Better for Michigan to go out cracking a stupid joke in a blaze of pointless glory, oblivious to the fact that his old friend had been planning his death just a few days later anyways.

He'd always been a fool.

(Michigan? Walter? Both?)

A blinking light on his screen drew his attention, and Walter reluctantly looked to see what his Hound had sent. He'd half-expected 621 to report some remnants ambushing him and requesting direction, but instead-

"Should I have picked the other job?"

Walter stared at those words for a long moment, baffled on where the question was coming from, before he realised that 621 was more perceptive than he'd initially thought.

"...one way another, Michigan would've met his end here," Walter said. By V.IV Rusty, or by the Second Fires, it didn't matter. "There's no point dwelling on it. Our mission comes first, anyways."

"But wasn't he your friend?"

"No." Walter's voice was harsh. "Business associate. That's it."

His Hound didn't say anything else, and Walter let the conversation - short as it was - die there. He must be slipping, if a brain fried merc like 621 could pick up on his complicated feelings over Michigan. Walter always slipped whenever that idiot was concerned though. Michigan had a way of getting under his skin.

not anymore, a traitorous voice whispered in the back of his mind. Walter ruthlessly crushed it.

It didn't matter.

It won't matter.

Not in a few days. Just a few days...

...and nothing else will matter to him, ever again.

#armored core #armored core 6 #handler walter #c4 621 #g1 michigan #fanfic #fanfic ramblings #drabble time! #time for some angst #and implied walter/michigan #aw yeah