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waeirfaahl · 1 year

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Ashi issue

In my previous post I discussed about the seven sisters and their inconsistency and pointlessness. Now we will talk about specifically Ashi. I'd be lying if I didn't say that she's the worst, poorly-written, empty and the most hated character of season 5. Especially after episodes 9 and 10. She is a manifestation of Mary Sue. Even more — she's much worse than Rey from Disney's Star Wars. And in order not to be unfounded, I will sort out on my fingers why everything is wrong with this character.

As I mentioned earlier, it's extremely idiotic idea to use some children or young human women against the warrior, who easily killed thousands of various bounty hunters (humans and aliens), powerful demons, robots, deities and undeads and etc. For thousands years Aku himself always used exactly robots and demons as his army, because they were the most powerful warriors, hence that’s why he used them against Jack. Aku himself as the most powerful being at least on Earth fought against Jack several times. Hence the entire concept of 5 season makes no sense and can not happen. Plus, according to 5 season itself, Aku ignored Jack all these 50 years and waited his natural death, he just relaxed in own castle. Hence I can’t understand, why the authors try to blame Aku for atrocities he even knew nothing about and didn’t participated — the unrevealed priestess-mother birthed and raised her girls as killers against Jack for own unexplained goals (I still can’t understand for the life of me, what she wanted), as well as the sadist controlled the blue alien cubs against Jack by own will. (even Scaramouche, the only assasin who works on Aku in 5 season, killed citizens by own will) Neither the sadist nor the priestess with her followers/tribe/fans have no reason and need to exist — they exist in 5 season only for cheap way of making Ashi to change her mind and fanatically believe to Jack. So, the seven girls are born in very disgusting screamer scene, their mother decided their fate for them, abused them physically and phychologically all their life, brainwashed them and taught only to fight and later face Jack. I wonder, how Ashi and her sisters stayed alive after this. After serious burns. At a very young age. Not to mention punches from the gorilla-like woman(?) or whatever this thing is.

How I said in this post, these characters are incredibly inconsistent. Interesting moment in the "Who created the stars? Aku did that?" scene. In the animatic version, Jack tells Ashi a fairy tale about the creation of stars, which his mother told him as a child (about the sun and the moon riding a phoenix in the dark), and that the fairy tale helped him fall asleep quickly and calmly, after which he falls asleep himself, and Ashi also likes Jack’s interpretation. But in the final version, this subtlety was lost — in episode 5, Jack tells this legend as the truth. Tartakovsky describes the entire segment with the phoenix and moon-and-sun siblings as Ashi's imagination. And I have a question — how can she know what a phoenix looks like, and what the phoenix is, if she does not know the outside world, nature, animals and their behavior at all?

Like, for example, in 3 episode the seven sisters didn’t know what deers and crows are, they lived in full isolation since infancy and knew nothing about the world... Ashi watched the shooting stars with fascination in episode 3, she was fascinated with traveling in ocean on the sea serpent, as well as she looked with fascination at valley and ladybug in childhood... But in the next episodes Ashi has no enthusiastic reaction and no interest (desire to learn and to discover more) toward other creatures, habitants and technologies, i.e. to the new world that is finally open for her, as if she always lived among them... WTF?!

The same inconsistency is demonstrated in her awareness/unawareness of nakedness and rules of decency. In 6 episode after washing from black ash she is aware that she is naked and hence she needs clothes.

And Ashi makes a dress out of leaves.

But in 8 episode Ashi does not pay any attention to her nakedness and sincerely does not understand Jack's confused reaction and his words about men/women differences and privacy. And she feels no confusion that she had in episode 6. It's one thing if she said "Don't worry about it, Jack. I know I'm naked, and I'm a little uncomfortable too. But now this monster is our main problem.", and if she made the ironic joke "Are you always so caring?", when Jack dressed her in his kimono. But no, here she knows absolutely nothing and understands nothing about nakedness, privacy and rules of decency.

Same thing with her sudden knowing that cruelty to children and living organisms is bad in 5 episode. Like, who could teach her this?! Might I remind you, their mother taught them only to be mindless and ruthless killers. In 3 episode the seven sisters watched the deers’ nuzzling and were completely shocked and confused and thought it’s something bad (i.e. tenderness = bad), hence they know nothing about love, care, tenderness, boyfriend-girlfriend relationships, friendship and etc. The abuse of their mother toward them they considered as normal, the devouring of the weak one by the strong one they considered as good. Ashi and her sisters mimic voice and intonations of their mother and all those fanatical speeches and swearing Ashi cried in 3, 4 and 5 episodes. So in 8, 9 and 10 episodes how Ashi knows what the love is?! She can't and shouldn't know that! The love-story and romantic relationships between her and Jack are impossible! Not to mention that she’s 20 (however, mentally she is much younger and more inexperienced), while he is 70+. (and it’s very weird and out of character that Jack reacts at her like a teenager, being a royal son with education and noble upbringing)

And if Ashi vaguely has an idea of love somehow, then why she didn’t give a sh*t about her dead sisters, who suffered ‘cause of their mother’s cruelty too and died 'cause of her, but instead Ashi falls in love with the one who killed them right in front of her a couple days ago, but could save them too?! She remembers her sisters only when the script wants, i.e. only in the fight against her mother, and then she just forgets them again. Like, in 1 episode one of them even wanted to help her, when she fell, i.e. the sisters had pretty good relationships. They never bullied her or whatever. But no, even in 5 episode Ashi says to Jack about only her suffering, she says nothing about her sisters. In the deleted scene of 5 episode from animatic Jack mentions about innocents as tools for doing evil will, Ashi whispers “That’s me...” and says nothing about her sisters again. And Jack has no reaction at her words too and doesn’t ask more about her and the dead girls from her team... Damn, that’s horrible.

Seems to me, Genndy and his team re-written script thousand times and payed no attention to these contradictions in character’s personality.

And Ashi’s mother partially confirms my assumption. Because the priestess tells about Ashi as about the two different persons. In 5 episode she says “You were always the weak one! Distracted! Unfocused!”, while in 7 episode she says “You was the strongest, but the most unfocused, always distracted, questioning everything!”. The way she describes her daughter in episode 5 fits to Ashi’s personality and behavior, demonstrated to us in the first six episodes of 5 season, and that Jack's kindness to the ladybug became a catalyst for Ashi's doubts and understanding that the samurai saved her life and is not bad, even if he still has to prove his words to her in 5 episode (sounds silly, but still).

While the way she describes her daughter in 7 episode... If the priestess was so annoyed with Ashi’s questions and doubts about everythingg from childhood and if she knew that Ashi will betray her... Why she didn’t kill Ashi, when Ashi was a child?! And this contradiction exists in both animatic version and final version.

Now I want to show how Mary Sue Ashi is. Unlike her dead sisters, she survives after falling from enormous height, blood loss and crashing bones, spine and skull she had to get after this.

Ashi somehow survives after multiple prolonged electric shocks she encounters first time in her life and does not get any burns or problems with internal organs and is even able to get out and fight. WTF?! She has to be dead.

Jack travels and lives in this world for 50+ years, he is incredibly experienced. He already had a case with children who were hypnotized by sound in the classic seasons. However, in 5 season Jack forgets about it. While Ashi, absolutely uneducated and inexperienced, confidently says “This sound controlls them!”. How?! She can’t know this at all! In animatic version it was presented a bit better — Ashi only assumes “The sound... there can be a connection!”, and Jack understands and commands “Find and destroy its source!”. I have no idea, why they changed it, because the final version is worse and makes Jack an idiot.

She kills an entire army of orks with her bare hands and alone. (in the deleted scene she also uses a gun for the first time and successfully)

She kills her mother without psychological overcoming some fears or whatever and very easy in incredibly pathetic fight. Seriously, instead of really dangerous enemy and serious battle with revealing some lore we got this — the brainless woman without face, personality and motivation, and who came alone, without her army of followers, without normal weapons, without armor and for some reason she still doesn’t try to kill Ashi, who betrayed her thrice (even if the orks were hers, still stupid). The second villain of 5 season, who embodies all horrors in life of one of the main characters, was easily defeated in 1 minute. What a shame... (not to mention Ashi’s impossible tricks with arrows and horn in this scene — they were mentioned here)

She is completely okay with trying to use this technology, being absolutely uneducated about it.

But there were easy examples of her being Mary Sue. The hard ones are in 9 and 10 episodes. Along with how Ashi ignores her dead sisters, I have another huge issue with her as a character — knowing nothing about conflict and its origins and reasons, she blindly believes to her mother and later she blindly believes to Jack in the same way and is ready to do everything for him (even to die, apparently, if you look at 9 and 10 episodes). She is not a character, she is a plot device, function without personality for moving to the events the author wants.

Speaking about hard examples of Ashi being a Mary Sue. Let’s just look at 9 episode. You can’t imagine, how pissed off I was, when this stupid “twist” happened in 9 episode. I hoped to the last that Genndy and the team were not such complete idiots to add this twist. Because by doing this, they ruined canon of the classic seasons and literally disgraced Aku. And although in first eight episodes I disliked Ashi and her role and existence in 5 season, I still reminded myself “Remember, she is a victim of child abuse... Remember, she is a victim of child abuse...”, but 9 episode happens... and for me, absolutely all excuses for this character have disappeared. I hated her. The one idiotic twist destroyed the whole 5 season for me and made me hate every aspect of it irrevocably. That was my rage mode reaction at this twist. And although it was kinda confirmed, that the real father of Ashi and her sisters is unstated, and I prefer to think their father was a random unknown human, I’ll just show, why this entire “Luke, I am your father!” sh*t here makes no sense and never could happen. And how stupid this is and how it disgraces Aku as a character. Most of the arguments I mentioned in the same post, here I will mention only the main ones and some new. First of all, the behavior of their fanatical mother and her cruelty towards her daughters literally debunk the idea of Aku being their father; she always says “OUR lord father, OUR lord master”, not “YOUR”, but exactly “OUR”, she never says to her daughters who their father is. Second, the main argument is simple — that’s absolutely impossible. Aku’s blood is deadly poisonous, it melts swords, helmets, armor, metal etc, it absorbs living beings to death, if it happens to be inside the living being then it will devour the living organism out of inside to its death. Aku himself is a genderless creature, he’s neither male nor female, he can’t mate with other species at all (about personality and biology of this character I discussed here). Ashi and her sisters couldn’t be born at all, their mother had to be dead immediately after her unexplained decision to drink Aku’s blood. And Aku himself is absolutely asexual creature. He was never interested in females, in making children, in carnal pleasures and so on. Aku was always lonely and asexual character, who needs no one. He is interested only in Jack and in ruling Earth. And he despises humans and other mortals. Hence for him, the superior and immortal loner, it’s absolute disgrace and serious contradiction to mate with such worthless, pathetic, inferior and insignificant creatures like humans. And just realize, how hypocritical it is. Like, in the narrative of 5 season “Aku is born from a shred of Ultimate Evil, hence he is the evil too and must be destroyed. We don’t care about his tragedy at all. We don’t care that he never asked for this and is either deprived of choice after his birth (the conflict with Jack’s father, who accidentally created Aku and then rejected him) or even never had it. We don’t care that he is doomed from the start of his existence. He must be killed because of his dark and evil origin”, and at the same time “Ashi is born from the part of the descendant of Ultimate Evil. Poor Ashi, she’s not like her big bad daddy and small bad mommy. She’s good, she’s more human and deserves the second chance and happy life”. FACEPALM.

Seriously, Genndy and the team in interviews told about how they like this character, but after this, how they butchered Aku in 5 season and turned him into complete moron with sudden female offspring from random female human, I started to think that they hated this character and intentionally disgraced him in favor of their precious monkey-like Mary Sue. Seriously, this entire “I’m your father, Ashi! But I didn’t know about this! And you too” is literally someone’s stupid fan theory from bad fanfiction, which somehow happened to be official despite the fact that it contradicts to the canon of the classic seasons, it also contradicts to own story in 5 season and contradicts to Genndy’s own words that the seven sisters are humans (hence they can not be related to Aku). Not to mention that the classic seasons show that Aku feels his parts and feels pain, when they die. I can not for the life of me understand, why fans ate this sh*t with joy. It contradicts to the canon, it comes from nowhere, there was no hints, Ashi had no green skin and no red/white hair, animals liked her and etc. Plus, before controlling and devouring its victim to death, Aku’s blood increases aggression and memory lapses of an infected organism — but for some reason Ashi doesn’t suffer from this at all. But let’s talk about the scene of 9 episode itself from the 5 season story’s perpective and presentation... I still have many issues with it. This segment gives questions instead of answers. The main ones — who the f*ck these random cultists are? Where they came from? Who is their leader and what she wanted? If I get right, she probably wanted to show off ‘cause of her desire to become one of Aku's official and respected henchmen/survants or whatever, but that's still a very vague and with no answer. Why she drank Aku’s blood? Probably she wanted to get Aku’s powers, but there’s still no answer. This moment only shows, how f*cked up this character is, if she never had a thought that Aku’s blood will kill her. (hmm, what if she didn’t know about her pregnancy during drinking Aku’s blood and was envy toward her girls, ‘cause some of them could get Aku’s powers instead of her, but still nothing happened even with them, so that’s why she was so cruel to them and saw them only as tools for own goals and never cared if they die?) But the funniest aspect is that she could just watch on Jack, find out that he lost his sword and then warn Aku about it. I mean, she watched on her girls and knew that the six girls died and that Ashi is a traitor. Plus, Scott Wills explained that the worshipers themselves summoned Aku (for, apparently, showing to him their statue in their temple). Hence there’s no need to birth the seven sisters and make them killers. All could end in the beginning of 5 season, even earlier — before 50 years have passed.

According to Aku, he visited them only once and then he forgot about them for years. And since he even doesn’t know the face of the cult leader, he knows nothing about the identity of the cult leader and her followers/tribe, i.e. absolutely random women he even isn’t familiar with. Then why the f*ck Aku left his blood for them?! Even the authors themselves don’t know the answer on this question, i.e. Aku left his blood for them for absolutely no reason and without any intentions. The theories like “Aku left his blood to the cult for creating new assasins against Jack” make no sense not only factually or canonically, but also as a plot element. Again, according to 5 season, after Aku destroyed all time portals (but forgot about artifacts and magical creatures with this ability, which were in classic seasons), he absolutely ignored Jack all these 50 years and just waited his death (forgetting the fact, that he has to destroy Jack’s sword also for preventing some new enemies to appear). Again, Aku absolutely ignored Jack all these 50 years, being depressed, and he didn’t care about what even his own henchmen do (scientists, demons and robots). We know that Aku always used only robots and demons as his army, ‘cause they’re the deadliest and the most powerful opponents. Plus, in the classic episode Aku controlled and participated in the creating of the Ultra-Robots from the beginning, only when they were finished and tested Aku empowered them with his blood and then tested and checked their killer skills and abilities and only after this he sent them to kill Jack. But in 5 season he just leaves his blood for absolutely random and unfamiliar women like “Do what you want, I don't care that by doing this I put myself in danger and can make enemies for myself ”, he didn’t participate and didn’t control them, he literally forgot about these female worshipers and knew nothing what they did and will do (the high priestess didn’t summon and didn’t notify Aku about the birth of her seven girls, she decided their fate and made them killers by own will and for own goal). FACEPALM. The funniest thing is that Aku could just restore the robots for eternity and simply exhaust Jack and then easily kill him (another sudden new ability of Aku in 5 season). So, again, there’s no single reason for Ashi and her sisters to exist. There’s no single reason for visiting these weird fangirls and giving to them the demonic blood.

But my personal biggest issue with this scene is Aku’s surprise at Ashi’s existence as either his child or vessel of his blood. Because this moment unintentionally confirms that Aku has no idea not only about how mortals reproduce, but also about how he reproduces... What?! That’s not what I expected to know from 5 season... literal “Wait, really? I'm able to do this? I can have host of little Akus? I didn't know that I can do this! I didn't know that this effect can happen if my blood will be inside of a mortal! My blood always infected, devoured and killed them before!” WTF?! Seriously, Aku was extremely confused after smelling his blood in the girl, he really doesn’t understand how and why it can be. Hence when he left his blood for the cult for, again, absolutely unexplained and unmotivated reason, he had absolutely no intentions in making offspring or in sharing his own power with these random fangirls he knows nothing about and even never knew the face and identity of their leader — he even didn’t see what actually happened, he only assumed. Then why the hell Aku assumed that the cult queen became pregnant and gave birth exactly after drinking his blood? Maybe she already was pregnant before drinking, so her girls were just infected with his blood! Maybe she herself didn’t drink it, but her daughter(s) drank!

If I were him, I would rather assume that Ashi was infected in the same way Jack or Ultra-Robots were, instead I would wonder why Ashi (and\or her mother) is alive after this, if Aku's blood is deadly poisonous. And I find it very ironic, that Aku wasn’t aware that the leaving his blood for these random unknown worshipers will somehow either cause a birth of the girl or only give power to this girl, as well as Jack wasn’t aware that by killing Aku he will erase this girl... Schrodinger's Ashi. Genndy turned Jack and Aku into idiots and forced to do unfounded and unmotivated sh*t for the forced final. Another uncomfortable question I have about this moment, if to assume this accidental and unintentional “hybridization” as really happened event. If Jack was transformed into woman 'cause of someone’s magic spell/curse (The Chicken Jack episode as an example) at the moment of “Aku Infection” episode and then, still being in a woman form, accidentally got infected by Aku’s blood — does it mean that Aku’s blood would impregnant Jack instead of devouring to death? If yes, then Ashi would be born much earlier, and it would be Aku’s best prank on Jack... Unintentional prank.

Although, by this logic even before Aku’s birth there would be lots of animals, who birthed demonic mutants after lucky escaping from the black lake, which tried to drown and devour them in “Birth of Evil” episodes from the classic seasons... So this entire “hybridization” is just a bullsh*t, and Aku’s blood just affected the already existed pregnancy of the cult leader, i.e. it just infected them all (or only Ashi, since they didn’t feel pain and death of each other, and Aku’s blood didn’t leave their corpses for returning to Aku). Instead of killing their mother and them in her womb... Everything in 5 season just ruins the canon of the classic seasons.

I was confused and amused that many people told “Poor seven girls, Aku birthed and used them as killers! Poor Ashi, how dares Aku to mistreat his flesh and blood and force her to fight with Jack!”. Ah... what?! Aku knew nothing about the cultists! He didn’t know about the existence of Ashi and her sisters! It was their mother, who abused them and used as killers! It was her fault and decision! She ruined their lifes! What are the claims against Aku? Why he has to feel something toward the random human girl he sees for the first time?! Okay, manipulating and forcing absolutely any person to do something against his/her will is immoral in any way, but still — Jack is his enemy, so it’s logical that he uses Jack’s ally against him. I mean, until he smelled his blood in her, he was pretty friendly to her and ignored her, i.e. he had no intentions to use her against Jack despite all chances for success in it. Moreover, in 9 episode Aku actually could just transform Ashi into a monster and force her to fight against Jack in the same way he did with those lambs in 7 episode of 5 season (another sudden new ability of Aku in 5 season). So there’s no need for Ashi to be infected by Aku’s blood for “Aku takes Ashi in hostage, Jack doesn’t want to kill her and gives up to Aku” trope.

The same weird answers come from Tara Strong (Ashi’s voice actress) in interview about the game, where she mentions that Ashi and her sisters were bred to kill Jack, and it’s their only purpose, but Jack teachs her the beauty of nature and world, teachs her to learn about each other, instead of wandering and murdering people around her, “especially when it’s designed by the superior figure like her father”. Ah... what?! Like, yes, she’s only a voice actress, and it is maybe just her opinion, but it’s still weird. Again, Aku didn’t know about her existence at all, like her mother Ashi referred to him only as to a deity. Plus, this “ideology to kill people, designed by Aku” contradicts to the classic seasons, because with such “ideology” this future with all these unique habitants and technologies simply would have never existed. Aku would destroy the entire life on this planet (or the only habitants of this planet would be only demons and maybe robots, while mortals and other living organisms would be dead) way before Jack’s arrival in this future.

And now about 10 episode. After butthurt I experienced in 9 episode, I actually assumed madness that will happen in 10 episode. But I didn’t think that it will be way worse and stupid. First of all — why Aku didn’t kill Ashi immediately? Why he called her “a daughter” and kept her alive? Absolutely random girl, unfamiliar to him, and who allied with his enemy and so on. And if Aku succeeded and killed Jack, what he’d do with her? He had do kill her as a potential rival and enemy. But Genndy forbids... Second — the “power of love” moment. This moment is not only a nasty spit in the direction of the emotional scene from the classic episode "Aku Infection", but also a plot hole. How Ashi can know, what the love is, if nobody explained it to her? Why this black mass tried to devour Ashi to death only now, but not in the end of 9 episode or even earlier? Plus, if the line “I love you!” frees from the evil, then why Jack didn’t tell it to Ashi in 9 episode? Moreover, I have a question — if “power of love” frees from evil, then what would happen to Aku, if someone told to him this line with all sincerity? Would it kill him or also free from hate and make him good or whatever? If you make an absurdity like "the literal power of love saves the day and frees", then make it to the maximum.

Third, this scene. Why the hell Aku asked Ashi about Jack’s death, if she didn’t talk and was controlled by him to do anything?! Why the hell Aku wasn’t surprise that Ashi talks and looks like a human instead of insect-like humanoid with horns and fire eyebrows?! Why he immediately, looking at her back, didn’t realize that she somehow became free from his control?! Why the hell Aku didn’t feel how she became free?!

Seriously, she even became twice smaller! Why Aku immediately didn’t take her under control again and didn’t kill her?! Ah, because Ashi is a Mary Sue and she can defeat only brainless and weak idiots.

Fourth, this garbage and Ashi’s triumph as Mary Sue. Yep, you got it right. Ashi gets Aku's powers literally from nowhere and near the end of the final episode. Ashi gets them for the first time. And for some reason she is sure she has to have them. She has no experience and knows nothing about abilities Aku has. But for some reason she successfully uses them and easily fights against Aku. Yes, the powerful and incredibly experienced demon with lots of abilities and tricks, who ruled the world thousands years, who created the multi-cultural society with technological progress and magic, and who fought with various powerful beings, now shamefully loses to the unexperienced human teenager like a helpless baby. FACEPALM!

I sweared at this entire segment. And I can’t understand, how people can enjoy this piece of bad fanfiction. And after this Ashi makes this... What the f*ck?! How?! Neither Jack nor Aku told to her that Aku opened the time portal and sent Jack to the future! She couldn't know not only this fact and how to open the time portal, but also she couldn’t know the fact that Aku has this ability! She couldn’t know, where to send Jack!

Seriously, how she did that?! And what the hell was driving her at this moment?!

And now we come to this scene. “Without Aku I would have never existed” moment. I couldn’t believe that there were people, who cried at this scene and felt bad for Ashi, blaming either Jack or Aku or even them both. I’ll try to mention everything, what’s wrong with this story aspect. First of all, this returning to the past and changing it literally erases and devalues all classic seasons. Because now all Jack’s friends from the future he saved and helped, and who gained the hope and believed in Jack as their savior — now they don’t exist anymore at all, they ceased to exist, they are erased from the universe. I can't even find words for how horrible and inhumane this is. Second, Jack’s surprise to Ashi’s words. How to ruin Jack with the final blow? Let's reveal that after decades Jack lived in the future he not just never cared about the fact of creating the paradox and erasing the future with all habitants forever, if he change the past — Jack wasn’t even aware of this destructive fact until Ashi told it to him. Yep, during all these years apparently nobody explained to him the rules of time travelling and how deadly it is and why he shouldn’t change the past. FACEPALM! Third, how Ashi can know about rules of time travelling and paradoxes?! And why she disappeared only after several days/weeks? And, by the way, why Jack didn’t disappear too, if he erased the future and the events, which made him what he is? He had to disappear as a paradox too. Fourth, according to her line, Ashi knew that if Jack change the future, she will disappear. Then why the hell she sent Jack to the past and unhesitatingly allowed him to kill Aku and to change the past?! Why the hell she didn’t tell to Jack that if he kill Aku, then she and all Jack’s friends from the future will be erased forever?! Why the hell she was okay with killing them, with killing entire world?! She did that, not Jack. She killed them all, not Jack. And before her death this “kind and pure-hearted” bitch subtly blames Jack, saying “Jack, you forgot? I’m a half-ginger! Although I’m after my mom, these ginger genes are still inside of me! It’s your fault, bye-bye!”

Absolutely disgusting, criminal and inhumane decision. And it's exactly her fault. She erased entire world, entire people and died 'cause of own stupidity. But nobody cares. And for this it was necessary to make Jack and Aku complete idiots? Was it necessary to disgrace Aku, by turning him into f*cking sudden “bad and irresponsible human father, who begets children and then never even knows it” for her? Was it necessary to disgrace Jack for her? Ashi ruined everyone and everything. I hate this character. Screw off her and her stupid “tragic love story with daddy issues”. She literally intervened in someone else's long conflict and idiotically solved it. Like all Mary Sue always do.

Some fans tried to excuse this character and twists with her with the interpretation “Ashi’s existence as Aku’s daughter is the strongest argument for Aku’s redemption and confirms that Aku is not the pure evil. Her baseline and love for nature begins and comes from Aku, not from her psychopath mother. She is the result of mistreating and bad environment in the same way as Aku”. If we think from this point of view, then... what’s a point of this disgusting “Let’s turn Aku into some cheap replica of cliched lustful satan with human harem and lots of half-breed bastards, birthed by these female concubines to him” thing? This thing is not argument for Aku’s redemption, it’s proof of his sudden (from nowhere) ability to mate with different species and with superior “pure noble and good” race like humans, and it somehow can redeem him apparently according to fans’ interpretation (yep, animals, who can’t mate with different species and have viable and fertile hybrid offspring — congratulations, you’re the pure evil). Why not make Ashi the same full-blooded demon with an animalistic appearance, born from Aku’s part (because he was lonely and therefore he wanted a child as someone he could trust and love and as someone who could understand and love him, I guess — the dragon from French animated film “Princesse Dragon” had the same backstory and explanation of his desire to have children) in the same way how Aku was born from the survived part of his dead ancestor, and with real relationships and strong bond between him and her as (not perfect, but still) caring and loving family instead of stupid cliche “Oh no! I found out I’m a villain’s child! I’m bad too! No, he is not my parent! I’m not like him! He is bad and evil!”?

Moreover, although it would have been a clear "deus ex machina", but at least it had the connection with the classic seasons. Which one? Let's remember the "Birth of Evil" episode. I have long assumed the possibility that not only the piece from which Aku was born, but other parts of the ancestor could have survived too. One of them could have fallen to another planet, and Ashi would have been born from it (which would have made her Aku's younger sister), she would have been lucky with those around her, i.e. unlike Aku, she would not have become embittered and poisoned with hate and would not have embarked on a dark path. And although she knew about her supernatural nature and experienced some predjustice sometimes from certain habitants, she would not consider herself evil (and did not know that someone considers her kind to be such), she would have limited superpowers, and the rest would have been learnt and trained while traveling as a criminal hunter, loving worthy opponents at the same time. She would have been less experienced, more fragile and weak in contrast to Aku, but with strong spirit, pretty smart and able to protect herself and she’d knew many things about the world. She would have had an idea of affection and loved Jack, and the discovery of the existence of Aku as her kin simultaneously sowed in her dislike to him as the one who posessed her for a fight against Jack, and empathy, because she would see and understand that in fact he has his own personal tragedy and was even quite ready to accept her as a sister despite his cynical nature. Yes, we would ask the questions "What planet is she from? How and why hasn't Aku found her for a long time? Why didn't he and she feel that his/her sibling had survived and existed all this time?" and so on, but such a scenario would be way more plausible, and it would clearly show that Aku is not evil, and that he was just unlucky, hence it was a matter of choice and personal tragedies, not of origin. As well as Ashi would be an actual character instead of ugly hybrid of Mary Sue and plot device.

Plus, Genndy himself stated the seven sisters are humans, hence their baseline is from humans. And I doubt that he wanted to cover the theme “What’s important — origin or choice?”. Remember this detail, we’ll return to this later.

Another interpretation from fans is “Ashi is a reborn version of Aku, more close to humans and easy to relate to”. Okay, again, why not make Ashi to be a reborn Aku directly and literally? Like, Aku is defeated and then dies in the past, but those three alien gods give him a chance for redemption and living happy life, so Aku is reborn as a human girl baby (or still as a demon) and Jack takes care about her and names her Ashi or whatever. At least, it would have been the same character we know and like, but not some new separate character the author forced to another already existed original character. I want to empathise with the character I like, I want to see exactly his development and his victory over inner conflict and so on. I don’t want to see his sudden children/relatives and their success in it instead of him, I don’t want them to exist. I don’t want to empathise with a female version or human version or alternative version of the character I enjoy. I want to empathise with the original character straight up. And I hate when people think that ability to have children is a reward and/or redemption for the character. Why people think that if you have children, then you have succeded and overcame everything because they did that? Children are NOT their parents or ancestors, they’re separate beings with own personality. Hence as new separate characters they have to earn respect and love of audience by themselves. You can’t imagine how it annoys me, when people say “Well, he/she died, too bad. But at least his/her children live, so he/she lives on” — no, it’s not. He/she's dead straight up.

Now, back to Ashi. Again, Genndy stated the seven sisters are humans. In the narrative of 5 season Aku is the absolute irredeemable evil, while Ashi is innocent and absolutely good and has a choice, so her human soul and human true self defeated the darkness posessed her, so she as a human defeated the pure evil that is Aku, and that humans are good and innocent, who just were an innocent tools in Aku’s evil hands and goals. Like, yes, extremely hypocritical sh*t, but my personal biggest issue with this aspect and with those two interpretations about Ashi is the human supremacy. Like, okay, those fans’ interpretations are about “Aku can beget/birth/create the life which can be kind and choose the path, hence Aku is not the evil, he just had no chance and was unlucky”, but the human aspect ruins and erases these interpretations. Because, by this twisted logic, for redemption and proving own goodness you, a supernatural being or non-human, have to mate with a female human and have human offspring with her or you have to be reborn as a human or half-human, so you’ll be capable of positive emotions (love, trust etc) and nobility. And by this twisted and hypocritical logic only humans or part-humans are good and deserve second chance. Do you understand how disgusting this morality is? You can say “You’re just nitpicking.” — well, if the ending with erasing the future with various sentient habitants of unique species (who believed in Jack as their friend and savior, but now they’re all dead and ceased to exist) in favor for the past and present with only humans as sole sentient habitants and rulers of Earth is not enough for you, then I’ll show you this.

Although I earlier mentioned they had the weapons for “destroying the evil” way before humankind started to exist, notice their dialogue: “Only through the strength of the human spirit and virtue of human righteousness can this evil be vanquished”. Not the strength, purity, nobility and righteousness of the spirit of any living being, but exactly a human, they are talking about a human, they are singling out humans as superior. And they create the “evil-killing weapon” exactly out of human soul. Yep, they don’t care, when humans are at wars with each other, enslave or kill each other or other species (and animals) — it's good. When someone else does the same thing to humans — he/she is the pure evil. Bravo, damn it. And I'm just interested in the reaction of the dogs-archaeologists to the facts about how humans throughout their existence either killed many animal species or used animals (dogs’ ancestors, for example) as slaves, transport, fur, food, tools for wars and entertainment (dogfights, cockfights, gladiator fights, hunting for fun and tropheys etc), created different breeds, separated cubs from their mothers and used them as a gift for other humans. I don't think they would have helped Jack for anything after that — because he is the one who wants to return this.

And final fan interpretation is about “Since Jack finds out about her dark heritage, but accepts and still loves her, Ashi accepts and embraces her dark half. Hence she gets all Aku’s powers and memories, and that’s why and how she uses time portal to send Jack back to the past.” Really?! Then Ashi is more Mary Sue than ever before! And she also is one of the most stupid, empty and sexist characters I’ve ever seen! After all, from now on, the character has survived, succeded and achieved something not thanks to own accomplishments, work, intelligence, training and fortitude, but thanks to the f*cking supernatural blood she so successfully obtained alone! And this supernatural blood didn't kil her in mother’s womb, but instead saved her life during cruel trainings from her childhood, saved her life from death after falling from height and electric shocks, gave super powers for fight against army and mother and will protect her, doing everything itself at the right moment in the plot for her — for example, will free her after f*king power of love and will fight against the master of this supernatural blood and give to her all the master’s powers and memories! Just wow, damn it!

Moreover, why and what Ashi had to accept?! Ashi was absolutely okay with her own self, she just changed the side of the conflict she knew nothing about. She realized that she is an innocent in 5 episode. The only her struggle in 4-5-6 episodes was in realizing and accepting that her mother’s words and doctrine are wrong — same thing was with Kovu from “Lion King 2: Simba’s Pride”, although Kovu knew from the beginning who he is and met predjustice because of it, but then he overcame it and was accepted. Ashi never cared and never interested about who her father is, she never had conflict about “If my mother is a monster, then I am a monster too or not?”, she just was freed from the forced destiny her mother gave to her. Her father never existed in her life at all (not only as a certain person, but also as "living organism actually has not only mother, but also father”) and he wasn’t aware of her existance and never expected the possibility of her existence, so the discovery about his possible crimes has absolutely no affection and influence, it changes absolutely nothing in her personality, life and worldview and so on, because she was already a well-formed person who saw herself as kind and good. Ashi already proved own goodness way before she found out about “kinship” with Aku. What’s a point of “embracing dark heritage” and “You are not like your father and mother! You are good!”, if there’s nothing to accept? And, by the way, her “No, you are not my father!” and “Without Aku...” lines confirm that she didn’t “accept the dark half of her nature”. She was just freed because of stupid sudden power of love, Ashi herself did nothing for getting freedom.

Same thing with Jack. He accepted nothing about Ashi. He knew nothing about her — only the fact that she was brainwashed, so he decided to help her and later fell in love. And he's not an idiot to blame the girl for something she herself didn't know about at all. Although, Jack is an idiot, since he began to blame Aku for this, while Aku himself also did not know at all...

And, by this interpretation’s logic, if Ashi had all Aku’s memories after freeing by “power of love”, then she didn’t give a sh*t about Aku’s tragic past and origin of his conflict with Jack, his father and humankind. As well as Aku, having all her memories, should read her thoughts and intentions and immediately kill her, foreseeing her every move.

In conclusion, it was enough for Ashi to have a strong conflict with her abusive mother, nothing more. There’s no need and no possibility to tie her with Aku. She is just a plot device for events and “morality” the author wants. She has no reason to exist neither from the classic seasons canon’s perspective, nor from the perspective of the story of 5 season. She stole Jack’s backstory (”The noble warrior was trained and destined to kill the evil”) and Aku’s backstory (”The one who is born from a shred of Darkness and is deprived of choice from beginning”). She stole Aku’s arc in “overcoming inner conflict and changing path from dark to light, becoming hero and proving that “The choice matters, not heritage”. She dies because of own stupidity in the first ending and becomes the empress in the second ending simply because she was lucky enough to become the wife of the emperor's son and the successor (or former vessel) of the demonic ruler. I legitimately say — Ashi is worse than Rey from Disney’s Star Wars. At least, Rey didn't get her abilities at the final of the very last film during her very first meet and confrontation with her creator.

#samurai jack #aku samurai jack #samurai jack 5 season #ashi samurai jack #aku theories

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comicweek · 8 months

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Launched during the pandemic with a playbook to shoot $150 million-plus seasons with no pilots, the Disney unit is undergoing growing pains and seeing the logic of "traditional TV culture."

...

Through it all, the company eschewed the traditional TV-making model. It didn’t commission pilots but instead shot entire $150 million-plus seasons of TV on the fly. It didn’t hire showrunners, but instead depended on film executives to run its series. And as Marvel does for its movies, it relied on postproduction and reshoots to fix what wasn’t working.

Even though they remain, along with Star Wars titles, the most watched shows on Disney+, Marvel series have recently faced a number of creative challenges and cries of diminishing returns from critics and audience metrics, causing a major shift at the studio to move to make TV shows the more traditional way.

“We’re trying to marry the Marvel culture with the traditional television culture,” says Brad Winderbaum, Marvel’s head of streaming, television and animation. “It comes down to, ‘How can we tell stories in television that honor what’s so great about the source material?’”

With Daredevil’s new direction, Marvel hopes to right the ship on a project with sky-high expectations. The show is Marvel’s first to feature a hero who already had a successful series on Netflix, running three seasons. But sources say that Corman and Ord crafted a legal procedural that did not resemble the Netflix version, known for its action and violence. Cox didn’t even show up in costume until the fourth episode. Marvel, after greenlighting the concept, found itself needing to rethink the original intention of the show.

Marvel plans to keep some scenes and episodes, though other serialized elements will be injected, with Corman and Ord becoming executive producers on the two-season series.

Daredevil is far from the first Marvel series to undergo drastic behind-the-scenes changes. Those who work with Marvel on the TV side have complained of a lack of central vision that has, according to sources, begun to afflict the studio’s shows with creative differences and tension. “TV is a writer-driven medium,” says one insider familiar with the Marvel process. “Marvel is a Marvel-driven medium.”

On the Oscar Isaac starrer Moon Knight, show creator and writer Jeremy Slater quit and director Mohamed Diab took the reins. Jessica Gao developed and wrote She-Hulk: Attorney at Law but was sidelined once director Kat Coiro came on board. Production was challenging, with COVID hitting cast and crew, and Gao was brought back to oversee postproduction, a typical showrunner duty, but it’s the rare Marvel head writer who has such oversight.

Even though the company does not have a writers-first approach to TV, directors could feel short-changed as well. “The whole ‘fix it in post’ attitude makes it feel like a director doesn’t matter sometimes,” says one person familiar with the process.

As its shows ramped up during the pandemic, Marvel stepped outside its usual staffing approach and brought in outside execs after years of internally promoting creatives who had been sufficiently trained in the Marvel method.

This change was felt most severely on Secret Invasion, the Samuel L. Jackson-led thriller that stands as Marvel’s worst-reviewed series. Kyle Bradstreet, a writer and executive producer on USA Network Emmy winner Mr. Robot, had been working on the scripts for Secret Invasion for about a year when he was fired after Marvel decided on a different direction. Enter new writer Brian Tucker, who penned the crime thriller Broken City. Thomas Bezucha, who helmed the thriller Let Him Go, and Ali Selim, who worked on Hulu’s 9/11 drama The Looming Tower, were on board as directors and to help crack the story.

#MCU #marvel #daredevil #daredevil born again #marvel television #disney+#d+#television

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convenientalias · 3 months

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Which is my favorite Kdrama network?

When I'm bored I like to list and categorize things. Today I've decided to discover, statistically, which Korean drama network is my favorite based on shows I've watched.

Including both shows I've completed and shows I've dropped bc in this case, the shows I don't like are relevant.

Using my ratings from MyDramaList :) which means however I felt the first time I finished watching a show, basically. Not including networks where I've only watched one show (e.g., Disney+, Wavve, Channel A).

JTBC:

Agency--Dropped

Beyond Evil--6

Itaewon Class--Dropped

My Country the New Age--10

Private Lives--Dropped

Reflection of You--Dropped

Sisyphus: The Myth--Dropped

I can't believe this network produced My Country the New Age when everything else I've watched by them has been a flop for me. Beyond Evil came the closest to breaking the curse but even then. Itaewon Class is one of my least favorite shows I've ever tried to watch; I've forgotten most of the details now but a bad taste lingers.

KBS:

White Christmas--10

Mad Dog--8

The King's Affection--10

River Where the Moon Rises--Dropped

Should I have given River Where the Moon Rises more of a chance? Bc apparently this network only makes bangers.

MBC:

Extraordinary You--7

Rookie Historian Goo Hae-ryung--9

The Veil--7

Idk what to say about this one. RHGH is pretty damn good but I think I would probs like it less watching it now than I did in 2019, newish to kdramas and ready to love anything. But it's a fave regardless, and Extraordinary You and The Veil are both fairly watchable. A serviceable network.

MBN:

Perfect Marriage Revenge--Dropped

Sponsor--Dropped

A network to watch a few episodes with the desire to see dogblood plots, and then leave.

Netflix:

Bloodhounds--8

My Holo Love--Dropped

Gyeongseong Creature--Dropped

Song of Bandits--8

The Silent Sea--7

It's Netflix. I don't know that they're ever going to make a real favorite for me but they're fairly competent.

OCN:

Save Me--8

Duel--Dropped

A Superior Day--Dropped

Apparently it takes Seo Ye-ji and Woo Do-hwan's powers combined to make me finish a show by this network. You'd think it would be easier bc they seem to enjoy angst and whump, but I think they pour it on a little too thick.

SBS:

Doctor Stranger--Dropped

Lovers of the Red Sky--8

Revenant--9

The King: Eternal Monarch--7

The Killing Vote--Dropped

Remember: War of the Son--Dropped

Honestly I might come back to at least one of these dropped shows. Their track record on plots is okay, but their actors are really good.

TVN:

100 Days My Prince--Dropped

Alchemy of Souls--9

Bad and Crazy--Dropped

Circle: Two Worlds Connected--9

Confession--6

Devil Judge--9

Eve--8

Flower of Evil--10

Hotel del Luna--Dropped

It's Okay to Not Be Okay--8

Mine--8

Mr. Sunshine--8

Our Blooming Youth--Dropped

Pandora: Beneath the Paradise--Dropped

Psychopath Diary--9

Tale of the Nine-Tailed--Dropped

Clearly I just start the most show by them. Do they make the most shows? I don't know. Good concepts and good cinematic quality on most of these shows, with just a few exceptions. Pretty solid network.

Viki:

Color Rush--8

I Picked Up a Star On the Road--6

Where Your Eyes Linger--8

You Make Me Dance--6

Mixed bag.

The takeaways:

I should probably watch more KBS. On my to-watch list, that translates to Youth of May, the Bridal Mask, Hwarang, the Bloody Heart, and Orange Marmalade. So mostly historical dramas, which is a pity bc apparently I also like their thrillers.

Really, though, my to-watch list at this point has a ton of SBS and MBC on it for some reason, at least with shows that have already come out. According to my stats so far, my odds are pretty mixed on liking them or not.

Somehow, one feels, I will actually end up watching more TVN instead... but that has yet to materialize. (except the one kdrama I'm currently watching is a TVN drama. so.)

Did I really learn anything? No. and on that note, good night.

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deadlinecom · 2 months

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rawtrends · 1 year

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The 40 Best Shows on Disney+ Right Now

The 40 Best Shows on Disney+ Right Now Disney+ is the streaming service from Disney that offers a wide variety of content for viewers of all ages. From classic Disney movies to original series, Disney+ has something for everyone. With so much content available, it can be hard to know where to start. To help you out, we’ve compiled a list of the 40 best shows on Disney+ right now. 1. The Mandalorian The Mandalorian is the first live-action Star Wars series and follows the adventures of a lone Mandalorian bounty hunter in the outer reaches of the galaxy. The show has been praised for its stunning visuals, compelling story, and strong performances from its cast. It’s a must-watch for any Star Wars fan. 2. The Simpsons The Simpsons is one of the longest-running animated series of all time and is still going strong after 30+ seasons. The show follows the misadventures of the Simpson family and their friends in the fictional town of Springfield. It’s a classic that’s sure to bring a smile to your face. 3. High School Musical: The Musical: The Series High School Musical: The Musical: The Series is a musical comedy series that follows a group of students at East High as they attempt to put on a production of High School Musical. The show is full of catchy songs, heartfelt moments, and plenty of drama. It’s a must-watch for any High School Musical fan. 4. The World According to Jeff Goldblum The World According to Jeff Goldblum is a documentary series that follows actor Jeff Goldblum as he explores the world around him. Each episode focuses on a different topic, from ice cream to sneakers, and Jeff’s unique perspective makes for an entertaining and informative watch. 5. The Imagineering Story The Imagineering Story is a documentary series that takes viewers behind the scenes of the Walt Disney Imagineering team. The show follows the team as they create some of the most iconic attractions at Disney Parks around the world. It’s a must-watch for any Disney fan. 6. The Simpsons Movie The Simpsons Movie is the feature-length film based on the classic animated series. The movie follows the Simpson family as they attempt to save their hometown of Springfield from destruction. It’s a hilarious and heartwarming adventure that’s sure to entertain the whole family. 7. The Clone Wars The Clone Wars is an animated series set in the Star Wars universe. The show follows the adventures of Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Ahsoka Tano as they battle the forces of the Separatists. It’s an action-packed series that’s sure to please any Star Wars fan. 8. Phineas and Ferb Phineas and Ferb is an animated series about two stepbrothers who attempt to make the most of their summer vacation. The show follows the duo as they embark on a series of wild and wacky adventures. It’s a fun and funny show that’s sure to entertain the whole family. 9. The Mandalorian: Season 2 The Mandalorian: Season 2 is the second season of the hit live-action Star Wars series. The show follows the further adventures of the Mandalorian bounty hunter as he attempts to protect the Child. It’s an action-packed season that’s sure to please any Star Wars fan. 10. The Simpsons: Season 30 The Simpsons: Season 30 is the latest season of the long-running animated series. The show follows the Simpson family as they continue to get into all sorts of misadventures in the town of Springfield. It’s a classic that’s sure to bring a smile to your face. 11. The Imagineering Story: Season 2 The Imagineering Story: Season 2 is the second season of the documentary series that takes viewers behind the scenes of the Walt Disney Imagineering team. The show follows the team as they create some of the most iconic attractions at Disney Parks around the world. It’s a must-watch for any Disney fan. 12. High School Musical: The Musical: The Series: Season 2 High School Musical: The Musical: The Series: Season 2 is the second season of the musical comedy series that follows a group of students at East High as they attempt to put on a production of High School Musical. The show is full of catchy songs, heartfelt moments, and plenty of drama. It’s a must-watch for any High School Musical fan. 13. The Simpsons: Season 31 The Simpsons: Season 31 is the latest season of the long-running animated series. The show follows the Simpson family as they continue to get into all sorts of misadventures in the town of Springfield. It’s a classic that’s sure to bring a smile to your face. 14. The Muppets The Muppets is a classic family comedy series that follows the misadventures of Kermit the Frog, Miss Piggy, and the rest of the Muppets. The show is full of hilarious sketches, catchy songs, and plenty of heart. It’s a must-watch for any fan of the Muppets. 15. The Simpsons Movie 2 The Simpsons Movie 2 is the sequel to the feature-length film based on the classic animated series. The movie follows the Simpson family as they attempt to save their hometown of Springfield from destruction. It’s a hilarious and heartwarming adventure that’s sure to entertain the whole family. 16. The Clone Wars: Season 7 The Clone Wars: Season 7 is the final season of the animated series set in the Star Wars universe. The show follows the adventures of Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Ahsoka Tano as they battle the forces of the Separatists. It’s an action-packed series that’s sure to please any Star Read the full article

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cartoonrankings · 2 years

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Worst cases of cartoons being screwed over

Cartoons are amazing, no doubt. But you know what the worst thing about cartoons is? When an amazing cartoon with huge potential gets screwed over by the network! I’ve seen it way too many times like many of you have! So today, I will be sharing with you guys the worst cases of cartoons being screwed over! Here you go!

10. OK KO: Let’s Be Heroes!

Cartoon Network’s treatment of this show really shows how innovation has been getting killed in cartoons as of late. While it started off receiving decent treatment, it all changed eventually halfway through its second season. Out of nowhere, the show gets moved to Sunday afternoon with absolutely no promotion. There were also barely any reruns of the series. All of these factors put together led to the series being canceled without the creator’s consent.

OK KO! Let’s Be Heroes takes place in the distant future in an alternate universe version of Maryland. It revolves around Kaio Kincaid also known as K.O. who has the goal of becoming the world’s greatest hero. He works at a store known as Gar’s Hero Supply & Bodega which sells a variety of items including hero supplies and many others. He works alongside Radicles (an alien from Planet X) and Enid (a female employee at Gar's Hero Supply & Bodega). The crew often have to fight off Boxmore, a store that sells equipment to supervillains. OK KO: Let’s Be Heroes! provides us with a great concept, unique artstyle and characters that all have very interesting personalities. OK KO! Let’s Be Heroes is definitely an amazing series that deserved better. You can watch OK KO! Let’s be Heroes on HBO Max or Hulu!

9. Wander Over Yonder

Ugh…a show with a very optimistic and positive main character. This is what the world needs right now. All we ask is for the show to not get screwed over. Well guess what? It got screwed over hard. In September 2013, Disney started regularly airing Wander Over Yonder, and it was performing decently well. However, in January 2014, it was suddenly taken off the schedule only to return to Disney XD in July 2014. So does that mean the series can finally prosper? Well no, because Disney XD is usually where Disney cartoons go to die, AND they took it off again in February 2015 with 3 episodes of season 1 left unaired. The show returned in August 2015, only to be canceled in 2016 because Disney thought that the amount of episodes they had was “enough” despite the series ending on somewhat of a cliffhanger. This whole situation makes me wonder how the show would’ve performed if Disney did not move it to Disney XD or just entirely remove it from their network multiple times. I would assume it’d have performed well.

Wander Over Yonder is about Wander, a Nomad who goes around to different galaxies to spread positivity and to encourage people from different planets to have fun alongside his friend Sylvia the Zbornak. However, as every story needs conflict, the journey isn’t as easy as he’d like it to be as one of the most powerful villains in the galaxy, Lord Hater often gets infuriated with him while on his quest for galactic domination. I love this show. Some of my favorite aspects of the show are the positive messages, the vibrant designs and of course the fun characters. This show is truly an amazing show that makes me smile whenever I watch it. You can watch Wander Over Yonder on Disney+!

8. Teen Titans

I’m sure we all know about this one. That dreaded cliffhanger hurt us all. Now Teen Titans cancellation was interesting. It was a series that was based off a huge franchise. It was loved by many, and it had DVDs, toys, comics and much more merchandise. So what happened? Well, according to creator, David Slack’s Twitter, he said that season 6 was an on again off again thing. The executives of Cartoon Network would say it would happen, they say it wouldn’t. However, it seems that the people working on the series thought that season 6 would happen, but it never did. It seems another factor that played a hand in the show’s cancellation was that Mattel did not own the licensing for toys, and they wanted to own the rights to manufacture the toys for all Cartoon Network shows. Whatever the reason may be, the outcome is still sad. And Cartoon Network has killed the legacy of Teen Titans more with Teen Titans Go, a show which while I don’t think is as bad as others say, it is definitely a step down from the original.

Teen Titans revolved around a group of 5 heroes known as the Teen Titans. The team consists of the leader Robin, a hero with the power to morph into animals named Beast Boy, an alien princess named Starfire, a cyborg named Cyborg (creativity at its peak hahah) and a goth girl with telekinesis named Raven. The series goes through multiple arcs with each arc focusing on a different character. I love the voice acting, the awesome soundtrack and the fast-paced action. Teen Titans definitely deserved better. You can watch Teen Titans on iTunes.

7. Sym-bionic Titan

Sym-bionic Titan’s cancellation was strange to me. You’d think that Cartoon Network would treat it well seeing how it was made by Genndy Tartakovsky, the guy that made some of Cartoon Network’s most successful programs like Powerpuff Girls and Dexter’s Laboratory. However, even when the team has a great history, Cartoon Network doesn’t seem to put faith in them. The true reason for cancellation is pretty in the dust, but Cartoon Network’s scheduling did not help. It was firstly moved to a Wednesday evening slot which was an awkward time already, but after that with no notice, moved to Saturday morning at 9:30, and let’s be honest: who wakes up that early on a Saturday. This likely caused the show’s viewership to drop, which was one factor to the cancellation, but rumors were all in the air. Another rumor was that toy manufacturers refused to make toys of a show with a female lead, but even that is a bit strange because Young Justice had toys made for it. Either way, the scheduling definitely impeded Sym-bionic Titan from becoming a hit.

Sym-bionic Titan was centered around three beings named Lance, Ilana and Octus from the planet Galaluna who flee their planet to come to earth. Their planet is war-struck, and consumed by creatures named Mutraddi. The leader of the Mutraddi has the goal of killing the rightful heir of Galaluna, Ilana. The three blend in on Earth to avoid being caught by the evil leader. When in grave danger, the three can combine and form the Sym-Bionic Titan. Off the top of my head, I love the character designs this show provides, the writing and darker themes. It was definitely a great show that deserved better, and I wholeheartedly recommend it. You can watch Sym-Bionic Titan on iTunes!

6. Harvey Beaks

I believe the creator himself said that if it doesn’t get the ratings that SpongeBob did, it gets canceled. Harvey Beaks was a series that was definitely treated unfairly. Harvey Beaks suffered a few hiatuses in between, and was even pulled off of Nickelodeon’s schedule at one point. After one of the hiatuses, a block was dedicated to new episodes of Harvey Beaks on Fridays, but even that was pulled out after two weeks. New episodes were aired months after, but with minimal promotion, and the series had no reruns. Eventually, it was banished to NickToons and was canceled without the creator’s knowledge.

Harvey Beaks was about Harvey, a blue bird who alongside his friends, Fee and Foo go through many different adventures in their wild habitat. While it is a pretty basic concept, there is still so much to love about it such as the wholesomeness, the characters and the unique artstyle. Harvey Beaks is the perfect example of taking a basic concept and making it feel unique and refreshing. It was amazing to see a show like this at a time where gross out humor was so prevalent at Nickelodeon. You can watch Harvey Beaks on Paramount Plus!

5. Glitch Techs

Oh wow, a new innovative cartoon with awesome concepts that haven’t been tackled before and very fresh and colorful character designs? I’m sure this will be a hit! Well…it could’ve been. Guess what? Nickelodeon gave this show off to Netflix in early 2020. Half of the first season released, and eventually the second half was, but marketed as a second season, when in reality, it was just the second half of the first season. It was a shame because the series was amazing, and had potential to continue.

Glitch Techs is about two teenagers, Hector and Miko who stop these video game characters that come to life from wreaking havoc across the real life world. I really loved it - the characters along with their designs made it super enjoyable for me, and the premise alone was very intriguing. I’d highly recommend it. You can watch Glitch Techs on Netflix!

4. The Owl House

Another one of the more recent cartoons to be added to the “successful but mistreated” category: The Owl House. The Owl House’s cancellation was really strange in my eyes: Firstly, Disney put out a promo for the show containing information that the series creator Dana Terrace did not want out. This is not really what led to its ultimate cancellation, but it is worth nothing as it shows how Disney treated it from the start. Furthermore, Disney cut the series short for no reason other than it not matching with their brand. Again, it is really strange as the series is widely acclaimed and one of the shows talked about the most in recent months.

The Owl House is about a girl named Luz who ends up finding a portal which takes her to a new world known as Boiling Isles, where she befriends a witch named Eda. She essentially practices becoming a witch with the help of Eda and her demon sidekick King. It was a great series, and the highlights for me were the animation, the LGBTQ representation and the characters who all were very vibrant and unique. You can watch The Owl House on Disney+ or Disney Now!

3. Infinity Train

Most of us who have been involved with recent cartoons know about this one…the show with no “child entry point.” Infinity Train was treated pretty terribly from the start with the pilot airing at 6:00 AM. However, it did get support from the viewers which led to it being picked up as a series. And again, even with lots of love, it was screwed over. Infinity Train was unfortunately canceled after its fourth season due to lacking a “child entry point.” A pretty lame excuse if you ask me. Especially since it was performing well already.

Infinity Train is about a train that picks up passengers that have unresolved trauma, and they travel through the train’s cars to resolve their trauma. This series was truly amazing, and it’s obvious why anybody would be mad about its cancellation. I loved the amazing concept, how it is easily able to capture the viewer’s emotions and the morals that the series teaches. It was an amazing series, and I would definitely recommend it. You can watch Infinity Train on HBO Max!

2. Motorcity

I probably brought back a forgotten memory. Why is it forgotten you may ask? Because of how Disney barely gave it any screen time! It was barely around, and it probably feels like a fever dream. Motorcity started off with being moved around in terms of timeslot constantly, and at one point was moved to a late night time slot. Alongside that, episodes would get leaked which would affect viewership, and unnecessary hiatuses would keep occurring. All this with minimal advertising. It truly is a shame that a great show had to go down with such sloppy treatment.

Motorcity takes place in a futuristic version of Detroit where an evil capitalist billionaire named Abraham Kane has taken over. However, he does have one threat: a group of rebels known as the Burners. The Burners consist of Mike (the leader), Julie (an insider gathering information from Abraham), Chuck (the tech guy), Dutch (the smart one), Texas (the muscle) and Jacob (the old aged mentor). The crew work to stop Abraham from taking over Motorcity, a small part of Detroit that has not been capitalized by him yet. There is so much to love about this show. Specifically, I like the interesting characters, the well thought out plotline and the fact that the series can often be thought provoking. Motorcity was a great show that deserved better. You can watch Motorcity on iTunes!

1. Detentionaire

Let’s be honest: this show has been screwed over so terribly that it isn’t even that well known because of how tampered it was. Detentionaire was a Canadian Teletoon series which was quite successful in Canada and other countries it aired in such as Australia. Unfortunately though, like most shows, Detentionaire needed a US audience to succeed, and this is where it went downhill. Cartoon Network did purchase the show, but they messed with it a LOT. Firstly, they hid it on their app which barely anyone already used. And by hiding, I mean they made it so people would have to do extra digging to find it. Not only did they do that, but they scrambled the episodes so anybody who did watch it would be confused since it is a story-driven show. Also, only 20 of the 53 episodes were actually on the app. The rest never even made it to the US. It was also only on the app for a short period of time which gave it absolutely no time to gain an audience. This low performance in the US resulted in the show being canceled due to the production company being massively disappointed with the show’s low performance in the US. Being Canadian, Detentionaire was one of my favorite cartoons, and still is. Every time I think of its cancellation, I can’t help but think that it deserved much much better. It makes it even worse that nobody knows the true story of Detentionaire. Detentionaire’s case was one of the worst cases of cartoons being screwed over if not the worst.

Detentionaire revolves around a high schooler named Lee who gets framed for the biggest prank in high school history, and gets a year of detention. He sets out to find out who framed him, but as he goes deeper into the mystery, he starts to discover secrets hidden deep beneath the school that could change the entire world as he knows it. As we get closer to finding out what is truly going on, Lee realizes he has a huge role to play in all of this. This series is truly amazing, and it is criminally underrated. My favorite thing about this series has to be the lore and how it gets increasingly more intense with each episode. Alongside that, I love the characters as they each feel like someone you would encounter in a regular high school, and I love the overall mystery. Detentionaire was an amazing series, and had it been given the right treatment, it would’ve been a hit. You can watch Detentionaire on the YouTube channel Retro Rerun, or on Tubi!

These were definitely the worst cases of cartoons being screwed over to me, but I am sure there are lots more like Detentionaire and Motorcity where they were screwed over to the point where they got swept under the radar and that I didn't even know about them. Which of these cartoons do you agree with? Which do you disagree with? Did I miss any? Did you discover any new ones? Feel free to discuss with me in the comments! And feel free to follow my Tumblr page as I post weekly blogs on cartoons!

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lokitvsource · 3 years

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'LOKI' STAR TOM HIDDLESTON SECRETLY WATCHES MARVEL MOVIES AS A FAN IN THEATERS

When "Avengers: Endgame" debuted in April 2019, Tom Hiddleston rushed to a local theater to catch the epic conclusion to the superhero saga — just like millions of other Marvel fans across the globe. According to the June 2021 issue of emmy magazine, which hits newsstands on June 4, he threw on a hoodie and ducked into a midnight showing on opening night in London.

Catching each installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in theaters became a bit of a tradition for the English actor after his on-screen alter ego was killed off for the second time — he was murdered by Thanos in 2018's "Avengers: Infinity War" after faking his own death in 2011's "Thor."

"I became an ordinary cinema-goer who would see the films on opening weekend," Tom tells emmy in Wonderwall.com's exclusive first-look at the June 2021 issue, adding that "with films like 'Doctor Strange' and 'Black Panther,' it felt like the Marvel Cinematic Universe had become more ambitious and profound, with deeper and richer characters."

The two-time Emmy nominee — who's brought Loki to the big screen six times so far — was fully prepared to bid adieu to playing the god of mischief after shooting his part in "Infinity War" in early 2017.

"The producers were on the set my last day, and we had some very sincere goodbyes," he recalls. "There were hugs and a 'Come see us anytime' and 'Thank you for your hard work.' I thanked them for the opportunity and certainly thought, 'Oh, this is it.'"

Fortunately for Loki stans, it wasn't.

Tom — who celebrated a milestone birthday earlier this year — is set to return to the role on the Disney+ series "Loki," which debuts on June 9.

"I'm 40, and I was 28 when I was cast as Loki. When I say it like that, it blows my mind. I don't think any actor could have imagined playing a character as long as this," he tells emmy.

"Loki" will see the titular antihero answering for his crimes against the universe — specifically, as the actor puts it, his "crimes against the timeline." The six-episode limited series — which he describes as a "really positive series with a huge amount of action and spectacle" — picks up after Loki nabs the Space Stone in a scene from 2019's "Avengers: Endgame" that's set in 2012. By using the Space Stone to evade imprisonment when the Avengers go back in time to stop Thanos, Loki inadvertently creates a new timeline, which lands him in the custody of the Time Variance Authority.

"The TVA represents order to the chaos," Tom tells emmy. "Loki confronting this institution is a thrilling jumping-off point because he must take in an environment that he doesn't understand and can't control."

Adds the actor, "One of the themes of the show is about identity and raising a question whether Loki can run from who he is and is capable of change. It's only once we accept who we are that we can evolve and grow."

If Marvel decides to move forward with a second season of "Loki," Tom is, of course, fully on board: "I'm here for the ride," he says.

He then waxes poetic on why he relishes the role: "What I love about Loki is that he's playful and charming and witty and dangerous and mercurial. He's also fragmented and broken and solitary and isolated," he says. "As one character says in the show, no one good is ever truly good and no one bad is truly bad. That's a fascinating anchor."

According to emmy, the role is so important to Tom that before anyone shot a single frame of "Loki," he gave a formal presentation to the crew's department heads to ensure everyone was on the same page regarding the character's background and motivations.

It's incredible to think now — a decade after Tom first brought Loki to life in "Thor" — that he first auditioned to play the other brother after connecting with director Kenneth Branagh in London. After the Oscar-nominated actor-director suggested Tom could be perfect for the part of the god of thunder, he submitted a self-taped audition and participated in a now-iconic screen test.

He never even auditioned for the role of Loki.

"Most of the world knows that the right guy was cast as Thor," Tom jokes to emmy.

And clearly the right guy was cast as Loki, as well!

Read more about Tom's next chapter as Loki when the June 2021 issue of emmy magazine debuts on June 4, and catch "Loki" on Disney+ on June 9.

#tom hiddleston #loki tv #loki series #loki #loki promo #interview #article

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1kook · 4 years

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disney+ & bust

this is part of my netflix & chill collection !

summary; There’s a pounding on your door a little past noon, so hard and rough, that you almost think it’s the police finally coming to catch you for all your years of illegally pirating Phineas and Ferb. It’s not. It’s just a really drunk boyfriend wailing for your forgiveness at the door. warnings; arguments, feelings of insecurity, bit of asshole jk, smut in the forms of degradation, dumbification, choking, fingering, spit kink, self punishment, unprotected but [ passionate ] sex, jk losing his cool, return of mean jk, he is actually an emotional mess in this one wtf miscellaneous; ANGST, anniversaries, the L word😳, app developer kook, rip ‘pretty girl’ </3, we all become phineas and ferb stans word count; 13k !!

notes; me: *writes couple who’s whole arc is being silly* y’all: MAKE THEM SUFFER GIVE US ANGST!! u ask I deliver so now we all suffer 😐 ngl it was hard writing this fic n u might notice there’s some parts that seem weird n that’s bc this was TWO fics w diff wording but I ended up mixing them bc I’m insane. still had a lot of fun! felt like I challenged myself!! not proofread bc when I say we suffer we SUFFER

please let me know what you think!!! a simple ask goes a long way <3

previous part: kissanime & foreplay

Approximately one week after The Bullet Bestie’s rise to prominence, Jungkook grows annoyed with it as his weirdly competitive nature rears its ugly head the more and more orgasms that little vibrator coaxes out of you. It turns on a weird switch in him, something slightly stuck up and snooty that he’ll never admit to out loud but is there nonetheless. By the following Friday, The Bullet Bestie is nestled deep in your garbage can and Jungkook’s back to pleasuring you with his tongue and fingers alone.

He had those moments in him, the ones where he liked to think he was better than any and everyone else, and occasionally they manifested against inanimate objects like a bullet vibrator.

Despite his polite and generally soft exterior, you catch glimpses of that cocky spirit more than anyone else. Over the past year, you’ve come to realize that Jungkook’s personality was like a coin that had been left out in the sun too long. He had this sweet and reserved nature you saw most times, a kindhearted boyfriend who adored you almost as much as you adored him. He was your angel whom you knew had a heart of gold, even if you were slowly bringing out his more childish tendencies. You knew him like the back of your hand, knew what his mom’s favorite color was and how he liked to stack the plates in his cabinet according to size and make. It was a side that was rusted from years of being out in the sun, basking in its adoring warmth, and you loved every inch about it.

And still, there was this other side to him you rarely saw. This cocky asshole who hid beneath the soft smiles and careful hands, making his appearance only through sly smirks and a tongue prodding against the inside of his cheek. He was a braggart, a man who knew his greatness yielded for no one and wanted that fact shoved down everyone’s faces. This Jungkook, this other side that never saw the light of day, was like the Hyde to his Jekyll. An unexpected, almost mean side to him that only dared make his appearance when his exhilaration was at an all-time high. Like when he was fucking you into another dimension, or kicking your ass in Mario Kart, or like now, when he was receiving an award at an annual tech ceremony.

On the eve of your one year anniversary, Jungkook’s company invites him to an awards ceremony for other web and app developers like him. It’s a grand event, filled with all the biggest nerds in the developing industry here to present the baby nerds with awards. Jungkook lies somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, both a seasoned player and a rookie all at once. He spends the night tolling you around in a floor-length gown and fangirling over all the “legends” in the room.

You know next to none of these people and none of their accomplishments but still pretend you respect them to hell and back. By the end of the main dinner, you’re sympathizing with Barbie’s ever-smiling features because your cheeks feel sore.

Towards the end of the night, Jungkook wins that random award— okay, who were you fooling? He wins the Platinum Mobile Standard of Excellence Award, recognizing him for all the hard work you’ve seen him put in this past year. It’s probably the highest recognition he can receive at this point in his career. It was an esteemed award that was bestowed upon only the most innovative developer of the year among tech companies, something Jungkook had briefly mentioned he always wanted. It’s basically the equivalent of placing first place in his field, but given Jungkook’s competitive industry and his young age, you think it’s like telling all these old Facebook lords to suck his big fat cock. (But that was your job when you got home.)

He gives a short little thank you speech, promising to work hard and own up to this title. The people around you are swooning, obviously endeared with his soft puppy dog features and melodic voice. They don’t know him like you do, don’t know that uppity twist to his grin like you do. It doesn’t slip off his face even when he steps down off the stage, arms wide open as he comes barreling towards you. Even with you in his arms, the congratulations that are thrown from every direction ring loudly in his ears and swell that ego of his.

The night goes like that for the most part, Jungkook’s acquaintances approaching him every few minutes to rain down their praises. He goes a little crazy at the open bar after a while, shoving the gold trophy into your arms as his beloved work seniors whisk him off for drinks. You don’t mind because you resigned yourself to a night of playing Jungkook’s perfectly perfect partner anyway, watching him politely mingling with his coworkers. Despite his earlier success, you know he won’t brag about it verbally. No, he’ll wait until the two of you get home—your place or his—and remind you how amazing he is with a quick snap of his hips.

As you said, he’ll never boast aloud.

However, that doesn’t mean you won’t.

“That’s my boyfriend,” you explain to the seventh person that greets you that night, excitedly pointing to where said boyfriend was slowly losing all sense of self by the bar. You don’t know anyone here beside Jungkook, and you’re pretty sure no one in their hammered minds is going to remember who you are anyway, so a little gloating never hurt anyone. “He won the ‘I’m Better Than Everyone Else’ award tonight,” you emphasize to the tipsy woman beside you who only laughs at your exaggeration. You assume she’s like you, accompanying one of the many developers here, because as soon as you finish boasting about Jungkook she moves to brag about someone too.

Truth be told, you spend the whole night re-analyzing the Zootopia movie you saw on Disney+ the other night in your head. So if the little fox fellow didn’t control himself would the city have fallen to ruins? Why was the useless sheep girl so evil and bitter? Why was there an unreal amount of romantic tension between the fox and the rabbit? Whatever, you’ll have to rewatch it some other night, and with your new Disney+ account, you could watch it anywhere you wanted to.

Now, you had never bothered to purchase a Disney+ subscription or even tried to swindle Jungkook for his password before. As far as you know, Disney+ was filled with old tv shows from your childhood, sitcoms that made you laugh when you were ten. There’s nothing wrong with that, but personally, you were a firm believer that that which was perfect should not be touched once finished; in other words, you were utterly terrified you’d rewatch an old episode of The Wizards of Waverly Place, only to find out the same joke you’ve been regurgitating for the past ten years doesn’t actually go that way.

However, the harsh reality was that Disney+ was good for a few things. Ugh, you hate when giant corporations provide decent services. Aside from Zootopia, you’ve watched about every animated media on there as well, all of which you replay in your mind as Jungkook has the time of his life with these nerds, knocking back champagne glass after champagne glass.

Anyway, the night ends a little past midnight, and Jungkook who is buzzed on alcohol and high on exhilaration ends up calling an Uber for the two of you. Your apartment— the new one he had not only helped you hunt for but also helped you move into, greatly cutting the cost of movers out with those glistening biceps and thick thighs —is still going through her rebellious phase where the potted plants are trying to take over, courtesy of Kim Namjoon. So for now, there’s a potted plant in an awkward corner that both of you stub your toe against on your way to your bedroom.

You’re thinking Jungkook is going to go to town tonight, given the fact he’s on Cloud 9 and has had his ego stroked by a bunch of dudes for the past couple hours. Maybe you guys can try out the hot role-playing scenario you saw on GirlsWay a few weeks ago, or the handcuffs you impulsively bought from Amazon one Monday night. Or maybe, and this one really makes you flutter, he’ll let you fully take the reins for once.

All those lewd fantasies end up being for naught because just as you shimmy out of your gown (with the help of his hands, of course) and turn to climb him like a tree, he’s on the other side of the room getting your makeup remover out for you. And also talking. A lot. And way more than usual.

“Did you see him, babe?” he sighs, dare you to say, dreamily, handing you the cotton pads as he begins pulling a million pins out of your hair. Slowly and with a lot of confusion, you pull your fake lashes off and begin cleaning your face. “He was amazing.”

“Uh-huh,” you say, having absolutely no idea who ‘he’ is or why Jungkook is so in love with him and not you at this very moment. “But so were you,” you add. Perfect. Stroke his ego and then stroke his cock.

Jungkook sputters at your praise. He’s carefully placing your hairpins on your thigh, cheeks flaming red every time he leans over you. “Was I?” he murmurs, voice sweet in that cute little way it always gets when he’s downed one too many shots of whiskey, enough to be buzzed but not enough to be wasted.

You turn and the pins clatter to the floor and across the bedsheets. “Yes,” you confirm, ignoring his sad huff at the mess you’ve made. Instead, you grab him by the collar of that pink button-up he taunted you with all night. “You were fucking incredible and I think incredible men deserve to have their dick sucked.”

Jungkook laughs at your vulgar statement, holding you gently by the hips as you climb into his lap. “Is that so?” The soft, shy persona is gone now, replaced by the gentle stirring beneath his dress pants. You nod hurriedly, plopping down on his lap and running your hands through his styled hair.

“Yes,” you confirm, kissing the corner of his mouth. “Luckily for you, I know this nymphomaniac who would gladly gobble up your cock at your every command.”

He snorts just as you push him into his back, nose adorably scrunched up. “First of all, you know I hate that word,” he chuckles, finally gracing you with a sweet peck that only makes you want him to fuck you into the fifth dimension. “Secondly, please don’t ever say you’ll gobble my cock up ever again.”

Something inside of you squeals with excitement as he rolls the two of you over, firm body pressing down on yours. “Oh, baby,” you groan, lazily throwing a leg over his hip. Jungkook grins and then decides to entertain you for a few minutes with a sloppy kiss.

You say a few minutes because just as things are heating up, he pulls away. He smiles apologetically. “As much as I’d love to be here with you, I actually have an early morning tomorrow.”

You frown at the sudden change in events. “Huh? They’re gonna make you work the morning after a Gatsby party?” you gasp, sitting up as he gets off of you. With every step he takes away from the bed your heart breaks a little more. “They can’t do that— that’s illegal!”

From the doorway he levels you with a comically raised brow. “No, it’s not.”

You scamper after him down the hall, watch the muscles in his back flex as he pulls his suit jacket on. “You can’t work on our anniversary— that’s illegal!” you offer instead.

He stops at your front door, feet squeezed back into his shoes. “Baby, it’s not,” he rolls his eyes, leaning down to peck your forehead. “It was either I work in the morning or work at night,” he explains, giving your messy hair a soothing caress. He’s looking at you with those eyes, the ones that make your heart lodge itself into your throat and make life a tightrope experience. There’s a devastatingly lovesick part of you that wants this moment, this kind face, to be engraved into your mind for the rest of your life. You want this to be the first and last thought you have and nothing else: just Jungkook’s adoring gaze on you for the rest of time.

The moment ends too soon when he flutters one last peck against your lips. “I’ll be done in the afternoon, okay?”

You pout. “Okay, your place?” you huff, making sure to get one last octopus squeeze around his waist. He nods. “Promise you won’t be late?”

The corners of his gaze soften. “You know I won’t,” he smiles, leaning down to bump your noses together playfully. “Can’t stay away from my pretty girl too long. Besides, I have a gift for you tomorrow.”

It’s with that sentiment and a hammering heart that you let him go. With Jungkook gone, there’s really nothing for you to do now. You took the next two days off in preparation for your anniversary sex, so you don’t have to head to sleep early like usual.

With nothing else planned, you decide on rewatching that Zootopia movie that had plagued you all night, ready to dissect every plot hole to hell and back. You don’t think Jungkook’s seen this movie yet so you add it to your long list of animated movies you’re forcing him to watch.

Part of you is actually really surprised Jungkook left. Well, kinda sorta, very, but not really. Jungkook was a good boy, that much was obvious. He took his job seriously, and if his job wanted him to come in at the asscrack of dawn, then he’d come in before the sun even rose. He was a goody-two-shoes, but even so, you were occasionally able to bring out that darker side in him.

Jungkook working, like actually working in an office setting, was pretty rare though. The dude had a chill job that let him stay home most of the time, and essentially clock in whenever he wanted. Every now and then you were able to convince him to stay, tucking him beneath your body or the covers, depending on the night, and refusing to let him go the morning after.

Once he had eaten you out until the wee hours of the day, ravenous between your thighs, and then went to work the next morning like he hadn’t broken you. Another time you had persuaded him into watching every season of the 2017 DuckTales reboot through the night. When the alarm had rung in the middle of the season finale, he had simply gotten into your shower and gone off to work.

So maybe you were a little confident in your skills, and Jungkook slipping between your fingers tonight was a huge bummer. But there was no use crying over spilled milk, you tell yourself, flinging your bra off somewhere in the corner as you snuggle back into your sheets. You’re ready to tear this Zootopia movie apart, scene by scene.

Even though your apartment is a little cold, you’re comforted by the fact Jungkook will be here to keep you warm all day tomorrow.

All men do is lie.

Despite his promise to come home early the next day, Jungkook ends up lying. The meeting he had been in all morning— the same one that had stopped you from getting bent like a pretzel the night before —drags on well past noon. Then, Kim Namjoon, AKA Jungkook’s favorite senpai in the entire world, catches wind of Jungkook’s success last night and absolutely has to take him out to lunch to celebrate.

You scoff, glaring down at your phone and the impulsive messages you’d sent out an hour ago when Jungkook had first texted you telling you he would be late.

You whirl around to stomp off in the direction of his living room, where all of yours and Jungkook’s favorite foods were growing colder by the minute. You had spent the longest time carefully laying them out, making sure the fried chicken was closer than the pizza but not closer than the breadsticks. Truthfully it’s a nightmare. There are about eight stomach aches worth of food sitting on his coffee table, the greasy stench makes you gag and will certainly stick to your hair for weeks, but none of that mattered because it was all for your beau.

Your very late beau who was making you grow more and more agitated with each minute that passed. Ugh! How inconsiderate of him to test your patience on a day like this. You didn’t want to be upset with him, but this was your first, real milestone as a couple with him. You had wanted to spend the whole day cuddled up, maybe finally tell him how much he really meant to you— definitely not waking up alone with eyeliner crusted eyes and an aching heart.

Deciding you’re being a little too dramatic, you head into the bedroom to calm down. This was fine, you tell yourself, carefully laying out the damn near harlotrous lingerie you had yet to put on. Jungkook would come over soon and everything would be A-okay.

Except for the part it’s actually F-not okay because soon it’s nearing sunset and the food has gone cold so you’ve stocked it into the fridge, and the pretty sheer bra has a wonky wire that’s two seconds away from piercing through your heart, but that doesn’t even matter because Jungkook being late for your all-day anniversary celebration has already ripped it to shreds anyway.

You plop down on the couch in defeat, impulsively opening up the Disney+ app to cry through another episode of Phineas and Ferb. You’ve abandoned the satin robe that came with the lingerie in favor of donning a big t-shirt that smells like him and makes your heart hurt even more. The setting sun paints the living room in muted oranges, the chirping of birds outside the soundtrack to your lonely day.

You end up watching some other cartoon on Disney+, avoiding the Marvel section because you had promised Jungkook he could be there when you lost your Marvel virginity. Well, at least one of you was good at keeping promises, you think bitterly. For a second, you think about randomly watching one of the infamous MCU films out of order just to spite him. But then you think of that soft puppy gaze and how disappointed he’d be in you.

Whatever! It wouldn’t ever match up to the way you felt now.

Anyway, you circle back. When you’re five episodes into Phineas and Ferb you hear the doorknob rattle.

You sit up just as the door swings open, visible from your spot on the couch. He meets your gaze almost immediately, big doe eyes caught in the act. What act? You’re not really sure. In fact, you don’t even know what you’re looking at when he walks in because he’s drowning in shopping bags. His lips twist into a grin. “Honey, I’m home,” he says playfully.

You don’t laugh.

Jungkook frowns, dumping all his bags down at the entrance before waddling over towards you. “Hey, what’s wrong?” he asks, coming to stand before you and cupping your face in his hands. He’s towering over you, so tall and gorgeous but for the first time, you’re not dazed by his beauty.

“Kook, you said you’d be back hours ago,” you say slowly, avoiding his gaze. You try to keep the frustration out of your voice, but you’ve had hours to dwell on it now, and those annoying cartoon characters, though charming at first, had only served to multiply your annoyance.

Jungkook blinks, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. “I mean… yeah. But I got you presents?” he beams, glancing back at the mountainous pile he made by the door. You look over too. There are some luxury bags squeezed in between other shops you like, the occasional jewelers' logo on the side.

You stand with a sigh, sauntering off into the kitchen with him on your tail. “I don’t want presents,” you mumble, reaching to pour yourself a glass of water. You’re briefly aware of how childish you must seem. Jungkook hovers behind you.

“What? Yes, you do,” he says. “You had an entire wishlist on my Amazon of things you wanted.” It’s his turn to level you with an unreadable expression, slowly crossing his arms over his chest.

Your frown only deepens as you turn to match his stance against the counter. While it may be true that you did indeed have an entire list of impulsive items on his Amazon, that didn’t necessarily mean you wanted them all. Sometimes you just wanted to stare longingly at a pair of satin gloves without actually buying them. You don’t know how to explain this much to him. “They’re not…” you stop with another deep breath. “Forget it. Thank you for the presents.”

Now it’s Jungkook’s turn to question you. “What,” he says in an unimpressed tone, padding over to you before you can escape back into the living room to watch the entire princess movie collection on Disney+. “No, tell me what’s wrong.”

For some reason, that’s exactly what you don’t want to hear. “Jungkook,” you say flatly, narrowing your eyes at him. “You come home six hours after you said you would without telling me why, and normally I wouldn’t care, but today was supposed to be a special day for us.”

Jungkook reels at your bluntness. “Babe, I was out getting stuff for you. I know it’s our anniversary— that’s why I wanted to treat you,” he responds, oddly condescendingly like you’re a child who doesn’t understand what exactly he was doing.

You brush his hands away from your shoulders. “Yeah,” you huff. “Now I know that. But I spent all day waiting for you,” you stress, chest puffing as you grow more and more agitated by his inability to understand you. God, can he let you go now? At least a bunch of animated, geometrically drawn cartoons won’t question you like this and make you feel as childish as he was.

When he doesn’t say anything else you stomp back into the living room, snatching up your phone from its forgotten spot against the couch. “I’m going to bed.”

At that Jungkook seems to kickstart back to life. “What? ___, it’s barely six,” he says as he follows after you into your bedroom. You ignore him, shuffling beneath the covers. In all actuality, you’re going to bed to mope and watch more animated family shows, maybe cry under the guise of the plot just being so sad. Jungkook sits beside you just as you click back on to finish off your episode. “Baby, I don’t get it,” he sighs. “You’re always talking about how much you want this or that, and I go out and get you it all but now you’re mad?”

You bite down on your lip, eyes lasered in on the pictures moving before you. “Jungkook, just forget it.”

“No,” he says, more sternly than he’s ever been with you before. “If there’s a problem, tell me.” There’s a heavy pause, and then he says, “don’t make me waste my time guessing what’s wrong, okay?”

“Waste your time?” you scoff, sitting up with pinched brows that you find match his. “I’m not trying to waste anyone’s time— in fact, that’s hot coming from you, Jungkook.”

He rolls his eyes. “What are you even saying? You’re mad because I took a little long getting presents, for you, might I add,” he huffs, plopping down on the edge of the mattress beside your knee. “You’re always saying you want this and that, but you can’t handle me going out to get those things? Do you hear how weird you sound?”

You whip the covers off of you. “Me talking about things doesn’t always mean I want them,” you defend.

Jungkook snorts. “Yes, it does,” he says. “Anytime you ramble about stuff for minutes like a little kid it’s because you want me to buy it for you.”

You blink. “Like a little kid?” you repeat, stunned by his comparison. Granted, you always knew you were the more childish of the two, but you never thought that would equate Jungkook thinking of you as a child. Something red and nasty flares in your chest. “Well sorry,” you spit, crossing your arms over your chest defensively, “sorry we all can’t be perfectly mature golden boys who would never see the light of day if I constantly wasn’t dragging them out.” You know it’s a somewhat low blow, especially because Jungkook’s told you before how his introverted tendencies were a sensitive issue growing up, but you can’t help it.

Jungkook groans, dropping his head into his hands. “Baby, don’t do this now,” he warns, digging the heels of his palms into his eyes. “Stop acting like this.”

“Like how?” you spit, “like a kid?” Jungkook says nothing, leveling you with a blank stare from the corner of his eye. You roll your eyes, phone falling off your lap. Another episode of Phineas and Ferb had started, the corny opening tune filling the space between the two of you. “At least now I know what you think of me,” you mutter over the guitar riff.

“Oh my god,” Jungkook blurts, sitting up wildly. “Of course I’m gonna think of you as a stupid little kid, look at you,” he seethes, gesturing at the phone beside you. You flinch. “All you do is watch kids shows and whine whenever I wanna watch anything normal adults watch. You complain every single day about the most normal things, like your job? Why should I fucking care that you’re working a dead-end office job in a field you didn’t even study for— that’s not my problem, __!” he snaps, eyes narrowed into little slits. “I just won an award last night,” he says suddenly, voice back to its regular volume. “I’m at the height of my career and I’m only going up, but I can’t even enjoy that because I have to come home and cater to you,” he finishes, a loud scoff punctuating the final word.

You had never imagined Jungkook finally bragging about himself would be at your expense.

A beat of silence passes, the angry glint in his eyes quickly fading away the longer you don’t say anything. You sniff once, turning your head idly to the side where Phineas and Ferb is still blaring loudly from your phone speaker. Picking up the device, you throw it across the room where it hits his closet door with a terrifying bang the breaks the silence.

The sound snaps Jungkook out of whatever shock he’d been in. “Baby…” he says slowly, carefully, like you’re a caged animal that’s just escaped the zoo.

“I’m going home,” you say, also a little too calmly. You saunter over towards his closet where your shattered phone screen glares up at you as you yank a pair of sweats off a hanger. Jungkook is still frozen on the edge of the bed, watching you with wide eyes as you move about the room.

It’s when you’re in the hallway leading downstairs that Jungkook finally snaps out of his daze, scampering behind you as you descend the stairs. “Baby,” he rushes out, loudly bounding down after you, “___, wait,” he gasps, catching you by the kitchen counter collecting your keys. “I-I didn't mean that,” he rushes out, eyes wide and frantic as they flicker over your expression. “I don’t think that—I don’t, baby, please, just… let me explain, please.”

“Jungkook, let go of me,” you respond, shaking your wrist in an attempt to release yourself. He’s not even holding you tightly— he never would—but the sound of your heart pounding in your ears makes your movements jerky and erratic. “I wanna go home.”

“No,” he chokes, cornering you against the counter. “No, baby, please just listen to me, I-I—“

“You what, Jungkook?” you snap, placing a hand on his chest and forcefully pushing him away. He lets you, stepping back with a wobbly bottom lip. “You need to tell me how you’re too good for me? How much I hold you down because I wasn’t lucky enough to get a job like yours straight out of college?” He says nothing, swallowing roughly as you jab a finger into his chest. “Well let me tell you something,” you snarl, chest heaving, “I may be childish and a huge complainer, but I’m not stupid enough to let someone walk all over me like this.”

With that, you make your great escape. Truthfully, you don’t want him to see the tears in your eyes as you yank his door open, stomping down his steps and in the direction of the nearest bus stop. The door opens right after you tug it shut, painting your shadow across the sidewalk. There’s the scrambled sound of house slippers against the concrete that follows you down. “Go the fuck back inside,” you snap without missing a beat.

Sensing your obvious anger, he pauses before he can reach you. “Text me when you get home?” he calls out quietly.

“No,” you respond.

You would never admit to anyone that you spend the entire night eating a tub of mint chocolate ice cream. It’s disgusting and makes you gag, but it’s the only one you have in your apartment. And of course, it was brought over by none other than Jeon Jungkook himself a few days ago. Even when you’re trying to comfort yourself over how mean he was, on your anniversary night no less, you’re plagued by thoughts of him everywhere.

As much as you want to brush his words off, put on that cool girl exterior you’ve maintained since high school, there’s something different about this situation. You guess it’s impossible to brush off such hateful words when they come from someone you love and adore so much.

Were you too childish? You had always believed that side of you was what made your relationship with Jungkook so perfect. The two of you meshed well because of your differences, like yin and yang. So how had he been able to so easily deconstruct every inch of that balance in a matter of a few seconds? Was this perfect reality all in your head this whole time?

You want to tell yourself it was just a heat of the moment outburst from Jungkook, give him the benefit of the doubt because he’s never snapped at you like this before. Of course you’ve fought a couple of times in the past year, but neither of you had ever stooped as low as you did yesterday. Furthermore, the insecure part of your brain says he obviously felt this somewhere in his heart to bring it up at all. What he had said to you wasn’t something someone could make up on the spot.

You don’t text him when you get home, partly to spite him, but mainly because you had left your phone at his place anyway. You know he tried calling you last night because the call log is synced up to your laptop. He called on and off for about thirty minutes before he probably found your phone in his room. Whatever, he can mope in his regret for all you care

—is what you wanna say, but the longer he goes without showing himself to you the more your insecurities and hurt fester. Was this it? Was this the end of what was probably the best year of your life? It’s too painful to think about, to even consider the possibility that Jungkook might have gained a new insight last night and decided, hey, maybe this is for the best after all.

You drown yourself in an ungodly amount of sugar for breakfast, your laptop blaring yet another episode of Phineas and Ferb on the dining table. Muscle memory has you making Jungkook’s favorite pancakes before you can stop yourself, and by the time you do realize, you’ve resigned yourself to the blueberry smell anyway.

There’s a pounding on your door a little past noon, so hard and rough, that you almost think it’s the police finally coming to catch you for all your years of illegally pirating Phineas and Ferb.

It’s not.

It’s just a really drunk boyfriend wailing for your forgiveness at the door. You open the door with a fright, jumping back when he slumps forward and almost crashes face-first into the floor. “You didn’t call,” Jungkook cries, leaning a little too much of his weight onto you when you reach out to steady him.

The thundering of your heart slows upon registering it’s him. “Kook?” you frown, nose pinched at the ungodly stench of alcohol wafting off his clothes. “Have you been drinking?” you ask even though the answer is staring you right in the face (and in the nose).

He groans, staggering deeper into your arms. You blindly push the door shut behind him, resigning yourself to this new situation while your pancakes grow cold in the other room. “Baaaby,” he slurs, letting you guide him into the living space. He’s unceremoniously dumped onto the couch, half-opened eyes gazing up at you. “Let me,” a hiccup, “explain.”

You won’t lie. There’s a very obvious sense of discomfort sitting in your chest, torn between two paths that you don’t wish to choose between. His skin is warm and flushed like he’s just walked all the way here in this morning sun. You step over to the window that faces down onto the street below. There’s no sign of his car; you would have killed him if he ever tried to drive in this state.

“Did you walk here?” you ask instead, deciding there’s no need for one singular path, not when you can walk straight down the middle, both cleaning him and grilling him at the same time.

Jungkook’s response is delayed, head lolling from side to side as you help him out of his sweater. His skin is sweaty beneath, scorching to the touch. “Uh-huh,” he groans. Jesus, you sort of assumed but him confirming it really set things into perspective.

By no means did you and Jungkook live on opposite ends of the earth. On a good day, a drive from your place to his took about ten minutes. But walking? Easily an hour. Had he walked all the way from his place, drunk on top of that?

You brush his hair away from his face, his eyes fluttering shut at your touch. His lips are pouty yet chapped, dehydrated from the sun and the alcohol he reeks of. “Sit up for me,” you instruct, scampering off to your room for chapstick and water.

“Anything for you,” Jungkook wheezes, throat probably dryer than a desert. When you return, he’s two seconds from face planting into the coffee table and breaking that pretty face of his. You catch him with a hand on his shoulder, keeping him balanced. “Tell me what to do,” he chokes out, voice hoarse.

“Just need you to drink some water,” you say, pressing a cup against his lips. He drinks it, but a drop still dribbles down his chin.

“No,” he groans, catching your wrist in his hand when you reach up to apply some chapstick on him. “Tell me what to do,” he stresses, “to fix this. Fix us.”

His words make you pause, the tube of chapstick hovering over his plush lips. “You don’t have to do anything,” you respond quietly, trying to finish the application so you can pull away.

Jungkook doesn’t let you go. You try to look away, but there’s something about him that looks off. Maybe it’s the raw skin under his eyes, red and swollen. Or the sad droop to those same eyes that hold you captive. Or maybe it’s the subtle tremble in his hands, the fingers that hold tightly to your wrist, not to keep you there but to ground himself. “I don’t wanna lose you,” he rasps out, shakily bringing your hand to his mouth, where he presses one airy kiss to your knuckles. “Tell me ho-how to fix this and I’ll do it,” he pleads, a vulnerable look in his eyes.

Unable to withstand the sheer amount of agony on his expression, you look away. “___, please,” he chokes out, stumbling off the couch in his drunk and desperate haze until he’s kneeling in front of you. “I can’t… I can’t,” he sniffles, tears clouding those pretty eyes you’ve come to love so much. “I don’t know who I am without you.”

You clench your jaw. “You’re Jeon Jungkook,” you murmur, slipping your hand out of his hold to run through his hair. It’s knotted and a little too greasy, two things Jungkook would usually never allow. “This year’s Platinum Mobile Standard of Excellence Award recipient,” you remind him, trailing your thumb across his cheekbone when he turns to look up at you with those big Bambi eyes. “Sweet and shy, but you love being rowdy with your friends. You love movies and TV and organizing your shirts according to fabric type. You work harder than anyone I know and never complain. You date me, even though I’m a huge child,” you smile sadly.

“No!” he jumps, turning that frantic stare back into you. “Y-You’re not— it’s not,” he stammers, words still slurring together. “I’m a liar,” he cries, resting his forehead on your knees. His shoulders shake. “I don’t deserve you,” he weeps quietly. You place a hand on his shoulder. “Y-Y-You make my life so much better, ___, so colorful and fun. I-I wish I knew you in high school,” he admits, “maybe I wouldn’t have been so emotionally constipated now.”

“You’re not,” you reassure him softly.

He disagrees. “You bring out the best,” he hiccups, “the best in me.” Your heart skips in your chest. “I-I love you, you know that?”

You sputter, eyes wide at his sudden confession. “I… love you so much, y’know? I think about you ev-every night, ___,” he rambles, eyes dreamily gazing off into some miscellaneous spot on the wall behind you. “I can’t get you out of my head. Like you're a song, o-on repeat but it’s not annoying because it’s my favorite song, and I could listen to it for the rest of my life, y’know? My favorite song, I know all the words b-because it’s all I think about! I love... My love… I love you so much.”

“Kook,” you rush out, cheeks flaming as you try to pull him away from where he’s slumped over your legs. His passionate speech has you abuzz, body tingling everywhere until you feel overwhelmed, head spinning like you’re on a rollercoaster. “Let’s get you to bed.”

He nods sleepily, seemingly coming down from whatever alcohol induced rampage has allowed him to walk for an hour straight in this searing heat just to confess to you. “Y-You don’t have to say it back,” he continues to stutter as you guide him through the living room on wobbly legs. “I just-I just— can I?” he babbles. “Can I love you, ___?”

You pass through the kitchen space, where whatever you were watching on Disney+ is blaring loudly. It distracts Jungkook for about two seconds before his attention returns to you. When you don’t answer, he presses on. “Is that okay?” he asks, whirling around to face you, catching your shoulders in his hands. He towers over you by the entrance to your bedroom, dark curls tickling your forehead. His eyes are dark and glazed over, both in tears and an emotion so raw and unfiltered it squeezes around your chest until you can’t breathe. “Is it okay for me to love you?” he murmurs softly, knocking his nose against yours.

Your cheeks blaze. “Yes, th-that’s fine, Kook,” you blubber, placing a hand over his chest, where his heart is also hammering away. “Just need you to go rest now, okay?”

He nods sleepily, nudging your nose with his one last time, like a soft almost-kiss, before letting you push him into the room. “Yes, yes,” he breathes, his body finally crashing from his adrenaline spike. He flops down onto the bed unceremoniously, dark waves fanning across your pillows. You try to wiggle him out of his shirt, but it only gets about halfway up his chest before he blindly reaches for the covers. His legs stick out awkwardly, clad in the sweatpants you’ve come to associate with him.

When he’s all swaddled up in your blanket he finally goes limp, tiny snores leaving his lips as he dozes away from reality. You sigh, pressing a palm to his forehead. He’s still warm and clammy, but at this point, there’s nothing you can do but wait for him to sober up.

With a final kiss to his forehead, you leave the room, closing the door behind you before sliding against the wooden surface. There’s a trapped bird in your chest, wildly flapping its wings in an effort to get out, and it’s all stupid Jungkook’s fault in the next room. Stupid Jungkook who demolished and remodeled your heart all in less than twenty-four hours. It doesn’t calm down, even when you rush off into the kitchen for a glass of water, or when you try to immerse yourself in some other show on Disney+. It stays beating against your ribs and your chest until you’re forcing yourself to sit down on the couch and process.

He wakes up a little before dinner. You hear him from the living room, where you’re flicking through the options on Disney+ for the nth time that day. You’ve seen the first fifteen minutes of about twenty different series and movies by now, always growing antsy and abandoning them early on. The only reason you know he’s awake is because the shower turns on for a few minutes, and then his bare feet are heard padding across the hallway back into your room.

By the time he resurfaces in the living room, you’ve resigned yourself to just more Phineas and Ferb, nonchalantly watching the silly cartoon. (Except you’re anything but nonchalant, and your heartbeat rings in your ears.)

Jungkook hovers by the door, clad in a pair of shorts he’s left here before, and a t-shirt you stole from him. “Hey,” he says quietly, lingering by the doorframe. You nod back in response. “Can I watch with you?” Again, another nod.

Slinking over to the couch, he’s rather careful as he sits down, leaving a few inches of space between the two of you. You don’t even think he can see the screen of your laptop until he murmurs, “he’s my favorite character,” when Perry the Platypus appears on the screen.

You hum. “Thought you didn’t like these kids shows?” you ask. You don’t mean it to sound as petty and backhanded as it comes out, but that’s really no one's fault but his own.

Jungkook’s breathing tightens beside you. “No,” he admits, “I don’t. Only watch them because I know you like them.” You contemplate pausing the episode and engaging in a real conversation with him, but at this point, you’re very tired from the events of the last day. Jungkook doesn’t press either, just shuffles more comfortably beside you.

You get about five minutes in, quiet chuckles shared between the two of you, before he strikes. “I’m sorry about yesterday,” he says, so hushed you almost don’t hear it. His hand is resting in the space between you, pinky brushing against yours. “About… being late. And the presents.”

You inspire slowly. “That wasn't even the problem, silly,” you brush off. From your peripheral, you see Jungkook’s slow nod. “I didn’t want any presents,” you mention, “I just wanted you.” You look away from the screen immediately after, pretending like the spot on the ceiling is actually really interesting.

The two of you fall into silence, the animated characters on your screen rapidly chattering away. “Oh,” Jungkook says after a moment.

You roll your eyes. They’re moist but you don’t want him to see. “Yeah, oh,” you parrot back softly, relaxing into the couch again. “Did you eat the food I left out?”

Jungkook shuffles beside you, the soft lull of the speakers soon being cut as he reaches over to pause Phineas and Ferb. A couple of seconds pass and then he’s leaning into you, head resting on your shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he apologizes again, placing a palm over the hand he had been teasing for the past few minutes. “I thought I knew what I was doing but I was wrong.”

His voice is so soft and sincere, it makes your chest ache. You try to burrow your face against your opposite shoulder, try to hide the stray tear that escapes out of the corner of your eye. “It’s fine,” you brush off, voice choked off and hoarse.

Jungkook leans up, pecks your cheek so tenderly it makes you go mushy. “No, it’s not fine. I acted like a know-it-all and said something way out of line,” he murmurs, raising his head to look at you. His hand feels warm over yours. It’s the touch you craved all day and yesterday, the warm feel of his body against yours. You’re embarrassed at how easily you melt into it. “You’re the best thing that has happened to me in a long time,” he tells you, holding your hand close to his chest. “I had no right to say those things to you.”

You sniffle, resting your head against his shoulder now. His heart beats loud enough for you to hear. “Was it true?” you mumble. “Do you really think of me like that?”

He shakes his head, his soft breaths fanning across your forehead. “No, never,” he answers. “I think you’re incredible. My brain was just trying to justify my dumb anger.”

You nod, even if you don’t believe it just yet. But that was a conversation for later, you suppose, sometime in the future when you aren’t on the verge of tears and threatening to crumble apart at the simplest word that leaves his mouth.

“I should have come home like you wanted, thought about my words before saying them,” he says, snuggling closer to you. “I’m sorry.”

“Stop,” you sniffle, covering your face with your free hand as he presses a kiss to the vein that runs over the back of the hand he’s holding captive. “Now it just sounds like I'm just being inconsiderate of your gifts and a crybaby.”

Jungkook kisses your temple softly, gently. “Don’t think about the gifts,” he says. “Just tell me what you wanted to do, doll.”

His voice calms you, has you like putty in his arms. “Watch movies,” you mumble, toying with a thread on your couch cushion. “Be with you.”

He hums. “Then we’ll do that,” he says, reaching for your laptop again. The screen nearly blinds you when it flickers back to life before you, Jungkook’s low breaths against your ear making it near impossible for you to process the titles on the screen. “You liked Disney+?”

Belatedly, you nod. “I like the animated movies,” you admit quietly, the anxieties of before slowly melting away, even more so when he slides his arm around you, pulling you close against his chest.

Unlike other times where he’ll critique the hell out of such childish films, Jungkook says nothing as he starts up the Zootopia movie instead, the same one you had wanted to show him before, right from the beginning. “That bunny looks like you,” you murmur when Judy Hopps first appears on the screen.

Jungkook snorts. “You say that about every cartoon bunny.”

You turn your head to glance at him over your shoulder. He meets your gaze with a small smile you return. “It’s because you’re so cute,” you say softly, lips twisting playfully when his cheeks grow scarlet.

He knocks his forehead against yours, eyes fluttering shut. “Not cute, just lucky,” he chuckles. “Lucky enough to have you.” Your heart turns over in your chest, threatening to burst out of your rib cage at his words. You try to turn in his arms. Before you can say the words that have been sitting on the tip of your tongue for months now, he’s beating you to it once again. “I love you,” he confesses in a hushed whisper, no alcoholic influence.

Something inside of you blossoms, eyes wide as he chastely kisses you. He pulls away without you ever reacting, too caught up in surprise to kiss him back properly. He stays close, curls tickling your forehead as he leans over you. “You don’t have to say it back, I just wanted you to know. I love you,” he says again, long lashes blinking down at you. “So much. It makes me feel like a stupid teenager again, going to the mall to buy a gift for my crush.” He laughs sheepishly, reaching down to tangle your fingers together. “Is that okay?” he asks quietly, pressing a kiss to your knuckles.

It mirrors the confession he’d given you that morning, those slurred words and teary eyes. It had been difficult to pinpoint the legitimacy of it before, the meaning scrambled by his hazy mind. But with him staring at you like this now, like you single-handedly plucked the stars from the sky to put them in those sparkly eyes of his, it makes something inside you ache.

Still, you choke on your own spit. “I-Is it okay for you to love me?” you sputter incredulously, realizing the oddity of the same question he’d thrown at you earlier. But now, you’re both sober and you can really tear apart that sentence. Jungkook nods a little too seriously for your liking. “Are you crazy?” He blinks in confusion, brows pulling together as you slowly but surely lose the last bits of your sanity. “You’re an idiot, Jeon Jungkook,” you huff, “a stupidly handsome, rich, walking dream, idiot who goes out with stupid girls like me.”

“Not stupid,” he murmurs, closing in on you again as he finally understands the truth behind your masked insults. He smells minty and like his favorite body wash of yours.

“No,” you deny. “You’re actually, like, insane. You have a bachelor pad, make enough money to sustain an entire litter of kittens, look and talk like every teenage girl’s dream boyfriend— but you mess it all up by dating evil, conniving hoes like me who lose their shit over Disney cartoons.” He says nothing, watching you with an amused grin as you talk over yourself, basically regurgitating his statement from yesterday except it kinda seems plausible now that you’re over it. “It’s stupid. No, you’re stupid. No— I’m stupid.”

Jungkook chuckles, kissing the corner of your mouth gently. “Done?” he says, a dimple appearing on his cheek. You could kiss it away, but you need him to know the amount of stupidity in this room was astronomically high. “You’re not stupid, baby,” he says. You level him with a look. “Well. You have your moments.”

“Moments?” you repeat, standing up in a hurry that has him flopping down beside you. Your laptop is lost somewhere on the cushions, the voices faded as they grow farther away. “I am so stupid. I called Namjoon a whore for taking you out for lunch!” you cry. “I am the stupidest person in the world.”

Jungkook cackles, standing up beside you. “Yes, yes, you’re my stupid girl,” he teases, tapping the pout on your lips playfully. “So stupid she slanders herself instead of just telling me she loves me too.” He bumps your noses together, dark eyes staring at you almost daringly after his claim.

You fold soon enough. “I love you,” you mumble, “even if I’m too stupid to say it.”

He rewards your confession with a kiss, pulling you into his arms soon after. He sighs, almost wistfully. “Whatever shall I do with my very stupid girl?”

After exactly three minutes of feeling safe and loved in his arms, he abandons the living room in favor of leading you back to your room, where he pushes you down against your mattress. You cling to him, leaving him positioned over you at an angle. His chest presses against yours, arm curled around the back of your head. “Gotta get up, baby,” he laughs.

You shake your head, caging him in your arms. “Nuh-uh,” you murmur, legs wiggling when he places a hand on your hip.

Jungkook chuckles, pressing a kiss against the side of your ear. “Your movie is still playing in the other room,” he reminds you, thumb drawing soothing circles on your hip. You don’t release him, his mindless touch only encouraging you to keep him close. “Babe?”

You say nothing, relishing in the comfort of Jungkook’s presence. His hair smells good and feels even softer against the side of your face. The cotton shirt he found is crumpled beneath your fists, dark blue pattern wrinkling. Finally coming to terms with his new home, Jungkook eventually relaxes into your hold with a sigh.

“Alright,” he hums, patting your hip as he repositions himself more comfortably. “I get it. My pretty girl must’ve missed me, huh?” You nod, soaking in every detail about him in this moment. Jungkook shifts, the hand on your hip suddenly falling over your thigh instead. “Or should I say my stupid girl?” he purrs, hand slipping between your thighs. “My stupid, little girl?”

A gasp catches in your throat when he runs his fingers over the front of your panties. Your legs kick out wildly at the sudden touch, toes curling at the hands you dreamt about all day and night. “Oh,” you pant, each brush of his fingers feeling better than the last.

“What?” he says, mouthing against the side of your neck. His tongue feels warm, but the trails of saliva he leaves have you shivering. “Too dumb to speak?” he scoffs, biting down against a particular spot on your neck. You whimper, unsure if it’s because of his hands or his mouth.

“N-No,” you try to sneer back, fingernails digging into his skin through his shirt. His hands are getting braver now, the pad of his pointer finger dancing over your engorged clit. The sheer material of your panties certainly doesn’t help, each touch feeling like it’s being magnified three times over. And if it felt this good with underwear, you can’t even begin to imagine how it’d feel without.

You don’t have to ponder for long, because soon after Jungkook is slipping his hand beneath your waistband, touching your sensitive pussy head-on. “Kook.”

He uses your momentary vulnerability to ease himself from your hold, finally recoiling enough to smother your mouth with his. You moan in surprise, thighs quivering as he gets to work circling your hardened bud sans your panties. Jungkook isn’t the least bit kind as he kisses you ruthlessly, likes he’s trying to compensate for something with his movements. When he finally pulls away it’s with an obnoxious pop and cherry red lips. He huffs, glancing down to see where he’s got his fingers pleasuring you.

Your thighs are squirming back and forth, closing around his hand every few seconds. Jungkook snorts. “Huh, look at that,” he mutters, trailing down until his fingers are gliding over your quickly sopping folds. “Stupid girl is good for something.”

Your cheeks burn. “Kook, I’m not—“

Jungkook levels you with an unimpressed glare. “Not what? Not stupid? But I could’ve sworn you just spent the last few minutes saying you were,” he drones meanly, landing one light slap against your cunt that makes your hips buck.

You bite down a whimper. “I was just…” you trail off, eyes rolling back when he teases one finger against your opening.

“Kidding?” he supplies. “Well, I wasn’t.” Your heart stutters in your chest, eyes growing wide as he finally pushes himself off of you, propping himself up with an elbow beside your head. His gaze is dark and unrecognizable. “I think you’re so fucking stupid, doll,” he sneers. “And what are you gonna do about it?”

You should have seen this moment coming, the manifestation of that shiny side of the coin finally reaching its full potential.

While Jungkook wasn’t exactly shy about his interests, he certainly wasn’t tripping over himself to tell you every new kinky thing he wanted to try. You sort of guessed he had some interest in this sort of play a few weeks ago when you watched the Barbie movie at his place. A lot of that night had branded itself into your three am wet dreams, but there was one particular moment that stood out to you. That was you, on your knees, with him condescendingly patting your head. Or just last week, you vaguely remember the term slipping through his lips as he pleasured you with The Bullet Bestie.

The thing about Jungkook was that, until last night, he would have never admitted, or so much as even thought, that he was better than you. That was fine because you would say it enough for the both of you anyway. Did you think Jungkook was amazing, an absolute diamond among these measly rocks? Absolutely. (Were you slightly biased because you were his girlfriend? Skip.) However, you also had this insane evil villain complex that made you want to brag about everything you possibly could, especially if that meant bragging about your boyfriend.

Realistically speaking, he was better than you, that much you could look past yesterday’s anger to admit, and not even in a stuck-up, conceited way; he had a really good job, an architecturally amazing house, and a hot girlfriend. Meanwhile, you had a mediocre job, an okay apartment, and an insanely sexy Calvin Klein boyfriend, half of which he had pointed out yesterday. Regardless of how powerful that third factor was, he still outnumbered you three to one.

Sue you, Jungkook was amazing. Anyone could see that! Except, maybe, himself.

And if the only time Jungkook would openly brag about his greatness or establish how much better than you he was, was in a post-fight, sex-induced setting, then you were more than happy to be his punching bag. So long as it was on your terms, and not as a result of his weirdly bottled up feelings.

(Yeah, you would have a long talk about that tomorrow.)

But for now, you pout up at him, clamping your thighs shut purposefully. “You’re stupid too,” you defend, “stupid and mean.”

Something in his expression changes. Suddenly, he’s moving at superhuman speed as he snatches his hand out from where you had previously trapped him between your legs, yanking you up by the front of your shirt. “Mean?” he mocks. “Isn’t that what you always wanted?” You shiver, fingers wrapping around the wrist that holds your sweater. “Wanted me to be mean and push you around like a little rag doll?”

Jungkook looks at you for another two seconds, before he’s slowly pulling away from you, leaning back on his knees. His tongue is pressing against the inside of his cheek, jaw tightening from the movement. “Baby,” he says so quietly it instills a prickle of fear in you, tainted with delicious excitement.

“Yeah?” you whisper, sitting up tentatively as you watch him, He was a bit frightening, like a wild animal about to devour you whole.

Jungkook rolls his neck, the joints in his spine cracking as he begins tugging off his shirt. You salivate at the sight, too focused on the sinewy muscles of his body to catch the dark gaze he levels your way. He throws it off to the side, his sleeve of tattoos that wraps around his bicep and begins to crawl down his chest wonderfully unobstructed now. “Eyes up here,” he says and you quickly meet his gaze. He leans forward, muscled arms coming to cage you against the headboard. “Stupid little sluts don’t have the room to make such comments,” he rasps out, unamused expression adorning his normally soft features. “Don’t you think so?”

“I-I don’t know,” you stammer, leaning away as he comes closer and closer, eventually just turning your head to the side to avoid that emotionless look. It’s the wrong move, and Jungkook lets you know as much by forcefully digging his fingers into your cheeks and turning your face back around to meet his gaze.

A hand grabs beneath your knee, tugging harshly until you’re flopping down onto your back with a squeal. You settle with his knee pressed hotly against your core. Jungkook stays towering over you. “Dumb little girls who make me watch cartoons,” he spits, tracing a hand over your chest, molding your breasts beneath his hands roughly enough to make you gasp. “And watch little animal movies on Disney+. Aren’t they just so stupid?”

“So stupid,” you concede, subtly shifting your hips for some desperately needed friction. Jungkook snorts, finally granting you your wish with one rough slide of his thigh against your core.

“I agree,” he says, and surprises you with a hand around your throat as he leans in to properly grind his thigh into you. “All they’re good for is being dumb little sluts with good pussy,” he murmurs darkly, thumb pressing into the side of your neck forcefully. “Sometimes, they don’t even do anything,” Jungkook continues, his other hand on your hip hauling you higher up his thigh. You mewl, soaked panties rubbing roughly against your folds. You miss the soft swirl of his thumb, the gentle prod of his fingers. Even so, you can’t deny this change in Jungkook is doing something to you, riling up a part of you that you hadn’t known existed. Maybe it’s the horniness from yesterday that was left unfulfilled, the one year anniversary sex that was put on pause. “Just lay there and take it, too fucked out and dumb to say anything.”

His fingers loosen for the briefest of seconds and you gasp for breath. “That’s terrible,” you whimper, rolling your hips up into his thigh, so close to his swollen cock.

Jungkook chuckles without an ounce of humor, pressing your foreheads together as he helps grind you to completion. “Isn’t it? I think that stupid little girl is cute though.”

“I’m sorry,” you blurt, vision spotting as he tightens his hand back around your throat. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you moan, stomach tight from all the stimulation.

Jungkook hums, slowing you down with a tight grip on your waist. “Hm, what are you sorry for?” he croons, pink lips pulling into an evil smile. “You said you weren’t that stupid girl, __.”

You shake your head, trying to roll your hips up again but he’s holding you too tightly now, rendering you immobile beneath him. “I am,” you choke out shamefully, grabbing at the hand on your hip in a feeble attempt to remove it. “I am a stupid little girl.”

Jungkook smirks, leaning down to slot his mouth over yours. “That’s right,” he murmurs, “nothing but a dumb little slut.”

You shiver, opening your mouth when he slides his tongue against your bottom lip. He’s not the slightest bit nice, and more messy than usual. He pulls away with a bite to your lower lip, meeting your trembling gaze with that same unrecognizable glint in his eyes. “Come on, dummy, keep up,” he snarks before devouring you again. You try to, you really do, but he’s moving like an animal today, despite his slow and drunken movements from that morning. So you end up with his saliva dripping down your throat, clinging to the corners of your lips as he begins slowly grinding you against his thigh again. He flashes you a wicked smile, pearly teeth on display for you as he glances down at your messy appearance.

“Are you gonna touch me?” you ask, lower lip trembling at the thought after your desperate rutting. Jungkook purses his lips together in thought.

“Mmm,” he hums. “Don’t know yet.”

You whine. “Jungkook, please,” you whimper, wrapping your legs around his waist. “I need you.”

Jungkook chuckles, running his hand up your waist and taking your shirt with him. He slips his fingers beneath your bra, pushing the wire over your chest as he mouths at your neck. “Cute,” he says. “Can’t do it yourself?”

You tremble, chest arching into him as he rolls your nipple between his fingers. “I-I can,” you gasp. “Just feels better with you.”

Jungkook follows your statement with a nip against your skin, tongue soothing over it right after. “Why? Because I do everything better than you? Even make you cum better than you?”

Your cheeks heat up at his blatant ego rearing its head, hands carding through the hair at the nape of his neck. You say nothing, and that only eggs Jungkook on. “Come onnn,” he teases, finally, finally rolling his hips down onto your core. You squeak, head falling back against the pillows as you’re granted the one thing you’d been chasing. “Say it.”

“Say what?” you ask, voice wobbly as he continues to slowly rut against you, the front of his shorts pressing against the soaked crotch area of your panties. “Oh, oh, Jungkook,” you whine.

Suddenly he bites down harshly, teeth digging painfully into your skin. You yelp in surprise, pussy throbbing at the pain that shoots throughout your body. Jungkook pulls away and doesn’t bother soothing over it as he leans up to capture your jaw this time. “Say you’re a stupid little slut who can’t do anything without me,” he purrs, kisses too soft for the words he says.

Your mind blanks, torn between the humiliating phrase he wants you to say and properly checking him in his place. In the end, it’s with a twisted need to please him that you’re repeating the words back to him. “I-I’m a stupid slut,” you whimper, fingers digging into his shoulder blades as he continues pushing you right along the edge. The rope pulled tightly in your core is slowly being pulled apart, threads hanging on for dear life. “Can’t... can't do anything without...”

“Without who?” he asks, reaching down and untying the front of his shorts. “Can’t do anything without who, baby?”

“Without you, without you,” you cry, bucking your hips up against his, the combined movements of both your bodies making you shake like a leaf. “Ah, K-Kook,” you wail, hips stuttering as your orgasm finally swallows you up. Your panties quickly grow wet and icky from your own arousal that pools between your thighs. Jungkook lets you writhe beneath him as you chase your high, mouth sucking a pretty blossom against your jaw.

You know better than to expect the night to end here, especially after seeing the glint that had been in his eyes as he watched you unravel.

He leans close, let’s his nose brush against yours as you catch your breath. “So perfect for me,” he groans, slotting his lips against yours. You can barely keep up with him, languidly going along with his hot tongue. “Perfect, perfect girl,” he murmurs, a stark change from the less than friendly adjectives he used just moments before. “Tell me you love me?” he says softly.

You nod, mind fuzzy as you wrap your arms around his neck. “Love you,” you exhale, letting your fingers knot in his hair. Your proclamation does something to him, makes him grind the front of his cotton shorts hard against you. For someone that was often rough and brutal with you in bed, he sure was sensitive to the mushiest of things.

“Don’t deserve you,” he huffs, hot breath fanning across your skin. He switches gears fairly quickly. “Tell me you hate me,” he begs hoarsely, rutting against your soiled panties. “Tell me I’m a piece of shit and you could do better without me,” he pleads, voice too airy to be another one of his usual sex-induced thoughts.

You shake your head, pressing a kiss to his cheek as he rolls his hips. “It’s not true,” you whisper, “I love you more than you’ll ever understand.”

Jungkook groans, suddenly winding back and tearing your ruined panties down your legs. You gasp in surprise, letting him haul you about in his blind, self-inflicted rage. “Stupid, stupid,” he huffs, though at this point you can’t tell who it’s directed at. With your underwear out of the way, he wastes no time plunging his fingers back into your cunt, bypassing the tight ring of muscle around it without any of his usual care. “You should hate me,” he snarls, lips pressed against your ear.

You moan, back arching at the sudden pleasure that blossoms between your thighs. “I-I don’t,” you gasp, toes curling.

Jungkook groans, the sound traveling down your spine and straight into your pussy. “Stupid girl,” he huffs, slipping an arm around you to pull you so close until you can’t breathe, chests lined up together. His skin is warm to the touch, scorching almost. “Fuck,” he groans, curling his fingers inside of you. You whimper and moan, incapable of staying still beneath him as he tortures you with a thumb to your clit. “Tell me you hate me,” he seethes again.

Despite the fog that’s settled over your mind, you still manage a resolute shake of your head. “N-no,” you cry, digging your nails into his back. They run dark red lines over his skin, making him hiss at the sting.

Whatever punishment he’s trying to put himself through is falling through with your refusal to admit such a thing. It aggravates him even more, your adamant stance on loving him so, and he’s retracting his fingers before you can cum again. “Please,” he chokes, face tucked into your neck. He’s sloppy with his movements; as he pulls his shorts down and kicks them away, he nearly suffocates you with his weight. “I don’t deserve you, ___, please.”

“I love you,” you whimper for lack of explanation. Jungkook leans back, that same madman gaze in his glossy eyes. He’s looking at you in disbelief almost, pouty lips puckered and swollen. Your hands slip from around him, falling on either side of your head.

Like a cobra he strikes, collecting your wrists in one hand he pins above your head. The sudden movement has him leaning in close, lips brushing over yours. His lashes are coated in a wetness he refuses to acknowledge, looking at you like you drive him insane. “If you ever try to leave me,” he whispers, jerky breath fanning over your skin, “I’ll lose my mind.”

He loves you so much it aches.

“I won’t,” you whimper, feeling your own eyes well up with an emotion that consumes every inch of your being. “I’ll never leave you, you stupid, stupid boy.”

A faint smile crosses his features at your words, lips quirking to the side. You relish in it for all of two seconds before he’s ramming his cock into you, your sensitive walls spawning around him. You sob loudly, eyes rolling back into your head. Your legs instinctively hook themselves around his waist, digging into the base of his spine as he rolls his hips into you.

You feel full and complete like he belongs there in this moment and every moment after this. It makes your heart constrict painfully. Jungkook’s soft groans follow your more unraveled noises, the vulgar slapping of skin on skin the underlying melody to it all. “Ffffuck,” he spits, greedily swallowing your moans up. You whine, arms bucking in an effort to hold him close. But he’s determined in his act of restraining you, long fingers tightening around your wrists until they hurt. “I warned you, didn’t I?” he huffs, snapping his hips into you.

Your walls clench around his hard cock, the drag as he exits sending shivers throughout your body. Jungkook’s body towers over you, glistening in sweat as he nails you into your mattress. “Remember what I said?” he asks, voice but a shuddery exhale. You shake your head numbly, overwhelmed by the rough drag across your walls. “All those months ago, when you first came over,” he adds. The hand on your hip abandons its post to cup you beneath the jaw, palm pressing sinfully against your throat enough to block the tiniest of airflow. “I’ll fuck you and keep you forever,” he murmurs, voice deeper than the pits of hell. He licks a fat stripe over your cheek like you’re nothing but a sweet for him to devour. “Do you remember that, pretty girl?”

You nod jerkily, hips arching up into him when he thrusts into you again. It’s a memory that replays in your mind every so often, your first night with the man you had planned to humiliate over a mere misunderstanding, now your boyfriend of one year. “Want that,” you gasp, tears blurring your vision when he begins picking up the pace. “Wanna be y-your pretty girl forever.”

Jungkook groans, kissing the corner of your mouth. His thighs are some magnificent beings, keeping his pace consistent even as he loses himself in his overwhelming need to kiss you. “Always,” he manages, soft lips pressed against yours. “I won’t ever let you leave.”

A shriek tears itself from your lips as he picks up that harsh piston, releasing your jaw to hold both wrists above your head. It makes his curls dangle in front of his eyes, covering that beautiful dark gaze. It makes his thin little necklace swing back and forth too, though it’s too small to actually touch your face. The rhythmic swing has you hypnotized, just like everything else about Jungkook.

With the length of his hair, you’re left staring at his lips, pulled taut between his pearly white teeth. The word from before sits heavy in your chest, begs to drip from the tip of your tongue. But he’s moving too fast and too hard, scrambling your thoughts until all you can think about is the cock plunging into your heat. His name falls from your mouth like mindless blubber instead, arms thrashing as your second orgasm swallows you up. It sends you crashing, body spasming as the sheer euphoria waves over you slowly and then all at once.

“Perfect,” he grunts, leaning down to slot his mouth against yours, “my perfect girl.” Your cum makes the sound of his hips erotic, the loud squelching following your panting. Still sensitive from your high, your body unconsciously tightens around him, keeps his cock from fully leaving. It brings a soft whine out of Jungkook, one he tries to muffle against the side of your face.

“Inside,” you whimper, even though your body feels like jelly beneath him. “Cum inside, Kook, please,” you beg.

It only takes a few more thrusts into your leaking hole for him to finally reach paradise, hips stuttering when that first shot of pleasure hits him. “Fuck, fuck,” he growls, wildly snapping his hips into your achy cunt. You moan, feeling just about brainless at the overstimulation. His cum leaves you full, almost makes your belly bulge from it. When he’s done he doesn’t bother pulling away, simply slumping into your limp form. His cock, though quickly softening, serves as a plug for the cum threatening to spill out of you.

There’s a muted noise coming from the other room, the faint sound of the mail slipping through your letterbox, the quiet chattering of the street outside. And of course, the loud blaring of your laptop playing the Phineas and Ferb theme song. Jungkook registers it at about the same time as you, a soft chuckle leaving his lips.

He pushes off of you soon after, leaning on his palms over you. He’s got that molten look on his eyes, the heat of a thousand suns burning behind those irises as he looks at you. Like he can’t get enough, even though he’s just about taken everything there is to take. “Love you,” he murmurs quietly.

A drop of sweat rolls over his forehead, clinging to the end of his eyebrow. You reach up and brush it away, let your hand trail down his face to cup his cheek. Immediately he leans into the touch, eyes falling half shut. “Love you more,” you respond.

“Impossible,” he scoffs.

Soon after you’re both stumbling out of bed, clothes haphazardly shrugged back on as you drift through the living room. There’s a thin, hot pink package sitting at the door, just having slipped through the letterbox; the stark Sexuality Unleashed logo is printed on the visible side, so you have to wonder what Doyeon could have possibly ordered this time that could be so thin. The laptop is awkwardly sandwiched next to a throw pillow, barely open a crack. Jungkook retrieves it, sets it on his lap as you scamper over to the couch.

“More Phineas and Ferb?” he asks quietly. He hates it, you know he does. And still, he wants to watch it with you.

You nod. “Please.”

He isn’t so concerned with the plot as you, clicking some random episode to start. You snuggle into his side, quietly singing along to the opening. After a moment, Jungkook speaks again. “Phineas and Flirt?” he offers cheekily.

You roll your eyes. “That might’ve been your worst one yet,” you sigh, trying to drown out his indignant huff by focusing on the screen.

“I don’t exactly see you coming up with these,” he points out, obviously feeling wronged.

Without missing a beat you say, “Disney+ and bust.”

epilogue