#also like. im making this post from the perspective of someone who always saw staged finale as really cool

[dr3amofagame]

I find it strange that a lot of people are coming forward and saying that the staged finale was a bad play for one reason or another but it really isn’t and I don’t understand where the hate is coming from.

yeah i've seen some of this the last few days--staged finale has always been somewhat "controversial" in the lorehead scene, so a measure of disagreement/discourse about it makes sense. especially bc it was honestly a very big change to what people thought was the story and required people to go back and reevaluate a lot, which. people are naturally resistant at doing

but while obviously i think that some healthy discussion about these things is good, and i feel like i have seen a level of...misunderstanding? about it?? which has gone into the ways that people disagree

staged finale refers to the decision to stage the finale. that's it. staged finale just asserts that based on preexisting foreshadowing and based on the sheer level of suspension of disbelief in order for genuine finale to be real, it made more sense for the finale to be staged than for it to have been genuine. how the finale was planned, when the finale was planned, and to what ends it was planned are all things that you can disagree on w/ other staged finale believers/supporters while still being a staged finale believer/supporter, ykwim? if you believe that c!punz faked his betrayal to c!dream, then congrats! you believe in staged finale. oftentimes i see people say things like "i don't believe in staged finale, i think that c!dream faked the betrayal and all and always had c!punz on his side but i think that the reason behind why he did it is [X]" and it's like. staging the finale is one (1) event, not a comprehensive explanation for everything c!Dream does. that would be more in line with something like the "strategist dream interpretation," which in itself does have different readings as well.

people have listed all of the inconsistencies in the staged finale before, but just to summarize--the guy literally could've dipped when everyone came to "defeat" him, c!tommy leveraging his own life is basically no leverage at all when the mans has the revive book, skeppy cage is a joke, c!dream revealing all of his plans when they were maybe 10% carried out (the entire damn attachment vault was empty of items besides stuff that was literally faked, his own damn stuff, and stuff that he stole recently from c!tommy such as the Axe of Peace and the discs) is ridiculously stupid, why the hell does he have blackmail against c!punz included in a bunker that c!punz clearly had access to???? the list goes on.

(as someone who took awhile to be fully convinced in staged finale, what really tripped me up was the stream punz did the day before: here's a post breaking it down that definitely helped me to see it in a different light.)

as far as foreshadowing goes, just off the top of my head: the original prisoner is a constant question from the day of the prison's creation, being something that's even highlighted on the day of the staged finale itself. c!Dream saying he has "the biggest house on the server" and how it's full of redstone. the entire conversation he has with c!punz, obviously. his holding back on the favor with c!techno, the connection between the revive book and the prison that he establishes the day they begin prison construction.

from a logical perspective, the plan as c!Dream establishes it doesn't make any damn sense. c!dream had opportunities to escape that he didn't take for illogical reasons (if the only reason why he allowed himself to stay in a fucking possible kill chamber was to keep c!tommy from committing suicide, then? what about the revive book? what about the fact that he literally kills c!tommy just a few months later????) -- a level of plot contrivance is expected in the medium, but for a lot of people this was just. Going way too far. Unless he literally lost his whole mind (which, to be fair, was the persona being played) there's just. really no other way to make sense of what was going on there, if it was all genuine.

the other argument is a narrative one--people claim that the story established by a genuine finale is cleaner than the story of the staged one, and honestly. it's like. like that's...a feature, not a flaw? the reason why the genuine finale worked isn't because it was logically believable. dream is Dream Manhunt. he's famously hard to nail down, famously good at escaping sticky situations, famously a man that can outsmart his way out of crazy disadvantageous situations--like. just in terms of minecraft skill, i'd wager that most people would think that dream would've technically been able to pull off an escape even when facing down the collection of enemies that were there. like he had 2 stacks of pearls.

narratively, though, the staged finale has a story that's quite appealing on the surface. the "story" of the events from the spirit speech onwards is one that revolved around the idea of "attachment." c!Dream rejects attachment in favor of control in the spirit speech when he says he refuses to let his love for his dead pet control him anymore, and he focuses on the ability to use the discs to control c!Tommy. the fact that c!Dream's relationships deteriorate at this time seems to support this point, and c!Tommy's strength in his relationships being what saves him and damns c!Dream ties everything off into a neat bow. c!Tommy wins because he has friends and c!Dream loses because he doesn't, moral of the story established, hip-hip-hooray. And so it goes.

but when we look at this more in specifics...? it does start falling apart a bit, doesn't it?

although c!Dream supposedly begins his rampage over his existing emotional connections with the spirit speech, his reputation had been in shambles long before that point. c!Dream-as-villain is first established as part of the greater story in the lmanburg revolution, and that's a title that he never really sheds (this point being emphasized in inconsolable differences and the book c!Wilbur has c!Dream write.) Dethronement happens within a day of Spirit Speech, iirc, and on that day c!Quackity specifically points out that c!Dream has no one on his side but c!Punz. the moments where he is more specifically isolated go back to events such as november 16th, where his alliance with c!Wilbur involved blowing up L'manburg, his deal for the revive book, which involved his publicly betraying Pogtopia, or his opposing Manberg to the literal Manberg cabinet. etc. all of these events in the Manberg/Pogtopia era had c!Dream's loyalties erode to end up as just c!Wilbur and later c!Schlatt for the book, two dead men. (and i say eroded loyalties as if pogtopia really believed dream was on their side, like, ever? like he was never trusted in their ranks, even by c!Tommy, who was definitely the person he worked the closest with outside of c!Wilbur.)

if we look at Dethronement itself, it doesn't actually fit the pattern of "c!Dream cuts off his attachment to people in order to make himself uncontrollable" -- in fact, what it does fit the pattern of is. Staged finale? Faking an end in a relationship with people that he does consider important to him, making a public appearance of betrayal + anger to mask an existing connection, drawing attention to their being enemies to hide the fact that they're actually friends--that's not c!Dream cutting anyone off. That's just the exact same ploy that he uses to make people think that c!Punz betrays him (only c!Sapnap and c!George ended up deciding that Nah We're Gonna Kill You Now. Fuck You It's Coup Time. so that's how that ended up.)

Otherwise there's...the Badlands, who were perfectly happy to agree to joining the coup on the day of dethronement if it got them more power and land. c!Techno, who c!Dream wasn't an ally of until later on with the favor established and then doomsday, and who was someone c!Dream was quite openly wary of + afraid of due to his combat skill. c!Dream was alone literally before exile even happened, his remaining "attachments" of c!George and c!Sapnap turning against him like the day he goes on a whole spiel about ohhoho from today onwards i DONT GIVE A SHIT ABOUT MY ATTACHMENTS !!! I ONLY CARE ABOUT THE DISCS !!! like congrats you don't even have a chance to cut off any attachment at all dingus they all hate you and want you dead already.

further, with c!punz, he literally says that they're more than just employer/employee in the infamous conversation they have about planning a betrayal. if the whole point of the story is "attachment good," then why is it that what takes down c!dream is...his one remaining attachment? if his fatal flaw is that he didn't trust people enough, why is it that he loses because he trusted someone too much? it's not like c!tommy had any attachment to c!punz--c!punz explicitly "has a reason" to betray c!dream because of money. he helps c!tommy because dream "should have paid [him] more." none of that reflects that spirit of "attachment" that people claim was c!dream's downfall.

(not to mention how the people present in the staged finale to take c!dream down included people who literally hated c!tommy's guts. like. what brought them together wasn't the power of friendship, it was the power of we hate this green bastard.)

this isn't to say that c!Dream didn't have some relationships that go up in flames because he starts acting particularly cackling evil villain (with the green festival being the specific moment where he really goes full in with that persona, going from someone that was framing himself as having a Reasonable Complaint to literally the joker as soon as he gets the disc from c!Tubbo. It's purposefully played as a "mask off" moment that is meant to make him look like a crazy fucking villain in front of a large audience--whether or not you think that was a choice that he made in character or not, the way his personality changes as soon as he receives the disc is jarring.) In particular, his relationships with c!Puffy and c!Sam come to mind--c!Puffy burns the house she made him when she decides that he's too evil (but, uh, c!dream really wasn't even there for that and didn't ever have a particularly close relationship with her) and c!Sam is among those whose opinions of c!Dream become drastically more negative around the period of time that spans green festival->doomsday->staged finale. but it's important to note that c!Dream's relationships on the server aren't...great, at the time of spirit speech. They're uh, really fucking bad, actually. dethronement only makes them even worse, and all of this happens pre-exile. c!Dream had significant reason to be paranoid and afraid for his life long before exile happens, which is Quite Significant, Actually, when you consider that that paranoia is literally what goes into his decisions to carry out the staged finale + put himself in the prison (which isn't the case for genuine finale, where he's more motivated by a desire to control the server without being controlled himself.) staged finale does solidify c!dream-as-villain for a lot of people, but it never would've worked if people didn't already see him as a villain in the first place. c!Dream doesn't make people hate him with the staged finale; he uses hatred that he already knows exists to put himself in what he sees as a safer position.

and look we could go into a whole discussion about manberg/pogtopia c!Dream (which i do think is way overdue to be fair considering that that's where the paranoia + isolation that motivates him post-november 16th comes from in the first place) but this post is long enough already and i still have to figure out a better way to articulate my thoughts on the matter. anyway. carrying on:

people still have different feelings on why he carries out staged finale in the first place, but what we do know for sure is that it was meant to protect punz and protect the revive book. by firmly establishing that c!punz and him were on opposite sides, he keeps the revive book safe and both of their lives safe by extension: as long as no one would kill both of them at the same time, they had a means of reviving the other if need be and obviously had the information on how to raise people from the dead secure. which was important to them. and otherwise...c!Dream is paranoid. c!Dream is very, very paranoid, and this paranoia goes back at the very least to when he learns about the revive book. the prison, for all the dependence that it required of him, was tailor made (and the construction process controlled by dream every damn step of the way) to make sure that whoever was in the main cell would be safe from external threats. the security of the prison and the prisoner was the POINT. i've seen some assertions that staged finale implies that he predicted everything that happened after he was put in prison and...no? i'd say that c!dream's behavior indicates him being thrown off by c!sam as early as bad's prison visit, c!sapnap's prison visit for sure. c!Ranboo being banned from visitation pretty damn obviously fucks him up, tbh. he has c!punz explicitly out there to keep an eye out on the server while he's in the prison, where he was meant to remain for a period of time that was supposed to be much shorter than how long he ends up being there. likely because, you know, he was supposed to have a consistent and reliable source of information with the outside world in the form of c!Ranboo, and c!sam wasn't supposed to fall off the fucking rails as soon as the prison started. people have also talked about how having the staged finale be true means that c!dream doesn't lose, which...i mean. gestures at the prison arc? that whole thing is a loss so catastrophic it literally destroys him. he's never the same after the prison happens. the false betrayal of c!punz is deliberately like ironically described to c!sam, who was the REAL betrayal that fucking. ruins him. he loses SO MUCH over the course of the prison, which was something he literally designed to keep himself safe from external threat. as far as losses go, i definitely find that a lot more compelling and a lot less contrived than watching c!dream go "whoop de doo guess i have to die now" when he's like 3 pearls away from making a clean escape in the disc vault, tbh.

at the end of the day, i think having some conversation about staged finale is fun! and it's always good to reexamine what you believe to make sure that it still holds water. but i've really not seen much staged finale crit that makes the genuine finale feel favorable as an explanation: logically, it makes a lot less sense. narratively, it relies on a story that the audience wants to be true and acts as a "clean" explanation for everything while not actually taking into account a lot of what was ACTUALLY going on for c!dream (cutting off attachments for the sake of control versus watching people turn against you and becoming increasingly paranoid, for example). and believe them or not, the content creators involved have always asserted that staged finale was the plan from the beginning, not any form of retcon. (and we do know that people have been dodgy about stuff like the "original prisoner" literally since the week that c!dream was imprisoned, so take that as you will.) (okay to be fair theyve been dodgy about the original prisoner since the day that the prison began to be constructed, but the QnA from that first week of imprisonment sticks out to me in particular because cc!Sam had the biggest fucking smile on his face and staged finale would've been planned out and then carried out in entirety by the ccs and the c!s by that point.)

this is a longass post but uh hopefully it makes sense, lmao. tried to touch on most of what i've seen recently 😅

#my asks !! #long post #c!dreamisms #also like. im making this post from the perspective of someone who always saw staged finale as really cool #but really wasn't 100% convinced until like ehhh halfway through the prison arc roughly? #like im not claiming any credit as a believer from the beginning it took me awhile #so like. i get it. #i think for me a lot of it was also just a lack of faith in the ccs' planning and writing and feeling that narrative contrivance #could be explained through the ccs being less experienced writers + the sheer level of what they were carrying out #but you know. staged finale canon now and im not gonna sit here and pretend that im the smartest person in the room #when these guys definitely overachieved in terms of what i was expecting them to pull off #by making a plot twist that was THIS BIG and conning the whole damn fandom and server in one #like nah they deserve their W actually lmao

[wehatejulietsimms]

A/N: i'm gonna respond to this in sections bc it's quite long so bare with me.

Howdy y’all, 🤠 again. Yes, I didn’t in fact die. I’m sorry though that I kept getting sidetracked and couldn’t submit this until now, my boss decided to keep dumping her work into my lap. So I just wanna preface this by stating that I’m going to try and say what I want to as coherent as possible, but I have pretty severe ADHD so I’m not always as easy to understand as I think I am in my head, and I often go off on tangents, over explain things and circle back to topics randomly without realizing. Im basically going to go over their relationship over the years as I said previously (I’m not gonna go into detail about every single scandal and shitty thing Juliet did over the years, because we’d be here all year. so I figure I won’t cover them here, but rather let people ask specific questions if they want to. Remember, I was present for pretty much everything so feel free to ask.😊), but I’m also going to do kind of a mini deep dive into Andy’s behavior and actions (because although the snakes will hit you with every excuse in the book, and tell you that you’re looking too far into things and that it doesn’t matter, it does. The way a person acts in general and towards people around them is very relevant when talking about someone’s health, happiness, and well-being.) To start off, let’s take it all the way back to the time before Juliet’s reign of terror, when Andy and Scout were still together. In all honesty from what I saw of them together (and I saw pretty much everything they posted, I’m only a year younger than Andy, and I was quite into him when he was on MySpace and such, and I always watched anything with him and Scout together because they were fucking adorable lol) they had a really healthy relationship. Not once did I get weird vibes from them. The way Andy acted toward and with Scout, you could tell they really loved each other and were happy together. They had nothing to prove. It just was normal. (For any of you who are younger, or didn’t come into the picture until Andy was already post-scout and would like to see some videos of them together, you could generally search on YouTube for it, but also there’s a specific channel on there called like bring the milk tea or something that has videos of old Andy blogs and also Andy and scout on stickam and such. Worth a look if you’re curious) They weren’t constantly all over each other like possessive pack dogs *ahem Juliet ahem* and whenever Andy mentioned scout he didn’t need to shower her in compliments. They both seemed very secure in both themselves and the relationship. Super cute. Initially when they broke up it seemed quite odd. I didn’t really expect it. It got even weirder when he states that he and Juliet are together. It didn’t feel like they fit together at all (and no I’m not talking about from a fame or success perspective. At least not yet lol) As I’ve said I got bad vibes from Juliet right from the get go. Andy already seemed to be acting not like himself. (Also snakeys have argued that it’s just that he’s more mature now and that’s why he acts nervous and constantly looks Ike he wants to die. 🙄 maturity doesn’t mean losing your fucking personality and being unhappy most of the time. Jesus Christ.) it seemed like they got possessive of each other and constantly needed to show people how in love they were. Pictures, videos, and fucking public love paragraphs to show they are, in fact, in a super real relationship and they love each other. It also felt like Andy’s family was in on this whole weird charade.They (Chris honestly) started to defend her degenerate behavior and attack anyone who had even a whisper of negative things to say about her or their relationship. It was like watching a group of awkward, pretty mediocre actors put on a play about them being together. (I’ve hit the text limit now, but there will be more that I will write just after I submit this one though, fear not haha. N, you can either post this now or wait until I submit the rest, it’s up to you.) 1 / ? -🤠

A/N: i was here for a lot of it as well so i do remember some of this. although i did join the fandom shortly after him and juliet got together (i joined like around the time she was on the voice) i literally remember hoping that him and scout would get back together bc juliet just rubbed me the wrong way and i didn't know why at the time. & side note i actually do recommend people go look at old videos of andy and scout they were really adorable. there is this one video of them singing (i think a carrie underwood song lol) in the car and it's really cute. but yeah just bc he's older doesn't mean his whole entire personality changes. you can be any age and act however you want. i could even use jenna marbles & julien solomita (a youtube couple) as an example, they've been together for i think like 8 or 9 years and are about the same age as A&J (julien being around andy's age & jenna around juliet's age) & although they can have mature adult conversations and all of that, they still act like idiots and joke around together. neither of them look uncomfortable or are afraid of saying certain things like andy is around juliet. so andy aging doesn't mean shit in regards to his personality doing a 180.

🤠okay, so part two here we go. (Also I apologize if I get the chronological order of anything I talk about incorrect, I’m a bit scattered sometimes and the next ask I make will be the one where I talk about the domestic abuse and I tend to get quite heated, which only makes my brain function worse lol) so the point at which Andy was trying to get fans to go vote for/ support Juliet when she was on the voice seemed really fishy. I’m all for supporting the work of the people you love, but it’s kinda strange how hard Andy was pushing this at the time. Too hard in my opinion. I’m obviously aware that it was helpful in the end and he more or less got what he was asking for. But it was like he absolutely needed people to vote for her. As if he would get in trouble if they didn’t. So around 2012 or 2013 it felt like things really went down the shitter from there and just got progressively worse. (I never knew why for the longest time, but after they revealed that Vegas wedding that happened in about that time frame, it made a lot of sense.) Andy’s behavior began to change towards his fans. There are a lot of accounts of this happening from fans themselves and a lot of people said that 1. It was worse with Juliet around, and 2. a lot of the time it would happen towards females especially. ( I think more towards the “pretty” fans but don’t count me on that, I don’t know for sure.) This was completely night and day. Especially coming from the same man who used to always defend his fans and once stated something along the lines of he would never have a crazy or awkward fan story because he loves and is grateful for all of his fans and he won’t get upset if they’re just really excited. I would understand if these fans crossed the line in some way (like the later incident of fans finding his address and harassing them, which is unacceptable no matter who the people are) but from most if not all of the fan stories I’ve heard, they didn’t. They were being respectful and didn’t do anything to warrant this happening to them besides showing up. Which brings me to my next point, a lot of these negative experiences were caused by Juliet. Either she was the one being mean to people, she was causing Andy to be mean to people on her behalf, or her presence was upsetting Andy to the point that he was angry and started being rude and irritable. What scares me the most are the accounts of Andy having a whole Jekyll and Hyde thing, depending on weather or not Juliet was present. Happy when he’s free of her and miserable when he isn’t. In videos of him where Juliet is behind the camera he always seems nervous and strange. Like he’s afraid to mess up. That’s fucking alarming to say the least. You would think that the last thing one would want to do if another person brings them this much anger, stress, and anxiety, the LAST thing they would want to do is fucking marry them. Right? He literally started barely smiling at one point and really doesn’t anymore. I mean for Christ’s sake look at his wedding photos. What’s suppose to be one of the happiest moments of your life and to quote another anon with a different ask, he looks like he’s being dragged to the gallows. (And I get really fucking Angry honestly when snakeys tries to pass it off as “oh he’s awkward he doesn’t know how to smile” or “omg he’s being dramatic for the aesthetics” in some pictures, yes. But why the fuck would you look like that in pictures with the “love of your life” who you now regularly write cringy paragraphs publicly professing your love and complete adoration for? Andy knows how to smile genuinely. Ffs he used to. He smiled genuinely when he was a kid, he smiled genuinely with scout, and he smiled genuinely when Juliet wasn’t around. He doesn’t smile when she is there, and if he does, it is pretty much always visibly fake.) So I may backtrack a little later, but right now I want to talk about the fact that Juliet IS an abuser. More specifically, the plane incident. (Word limit. TBC.) 2 / ? -🤠

A/N: yes. 100%. when it comes to the wedding photos i will never understand people (specifically snakeys) writing off his behavior as him "just being dramatic for the aesthetics". is that something he would do in photoshoots? yeah. is it something he may do on stage? sure. something he would do in an interview? maybe. but candid shots of him on one of the "happiest days of his life"? wtf no. & idk why people think that.

🤠 Just before I start, again, with the pictures, I really don’t think that Andy is enough of a self absorbed egotistical dick that he would actually sit there and put on the whole “miserable tough guy” act in every fucking photo he takes. Ah yes, the infamous plane incident. So straight up, Juliet exposed herself as an abuser, and brought out every bullshit excuse in the book (and made Andy go along with them) to try to cover it up. 1. She was drunk. Honestly this is total bullshit. I say this same thing when people defend cheating or any other degenerate behavior with the excuse of intoxication and I will say it now. Being drunk does not make you a different fucking person. It does not change the thoughts in your head. What it does do is impair your ability to make decisions and judgement skills in general. It’s the same reason why people drive drunk. It’s routine. Its what they would normally do. And because they’re drunk, they can’t see any reason why they shouldn’t do that. Juliet gets drunk, she and Andy fight, she wants to hit him, and because she’s drunk she doesn’t think that she shouldn’t fucking put her hands on him. 2. She hit him in “self defense” and he broke her ribs.(There’s several points I have debunking this) first of all let’s get this out of the way, no one on that plane (including the very real witness who just so happened to be an adult film actress (I think?) who you so love to discount because of it) saw him strike her or even touch her at any time. Two, you are in fucking airplane seats sitting right the fuck next to each other with an armrest in between. It would be pretty fucking hard to break your ribs unless they were made of actual glass, or Andy’s real name is Bruce fucking banner. Bones are surprisingly strong and I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that it’d be damn near impossible for him to do that to you, which brings me to three, if he had broken your ribs you would not be fucking standing up, thrashing around, whining like a little bitch, and oh by the way, continuing to abuse your husband for the second time on that flight. Four, you had a miscarriage. (When I was trying to conceive with my husband it was very difficult. I had two miscarriages before I finally had my son. I’m fully aware of how devastating having one is.) which is why if you are not lying (which I fully believe that Juliet would stoop that low just to get sympathy, especially with this big of a scandal. But I don’t actually have proof of this so I will say that it is just speculation on my part) I don’t fucking care. I am not unsympathetic to her if this did actually happen as I said, however, You do not get to make any excuse for putting your hands on another person out of anger. Ever. I don’t care who you are, I don’t care what kind of stress you are under, I don’t care if you are inebriated in any way and I sure as hell don’t care what the fuck you have between your legs. You do not hurt anyone. Point blank period. Five. You are a woman, you can’t hurt him. This one, actually enrages me. We all know your crusty ass pulled this one out (and threw around trump supporters a few times for good measure) because you know damn well how society and the media views and deals with abusive women. Women can abuse. Women who are shorter or weaker than their target can abuse. The fact that there are people who either don’t know that or don’t agree with that is absolutely baffling. Six. The same (I believe) porn actress. Literally saw you beating your own face with the restraints you had to be put in (which by the way flight attendants only ever use restraints as an absolute last resort when someone becomes a danger to the others on board, so she had to be acting absolutely deranged) to give yourself a bloody nose to claim Andy hit you. Then you proceed to act like a child and tell Andy to call your fucking dad. (Which kinda proves that whole Scientology thing honestly) what in the hell. I stg as long as I am breathing I will never let this go. This is actual fucking domestic abuse. (Word limit TBC.) 3 / ? -🤠

A/N: yeah her hitting him "bc she was drunk" was never a good excuse not only for the reasons you mentioned but, also bc let's be real at no point are you ever going to get served enough alcohol on a plane to make you that drunk i don't care what anyone says. also when it comes to the excuse of him "breaking her ribs" does she forget that andy actually did break his ribs a while ago? i think she even visited him when he was recovering so she should know what kind of pain he was in. & if he actually broke her ribs, there's no way she would have even been able to stand bc i know andy sure wasn't able to. he said it was one of the most painful things he's experienced. (i don't think i need to comment on the rest of this. it would just be redundant. you hit the nail on the head with that.)

🤠 I don’t care if it happened just that one time ore more likely is an everyday occurrence. Abuse is abuse and should never be tolerated. Kind of getting away from the plane thing. Andy always seems, as it’s been said on here before, afraid to mess up. Like he might mess up, and make her mad. A common behavioral pattern in abuse victims. He also at this point and for a decent amount of time before, doesn’t seem like he loves her anymore. Like he keeps up appearances and pretends, but it’s like it’s a job he’s forced to do. He’s tired and burnt out but was probably manipulated into staying and juliet is probably clinging for dear life. Also I don’t know if I’m the only one who thinks this, but I swear, the veganism and sobering up was just a cover up, most likely formed by either Juliet herself or her fucked up family, after the plane incident to hide their tracks and regain some public favor (because you know, if you advocate for animal rights then you can’t abuse your husband 🙃) Andy never gave a shit before though. Even though it was unhealthy he loved to drink and smoke and was very outspoken about that. And he used to never give a fuck about eating meat or consuming animal products like leather. I mean they’re still selling leather goods ffs. I would get having minor fuck ups because you don’t know any better, but it’s fucking leather. And now Andy is unhealthy and miserable as ever, but the culprit is malnourishment and Juliet rather than cigs, alcohol, and Juliet. My final thoughts: I do definitely believe in the Scientology theory, but if not that than I definitely believe that Andy was and is being manipulated for his fame. On several occasions it really looked like they broke up, including the time when they did, and then said it was a joke. It really doesn’t feel normal. Also, Juliet doesn’t really care about Andy that much. She never wears her wedding ring, she sells all their shit, including sentimental items, and now that she’s gained more popularity from being with him, suddenly doesn’t want to put him in her bio or write him the same creepy ass paragraphs or anything. It’s fucked up how shes so keen to say she did it all herself when really she’s been riding dick for fame since before she even met Andy. It also always kinda seemed to me that Amy was kind of uncomfortable around Juliet. We all know that Chris loves to kiss her ass night and day (most likely to do with the Scientology thing “if” it’s true), but Juliet and Amy always seemed to have a weird relationship like it was tense and forced. Also I just want to mention the time that Juliet talked about screaming at the woman over what I believe was a game night and brushed it off as being competitive and no one gave damn. Fucked up. To finish off this already way too long little series, I think Andy is a very vulnerable insecure person who got manipulated by several people (not just Juliet) some of whom he probably really trusted, and they helped to get him in Juliet’s (equally if not more insecure) hands so she could hurt him as she pleases. I truly hope that even now both he, and his parents (even though Chris really grinds my gears) can get out of this whole shit show, relatively unscathed. I know this is probably pretty unlikely, but hope springs eternal I guess. As I said feel free to ask any questions you may have and I will try to answer them best I can. Thank you for reading. 4 / 4 -🤠

A/N: yet again you hit the nail on the head with this part so i don't need to comment too much. other than the fact that i do agree that juliet and amy's relationship does seem weird.

#submission #anonymous

[freebooter4ever]

i’ve seen the discussion going back and forth on boundaries and sexual objectification, and i don’t have much to add to the conversation other than to say everyone is allowed to determine their OWN ‘lines’ and just because we don’t vocalize them doesn’t make them any less valid. but here’s the limits i set for my blog if anyone feels it is important for them to know (<3):

personally I consider ‘characters’ fair game for anything goes, with ‘public personas’ a little more iffy. ‘RPF’ isn’t new - it just takes on a new more accessible/visible form nowadays. i remember reading my first fic about a ‘real person’ back in my LOTR fandom days - it was a story in first person perspective about the main character meeting orlando bloom on a plane before he was ‘famous’. like a lot of these types of stories, it wasnt so much about the person as it was about the meet cute. the actor was just a convenient placeholder with a handsome face and some personality quirks thrown in to make the romance/dialogue more specific. i personally dont read much xReader fic nowadays, but mostly only cause i’m an old fart who can’t relate to the ‘you’ format. i miss the good old days when people actually created OC’s and then inserted them into things LOL. but also LOL if you think i’ve gone an entire year of quarantine without some imagined personal fantasies of joe mazzello (or steve aoki in the years before)(ramilicious can attest to this. she can also attest to most of these fantasies ending in friendship rather than anything explicit cause that’s just how i roll these days lol). the line i draw is i would never post these types of fics in a place where the subject could accidentally find them - you have to go looking for this stuff on tumblr, most fics are given explicit ratings and under read-mores. with the blacklist tags it’s pretty easy to filter things out. its even easier to add filters to ao3 searches. i am NOT going to do something like message steve aoki and say ‘yeah i watched that movie Ibiza like five times, here is my 1k fic where you’re the dj and i’m the one night stand’. but obviously people still enjoy imagining scenarios like these otherwise movies like Ibiza wouldn’t exist?

for art, i consider anything already on display up for grabs, we all know a certain person’s ass is all over the place...all you have to do is google ‘need for speed’ and rami’s name. HOWEVER, in the case of actors i personally would not draw anything more explicit than what’s already there. i’m not gonna draw full frontal nudity for rami (unless he gifts us with it in a movie, i suppose) or anyone. this is 100% a personal choice for me. 

i was a sophomore or junior in college when i volunteered as a figure drawing monitor where i’d time the nude model’s poses and help them set up the stage and lighting and such. there was this one guy in his mid forties probably, a regular who came every week, and i always thought of him fondly till one day (the day after i ran into my Hot Programming TA during dinner and later sent him an email begging him to go on a date with me because i was desperate for kissing experience)(and Hot Programming TA emailed me back within minutes saying yes) this artist guy who i saw all the time and thought i knew fairly well, decided to draw me instead of the model. which would have been fine except he drew me naked. i was NOT naked at the time, i was wearing a shirt, and a bra, and a full prairie skirt with alternating calico and floral patterns. he drew what he imagined was underneath all that. he came up to me after the figure drawing session and showed me his drawings and told me i had been ‘glowing’ and my response was to laugh it off awkwardly and get the hell out of there as soon as i gave the model their pay check. but inwardly i was thinking a) i was NOT glowing for this creepy man twice my age and b) i did NOT give him consent to sexualize my body under my clothes and then SHOW me that objectification. i never said anything to him or anything else, i continued to be the monitor, and i continued to field off creepy advances from him including multiple job offers, but when i finally realized i could just...stop..and i passed the student volunteer monitor job on to my friend naeem, i also realized that what that older male artist did was NOT ok in my book. and it was probably not something he would do while naeem was monitoring.

nowadays im working in an industry that regularly objectifies female bodies. in the past year alone i have had to deal with requests to make breasts bigger, i have been given character rigs that in addition to the usual elbow, knee, and spine joints also have ‘nipple’ joints but ONLY for the women (to make them jiggle for animation), every time i send out a female pose i get it back with notes that push it further into the sexy type of body language reserved for women (twist the spine more! sway the back more! give it ‘energy!’), i have been told to erase wrinkles and fat and pores but ONLY for the women (men you ADD pores bc realism! and manliness!) and this is all me working for a company that is actually fairly progressive in terms of sexism compared to OTHER studios.

like it or not, sexual objectification is a huge part of specifically women’s lives and how we react to that is our business. for me, turning the tables and putting men on display feels like fair’s fair. i cant stop the men from doing it, so if i want to enjoy sexualizing male bodies, damn it im gonna! like dang it, boy do i want to send steve aoki a thank you note every time he posts a video of himself doing those ice baths during the sunset golden hour bc holy shit gorgeous or working out in his gym wearing VERY little clothes, but i dont because i know what its like when someone imposes their personal fantasies on the subject. or, god, there was that time i had to unfollow nicole’s insta for a while bc i had a very explicit dream about her and realized, shit, i need to take a break and get my emotions under control before i can refollow. and god some of the stuff i see dudes sending her during her live videos on mental illness/meditation is TOTALLY gross and not something they should be confronting her with. and she’s not even ‘famous’ famous. or how some fans send their idols explicit direct messages without consent. THAT feels inappropriate to me.

a part of me feels like i shouldn’t have to defend this. men don’t. they’re even encouraged in mass media to sexualize women. but i also recognize the importance of talking about consent. the importance of recognizing that a celebrity deserves to have their boundaries respected. these are my lines in fandom. other people have different lines they won’t cross, and that’s okay to me. i block or blacklist any blogs or tags i think go over the top.

heck, even in fandom-only spaces i still try to keep my own more sexual fantasies off this blog and only in private messages with my friends and mutuals, and i feel like that might come across as unintentionally prudish or judgmental sometimes. i’m not ‘horny on main’ very often. but like...every time i reblog that particular ‘washing machine’ gif of joe mazzello am i thinking about him naked and thinking about how he’s got very loooooong feet, and ‘gee i wonder if that means /other/ things are Too Big for my tastes’ but also ‘gosh wouldnt that make a pretty picture to draw’???? hell yeah.

i dont know who is gonna actually read this essay but yolo i guess :)

#journal shit

[springfieldblues]

this writer and journalist i admire did a guardian article that was basically like “i watched 50 hours of new simpsons so you don’t have to!!” and i kinda...didnt agree with the overall ‘new simpsons bad’ tone (though some points were interestingly phrased re the constantly shifting timeline) but something that stood out to me was that The President Wore Pearls was one of the new episodes cited within the article - the country im in always just reruns simpson eps in random order so i never knew what season that ep was from but in my head, me and my peers think of that as a classic from when we were kids! (and constantly quote ‘purse! lunchbox! teeth! milhouse!) i’m 22 so i guess people have been watching simpsons a lot longer than that, but what i think i’m saying is the demographic of simpsons watchers is as fluid as the shows timeline yknow? because it’s something so many generations watched as kids, people will be nostalgic about different bits/have different perspectives on what’s ‘old’ and what’s ‘new’? because the simpsons is such a long-lasting cultural wave it’s almost like if people started complaining about like, mickey mouses or santa clauses’ continuity changing? does this make sense? i’m kinda spitballing here haha

yeah i would hardly consider The President Wore Pearls new at this point...its from season 15, which is still before the simpsons movie even came out. ‘new’ simpsons to me would be like. HD era simpsons probably, but i guess post-movie simpsons could count as well. idk. the teen seasons were a very awkward stage

youre definitely right about the demographics though. this 18-19yo on twitter told me that if you didnt grow up with the simpsons, the classic seasons can feel kinda meh (this person did, however, grow up with family guy so maybe that influenced their perception of the show as well)

then again sometimes i see people even younger than that very earnestly into the simpsons and classic episodes as well, but i wouldnt know if they were influenced by a parent or older sibling or someone who also liked the classic episodes or just watched reruns and liked what they saw

i know as a kid i watched reruns and liked what i saw. by the time i started i mustve been like 10 years old and stuff like New Kids On The Blecch was pretty new (my earliest memory of this episode is watching it on an old tv with terrible signal after spending the day playing gameboy by a hotel pool because we went to the beach for the weekend) but i found myself enjoying episodes from season 8, 6 and 4 too without even knowing what season they were from. i didnt really think about which ones were newer, i just wanted to watch cartoons

idk! people are built different and we all have different experiences, perspectives, perceptions and opinions of things. we cant all enjoy the same things in the same way and thats okay

#Anonymous #asks

[queenlokibeth]

hi, i saw your addition on a post about age gaps and while i agree with what you said in general like how 15 and 18 is messed up, i noticed your example with the two 20-somethings revolved around the premise that one could be in college while the other is a college graduate, but... not everyone goes to college? also, there are people in their late 20s who are still college undergrads for plenty of reasons (started at a later age, have chronic health issues, took time off to grieve a loss, etc.)

Oh my FUCKING god i know i know i KNOOOOOOOOOW this fucking post will haunt me forever.

They're EXAMPLES. I SAID that they're EXAMPLES. I said COULD BE in college. It's to put things into PERSPECTIVE.

Im not a fucking dumpling I know that not everyone goes to college. I'm sorry for getting so agitated im just so tired of everyone disescting that post and taking it as some sort of instruction manual instead of general advice. It's not that deep. It's an example of how vastly different people's life stages can be in a relatively (otherwise) short period of time. One could be an international rockstar and the other could work in a farm. One of them could have 10 years experience working in their trade and the other be still be living with their parents and never have even put up a lemonade stand.

Everyone is different everyone can do different things but the point is that objectively a 29 year old has almost 50% MORE LIFE EXPERIENCE THAN THE 20 YEAR OLD. It could work. It could be healthy and good, but it could also be a huge power imbalance. Im not telling people who to date or not date, im telling people to be wary and critical of what they're doing, to be careful, and not simply parrot AGe Is JuST a NuMBer!1!!1!1 because that's DANGEROUS. We tend to overestimate how mature, experienced we are, especially when we're younger. If you're 20 you probably shouldn't be dating a 29 year old unless you've proven to TRULY be advanced for your age, but most importantly that THEY have proven to be mindful of the age difference and concious that there could be a power imbalance, and are on top of their shit with communication and being careful. If the 29 year old is being dismissive about age concerns, that's a huge fucking red flag.

I'm going to use myself as an example. I've always been "mature for my age" in terms of life responsibilities, taking care of myself, etc. And BECAUSE of that I was also very aware that I probably wouldn't do great with someome much older. In fact, at one point, I had a terrible situation with a friend just 3 years older (in high school that is significant) that thoroughly hurt me, but that was also because that specific person was trash. I have always gotten along well with people one or two years older than me, but I also have a few friends who are 1-3 years younger and I make sure to take on a very "older sibling" kind of role. In the last couple years, due to personal circumstances + pandemic, i objectively matured like 5 years. I had to do stuff that none of my peers have done, that many people wouldn't do until their late 20s maybe, or later. I look at my own self from 2019 and go "damn, that's an entire baby" so I would feel more comfortable dating someone in their late 20s NOW, for example, BUT ONLY IF THEY WERE CERTAINLY NOT A WALKING RED FLAG, and not someone who was, in their own reality, more advanced for their age (for example, when I turn 29, I will objectively be at an entirely different place in life than some of the people I grew up with. Due to cultural reasons, some of my friends might JUST be moving out to live on their own for the first time, but I would've already been doing it for a decade)

THESE ARE SUGGESTIONS DONT GET DEFENSIVE IM JUST TRYING TO HELP PEOPLE

#ask #anon

[kpop-pick-me-up]

So, can I say something real quick about Kpop idols?

This has been a thought on my mind basically since I joined the Kpop community, and I know some people might react weird or not understand what I'm trying to say but that doesn't matter to me. Putting this out there does.

*ahem* NO KPOP IDOL IVE SEEN PEOPLE CALL CHUBBY IS ACTUALLY CHUBBY.*ahem*

Like for real. I see posts talking about how Suga's cheeks get chubbier on break, and how Haechan's cheeks have gotten chubbier, or "before" and "after" pictures of idols who have gone on a diet and people saying "I miss when they were chubby" like.... They never were and they aren't. This is just what they'd actually look like if they got a normal amount of sleep, ate like a normal human, and didn't dance for 4-12 hours a day. That's not chubby, that's how they'd naturally look.

Chubby, to me means that a person is slightly overweight, or that they're a healthy weight but naturally softer and can look more fuller. Which is all beautiful. And I'm aware this can be a culture difference because of how idols are expected to be thin and perfect but sometimes when I look at them I just think about how unhealthy some (not all) of them must be physically.

Because on a mini tangent: when someone eats so little amount of food for so long and is they are always in a caloric deficit (so let's say youre recommended amount to maintain your weight is 2000, but you constantly eat 1500, or 1200-1400 calories a day) their metabolism adapts so that it's natural state of burning to maintain IS 1500 or 1200-1400. So they'd HAVE to eat less to lose weight, or fix their metabolism by slowly increasing their food intake so their metabolism can adjust to a normal amount of food again. But to do that their weight would plateau or they'd even gain a little bit. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with an idol gaining weight or doing any of this, except for the fact that they'd be called "fat" by the media. Nobody actually seems to care about an idol's health. And imagine what calling them "chubby" does to them when it's just them eating normally. Why do you THINK idols always go on strict diets before a comeback? Because they know that if they eat normally people would know and call them chubby. And I'm not saying this offends them, but I know that I would feel so pressured and judged subconsciously to eat less and lose the "chubbiness" because the media must see it too if fans do.

And I know some idols don't care or even just say they don't care (but trust me, they probably do), and I know some of you guys don't mean to hurt their feelings and just mean to say it innocently, it still encourages this unhealthy mindset that all idols MUST be borderline unhealthy, and just BARELY a healthy weight or diet amount. This gives their employers a reason to make them do those crazy restricted diets (ice cube diet, or the IU diet for example) and force them to lose weight because they KNOW and SEE what you do as well, and can see when you comment on it.

To put this into a different perspective as well, as someone who's been struggling with an eating disorder, looking at really thin idols like Jimin, Suga, Haechan, etc who all weigh less than me and are taller than me and to see them called "chubby" kicked my mind into comparison mode and said "then I must be HUGE." Or "I won't ever officially be skinny or pretty until I weigh the same as them or less" because that's how a sick mind works. So not only does this infect the idols minds and encourage the bad mindset, but it can infect their fans minds to think that they aren't good enough.

I've never wanted to point fingers at this because I love it so much, but I can't be a fucking liar anymore and hide behind it because I want to get better, and I'm tired of believing that I'm too big, or that I'll always be chubby until I'm 90lbs like all the female Kpop idols. But sometimes the Kpop fandom can trigger my eating disorder. There, I said it. Fight me. Because you call thin idols chubby, and you implant this way of thinking that how they eat is okay, and that weighing 90lbs and eating 1200 calories a day is a lifestyle or that constantly restricting and not focusing on nutrients or what body type I am is how life works because IT ISNT. Some people may be that naturally, but the fact that some idols noticably change a little bit when they eat normally on breaks shows that how they are on stage isn't natural.

And to end this off as a disclaimer again, I know people don't mean to be triggering, and they don't think there's anything wrong in what they're doing (which I understand), but you also have to really take a second to think about what you're saying a little bit. Chubby is a word that is either black or white to people. Either they think it's cute, or they think it's an insult. That all depends on culture and self esteem and blah blah blah. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with being chubby, or that it's a bad thing to be because it is definitely NOT and I think everyone is beautiful how they're meant to be. So of you're 90lbs or 140, or 180, or 200+ or anything in between naturally you're all still beautiful and have your own necessary standards to consume to be healthy that will be different from everyone else. However, that is where the issue lies. Because most idols weren't born as thin as they are, they are usually forced and conditioned to be that way. But to help you decide whether it's okay to make these comments, ask yourself this when you're about to call an idol chubby:

1: am I calling them chubby because they're "eating well" (a normal diet) and they've started filling out?

2:Would I like it if someone I loved, respected or whom I cared about their opinion called me "chubby" after finally getting off of a restricted diet and just eating healthy but normal amounts of food?

3: If I was a Kpop media outlet and saw that they gained weight, what would I write? (Really put yourself in their shoes and be honest.)

4: Am I calling them chubby cheeks because they're just puffing them out and being cute? (Then okay, it's fine)

5: when I say this, are they really chubby? Or has my mind been twisted to think they are just like their critics?

And I know that may seem extreme, but that's how it is. You all preach about how self love should be more important in the "toxic" Kpop industry but still subconsciously encourage its toxic behavior. So instead of comments like "omg your cheeks are so chubby now! <3" or "awwww look at his tummy he gained!" Say: "Omg, you look so healthy! ", " You've been looking extra cute recently 😍" and stuff like that. Because it still gets the point across that you like seeing them healthier, but it doesn't use possibly triggering words like chubby or thick because they are neither.

Anyways that's my mini rant. I don't mean to trigger people, or point fingers because I used to do it too. But I think we all need to collectively recognize this as part of the issue, and say, "huh, maybe that could hurt their feelings a little but EVEN IF I DONT MEAN TO, OR ITS NORMAL WHERE IM FROM TO SAY AS A COMPLIMENT"

Because as one of my favorite quotes puts it in words perfectly "You don't get to decide whether you hurt someone or not." So yes, people like me are sensitive, and yes, it may not seem like a big deal to you. But honestly I've sat by and respected all of your guy's opinions and words for a while now, and I think it's now okay for me to say "hey, this kind of bugs me a bit." Without being looked at as weird or annoying.

So in the nicest way possible, say what you want, but I'm not taking this down. I've made myself clear and as understanding as possible. But people like me who have an eating disorder, had one in the past, or are on the road to developing one, or someone who is about to start one of the insane Kpop diets, needs to know that this isn't normal. And they shouldn't compare themselves to the unhealthy kpop standards like it did.

Anyways, thanks for listening to my rant.

~DeepSheep

#bts #nct #nct 127 #nct dream #nct u #red velvet #got7 #svt #seventeen #twice #jyp twice #momoland #blackpink #exo cbx #exo #astro #ateez #straykids #skz #txt #bighit #sm rookies #jyp #monsta x #itzy #kpop #kpop opinions

[blaperile]

Homestuck Epilogues - Meat - Page 13 (Epilogue 2 Page 5)

#Homestuck #The Homestuck Epilogues #Meat #Epilogue Two #Vriska #Tavros #Meenah #John #Lord English

[abundantchewtoys]

HS Epi Meat, p5 reaction

Meat Page 5.

We might be due another perspective switch - unless the plot stays with John until he's assembled all his friends.

When John goes to pick up Rose, it’ll probably be on LOLAR. Terezi might still be there, if she hasn’t gone clownhunting just yet.

If so, perhaps we’ll get to see whether Rose ‘n Terezi’s migraine was really due to the substance abuse + caleidoscopic colours of LOLAR + glitches… Or whether it was due to the GO timeline “supposed to” have gone differently, with John’s current retcon being the thing missing to happen. It takes a bit of effort, remembering what everyone was exactly up to on this part of the GO timeline and what would be a fortunate time for John to take it off the rails. For Kanaya, that might very well be the moment Jane set up her literal shop on LOFAF, selling her all those blood potions, for instance.

For Dirk, it might be before his conversation with Arquiusprite.

I'm getting the feeling that John might be jumping to exactly those moments in the scenes where the characters were at their lowest, self-esteem wise. Giving them a literal second breath. ;)

Not sure what we can expect from the ghost side of things though. I think they might not be duplicated, leading us to meet up with (Vriska) as we knew her, punk cut and all. Even though GO Terezi's ghost will be there with her too.

I'm half convinced Calliope will get copied somehow, but not entirely sure. The only 'real' duplicate Calliope had already, besides Alt Calliope, was her dreamself. He could snatch the body, but I was under the impression Caliborn consumed it in a literal sense to establish his dominance over the body.

Meanwhile, it occurred to me to that Andrew Hussie (the author avator) will make a comeback, probably a background cameo. I've only now realized that he's a literal ghost writer of his own story right now, in-canon. While outside of canon, he’s more becoming like Stan Lee, executive producing stories using characters he designed.

Anyway, let's start this up.

---

"The stands of the Cantown Memorial Arena" Okay, my first thought was this takes place on the meteor, but yeah, it's a building named presumably after the literal Cantown WV build in his station, back on Earth. Or the Exile Town that Bec Noir massacred. Though, does this indicate a perspective switch back to Roxy... Or is the CMA where Rumble in the Pumpkin Patch is recorded? Probably the latter, meaning the perspective is switching back to Dave! Uh, the alpha version, I guess I should call him? Post-canon, adult Dave?

"His shit eating was so brutal that no one, except maybe Jake, cares that he’s taking a phone call in the middle of a live broadcast." So, was it staged, or did Jake really get a power boost, coming into his role as the Page?

Also, I feel like if Karkat's run for president gets announced by Dave on live television, "and the crowd goes wild" will apply here.

"Dave takes a seat on the couch, right in Karkat’s butt groove." Okay, so he's not going just yet. ... Karkat's butt groove is available because the latter absconded the fuck out last we saw him, hahah.

"a piece of absolute garbage." Callback secured.

"DAVE: while the beatdown you just received was as thorough as it was humiliating im afraid as usual the solution to this problem should probably not involve your decapitation" While Dirk might be the one to keep this beaten dead horse of an in-joke going, Dave isn't going to be the one to cut its head off and end its misery. :P

"DAVE: jake just kicked your ass DAVE: thats really all there is to say on the matter" AWWWWW yessss, hahahahah. Dirk's laid down, on the ground, on his smartphone, just like Dave was after his beatdown by Bro. Awesome callback.

"DAVE: its really amazing how this meme we have going here continues to be exactly as funny as the day it was established DIRK: Isn’t it always though? DAVE: yeah" That's Strider Irony at its finest for you. You never can be entirely sure non-sincerity is what's taking place here.

" DAVE: how DID you get your ass kicked so bad DAVE: jake sucks and his raps are fucking awful" Oh, scratch that thing about his power level, then. ... The rapbots didn't join in to beat Dirk down, did they? ... Though I would like to see either them or their zilly versions again. :P

"

On the TV, Dirk makes an elegant hand sign that once might have represented solidarity with some ancient coastal rap group but now has been utterly divorced from its cultural context here on Earth C." Is it a sign associated with... the ICP? Yes, I guess whatever 'references' the kids make get picked up as divine decree...

"The camera pans away from him and over the crowd. It zooms in on a young crocodile wearing an oversized T-shirt with Jake’s highly marketable ass plastered over it and the phrase “Tally ho” written in big bubble letters." ... including stuff that was already dated when the gods were still actual kids. (By which I mean the phrase, not Jake's marketable ass.)

"DIRK: Holding back a little to achieve certain results doesn’t necessarily mean you’re participating in a farce or rigging the event. DIRK: We do this all the time. We hold back our thoughts, our true feelings, our full potential. We disguise how much we know about what and when, for many purposes. To ease relations, to let others behave naturally and make up their minds without undue intervention. To wait for the right moments to show our hands, to pick our battles. " Dirk is still overthinking things. :P He's also still a schemer, even though he's grown more mature. I think in this case, he might be trying to keep up Jake's taste for adventure and hone his skills? That might be related to the fact that he's one of the few in the know of what John is up to (also a thing he's withholding right now), and he might be trying to get Jake battle-ready in case he needs to be. ... In case he doesn't believe they'll stay irrelevant to the plot.

"DAVE: my dog you are full of some SHIT today arent you DIRK: Absolutely." It's a good thing Dave can see Dirk typing, otherwise I might have asked whether Dirk may have reinstated an autoresponder to answer when he's busy. :P

"DIRK: And when it comes to theater, there are just as many reasons for restraint. To build tension. To set the stage. To give the people someone to root against." Okay, that's actually kind of meta. Also, in-story, it might mean Dirk is deliberately trying to come off as weaker, to get people to boo at Jake so he can play hero?

"DAVE: i can see you on tv DAVE: theyre booing you dude" Okay, never mind.

"The excitable salamander manning the camera switches to a fish-eye lens for some unfathomable reason, giving the whole exchange an air of demented absurdity. Dirk’s sunglasses distort and stretch to dominate the entire screen." I'm all here for NPC races doing menial labor half-way competently. :P Also, I feel like there should be some sort of visual callback to that image of Dirk's sunglasses. Something to do with the black hole from Problem Sleuth expanding to suck the entire universe up, which was reflected in the Stiller shades, and the event in itself is being called back to now, in the Black Hole sucking up the Furthest Ring!

"JAKE: What about the agitated rabble? Theyre starting to throw things. DIRK: I don’t know. Do a dance or something. Sing a song. DIRK: They love anything you do. JAKE: Ummm. JAKE: Ok sounds stupid but ill try." Using Jake's charisma as crowd control? Dirk, you beautiful mastermind.

"Jake tips an imaginary hat toward center stage and begins doing the Charleston." Hah, right, this might be a callback to that other Page dancing old-time dances, hahah, Tavros after he assembled the ghost army.

"Just as Dirk predicted, the crowd immediately loses its shit, except for a single carapacian in the front row, who continues to glower at Dirk with an expression of absolute and total contempt." If Jack hadn't remained in the session, I would've designated this guy as his great-whatever-grandchild.

"DAVE: why do you want people to hate you so much DAVE: its fucked up DIRK: You’re reading way too much into it." I don't necessarily believe that.

"DIRK: If I wanted another round of embarrassingly indulgent and mutually masturbatory psychoanalysis, I would have called my daughter instead. DAVE: hm DAVE: do i need to point out how fucking weird what you just said was or can that start going without saying at this point" This. This is Homestuck. This entire exchange.

" DIRK: The point is, playing myself up as a villain figure in this hacky rap pageant has nothing to do with getting people to dislike me. Besides, everyone loves a good villain. When they boo, they don’t really mean it." That has me thinking of Thog, a villain from Order of the Stick, actually. But yeah, Caliborn, Condy and others were really good villains. Doesn't mean we didn't mean it when we cursed them, though.

"DIRK: I think you’d be surprised by how popular I actually am. DAVE: i dunno man" At some point, playing the villain stops being a role, if you're too thorough in antagonizing the crowd. Dirk may have gone overboard here - in his role in the pageant I mean, I don't think anyone loves their god any less. Just one more way to show that, victory state or not, their original issues still come into play and challenge them to grow.

"DIRK: The point is, this is much less about me, and more about providing a foil for Jake’s heroism and charisma. DIRK: It’s very important that his popularity continues to be cultivated, to maximize his political capital. DAVE: political capital" ... Oooooh! Thinking three steps ahead of everyone again, nice going Dirk! I think Dirk might even have foreseen Dave rallying Karkat to stand against Jane, but I wonder which side he'll be choosing!

" DAVE: what the fuck are... DAVE: ok how long have you known about the jane thing DAVE: i mean is this something you have been planning for like DAVE: a long time or DIRK: Planning is such an intense word." Oh, he's trying to pull the strings again, is he? What game is he playing then, what policies does he want to instate, if any? ... Is Dirk a supposed xenophone too, or just playing to the tune of the largest group of swing voters?

" DAVE: jane is a shitty candidate dude DAVE: shes going to be so shitty DIRK: I thought you’d feel that way." ... Pfff I just realized Dirk wasn't typing, since this was a phone call. He's saying this all out loud! Typing's the old way of conversation, we discarded it for the most part, everyone has their Gift of Gab now. Well, hopefully at least Dave's part isn't being recorded and broadcast.

"DIRK: I respectfully disagree. DAVE: i get shes a good friend of yours and all but even you have to admit how far up her own ass she is DIRK: Of course. I consider it to be among her best qualifications for the job." Dirk might just be thinking: a self-absorbed candidate won't notice being pulled around. Even though she's, you know, his dear friend and all, he's still planning on manipulating her. :/ Old habits and such.

"DAVE: christ DAVE: ok if nothing else have you at least taken into account the DEVASTATION to the economy this will cause???" Strider Irony(tm).

"DIRK: Dave, I think if you search your soul, you’ll come to the same conclusion I have. Jane is just what this planet needs. DIRK: We’ve all had our fun here, but it’s easy to overlook the fact that civilization on Earth C is hardly a sustainable proposition. DIRK: Just beneath the surface, it’s quite a dangerous and unstable place." Oh, cool, so Dirk was acting on the same things Dave noticed, just having drawn different conclusions. Guess there's more to playing god as a winner of Sburb than sitting on your butt all day long, huh?

"DAVE: i know that DAVE: which is why actually i think it would be cool to have a president that is good instead of bad DIRK: He’s not as great as you think. DAVE: what" See, I know Dirk'll say Karkat, but I kind of wish he'd say Obama. :P

"DAVE: who DAVE: obama?? DAVE: how dare you" XD PFFFFFffffhah, okay, should've seen that coming.

"DIRK: I’m happy for both of you, really. It’s nice that you encourage and support each other in this way. But you’re sending him on a fool’s errand which can only end badly." Like, I understand where Dirk's coming from, we know how unbalanced Karkat is at his worst. But Dirk's seems to be the conservatist route, while the current status quo is so unbalanced someone with at least a little liberal thinking should try changing policy, little by little. ... Okay now Homestuck has me doing political discourse. Hussieeeeeeee! ... Why am I now picturing a Homestuck AU about the climate change truant student marches of Europe?

"DAVE: wait DAVE: how do you even know hes entering the race DAVE: we like just decided this DIRK: A competent political operative has his ways. DIRK: Besides, it was always pretty obvious to me you’d react this way the moment the announcement was made." Okay, not ruling out entirely Dirk has something spying on Dave, but that would verge too much on what Bro would've done in his place. He probably just cold-mindedly assessed his potential response.

"DAVE: cause if youve already got jake on your side then i guess we might as well just fucking quit DIRK: I wouldn’t worry about that. DIRK: He and I don’t quite have the rapport we once did. DIRK: He’s “over me” and doesn’t spare opportunities to make ostentatious demonstration of this claim. DAVE: um DIRK: Basically he doesn’t like being told what to do. Especially not by me." Cool, okay, so... Jake is needy in his own way, in showing he can fend for himself, at least that's how Dirk sees it. Guess they still hang out a lot though, just no longer "like that". That must be a letdown for the shippers, but a boon for the people that felt betrayed at seeing Dirk & Jake back together in the Credits. I like that middle road, actually! And hey, the versions of Jake & Dirk in the New Game Plus timeline, or whatever we should call it, are still fair game!

"DIRK: So it’s fair to say as of now, he’s still fully in play. DIRK: Not that I should be encouraging you, really. DAVE: you are one doubletalking son of a bitch you know that DAVE: i cant tell if you dont want us to run or are reverse psychology mindfucking us into running" Very true, that. Why would he share the truth about Jake if he wants to win, unless he wants fair competition? Best not to dwell on it too long on this neverending stairway of hidden intentions, lest we fall down it.

" DAVE: not like i can just stand around and wait for president crocker to like DAVE: write fucking grammar laws into the constitution" Pfffff, yes, I had forgotten about Jane's grammar practices, hahah. Guess she has a good running mate in Dirk for that, at least, capitalization and everything in order when he's not rapping.

"DIRK: Sorry to cut this short, but diapers are starting to come down pretty hard right now, and some of them haven’t even had their babies removed. DAVE: what" what. I hope it's at least consort babies, they're arguably the most resilient, as semi-sapient animals.

"DIRK: That was a joke." Ah.

"Jake can’t help but watch the motion, raking his eyes over the muscles shifting beneath the skin of Dirk’s neck and arms.

There is something implacably magnificent about Dirk Strider, Jake thinks, untamed like a wild game beast of incredible size and strength." ... Well then! I didn't think the narration would offer us this view from the perspective of Jake, thought it would be reseverd for John! Not entirely sure how I feel about the privilege of seeing Jake pine for Dirk, though. :P At least it clarifies where the allure is in it, for him. It's an extension of his taste for adventure and his upbringing on an island full of terribly powerful beasts.

"Of course, their history together is never far from Jake’s mind, however many years it’s been since their last tussle of an amorous nature. The old dramas and triumphs in the days of Sburb. Dirk’s companionship has been taxing to the heart, to say the least, and yet he’s taught Jake so much—about combat, philosophy, life, love." Okay, that is just such a Jake thing to phrase it like this. I'm glad we get to see he's not so oblivious or un-elloquent in his mind as he presents himself to the outside world, consciously or not.

"But sometimes, despite their checkered and problematic past, Jakes wishes that he could seize Dirk by the proverbial horns and wrest him bodily into becoming a much more agreeable fellow." Heheh, so Jake actually would like to impose on Dirk some manners. At least with him it stays with desires, while Dirk really did try to impose on Jake when they were together.

"DIRK: How about you kick off the next round? DIRK: I bet this crowd will settle its shit right down the moment you drop the latest rhymes you’ve been tinkering with." This is going to be painful to read, isn't it? ... If we're going to read them at all. ... I swear, this might just lead into them having "the xest rapoff in the history of Earth C".

"Jake’s face lights up. He composes himself, adjusting a bow tie, although he is not wearing one, and making a vague gesture like he’s twirling one end of that mustache Dirk has not yet let him grow. Dirk lets him go with a gentle smile, like the sort you’d give to a dog for performing a trick adequately. Jake responds to the signal like an Olympic athlete hearing the starter pistol. He was born for this." All the best and worst aspects of Dirk & Jake as a couple are basically summarized here. I mean, Dirk is not even WITH Jake and vetoes some of his choices. Then again, Jake really does have TERRIBLE (but hilarious) taste in mannerisms.

"JAKE: Tally ho its me, jake mcgee! JAKE: Popping my pistols off, two shots and a kiss JAKE: My aim is tops, i never miss" ... I'm not disappointed, this really IS almost physically painful to read, as expected.

... Okay that was actually a very amazing rap. Well thought out, good use of the vocabulary, dated though it is. I liked "jake-eng's" and "jape-slings" in particular, especially since that was what Vriska dismissed him as, a joke, a jape.

"The crowd, as Dirk rightly predicted, has settled its shit right down. This is not due to any accidental brilliance on the part of Jake English, but rather due to an abashed but loyal brand of pity, the kind a devoted fan cannot help but feel when they see a beloved celebrity make an ass out of themselves during a live broadcast they have waited two and a half years in line to buy a ticket for." I think this might be Dirk's POV. Not everyone's tastes in rap are as dignified as his, after all. :P Consorts in particular might love this. Then again, we saw John embarass carapacians not too long ago, they're not immune to pitying people. But hey, on the brightside, maybe some of the audience <>'s Jake now. :P

"Dirk’s phone begins going off again." Unless it's something more ominous, this is probably Dave having the last quip.

"With a casual flick of his wrist, Dirk snaps out a bright red tranquilizer handgun and shoots Jake in the neck. Jake’s glasses crack when he hits the mat. A chorus of boos rises up from the crowd like groundwater. Dirk artfully dodges a bucket of obscene troll fluid to field yet another very important personal call." ... Did Dirk actually use a Crockertech tranquilizer on his co-god? What the hell, Dirk? Guess all is fair in the ring.

And I suppose it's not Dave then that is calling him this time, if he takes such drastic measures.

"DIRK: Yo Rose, what's up?" Oooh, if we get to see this, that would be early we get to see Rose again! Dirk and Rose'll probably be planning their next move now that John has left. (Which I take Rose to already know about, through her Seer powers, or a call with Roxy.) ... Maybe some of their plans only could have worked IF John left, if they wanted to regain some measure of relevance through them.

#homestuck #upd8 #reaction #spoiler alert #dirk strider #dave strider #jake english

[maliasass]

hey @lydiastxles, i know it’s technically an hour after your birthday now (and im really sorry), so this is now a (very slightly) late birthday gift. I wanted to write you stydia for your birthday bc you love them, but also im kind of terrible at writing this. So this if a happy medium, with a little bit of stydia, and a little bit of malira, and lots of platonic malydia banter. Hopefully you’ll enjoy it- i tried my best. I lvoe you lots and lots, and I hope you had an amazing birthday!

without further ado, i present scenes from the you & i are a symphony universe in Lydia’s perspective:

Lydia was busy folding Malia’s laundry (partially because she was a good roommate, and even more partially because it had been sitting there for a week and she needed to borrow the laundry basket), when Malia strolled back in, slamming the door behind her as she always did.

Lydia took one look at her wind tousled hair and the jacket she had thrown on over her leotard and asked “Roof?”

Malia nodded, and that was when Lydia noticed the weirdly dreamy look in her eyes.

Lydia knew what that usually meant. “Oh god, do you have a new girl? When do you need me out of the room?”

“No,” Malia shook her head quickly, “I’m not interested in anyone.”

Lydia raised her eyebrow. She also knew Malia well enough to catch her being defensive. “Hold on. Did you find a girl you like who isn’t throwing herself at your feet just because you’re a good kisser with a dancer’s body?”

Malia flopped down on her bed. “No. I told you, there’s no one.”

“You know, if someone doesn’t immediately confess their love for you, you could always try, well, trying. I can give you some tips,” Lydia kicked the mostly empty laundry basket to Malia, “ but only if you finish putting away your laundry.”

Malia chucked a pillow at Lydia (with much more force than strictly necessary), and then groaned and rolled over to face the wall.

Lydia wasn’t sure if that was a reaction to the teasing or the laundry. Probably both.

Lydia sighed and retrieved the laundry basket, then returned to shoving the clothes into Malia’s drawers (which were a disaster- she was going to have to make Malia organize them later).

“You know,” Lydia piped up, “next year, I’m going to live alone.”

Malia gave her the finger.

Lydia didn’t get any answers until the next day. She was studying in their dorm, while Malia was draped across her bed doing, well, whatever Malia did when she was ignoring her homework, when Malia suddenly piped up.

“Do you know Kira Yukimura?”

Lydia closed her book. Somehow, she knew this was going to take more than a one-word answer. “She’s in my history class.”

“Hmm.” Malia hummed.

“She’s pretty.” Lydia commented, thinking of Malia’s starry eyes after her tryst on the roof the other day. “Smart too. Super type A.”

Malia didn’t say anything, but Lydia knew she was listening.

“She plays the violin.” Lydia added. “Religiously. I’ve heard she’s top of her class.”

“Hmmm.” Malia repeated. “I’ve never her seen her before. Does she ever go to parties?”

Lydia shrugged. She only had one class with the girl. “I don’t think so.”

Malia tossed her pillow up in the air and then caught it. “Huh.”

“So when did you meet her?” Lydia pressed.

“I just ran into her the other day.” Malia said, all too casually.

“Why the questions then?” Lydia asked, “If you just ran into her.”

Malia shrugged. “I was just curious.”

“Sure.” Lydia said, “Just curious.”

“Yup,” Malia tossed her pillow again, and then was silent for a few seconds. She piped up again a moment later, staring at the ceiling, “She is pretty.”

“What did she say when you guys met?” Lydia asked.

Malia’s face scrunched up, “Don’t you have a textbook to read?”

Lydia raised her eyebrow. “Oh, so now you care about my education?”

“Education is very important, Lydia.” Malia said, keeping an impressively straight face.

“Alright, fine. You can tell me about your new crush on Kira later.” Lydia turned back to her textbook. She did have to study after all. And Malia would tell her. Eventually.

While Malia was (unbeknownst to Lydia) busy dragging Kira around town on their not-date, Lydia was having a much less fun night.

She made her way to the auditorium after dinner, where she found the scrawny brunette she assumed was her client waiting.

He sat up when he saw walking in, “You’re here.”

“Of course.” Lydia said, “I don’t get more tutoring jobs by showing up late.”

“Right.” He popped up to his feet and held out his hand to Lydia. “Stiles.”

“What the hell is a Stiles?”

“My name.” The boy- Stiles- clarified, “I mean, my real name is, well, you wouldn’t be able to pronounce it, but everyone just calls me Stiles.”

“Okay.” Lydia shook his hand, “I’m Lydia. So, what do you need help with? I usually do math or science, but-“

“Actually,” Stiles interrupted, rubbing the back of his neck, “I, uh-“ He trailed off.

Lydia raised her eyebrows. She didn’t have time for this. “Well?”

“I need you to teach me how to waltz.”

Oh no. Just because Lydia tutored people for extra money didn’t mean she would slow dance with any horny guy who paid her enough. “Why? You’re a little old for a bat mitzvah and a little young for a wedding.”

“I’m not a creep. Promise.” He said quickly, “Look, I’m an actor, and I got the lead role in this big student play, but there’s one scene where I’m supposed to waltz, and I kind of maybe said I already knew how in order to get the part.” He rocked nervously from one to the other, waiting for her response.

“So you’re not a creep, just a liar?” Lydia responded. “Huh.”

“If I learn to waltz before the show, than I’m not really a liar. Technically.”

Lydia turned to leave. “Good luck with that.”

“Wait,” He trailed after her, “Please? If you don’t help me, I’m just going to have to watch that scene from High School Musical 3 on repeat and try to copy Zac Efron and then my roommate will laugh at me and I’ll be a social outcast and die. Do you really want my death on your conscious?”

Lydia rolled her eyes. He was going to be a piece of work, but damn, she could still use the money. She turned back to Stiles. “If you try to cop a feel, I will break your hand.”

Stiles held his hands up in surrender. “Right! Just tell me what to do.”

“Alright,” Lydia strode onto the stage, expecting Stiles to follow, “Listen carefully, and follow my lead.”

Lydia leaned back on her bed, waiting for Malia to come back. She was going to need to ice her feet after all of the times Stiles had stepped on them in the past hour. God, you would think being an actor would require some coordination. How had he never fallen off a stage and killed himself? She looked at her phone. No texts from Malia. What was she up to? Normally she was only out late on weekends or when she had been hanging out with a new girl.

As if summoned by Lydia’s thoughts, Malia strode through the door at that moment, cheeks flushed and a small smile on her face.

“Did you find somewhere other than our room to have sex for once?” Lydia asked.

“Huh?” Malia flopped down on her bed, staring off into space. “No, I wasn’t having sex.”

“Really? Because that looks like your post-sex face.”

Malia scrunched up her nose. “I don’t have a post-sex face.” She paused for a second. “Do I?”

“Definitely.” Lydia said. “So what were you doing while you were not having sex?”

“I was out” Malia said, and then added “with Kira” under her breath.

“Sorry, did you say you were out with Kira?” Lydia sat up. “Cute nerdy violin Kira from the roof? You got her to go on a date with you?”

“It wasn’t a date.” Malia said quickly. “We were just hanging out.”

“Sure.” Judging by the post-sex face, there was definitely something more than hanging out going on. “What did you guys do?”

“None of your business.” Malia replied, but then sat up and faced Lydia. “I took her to Paisley’s.”

“Oh God, did you eat the meat pancakes in front of her? She’s never going to call you now.”

“Shut up.” Malia chucked a pillow at Lydia, but Lydia caught it.

“I’m going to keep this.” Lydia said, holding the pillow above her head like a trophy. “You’re going to run out of pillows eventually and then you’ll have to talk to me.”

“It wasn’t a date.” Malia said, again.

“Did you want it to be?”

“Careful, I have a lot of pillows left.” Malia shot back.

“Hey,” Lydia looked Malia up and down, “Weren’t you wearing your jacket earlier?”

Malia looked down, as if she hadn’t realized she wasn’t wearing it anymore. “I don’t think so.”

“Okay-“ Lydia began, but Malia cut her off.

“So how was your night?”

“Oh boy.” Lydia said. She wanted answers from Malia, but she also needed to complain about Stiles, and if there was one thing Malia was good for, it was telling Lydia how she would violently murder anyone who annoyed her, which was always strangely comforting. “So I had a new tutoring job-“

“Who slept in my bed?” Lydia said almost as soon as she stepped into the room, “I said I didn’t care if you had people over while I was at my mom’s, but please tell me you didn’t have sex in my bed. If this is about that fact that you haven’t washed your sheets in-“

“No one had sex in your bed.” Malia interrupted, mouth full of chips. “Promise.” She held out the bag of chips to Lydia, offering her one. “Also, I do wash my sheets.”

Lydia took a chip and sat down on her bed. “Then who slept in my bed?”

Malia stared at her feet. “Kira.”

Lydia tried to keep a straight face. “Violin Kira?”

“We didn’t have sex.” Malia said instead of answering. “She got locked out of her room and I offered-“ Malia trailed off.

“Okay, I get it.” Lydia said, “No sex.”

“Because we’re not together.” Malia added.

“Right.” Lydia said. “Of course not.”

“How was your mom?” Malia asked, but before Lydia answered, a small smile spread across her face and she said, “I got her to ride on my motorcycle.”

“With you driving?” Lydia snorted. That was a death wish. “She must really like you.”

“She doesn’t-“ Malia began, but Lydia cut her off.

“Just like you like her.” Lydia added.

“Who says I like her?” Malia said.

“Don’t bullshit me, Tate. I know you.”

Malia frowned, and then threw a pillow at Lydia for the 10th time that week.

Lydia caught it. “You know, you have way too many throw pillows.”

Lydia set the stack of folded clothes onto Malia’s bed.

Malia looked up from her laptop. “If that’s my laundry, I was totally going to get to that.”

“Nope,” Lydia said, “I did your laundry last week. Since I do all your chores and you never study, remind how you spend all of your time?”

Malia pretended to think about it. “Dancing and sex.”

“That sounds about right.” Lydia gestured to the pile of clothes, “And Kira gave these to me. Apparently you lent them to her.”

“Oh right.” Malia said, “Tell her thanks.”

“Tell her yourself.” Lydia shot back, “And tell her to give your stuff directly to you next time. I’m not your maid.”

“You basically are.” Malia pointed out.

“Shut up.” Lydia said. “Hey, do you want to tell me what you’re going to be for Halloween?” If she had to do Malia’s laundry, she was at least going to make some money off of being her roommate.

“Nope.” Malia responded, turning back to her laptop.

“No?” Lydia raised an eyebrow, “Even if I take you out to dinner with some of the money?”

“Nope.” Malia repeated, not looking up from the laptop.

Lydia frowned. “So you already told someone else? I’m hurt.”

“So how’s waltz boy?” Malia responded instead of answering.

Lydia knew Malia was trying to distract her (which meant that she had definitely already told somebody else what her costume was but didn’t want to admit it to Lydia), but she took the bait anyway. “Utterly incompetent.”

She had met with him a second time, and it had gone about as well as the first. He was improving, slowly, but if Lydia were a quitter, she would’ve given up. Luckily for Stilinski, if there was one thing Lydia wasn’t, it was a quitter. Especially when her tutoring reputation was at stake.

“So is he in love with you yet?” Malia asked.

“Excuse me?”

“Is he in love with you yet?” Malia repeated. “Come on, slow dancing all day with a hot piece like you? He’s got to be in love with you.”

“I’m tutoring him.” Lydia said plainly. For all his awkwardness, Stiles had been nothing but professional. Apparently he had heeded her warning from their first meeting.

“Mhmmm.” Malia replied suggestively.

Lydia rolled her eyes. That was never going to happen. “Maybe I’ll put $5 on you being an asshole for Halloween.”

“That’s the lamest costume idea I’ve ever heard. What do you think I am? Wait- don’t answer that.”

Lydia patted the clothes as she walked away, “Put these away, asshole.”

“Stiles, you have to put your hand on my back.” Lydia said for the third time.

“Right.” Stiles mumbled, awkwardly placing his hand near the small of Lydia’s back. “Is that okay?”

“Firmly.” Lydia commanded. “You’re leading, remember?”

“Right.” Stiles said again, though he didn’t hold Lydia with any more confidence.

Lydia sighed, but didn’t say anything. “Alright then, lead.”

“Now?” Stiles said, but apparently Lydia’s face gave him all the answer he needed. “Now. Okay. Right.”

Despite his words, he didn��t move.

Lydia sighed again. “Okay. I’ll count. Ready?”

“Ready.” Stiles said.

“1-2-3, 1-2-3” Lydia began, slowly at first, and working up to a normal tempo. Stiles stumbled through the first few counts, but began to find his footing. Lydia wondered if he’d been practicing on his own.

They stopped after a few minutes.

Lydia nodded. “Good job?”

“Good?” Stiles pumped his fist, “Hell yeah. You think I’ll be ready for rehearsal next week?”

“We’ll see.”

When Lydia made it back to the room Halloween night, Malia was already there, which was odd, because Malia was almost always out late.

“What happened to you?” Lydia asked, plopping down on her bed and kicking off her heels. “You abandoned me out there.”

“Sorry.” Malia muttered, but Lydia could tell she wasn’t really paying attention- mostly because Malia rarely apologized.

“So where were you?” Lydia asked again.

Malia still didn’t seem to be paying attention. She was staring up at the ceiling, with a dreamy look in her eyes that Lydia had never seen before. “She kissed me.”

“What?”

“She kissed me.” Malia repeated. She sat up and looked at Lydia, focus returning. “Kira.” She clarified. “Kissed me. Tonight.”

“Congratulations?” Lydia said.

Malia cocked her head. Clearly she had been thinking about this for a while. “I didn’t think she liked me.”

“I knew she liked you.” Lydia said. Anyone who could stick with Malia after the god-awful meat pancakes had to have some sort of thing for her.

“I think I want to date her.” Malia said. “Like date her date her.”

Lydia’s eyes widened. She had known Malia had a thing for Kira, but in the year and a half she had known her, she had never heard Malia say she wanted to date someone. Sure, she had been on plenty of dates, but none of them had turned into relationships. Lydia had been beginning to think Malia had a fear of commitment.

“Good for you!” Lydia hopped out of her bed to walk over and hug Malia. Malia made a weak attempt of shoving her off, before resorting to just groaning.

“Shut up.” Malia grumbled. “I don’t even know if she wants to date me.”

Lydia rolled her eyes. “She kissed you, didn’t she?”

“Yeah, but-“

“Malia,” Lydia said seriously, “I’ve met her a few times now, and I really don’t think Kira’s a kiss and run type of girl.”

Malia tried to act like that remark didn’t make her happy, but Lydia knew Malia too well for her to hide anything.

“How’s waltz boy?” Malia asked suddenly. She had a habit of changing the topic whenever they talked about emotions for too long.

“Stiles?” Lydia rolled her eyes, “Fine, I assume. He’s getting decent at the waltz.”

“I hate the waltz.” Malia mumbled (despite the fact that Lydia knew Malia had a gorgeous waltz, Malia had never been one for ballroom dancing). “And I meant how are you two doing?”

Lydia rolled her eyes. “We aren’t doing anything.”

“Mhmm.” Malia said.

This time, Lydia threw a pillow at her.

It was past one in the morning when Malia walked into the room.

“I was beginning to think you were dead.” Lydia said from her bed, where she had almost managed to fall asleep before Malia had flung the door open.

“Did I wake you up?” Malia asked.

“No.” Lydia answered, propping herself up on her elbows. “It’s a school night, you know.”

“Hmm?” Malia glanced at the clock, “Oh, yeah.”

“Alright, what’s on your mind?” Lydia said. Something was up with Malia, and she wasn’t going to get to sleep until she got it out of her.

“We’re a thing.” Malia said, and Lydia didn’t even stop to think about how odd it was for Malia to actually answer her question.

Lydia didn’t need clarification. Her and Kira. Of course it was her and Kira.

“Congratulations.” Lydia said, smiling. It was still dark in the room, but she knew Malia was smiling too.

“Shut up.” Malia responded, but with even less malice than usual (which wasn’t that much to begin with).

“Gladly.” Lydia said, and then lay back down, and slept like a baby.

#My writing #yaiaas #tw fanfic #malira #stydia #malia tate #lydia martin

[crazydiscostu]

It’s got it all! This film literally has a character break the 4th wall (with a boat)! The Truman Show has not only been nominated for countless awards in its time but it has won countless more. We take a look at what makes this Jim Carrey outing so enduring after all these years and why it is so difficult to corner into any one genre of film.

This film can be defined as Science Fiction, Comedy, Satire, Concept or Drama, but more accurately the film is a blend of all of these genre elements. Everyone and their dog agrees the film is a giant metaphor but no-one can seem to agree on what that metaphor is. Lets get the more obvious symbolism and observations out of the way first : There’s the Christof (of Christ) / Truman (true man) dynamic between what is essentially creator and creation. The themes of Moses and the book of Exodus. But the most prevalent themes come from Plato’s ‘Allegory of the cave’, an interplay where :

“Plato has Socrates describe a group of people who have lived chained to the wall of a cave all of their lives, facing a blank wall. The people watch shadows projected on the wall from objects passing in front of a fire behind them, and give names to these shadows. The shadows are the prisoners’ reality. Socrates explains how the philosopher is like a prisoner who is freed from the cave and comes to understand that the shadows on the wall are not reality at all, for he can perceive the true form of reality rather than the manufactured reality that is the shadows seen by the prisoners. The inmates of this place do not even desire to leave their prison, for they know no better life. The prisoners manage to break their bonds one day, and discover that their reality was not what they thought it was. They discovered the sun, which Plato uses as an analogy for the fire that man cannot see behind. Like the fire that cast light on the walls of the cave, the human condition is forever bound to the impressions that are received through the senses. Even if these interpretations (or, in Kantian terminology, intuitions) are an absurd misrepresentation of reality, we cannot somehow break free from the bonds of our human condition—we cannot free ourselves from phenomenal state just as the prisoners could not free themselves from their chains. If, however, we were to miraculously escape our bondage, we would find a world that we could not understand—the sun is incomprehensible for someone who has never seen it. In other words, we would encounter another “realm”, a place incomprehensible because, theoretically, it is the source of a higher reality than the one we have always known; it is the realm of pure Form, pure fact.” – ‘Allegory of the cave’, Wikipedia

This idea was also promoted heavily in the Matrix. After all this is a story about control.

“We accept the reality of the world with which we are presented”

Moving on – Flat Earthers point to the symbolism of a presented idea, a giant dome which is not as it seems…. I’m not going to get too bogged down in that one given that the Flat Earth movement was started on 4Chan….

But speaking of paranoia – while researching the film I came across a few articles commenting on how the film echoes our current online privacy and data concerns (outlined in a previous post). However I feel that line of thinking is ill conceived : We elect to share our information, doing so without comprehension whereas Truman literally had no choice. He was born into his world was denied privacy from the start. Presumably those articles were attempting to draw comparison to Jim Carrey dumping his Facebook stock and calling out data mining? Who knows.

Soundtrack-wise the themes are emotive and engaging. Burkhard Dallwitz and Philip Glass capture the mood with each scene and build from introspective piano melodies to crashing epic tension with ease. Check out ‘It’s a life‘ , ‘Dreaming of Fiji‘ , ‘Reunion‘ and ‘Truman sleeps‘ specifically. The strings are vibrant and never overstep the mark, driving the scene in some areas and guiding it gently in others.

Jim Carrey filmed this at the height of his career but up until then was only really known for his comedic roles. Despite filming taking place earlier and delays with the studio over the films release, Carrey already had a number of successful box office films (Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (1994) The Mask (1994) Dumb and Dumber (1994) Batman Forever (1995) Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls (1995) The Cable Guy (1996) Liar Liar (1997)) under his belt. Some more successful than others obviously but this marks his first real acting job as far as I’m concerned. He has range here that we had previously never seen before. It demonstrates his first performance outside of the goofball character.

It’s worth noting that a similar project came out after The Truman Show – EDTV was another concept film which saw Matthew McConaughey (also starring Ellen, Woody from Cheers and Chandlers fruit-dehydrating roomate) elect to become a reality television star (with hilarious consequences ugh). A bit of a flop, EDTV’s saving grace was it’s ability to portray the “everyman”. They showed the effects of having the cameras intrude on the life of an aware Joe Bloggs character. The protagonist being a bit of a slob (and not too bright) made it easy for the writers to put him into that situation and act boisterous in an effort to escape. With Truman there was a child-like naivety that made him the hero of the film. His schtick was an innocence that made the audience root for him.

The deleted scenes allude to deeper plot threads and character traits. There is a scene where it could be theorised that the network were drugging Truman with “vitamins”. A scene outlining a studio plot for Truman to have an affair, a son and his inevitable death (prematurely or otherwise). In this scene they discuss Truman’s son and the continuation of the show which is an interesting concept in itself. In another scene we see that when Truman steps onto the boat – he knows completely that everyone in Seahaven is in on the conspiracy. He appears disguised as a member of his own search party and makes his way to the docks. Once he knows the truth there is no turning back for his character. Obviously this scenes omission from the theatrical cut makes for a more compelling story if Truman still has doubts as to the level and intricacies of the conspiracy by this stage.

I truly feel like Andrew Niccol doesn’t get enough credit for the world-building at play. Every character not only has a backstory within Truman’s world, but so does the actors that play them (within the confines of the world outside Seahaven). I admire this level of detail (seen more recently in the gaming world with the likes of Red Dead Redemption 2 – where the NPC’s have lives and jobs and a scheduled day independent of the protagonists actions). We can also see the sophistication of the camera technology grow as Truman gets older in the more “clip driven” portions of the film.

The filming is in itself fascinating. At the beginning of the film shots of Truman appear largely in fish eye, iris and point-of-view to demonstrate the perspective of the hidden cameras. As Truman discovers his world these devices are used less, subtly taking the audience out of this world alongside Truman (to a certain extent). The shift is subtle but wholly impactful. Even camera angles throughout the film make it look like filming is being conducted from hidden locations within the scenery.

As solid as the world-building of the film is, there are still some concerns about the ending : what happened when Truman went through the door? Did it lead into a backstage area or some sort of maintenance corridor? Echoing back to the religious symbolism, Christof addresses Truman from the heavens with a booming voice and Truman turns his back on the creator. As symbolic as his exit is in the film, Truman is still within Christof’s control (at least until he makes it outside of the secure studio/dome facility). And then there’s the legal ramifications of his departure. The studio presumably have a legal obligation to his care and well-being. We assume that Sylvia comes to meet Truman leaving the studio but we have no idea how difficult it would be for him to leave the compound property.

Christof and the network can’t have been too happy about Truman’s departure – Would they seek to smear him using footage of grabbing his wife Meryl with the blade? What are the copyright and consent limitations? Then there’s the serious mental toll of living a lie : breakdowns and trust issues, lack of anonymity. We only see glimpses of the world outside of Seahaven and even then it is only of the audience themselves. What kind of world could Truman potentially be walking into?

Calm down, Stu. It’s only a film?

The Truman Show is heartfelt and sincere. It is all of these genre specific elements, religious analogies and psychoanalytical commentaries rolled neatly into the DNA of what is a solid concept film (which ironically would work well as a television series). It asks fascinating questions about identity and privacy. For that reason I feel it will be remembered fondly for years to come. A time capsule if you will. A snapshot of a time before mass surveillance and reality television.

“In case I don’t see ya, good afternoon, good evening and goodnight”

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When Truman leaves : ‘The Truman Show’ (1998) It's got it all! This film literally has a character break the 4th wall (with a boat)!

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