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tempestswing · 2 months

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Ranking the Dark Council:

hi! I was writing some notes for a piece of SWTOR fiction I am working on, and decided to create this list as a fun way to share that information.

Dark Council Pre-Shadow of Revan:

12. Darth Aruk - we know nothing about this character, other than that they were head of the Sphere of Sith Philosophy. According to the Wiki, rooting out Revanites was supposed to be their job. What a failure, hopefully they still have a job after Shadow of Revan?

11. Darth Rictus - Also kind of a mystery, which is ironic since he was head of the Sphere of Mysteries. Rictus does appear in a novel called 'Annihilation', but that book is mostly about Theron Shan. All we really know about Rictus is that he's (A) old, (B) dislikes aliens, unless they're murderous enough, and (C) founded the Dread Executioners to take down the Dread Masters. Not enough information to rank any higher.

10. Darth Acharon - at least this guy appears in the game. He's kind of a nothing character though. He defended the imperial occupation of Corellia unsuccessfully. He was head of the Sphere of Biotics. Since he died on Corellia, he would presumably have been replaced by Shadow of Revan, but we don't know who by.

9. Darth Arkous - hate this guy, but he's still technically head of the Sphere of Military Offense after the Hutt Cartel plotline. God, what a bag of dicks he is though. The one good thing about this character is that he's technically Lana Beniko's master? Although she's an advisor rather than an apprentice, so he gets no credit for the existence of awesome Sith wife.

8. Darth Decimus - Also found in game on Corellia! Decimus is actually present in the imperial quests, so you get a lot more interaction with him than Acharon. Canonically, he also trained Krovos! Krovos is really cool, so decimus should get a few points by association. Not enough to bump him up the list though. For the head of Military Strategy, he's not a very good commander.

7. Darth Ravage - You can meet Ravage at the end of the Inquisitor and Warrior storylines, and for all imperials he is present during the cutscenes preceding the Emperor Malgus flashpoints (although does nothing to help?). The main reason I'm putting Ravage so low is that he's a little bit inconsistently written. He'll gladly say "good riddance" to Darth Thanaton's death in the inquisitor plotline, but if you kill Baras in the Warrior plotline, he'll show up at Nathema and be all offended that you claimed power by murdering your master... does he know what a Sith is?

6. Darth Mortis - I have a bit of a soft spot for Mortis. He's got a no-nonsense demeanour which is rare amongst Sith, and he's clearly serious enough about their philosophy to join a secret conspiracy against the alliance if you "squander" the power of the Eternal Throne - a petty move, this man is a bitch after my own heart. He also is the one who snaps Darth Thanaton's silly little neck, which definitely earns him a few points in my eyes. As a point, he's involved in the Macrobinocular missions, which I did not enjoy, but he was a highlight of the questline.

5. Darth Acina - WOMEN IN POWER!!! Empress Acina is better than Emperor Vitiate. Unfortunately Acina is kind of bland, I really don't feel strongly about her either way. I've killed her on Iokath in most of my playthroughs, even if I don't intend to defect to the republic later. I might be lesbian but I just don't like her that much. Her reforms to the Empire are interesting though, I do have to give her credit for making the Empire slightly less racist and Sith dominated.

4. Darth Vowrawn - Silly guy!! This man is genuinely quite funny. He's a blast to spend time with at the end of the Warrior story, after dealing with Baras' grumpy ass for close to fifty levels. His choice to help the Wrath with the Hand on Rishi says... something. He's genuinely an interesting character to me, especially since he maintains that joviality when he becomes Emperor. It's tempered, to be sure, but I think it does show it wasn't entirely an act. Vowrawn could be a genuine friend to the Wrath.

3. Darth Jadus - Sue me, I like unapologetically evil characters. Jadus is not just an evil clown, he's an evil circus. Schemer to the core and melodramatic as fuck. I chose to serve him without a second thought in my agent playthrough. I appreciated the name drop on Iokath and I have 1% chance 99% cope that he will return at some point in the story.

2. Darth Occlus/Nox/Imperius - OCs are fun. No further notes. I should probably drop the lore for my verison of this character, huh... maybe in another post.

Darth Marr - Everyone's favourite tired Dad just trying to keep his society from collapsing as his colleagues bicker about inane bullshit. I reckon he drinks coffee straight outta the pot in the Dark Council's break room. I really wish he hadn't died, but his force ghost shenanigans were neat and I liked seeing him find a measure of redemption. Again, I am on a high dose of copium but if Malgus can return after being killed and abandonded on an exploding space station why can't someone scrape Marr off the floor of Zakuul and rebuild him. I do also low-key ship Marr with Satele Shan?

anyway, that's my totally subjective ranking of Dark Council members.

#swtor #Dark Council #Sith #sith warrior #sith inquisitor #darth mortis #darth Marr #darth acharon #darth acina #darth decimus #darth arkous #darth jadus #darth ravage

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pippin-pippout · 5 months

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So I dragged myself kicking and screaming and, yes, mostly in denial, through the last episodes of A Journey to Love.

My thoughts can be summarized as follows:

Obviously this is mainly due to me being horrifically traumatized by Yuan Lu’s death. After all, they told us from the get go he wouldn’t live to 20. They made it clear he had a deadly heart disease. And then. They had the nerve. They had the audacity. They had the actual fucking bahoonga BALLS to follow through!?

But then I found myself sobbing at literally every good guy death scene, plus all of the mourning scenes. The latter was in large part thanks to Alen Fang's acting - deepest apologies to him for just referring to his character as 'the slutty one' for the majority of the show. Not that I was wrong. Also thanks to strong performances from He Lan Dou for Yuan Lu's death.

Anyway so I need to add this gif x4 for the Liudao Hall babies:

Qian Zhao, da ge, who made mistakes but always did right in the end

Sun Lang, who just wanted to hold something fluffy at the end, dying a hero

Yuan Lu, who died in his princess's arms after running to deliver a letter rendered useless by the Emperor of An's greed.

Yu Shisan, who lived as he lived and had such a happy moment with Chu Yue right before it all became irrevocable.

When they added Yu Shisan to the snowball fight, I just about lost it. Liu Yuning's acting there - having the realization about Shisan's death as he watched them play in real time was so well done. Really hurt.

Plus I'll make a couple of versions with edits.

For the Wu Emperor. I knew it was gonna happen from the spoilers but damn, him genuinely learning the value of friendship and brotherly love made me root for him. Dude did not deserve to go out like that. Thank goodness for the magic of CDramas where he lived just long enough to pass on his will to Ning Yuanzhou, and do one last act of good.

It also ensured Duke of Chu was able to pass on his command to his daughter, Chu Yue, before dying of the same (was not clear if her bro died or not, or if dad was always going to choose her).

And for Deng Hui. Started out thinking he was just a sexist bastard. Turns out he was one of the most principled characters in the show.

Their deaths didn't make me cry, but I respect them.

Also loved Chen Du Ling's (Empress of Wu) small part in this. I may not like all of her characters but she can deliver a scene and hold a room. It was a bit cathartic to see her put every man in their place, and basically decide the fate of two countries, even though her lament that she'd only ever have power through another held true.

Ah Ying, my baby girl. This is a character that could have turned people off from the beginning. Thanks to strong writing and stronger acting, it did not. I was super impressed with He Lan Dou. She can dial it up and dial it down in a single take, and can play big dramatic scenes with a subtlety that some older actors cannot grasp. This was the first thing I've seen her in, though for her and Chen You Wei (Yuan Lu) I might watch Tiger and Crane if someone tells me it's good.

I still think Li Tongguang is a perverted and creepy child, who never managed to learn (except in literally the last ep), but at least I trust that he will treat Ah Ying well. I don't hold it against him for screwing up the battle - he was trying to be benevolent but made a bad choice.

The main couple win it for me this year. What an inspired pairing. They beat out heavy hitters including Bai Lu x Everyone which was near impossible. Something to do with letting Liu Shi Shi use Liu Yuning's height against him at every possible moment. Also the 'if you die, I'll finish the job and then follow you' is my favorite dynamic. I swear when Ruyi threw those bombs, NOT NEEDING TO HAVING ALREADY SUCCEEDED AT KILLING THE KING AND PRINCE, just to join him, y'all I died. Good for whoever posthumously gave her the Marquis title on her own (not just furen) - couldn't tell if it was Li Tongguang acting as regent or Dayang (great shot of those two at the end).

The final episode was one of the best final cdrama episodes I've seen. I might have to make another post about that. In sum, despite losing a large portion of the well-loved cast, the remainder gave a world-class finale. The visuals were incredible (explosions are my favorite). The final scene was beautiful (though I'm a bit surprised they gave it to Chu Yue instead of Ah Ying who knew all 6 of them closely).

#a journey to love #一念关山 #yi nian guan shan #liu yuning #liu shi shi #he lan dou #alen fang #fang yilun #chen youwei #ning yuanzhou #ren ruyi #yang ying #yu shisan #yuan lu #li tongguang #qian zhao #sun lang #chu yue

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internetskiff · 7 months

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I think Empress Tihana is a pretty underrated Amnesia character. I find it hard to call her outright evil because despite everything she's sort of as much a prisoner of circumstance as the others. Everything she's done was out of a misguided belief that it'll end up saving Tasi's child. Yes, she's damned half the crew of the Cassandra to turning into monsters, but it seems like a sort of response to Tasi rejecting her initial offer. It's fucked up, but it seems she did it in hopes Tasi would be more open to suggestion under the effects of it - she still wanted to save her child even then. Judging by the fairytale retelling of her rule over Zerzura, I'm not even sure how much say she had in becoming "The Last and Eternal" Empress of her bloodline. " 'Nonsense', said the wise people, 'We will brew you a magic potion, and then you will live forever.' " - makes it sound as if it was mostly the Alchemist's idea. Brings me to another point, but she and another Zerzurian seems to be the only real example of how an overabundance of Vitae can affect the anatomy:

You see all the roots sprouting all over her throne chamber? I don't think they're plants at all. Judging from the fact that she can command them, willing them to move and even using them to try and tear open a wall during one of the endings, I think this is all actually an extension of her body. She's sprouted out all over the room. I'm not even sure if the way her head split open is a direct result of some sort of surgical intrusion to supply her with Vitae or if her head split open as her body began to grow more and more reliant on the supply, deforming and spreading until it covered her entire throne room. Kita seems to suffer from the same effects, though to a lesser extent since unlike the Empress, who's feeding on an entire city's worth of suffering, he seems to have been leeching off of one single leyden jar of Vitae the whole time.

He's been encased in similar vines that seem to have sprouted from his legs, basically trapped in his chair for the rest of his life. I'm not sure if this is specifically how Zerzurian anatomy reacts to Vitae or if the human body would suffer similar effects if one tried to overextend their lifespan as those two have. Considering Kita calls his Vitae intake a "meagre portion", the amount of suffering Alexander collected during his time as the Baron of Brennenburg barely even equates to a single jar. It explains why he looks so old and withered compared to Kita and The Empress, his intake must've been enough to keep him alive but not enough to keep the effects of aging at bay. Thinking about it, there is a single example of how Vitae would affect human anatomy, but it is combined with the effects of turning into a Ghoul.

Lambert seems to be what happens when a Ghoul is allowed to absorb the Vitae inside of their system. I believe the only reason Rebirth's ghouls are so gangly and twitchy (and relatively humanoid) is because they are immediately bled dry of their accumulated Vitae by Alchemist machinery. Lambert on the other hand moves relatively smoothly, like an animal, and he has become a lot larger as a result of his environment, war being inherently a breeding groud for human suffering and therefore the perfect environment to cultivate Vitae. There is no one to take it from him, so his metamorphosis is allowed to progress even further. It's even more off-putting considering even now he seems to be only halfway done turning into something else. I think in the ending where you allow him to escape into No Man's land he will eventually grow into something even worse as he now has an unlimited supply of soldiers to torture, both enemy and ally. He seems to realize bullets do nothing to him during the encounter in the Roman ritual pit, so in that ending Henri has basically unleashed a near-unstoppable monster out into the world. Vitae offers an indefinite extension of life, but not without leaving it's mark on the user's body. Tasi's child would probably end up just as warped as The Empress if left in her care.

#Amnesia #Amnesia: Rebirth #Amnesia Rebirth #Kita #Empress Tihana #Alexander of Brennenburg #Zerzura #Amnesia: The Bunker #Amnesia the bunker #Lambert #Rambling

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mirageofadesert · 5 months

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C-Drama Review: Story of Kunning Palace

Broadcast: iQIYI, 2023, 38 Episodes Genre: Romance, Historical

My Rating 8/10

For the better part of the show, the drama does not focus on the romance between the main couple, but rather on the complex power structures within the palace and the relationships between the mostly female characters. As soon as it becomes a romance, it falls apart.

Acting: 8/10 World-building: 6/10 Production: 9/10 Storytelling: 8/10 Pacing: 10/10 Re-watch Value: 9/10 Bonus: for Bai Lu being the Empress of my heart.

Summary with minor spoilers: Jiang Xuening (played by Bai Lu) will stop at nothing to achieve her goal of becoming Empress. At the end of her young life, she dies alone and despised by everyone. Yet this is only the beginning of her story. She is given a second chance and wakes up in the body of her 18-19 year old self. Determined not to repeat her mistakes, she is unable to escape the intrigues of the palace a second time. In this life, she wants to protect those close to her. These include her childhood friend Yan Lin, Princess Shen Zhiyi, her former lover, the upright Zhang Zhe (played by Wang Xingyue), and her mysterious teacher Xie Wei (played by Zhang Linghe), who is plotting his own intrigues at court…

My Review (spoilers ahead, TW: sexual violence)

Story of Kunning Palace has one of the best pacing of any 2023 drama. The storytelling is intriguing, with suspenseful arcs from the very first episode. The show does a great job of introducing the many characters and establishing their motivations. For the first 30 episodes, the twists and turns, as well as Jiang Xuening's personal growth, captivate the audience. The female friendships are beautiful and the discussion of female power is interesting.

The romance isn't the main focus of most of the show. In the beginning, Jiang Xuening struggles with her best friend's romantic feelings for her, while trying to save him and his family this time. In order to achieve this, she begins to plot with her teacher Xie Wei, but only in the last arc does she develop feelings for him. Instead, she longs for her former love, Zhang Zhe, an upright official with a strong sense of justice. One of the main themes of the show is that Jiang Xuening is not a good person, not in this life and certainly not in her last, but she is trying to be better. While Zhang Zhe is not a good match for her, the scheming and violent Xie Wei is. The story of Kunning Palace is not about love, but about intrigue, friendship, ambition and doing the right thing. It's only in the last 8 episodes that there is a real romance, and then the show loses its intrigue.

There are several reasons for this. The show fails to raise the stakes in a coherent way, instead it gets messy. However, the main reason for me was that I did not like the main couple. I was rooting for them right up until the moment their actual relationship developed. Firstly, I'm generally not a fan of the trope of men forcing themselves on women and women giving in until they like it, even if it's under the influence of trauma. Is it reasonable for his character to react that way? Yes, it is. Did the writers have to make him do it? Absolutely not. Especially when it is all framed as sexual tension. Also, Bai Lu is usually known for her great kisses on screen, but they really weren't anything more than forceful pressing of mouths, except for the extra episode. They were great as partners in crime, but at that point, is just using trauma for the sake of drama. Which brings me to my second complaint: It's one of my least favorite depictions of trauma. While it's understandable that he suffers from PTSD, the way the writers use it to create tension between the lovers and legitimize him being abusive towards her and later his own son (which is framed as funny) is something I dislike. I think they want to show that even a couple that isn't "good" and "righteous" can work well together in this world, but by that time Jiang Xuening has grown so much that she has become a good person - at least on screen, because they choose not to show her cruel and intense side for many episodes.

The third problem with the third arc is that they change the main character from Jiang Xuening to Xie Wei. This is something that is quite common in dramas - the female lead becomes the relatable character with whom the audience explores the new world, while the male lead is shrouded in mysteries that unfold in the later part of the series. This is one of the cases where it didn't work well. My emotional connection was with Jiang Xuening, so I lost interest when she became a minor character.

There are two other things that didn't convince me: One was the overall poor OST of the series, and the other was the xenophobic portrayal of other cultures. While the trope is popular, it was not well executed here, portraying them as less than human in their cruel behavior.

Overall, Bai Lu really stole the show. She was absolutely perfect for the part. As for Zhang Linghe, his performance again lacked nuance, but it was better compared to other shows I have seen so far. As for the side characters, the only other one that really stood out for me was Lui Xiening as Princess Le Yang/ Shen Zhi Yi, as well as the scheming Xue Yuan (by Huang Haibing) and his sister, Empress Dowager Xue (by Liu Min). These two were such great villains!

Despite all the problems in the last arc, I really enjoyed the show and will probably re-watch it!

#story of kunning palace #cdrama review #bai lu #zhang linghe #wang xingyue

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kadajchan · 2 years

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Yuusin

I skipped modern au questions hope it is ok.

1.Who would end a heated argument by defending their actions with ‘because I love you!’ ?

Neither. Hakuyuu is more emotional in this matter but they both know that the other's actions usually are not just because of love.

2.What would they do if the other woke in a manic state after a nightmare?

Hakuyuu is used to comforting his siblings, so he deals with the situation easier. He brings water and hummus softly, using his voice as a source of comfort. Sinbad is more touchy-feely in sleep so he gives body comfort, like cuddling or nuzzling or playing with hakuyuu's hair.

3.Do they wear the other’s clothes? (sweatshirt, bandana, necklace, etc.)

Mostly Sinbad. He likes to wear hakuyuu's hair pin.

4.Which one is more protective?

Both are on the same scale.

5.who needs to be ‘protected’?

Neither. They are an absolute power couple.

6 describe their cozy night in.

Reading poetry and drinking sake on their private porch.

7.who would beg the other not to leave?

Neither. They prefer a broken heart over a broken pride.

8.who has to leave to protect the other?

Neither. They would probably - agree - on getting separated if it comes to it.

9.would they build a pillow fort together just because?

10.what happens if one of them gets sick?

Sinbad will - test - every remedy he had learned in his travels on Hakuyuu as long it is a simple sickness like a cold and Hakuyuu calls the palace doctor.

11.Do either try to hide their emotions if upset?

Sinbad. He doesn't like to wear his emotions on the palm of his hand.

12.can the other still tell?

Yes. Hakuyuu is good at it since his cousin Kouen hides emotions as well and he is used to handle him.

13.Do they have many heated arguments? How do they smooth things over?

The king of the seven seas and Kou's emperor? of course there is going to be heated arguments. It's shake and break up, then kiss and make up for them.

14.who’s the bigger tease?

Sinbad, who else ?

15.How do their personalities compliment each other?How do they clash?

They are like thunder and water. Sinbad being a shining stunning entity full of passion and Hakuyuu a calm deep water. Nevertheless thunder and water complete each other and make a huge storm. No enemy can stand in their way when they are together.

16.can they stay up all night just talking?

Absolutely. It's their favourite non-sexual activity. Sometimes a battle of wits and sometimes poetry and romanc.

17.Who's more likely to pull the other in by the waist and kiss them passionately?

Sinbad.

18..Who would get into a fight to defend the other's honor?

Both.

19.Who tends to the other's wounds?

Hakuyuu

20.what reminds each of their partner?

Sea for Sinbad and fine sword craftsmanship for Hakuyuu.

21.Who's more likely to convince the other to stay in bed come morning?

Sinbad.

22.Who's more likely to give the other a massage?

Hakuyuu. He likes the feeling of Sinbad's skin under his touch.

23.Do they have any hobbies they share?

Political views discussions, practicing swordmanship, cooking.

24.who is the light weight that needs to be taken care of after a party?

Funnily enough, Sinbad.

25.what are there thoughts on pet names? Do they have any?

Sinbad loves it, using Hakuyuu's title as an endearing form of tease and Hakuyuu loves it secretly.

26.your OTP gets to pick out each other's outfits; what is each wearing?

Sinbad in a royal frilly dress of Kou fit for an Empress and Hakuyuu in a simple Partevian outfit because despite everything Sinbad is attached to his roots.

27.can they sit side by side without touching the other or are they handsy? (lacing fingers, touching knees, etc.)

Yes. They are rulers after all.

28.who's the better story teller?

Sinbad.

29.Who's the better cook?

Sinbad.

30.who's more likely to tell a dirty joke or story to make the other blush?

Both. Their private life is pretty - interesting - .

31.who's more artistic?

Hakuyuu.

32.who's more likely to fire up the stove at 2am because the other woke up in the middle of the night hungry?

Hakuyuu.

33.Which is more likely to swear?

Sinbad.

34.Who is more sexually experimental?

Both.

35.who's more vanilla?

Hakuyuu

36.who would rescue an injured animal and nurse it back to health?

Sinbad.

37.who an insatiable appetite? And what does the other do to help?

They both normally unless it is alcohol for Sinbad which hakuyuu disapproves.

38.what's their favorite type of weather to enjoy together?

Cool weather after the rain.

39.Who would give their life for the other without a second thought?

Hakuyuu.

40.can they fall asleep without the other?

Yes. Diplomatic trips, anyone?

41.Does either of them have a secret that could potentially ruin their relationship?

Of course.

42. Does either of them have a hard time being away from the other?

Yes. Hakuyuu. Sinbad is a man who cannot be chained.

43.who's more likely to do something out of spite?

Sinbad.

44.What’s a non verbal way they say I love you?

Lying on hakuyuu's lap and enjoying his hair being caressed for Sinbad and receiving unique souvenirs from Sinbad for Hakuyuu.

45.Who’s more likely to carry the other to bed?

Sinbad.

46.Do they like watching clouds or star gazing?

Yes. Star gazing with Sinbad telling hakuyuu about different stars and how sailors find their way based on them.

47.What do they do turn the other on/put them in the mood?

Nothing but a good heated discussion and disagreements can do it better.

48.Who’s more likely to hold a grudge after an argument?

Neither but Sinbad keeps pouting because he knows Hakuyuu cannot resist kissing him then.

49. Who tops? Who bottoms?

They are a switch but with a top Sinbad preference.

50.Who pulls the other closer when they’re sleeping?

Hakuyuu

#magi #sinbad #ren hakuyuu

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realcatalina · 2 years

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Hair colours of children of Juana of Castile:

Many of us seen potraits of Habsburg relatives of Catherine of Aragon. We think we know how they looked. That they were brownhaired/ravenhaired.

But how true is it for children of Juana I of Castile and her husband Archduke Philip of Austria, Duke of Burgundy?

Eleanor:

Between strawberry blond and red-Philip’s hair colour

I also concluded that this should be Eleanor(and not Isabella) and National Trust Collection actually believes it too(which is kind unsual):

Looks like strawberry blond to me, but some may refer to it as light red.

Charles V:

There are very few undarkened potraits of him. Empress Isabella had dark golden strawberry blond hair(literally like liquid gold), and her hair didn’t darken(mostly), while his did in their joint portraits. Hence we can rule out they had same hair colour. In this potrait it seems he had his father’s hair also, but i am not sure. Could be reddish brown.

But as child he certainly had golden strawberry blond hair(yes this is him and not his father Philip, this painting is commonly mislabelled):

Supposedly this is him, aged 15: he looks blond, or golden strawberry blond

But I had cousins who were completely blond until late teens and in their twenties their hair turned like medium brown. SO not necessarly it is hair he ended up with as adult.

Some of his adult portraits certainly don’t have raven hair, but rather what looks like lighter shades of brown(if i didn’t know Isabella had it I’d say maybe dark strawberry blond, but due to her not darkening and his yes, it has to be different shade of hair), possibly reddish. So possibly he took after Ferdinand II, and had lighter shade of brown hair.

Isabella:

Originally i thought her surviving portraits are all darkened, but then i looked at this one, and realised it could be showing dark golden strawberry blond. Especially around roots it was appearing more as golden-brown colour.

I’ve also recently determined this is Isabella:

and that is certainly dark golden strawberry blond. At least as child, she had it.

Ferdinand:

Strawberry blond, possibly dark golden strawberry blond or maybe between red hair and strawberry blond, based upon the painting bellow:

Mary:

That is not dark brown hair at all! If you look at portrait of her sister Catherine down bellow, you quickly can see it might be same hair colour. Dark golden strawberry blond, which in some instances can look bit(or a lot) like golden-brown.

(this is also why her portraits and taht of her sister in law Anne of Bohemia and Hungary were often confused in past. Because Jagellonians also had golden strawberry blond hair. Seriously with amount of royals which has hair of similiar shade, it is no wonder such hair became ideal of beauty.)

I have also concluded due to thistles in trim, that this is Mary:

And once again, that is not brown, but golden-brown, hence very likely dark golden strawberry blond.

Catherine:

darker shade of golden strawberry blond. It is very hard to describe and very few examples where it is recognizable survive. Even fewer which give it justice. This is probably THE best! (by the way sadly her nose from side was same as Maxmilians-picture bellow, otherwise she’d be beautiful.)

How is this all possible? How come, so many aren’t brownhaired?

In real life, just one of their grandparents was confirmably brown-haired.

The rest of their grandparents are believed to be brownhaired because of phenomenon known as darkening of pigments, common occurance in portraits of 15th and 16th century, and also in lesser amount in manuscripts(iluminations). Their grandparents weren’t actually brownhaired! Nor their parents!

Philip’s father-Emperor Maxmilian I:

Had golden strawberry blond hair too-probably due to his Iberian ancestry, his mother was Eleanor of Portugal, granddaughter of Philipa of Lancaster.

Philip’s mother- Mary of Burgundy.

In her portraits it is impossible to determine what hair colour she actually had. It could be brown, red, darker strawberry blond, you can’t tell. She too was descendant of Phillipa of Lancaster, through her father.

Philip of Austria, Duke of Burgundy:

Philip’s hair was between strawberry blond and red.

Interestingly that is hair colour Elizabeth of York had. However Philip didn’t have York ancestry(that is mere myth), Mary of Burgundy’s mother was Isabella of Bourbon, 2nd wife of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy. Margaret of York was his 3rd wife, and hence stepmother of Mary of Burgundy. Hence his hair is not due to his York heritage. Whetever it is due to his Iberian heritage or Burgundian heritage it is unknown. Lots of rulers at those days had reddish hair.

Philip’s sister Margaret in her depictions usually looks strawberry blond, but whetever that was same hair as her brother or as her father, or some other is unclear.

Ferdinand II of Aragon:

He was brownhaired, plenty of period descriptions stating that. But he wasn’t raven-haired:

Yes, that is Ferdinand. With LIGHT BROWN hair. (If i said he was blond, and used this as proof, i might convince some of you.) But it is only depiction in which he doesn’t have raven hair, even in his iluminations they look always raven.

Juana’s mother Isabella I of Castile:

-strawberry blond

While in some depictions her hair seems to go to red, most of her descriptions state her hair as golden, or most golden colour. One other shows her with golden-brown hair. So I believe her hair colour was dark golden strawberry blond (just as her cousin Maxmilian’s), which truly can look like liquid gold. Yet under certain light it can also look more as reddish brown, as light red etc. Painters struggled to correctly depict it and often in Isabella’s case result was darkening of pigments.

Juana I of Castile:

-Strawberry blond

-strawberry blond(in stain glass it is impossible to tell the exact shade, it was less precise in mixing of colours)

Possible unidentified depictions of Juana:

(same painting, different light)-dark golden strawberry blond

(i think it is juana, because of sumptousness of parlet, spanish headwear, formerly being part of Habsburg royal collection and resemblence of dress with her tomb.

This spanish-dressed girl in Marriage feast of Canna, imo could also be her, and though overall darkness of painting makes it hard to recognize-hair look dark golden(which is probably dark golden strawberry blond).

#habsburgs #early 16th century #historical portraits #history of spain #charles v #eleanor of austria #Isabella of Austria #Ferdinand of Austria #mary of austria #Mary of Bohemia and Hungary #Catherine of Austria

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bamfdaddio · 3 years

Text

X-Men Abridged: 1979

The X-Men, those globe-trotting mutants that have sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them, are a cultural juggernaut with a long, tangled history. Want to unravel this tapestry? Then read the Abridged X-Men!

(X-Men 117 - 128, X-Man Annual 3) - by Chris Claremont and John Byrne, Terry Austin, George Perez

See Jean? Dark Phoenix is nothing: this is how you turn evil properly. (X-Men 123)

So, these things have been getting longer. Whoops.

Last year, plotlines tended to bleed over in one another, but this year is a lot more arc-based, jumping from location to location. This is basically X-Men: World Tour. After hitting Antarctica and the Savage Land, our team of merry mutants visits Japan, Canada, Egypt, Scotland and even a theme park! (And really, both Murder World and Disney Land are run by capitalist scumbags who pretend to be in it for the art, the only difference being that Arcade purposefully murders his guests.)

But, before we check in with the X-Men, we return to the Institute. See, there’s a mutual misunderstanding that wouldn’t be out of place in a Shakespearian tragedy: Jean and Charles think Beast and Jean were the only survivors of their fight with Magneto in Antarctica, while the rest of the X-Men believe they were the only survivors and Jean and Beast perished. Since the X-Men have been trapped in the Savage Land, nobody has been able to clear up the confusion.

With their grief driving a wedge between her and Charles, Jean leaves the mansion to deal with her feelings on her own. (She’ll end up on Muir Isle.)

This is adorable! And, if the whole "Empress of the known Universe "-thing blows up in her face, she can always become a barista at Starbucks. (X-Men 117)

Lilandra successfully persuades Xavier to leave Earth as her consort, now that there is nothing left for him. Xavier agrees, but not before having a flashback to the time he met another telepath named Amahl Farouk in Egypt. (The Shadow King isn’t relevant just yet, but he’ll become an important villain later on.)

The X-Men, meanwhile, cross a treacherous ocean on a raft and are picked up by a Japanese vessel. The Japanese do not allow them to call anyone, for some reason. Sure. When they finally dock in Japan - six weeks later - some arms dealer named Magnum Moses has put Agarishima is on fire. Like, literally an inferno of such big proportions that even Storm can’t do much.

What follows is an uninspired, slipshod adventure. For some reason, Misty Knight and Colleen Wing are there too, because the president needed American detectives to investigate Magnum Moses (?) and for some reason, Misty doesn’t know Jean thinks Scott is dead, nor does she mention she just saw Jean to Scott. AUGH. It will take almost a year for Scott to figure out Jean isn’t dead and it becomes increasingly more contrived. I get that Claremont needed to isolate Jean to make her susceptible to, er, a certain someone’s machinations, but holy fuck do I have to suspend my disbelief for all of this bullshit.

The only good things about this little arc are:

Sunfire is still a dick.

Wolverine meets Mariko Yashida, a Japanese girl who actually reciprocates his feelings, as opposed to Jean. I’ve mostly been ignoring his budding feelings for Jean, because I stopped finding love triangles interesting since I was 16 and watched The OC, so I can only applaud this development. Mariko brings out Wolverine’s soft side and it’s very adorable. Later on, she moves to NYC for some reason and they start dating.

There is something sweetly disarming about calling Wolverine ‘beautiful’. (X-Men 120)

Anyway, Magnum is holding Japan hostage: either they give him what he wants - I think that might be money, sorry, wasn't paying attention - or he sinks Japan by activating the fault lines and you guys, I am sooo bored. Unsurprisingly, the X-Men stop him and for once, it’s Banshee who gets to play the most important part.

It’s a good thing I was terrible at science, otherwise I might have to point out that earthquakes and sonic waves don’t work that way! I simply get to be entertained by little rascal Colossus, plugging his ears like a toddler, and Sunfire’s gritty determination to not be impressed by some silly screaming Irishman. (X-Men 119)

Banshee pays a steep price for the victory, however: his vocal chords end up damaged, leaving him effectively powerless for the remainder of the year.

Oh, and here’s interesting fact about the above spread: you may or may not know that Chris Claremont and John Byrne were notoriously terrible at working together; this issue became a particular sore point between the creators. See, Byrne wanted to run the above panel without the sound of ‘Kra-Koom’, believing the art was strong enough to convey the destruction. He was livid when the finished product ended up containing a sound effect after all. I get your frustration, man, but if you want a writer who knows how to say less with more, you should maybe not work with Claremont?

(One of the reasons Claremont liked being so verbose and descriptive in his scripts was because otherwise, the artist would fill in the blanks using his own imagination. It’s no wonder these two found it hard to work together.)

On the flight to the US of A, Colleen Wing hits on Cyclops. It has to be the jawline, right? It can’t be the personality. All of a sudden, a snow storm causes their plane to be diverted to Calgary. The cause of this delay is Alpha Flight, who want their Wolverine back!

When even the narration is all “and they think they’re equal to any team of superheroes”, you know you’re a bunch of C-listers. Ugh. (X-Men 121)

Vindicator, previously known as Captain Alpha. He changed his name after accidentally shooting Moira that one time, which is exactly the kind of hollow gesture this dude would make. Ugh. If you think his new-found remorse won’t let him threaten an airplane chock full of innocent passengers, you would be wrong.

Shaman, doctor by day, magic user by night. Him and his magical little pouch are to blame for the snow storm.

Sasquatch, Canada’s answer to the Hulk. (Hilariously, the theory on why he turns furry instead of green is because he’s closer to the Aurora Borealis and this somehow messes with the radiation?)

Snowbird, a young Arctic goddess. Precious. To be cherished. Barely there for this adventure, sadly.

Northstar, an arrogant, hot-headed speedster, the twin brother of

Aurora, a lover, not a fighter. Together, they have light powers.

Vindicator and Shaman hog most of the spotlight, so Alpha Flight continues to be the ever-loving worst. They’re really wasting Northstar’s first appearance here. Here's why they suck:

Alpha Flight accidentally smashes a plane and keeps threatening to drag Wolverine back to the military against his will.

They push the cover price of the comic to a whoppin’ 40 cents.

Johnny fuckin’ Hudson even provokes Storm into an attack in the middle of a mall.

Shaman lets his blizzard get out of control.

After Storm fixes this mistake for him, Northstar has the gall to knock her out, “because she’s obviously the strongest”. Like, you’re not wrong, but damn, y’all a bunch of unpleasant superheroes.

To stop the fight, Wolverine decides to turn himself in. The X-Men leave, but while flying back, they already make plans to save their teammate. Wolverine saves them the trouble, casually sauntering into the cockpit while claiming that pulling a fast one on them was the easiest thing ever.

To be fair, I understand why you’d want to put a country between yourself and those bozos.

And finally, the X-Men are home! Xavier left them the equivalent of a Post-It saying “off to space”, so they try to pick up their life as best they can. None of them contact Jean’s parents, make an attempt to visit her grave or happen to see Beast on TV and by now, my suspension of disbelief is stretched so far that it could replace Reed Richards on the Fantastic Four.

Ororo, meanwhile, makes a little pilgrimage to Harlem, to the building she grew up in before she moved to Cairo.

I have failed you as a recapper, because I have absolutely no idea how to parse this scene. (X-Men 122)

I think I’d have to write a full-on thesis before I could properly analyse this, because so many things intersect here: poverty and racism, the boundaries of a superhero comic, confronting a (shared) past. I can’t even fully gauge if this is a clumsy, privileged attempt at tackling a serious topic or rather, a valuable moment in a comic that continually tries to expand on its themes of racism, exclusion and prejudice. One thing I will note is:

Luke Cage delivers the sort of trite conclusion that they’re superheroes: they’re better at fighting Galactus than at fixing the human condition. Point is, he kind of has to believe that, doesn’t he? It’s the sort of blind spot we all permit ourselves: you can’t fix everything. None of us have the power to fix the earth, or humanity, or the economy, or whatever: if you’re lucky, you can maybe tend to your own garden and leave it better than you found it, ensuring some happiness for yourself and a few loved ones.

Chasing bank robbers is easy. Superhero stuff. But here? Who do you attack here? These kids, or the system that failed them? You can’t really punch a needle exchange into being. Maybe that’s the appeal of superhero comics: there’s a clear villain, which is so sorely lacking in our day to day lifes. There, we are ruled by systems that are rooted in inequality, patriarchy, gender...

But Storm isn’t like Luke Cage, not in this regard. Before she became an X-Man, she used her powers to help people that came to her. And the whole point of the X-Men - other than beating up villains in colorful spandex - is that they want to change the system. They want to fix things, they want to fix a dark part of human nature, the part that hates which we fear.

Storm doesn’t really respond to Luke Cage here, but we know she’ll keep fighting the good fight, despite insurmountable odds. You can’t fix mankind, I don’t think, but you can sure as hell try.

*coughs*

Anyway!

Black Tom and Juggernaut hire Arcade… to kill the X-Men! I’m not sure why? I thought these two usually attempted to solve things on their own and Arcade’s fee is, like, a million bucks, so…? Maybe Black Tom asked his boyfriend what he wanted for his birthday and Juggernaut clenched his fists and said “I WANT THE X-MEN DEAD” and things escalated from there.

So, Arcade is a subtle villain. While Scott and Colleen Wing are on a date, this happens:

I can’t decide which is funnier: kidnapping people by sneaking up on them with A GARBAGE TRUCK or the fact that Spider-Man deduces this is Arcade’s doing by the noise alone. (X-Men 123)

Spider-Man doesn’t really figure into the rest of the plot, by the way.

Arcade successfully kidnaps all of the X-Men (and their dates: Colleen, Amanda and Betsy). Who is this Arcade? Well, he is an assassin who lets his victims run through a gauntlet of some sort, testing them with potentially deadly results in his Murderworld. He’s like a discount-combo of Saw and the Joker, except a lot less competent and a lot more spoiled rich kid. He barely kills anyone, ever, until maaaybe Avengers Arena, some forty years later.

Arcade veers heavily to the silly side of the silly-to-sinister scale, but he at least commits to a theme. Bonus is that trapping your heroes in a bunch of ricocheting balls fubars them ever-so beautifully. (X-Men 123)

This whole adventure is very silly and has very little bearing on the overarching plot, but it’s a fun enough romp: Cyclops nearly gets squashed by a hydraulic press, Nightcrawler gets attacked by bumper cars with chain saws attached to them, stuff like that. The absolute best part is when Colossus is hypnotized by an illusion of the KGB and becomes THE PROLETARIAN.

His insignia is Vladimir Lenin, y’all.

After various shenanigans, everybody is freed from their respective booby traps, everyone except Colossus. See, Piotr has been feeling down, torn between the exciting new loyalty to the X-Men and the more dutiful loyalty to his family and his motherland. (Also, he’s been feeling like a failure because he came up short a couple a times, aw.) Those feelings are exactly what Arcade has been abusing, but when Colossus comes in for the kill, Storm gives the most heartfelt plea:

I’m not crying, you’re crying. (X-Men 124)

Arcade’s all: “Eh, can’t win ‘em all” and yeets the X-Men out of Murderworld. The story has barely any other repercussions, except we stop seeing Colleen Wing and Betsy (Piotr’s date) after this. To be fair, being kidnapped by a super villain is a good reason to stop seeing someone.

Even more inconsequential is the adventure in the Annual. The only important thing to glean from there is that, when Thor is unavailable, Storm is a suitable substitution. Couldn’t agree more.

The quality of the comic has been steadily ascending throughout the year and ends on a supremely high note: Proteus. Because I think it might be Claremont’s best work so far, I’ll be dedicating a full post to that. (Man, that 10-picture-limit is a real bummer, huh?)

Ugliest Costume: I don’t care, I just want someone to cosplay the Proletarian.

Best new character: There’s actually a few options - Snowbird, Northstar, Proteus - but both Jean-Paul and Narya don’t really show their best sides this year, so I’m going in a different direction. My pick is the Shadow King. He is a very effective foil to Xavier, perhaps even moreso than Magneto. I know I rag on Xavier and his cavalier attitude to bending others to his will a lot, but imagine if you had his powers: wouldn’t you just make people do whatever you want? Just, like, all the time? The Shadow King is an effective reminder of what Charles would have been like, had he been immoral. (Well, more immoral.)

No matter how cool your psychic battle may be, this is what it looks like to the rest of the world. (X-Men 117)

Turns evil: Colossus, for the first time!

What to read: 117, 125 - 129.

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satohqbanana · 3 years

Text

Aveyond Divergent Fate P9-3

A/N: The iconique hind quest, with major revisions to fit the ADF universe.

Warning: Slightly douche Lars

Rhen and Lars figure out that they might overcome the hind's curse by having her gaze into a mirror. So, they come up with a plan: while wearing earplugs to block the harp off, Rhen will go in blindfolded while carrying a mirror, followed by Lars who will have to duck the whole time, put his hands on Rhen's shoulders, and guide Rhen's path as she cannot see.

They make earplugs using beeswax from the bees in the Wildwoods and some cotton the hunters lent them. Lars, ever the vain nobleman, has a hand mirror which Rhen practices holding while blindfolded. They do trial runs of their plan, which mostly involve Lars leading Rhen around the forest while she's blindfolded.

During one of which, Lars warns Rhen about a huge root in front of her. Rhen thinks that maybe, just maybe, Lars could be a good person too. Lars meanwhile feels weird that Rhen's just following what he's saying. Eventually, Rhen figures out Lars shouldn't be talking to her, as they'd both have earplugs, so they develop a way to communicate simple messages through gestures.

It's not always a smooth trial run, of course. There are times they run into wolves and crows, and sometimes the hunters have to rescue them from their "weird and dangerous stupid game". The two eventually learn which parts of the Wildwoods are safer than the rest.

Finally confident enough, Rhen and Lars go down the path the hunters warn them away from. Their plan must go perfectly, or else it will be death for the both of them.

They hear the faint music, and quickly they put their earplugs in. Rhen ties her blindfold and Lars places the mirror in her hands. He goes behind her, holds her shoulders, and keeps his head down. They go over the plan in their heads one last time. Time to do this.

Lars nudges Rhen forward, and uses his peripheral vision to navigate their way to the hind's lair. He notices the statues around them, but he has to focus.

Rhen, who knows little of what's going on, is very nervous. She begins dragging her feet and using them to sense her surroundings. Lars doesn't give her a signal beyond moving towards a path they've never explored before.

The end of a path is a small cave, as the witch had told them. The hind notices them and comes closer. Lars sees her huge figure in his peripheral vision and urges Rhen to raise the mirror. Rhen raises the mirror with no hesitation.

The aura of magic surrounds them… and then, nothing. Rhen keeps the mirror in the air, and Lars lets a few seconds pass before peeking around. The hind had turned to stone, and she had dropped her harp.

They did it. They've done a good deed. And they could take the harp with them as proof.

Rhen and Lars recompose themselves and put away their paraphernalia to investigate the hind's cave. The hind is, uh... pretty, yeah, but not the kind of pretty they'd worship. In the cave was a pool, but it was too dark to see without any light aiding them, so the hind would've never had a chance to look at herself.

Outside were men and women who had wandered too near, and had themselves turn into stone. Rhen wonders if there's a way to restore them back into flesh. Lars thinks so, but that's not their business anymore.

"And just leave these people out here?"

"We can't save them! We don't even have the magic to undo this curse." Lars sighs. "We've stopped the hind; that's enough of a good deed, isn't it?"

"I'm not walking into Shadwood without turning these people back."

Lars stiffens. Part of him wants to leave Rhen there and then, but a bigger part of him says it's wrong to do. "...listen, I may not have been as nice as you have wanted me to be, but I am not walking into Shadwood with this harp alone. A-and, besides! If I return to Veldarah without you, the Empress will have my hide."

"Then stuff that harp in your bag and forget about it for a while! We're taking a brief detour to figure out how to turn these people back."

They both consider going back to the tavern, but figure out that the hunters were going to ridicule them instead. So, for the first time, they use the runes and go to Veldarah in search of some answers.

#aveyond #av1 #aveyond divergent fate #anne's av1 au #annelaurant writing

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mikk1n · 2 years

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Ooh do Vesna!!

How I feel about this character:

My horrible baby, my evil little child, I love her.

All the people I ship romantically with this character:

No one, really! Or at least, no one in the "I'm definitely rooting for them" sense.

In COH she enters a polycule with Delilah and Breanna (when she's an adult, of course), but there's no real romance in it; she's using them, and Delilah is using her.

I was also thinking about her maybe having a similar "I'm using you" fling with a boy her age in Shadow of Tyvia (mostly explored in the Makarov-centric COH spinoff I'm kinda sorta planning), though that's not set in stone rn.

Vesna is very much like her father in that she manipulates more than she allows herself genuine relationships, so she usually enters a relationship under the premise of getting something out of it.

Gonna put the rest of this under a readmore. It's gonna contain a HUGE spoiler for Call of Honor (specifically Part Four: The Shadow of Tyvia and Part Five: The Unquiet Grave), so keep that in mind!!

My non-romantic OTP for this character:

I'm gonna go familial relationship with this one and talk a bit about Vesna's relationship with her dad. Like...they are devoted to each other deeply, and in canonverse and COHverse it's to an unhealthy degree.

I'm gonna ramble a bit about their relationship in Call of Honor, because it's the timeline I've developed the most in terms of their relationship and I'm just *vibrates*

BIG ole spoilers for COH incoming!

Makarov dies again in Part 4 of COH (after kickstarting a revolution in Tyvia that results in the establishment of the pseudo-USSR government that's canon to Dishonored), and Vesna just...can't let go of him. She wants to resurrect him, and she learns the magic necessary to do it (as well as does...other things, lol), but since bodies are usually cremated in the Isles, there is no body to bring Makarov's spirit back to.

So Vesna literally rebuilds him, magic Frankenstein-style, and goes to extreme lengths to bring her father back. Her primary plan in UG is to achieve godhood, and she quite literally refuses to achieve godhood and become god-empress without her father by her side. Not just because she needs him to use the Knife, but also because she wants him there. Her idea of a perfect world is one where her father is with her, always. And when Makarov is resurrected, he will go to any and all lengths to help Vesna achieve her goal—not just because he stands to gain something out of it, but because he loves her and he always intended on giving her the world—literally—once he was through with it.

Makarov and Vesna are a foil to Corvo and Emily; they're both examples of familial love and devotion between father and daughter, but Makarov and Vesna's devotion to each other drives them to do unspeakably horrible things. Which makes it all the more ironic that Makarov originally didn't even want Vesna; it was the idea of an heir that made him warm up to having a child. But now he wouldn't trade her for the world.

Spoilers ended!

I just *clenches fist* familial devotion taken to the extreme. They would and have killed and committed atrocities for each other.

My unpopular opinion about this character:

I don't really have one? Mainly because she's an OC, so all my opinions on her are the right ones (/j), but also because I haven't seen very many misconceptions about her from people who are interested in her. I'm pretty open about the fact that she's a horrid little child, lol.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:

She lives :(

Right now my "canon" for her mostly relates to COH, which demands that she die right around the time of Dust to Dust so that she can appear in DHverse. She dies in COH because her convoy was ambushed by Price and Yuri and their crew; they intended to capture her to bring Makarov out of hiding, but it went horribly wrong and she dies during the operation instead. It’s possible for the same to happen in canonverse, though it’s also just as likely that Vesna manages to get away safely and gets to grow up, albeit without her father.

my OTP:

None!

my cross over ship:

I guess Vesna/Delilah (again, once she's grown)? Though again, that's less an "I'm rooting for them" ship and more of a "this serves the plot" relationship.

One of my friends also suggested Vesna/Emily and ykw that's cute too. Absolutely not in Unquiet Grave (or canon COH in general, Vesna would be a horrible partner and it would be akin to canonverse Makayuri), but perhaps in an AU where she and Makarov are a little more hinged and capable of healthy relationships :D

a headcanon fact:

Vesna is extremely well read from an early age because Makarov would read her "adult" books instead of typical children's books (and by "adult" books I mean books geared toward adults and higher reading levels, not smut or anything of the sort). When she was little, she was one of those kids who used words almost too big for her to wrap her mouth around, lmao.

#thank you!#oc: vesna makarova #ask game #not art #saint-vulgaris #inbox

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imagines-to-quench-thirst · 4 years

Text

Imagine explaining to your man Kdramas:

This is a small drabble like a story for each man on my main roster. I love Korean dramas and I wanted to pair some dramas with one of the guys.

Enjoy and if you like some of the dramas mentioned here they are all on Netflix where I watch them.

Enjoy ❤️

Victor Creed:

This man lived some time in Korea and lived along with the Korean Empire in great secrecy but seeing you so immersed in your drama he is ready to roll up his sleeve and talk about his tales of Korea.

'And that's how my friend at that time Jeon helped me escape the death penalty.'

'But you don't have friends. You said that.'

'...'*modem ringing*

'Sorry.'

'You know what? You don't get to hear my other story that includes stealing a golden elephant with a secret clan of widows.'

'What?!'

'Noooooo.'

His favorite pick is: Nokdu

Loki Laufeyson:

Loki is frazzled to say at least when he saw you cocooned in your blanket with your coffee as you glued your eyes to the TV screen. It took a few good episodes to pass and an empty cup of coffee for you to notice a presence on the couch. Loki was a little mad since you absolutely 100% rooted for the good muscular actor as he played his part and you did yours which may or may not include some drooling and whistling. He waited for you to finish to hear the explaining he wanted to know so much.

'There is a special girl who is a Samjang and she meets a locked up God when she was a kid and then... They fall in love.'

'Can-can you repeat my love?'

'Oh, and one of the gods sells ice cream!'

'Once again darling... Repeat but slowly.'

His favorite pick is: : A Korean Odyssey

Thor Odinson :

You already know that this man is already on the drama-wave and he is nothing but a bigger fan than you. He lives to talk about the whole drama when you two finish it.

'This Drama! Was the peak of entrainment. The suspense, intrige, and oh soo more.'

'Oh and don't forget the secret brother twist.'

'Of course, when Tae-ho's ex-girlfriend boyfriend is his enemies secret younger brother that he sent to America to be super smart and zo come back so they can avenge their father.'

His favorite pick is: Last

Bucky Barnes:

Bucky is hella confused at the start but later he is on it and not letting go. His Netflix list is as long as his hair. And most of all he loves to draw parrel when you do a brief summary of the drama you two will watch.

'So you are telling me a rich girl paraglides into North Korean and falls in love with a stoic soldier.'

'Yes, but not by choice, a tornado swooped her out of South Korea.'

'So, like us.'

'Yes, minus the parachute.'

His favorite pick is: Crash Landing on You

Steve Rogers:

For Steve, it's a little hard to get adjusted to with you being all over the TV as you root for the main underdog girl that tries to win over her boss's heart who can recognize people's faces. Especially when he saw the main charted hovering over his on-screen ladylove. So he tries to copy-paste it.

'Y/n...'

'Yes, Steve?'

'Jagiya~~~'

'...HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAH No.'

'Okay, sorry.'

Bless his heart.

His favorite pick is: The Secret Life of Secretary Kim

Jagiya is a Korean word for honey. I think so don't kill me if I'm wrong.

Bruce Wayne :

Y'all know my boy is ready to leap if you say you find an actor or location great in a drama he is ready to pick up his phone and call a few people to arrange a fan meet or travel to the location.

'I saw that the actor who played Park Hun in your favorite drama is landing here for a contract meeting.'

'How do you know that? I don't think that's public information.'

'... I-i just know.'

His favorite pick is: Doctor Stranger

Clark Kent:

This cinnamon roll is the best one to cry with more like on him. He is a great boy that will hear your cries over the deaths of the characters. He just radiates comfort.

'It's okay, Y/n. He avenged his brother's death and got a chance to reincarnate.'

'But-but his mother... I just want to hug her and make her tea.'

'I know sweetie.'

His favorite pick is: Along with the Gods

Not a series but a damn good movie I always ball my eyes on it. Highly recommend.

Arthur Curry :

Arthur is very much in the middle of it. Very well knows that being on your good side means appeasing your needs and wishes. But hooking this Fishman on your drama was easy as sinking the same hook.

'I like this one. When will the next episode come out?'

'Next Tuesday.'

*GASP*'Shut up.'

'I'm serious Arty.'

'Damn you scheduling system. Damn you!'

His favorite pick is: W

Orm Marius:

The ex-King himself finds weird comfort in the unsung heroes of Imperial Korea with the misunderstood King. And he is ready to sneak into the bathroom to gasp in secrecy at the episodes.

'Orm, come on lets go!'

'Just- 32 minutes until it ends, my world. I need to know if Prince Lee Hyeok will win the hear of the commoner Sunny. Like us.'

'What?!'

'Sorry, my darling I'm coming.'

His favorite pick is: The Last Empress

Joker(Suicide Squad):

This clown is frazzled by your state when you start your dramas but know very well not to touch the tiger when watching point of interest. But him being the needy person he will mostly sneak under your arm and as you to pay attention to him with no avail as your eyes still gaze at the action scene. His mild distaste is only that you pay much more attention to them rather than him.

'Y/n, why do you watch this police drama. It's not even that good.'

'You take that back my woman Ha Na and my boy Hyuk gave their all to capture the killer that killed her father and his wife with a kettlebell in the first episode.'

'Kettle ball you say? Maybe it's not that boring.'

His favorite pick is: Voice

Duncan Vizla:

This agent of absolute peace and carnage loves to watch them with you it reminded him if the times he was in Korea undercover killing a corrupt minister. He loves the thrill of the police dramas with the time travel twist as his top one drama and as well as yours.

'This actor Choi Jin Hyuk really knows how to act with the time travel twist.'

'True that's hard to act through. That's not everyday stuff. Do you think that time travel is real?'

'Of course, it's. I know it first hand.'

'How?'

'Well I got to be with you and I think the only plausible explanation is time travel.'

'Awww, Donut!'

His favorite pick is: Tunnel

Kdramas are a big part of my life and each of the dramas and movie listed I have watched and much more. Not to blabble long enough I hoped you liked it.

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just2bubbly · 3 years

Text

Breaking the news..

Masterlist

Rumors and Affairs Chapter List

// This is an update of What was she thinking?!

Cinder’s Perspective:

She decided to go through the articles. Most of them were dated from when she had escaped out of prison with Thorne. They said how Cinder had run away with her ‘lover’ criminal Thorne. She cringed on the word lover. The more recent ones were about her and Thorne at the Ball. After reading many such articles, she came across the article that was the root cause of all the rumors. It had the picture of her and Thorne standing outside the hall while the ball was going on. He had brought her outside to tell her about how he was going to propose to Cress and Cinder had become so happy to see how far her best friend had come. She had hugged him and kissed him on the cheek. Being pregnant had made her super emotional; she could have a headache or laugh over the silliest thing. The media captured this specific affectionate moment between the two and right now she wanted to kill herself for her idiosyncrasies. She was just hugging Thorne why did they have to make such a fuss about this. Well after reading the entire article she came to realize that the media had misinterpreted the scene between the two. They had thought that the two were meeting outside to have a word without the Emperor catching them and it became a bit affectionate but Empress Selene restrained herself in the fear of getting caught.

Cinder recalled how she had confined Thorne that she was literally more scared of doing childbirth than leading the lunar revolution and he had assured her in a rather affectionate way, where he did hold both of their hands on her swollen stomach. The media had definitely misinterpreted and made a fuss about it. Plus Thorne was known for his flirty personality all over the world and also Luna.

All such times she hated how the press and mass media could not have any restrictions and limitations. Stars, they should not publish stuff that they did not have a clue about.

She was having a strong headache meaning that if she had tear ducts she would be crying now or maybe she was just having a headache from frustration. Either way it was not good for her or the baby. Last month they had a riot outside the palace gate about her cyborg-ness. The hatred towards Cinder had been high time since Kai and she had announced that they have been expecting an heir soon. Kai did his best to make her feel better but she was so insecure in moments like these. After all she had received this hate since she was 11. Memories don’t fade easily, especially bad ones.

She was walking in the gardens when the whole incident had happened. The riots were peaceful but Kai and Torin were all shaken up. It looked like they had been expecting this sometime sooner or later. Well saying that Cinder was not expecting this would be a lie for she had so many nightmares about her being close to a crowd and then a riot would start where she and the baby would be harmed in some way or the other.

Cinder herself had taken so much effort to remove cyborg prejudice. Even then she had to suffer through first hand cyborg hate taking in consideration that she was the Empress of the Eastern Commonwealth.

That’s when she saw it. It was Kai. He had commed her. In a normal and peaceful situation she would be happy and bubbly(I know I just made a reference) to see him but now that the situation was anything but calm and normal. She wanted to not pick his call. Not receiving his comm won’t help her though. So she gave in.

“Hey! You took a lot of time to pick up the comm, were you sleeping?”

Seeing him in front of her eyes she just wanted to hug him and let him whisper to her that everything was fine-

“Hail to Cinder! Are you there?”

“Yeah! Why?”

“Well respond so that I can understand”

“When are you coming back?”

“Oh! I see you were so lost in thinking about me that you forgot to realize that your dear husband Kai is there in front of you! Tell me Cinder, Am I wrong? Did you spend all your time thinking about me then?”

“Don’t flatter yourself Emperor. It does not suit you well.” Technically she had been thinking about him all the time but pregnancy had not made her lose her mind so far so she would not blurt out about how she was day-dreaming about her husband.

“C’mon Cinder why can’t you just accept that you missed me? I do it all the time.”

“Okay Kai. Tell me when are you returning now?”

“I will be there in New Beijing besides you till tomorrow afternoon. I would have left tonight but Queen Camilla invited us to dinner at the royal palace. I don’t want to go-”

“What? You will be coming tomorrow?” she screamed, maybe.

“I thought you would be sad to know that I am delaying my flight because of some stupid dinner.”

“No Kai, it is not like that. Well I certainly do miss you and am happy that you will be there here tomorrow. Stars, it has been difficult without you here but I thought you had yet a week to come and stars above I have so much stuff to do and things to fix. I just don’t have the time to do it before you get back I can’t believe I am running late on my schedule Kai I want-”

“Calm down Cinder. I had asked you to do nothing if you remembered. Plus Torin told me.”

Cinder had covered her face with her hands. She peeked at him a bit scared of his reaction. Why the hell was he being good and not yelling at her if Torin had already told him?!

“What did Torin tell you?”

“Why? Is it problematic that my advisor tells me all about you?”

“That’s not the point Kai. What did he tell you?”

“Nothin’ just how you over-work yourself and do not rest well and keep zoning out between conversations. You really do get hopeless without me.”

“Oh! That’s what Torin told you. Thank goodness”

“Why? Was there something else?”

“NO! Nothing else…. for now at least- I can’t ...I don’t know” why couldn’t she lie towards Kai as easily as she did with the others. It felt like Kai could just look through her soul and realize the truth.

“What happened Cinder? Are you okay? Is the baby okay? Did something happen to you? Did Dr.Nandez say something about the pregnancy? Cinder tell me! ” He looked desperate and all the worst possible scenarios were running through his mind now. She could tell it.

“Kai, I am fine. The baby is fine. Everyone is fine. Well not everyone because Torin and I are all panicked because I did some mistake and screwed up big time….” she trailed.

“Oh! Only that much. Well I thought something happened to you and the baby.”

He sighed before continuing, “What did you do?”

“Well it’s related to the baby. In the head staff meeting I said something that made the entire Thorne-Cinder affair rumors worse.”

“Oh.” he had not expected that.

“Can you brief me about it if it is okay for you or should I ask Torin?”

“Well I kind of blurted out that the rumors about me and Thorne are true while I was zoning out and although I tried to assure them I don’t think that they are much convinced. Shit. I screwed up Kai.”

His eyes had definitely widened. Cinder could tell that without looking. He was trying his best to remain calm but she wanted him to talk. Bloody hell she wanted him to talk now. She was a mess on the inside. Thankfully there were no new rumors about her and Thorne or any news about today’s meeting on her newsfeed yet.

There was an unwanted and suffocating silence between the two of us.

“Well you did screw up big time Cinder but it's okay. Do they know that I know about these rumors?”

“I don’t know. Mostly likely not because I think usually courting outside of marriages are to kept a secret.

“Cinder please.” She should not use sarcasm in situations like these. She nodded and whispered a sorry.

“What should we do?” she asked again trying to take a hold over this bizarre situation.

“You really cannot do anything anymore. Whatever you say will not be given much importance and most likely be doubted so you would only give a single official statement in my presence when I return. For the rest, I will come up with a plan with Torin’s help.”

“Kai stop fighting my battles. You already have done enough by not kicking me out okay. I should take responsibility of my mistakes-”

”It’s okay Cinder. Everything is okay. You and I know that we are madly in love with each other. That’s all that I care about. You would no longer over work yourself. I guess you should stop holding meetings for time being as well, you know as a precaution.” he said the last part teasingly but yet I felt disheartened.

I was glaring at him but then the rumors about our child’s parentage hit me like some train. I could not tell Kai this. He would surely be disappointed. He would be heart-broken.

What should I tell him huh- Hey Kai! The media thinks that the child I am carrying is Thorne’s and not yours. Lol, but you know the truth right?

Sue me.

“There is something more Kai.”

“What?” he asked a bit concerned, a furrowed brow forming.

“They questioned about our baby’s parentage as well”

Upon hearing this he really looked so sad. His face had fallen and he avoided looking at her.

She heard some commotion from his side.

“Cinder I have to go. I am sorry we will talk later. I will figure it out with Torin’s help. Bye. Take care.” He was croaking. Cinder had a headache coming as well.

Before she could reply, he had ended the comm.

Glancing at her net-screen Cinder sighed. There was no news about today’s meeting anywhere. Torin might have done his miracles on the staff again.

A/N: I am thinking about a good damage control idea, so it might take a while. Needless to say, There is more!

( I also have an another Kaider fic named ‘ Nightmares’, if you like Kaider fluff you can check it out!! 🖤 )

Likes, Reblogs and Comments will be much loved! 🖤

P.S Can you suggest some baby names for Kaider child, both the gender please.

#what was she thinking #update #kaider #kaider fanfics #just2bubbly fics #fanfiction #emperor kaito #kai #linh cinder #carswell thorne #cress darnel #marissa meyer #tlc #lunar chronicles #konn torin

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orsuliya · 3 years

Note

Since you do such detailed asks and give a well thought out answers, I want to know your opinion on the Ma brothers. Zilong, Zilu and Zitan. What do you think about them?

Ah, our three intrepid Ma princes... Wait a minute, why three? It's not like we're in a fairytale and while Zitan is certainly a fool, he's not nearly good-hearted enough to play the role of Ivan the Fool.

But seriously, it seems mightily suspicious of Daddy Emperor to sire three sons in quick succession and then, as far as we know, never ever procreate again. He's an Emperor and obviously fertile, so how come the imperial nursery remains so glaringly empty? Could it be that he has no concubines at all except for his beloved Xie Guifei?

Or... has the Empress been aborting babies left and right, and poisoning her way through swathes of women to boot? Not impossible, knowing her temperament, but it doesn't really make sense within the dynamic presented in the drama. Drama!Emperor hates, hates, hates the Wangs and especially his wife, so it's hard to believe he wouldn't have used this juicy tidbit to weaken their influence. In the book Wanru is allowed to run roughshod over Potato's concubines and feed them contraceptives willy-nilly, but that's because Potato doesn't really care. The Emperor, as we see him in the drama, would have found reason enough to care upon being given such an obvious opening to start a smear campaign against his favourite enemy. Stymying the imperial bloodline?! Why, I think it might be a crime and easily provable one at that!

This leaves the other option - perhaps there aren't any concubines in the palace or, if there are, they're not being, pardon my French, bred. It's not that multiple imperial concubines of lower rank aren't a thing in this universe - Potato gets at least two and possibly more after sitting on the throne for a relatively short time. It's a pity we don't know what's the policy on entering the palace. Is there a multi-stage selection process? There is certainly no indication of that! Xie Guifei might have been an attempt to balance out a Wang Empress, Seagull was Zitan's impromptu choice, Miss Screecher was meant to be chosen by Potato outside of any organized selection and the same could be true for Potato's other concubines. Our only outlier might be Zilu's Mom and even then it's rather doubtful she was ever processed properly as it would have required a lot of effort and luck to conceal an already existing pregnancy. No, Zilu's Mom was most probably a gift of 'peace' from one brother to another.

My guess as to what Daddy Emperor is thinking? If Zitan has been his preferred heir from the start and he very well might have been since it never had anything to do with Zitan's actual qualities, then it's possible that he simply didn't protest - or did so in a purely symbolic manner - when the Wangs started limiting his reproductive chances. Why breed competition? We already know he has no use for any sons lacking powerful backing of their maternal clans, see: his treatment of Zilu. And any son with such backing would be a direct threat to his favourite, not to mention a potential upset to the carefully maitained Wang-Ma-Xie balance.

...or it could be that Daddy Emperor really loved Xie Guifei and wanted no other. Seeing as he's strongly implied to spend his nights in her chambers twenty years after their only and last kid was born, this would make a staggering amount of sense. The same principle applies - he'd still not protest Wang tyranny over the inner courts, only he'd do it for Xie Guifei and not for Zitan. It does seem to fit with Daddy Emperor's general mindset. Let the others do open battle and exert all that effort, he'll just sit there, look sage and reap the benefits!

After this rather senseless and overly long prelude, let's finally get to answering your question. Mind you, those are not going to be organized, thoughtful opinions, just my subjective impressions on each and every Ma Prince.

His Imperial Spudness Ma Zilong

The not-so-little Potato that could not, but still tried! Let's start with the elephant in the room, namely his rapist tendencies or the lack thereof. See, I'm convinced that raping Awu wasn't actually in the cards, at least as far as Potato was concerned. Compromising her, sure, just lure her into an emptied palace and cry wolf. Outright raping her, no, if only because Potato is way, way too weak and soft to execute a plan this ruthless in its entirety. Besides, harming Awu to this extent would be risky as all hell and sure to provoke authentic wrath in both Daddy Emperor and Daddy Wang. The Empress is not stupid enough to give her husband the perfect excuse to do away with her son nor to alienate her main supporter in the same move. Even if she was able to force a marriage in the first place, Potato would be pretty much done for politically unless both Daddies suddenly dropped dead. The most she would be able to get would be a grandson in a privileged position, so she'd be back to square one, only with one more female to share power with. No, what Potato did and what Wanru suffered was mostly courtesy of Zilu's suspicious drugs. Not to say Potato isn't a rapist all the same, but I'd argue for diminished capacity.

As for Potato himself in his shining spuddy glory, I truly pity the man. From time to time we see glimpses of the ruler he could have become and whom he still tries to be, and it becomes clear that there was something there worth cultivating. The problem is that nobody could be bothered to even try. Daddy Emperor certainly didn't, leaving Potato pretty much to his own devices and believe me, it had nothing to do with his talents or the lack thereof. Do you remember that lovely family scene at the beginning of episode 1.? You know, the one where Awu, Zilu and Zitan lure Zilong into a trap and then leave him there to lie amidst icy rocks in the middle of winter? He could have easily hit his head and died right then and there. Or get pneumonia and die a little bit later. Does the Emperor care? No, not at all! Baby!Awu isn't that good of a liar, but even if she was, perhaps it would behoove him to actually investigate. Not from any kind of fatherly feeling, let's not expect miracles, but perhaps from political expediency? Yeah, no. And I doubt that was the only incident of this kind. Potato must have known even this early on that his father doesn't care for him, not even like an Emperor should for his eldest male scion. Moreover, there is no way Mommy Dearest wouldn't harp on about the Emperor's negligence in private, further affirming this awful truth in Potato's mind.

Mommy Dearest might care, but her care is no less toxic than Daddy Emperor's open negligence. Potato is her key to power, her only way to win the game of thrones and make all her sacrifices worthwhile... and this is exactly how she treats him. Oh, she loves him well enough as her son, clings to him in his role as Crown Prince and then Emperor, but she doesn't actually like him as a person. And oh boy, does it show! I get it, he's not this perfect shining prince that would justify her long years of suffering, but then I have this feeling she gave up on him the moment he showed himself to be perfectly average. Sure, she offers him (toxic) love and (conditional) support like nobody's business, but there's always this nasty undertone in their relationship. Mommy knows best, don't even try to think on your own, listen to me and only me. It's no wonder that Potato thinks he's perfectly useless and doesn't bother to try and better himself, if he knows that even his own mother sees him as a perfect nincompoop. Uncle Wang's open derision isn't helpful either!

And yet Potato is, deep down, a decent enough man. Better than the average Ma, I'd say. I mean, he has some scruples! They might be really, really tiny, but they're there, even as he's being subjected to a barrage of mental attacks from both his mother and his wife. Why, given proper support and a competent cabinet, he'd make a somewhat ineffective, but decent enough ruler, his handling of the flood crisis shows us this much. Potato's best quality is that he really tries. Oh, he fails, but he's no Zitan, content to sit in his room and mope while the country goes to hell. When it's important, he can make actual decisions! Which he may then go back on (or not), but it still counts. Also, he's not petty. Like, at all. He'd like nothing better than for everybody to get along and have lots and lots of plump babies. Even his decision to do away with Xiao Qi is not motivated by jealousy, no matter how hard Wanru and Mommy Dearest keep pressing on that particular button.

Is he childish? Yes. But then, he's never been given any real responsibility and for years and years languished under the care of a helicopter parent who never forced him to man up nor face actual reality, hence his disillusionment with Wanru, once she stops being this perfect smiling automaton. Is he selfish? Oh yes and it shows nowhere better than in his last will. But even so, such selfishness is pretty much par for the course when it comes to the Mas and at least Potato didn't wreck a country for the sake of personal spite, which puts him way ahead of his father, uncle Jianning and bro Zitan. And perhaps even cousin Zilu, who cared less for the country than for Huanmi.

At the end of the day, our humble root vegetable is a tragic figure. I can't help but pity him every time we see him bloom under somebody's attention. Give that man some respect and he'll pay you back with the same, weird comments about killing you nothwithstanding. And he did give us Miracle Baby, Our Lord and Saviour!

Our beloved Groomzilla, Ma Zilu

Daddy Emperor must have been stupid, high, blind or all of those in order to let Zilu and his beautiful brain slip through his fingers. He was right there, that defenseless, motherless boy and ripe for the taking too! If after years and years of being neglected and treated as an afterthought, after suffering an obvious slight of losing his love on Daddy Wang's say-so, after being allowed to supposedly run wild with no attempt at parental intervention... If after all this Zilu still craved his father's approval in whatever form he could get it, craved it so much that he allowed himself to be led into an obvious trap, then what kind of loyalty might he have offered, had somebody bothered to nurture him properly?

And it's not like his talents were easy to sweep under the rug. It's not until after he's an adult that Zilu takes up the pretense of being a never-do-well; during his adolescence he was still giving it his all, hoping in vain that his father might notice and offer him some sweet, sweet parental validation. Alas. The lack of powerful backing from his maternal family is an obstacle, but not if one actively tries to fight against consort kin clans and their influence. Or is it only the Wangs who are the enemy? Must be so, otherwise why the hell would one not see Zilu's relative independence as his greatest asset? You don't even have to make him Crown Prince to use him; just instill some sense of pride and validation, feed his need for attention and put him behind Zitan's throne. Okay, maybe don't do that last thing, deadly brotherly competition being a whole thing in palace environments, but still, use him! But no, Huanmi remained the only person to actually see and appreciate Zilu for what he was. Is it any wonder he was so absolutely loyal to her that even when it looked like she had attacked him with lethal intent, he still cared about her safety most of all?

And is it any wonder that he expedited his considerable will and brainpower solely for her benefit? I was absolutely floored when I realized that becoming an Emperor wasn't actually his ultimate goal - marrying Huanmi in the biggest, reddest wedding possible was! Even if he needed to drag the more august guests in at swordpoint. Not to say he didn't want to take the throne for his own sake; he absolutely did, but only as far as it served as a big fat fuck you to every person who kept dismissing him out of hand, so basically every person other than Huanmi. Taking the crown was a power fantasy, an idee-fixe of sorts, but for all that keeping a throne in one's basement can be seen as somewhat peculiar, there are very few - if any - signs of actual delusion in Zilu's actions. The throne is not a goal in itself, merely a way to achieve his primary goal, which is to marry the woman he loves, take revenge for Huanmi's sake as much as his own and build a life worthy of her. She's his Empress and by gods, she's going to be the real deal soon enough, no more cosplaying in private villas, however nice it might be!

Ma Zitan, the one and only Master of Mope

With every Ma Prince I become more and more convinced that there was something seriously wrong with Daddy Emperor's brain. Neglecting Potato makes some sense within the greater political picture, letting Zilu lie fallow is the height of foolishness, yet it's more a matter of criminal inaction than actively doing something wrong, but Zitan? Oh, there is no excuse for the way Daddy Emperor chose to deal with Zitan. If the Third Prince was truly his intended heir from the start and there is little reason to believe otherwise - if Wangs are to go then Potato is done for, Zilu was never even considered and Zitan remains the favourite long after showing his complete uselessness - why not try to prepare him for his future role? True, doing so openly might provoke the Wangs, but it's not like there aren't any ways to present such ruler lessons as something else, even a punishment. But no, let's just hope he turns out okay all by himself!

Now, logically reasoning, if Zitan was Daddy Emperor’s favourite and the prince he originally wanted as his heir, then Zitan should be given all possible help, right? So why wasn’t he taught any actual skills, whether in governance or in military matters? The thing is… they might have tried. In episode 61, when Zitan asks his faithful pair of retainers if he would be able to best Xiao Qi, their first answer is not that he’s the Emperor so it’s a given. Well, that too, but the first, immediate response? You studied the art of war. Which, okay, might be a reasonable guess when it comes to any prince, but those retainers are rather young and only recently-promoted. Before their soujourn at the Imperial Mausoleum they probably served somewhere within the wider imperial household, but not close enough to any great personage to be knowledgeable about what the princes might or might not have studied. Also, that answer, should Zitan’s lessons be limited to his early childhood, would make them look like idiots or bootlickers of the worst sort. But let’s say that Zitan actually studied the art of war and did so longer than his brothers. Or, alternatively, with more famous masters. That would naturally be a subject of some talk, if only within the imperial household itself. If so, then the female retainer, who seems rather astute in general, gave the best answer she could give.

Okay, so maybe somebody actually tried to help Zitan along. It still failed. Zitan at twenty or so is singularily useless and strangely unambitious, and no, calligraphy doesn't count as useful, not if one is an imperial prince and Emperor-to-be!

It's not Zitan's uselessness or even his refusal to feel any kind of reponsibility for his own people (as shown in the Huizhou arc) I have the most issue with. Although the latter is simply disgusting. And... really, really short-sighted. If Huizhou falls, as it surely must, Jianning and Co. get a clear way to the capital, leaving Xiao Qi to play deadly catch-up. Which means that Zitan's family is pretty much done for. Now, he might not care about Potato and Zilu, but surely he should feel something towards his father? Some filial piety, if not actual love? But no, screw the people of Huizhou and screw Daddy Emperor. Still, does he think that Jianning wouldn't pursue him to the ends of the earth in order to eradicate a potential claimant?

No, what really angers me is the way Zitan treats the women he claims to hold dear. And I'm not even speaking of Awu, although it's rather obvious that he cares little for her internality and rather more than is healthy for his idealized image of her. Xie Guifei dies for him, which is not his fault in the least... or is it? See, I'm pretty sure that Zitan's insistence on marrying Awu despite his mother's reservations was what provoked the Wangs to take certain... steps. Provoking a power struggle is all fine and good, if you're at least somewhat prepared for the consequences. Zitan is no fifteen year old well-bred young lady, he's an imperial prince right in the middle of a delicate balance of power, how the hell does he not know or care about possible ramifications? Naivety is theoretically not a crime, but that surely is criminal naivety. Which begs the question - how hard was that boy coddled by his mother? My guess is a lot. But Xie Guifei is but a trifle compared to the elephant in the room.

Xie Wanru. Xie Wanru, who supported Zitan as much as she could while being in a precarious situation herself. And whom he had no problems with asking for further support, going as far as to aim for the throne, disregarding her own and her children's potential interests. Xie Wanru, who didn't make the first move, even knowing Zitan to be a potential threat to her and hers. Xie Wanru, whose baby got a full portion of avuncular love in form of actual torture and was lucky to get away with his life. Xie Wanru, his sister, whose ghost must have screeched with fury upon hearing Zitan laud himself as this paragon of brotherly feelings in comparison to the well-intentioned Turnip.

Oh, and he just sat there like an offended child while the country kept sliding into chaos, simply because some evil old men didn't let him kill Cheng's entire army with his sheer incompetence. Those dastardly old bastards! Let them scramble around and let the people in the provinces keep dying; they all deserve this for not recognizing Zitan's awesomeness! I'm not saying he should have fixed everything. I'm saying he should have done the bare minimum. He killed a brother for that throne, now he should actually do something with it. Other than purposefully provoking the only guy who actually restored peace and stability simply because the man happens to be married to Zitan's first love.

I'm sorry, I cannot with Zitan. There's a lot more to be said about that twerp, much of which has already been said, but at this point refraining from plowing on it's a matter of mental hygiene.

#ask and answer #the rebel princess #no but seriously how come there are no other Ma scions in the main line #is Daddy Emperor overly careful after his own experiences with his brothers?#could be could be #Zitan oh so pretty and oh so useless #and that was the last ask in my inbox!#I can hardly believe it

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dwellordream · 3 years

Text

“...We can dispense with the first question fairly quickly: is violence the supreme authority from which all other authority derives in actual societies? After all, we keep encountering historical models predicated on that premise and they keep being pretty bad, inaccurate history. But even shifting from those specific examples to a more general appraisal, the answer is pretty clearly no. Reading almost any social history of actual historical societies reveal complex webs of authority, some of which rely on violence and most of which don’t. Trying to reduce all forms of authority in a society to violence or the threat of violence is a ‘boy’s sociology,’ unfit for serious adults.

This is true even in historical societies that glorified war! Taking, for instance, medieval mounted warrior-aristocrats (read: knights), we find a far more complex set of values and social bonds. Military excellence was a key value among the medieval knightly aristocracy, but so was Christian religious belief and observance, so were expectations about courtly conduct, and so were bonds between family and oath-bound aristocrats. In short there were many forms of authority beyond violence even among military aristocrats. Consequently individuals could be – and often were! – lionized for exceptional success in these other domains, often even when their military performance was at best lackluster.

Roman political speech, meanwhile, is full of words to express authority without violence. Most obviously is the word auctoritas, from which we get authority. J.E. Lendon (in Empire of Honor: The Art of Government in the Roman World (1997)), expresses the complex interaction whereby the past performance of virtus (‘strength, worth, bravery, excellence, skill, capacity,’ which might be military, but it might also by virtus demonstrated in civilian fields like speaking, writing, court-room excellence, etc) produced honor which in turn invested an individual with dignitas (‘worth, merit’), a legitimate claim to certain forms of deferential behavior from others (including peers; two individuals both with dignitas might owe mutual deference to each other).

Such an individual, when acting or especially speaking was said to have gravitas (‘weight’), an effort by the Romans to describe the feeling of emotional pressure that the dignitas of such a person demanded; a person speaking who had dignitas must be listened to seriously and respected, even if disagreed with in the end. An individual with tremendous honor might be described as having a super-charged dignitas such that not merely was some polite but serious deference, but active compliance, such was the force of their considerable honor; this was called auctoritas. As documented by Carlin Barton (in Roman Honor: Fire in the Bones (2001)), the Romans felt these weights keenly and have a robust language describing the emotional impact such feelings had.

Note that there is no necessary violence here. These things cannot be enforced through violence, they are emotional responses that the Romans report having (because their culture has conditioned them to have them) in the presence of individuals with dignitas. And such dignitas might also not be connected to violence. Cicero clearly at points in his career commanded such deference and he was at best an indifferent soldier. Instead, it was his excellence in speaking and his clear service to the Republic that commanded such respect. Other individuals might command particular auctoritas because of their role as priests, their reputation for piety or wisdom, or their history of service to the community. And of course beyond that were bonds of family, religion, social group, and so on.

...So while it is true that the state derives its power from violence (as in Mao’s famous quip that “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun”), the state is not the only center of authority within a society. And indeed, even the state cannot run entirely on violence; this is the point that Hannah Arendt makes in the famous dichotomy of violence and power. In many cases, what Heinlein’s premise does is mistake violence for power, assuming that the ability to violently compel action is the same as the power to coordinate or encourage action without violence. But in fact, successful organizations (including, but not limited to, states) are possessed not of lots of violence but of lots of power, with much of that power rooted in norms, social assumptions, unstated social contracts and personal relationships that exist entirely outside of the realm of violence.

And so in both theory and practice, Heinlein’s premise fails to actually describe human societies of any complexity. There are no doubt gangs and robber-bands that have functioned entirely according to Heinlein’s premise (and presumably some very committed anarchists who might want such a society), but the very march of complex social institutions suggests that such organizations were quite routinely out-competed by societies with complex centers of authority that existed beyond violence, which enabled specialization (notably something Heinlein disapproves of generally, ‘specialization is for insects’) and thus superior performance both in war and in peace. Kings and empires that try to rule purely with force, without any attention paid to legitimacy or other forms of power (instead of violence) fail, and typically fail rapidly. As with almost any simple statement about complex societies, Heinlein’s premise is not merely simple but simplistic and so fails.

...The Cult of the Badass, as expressed here, lives in what we might call the “cult of tradition,” “dreaming of a revelation received at the dawn of human history” about a certain set of warrior values which were both expressed by famous historical warriors and which now provide a blueprint for life. This point of explicit in Pressfield’s set of videos, and implicit in the Fremen Mirage’s strong men/hard times model of history. This “cult of tradition” is quite selective, of course; Pressfield makes functionally no effort to engage with actual ancient value systems in a sustained way, limiting himself mostly to ‘badass’ aphorisms from Plutarch (himself hardly the most intellectually sophisticated or morally challenging author in the classical canon). It is tradition as imagined dimly in the present, not tradition as uncovered by careful historical research.

Consequently, the cult of the badass must engage in “the rejection of modernism;” this is no accident because the cult of the badass is an “appeal to a frustrated […] class” – this too is explicit in that Pressfield frames his ideology was a way for individuals who are held back or stagnated to unleash their true potential and overcome their limits, through the explicit rejection of modern values and the embrace of what are at least presented as traditional, even timeless values. That sort of appeal is also explicit in a lot of the fitness marketing that trades on the cult of the badass (and it seems notable that Pressfield himself lists “anybody that is heavily into fitness” first among his people living out the ‘warrior archetype.’), calling on people to work out like the Spartans. Consequently, it is a “cult of action for action’s sake” often focused on doing rather than asking what should be done (it is striking that Pressfield, despite nearly all of his video examples coming from the Greek and Roman world, engages not at all with the extensive Greek and Roman philosophies of justice).

Instead, this ideology, because it positions the capacity for violence as the highest human value, presents the thesis that “life is lived for struggle.” Pressfield reframes all of life’s struggles, including struggles of motivation and self-discipline, in terms of violence, in terms of a war against the ‘inner enemy,’ and consequently “life is permanent warfare.” And I think this goes a long way to explaining the obsession of this philosophy on warrior elites, because there is an inherent element of “popular elitism” in the cult of the badass, an insistence that at least it should be the case that “everybody is educated to become a hero” and thus not only develop the capacity for violence but also orient themselves towards “heroic death, advertised as the best reward for a heroic life.”

Thus the outsized influence of Thermopylae, a ‘heroic’ Greek defeat over other battles; Pressfield, again, is explicit on this point that it is at Thermopylae in particular that the Spartan warrior ethic is best and most perfectly displayed. If these are held to be the highest ideals, then anyone who falls short of them or refuses to engage with them must be weak, perhaps even “so weak as to need and deserve a ruler” (a point that often emerges in the sheep/wolves/sheepdog metaphor used by many ‘warrior cops,’ an ideology Pressfield explicitly appeals to, lumping in law enforcement as exemplars of ‘warrior’ ideology).

And of course, as is I think obvious in these readings, there is an undercurrent of anxiety about masculinity here. It is, after all, strong men in the strong men/hard times trope (and that is no accident as the trope is deeply connected to concerns about masculinity throughout its history). ...While Pressfield insists in some of his videos that his life philosophy is equally applicable to men or women, it is hard not to notice that his historical examples of warriors are all men (no Molly Pitcher, no Deborah, no Hua Mulan, etc. Not even Empress “Imperial Purple is the best burial shroud” Theodora; he does discuss the legend of the Amazons with rather less historical rigor than I might like). Where actual historical women fit in to his narrative, it is mostly as the mothers and nurturers of warrior men. While Pressfield does his best to paper over this (and to be fair, I think he is sincere in trying to present his ideology as non-gender-specific, unaware of the ways in which the broader framework of that ideology is aggressively unwelcoming to women), I think it is fair to say this is an ideology created largely by and for men, which values a hypermasculine ideal – we might even say “machismo.”

And by now readers are beginning to wonder where all of these little quotations are coming from (apart from the bit from Theodora). But first I want to note that we have a name for an ideology that fits these main points – where “life is permanent warfare,” “lived for struggle”, such that “everyone is educated to become a hero” to participate in a “cult of action for action’s sake” in a “cult of tradition” seated in a “rejection of modernism.”

And it’s fascism. Because all of those little quotes are from Umberto Eco’s famous essay “Ur-Fascism” (1995) which presented one of the most compelling classifications of the foundational DNA that all of the various, disparate forms of fascism share in common. ...Now I think it is important to back up here and be fair to Steven Pressfield. I don’t think Steven Pressfield is a fascist; ...What I do think is that the ideology that Pressfield is advancing has fascist tendencies (that he is, I suspect, unaware of, having not interrogated the nature of Spartan society as carefully as he might have). The ideology he is advancing shares most of the DNA of Ur-Fascism and it is not hard to see how the remaining handful of elements might easily be bolted on to this framework.

It is also, in a way that Pressfield never really addresses (and I suspect has never really realized), an ideology which is fundamentally at odds with the democratic values he also holds. If only some people are ‘warriors’ and developing that warrior capacity towards violence it the primary or principle virtue, it follows – and literally any Spartan could have and would have told Pressfield this – that everyone else is merely fit to be ruled. Sparta’s brutal oppression was not incidental to its ideology or social structure (as we’ve discussed!) but essential to it. As Eco points out (in his 10th point), it does no good to suggest that everyone ought to be equally a warrior; this is after all a cult of violence for its own sake and in violence there must be winners and losers. No complex society is composed only of warriors; for there to be kings and knights, there must be serfs too.

...Put more bluntly, the ideology of the Cult of the Badass is so easily falsifiable that the act of disagreement itself, rather than the content of arguments, must be rejected). The rejection of disagreement in turn demands the fear of difference because the ideology requires consensus and an absence of criticism. And once the ideology fails – and it will, because it is disconnected from the real world – conspiratorialism is the natural response for true believers unwilling to reject the ideology. If your ideology tells you that you are superior, and yet you do not produce superior results, what recourse is there but to conspiracy? As Eco memorably quips, “Fascist governments are condemned to lose wars because they are constitutionally incapable of objectively evaluating the force of the enemy” which is also, by the by, why so many authoritarian armies, theoretically filled with supposedly highly motivated, ultra-badass super-soldiers, tend nevertheless to lose more than they win. We saw this with Sparta; the very ideology of the place made them bad strategists, in precisely the ways that Eco suggests it would.

In short, the ideology of the Cult of the Badass – which is easy to see in any number of modern films, books and TV (and occasionally read into films that explicitly reject it by their viewers; I suspect everyone of at least a certain age has known that guy who watched Fight Club and then wanted, entirely unironically, to start his own fight club) – is a gateway to authoritarian thinking which, contrary to the name, is based in violence rather than authority. The supremacy of action, of violence, of the warrior and his ‘ancient’ (but actually quite modern) values are the foundation stones on which fascist ideologies (and I’d argue, other non-fascist authoritarianisms, but that’s a debate for another day) are constructed.

And, as Eco notes, “The Ur-Fascist hero craves heroic death, advertised as the best reward for a heroic life. The Ur-Fascist hero is impatient to die. In his impatience, he more frequently sends other people to death.” This is not a good ideology. As I noted in the first post in this series, a free society has no need for warriors. Not among its soldiers, not among its police, not among its civilians. At times, a free people may need to become soldiers, or police officers, but always to return to being civilians again, either at the end of the day or at the end of the war.”

- Bret Devereaux, “The Universal Warrior, Part III: The Cult of the Badass.”

#the universal warrior #the cult of the badass #ur-fascism #bret devereaux #history #writing #warfare #ancient #medieval #greek #roman #spartan

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colemacgrathtkz · 3 years

Text

Crashed Course

Previously. Next.

Disclaimer: Another long one but be warned.

[Six days after "Ah, memories", Blight manor]

As previously discussed, Luz held a sort of human crash course for her friends. Before they could meet her mother, she wanted to share as much about the human realm as possible. Willow, Gus, and Amity learned all they would. From currency to anime, most days, it seemed more like an excuse to hang out. Once, Willow and Gus couldn't appear. In light of this, Amity suggested holding the session at the manor. Luz didn't see anything wrong with that. Today's topic, the acceptable way to dance to "Bette Davis eyes". It was mostly her waving her arms in the air. However, her green haired host snatched her beanie during the lesson. Amity offered her a "teacher" a trade. They would take a break, in exchange for the cap. After agreeing, Blight etiquette called for getting the guest a drink. While she was away, Luz's "partner" had something to say.

Empress Luz: "Are sure about this? She turned on you in seconds."

Luz: "She was afraid of you and doesn't remember it. We're fine now. Besides, what kind of teacher would I be if I gave up on my student?"

Empress Luz: "Your first date ended with us erasing her memory. This is basically your second chance. Don't bring up any nasty memories."

She tried to answer the voice in her head, but Amity walked in at that moment.

Amity: "Two glasses, just for us."

She sat down on the davenport(sofa), right besides Luz.

Something to notice was the actual new haircut. Her Blight amor returned to style from day one. Short, but without the ponytail on top. Luz was stuck between her accomplice and her inamorata. She looked for anything to ease the tension. A quick observation might distract her "suspicious mind"

Luz: "So, you got rid of all your plants. You and Willow have a fight, again?"

Amity: "You were tied to a chair, by Willow, with my house's greenery. I just figured you'd prefer not having anything to worry about in your class here. I don't want to trigger any nasty memories for my you. "

Empress Luz: "She knows! Check our drink!"

Luz: "What about that one?"

The moment Amity turned her head, Noceda slipped something into her own drink. After surviving on the streets and avoiding poisoning attempts on the Isles, she learned a thing or two about self preservation. She merely poured a harmless potion meant to detect any "unusual" ingredients. She kept some of her own concoction on her, at all times.

Amity: "That's a mirror. And that's you getting busted."

Busted.

Amity: "I promise, it's just sparkling apple blood. But if you don't want it, I could take it. I'll check it for poison or whatever you had in mind?"

The latina quickly swiped her glass back.

Luz: "It's OK! It's just this isn't what you usually do."

Amity: "Is that so bad?"

She scooched closer and placed on hand on Luz's. Almost startled by this, the human chugged her drink and tried to get some distance. Normally, this stuff wouldn't bother her. But she knew full well her "partner in crime" could switch gears with her, at any moment.

Luz: "Say, how bout I teach you, what makes a good anime opening? Guess class is still in session."

Both her hands were held in that moment and Amity brought her face up close and personal. This was, once again, a high class manor with just the two of them.

Amity: "Amity Blight? What do you think about that?"

Were her eyes always this big?

Luz: "Your name? What about it?"

Amity: "Do you like it?"

What was in that drink?!

Luz: "Sure, I like it. Listen, maybe you should..."

Amity: " What about 'Amity Noceda-Blight'? Do you like the sound of that?"

Luz felt her heart skip a beat. Which was funny, considering Amity's head was now buried in her chest. Things were baffling as they are.

Luz: "It's a little early to start talking about that, isn't it? I mean, we're still pretty young."

Amity: "You haven't thought about it?"

Luz: "...."

Amity: "I've thinking about what meeting your mom means. I'm amazed that you can be so open, at times. 'You done things I could never do.' And that was before all this... monster staff life. But you've really proven yourself. And I think the others will see that, too, someday. So, don't go lying to me now, ok?"

Luz: "I haven't lied to you, preciosa. You can breathe easy about that."

After heaving a sigh, Amity just let herself flop on top of Luz. She didn't lift her head up one bit. Being so... affectionate wasn't a usual habit of Amity's. And yet, there she was being oddly "cuddly". The human underneath only cared about one thing at that moment. Rubbing her girlfriend's back and hoping that moment wouldn't end.

It had been a while since she'd felt truly happy.

Unfortunately, Amity was sent flying by a shockwave of red energy. The manor's resident found herself pinned to the wall.

Empress Luz: "Luz Noceda, your lovesick otter pup. You can fool her, but not me!"

The Empress snatched control from Luz. Now, she could only watch.

Amity crushed something in her hand and smoke began to engulf the room. The black smoke screen disrupted her captor's concentration. Blinded by the haze, she focused on a new sensation on her hands. Something was beginning to grow on palms of her hands. A black orb engulf each finger until it looked like she had bowling balls for fists.

The Empress made a beeline for the door, from memory. She barged through and raced for the gates. But her escape was cut off by giant tree roots. While they rose from the ground, hooded interlopers surrounded their target. Agents kept running around her. Randomly changing directions and yet never crashing into each other. She tried counting but lost track at 28. Luz would take a few hits from ones that managed to get close. Most of them were just advanced illusions. However, she noticed the footprints in the dirt gave her an opportunity. Using her feet, she made makeshift glyphs. Ironically,a ring of fire gave her enough of breather to make a pillar of ice. The Empress used the pillar like an elevator. She immediately got to work on smashing her new "weights" against the icy floor. Just as they were about to crack, an abomination grabbed the one of her right hand. Amity's creation had hitched a ride up with her.

Empress Luz: "Let me go!"

She smashed her left restraint to pieces and wasted no time firing a fire blast. The abomination was destroyed. But the heat from the surrounding flames and her attack did her pillar in. It crumbled to pieces underneath her. She was sent tumbling down to her waiting captors. As she tried to get up, two of them struck her just behind her knees. Sending her falling right on top of two well placed plant glyphs. The roots entangled her legs. Just as she was about to use her free hand, thick vines swirled completely around her left arm. They had her fingers immobilized. The greenery sprouted flowers and blew their petals in her face. That had to be Willow under that hood. Attempting to free her other arm, another abomination gripped her right arm. Blinded by the petals, she couldn't see something fly straight for her face. Whatever it was, it pinched her nose and held on for dear life. It wasn't hard to figure out what they had in mind. She tried to shake it, but to no avail. She was about as trapped as a human could be. Despite shaking her head violently, she felt some land right on head.

King: "Take this, I command as your ruler! The king of demons!"

Luz: "King?!"

She slipped up the moment she heard her boo boo buddy's voice. King dove his paw into her mouth with the payload. A small squishy like ball was introduced. He wrapped himself behind her head. He had to make sure she didn't spit it out.

After a few moments, she swallowed it. Right on cue, everyone let go and regrouped. Finally, she could see the hand of her former mentor scurrying away. But before she could do anything, the marble burst and released a orange vapor. Every one watched her cough some of it up. She smashed her last restraint and tried to tear the roots on her legs. Unfortunately, the potion finally kicked in. Her vision became blurry and her head fogged up.

Luz: "Oh, goodbye muscle control..."

She flopped face first into the dirt.

Everyone cautiously approached her. Amity was the first to reach her. She lifted her girlfriend's softly snoring head and put it on her lap.

Amity: "She's out cold."

As she wiped dirt off Noceda's face, the illusions were undone and everyone removed their hoods.

Eda, Lilith, Willow, Gus, Emira and Edric. King returned to Eda's side.

Eda: "Nice job, honor roll. It looks like we can work together."

Tonight was a tough mission. But they only wanted people who they trusted to bring in Luz alive. The most of the damage was kept to the front of the estate. The Blights agreed to be the ones who moved Luz to their secret base. Emira and Edric didn't want to clean up the mess in the yard. Eda collected some drool in a green bottle.

Things were finally setting into motion.

[Bonus]

[The 2 nights before, convention center]

Amity had received a request for a meeting. The catch was she come alone, without telling Luz. Under normal circumstances, she wouldn't have bothered with this. But recognized the handwriting. Eda, the owl lady, was finally making an appearance.

Eda: "Yo, class rep! It's been a while."

Amity: "Hi, it's nice to see you again. But why the secrecy? I thought you would have wanted to see Luz? Did you heal your curse, yet?"

Right then, Eda activated a plant glyph under the "New Coven" leader. As Amity struggled to get free, the owl lady poked and prodded the young witch's face.

Eda: "Sorry about that, kiddo. I had to be sure. I couldn't fall for the same trick, like the other twerps."

Unsure of what she meant, Amity simply gave her elder the floor.

Eda: "I can't stay for long, so I'll be quick. You and her other friends got caught in your little scheme. My former student messed with your memories. I know you wouldn't believe me without them. But my guess is she only left the good stuff. Hate to break it to you kid, but no relationship's a honeymoon forever."

Amity: "What are you talking about?"

A small blue vial was presented to her.

Eda: "Want to see if I'm right? A little something to turn you into a living lie detector. Just take some of this and look for a pulse."

An unconvinced look of a Blight might have reminded someone of old times.

Eda: "Come here, class act. There's something I want to show you."

Author's note:

This one reminds me of a certain movie fight.

I meant to upload this one, last week. Oops

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lucidlucy · 4 years

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The Sith, Dyads, & The Obsession with Immortality (TROS SPOILERS)

I preface this by saying that this may mostly be word salad as my thoughts are whirling after watching TROS. I also add that I am only familiar w/ some of the SW Lore at face value, so this ends up very nearly in the realm of fanfic. Humor me. TROS and Palpatine’s appearance/plan has my mind racing:

In TROS, we find out that Rey is a Palpatine, and that Palpatine’s plan in luring her to Exogol is not to kill her, but to have her kill him and take his place as Empress. As he explains, the moment she kills him, his soul essentially transfers into her and they become one, and in doing so, Palpatine does not really *die*. He is all of the Sith, as he clearly states, and his plan confirms this. He is The First Sith and every Sith thereafter, and should Rey kill him in anger and take his place, his spirit lives on... he essentially achieves a really grotesque form of immortality.

So really, this makes me think the Rule of Two is a sham. It really is The Existence of One. It shows how greedy and malevolent the Sith are—there can really only ever be ONE Sith in the end. Just one, morphing over and over as it takes over it’s next host and the student becomes the master. Sidius points this out when he tells the story of Plageuis the Wise in the PT.

Now, here’s where things become word salad-y. So there can only ever really be ONE true Sith, which means there at some point was an *original* Sith. Keep this in mind for the next part:

Ben Solo and Rey are a Dyad— a pair of Force bonded soulmates, and they each in separate instances save each other from dying. Together, when Palpatine syphons some of their life force he manages to gain some vitality. Not life, per se, but his body clearly restores. It shows where the true marvel of a Force Dyad lies: they can keep people from dying. They can even return the dead back to life. Sounds awfully like something a certain Sith who was Wise said he knew how to do... but he couldn’t save himself. Just like Rey couldn’t save herself from dying, nor Ben from starting to fade towards death when Rey stabbed him atop the Death Star.

Here’s the third part of my crazy theory: In TLJ we see the Jedi Temple on Ahch-to have a beautiful mosaic of the Prime Jedi- a dark and light figure perfectly balanced in near ying yang symmetry. But let’s say there wasn’t one, but two of them, achieving what the light and the dark sides could not do alone.

Which makes me think... considering the story of Plagueis, that The Prime Jedi, the paired figures we see in the temple, were the original Dyad. Plagueis, or whatever first incarnation existed of him, was half of that Dyad. Perhaps their other half became the first Force Ghost, in which case there is no return... And it makes me think that they/he must have lost their other half, and with that, the obsession with immortality began. With their half gone, there is no way for them to stay alive. But they *knew* how to keep people alive. How to bring them back, even. They just could not save themselves, and in the quest to find away around this, corrupted the Force by forcing it into doing this despicable, monstrous process of transferring their spirit into a new host and merging with them as a way to remain alive.

The Sith live within Palpatine while the Jedi are all Force Ghosts, just like the original Dyad ended up, and the cycle has been perpetuated for millenia.

Perhaps the Force created a new Dyad to try and *right* that loss. Not so that there’s “balance” to the force in equal parts light, equal parts dark, but as a way to root out the perversion that the partnerless Dyad had created when it lost its mate, as they were originally not evil, just simply part of the Force. As birth, so death, as day, so night, neither of which sides of the coin are perverse, they just are. The Sith have correoted this, thus becoming something entirely different and abhorrent to the natural order of life.

With Palpatine gone, Ben Solo having turned to the light, and only Rey (A lightsider) left, and since I very much doubt Rey would go trying to find immortality, the balance has been restored.

This might be total BS of stringing pieces of new/old lore together to form a semi coherent answer to a puzzle, and honestly more fanfic material than anything, but I couldn’t help but notice all of these tiny little things that would work out really well if you just... connect a few dots. Especially because it makes me wonder how they’re going to incorporate all these new bits of lore into what we have. And i honestly wouldn’t be mad seeing something like this.

Hell, maybe if we get freaky Rey and Ben could be reincarnations of the original Dyad—two parts of a whole connected across time and space. Which, means they’re bound to be reunited/reborn again as a mated recurrence in the Force, essentially able to do what nobody else, not even Vader the Chosen One, managed to do: bring someone they love back to life.

#reylo #meta #reylo meta #honestly this is a lot #but satisfying to me #tros spoilers #ix spoilers

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