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alexhoghdaily · 3 years

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Alex’s Instagram Live interview with Tommy DiDario for #LetsStayTogether

Once again this got extremely long. Because as usual I cannot grasp the simple concept of ‘Highlights’. I basically wanted to write every single sentence down. Forgive me.

(note: this interview contains spoilers for the Vikings finale!)

The comments are turned off. This sets a relaxing mood for the interview.

Alex starts by asking if he’s getting through alright, Tommy is in New York and Alex is in Denmark. Which can make the time difference and connection difficult. He was confused about the actual time of the interview. His email said the show would be at 9pm, but the instagram countdown was set for 7pm. He’s not a technical person so he got a little nervous and was very happy to be live.

Tommy mentioned he started the show #LetsStayTogether during covid to give people a place where they can turn to for some joy, hope and inspiration. A place to just have fun. He said Alex brings all that and more so it was a pleasure to have him on the show.

He spoke about his character and the show Vikings, and asked him What made him want to play the part of Ivar on the Show. Alex answered the question with him being a ‘nobody’ when he came into the show, and he was very thankful to get the opportunity. He didn’t think about wether or not he liked the character, for him it was more like “I’m going to be an actor on Vikings? Are you kidding me? That’s a solid yes.” He didn’t even know what character he was going to play. It started with a regular self-tape of him doing weird accents and weird lines and then multiple auditions for all of the brothers. He said it was an intense audition. He remembered coming into the room and immediately noticing that the people present there were very important.

Tommy mentioned the darkness he brought to the show, the rise and fall of Ivar and how people were rooting for him in the end, and then asked Alex what he loved about playing such a great character like this. Alex answered with the ups and down’s, those are always fun for an actor to get into. Ivar is complicated and that’s always fun to take on as an actor. you always have to defend him [Ivar] even despite him making that very tough. “When he started burning people for a living I was like Michael Hirst are you kidding me. How am I supposed to make people still kind of love him?” It was challenging and fun.

Tommy asked Alex if he was protective of him [Ivar] because he felt like he had to figure out a way to make people like him. Alex answered with: Absolutely. He needs to be, because he always has to understand him and never judge him. And if he would struggle with that, the audience would absolutely 100% too. He has to be the last line of defense. He explained his thoughts and reasoning behind Ivar’s decisions. If he can reason with his thoughts and feelings behind it, it can completely change how he says his lines. It’s all in the little details and that’s what makes the job fun.

He didn’t get his script long ahead of time, only a week, so when he was still rehearsing his lines for one episode he already got his lines for the next and that was really though.

Tommy asked him why he [Alex] thinks is the reason fansresponded so well to his character even with his darknes. Alex answered this wit that he thinks it’s because he’s an antihero. You like rooting for someone who isn’t always perfect because we as human beings are also not always perfect. (He compared it to him liking batman over superman because batman is more flawed than superman.) He also said that he loves that he’s [Ivar] complicated. Every time you create a character that has a lot of depth to them, you challenge the audience and force the audience to always question him and ask themselves what they think about him and his actions. Why is he doing what he’s doing? That keeps people invested and engaged with the story/character. That’s his job.

Favorite scenes: Alex’s favorite scenes are 5x03 where Ivar is yelling, covered in blood in York. (He repeated his iconic Icelandic line as usual.) Another favorite scene was the one where Ivar said goodbye to Baldur in the woods. It is a scene that is really close to his heart. This is because Ivar was honest and vulnerable. Usually he’s doing crazy stuff and yelling and killing people. Alex likes the quiet moments more where he’s just in his own head and having a heart time. He loved the scene because it was so real.

Tommy asked Alex how he views Ivar’s relationship with love. (Absent father, overprotective and smothering mother, a tragic marriage, how does Ivar view love after this.) Alex said that he understands why Ivar does not understand love. After his absent father, smothering mother, tough love from his brothers, he was so blinded by Freydis’ love and his love for her that she could fully manipulate him. It was a complete disaster. When they started season 6 Alex thought that Ivar had completely given up on love. He had discussed this issue with Michael Hirst and the directors. Alex found him to be a sociopath and not an actual psychopath. Because he understands emotions, and he has a lot of them. He does have love and he does have empathy. He thought it was great to focus more on that in season 6. Showing more of Ivar’s human side was very important to him. He has many emotions and he was never just a crazy guy, Alex never thought he was crazy, nor that he was a god, he believed that Ivar knew better than to actually view himself a god. He thinks Ivar is an actor, and he is more broken on the inside than on the outside. The whole “I’m a god” act was all fake, and it was Ivar’s defense mechanism.

For his journey in season 6, Alex asked Michael Hirst to take it down a notch for Ivar. in season 5, especially 5B, he was challenging to like and Alex was struggling to defend him. He wanted to turn that around. He said that after losing his wife, his throne, and being on the run really makes him think. He says Ivar was smart enough to learn from his mistakes. He loved to come to a new place and start from the beginning. He did say that even with the new beginning Ivar was still plotting and manipulating and smart. He is still Ivar the Boneless. Alex was always amazed by his smarts when he read the scripts. He loves season 6 because Ivar was more human and humble.

They discuss Ivar’s death in the final episode. Alex said that he was on top of that. It was completely his idea. He wanted him to go out with a bang and not survive. He told Michael Hirst he wanted a death scene for Ivar. He also discussed with Michael that he loved the idea of Ivar being scared in the end. That he showed himself to be extemely human in his very last moments. Which Alex himself thinks all of us would be. Ivar is the guy who has been yelling that he’s a god, and he loved to contrast of him showing who he really was in the end, and just being afraid. He wanted him to be human in the end, the little boy that he really is. He needed him to show it in his last moment. He thought it was a beautiful brotherly and honest moment. Quote: “I like honesty.” He said that it was also one of his favorite scenes.

Tommy asked what it was like for him, and Alex said that he was bawling his eyes out. He cried the entire day. It was the end of 3,5 years of Vikings, the end of a very intense period of his life and it had been extremely challenging. He was happy to go but he also knew he was going to miss everyone. They were like family. It was the very last scene he shot, and it was magical to finish filming the show with his death scene. After it he was like I guess it is really over. He got a microphone and a signed shield with little messages. He was crying and everyone was gathering around him in a circle, which made him very nervous. It was a regular day with many extras and crew members and performing for them is no problem but when it get’s personal it’s more difficult. It felt like a very private moment. It wasn’t until he got home 14 days later that he fully understood what happened.

Tommy said that he understood that after such an intense role it would take a bit to come back from that and realize what he’s done. Alex agreed 100%. He said it can really feel like an empty dark hole, because you’re so used to working with so many people around him and he’s in a groove and all of a sudden it stops.

He mentioned that he was in his studio, and that he has a band. “That’s what’s happening in the background here.” It’s a fun hobby, nothing official. It’s just them doing decent cover songs. When Tommy asked if we would be able to hear any of them Alex answered with: “Absolutely not”. He joked about it being a secret passion and that it’s not supposed to be talked about. Tommy said no one would be opposed to them releasing a single.

After tommy asked about on set relationships Alex said they were all really close like a family. Filming was tough, not the best circumstances, 15 hour workdays, no breaks, eating the same cold food in between takes and the only way to get through it is because you’re with family. He said he worked with incredibly beautiful and talented people and that helped getting through it. He says he keeps in touch with a lot of people, not just cast members. He said that this is the beautiful thing about this job, you get families all around the world. He mentioned that there were a lot of food battles between the actors.

They moved on to the most popular fan questions.

Who would Alex play if he wasn’t Ivar? In return Alex asked if he could pick anyone and it wouldn’t matter. He jokingly said Lagertha, then said he would actually like it. Then he said Floki because he loves both Floki and Gustaf. (insert little floki laugh.) He also said Ragnar and King Ecbert.

What was the experience like filming Ivar’s genetic disorder? Alex said it was such a challenge. Especially physically because had to crawl around. He thought it was very important to him because he studied OI for his role and he said it’s an awful disease. It was important to him to make it as authentic as possible and show the struggles people who have that disease go through every day. Tommy said that people really appreciated the honesty that Alex brought to that portion of the character and he saw a lot of comments from people in the disabled community saying that they appreciated seeing someone go through that on a mainstream show because they can relate to it. It’s very powerful. Alex had also received some messages from people suffering from OI and it was very inspirational and humbling. It made the experience even better because he likes that he can give people the extra confidence to go out there and do things.

The third question was if Alex would ever be interested in doing a prequel about Ivar’s life. Alex said that he would want to. He jokingly said: “Why not? if the money is good enough.” Of course he would because he loves his character. He also said that even though he would love to, he also has to admit that his character has been a big part of his life and he would like to do portray other characters. (They joked about a lot of people wanting to see Alex in a romantic comedy and Alex mentioned it’s not his favorite thing to do).

Is there a behind the scenes secret that people would be surprised to know about? Alex said that on Vikings they were allowed to write their own lines once in a while and that’s not very common.

Alex’s screen froze and he suddenly left the livestream, but he finally was able to come back after a few minutes. (Insert embarrassed face and him apologizing for being a technical disaster).

He continued about writing their own lines. They really had a say in their own lines and character’s storylines and that was amazing. It helped getting a better sense of understanding characters.

Tommy asked him if he had a favorite line or scene that he’s written. Alex told about the scene where Hvitserk and Ivar meet each other again in season 6 after being separated for a long time. Marco and himself wrote the tiny scene together where they sit together next to the river where Ivar says to Hvitserk: “You look like shit” and Hvitserk replies with “I feel like it.” Followed by “What are you wearing?” Alex loves that little moment because after everything it brings them straight back to their original relationship.

The last fan question was actually not a question, it was a happy early birthday! Tommy asked Alex how he would celebrate and what he would like for his birthday. Alex answered the question with Less COVID and peace in the world. It’s really the time to stick together. He can talk about it and use his platform but that’s all he himself can do. He said he’s happy and priveleged, everything is good. Copenhagen is opening up. Because cafe’s are opening up again he can go out to have lunch and a beer. But there are so much places around the world where circumstances are horrible and it would make him happy if everyone could get a little closer together. Tommy agreed that it was an important message to put out there.

They joked about his band again, Alex not committing to putting anything out. Alex said it’s absolutely noted. He also jokingly said he would tell his bandmates that they should put out some originals.

They spoke about Alex’s photography. Alex said it’s a side thing and a hobby, a way for him (when on set) to relax and focus his mind on something else. He also thinks it’s so much fun to capture moments. He likes to capture moments in front and behind the camera, that’s what photography for him is about. Capturing moments and telling stories. It’s a pleasure to bring his camera on set because he can capture so many different things. He likes to keep doing it. He also said he’s working on a photography book but he wants to wait with releasing it until he has enough good material from a lot of different projects to include.

Finally Tommy asked him what he would like to say to everyone who tuned in and who stood by him for all these years. Alex answered with: “Thank you very much for all the support throughout the years, he literally couldn’t have done it without you [the fans] because that’s why they keep doing another season and another episode. Because you tune in every single week and do that for several years. It’s all for the fans. Sure they do it for themselves but in the end it’s all for you and they are proudly trying to make it as good as possible because of you, and because you are watching. Thank you for doing that.”

#interviews #instagram #live #alex høgh andersen

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earthstellar · 3 years

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The Most 80s Cartoon Theme Songs Ever: Guitars, Synth, Emotional Lead Singers, Robot Voices

Now, I know this is on my Transformers blog, and I already made a whole big post about the objectively best Transformers theme songs here.

But if you like the Transformers 80s rock/synth music, I have some classic 80s cartoon series songs that younger people out there might not even know about-- And they are absolutely the most radical 80s songs you will ever hear.

You will either love these, or you will laugh extremely hard. I don’t know how anyone under 30 years old might react to these, but I want Gen Z to experience some of the sick jams I grew up with, so here you go!

1) MASK Theme Song: If GI Joe and Transformers Were The Same Show

If you follow me for Transformers: This show is what would happen if a bunch of bots used their holoforms to do a GI Joe adventure while driving around in a bunch of weird Combiner alt-mode vehicles.

Check that out. It’s a 50s Cadillac painted like a flaming hot rod with triplicate tires and a rotating tank turret. Look at how much ass that kicks.

MASK was about being rad, using cars and trucks that had a bunch of really goofy nonsense like laser beam headlights to fight the Bad Guys, who were mostly B-list GI Joe villains. This show is fondly remembered because it was fun and silly with some pretty cool design ideas and toys, and that’s all it needed to be. MASK was pretty great!

Best Elements of the Song: The song opens with soft synth keyboard, then kicks off into guitar and a heavy synth robot voice accompanied by a super passionate dude absolutely invested in singing about “always riding hard on Venom’s trail” (you can decide if it’s gay or not, personally I remember fanfiction about this series that was actually pretty good), before an excellent guitar solo that melts into a synth duet and a last round of vocals to close out the track.

Worst Elements of the Song: The lyrics are horrendous. You will either love how much of a jam this is anyway, or you’ll laugh at it because it’s so cheesy. Either way, it is still actually a great track, so give it a listen if you’ve never heard it before!

2) Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors: You’ve Probably Never Heard of This Show Because it was Made by French Canadians

If you follow me for Transformers: This show is what happens when Whirl spikes all the drinks in Swerve’s and

There’s a space outlaws themed episode where the above character uses her bisexual mullet and shoulder pads made of steel to defend her title as the space pirate queen. Please watch this show.

This show has everything, from multiple characters with mullets, a character who is a cross between Han Solo and Bender from The Breakfast Club, a space wizard, a magical Captain Planet space magic ring, space pirates, space vehicles of all kinds, surprisingly solid animation, and overall a really fun vibe. The character designs are really interesting, and it’s a shame this show isn’t more widely known. The famous J M Straczynski (look up everything he’s worked on and have your mind blown) worked on this show as well!

Best Elements of the Song: The track opens with the opening narration from the show, and immediately kicks off: “There’s a power that comes from deep inside of you, every day you’re reachin’ towards the light! And you know there’s a long long way ahead of you, but when your wheels get you there-- Things will turn out right! ” Absolutely great vocals accompanied by synth beats and hair metal guitar which goes into a vocal chorus, ending with an emphasis on the solid vocals for impact.

Worst Elements of the Song: It’s hard to find a full length version of the track. The one I linked above is still the TV edit of the theme.

3) The Real Ghostbusters - Hometown Hero: I Really Miss Cartoons With Synth Music

Honestly, the whole album is worth a listen, this is 80s gold.

This show was one of the biggest hits of the 80s. I had an Egon Spengler blue Ghostbusting jumpsuit, and this is the show I remember most fondly.

You knew shit was real when you got the frontal proton-guns-out group pan shot.

Now, you might laugh, younger people, but The Real Ghostbusters actually had some of the best writing of any animated show at the time, and it still holds up today. (I recently re-watched it, and I was impressed at how good it still is.) It was unreal how great and how adult the first two seasons were, especially. Janine was the coolest, most stylish, fiercest lady in cartoons. (I had a crush on her for years as a kid.)

It’s also probably one of the few 80s cartoons that is entirely watchable in the current day. The dialogue is genuinely funny, and the show gets deeply emotional at times, in very effective and real-feeling ways. You will cry when things get serious. You get entirely invested in what’s going on, no matter how wild or bizarre. The creature designs were amazing, and the animation was solid. This show was above and beyond in terms of overall quality, and the music matches.

Best Elements of the Song: I do recommend you listen to the whole album, because each song is very distinct and extremely 80s. The one I linked above, Hometown Hero, was made for a specific episode in which Ray returns to his hometown to bust a ghost that a family friend has requested the Ghostbusters help out with. However, Ray is afraid that people will think his career is silly or that people might be disappointed in him not having a more traditional job, so he’s nervous. However, when they get there (after lots of encouragement from the rest of the team), they successfully deal with the situation, and Ray’s courage is back! Cue the music!

It’s a very uplifting song, and a pretty good episode, too. (There was lots of good episodes, but I recommend the first two seasons in their entirety. They’re all good episodes, no lie.)

Worst Elements of the Song: Unfortunately this track ends eventually, but there is an entire album for this series, including one of the best Halloween themed bops I’ve ever heard, which you can enjoy here.

This post is pretty long already, but if you want to hear more 80s cartoon jams, let me know and I’ll share the objectively best ones!

#the real ghostbusters #real ghostbusters #80s #retro #vintage #cartoons #ghostbusters #MASK #80s cartoons #80s shows #80s music #music #1980s #animation #jayce and the wheeled warriors

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downwiththeficness · 3 years

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In the Bond-Chapter 16

Summary: Lilah often wished she’d never said yes to working with the Gecko brothers—usually while dodging gunfire. At no time was she regretting that decision more than when she’s hanging upside down from the ceiling, staring down a group of hungry culebras and one (1) extremely powerful sun god.

Word Count: ~6,100

Warnings: Smut

A/N: This is an AU of my Story In the Blood, which can be read here. Basically, this fic explores what would have happened if Lilah had met up with Geckos before she met Brasa.

Taglist: @symbiont13

Start from the beginning Previous Chapter Next Chapter

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Lilah woke unwillingly. Rolling over, she scrubbed at her eyes, still swollen from crying herself to sleep. Brasa had held her closely as they drove away from a home Lilah wasn’t sure she would ever return to. She’d managed to hold her tears for about ten minutes, and then her will had given out.

In her state, Lilah could be forgiven for how long it had taken her to notice that they weren’t on course for Brasa’s bar. When she’d asked where they were going, Brasa had simply said, ‘home’.

‘Home’ was quite literally carved into solid stone. Accessible through an elevator hidden cleverly in a low rock formation. It opened into a completely dark corridor. Lilah let Brasa lead her by the hand into the darkness, looking back only once to catch Javier reaching down to close the doors to the elevator carriage, shutting out the only light.

Blind, Lilah’s step had faltered. Brasa took it in stride, wrapping an arm around her and acting as her guide. They reached a door, which opened to… ‘home’. It was, she supposed, average in size, though she hadn’t paid much attention to the architecture. Brasa had cosetted her in yet another deliciously comfortable bed and she had spent the rest of the afternoon and evening putting off Brasa’s questions regarding her well being.

To be fair, Lilah hadn’t known how she felt the night previous. She still wasn’t sure how she felt. Her emotions wavered between indignation and deep depression, both of which made her head ache. She pushed the covers back and swung her legs over the edge of the bed.

Padding quietly to the bathroom by the illumination of a small nightlight shining near the door of the bedroom, Lilah went through the motions of cleaning herself up. No stranger to a rough night, she was unsurprised to find shadows beneath her eyes and her hair in disarray. A quick look in the vanity drawers found a comb that the used to gingerly comb out the tangles.

After washing her face, Lilah made her way to the bedroom door, peering out into the hallway. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, she tip toed towards the living room. In the few moments that she’d spent standing at the threshold, waiting for Brasa to shrug off his coat and hang it up, she’d noticed how sumptuous the furniture was—an overstuffed couch, soft carpets, dark and heavy woods. Everything was all rich fabric and soft textures. And yet, it was strangely bare. No pictures, no art, no...personality.

As she made her way deeper into the house, Lilah came upon Brasa sitting in the plush chair, a book in his hand. Head bent over the pages, he looked...so completely normal that she had to blink a few times to make sure that it was, indeed, him.

Sensing her approach, he looked up, eyes assessing, “How did you sleep?”

Lilah watched as he closed the book, setting it aside, She watched as he stood and approached. She watched as he became more concerned as she failed to respond. He grasped her above the elbows, head dipping to catch her eyes. Lilah couldn’t hold the gaze, and felt ridiculous for it.

“You should eat,” he pronounced, turning her and leading her gently through a set of double doors to a small, intimate dining room.

He bade her to sit, moving past the room and through to the kitchen. Lilah leaned her elbows on the table, resting her head in her palms as she waited. Drowsy from too much sleep, she blinked lazily into the middle distance, until movement in her periphery caught her attention.

Brasa approached, a plate in one hand, a glass of water in the other. He placed both before her, nudging the plate when she hesitated. Lilah looked down at what he made, a small chuckle sounding from low in her throat. Eggs in a basket. Toads in a hole. He’d remembered.

Charmed, and more than a little grateful, Lilah picked up the fork and cut into the edge of the toast, nicking the egg yolk. As she chewed, she glanced over at Brasa, who was watching her. Though his posture was relaxed, there was a sharp light in his eyes that signaled he was studying her carefully.

“He will change his mind,” he said casually, gesturing smoothly with one hand.

Lilah paused, swallowing, “What?”

Brasa smiled, “Seth. He will change his mind.”

Eyes falling to her plate, Lilah busied herself with cutting into the second piece of toast, “You know that?”

“I do,” he answered.

“How?”

He shrugged, “I’m old.”

“You’ve mentioned.”

With a smile, he countered, “Old enough to know how men like Seth think. He’ll be mad for a while, but if he cares for you—and I think he does—he will come around.”

Lilah sighed and leaned back into her chair, “I’m so mad at him.”

Brasa nodded, saying nothing, waiting for her to continue. She looked to the ceiling, trying to gather her thoughts, to sort her emotions in a way that made any kind of sense.

“I know he’s struggling to accept…” she gestured broadly, “All of this. I mean, I’m still trying to accept it. But...the way he treated me, like a…”

Lilah stopped, ‘kid sister’ sitting like lead on her tongue. Her eyes closed as the implications of her own thoughts sunk in. He’d treated her just like a kid sister, an annoying kid sister that didn’t know what they were doing. And, somehow, that made her feel worse.

Sensing her unease, Brasa leaned forward and touched her hand, brushing his fingers over the back, “As I said. He will get over it.”

Casting him a sorrowful look, she murmured, “I hope so. We’re friends, you know?”

“I know.”

“And,” she continued, turning her hand over to thread her fingers through his, “I still want to be friends.”

He nodded, giving her hand a squeeze before picking up her plate and taking it to the kitchen. Lilah fiddled with her glass in a kind of soft resignation. This would have to play out however it was going to. Pushing the issue wasn’t going to make things better. Neither was dwelling on it. Still, she gave herself permission to feel sad for a while. That seemed fair.

Brasa returned and held out a hand to her, which she took. They walked amiably back to the living room where he sat her down on the couch and handed her the remote.

“I have some work to do,” he explained, leaning down to press a kiss to the crown of her head, “It’ll take a few hours. Then, we’ll decide what to do for the evening.”

Lilah spent maybe half an hour scrolling through the many streaming services that were on the top menu of the TV, amazed that Brasa had gotten so fully up to speed on modern entertainment. Furtively, she glanced through some of his watch history, smiling when she noted that he’d made it all the way through every season of House and, oddly enough, had recently watched The Princess Bride.

Eventually, she settled on restarting Drunk History from the beginning. Prior to signing on with the Gecko brothers, she’d watched a few episodes a month in her down time. There were always TVs on in the bar, so she’d never thought to purchase one for her room. Now seemed a good time for some comfort.

Brasa had been right when he’d said that his work would take a few hours. Lunchtime came and went, Lilah making her way to the kitchen and finding that he’d stocked it with some basic staples. They were going to have to take a shopping trip, though. The man had eggs, bread, a bag of various fruits, and a jug of milk. Her guess was that he’d googled basic foodstuffs and had run with it.

After eating her meal perched over the sink, Lilah washed her dishes and returned to the couch to start the next season. That was where Brasa found her, half asleep, stretched out over the cushions. He smiled as he approached, reaching down to lift her legs and sit, draping her feet over his lap.

“Done for the day?”

He shrugged, “In one manner of speaking.”

“What does that mean?”

Another shrug, “Benny’s following has grown again. We think he’s turning a few humans a week.”

Her brows came together, “What does that mean for you?”

Brasa took a few seconds to think about it, his fingers drawing little circles over the sensitive skin of her ankle, “It means that he is likely going to resort to violence, and soon.”

Lilah felt her muscles tense, a kind of latent anxiety rolling along her body, “How do we prevent it?”

Looking at her, his expression was soft, but sure, “I don’t think we can.”

She sat up, disbelieving, “Why not?”

Turning a little bit so that he could prop his arm up on the back of the couch, Brasa explained, “Men like this…there is only one thing that checks them, and I promised you that I would look at other options. He wants blood, will be satisfied by nothing else.”

Lilah pulled her legs up and under her body, folding her hands in her lap, “We can talk to him, right?”

“We tried that.”

“For like two seconds,” she countered, her anxiety melting into frustration, “There has to be a way. Nobody has to die for this.”

Head tilting to the side, he said, “When has, essentially, a coup, ever not resulted in bloodshed?”

Lilah rolled her eyes, “This isn’t a coup. Its...an administrative change.”

Brasa shot her a look that very clearly said that she was bullshitting, “In their eyes, I have taken away their way of life. You know this.”

She shook her head, “You’re giving them a better life. A life where they’re not hiding in the dark, picking off humans, and running from local hunters.”

“Some don’t see it that way.”

There was a kind of finality in his tone, a tension borne of having had this argument over and over with different people. Lilah sighed and wriggled deeper into the couch, feeling not a little bit petulant.

Brasa reached over and took her hand in a loose grasp, “This is not the first time I’ve brokered peace—did so just recently with the most stubborn people I’ve ever met, if you’ll recall.”

She laughed, “Yeah. There were a couple times I almost threw something at one or all of you during those meetings.”

One side of his mouth quirked up, “I could tell. You do not hide your feelings well.”

“Um, excuse me, I think I do,” Lilah shot back.

The little quirk in his mouth widened to a smile, “You do not. At least, not from me.”

Again, she rolled her eyes, “That’s because of the bond.”

He hummed in the negative, “You have a very expressive face.”

Lilah scoffed, “I have an excellent poker face.”

This earn her a low chuckle, “You do not.”

“I was able to keep the bond a secret for months.”

Brasa leaned into her space, his hand running up the length of her arm to settle behind her neck, “Richie knew within seconds of seeing you the night we met. And Seth’s powers of perception are mediocre, at best.”

Lilah was not too proud to admit that she was a little dazed at how close they were, coffee and caramel filling her senses. He’d given her a lot of space over the last twenty four hours—she wasn’t even sure where he’d slept. She found herself yearning to crawl right into his lap and stay there for the rest of the night, and some part of her figured that he’d probably let her.

But, while he’d been working, she’d been thinking. And, the first order of business was to get some food that would make more than one kind of meal in the house.

“We need to go shopping,” she said, smiling when he tilted his head to the side in confusion, “Groceries. We need them—well, I need them.”

Brasa gave a curt nod, rising and pulling her to standing, “Do you want to go now?”

Knowing that she looked pretty fucking bad, Lilah shook her head, “Let me get cleaned up. I’ll be out in about forty minutes.”

She took her time with getting ready, making sure that she washed every inch of skin, shampooed and conditioned her hair, covered her dark circles, and put on some fresh, clean clothes. As she dug into her bag for socks, her phone and the case for her comm fell out. She touched them gingerly, noting that there was no service and that the comm was redundant, given that she didn’t have anyone to connect with. She tucked both away.

In the end, it took a little longer than forty minutes, but Brasa didn’t seem to mind. When she emerged from the bedroom, he was lounging on the couch, CSPAN playing on the TV.

Lilah’s eyes narrowed, “Why are you watching this?”

His eyes scanned her lazily, taking her in, “You didn’t think my entire business was in medical supplies, did you?”

She shrugged, “We never discussed it in detail.”

Reaching for the remote, he turned off the TV and stood, “I like a diverse portfolio. Keeps things stable across the board.”

Lilah knew nothing about stocks, and even less about portfolios, “I’m sure that’s a good strategy.”

“It can be, though some people prefer a more adventurous technique.”

She moved towards the door, looking over her shoulder at him, “But, not you.”

He followed, “No.”

That tracked. Every decision Lilah had ever seen him make was calculated with brutal efficiency. Brasa did nothing by halves, nor did he make impulsive decisions. It was one of the things that Lilah liked most about him.

The hall was dark as it had been the day before, a chilling lack of light—except for a small triangle in the distance, the illumination so dull that it almost didn’t look real. As before, Brasa took her hand, leading her. As before, she went willingly. Unlike before, Lilah was alert enough to ask questions.

“What is this place?”

Brasa’s voice sounded next to her, “I’ve already told you.”

“Yeah, but what is it?”

They neared the light, and it was cast in shadow for a moment as Brasa pressed the button, “I needed a more secure place, a place to allow myself true rest. A place where I could keep you safe, when the time came.”

Leaning into his side, she asked, “Because of Benny?”

Though she couldn’t see him, Lilah felt him shake his head, “I have lived a life of nearly total violence. That comes with a cost.”

And, here they were, back to the same conversation they’d had at least twice before. Her safety. Her weakness. Her humanity—though, not her mortality.

“You think I’m safer underground?”

The doors opened and Brasa ushered her inside, “Only Javier and I—and now, you—know about it. It is secret.”

She smirked at him, “I’ve always wanted a secret hideout.”

He returned her mirth, “I live to serve.”

They held hands all the way to the surface and up until Brasa helped her up and into an SUV that was hidden in what basically amounted to a hollowed out rock. Lilah had to hand it to them. If she hadn’t known that this was here, she would have never guessed. There was literally no indication that the formations were anything but rocks, once all the entrances were closed.

She looked up a local store and they headed out, guided by the navigation in the dash. As they drove, Lilah drew up a list on her phone, having memorized her standard grocery order long ago. To it, she added a few items that she might not otherwise pick up, telling herself that she deserved a treat or two after the emotional fallout of her confrontation with Seth. She also decided that she was going to pick up a few bottles of wine.

Lilah had to admit that she never once thought about what it would be like to see Brasa in such a mundane setting. She doubted that he did his own shopping, what with Javier taking care of most menial tasks. Now, she was watching him step through the automatic doors of a local supermarket, his head turning to glance at her for direction.

It was surreal. Truly surreal. Lilah had the insane urge to laugh as she looked from him to the milling crowd that parted around him. She caught a few curious glances from them, even further amused that Brasa seemed to take no notice.

Shaking herself from her thoughts, Lilah took his arm and led him to the shopping carts, pulling one from the long line and taking a moment to study the layout of the store. Tall shelves were lined one after another, stocked full with wares. Veering to the left, she headed for the bins of fresh fruits and vegetables.

Lilah was intimately aware of the way Brasa observed her going from bin to bin, picking out one or two and setting in the cart. He gave her space, but paid attention to how she chose her wares. Lilah mostly ignored him, focusing on trying to get enough to last her at least a few days.

As they passed the dairy aisle, Brasa finally said, “Things have moved...so quickly in the last few hundred years.”

She was leaning down to pick up an extra carton of eggs when he spoke, her head turning awkwardly to look at him, “What does that mean?”

He pushed his hands into his pockets, giving a shrug, “Advancements that would have taken a millennia several thousand years ago now happen in a hundred.”

Putting the eggs in the cart, Lilah thought about it for a moment, moving slowly towards the canned food, “I suppose you’re right.”

“I am,” he pronounced, smug.

She scoffed, pulling cans off the shelf to stock the small pantry behind the kitchen. Her voice, when it came, was tinged with a tease, “I’m an ancient vampire, I’m so smart, and I’ve seen everything.”

His laugh was soft, but genuinely amused, his chin dipping down towards his chest in a movement that was nothing short of demure. If Lilah were just some anonymous person in this store, if she were looking at him for the first time in that moment, her breath would have caught—as it was now—and she would have scurried away feeling so completely embarrassed at finding a total stranger so endearing.

As it was, she wasn’t anonymous. He very much knew her, a thought that would have been no less than frightening a year ago. Lilah felt no such fear now, only warmth that unfurled comfortably in her chest.

Brasa steered her down an aisle, gesturing at a shelf full of Gatorade, “Javier has sent me four texts reminding me that you will need this.”

Mouth open, Lilah stared at him in confusion for several seconds, “I will?”

He nodded, “Javier is adamant that I keep this in stock. He says you prefer the red color.”

Agog, Lilah asked, “How the fuck does he know that?”

Brasa cast her a look that said she should know the answer to that question. Javier might be quiet and unassuming, but he was better than the FBI at finding out the minutiae of people’s lives.

“Okay,” Lilah relented, “He’s right, but I don’t know why you would need to keep it on hand. Its not like I’ll need to constantly replenish my—oh.”

Without another word, Lilah leaned down and picked up two packs, setting them in the cart. She lost her battle to keep the nervous laugh at bay when she glanced at Brasa’s smirking face. He wasn’t even trying to hide the satisfaction in his expression. To give herself something to do other than smile stupidly, she turned her attention to navigating to the check out.

Brasa was quietly helpful in loading the groceries onto the conveyor, and Lilah didn’t miss how he maneuvered around her to pay before she could get her card out of her pocket. Casting him a knowing smile, Lilah moved past him, hands briefly touching his hips so that she could slide out from between the partitions to load the cart.

A few minutes later, she was pushing it out into the warm, humid night, and towards where he’d parked the SUV. A few more minutes, and they were making their way back to what she was going to continually call the ‘secret hideout’. The title brought a small, ‘secret smile’ to her lips.

As they pulled to a stop, that small smile turned into a grin. She looked to Brasa, “You’re about to be witness to an ancient human custom, going back at least a century.”

Head cocked to the side, Brasa looked at her in confusion, “I believe I am aware of most human customs, ancient or otherwise.”

Rolling her eyes, Lilah hopped out of the car and made her away around to the trunk, pushing the button to initiate the automatic open. She’d only picked out enough food to last for the week she promised him when he’d been negotiating her stay. Lilah was not going to think about how she likely would have to extend her stay indefinitely.

Lilah reached down and looped a few bags over her arm, “So it goes like this: No matter how much you buy, you never, ever, take more than one trip to get it in the house.”

Brasa looked at her arm, laden with bags, and back to the rest, his brow rising, “I...was not aware of this custom.”

She fixed him with a serious look, “Its a very important tradition.”

A little crease formed between his brows as he studied the bags they had left. Lilah swallowed the laugh that threatened to break the whole act apart, and hefted a few more onto her free arm. Brasa looked at what she carried, then leaned in and snagged the rest, hoisting them effortlessly in one arm.

She stared at him, chastising herself for forgetting how powerful he really was. She chastised herself further when she stayed right where she was as he reached up, closed the trunk, and tugged one of her arms free of the bags. It wasn’t until she was looking at his back as he opened the door to the elevator that she was able to make her feet move.

As they made the descent, Brasa shifted the bags to one arm and took her hand, turning it over to see how the bags had made little creases in her skin in the short time before he’d taken the load.

“I don’t understand this tradition,” he muttered, thumb rubbing at her palm.

Lilah smirked, “You don’t have to understand it to be a part of it.”

His eyes lifted from where they were studying her skin, “You are right. Some things just are.”

She had the distinct feeling that he wasn’t talking about defeating the grocery bag challenge. The weight behind his gaze made that place in the back of her mind flare up, the bond almost stinging her. Reflexively, her fingers curled, wrapping around his thumb.

There was a clinical ‘ding’ and the doors opened. Adjusting his grip, Brasa led her into the hall and to the door. A few taps, and the door opened. They carried the bags into the kitchen and Lilah took her time figuring out where to put everything.

As she was standing in the middle of the kitchen with a small bag of potatoes, Brasa’s phone rang. He pulled it from his pocket, held up a finger, and stepped from the room. She looked at the place where he’d been for a few seconds before shaking herself to attention. The potatoes could stay on the counter.

It was then that her stomach reminded her that she hadn’t eaten in several hours. With new food to choose from, she found herself a little bit at a loss as to what to make. In his kitchen, bare save for the food and the tools she needed to cook it with, she again longed for comfort. Broccoli cheese soup, it was.

With renewed purpose, Lilah began assembling the ingredients and putting a pot on the burner. She hadn’t made this particular recipe since high school, when she was still living with a family that she hadn’t talked to in years. Her hand on the knife paused as she took that in.

When she was running dangerous jobs for shady people, she had deliberately cut them off in fear for their safety. Now, she knew she could definitely never rekindle that relationship. What would happen in ten years, twenty, fifty, when she didn’t age, when she didn’t die?

Sniffing, she set her mind to cutting the broccoli florets into one inch pieces. There was no need to deepen the emotional anguish she’d experienced this week. She could do that at another time. Just to be safe, she opened a bottle of wine and left it and the glass on the counter to breathe.

As she was preparing to stir in the cheese to thicken the broth, Brasa returned. He leaned against the counter to watch her cook, arms crossed.

“Work?” she questioned lightly.

He gave a nod, “Javier worries.”

She hummed, glancing over her shoulder at him, “And?”

Pushing from the counter, he touched the small of her back. His hand traveled around her waist to rest just below her belly button. Lilah leaned into him, her head tilting to the side so that he could lay his chin on her shoulder. She relaxed into his hold, stirring slowly, in no hurry to move. Eventually, the soup thickened up as it was supposed to, and she reached up to turn the burner off.

Brasa already had a bowl ready for her, a spoon in his other hand. Lilah took it with a grateful nod and ladled a serving for herself. Rather than sit at the dining room table, Lilah hopped up onto the counter and spooned some into her mouth.

“You going to answer my question?”

His eyes dropped, though his mouth quirked in amusement, “He thinks we should be more aggressive with Benny.”

Lilah waved her spoon at him, indicating that he should continue.

“I find myself wondering if I should follow that advice.”

“Why?”

He sighed, his shoulders slumping, “His numbers grow along with the recklessness of his actions. He attacked a hotel last night, slaughtered the guests and staff. The police are investigating.”

Swinging one leg, Lilah asked, “You can’t buy them, bribe them to close the investigation?”

“We are working on that. The police chief is...remarkably stubborn about policy. Javier wants to eat him.”

She should not have laughed, but the thought of the prim and dapper Javier ripping the throat out of a police officer did not mesh together. He’d be too worried that he’d get blood on his suit.

When she finished, Lilah slipped down from the counter and rinsed out the bowl, setting it in the sink to clean later, “You want to watch a movie?”

“I could do that.”

“Cool,” she replied, already heading for the living room, grabbing the bottle of wine she’d opened along with the glass, “Where do you keep your extra blankets?”

She picked the softest, fluffiest one of the bunch and threw it over them both as they sat next to each other on the couch. Wine glass in hand, Lilah flicked through the streaming channels, already knowing which selection she was going to make.

His hand on her thigh, Brasa settled deeper into the cushion, letting out a light chuckle as she hit play, “I like this one.”

“Me, too,” she said, shifting so that she could lay her head on his shoulder.

Warm, full, and comfortable, Lilah found herself drifting even as Princess Buttercup argued with the Dread Pirate Roberts. The familiarity of Brasa’s scent wrapped around her and the story on the screen made everything inside her loosen for the first time since she’d left behind an angry Seth—well, that and two glasses of excellent wine.

By the time the credits rolled, Brasa had leaned back into the arm of the couch, pulling Lilah down to lay atop him. Her body pressed against his, Lilah soaked up his unnatural warmth. His arms held her loosely, but his hands were firm on her back and hip.

Lilah pushed up on her hands, looking down at him, “Thanks for bringing me here.”

“Of course,” he said, a little too quickly, “Of course.”

She smiled, dropping to an elbow and kissing him. Intending it to be a sort of ‘thank you’, Lilah started to pull away only to feel Brasa cup the back of her neck and hold her in place as he twined his tongue with hers. He warmed beneath her, burning hot, body arching. Lilah pulled her knees up underneath her, balancing on one hand so that she could run the other down the front of his shirt to pull it from where he had it tucked into his slacks.

He lifted his hips when she moved around to the back, his own hands roaming over her jean clad legs, pulling on each so that she sat astride him. And then, in a move she could have never accomplished on her own, he swung his legs over the edge of the couch and stood. Her ankles crossed to anchor her body on his hips, her hands grasping frantically to clasp the back of his neck. Lilah laughed as he kissed her cheek, her neck, her shoulder, all the while moving towards the bedroom.

He laid her carefully on the bed and systematically undressed her. Shoes, socks, jeans, underwear, shirt, bra—everything was peeled off without ceremony, without patience. Lilah was stripped bare before her brain caught up to the fact that this was actually going to happen. And then he was crawling over her, his mouth sealing over hers.

He kissed her like he was starved, as if he might never kiss her again. Deep, unrelenting kisses that left her gasping beneath him. She reached up to to get at the buttons of his shirt, managing to get one or two free before he was moving down her body, nuzzling the skin between her breasts. Thumbs circling her nipples, he drew one into his mouth, releasing it with a wet sound. He licked at her biting down gently, and laving the spot with his tongue.

Shifting a little to the side, Brasa pulled her knee up and around his waist, fingers drifting so that he could run them up the length of her slit. She keened, spine arching up so far that her shoulders lifted off the mattress. Her skin was seared where they touched, sizzling with sensation that only seemed to grow. He massaged her in wide circles, the pad of his forefinger brushing over her opening.

Rubbing his cheek against her, Brasa moved steadily downwards, kissing and sucking and nipping until he rested between her spread thighs. If Lilah had any thought that he would ease into it, those thoughts were shattered by one long, enthusiastic lick. Sighing into the motion, he sucked at her folds, emitting a contented growl when her legs tightened around his shoulders.

He held her open, wedging his massive body into her hips until her inner thighs ached with the strain. Lilah was beyond caring, her fingers digging into the pillow beneath her as she rose higher and higher towards orgasm. There was no teasing, no drawing this out. Brasa worked with a singular purpose, tongue swirling around her clit, hands holding her up to his mouth.

She grit her teeth, the need so vast and deep that it became a vibrant pain, soothed only by his touch. It tunneled down deep into her bones, sticking in her throat when she cried out, the spasms raking over her voice so that it came out hoarse and rasping.

Lilah breathed forcefully, eyes squeezed shut as he worked her through it, easing up when she shook, too sensitive. When she was able to look down at him, he was rolling his tongue over his lips, eyes focused on where she was still fluttering sporadically. Her mouth went dry at the sight, the hunger that he wasn’t even attempting to veil.

The hand on her hip rotated, and she felt him push two fingers inside her, the motion sending little frissons of electricity over the nerve endings. She shivered. He smiled, fangs peeking out. Then, he brought his fingers to his mouth and sucked them clean, black gaze watching her reaction. Lilah bit her lip, giving up totally on controlling her breathing.

He kissed his way up her body, settling atop her. Lilah pulled him even closer, yanking at the buttons of his shirt. It was nearly impossible to focus when he was kissing her, hands turning her head so that he could nuzzle against her neck, inhaling. She gave herself some credit. She got his shirt unbuttoned and halfway down his arms before she got distracted by a particularly hard nip just above her collarbone.

Hissing, she pulled him up, trying to gain a little leverage to push him over onto his back. Lilah was not successful. He held her down, smirking when she made a small sound of frustration.

“I want,” she started, a whine cutting off the rest of the words.

Brasa caught her hands, holding them down onto the mattress with almost his full weight, “What is it?”

Oh, now he wants to tease, she thought.

“Is this what you want?” His hips swiveled in a slow, firm grind, “I’ll give it to you, if its what you want, querida.”

Lilah moaned, writhing beneath him, desperate to get the friction she needed. She was close, close enough that she was willing to forgo any sense of pride to get there.

“Yes, yes,” she breathed, head thrown back as he rolled his hips against her.

He let go of one of her wrists, and she felt him reach down and open the fly of his slacks. Lifting off just enough to kick off the offending material, Brasa laid back down, gathering her to him. The next kiss was venom soaked, sweet and hot. Lilah groaned, pushing her hips into him, needing to feel him inside her.

Brasa slid in to the hilt in one strong, fluid motion that filled the emptiness inside Lilah completely. Her breath stuttered in her lungs, her legs lifting to accommodate him. He was so fucking hot—his mouth, his body, his cock. Sweat pooled in the hollows and bend of her limbs, darkening the hair at her temple. She gripped his shoulders, pulled on the shirt he still wore, caught by the buttons on his cuffs.

And then he was moving. The sound of his cock pushing into her wet body, the feeling of him both easing and stirring the blooming ache of her arousal, the way he ground out a helpless sound against her neck. It all meshed together, overwhelming her until she could do nothing but hold on as he fucked her.

The pleasure grew inside her, reaching into every inch of her body. She wailed, head thrown back, fingers fisted in his hair. Spurred on, his pace picked up, breath punching out of him when she raked her nails up his back. It took very little to push her the rest of the way over the edge, the feeling spiraling through her.

Brasa’s grip on her tightened as he thrust into her one last time, his spine arched, lips pulled back from his fangs. She could feel him pulsing, could feel every reflexive spasm as he came.

When his strength returned, Brasa rolled gingerly off her, his large hand tracing down the center of her body to rest heavily on her belly. She grasped it, holding him by the wrist as she caught her breath. Lilah looked over at him, smiling at the fact that he was still wearing that shirt, though she’d torn the collar and it was wrinkled beyond nearly all recognition.

Her fingers touched the tear, “That’s going to be a difficult one to explain to the dry cleaner.”

Brasa smirked as he unbuttoned the cuffs around each wrist, “I may keep it like this.”

Lilah’s brows lifted, “Like a memento?”

He hummed in confirmation.

“I didn’t realize you were so sentimental.”

Throwing the shirt off the side of the bed, Brasa laid on his side, observing her from where he’d perched his head on his palm, “I am not, generally. But, with you…” He trailed off as he leaned down and kissed her softly.

#from dusk til dawn #from dusk til dawn: the series #Brasa #In the Bond

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yurimother · 5 years

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Top Yuri Anime Poll Results

Whether it is subtext or explicit, cute or sexy, school love or gay action thrillers I love yuri anime. These series either focus on or contain elements of female same-sex relationships. Pride month is the perfect time to look back and reflect on the best of this genre. I teamed up with OG Man of The Yuri Nation (yurination[dot] wordpress[dot] com/) and together we put out a poll asking what you thought the top yuri anime series were and over 1000 of you responded submitting almost 5000 different entries. We spent hours combing through the data, analyzing and commenting on the results and we would like to share our thoughts with all of you. Enjoy the reflections of me the yuri critic and OG the dedicated yuri fan!

These are the Top 20 Yuri Anime as voted by you

1. Bloom Into You - 692 Votes

OG: Be it East or West the YagaKimi took the world by storm. Citrus and BiY once again taking the top two spots remains unsurprising.There is something undeniably fascinating about our leading ladies consisting of an asexual slowly coming to love her senpai back but restraining herself for various reasons. The biggest one being said senpai having a deep case of self-loathing and a fear of romantic reciprocation, also for various reasons. She is like “I love you but please do not love me back”. Then there is one of the most popular “cursed” lesbians of all time in Sayaka, the fantastic adult side-couple (The world needs an anime starring lesbian adults/mothers) and the various other characters who have their own interesting tales to tell. The series absolutely deserves a spot in the Top 10 though it would not be in my personal Top 3. Oh and as Yurimother said the presentation was fantastic.Visually stunning from start to finish in my opinion. Special mention goes to the criminally underused first-person “camera”. So cool.

YuriMother: I agree with this series deserving a spot in the top ten even if not the number one slot. For me, it was good but not great. Moments such as the aforementioned adult couple as well as stellar art and a phenomenal score made this series enjoyable but they were not enough to overshine the problems of the narrative. For the love of the Yuri Goddess, this series is crying out for asexual representation but insists on carrying on with its confused romance. Enough complaining though, many people love Bloom Into You despite its faults and I agree. The characters are interesting and lovable and it manages to tell a yuri story more real and complex than the typical fluffy girl meets girl narratives.

2. Citrus - 452 Votes

YuriMother: The presence of Citrus and Bloom Into You prove two things to me, the importance of recency, as both anime aired only last year, and the sheer popularity of these series. Both had established and extremely successful manga runs which were adapted into English by the publishing masters of yuri, Seven Seas. Citrus is a contentious series, to say the least, as it includes elements of (non-blood related) incest and non-consensual actions as part of Mei and Yuzu’s “relationship.” However, if you possess the magical power to turn off the part of your brain screaming at you that those aspects are deeply problematic or if you seek a different interpretation then Citrus can be downright WONDERFUL. I actually loved this anime series for its characters, amazing animation, and salaciousness. As OG said, it is an operatic concussion of emotion (seriously everyone in the series needs therapy) but my is it fun to watch. The Citrus anime also holds a special place in my heart, as the first serious piece I ever wrote was a review for it over on Okazu (nice plug)! Citrus is certainly not for everyone but those that stuck with it and overlooked some of the problems ended up loving it.

OG: Here we are again with Citrus at #2. My thoughts on the series remains the same as in the previous two lists I discussed (the Akiba Research and goo Ranking Japan lists), overrated. Good soap opera/telenovela-esque series but my feelings on the cast are mixed (which I imagine was the writer’s intent). My main issue has always been the obstacles repeatedly challenging Yuzu and Mei’s feelings for each other instead of it focusing on “Hey. We like each other but our parents got married. What do we do? Can we keep our desires for each other in check?”. Instead it is one newcomer after another who want to eat either Yuzu or Mei and Yuzu repeatedly asking herself if she really wants robo-stepsister patties? I will give the anime adaptation credit. The story was easier to enjoy animated than drawn. It also helped that I grew up in a telenovela loving family. The characters’ actions, reactions and emotions were depicted better in the anime. I still consider the show’s greatest accomplishment being the humanization of Mei-Tron. In the manga it took a post-epilogue continuation to show readers “Hey everyone. Mei-Tron was human all along.” whereas in the anime I sensed the small bit of humanity quicker than in the manga where I continued seeing her as a block of wood with a brain up to the point where I dropped it. Harumin though is the greatest regardless of anime or manga adaptation. Bless her. Regardless of how I feel about the series I get its massive popularity. After all, were the rest of the story to get an animated continuation I would gladly pick it up...Not the manga though.

3. Sakura Trick - 342 Votes

OG: There are fans who understandably would disagree with Sakura Trick’s praise but I will always defend it and the anime as one of the very best in the genre. First off it aired at a time where animated on-screen close up kisses (specifically consensual ones) between ladies were rare. Haruka X Yuu’s relationship was believable for the most part. Even their season finale resolution, them not getting what being “in love” meant at the time, made sense though I get why it left some scratching their heads. Probably not the best “manga lure/bait” end I suppose. On the bright side Kotone X Shizuku’s story definitely did not have the two doubting their true feelings for each other. I do hope Kaede X Yuzu eventually hooked up in the manga as they too had potential to be a lovely couple.

YuriMother: Sakura Trick has no real narrative, no great insight, and offers little intellectually. As a teacher, it makes me furious, as a fan of yuri, elated. The anime is beloved for its plentiful soft service, presenting a plethora of kisses, cuddles, and awkward thigh shots (ew). However, it was one of the first anime to include this much explicit yuri service without being pornographic. All the characters were cute and fun, even if there was little in the way of development or complexity, it worked for the series. If you want something to make you think or to learn about yuri, pass over this one. But, if you want a cute and meaningless anime definitely watch it.

4. Yuru Yuri - 337 Votes

YuriMother: OG may not be a fan of Yuru Yuri but I certainly am, which is fairly obvious to anyone who observes that a solid 20% of my communications occur in the form of gifs from this series. It is hilarious, cute, and playful. Just like Sakura Trick, this anime is an easy watch with ultimately little substance. However, the part of me that is not rolling of the floor laughing every time I watch Yuru Yuri lives in a state of pained existence with the knowledge that this work of all things ended up being so popular when people are telling interesting stories about queer women and people in actual relationship that manage to still be funny and adorable while having something to say.

OG: The undisputed most mainstream friendly yuri series there is. It is also one of the funniest. My one gripe is that excluding a select few the main draw of the show besides the comedy and yuri is the ship wars, meaning (almost any girl can be shipped with each other). Not a fan of that but hey, it brought Namori the big bucks so who am I to judge? In any case not much else to add. It deserves all the adulation it gets but the free for all shipping irks me. Reminds me of how they botched Chika X Riko in the Love Live! Sunshine!! Anime. If you were going down the Riko X Yohane route from the start then why give us Chika X Riko in the first half? Ship wars yo. Tch. Hopefully I properly explained myself..

5. Kase-san and Morning Glories (Asagao to Kase-san) - 289 Votes

OG: Still wish this got a 12-13 episode anime. The glorious movie showed how much it deserves one. Whether it will happen or not remains to be seen. In any case the beauty of Kase-san X Yamada is how simple their romance is. No strings attached whatsoever. It is as straightforward as a self-proclaimed “ordinary” cutie, Yamada, having a crush on the super cool school beauty Kase-san. Said beauty is revealed to be just as “adorkable” as Yamada. The other highlight is their story not ending once they officially started dating (as is the case with many romance stories) but that being only the beginning, like real life. From then on, side-stories aside, the two biggest challenges for the two is Yamada accepting that it is okay for someone as “ordinary” as her to be the “cool babe”s girlfriend and Kase-san finding different ways to express her love/hunger for the cutie. As for the OVA, cramming the second part of the first series in an hour definitely had the downside of excluding some important moments, yes, but it at least covered some of the best moments in the manga. The first half of the story was summarized in a five-minute music video. One last thing. The animation, though a bit too brought for some, was glorious. It also had some long pauses which were effective (The bus stop scene being the most infamous) but while I did not mind them at all even I will admit some pauses went a bit too long. A small nitpick all things considered. Fingers crossed one day we either get that 12-13 episode anime for the first series, the sequel or both. That is one of my dreams.

YuriMother: At last, an anime that I do not have to react cynically to! Kase-san is one of the single greatest works of yuri animation to ever to be created and its glory is rivaled only by the manga from which it originated. Despite being only a one hour long OVA this adaption told such an engaging and realistic (finally) story of romance and personal growth. We get to skip the meatless girl meets girls arcs and get into the depth and complexity as Yamada and Kase work to further their relationship. They struggle with the fact that they are two different people who want different things out of life and love and have to actually work on their partnership. Kase-san also includes signs of physical affection and love that are never lewd, immature, or gross, I do not even think I could refer to them as “service”. However, for me, Kase-san’s greatest victory (both the anime and manga) is in its escape from school romance, which in this genre is often a shelter from reality, allowing for women to be in relationships without actually being queer. Kase and Yamada instead make an effort to continue their romance and build a life that includes their relationship once they graduate in a triumphant final act. This anime is a slap in the face to the class S stories and sloppily sexualized works which proliferate the yuri genre. Asagao to Kase-san shines as a holy beacon for the greatness that this genre can achieve.

6. Puella Magi Madoka Magica - 286 Votes

YuriMother: Hurray!! For two entries in a row, I get to talk about series that I wholeheartedly adore without having to constantly attach caveats. Puella Magi Madoka Magica is not considered by all to be yuri, and that is certainly not what it is best known for. PMMM is however famous for twisting the tropes of the magical girl genre and creating one of the most cohesive and thoughtful narratives ever put to screen. This series summoned a new era for the magical girl genre (what OG humorously referred to as the “Moepocalypse”) but no other title managed to top Madoka Magica’s runaway success. Every aspect of this work is highly polished including character designs, a phenomenal soundtrack, and superb writing. This is not only the definitive work of its genre but of all postmodern anime. Whether or not one is a fan of yuri every anime fan should give Madoka Magica a watch.

OG: Meduka Meguca. Its impact in the “Moepocalypse” (Shows where cute and sexy girls consistently suffering physically and emotionally. These are usually dark magical girl shows.) genre and legacy are undeniable. It deserves all the praise it gets. It scarred many unfortunate souls, Homura is a legend in yuridom, Kyouko X Sayaka are glorious (Especially in Rebellion), Meduka’s Mom Junko is a Top Tier Sexy Mama, Charlotte the Witch is a very strange girlfriend and of course Hitomi is a walking anti-fun meme. The animation, especially the creepy doodle like monsters known as Witches are memorable. However, it is not my favorite Moepocalypse show. That honor goes to Yuki Yuna is a Hero.

7. Strawberry Panic - 224 Votes

OG: Like it or not Strawberry Panic is a yuri classic. I have a strong feeling that like many readers around my age (31 during this writing) this was their first 100% yuri anime. The cheese is real but it is the yummy kind of cheese and I loved almost every minute of it, except Amane X Hikari. That was the weakest of the love stories going on. Poor Yaya trying too hard (Not saying this in condescending way. She literally tried too hard). It is like a young adult lesbian novel but more fun. I mean Nagisa X Shizuma might as well be “Lesbian Twilight but not crappy”. Let us be honest, Shizuma is a vampire. Chikaru is an undisputed goddess and Kagome is the cutest.

Oh and I will repeat this statement till my last breath…

#TamaoWasRobbed.

YuriMother: I may be almost a decade younger than OG but even for me Strawberry Panic was my first yuri and it more than earns its nickname as the “gateway yuri,” although last year’s Citrus and Bloom Into You may be presenting serious contenders for this title. If for no other reason than nostalgia, Strawberry Panic remains my favorite yuri works but this ridiculous soap-opera of an anime does deserve a fair amount of recognition. I see Strawberry Panic as the culmination of the S subgenre revived by Maria Watches Over Us. However, this work succeeds at both parodying many of the tropes of S and yuri while breaking a few. However, its greatest accomplishment is introducing many of the young western fans of yuri to the genre. Strawberry Panic, you are an overly dramatic mess but thank you for all you have done.

8. Revolutionary Girl Utena - 176 Votes

YuriMother: Another gem of the yuri genre, actually scratch that, if works like Kase-san are gems then Utena is the minerals from which gems form. I think that is how it works, I am not a geologist. My poor analogies and subtle nods to Steven Universe aside, Revolutionary Girl Utena is one of the single most important works of yuri anime, possibly even more so than Sailor Moon. These two works were the dawn of the current age of yuri, an era spurn on by social progress and the internet into a place where more yuri works featuring honest depictions of homosexuality are flourishing. Utena laid the groundwork for queer representation in anime and for that I remain forever grateful to this masterpiece.

OG: I must confess. While I saw the movie long ago and thought it was cool I have yet to sit down and finish watching the main series. I cannot say much about this show other than it is another yuri classic. Possibly one of the biggest. I think I will leave this to Her Holiness because even if I had seen it I do not consider myself someone who possesses the sufficient intellect to properly explain why this is a legendary show.

9. Flip Flappers - 132 Votes

OG: I would need an essay to explain why this show is legendary. Let me see. It is a story of a girl who discovered her gayness thanks to her growing attraction to a lovable idiot/genki. There are references to Western media, dimension hopping (including Class S Hell), self-discovery, a sexual orientation journey, a tree, armored wedding gowns, crazy third wheels, Ku Klux Klan stand-ins…You know what? Just watch Flip Flappers. It is a hot mess of random, crazy, creative and thought provoking awesomeness with a wonderful dose of gayness. Glory be to PapiCoco. However, as Her Holiness mentioned this is essentially Ikuhara-san levels of weirdness (though not as complicated I feel) but as the plot thickens it all (sort of) starts making sense...eventually. That tree yo.

YuriMother: Flip Flappers was almost too strange and abstract even for me, and that is saying something. However, upon further examination, one of the most interesting works of yuri is revealed. This heavily stylized anime delves deep into the sexual maturation of its protagonist while examining the yuri genre and representation in media. Flip Flappers is the perfect marriage of heavy visual style and intellectual substance. Definitely give them one a.. err better make that three watches, as you will want to be sure to get everything out of this beautiful series as possible.

10. Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid - 131 Votes

YuriMother: This series is the closest anime fans have to a lesbian couple having a family that we have, and that is a shame. I LOVE family narratives, outside of the yuri genre Usagi Drop is my favorite anime. To me, seeing women balance life, a relationship, and children is some of the best queer representation there is. However, for every point in Kobayashi’s favor, there is also a glaring fault. Kobayashi is a modern woman in the workforce providing for herself and her “family,” but is borderline abusive to Tohru. Kanna is an inquisitive child being raising by two women, but there are weirdly sexual scenes featuring her. As previously mentioned on this list, if one can silence the reasonable part of the brain this work becomes enjoyable, hilarious, and adorable. Unfortunately, its faults prevent it from being more than an amusement and I seriously doubt that they will fade in the second season. But hey, it sells a ton of figures so… YAY!

OG: This series is one of the closest yuri fans have to a series starring a lesbian couple with a daughter and it is wonderful. Is the tale of an eternally grateful dragon who wanted to repay the human who saved her life, albeit drunk, by becoming her live-in maid. Tohru being a dragon girl had incredible power and could easily crush everyone in sight but preferred to try and understand humanity so she could live in peace with the woman she loved. It of course was hard at times but thanks to Miss Kobayashi slowly growing to accept her back (romantically she had a ways to go) and the two raising the adorable bundle of mighty puff known as Kanna they became a happy family. How long this relationship will last and whether Miss Kobayashi would come to fully love Tohru back romantically remains to be seen. I have high hopes it can and will happen. Kanna X Riko is precious (Yes. Even that scene). We even have a potential BL couple, which is nice. Not a fan of Lucoa X Shouta the shota. Not because of the age gap but it not being my kind of romantic comedy. It is the same reason I have a hard time buying Tsubame X Misha from UzaMaid. Mya-Nee X Hana from Wataten...maybe. At least Mya-Nee showed she is patient. Back to Dragon Maid. Great series. Naughty of course but great.

11. Sweet Blue Flowers (Aoi Hana) - 119 Votes

OG: Megane girl falls for a cutie but has a hard time confessing to her to the point she gives a relationship with another girl a try. Said other girl has troubles of her own courtesy of her own views on what love. Do not get me started on the OTHER girl who likes megane’s girlfriend. I did not even mention megane girl’s first love interest who she herself eventually begins questioning her feelings for the glasses wearing maiden. While this is well known throughout the history of yuri anime Aoi Hana made it clearer than ever that Yuri + Classical Music go hand in hand. Plus the show is quite pretty. Ultimately enjoyment of this series depends heavily on viewers’ patience.

YuriMother: Aoi Hana was ahead of its time in many regards. Most yuri during the early twenty-first century was unrealistic and melodramatic, especially with the revival of S stories. Aoi Hana instead presents a calm and realistic story that we still rarely see in yuri anime today. Instead of relying on tricks like service or comedy Aoi Hana presents a serene and character-driven story which is matched by equally calming scenery. It is certainly not the most thrilling watch, but a slow and beautiful slice of real life that remains one of the all-time strongest yuri works.

12. Yurikuma Arashi - 99 Votes

YuriMother: Yurikuma Arashi is strange, to say the least, but this is not out of the ordinary for legendary director Ikuhara, who also directed Utena. Parallels are easily drawn between this work and Flip Flappers, as they are both complex and encoded with enough symbolism to drown a bear. Yurikuma is one of my favorite works in the yuri genre and I have had more than a few heated discussions about interpretations of the work, including one memorable occasion when I was visiting a college professor and we ended up in a shouting match in the middle of the hall. However, while Flip Flappers holds a high degree of polish the same can, unfortunately, not be said here. Yurikuma Arashi has more than a few scenes of fanservice many of which overly fetishize the characters and relationship and some of the symbols, particularly lily flowers and the word “yuri” are practically beaten to death with an object I refuse to come up with because I am starting to have my fill of symbolism. However, despite some of its sloppiness, Yurikuma is one of the single most interesting and well-formed anime out there and analyzing it is practically a right of passage for seasoned yuri fans.

OG: Yurikuma Arashi is my favorite of Ikuhara-san’s series. To me it was the least complicated of his works but even so I needed help to understand the show. Luckily I had plenty of assistance. The meat of the story is more complicated but put simply it is about a war between a group of bear girls (and some human girls) who want to freely express their love and/or desire/hunger for each other and another group that amounts to Right to Censor from WWF. Like I said it is far more complex than that but that is the gist. The anime is quite ecchi and it has good reason for it. Again the gay bears are the more liberated of the groups and them getting more sexy scenes is meant to showcase that. Our heroine has good reason to be grumpy and a divine entity was introduced alongside a certain someone from a certain dark anime we already discussed.

In the end it is a show starring lesbian bear girls. I love love stories between women and i love bears. It was obvious I would end up enjoying this one. Like other complex stories it is not for everyone. Shows like Flip Flappers, Utena and Yurikuma have something of a learning people will have to get accustomed to in order to enjoy them.

13. Whispered Words (Sasameki Koto) - 88 Votes

OG: To me Aoi Hana and Sasameki Koto were always connected despite the former being a drama and the latter a comedy. Both star a female protagonist struggling with how to best tell the girl she likes her true feelings whereas their love interest for one reason or another makes it all the more challenging to get their feelings across. Both shows aired during a time yuri was not as popular of a genre as it would become over time. Perhaps if they had come out a little later when yuri was becoming more popular in the mainstream they would have fared better…Then again they may have helped set the groundwork for future yuri shows so it’s just as well they came out when they did. In any case both good shows worthy of “best of yuri” lists. SK has the dynamic of the megane in love and her somewhat airheaded love interest who specifically likes “cute girls”. Poor megane has a hard time figuring out what the airhead defines as “cute”. The show also features an amusing side-couple of an ojou-sama and her tsundere girlfriend. Not to mention the somewhat controversial side-girl who plays a more prominent role in the 2nd half of the anime. Heck, even Mr Crossdresser himself is cool. Let us not forget Miss “Ha Ha Ha!” Another really good show that I would love to see the rest of the manga get animated someday but considering most anime are essentially manga commercials and the SK manga ended the odds of a 2nd season are close to 0.

YuriMother: 2009 was a great year for yuri anime, with both Sasameki Koto and Aoi Hana, among other works, airing. But while Aoi Hana sought to resist many of the common tropes of the genre and tell a simple grounded story Sasameki Koto appears to have looked a the list of every convention possible and say “yeah I can do that.” It has melodrama, comedy, one-sided love, friend love stories, I worship this genre but even I think there is a limit. However, Sasameki Koto is one of the most competent yuri anime works of the current era. While all the tropes are present most of the problematic aspects of the genre are not. The story is well written, characters enjoyable, and art that is really well done for the time. I enjoy every watch and if I ever want to quickly download the genre’s tropes into another person's head I need only duct tape them to a chair and throw on Sasameki Koto.

14. Riddle Story of Devil (Akuma no Riddle) - 77 Votes

YuriMother: Akuma no Riddle was highly anticipated back in 2014, sporting a premise of student assassins that, while certainly not unique, was outside the norms for the yuri genre. It promised a dark and thrilling take on the yuri genre that would not become popular until the yuri horror trend a few years later. At first, it looked like this would be successful with an excellent setup and some pretty compelling characters but ultimately Akuma no Riddle fell flat and became more derailed as it continued. The monster of the week style of episodes left little room for complex plots and plans or proper character development, which is a shame because of how engaging so many of the assassins were upon original presentation. However, this show still has some of the best action in the yuri genre, placing it alongside series like Cannan and Utena despite its flawed storytelling. If nothing else, the anime may compel one to read the manga, which expands the story and characters more than the show was given time to.

OG: Professional assassins secretly gathered at an academy in an attempt to take the life of a seemingly innocent cutie to win the ultimate prize, one of whom wishes to protect the adorable redhead. Yes the manga, which is pretty much a Director’s Cut, is better and the anime would have benefited from having 20+ episodes instead of 12 and a delightful beach OVA but the show did a good job of showing viewers what each assassin was like, their motivations (though many of their origin stories were summarized in written biographies during commercial breaks viewers needed to pause to read) were clear enough and the duels, as brief as some of them were, had enough spicy goodness in them to be memorable, especially the ones in the latter half of the show. Oh, and although the manga wrapped up after the anime it had a very similar ending.

15. Revue Starlight - 72 Votes

OG: Gay theater girls who strive to become the top star, meaning the best actress or lead actor of the cast. How do they do it? By working hard and overcoming their personal hardships? Yes. That. What makes this show so wonderful despite being almost a year old as of this writing is not only do the ladies all have interesting stories to tell but so does the stage. Every song, prop, movement, dance, gesture etc. It is like the performers and performances are united. It is like in Spongebob where not only does the person in the boots tell a story but the boots as well.

Oh yes. I almost forgot to mention the mysterious underground theater and talking giraffe. Never forget the talking giraffe from Hell. #Wakarimasu.

Super cool and super gay.

YuriMother: Bushiroad continuously gets better at what they do, creating media franchises of cute girls filled with music and making mountains of cash from smartphone games. Inspired by the likes of Love Live, they created BanG Dream and last year Revue Starlight. However, where these franchises fell short Revue Starlight success. It never twists its characters to tell a story but rather creates compelling arcs around them. I thoroughly enjoyed and agree with its place on this list.

16. Konohana Kitan - 68 Votes

YuriMother: I know of Konohana Kitan for its constant presence at yuri events more so than the anime or even the manga. It is adorable, relaxing, simple, and fun. While it does not add anything super substantial to the genre it does not take anything either or present any objectionable material. The “plot” is nonexistent but that does not matter, as it is not trying to tell a story or make commentary, just be fluffy and simple.

OG: Konohana Kitan to me is a Girls Club (Cute girls doing cute things) and iyashikei hybrid anime. It is visually stunning as it is relaxing with Yuzu pretty much one of the cutest demigoddesses in existence. She of course is a chick magnet but her heart will forever belong to Satsuki.

17. Destiny of the Shrine Maiden (Kannazuki no Miko) - 65 Votes

OG: The other stuff on the show is still not that great but ChiMeko will forever stand the test of time as far as I’m concerned. Top 10 for their love story alone. Yes. I know THAT ONE SCENE continues being controversial and talked about every time curious new yuri fans witness greatness…but I will forever defend Chikane because I get where she was coming from. Would I have done something different? Yes. The thing is you need to put yourself in her shoes and understand what she wanted to accomplish and how far she would go to get it done. Kotoha is best side-character and Souma Ogami is real man’s man who does not deserve the hate. He was an honorable warrior to the end. He fought well and accepted defeat like a man. Plus his yell is inspirational.

YuriMother: My feelings on Kannazuki no Miko are incredibly mixed. It has many of the worst facets of early current era yuri anime, tropes include S, rape and… am I reading this correctly, demon mechs? Worst of all it presents a cycle, a never-ending loop that haunts the characters in the overarching plot and it does not resolve it. If a work ever presents such an element, like Puella Magi did, it must be overcome or confronted at least. Its presence makes the already cringy story feels cheap and lazy. However, I love the two female leads and their difficult relationship. I love the music, especially the hauntingly beautiful ending theme, and the final moments of episode 11 are some of the greatest seconds I have ever seen in an anime. I cannot wrap my mind around my view of this series but at the end of the day, I understand it. I do not believe that work like it would ever be warmly accepted today but for its time it does stand as a breakout piece of yuri anime.

18. Princess Principal - 61 Votes

YuriMother: Princess Principal is one of the best anime of the past few years. It had everything, an interesting premise, great characters, an incredible soundtrack. Alongside all this is the sharp writing and thrilling story. Princess Principal did everything Akuma no Riddle wanted to with an intriguing and action-packed story featuring strong characters. On top of all this, the animation is top notch. A six-part movie sequel is planned which has me somewhat concerned, but I am glad to see that it is being continued as the ending to the series was one of its weakest aspects. Now if you will excuse me, I need to listen to some jazz.

OG: Cute and sexy gay spies in a dramatic British Steampunk setting. What more do readers need? Allow Her Holiness to elaborate a bit further. Currently waiting for the multi-part cinematic continuation.

19. Izetta: The Last Witch - 60 Votes

OG: I am known for loving shows people do not think as highly of. Izetta: The Last Witch is no different. I love this show so much. Besides how certain events transpired some complained about the depiction of WW2. Basically think about people ranting about storylines and content featured in certain Call of Duty and Battlefield games. Here however, it is clearly a fictional great war inspired by WW2. I was invested in the following:

-The cute and sexy ladies.

-Seeing two badass lesbians lead an army against an evil empire.

-FiZetta’s romance. This of course being the major highlight. I love FiZetta so much. My sexy lesbian babies and Anne X Grea’s mentors. They taught them everything they know after all.

It is similar to how I felt watching Kannazuki no Miko where my focus was primarily on the leading ladies’ developing romance. The difference is that unlike Kannazuki I was also somewhat entertained by our heroines’ enemies along with their allies. Basically viewers’ enjoyment of the show depends on how seriously they take their history and are willing to overlook the liberties this story takes with its depictions of the weapons, military and the familiar evil empire. FiZetta are one of my favorite lesbian couples of all time.

By the way, in that famous scene, yes they did. Viewers just have to squint their eyes to see “it”.

YuriMother: Another show that I consider to have squandered its potential. I know that lots of people enjoyed this one, including OG but I could not bring myself to finish this constantly mediocre series. Perhaps I am tired of alternative light-fantasy European-war inspired plots. Trying to stand out in this bloated genre is difficult and Izetta fails. Izetta started strong and hooked many viewers with its amazing visual and auditory polish but this was quickly lost in the plot which, while set up well, struggle to gain any ground of pay off what had been established. On the yuri side, it did not really do anything interesting or satisfying, with plenty of scenes feature the character’s standing next to each other looking cute and one or two moments of actual yuri. I am glad that some of you were able to enjoy this one more than me at least.

20. Maria Watches Over Us (Maria-sama ga Miteru) - 57 Votes

OG: Like Strawberry Panic this is a “Like it or not” classic. Despite being a Class S show it did its own thing and became a pioneer for . It’s also responsible for the many yuri jokes related to all-girl schools in anime.Shimako X Noriko best Grande and Petite Souer! Yumiko X Sachiko were great too as the two grew to better understand each other. Most memorable scene for me was the panda costume. Even Sei is a sleeper icon in all yuridom. Yoshino X Rei had a very interesting dynamic. I actually think they are the real pioneers of relationships between cousins. Thank you YoshiRei. HaruKana, Kaede X Sara and several others owe you two much appreciation.

YuriMother: Another great and significant series, Maria Watches Over Us, took the tropes of early yuri works, Catholic schools, a lack of men, piano scenes, and emotional relationship rather than physical ones and turned the dial up to 11. For better or worse, it single-handedly revived the Class S genre and was copied (and parodied) endlessly for over a decade. However much I complain about S I actually do not think that we would have the current age of yuri without its popularity and proliferation at the beginning of the century so I owe a big thank you to Maria Watches Over Us for that. Ignoring its historical importance and literary significance the anime still presents an engaging plot with wonderful characters and more butchered French than my last trip to Europe. It is certainly worth a watch and worthy of a place on this list.

What do you think should be on this list?:

YuriMother: As I previously said, this is a pretty perfect list. As far as missing titles I can think of the following.

Simoun - not the greatest in terms of plot or animation but it had cute service and a fun action-packed plot.

Kashimashi: Girl Meets Girl - This series may be strange and present the dreaded love triangle but it did its best to tell a transgender narrative in 2006, naturally this involved aliens, and I applaud it for its attempts.

Cannan - This series is light on the yuri but heavy on the suspense, action, and amazing character designs. The terrorist plot is exciting and the final train fight featured in the series is one of the greatest action spectacles in anime that somehow manages to remain grounded.

OG:

-Harukana Receive: Best all-female sports anime ever made. Plus the gayness is not subtle at all.

-Mikagura Gakuen Kumikyoku: Eruna Ichinomiya is an underrated yuri icon. While not the first of her kind (That honor, I think, goes to Galaxy Fraulein Yuna) she set the standard of cool and inspirational badass lesbian protagonists who are proud of who they are and...also happen to be super perverts. Eruna made it cool to be such a protagonist. It is nice seeing a lesbian lead who does not care what anyone else thinks. She is hungry for cute girl booties. While she often loses her control in the presence of pure beauty she, as an inspiration for others like her, has enough self-control to not go overboard (most of the time).

-Symphogear: Symphogear is love, Symphogear is life. Hopefully Season 5 will keep up the good work.

-Rinne no Lagrange: My favorite mecha anime and the reason I embrace OT3s when the signs are there. Not the greatest but man was it fun. Plus Madoka Kyouno is still sexy.

-Yuki Yuna wa Yuusha de Aru: My favorite Moepocalypse anime of all time. Yuna X Togo taught me to love and trust some people outside my closest family again.

-Mouretsu Pirates: If someone were to ask me “Hey OG. What to you is the perfect anime?”. I would tell them Mouretsu/Bodacious Space Pirates.

-Kashimashi: Girl Meets Girl. Thanks to the first fan commenting and reminding me of it. Definitely worthy of a spot. #HazumuWasAlwaysFemale

Final Thoughts:

OG: Pretty good list and close to what mine would look like were I to make one. Reason I have yet to do so is because I do not feel confident enough to pick a favorite yuri anime of all time. Favorite yuri manga and couples? That I can do, but anime always seems to give me a hard time choosing my absolute favorites. Like I said though, a potential yuri list of mine would look something like this. I also found it interesting how similar the Top 10 are among both our respective fanbases and visitors to the poll conducted by the Akiba Research Institute.

YuriMother: I may have done most the complaining and left the praise to OG but I actually and really happy with this list. I think that every title presented is a worthy addition and while I would certainly move some higher or lower than their current placing I do not believe that these are too far off from my own opinions, which is surprising for a popularity poll. More than anything I am thrilled to see that works I dislike that I thought to be popular did not make this list. Perhaps I should have more faith in people and their opinions. Everyone did such a wonderful job voting and I am so grateful!

Thank you so much everyone for reading and for voting in the top yuri anime poll. To see the full results of the poll and to support yuri news, reviews, and content, check out the YuriMother Patreon. Happy Pride Month

#yuri #lgbt #lgbtq #lgbtq+#pride #pride month #queer #gay #anime #cartoon #tv #lesbian #lesbians #girls love #wlw #gl #poll #manga

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reachexceedinggrasp · 4 years

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Fated to Love You here reaffirming my long held conviction that no pure romance drama should be 20+ episodes.

This show is... really something. It is, in the fullest possible sense, A Lot. It starts out as an all-out screwball comedy wrapped around a troperiffic romance fluff plot. Wall to wall clichés, but not in a bad way; in a meta, self-aware, peak performance, finest Velveeta way. And if you’re not familiar with screwball comedy, think ‘light-hearted crack fic with slapstick and farce’. There is nothing believable or grounded about any aspect of it, it starts at Bonkers Level: Platinum and it only climbs higher as it goes on.

(On a side note, this results in the leading man being possibly the most memorable love interest in romcom history. His introduction scene is nothing short of batshit insane and you can't reliably predict how he will respond to anything. I have never seen a main character like this, he is all over the shop and utterly singular. Your first reaction to him is ‘wtf?’, your second and third reactions are ‘really?! this guy??’, your fourth reaction is ‘okay he do be mad hot tho’, your fifth and final reaction is ‘I cannot believe this performance exists, I have no idea what he is doing, but it is amazing.’

Appropriately(?) the actor who plays him is an uncanny Korean doppelgänger of Johnny Depp and- between the resemblance, the mannerisms, and the fearless total commitment to a bold as fuck acting choice with the very serious chops to back it up- I’m not convinced they aren’t half brothers separated at birth.

They do sabotage my happiness several times by starting to randomly style his (long, beautiful) hair very weird, fixing it right when the plot is rapidly circling the drain so he looks his hottest just as the show becomes briefly unwatchable, and then ruining him for the entire second half of the series by shearing it all off. WHY, my anguished cry goes up. Why do you do this?! Why does he have like seven hairstyles over the course of the show? Much later they even briefly give him that ubiquitous Kdrama Second Lead haircut with weirdly forward combed fringe in a solid straight line across the brow all the way back from the crown. It looks terrible on everyone and I hate it so much. This version was less bad than most but it is still bad. Anyway.)

So it’s an incredibly fun time to start but there are some problems with the tone and plot even in the first 9 episodes, including when the lovers start getting along really well right away and they’re both thoroughly decent people so there’s nothing keeping them from having a lovely time together making the best of the circumstances (forced/fake marriage). And, instead of introducing new conflict or advancing one of the dozen conflicts previously established and actually moving forward, there is a painfully contrived rehash of something they already dealt with which is then just never resolved. They make the hero leap to a conclusion his wife is nefarious after he’d already decided once that she isn’t (though it was completely reasonable for him to think she was- the fact that he decided to trust her so quickly just speaks to what kind of person he is), never try to find out more or talk to anyone about it, start pushing her away because of it, and have all this come to absolutely nothing. It only exists so he’ll stop being so incredibly nice to her and they won’t fall in love too fast.

You’d think they would have to eventually clear the air before the romance advances right? No. It wasn’t a real plot point, it was just a reset button to get them estranged and hostile again after they connect over their kindred spirits and we’ve spent a bunch of time showing how profoundly supportive and honourable our hero is. He’s being beautifully mature and selfless because he’s a really good dude (unusual for a romcom drama, right? for the main guy to be nice and considerate? to accept responsibility even if he doesn’t have to? Gun’s weird but he’s wonderful), but the writers need him to be cold and standoffish, so they just make him act like an unreasonable idiot for a while. He’s been thus far hugely proactive and direct and honest about everything, it’s one of his most prominent character traits, but suddenly he’s going to avoid confrontation in favour of being super passive aggressive?? Then the writers never solve it. Never! It just goes away. He got over it, I guess? He decided he doesn’t care if she’s a gold digger who deliberately trapped him? God forbid we have motivations that make sense and organic character drama, right? It's not like he didn't have totally valid reasons to be suspicious that could have led to legitimate conflict our heroine would struggle to vindicate herself from.

But anyway, apart from that kind of lazy bullshit, it’s a fine romance plot with extremely endearing characters who have great chemistry. They are fun and well-rounded and incredibly human despite all the silliness and OTT antics. Their relationship is hugely, hugely engaging and the dynamic is perfect, they really complement each other as characters and organically drive each other's arcs. There's the genuine depth and warmth and quiet pathos so often lacking from this kind of show. Things progress at a semi-reasonable pace. They work up to confessing their mutual feelings and get into some cute shenanigans before making out. It happens soon enough that you are not frustrated, but there's still plenty of build-up. Then- uh oh! We’re only 9 eps in and we have another 11 hours to fill with this fluffy plot!

Time for a bunch of absolute fucking nonsense. Time for our show, which has been so goofy and removed from reality it occasionally resembles a Monty Python skit, which has been so light it asks you to ignore the frankly incredibly fucked up implications of its premise for the sake of comedy (they were both drugged and proxy raped resulting in a pregnancy- the FL was a virgin prior to this and Gun had a girlfriend he wanted to propose to- and it was the FL’s family who did this to them: SUPER FUCKED UP), so farcical that it makes Some Like it Hot look like a gritty crime drama, that show to cover a bunch of serious heavy shit.

First, the rankest of melodrama. The families and the world all turn on our couple, but their love is true and will conquer all- UNTIL, he randomly collapses and gets convenient Soap Opera Amnesia. He’s forgotten their entire relationship and a series of coincidental pieces of misconstrued evidence, the machinations of his scheming ex girlfriend, the Soap Opera Doctor’s advice, and his closest confidants all going along with this conspire to make him believe (AGAIN) that his wife just wants his money.

This whole terrible episode is mercifully brief, but it just gets worse after his memory returns. This is where we get into the Noble Idiocy. The ‘pretend you don’t love them to “save them” from getting hurt by hurting them and making their important life decisions for them as if they don’t have a basic fucking right to decide that themselves’ kind. Which goes on for three FUCK years in the show. He wastes three years of their lives they could have spent together because he’s worried he might die young (in a terrible way) and doesn’t want to put her through that. And, of course, they inevitably get together later, so all he did was make it infinitely worse for her either way. To say nothing of how he thus couldn’t be there for her through the loss of their child. Possibly my most hated fucking trope of all time when done this way.

And, yep, you read that right. This show that has the single most batshit bonkers over the top slapstick I have ever seen in a kdrama, this show has a storyline where the fluffy romcom trope accidental pregnancy ends in massive trauma. Because she was standing around in the street after realising he does remember her (he continued to pretend he had amnesia after his memories came back, it’s all part of the stupid noble idiocy so I glossed over it) and gets hit by a car in the middle of their angst staring.

It is nearly Meet Joe Black levels of hilariously abrupt and incongruous.

so, blah blah, they lose their baby (there’s a very stupid whole thing about her telling everyone to save the baby instead of her- the baby is not far enough along for this to have been remotely viable. She is like 3 months pregnant. They all act like there’s a choice to be made between them and she’s mad at her husband for choosing to save her, but there was NO CHOICE. Either she lives or they both die! ffs I’m so irritated about this) and then he dumps her ~for her own good~~ because he loves her too much to make her go through losing him? So she loses him sooner?? right after their baby died???

Why do people in these stories always think being betrayed and abandoned for no reason and being incredibly angry at someone you love while also not getting to be with them is somehow less painful than making the best of your life together and then losing them against their will? ‘I will make her hate me and then she won’t be sad we broke up/I died!!!!’ is such a fucking galaxy brain take and I despise it with the heat of ten thousand suns. Fuck you, Spider-Man. You aren’t protecting anyone, the villains still know you love MJ and will still use her against you, you clod. Emotionally torturing the person you love is not going to make them not a target because the villains are not as fucking stupid as you two. Anyway.

Amnesia was right where I started fast-forwarding and skipping around (because I couldn’t bear it), but it only goes downhill from there. Maybe I would have toughed out more of the wretched middle part plot twist if they hadn’t cut all the hot guy’s hair off. If I’m going to watch total nonsense tedious melodrama, I need it to at least be pretty. I understand it was a Symbolic Haircut but damnit! Let me have this!

And it ultimately does the thing that kdramas seem obsessed with and which makes me want to claw out my own eyeballs with frustration. There’s a giant time skip, the female lead gets a personality transplant, all narrative momentum is lost, and the characters who eventually (at ENORMOUS length) get together permanently are essentially completely different characters with a completely different dynamic than the couple you were shipping for 90% of the story. It is so FUCKING unsatisfying and it is EVERYWHERE.

Not so much with this one because this one still had a lot of very romantic scenes late in the game, but most that do this, it’s also like all the romance is sucked out of the post-time skip episodes and the ending is a consolation prize instead of a triumphant culmination. Inevitably, the heroine abruptly cools off and is suddenly wary of the hero and wants this Important New Career she never mentioned until the penultimate episode but is now her one true life’s dream. What the apparently irresistible appeal is of these contrived separations and demure conclusions is I CANNOT FATHOM. I’m here for the fucking romance guys, you have not made Citizen Kane, please just indulge me with a big schmoopy finale.

And if not that, it’s frequently that there’s been so many random mood swings and so much shitty behaviour by the end that the relationship doesn’t make sense and you don’t know why they even bother to get back together.

I’m not inherently against all misunderstandings (they are the bread and butter of low stakes romance let’s be real) or attempts at noble idiocy from misguided characters, but the duration and seriousness of the drama these generate needs to be in proportion to how ridiculous they are. If your entire plot can be solved by a thirty second conversation there is NO REASON not to have and the continuation of the misunderstanding is a result of someone just NOT SPEAKING UP when any functional human being would have spoken up seven times by now IT’S BAD.

Do little cliff-hangers, whatever, but don’t draaaaagg out silly misconceptions into Shakespearean tragedy, it’s just wearying. It makes me hate the characters for acting like emotionally constipated toddlers with terminal stupidity. If there is so little trust, so little understanding, and so little basic patience between these people, they probably shouldn’t be dating, so try fucking harder, writers. And noble idiocy that is more than an impulse they fairly quickly see the error of is just insulting. You are not helping the other person, you are being domineering and selfish. I have a whole complex about wasting time and seeing endless parades of characters flushing years down the toilet for literally no reason gives me hives. Especially when the whole issue is about time!

(And, btw, so much of the plot is about how desperately the family needs an heir and everyone still wanting them to have kids the second time they get together- while the ~dilemma used to keep them apart is a GENETIC DISEASE which could STRIKE AT ANY TIME. Do you SEE THE PROBLEM WITH THIS WRITERS????? NO, I KNOW YOU DON’T. ommmmmmmmggggg that’s awful! So they’re just dooming more kids to Soap Opera Brain Disease? And maybe growing up without a father just as Gun did? And no one even considers suggesting adoption??? He never considers that he shouldn’t have biological children despite thinking he shouldn’t have a wife?)

ANYWAY. Please do watch the first nine episodes and the last three, it’s bananas. They are cute as fuck, Gun is The Best, and the tropey romance scenes are top quality. You don't get those things executed so well, it doesn't happen, so you need this in your life. The acting is of a calibre you never usually see in modern romcoms; these are people at the top of their game committing utterly and taking these characters completely seriously. In that way it is pure wish fulfilment for me as someone who loves romance and is almost always disappointed by popular romance media, and thus the show is incalculably special. But skip the middle. Just skip it. It's not worth the suffering. I find the tone whiplash honestly just this side of crass.

I’ve been thinking about it for over a week and I truly love the main characters so it did plenty right, but I just cannot with wedding the two things this show is trying to be together, especially when it goes so hard in two mutually exclusive directions. but also the Meet Joe Black sudden car accident device is not redeemable under any circumstances. Can we never do that again, please.

#fated to love you #kdrama #jang hyuk #writing

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rantceratops · 4 years

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Why Dick is NOT a Resentful Twat: An Evidence Backed Rant by TheRantDragon.

*cracks knuckles*

I have been dying to tackle this one all day. This is legitimately FUN for me, I am enjoying myself. I came home from work, I sat down at my computer, and I started compiling my list of points and evidence. I am beyond ready to debunk this asinine fucking fan theory.

And for those of you that DON’T know what fan theory I’m talking about, it’s as crazy as this: Somehow it was apparently gathered that Dick is resentful towards Wally and Artemis’s romantic relationship. That because his s3 Fever Dream takes place very obviously sometime right after Artemis joined the Team in Infiltrator, and because he and Wally’s relationship was supposedly “strained” in s2 because of Artemis being undercover, that means that Dick is resentful because he either 1) is jealous of their romance because it means Artemis is “stealing” all of Wally’s time/friendship from him (I am legit rolling my eyes so hard right now, I wish I could film it), or 2) he secretly has romantic feelings for Wally.

This is all complete bullshit, and I am here today to show you, in extreme detail, with a shit ton of pictures and gifs straight from the show to back it all up, why this is the dumbest theory I’ve witnessed on this hellsite.

Please, proceed under the cut with the knowledge that it will be long and sarcastic and also I’m a bitch. :) I’m also going to warn you that if you remotely ship *raught or *ird*lash in a “canon” sense, you might want to skip this. By all means I support and respect people shipping what they like, but my philosophy is that I don’t have to respect the ship itself, just the people who do the shipping of it. I refuse to respect any ship I don’t like(I don’t expect anyone to respect my ships), and I don’t have to and I’m not obligated to.

These points are not in any specific order.

Point One

So, I’m actually going to start this off with an oldie, but a goodie. If you will, my friends, go back in time to early Invasion. Depths had just aired, and there was another theory going around then, that I feel the need to address first. This might feel a bit unrelated, but remember that I am debunking the notion that Dick is resentful toward Spitfire for ANY reason, so I feel it needs to be addressed first.

This theory, which was a shipping theory, was that Dick was in love with Artemis or otherwise had feelings for her, and that this was all part of the drama fueling into Dick and Wally’s supposed “strain”. He gave her mouth-to-mouth when he “didn’t need to”, he looked at his old picture of them wistfully in the warehouse, he looked away from Artemis and Wally’s last kiss because it was “painful” due to him being jealous.

None of this was true, and never was.

“Dick gave Artemis mouth-to-mouth even though it was “unnecessary”. He did this because he wanted to “kiss” her.”

Okay, but Dick giving Artemis mouth-to-mouth was 100% necessary. They were trying to sell a death here, really sell it because the entire mission hinged on the success of her death being believed. How unbelievable would it have been for Dick to just sit there and watch his friend bleed out and die, instead of trying everything he could to save her life? Regardless of whether CPR would have been the appropriate thing, the point is that if she had stopped breathing, CPR would be the obvious option in a last ditch effort. He needed to try everything to make this look good.

“Dick looked all wistfully at that picture of he and Artemis in Depths and said ‘We’ll laugh about this some day’, he clearly has feelings for her.”

No. First of all, Dick probably has a fucking framed version of that picture because of how damn funny it is. It’s his ultimate Artemis troll, and in case y’all forgot, they are very good friends (and oh, believe me, that is a topic I will get into). I hardly think looking at a picture of a fond memory with a friend automatically means romance. Secondly, this entire scene served two purposes. The first was to continue to try and fool the audience into believing that Artemis had truly died (it got me, I was crying up until she came out in the warehouse, not even gonna lie here. It got me GOOD). The second was to show the sense of guilt that Dick was feeling. He had literally asked Artemis to basically throw her life away; to fake her death, to fool all of their friends and family into thinking she had DIED. This is serious fucking shit, this isn’t something to just shrug off. (I am not saying that Artemis did not make her own decisions here, because she did, but this whole entire plan was Dick’s idea, and he is the one who asked her, thus putting the guilt he felt upon his shoulders). So outside of the audience reasoning for the picture, it was meant to show his guilt. “We’ll laugh about this someday...” Will we laugh about this someday too? Will this all be funny later, when things are okay? Can we still laugh and be okay even after what I’ve asked you to do?

“Dick looked away when Wally and Artemis kissed, even Kaldur noticed! He obviously has feelings for her and it hurt for him to watch, and this is definitely really feeding into his strain with Wally!”

Uh, no. Again, this all ties back to guilt, and general respect. Kaldur is not looking at Dick, Kaldur is turning his gaze away as well, to offer them respect. They are about to part from each other for god knows how long, and Artemis and Kaldur are both going into the lion’s den, where anything could fuck up at any time and leave them surrounded by enemies hundreds of meters below the ocean. Of course it’s common fucking courtesy to look way and give your friends some mild form of privacy. Dick is also looking away largely out of respect, but his feels lightly tinged with that guilt I already talked about. Guilt at what he’s asked her to do, of what he’s asked her to leave behind, of how his best pal will have to roll with the punches and act devastated that his girlfriend is dead. And honestly just guilt at seeing two people, both whom are his GOOD friends, and who happen to be pretty fucking solid and in love with each other, part ways for god knows how long.

Point Two

Dick cherishes childhood/the past/the good old days. This is made extremely obvious, especially throughout Outsiders. I bring this point up as part of debunking the notion that the era of Dick’s fever dream somehow means that he feels resentment towards Spitfire; that by going back to a point before they were together, that means Dick specifically misses those days before Artemis started “taking up Wally’s time” (huge eye roll again).

This is expressed mostly through a few quotes, that I will list here, and you can go listen yourself if you feel the need to.

“Oh maaan...I hate being a grown-up.” - Expressed during the Outsiders episode “Rescue Op.”. This is in response to Dick questioning why Brion and the others went and did the thing they were told NOT to do, to which Conner and Megan proceed to remind him of the Cadmus incident while also obviously implying as well all the times the Team broke the rules as teenagers. I think this quote speaks for itself.

“Kinda like old times, huh, Wall?” -During Dick’s hilarious adventures with the Harpers during the Outsiders episode “Private Security”. (That episode is a goddamn national treasure). While obviously this moment is largely meant to focus on Dick’s deeper issue of avoiding his problem and not having Wally around to knock some damn sense into him, I do think this is also fairly an indication of how much Dick misses the old days/latches onto them. This one is more specifically related to Wally, but it doesn’t remove from my point.

And of course the biggest one here, is the actual Fever Dream itself. Dick misses the old days, when the Team was young and new and everyone was at the top of their game. When his best friend was alive and well and goofy as ever and they were all having FUN with the hero gig. Things hadn’t gotten so dark yet. I will tackle this more thoroughly in and of itself later, but it also is relevant in this section.

Dick very deeply clings to the “good old days”. He MISSES his early days with the Team.

Point Three

Now, let’s talk about Artemis and Dick’s friendship. I already think that the fandom doesn’t appreciate this friendship enough as it is, but this fan theory leans toward straight up disrespecting not only Dick’s friendship with Wally, but his friendship with Artemis as well. I’ll start off by saying that I am not remotely arguing that Dick’s friendship with Artemis is a Wally-level for him (no one is Wally level, that’s his best bud <3), but I think it’s made incredibly obvious that they care deeply about each other in many ways throughout the series. They love each other.

My point here is that insinuating that Dick “resents” Spitfire because Artemis supposedly “steals” all of Wally’s time is just so fucking gross. That, at its core, is asserting that Dick resents Artemis herself, which is just plain fucking false. Now I will show and tell you WHY that is some blatant fucking bullshit.

The simple fact that Artemis and Dick are the OG badass no-powers heroes of the Team.

The entirety of Homefront. Seriously, go re-watch it in case you have forgotten how amazing it is and how amazing their friendship is

Three little moments in episodes right after Homefront, indicating the two have grown closer following the events in that episode: Dick and Artemis both helping each other with the attacking monkeys in Alpha Male; Artemis having clearly gotten some re-breathers from Dick after Homefront to add to her arsenal; Artemis and Dick sparring at the beginning of Humanity (and Artemis kicking his ass).

Dick specifically choosing Artemis to go undercover with Kaldur because he knows how capable she is, and how much he trusts her.

Dick and Artemis’s quiet conversation while waiting for the Comms Satellite to launch in Depths.

Dick specifically seeking out Artemis as part of his Team for the Markovia op, because he knows how capable she is, and how much he trusts her.

Dick and Artemis’s playful “Tigress”/”Nightwing banter on the beach in the Evolution episode.

Dick placing a comforting hand on her shoulder when Artemis explained her decision to live a normal life with Wally in the episode Influence. (ah yes, solidarity, compassion, and comfort! Truly the most resentful of gestures!)

Artemis and Dick’s touching moment shared for Wally after the events of the Fever Dream.

And just a couple of bonus images of their friendship:

( ^ look at them fucking hamming it up XD <3)

There was literally zero indication that Dick harbors any sort of resentment toward Artemis, which would have to be the case for the argument against Spitfire, considering the resentment itself would have to start with her coming into Wally’s life. There is nothing but love, friendship, trust, and understanding between these two. There is not even a fragment to suggest otherwise. So no, this does not stand.

Point Four

Dick ships Spitfire. How could he resent something that he very obviously supports? There’s no shipper goggles here, we have several instances in the series itself that either blatantly or insinuates that Dick is fully aware of and in support of them.

-First of all we have the whole exchange between he and Wally in Infiltrator. He’s clearly noticed the tension as they all have, and while this isn’t a major one, I think it still stands. “You might cut her some slack. It was her arrow saved your butt against Amazo.” I’d also argue that, upon listening to Dick’s voice when he says this to Wally, that his appeasing inflection indicates that he’s trying to help clear the air between them, to give Wally a reason to chill and give her a chance. It might not be for romance purposes just yet, but he clearly was trying to help them become friends and ease the tension.

-The most blatant quote from Bereft: “Yeesh, get a room!” in response to them arguing with their faces close and being generally fairly obvious to anyone with eyeballs/ears.

-In Failsafe, Dick knowingly, if regretfully, uses Wally’s feelings for Artemis to keep him moving forward. He sees how badly Wally reacts, is able to easily discern from past moments between them and from Wally’s reaction itself, that he has some pretty deep feelings for her. We’ve already seen evidence that Dick is supporting of it through his teases, and the fact that he realized he’d have to feed Wally false hope about her to keep him moving shows that he’s not blind to it by any means. Dick felt awful about it; he does not say anything specifically about anyone on the Team to BC in his therapy session, but everything is still addressed as a whole, as he does talk about “sending (his) friends to their deaths” and being like Batman with his drive to finish the mission, etc.

-Again, Dick showed respect(and guilt) and looked away when Artemis and Wally kissed in Depths.

-And lastly and probably most importantly: the Fever Dream itself has nods to early Spitfire, and it came straight from Dick’s own brain. He’s not an idiot, he knows they liked each other and what they would mean to each other. If he had some kind of true resentment about it, don’t you think that in addition to not being so chummy with Artemis in s2 and s3, that he would have, idk, imagined the Team WITHOUT Artemis completely? Come the heck on, people. This is so goofy. (”Oh, hey, the new girl. I’m gonna keep my eye on her.” “We heard that!” // “Jected! She owes me one!” “You know I can still hear you?” “Dang it!” These two quotes are quite literally references to Infiltrator itself, wherein Artemis tells Wally “You know, I can still hear you!” when Wally says he’s not going to give her the satisfaction.)

Point Five

The Fever Dream itself. This isn’t even going to be a massive section because it doesn’t really have to be.

The point of the Fever Dream taking place in what was clearly post Infiltrator, was that it was before Failsafe. Before Infiltrator, nothing super crazy traumatizingly bad had happened to the Team yet. It wasn’t arguably until Home Front, Revelation, and Failsafe that shit started getting deep. They lost Kent in Denial and that probably didn’t sit well with Wally, it was one of the first losses they had experienced besides the woman the boys failed to protect in the tie-in comics. But ultimately Failsafe is the biggest thing that happened to them; it ruined them, it left lasting scars, it wasn’t fun, and being a hero was supposed to be fun back then. They knew it was responsibility too, I’m not saying they didn’t, but... they were kids, and it felt cool to be doing the stuff they were doing.

I don’t think there’s really any specific reason other than that. Early Team was good days, when everyone was happy. It was “All aster, no dis”. To me this is extremely obvious.

Point Six

Perhaps an even shorter point but one that desperately needs to be said because imo it alone is enough to derail all this horseshit.

This fan theory, once again I must reiterate, is basically saying that Dick either resents Spitfire/Artemis because it strained he and Wally’s friendship somehow, or that Dick has some hidden romantic feelings toward Wally. In claiming this, you are flat out choosing to ignore that Dick himself is basically a respectful player in s2 onward. It is made NO secret that he dates a LOT of women, all of which he respects and enjoys the company of and ends things nicely with, because he just loves women and sex (literally a Greg answer, of which I will grace you with shortly).

Are you trying to tell me that Dick resents Wally having a loving, deep, dedicated, solid, fucking loving ass relationship, and yet himself goes around being with a bunch of women and eventually winds up in his OWN deep long-term relationship with BABS? What kinda fucking hypocritical BULLSHIT y’all trying to pull here?

This point alone is enough to destroy this entire stupid ass theory.

(”Dick Grayson is a perfect gentlemen who love sex. He keeps a strong friendship with his many, many ex-GFs.” This was from a raunchy q&a done with Greg that included some of the other characters/relationships as well. And honestly that is THE most perfect description of s2-onward Dick that I’ve ever seen. “A perfect gentlemen that loves sex.” This is literally him.)

Final Point

I’m honestly just gonna stop the *ird*lash part of the theory in it’s tracks right here and now.

Now, anyone can ship whatever the hell they like, I am NOT disputing that, nor telling people they have to ship what I ship. What I AM saying though is that *ird*lash is not a thing in canon, so a fan theory based around some secret romantic feelings for Wally just isn’t going to work. Now, you can imagine whatever you like in fanon and fanfiction that’s cool! Fanon/fanfiction is always there to have your back (hell, I rely on it every day since 2013 with Spitfire because as of right now Wally be dead! *shrug*).

But the fact of the matter is that not only does the show dispute this pairing, as both boys are in dedicated relationships with other people canonically, neither Dick nor Wally are romantically inclined to each other in the creator’s eyes.

(”Well, what really precludes it, I suppose, is that I don’t think either of them are gay. But everyone is entitled to their opinion.” - Greg) And he’s blessing people to have their own opinions and use fanon too!

In Conclusion

Dick is not and never has been a resentful twat/bad friend, and this theory made me puke a little in my mouth from the first moment I heard it. I’m inclined to say that having a bit more respect for Dick might be wise.

#ranty rants #ranty is a bitch #yj meta #yj #otp: when we're alone #spitfire #ranty's meta

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thankskenpenders · 5 years

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So there’s this little cartoon you may have heard of...

As I’ve said on this blog before, I’d never watched all of SatAM. This might be shocking to hear from someone who runs a blog dedicated to Archie Sonic and one of the top twenty Bunnie Rabbot fangirls in the world. But it’s true.

SatAM was very difficult to track down compared to other Sonic cartoons when I was a kid, and I just never got around to watching it as an adult. So for the longest time, I had only ever seen the first episode, which I found uploaded in parts on YouTube in 2007. As the one cartoon featuring the characters I liked from the comics, it became sort of this holy grail of Sonic media for me as a kid, especially with people online always talking it up as the best thing ever and petitioning for a revival. Hell, to this day, a lot of people hold it up as this masterpiece and act like the Archie comics were a complete mockery of it

Anyway so I finally got around to watching the whole series with my boyfriend these past couple weeks, and it was pretty good. So instead of covering a comic today, here are some thoughts on the cartoon that started it all

General Thoughts

SatAM is a pretty good show. It isn’t the greatest piece of Sonic media ever, unlike what some older fans will tell you. It might not even be the best Sonic cartoon (you could easily make a case for the Japanese version of Sonic X, or Sonic Boom if you’re looking for something more comedic). It hasn’t aged the most gracefully, in some ways. The animation’s cheap, the stories sometimes bland. But for a DiC-produced video game cartoon from the early ‘90s, it’s really solid

I think that in many ways, SatAM is carried by the strength of its ideas over its actual execution. The darker, more serious tone is a really cool idea, even if at times it can get a little dull, and even if the show actually gets silly as hell pretty often. (This is a show where Snively literally tortures a captive Antoine by preparing French cuisine improperly.) That opening scene of Robotropolis in the first episode actually sets the mood really well and feels like it came straight out of some cyberpunk anime from the ‘80s or ‘90s. The concept of Robotnik turning people into robot slaves is really cool, even if surprisingly little was done with this aside from Uncle Chuck’s storyline. And I think the Freedom Fighters make a great supporting cast for Sonic, even if the writers didn’t use them to their full potential

Interestingly, I’d often heard from fans that season one was the stronger of the two, when I’d say that the opposite is true. Season one episodes were pretty samey, usually involving low stakes missions to Robotropolis with no real continuity, and Sally ended up being a damsel in distress more than I’d like--hell, so did Bunnie in a few episodes. It wasn’t bad, but it was highly repetitive, and I got a little bored at times. Season two had a few real stinkers (the Antoine episodes) and Dulcy was an unwelcome addition, but I thought the heavier focus on continuity gave the season some real momentum and more emotional weight, which made it way more enjoyable overall

Things I Liked

Sonic. I quite liked this version of Sonic, actually! Jaleel White is a great Sonic, and he was written pretty well. At times the extremely tubular ‘90s lingo was grating (I never wanna hear “Gotta juice!” again), but I was surprised to see that this version of Sonic had a lot of heart. He really cared about the well-being of his friends and Uncle Chuck, and they even let him cry a couple times. I thought they struck a good balance between snark and sincerity with him

Sally. I don’t think SatAM Sally was perfect, but I liked her. I’m still of the opinion that she should have been given more ways to defend herself physically (maybe some kind of power of her own) so that Sonic didn’t have to save her as much, but I liked the banter she and Sonic had. Unlike the early Archie comics, Sally doesn’t come off as the bossy girlfriend who ruins Sonic’s fun. Maybe it’s Jaleel White and Kath Soucie’s performances doing most of the work, but they had a fun back and forth dynamic, with Sally’s sarcasm keeping Sonic’s ego in check, but there still being clear chemistry between the two of them

I also liked the greatly reduced emphasis on her being a princess compared to much of Archie’s material. Like yeah, it’s there. Her dad’s the king, and left her some classified info via Nicole. But her status doesn’t really affect things much. They don’t talk about her having this grand destiny and being the next in line to rule. It’s clear that she’s in charge of the Freedom Fighters not because of her status, but because she’s smart, brave, and gets shit done. That’s the Sally I like.

Plus! In the finale, Sally insisted upon going with Sonic for the final confrontation, and was a crucial part of the climax. Her powering up with Sonic and matching his speed and strength ruled. Compare that to the climactic defeat of Robotnik in Archie, where she was fucking dead

Robotnik. I don’t think much needs to be said here. Jim Cummings rules as Robotnik, like everyone has always said. He’s just so evil and so much fun to watch

Snively??? I’ve never cared for Snively as a character, but Charlie Adler rules and his over-the-top performance made the character way funnier than he should’ve been. Just something about all the little noises he makes, and the way he almost shifts into the Red Guy voice at times

Nicole. It was fun to see Nicole start to get more of a personality in season two, having some banter with Sonic and also picking up some slang from him. It makes the later decision to turn Sally’s computer into a full character (which would have happened in season three, and obviously eventually became a big subplot in the comics) make a lot of sense

King Acorn. While he was only around briefly, I liked that he wasn’t a huge dick, unlike Archie’s King Max

Things I Didn’t Like

The misuse of the other Freedom Fighters. This is, by far, the show’s greatest crime.

I already write approximately 100k words a week on this blog about how I think Bunnie Rabbot is amazing and criminally underused, so I’ll keep this brief, but I was shocked to see how little she was used in this show. People tend to say Dulcy stole her screentime in season two, but she didn’t have much to do in the first season either! We somehow never got a single episode focusing on her. The one where she got temporarily deroboticized focused much more on Uncle Chuck. We never got to learn the story behind her roboticization, or delved into her feelings on the matter much. She mostly just served as a positive, lighthearted supporting member of the team who acts cute and gets some funny lines, but usually stays home

Antoine might have been even worse, honestly. Like, they used him so much! They had multiple episodes focusing entirely on him! And yet I’m not sure he ever really helped. Sonic and Sally kept taking him along, but every single time it felt like it would’ve been a wiser decision to bring Bunnie instead. The jokes about his broken English were just dumb, and god, the way he constantly hits on Sally and starts kissing her hand at the most inappropriate times is just SO fucking creepy. SatAM Antoine is just a horrible, one-dimensional stereotype. There’s a reason why readers of the Archie comics wanted him out of the series until later writers majorly rehabilitated him

Rotor also didn’t get much use, which was a shame, but it at least felt like he was used efficiently. I got the vibe that Rotor was much more bitter about the war with Robotnik than his friends, and it would’ve been interesting to see this explored more. At least we got that one fun episode where he went to space with Sonic

Dulcy. Oh my fucking god. I wanted to like Dulcy! I really did! But most of the time she was just a clutz used for comic relief, and they kept reusing the same joke where she crashed, bumped her head, got dizzy, and thought she was talking to her mom. This happened in almost every episode she was in.

The other miscellaneous Freedom Fighters. Like in the early Archie comics, none of the other miscellaneous Mobians they meet were as interesting as the core cast. They just always felt very bland and I was never as invested in them as the writers wanted me to be. Ari was boring, and that episode where they found the underground city and this other dude started hitting on Sally was a drag. Lupe’s cute though

Rings. This is a common problem in Sonic adaptations, but the fact that rings always serve as Sonic’s instant win button kind of sucks. Basically any time Sonic’s in a pinch, he pulls a ring out of his backpack, powers up, and wins. Not exactly a recipe for suspenseful action

Oh, also, I did kinda find it weird how much Sonic and Sally kissed? Like, all the time? Often while their friends just stand there and stare at them? Not something I’d expect from a Sonic cartoon

Things Archie Did Better

I’ll limit this to the first 50 issues or so, since I don’t think it would be fair to compare two short seasons of SatAM to the highlights of nearly 500 issues of comics

Tails. Tails is okay in SatAM, Archie just used him as Sonic’s sidekick way more. He was barely even in the show. Poor little guy only gets to play dirt hockey all day

Bunnie. Again, Bunnie was underutilized in both series, but the Archie comics did her better. They actually showed the story of how she got roboticized (even if it was a silly story), and they got to flesh her out a bit more. Gallagher showing that she was a carrot farmer before her roboticization and saying she wanted to be a hairdresser was at least something. And as I keep harping on, Rich Koslowski’s backup story in #37 where we find out Bunnie has recurring nightmares about her robot parts taking over and making her a threat to her friends? This single backup story did more to flesh her out than all 26 episodes of SatAM combined

Antoine. Not hard to do better than SatAM here, really. He was really bad early on, serving as little more than Sonic’s punching bag, but eventually they started to set up a romance between him and Bunnie and explored his past a bit, saying that Antoine’s father (his personal role model) was a member of the royal guard who was roboticized in the war. While he still had a long way to go, these were important first steps towards him being a decent character. Hell, these days, being Bunnie’s love interest is one of Antoine’s defining characteristics! And it doesn’t come from the cartoon at all

Roboticization in general. I was surprised how little this came up in the cartoon! In the comics, it’s such a central element. We see more of the heroes’ loved ones turned into robots, and we even got some fun stories where characters like Sonic and Sally were roboticized temporarily. The Freedom Fighters’ efforts to reverse the process was a major part of the plot for quite a while. Bunnie’s fear of losing control is a pretty important part of her character (even if it was only touched on briefly), and after they’re rescued, the rest of the Mobians fear that the “Robians” (including Sonic’s entire family) will turn evil again. It comes up a lot! There are interesting things to discuss here! But SatAM only really talks about Uncle Chuck. We never even see what happened to everyone else

Closing Thoughts

SatAM is not the best show in the world, but it is a solid and enjoyable one. It’s easy to see why people who grew up with it are fond of it, even if I think that it’s long past time certain fans quit acting like it’s the only valid take on the Sonic source material and petitioning for a third season. At the very least, the concepts and characters introduced here are strong ones, and it’s easy to see how they spawned over 20 years of comics exploring said ideas in greater detail. While I’m not sure I could recommend it to non-fans, I think it’s definitely worth checking out for Sonic fans who missed out on it (especially fans of the Archie comics)

Anyway I got to see Bunnie dropkick some Swatbots twice her height so I had fun

#tkp post #other media

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kdramafeminist · 5 years

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Drama Masterpost 2020

Every drama I’ve watched this year + a one line review + score out of 10!

My Ratings:

10= Masterpiece! Work of Art. Don’t agree and I will fight you. Swords at dawn. 9-9.5= Basically Perfect! Flaws you say? What flaws? 7.5-8.5= Big Loved! It stumbled in a couple of places, but we forgive it. 6.5-7= Super Fun! Enjoyable ride but nothing spectacular. 5-6= Safe Average. A solid “okay” I probably won’t remember for long. 3.5-4.5= Precious time in my life I’ll never get back. 1.5-3= Bad. Just bad. Do not watch. 1= Kill it. Kill it with fire.

Hyena (aired 2020) - problematic leads with fire chemistry and wonky morals serve us a super addictive, kinda cheesy, very fun journey. 8.5/10

Crash Landing on You (aired 2019/20) - started absolutely brilliantly, began sinking midway and became a lead balloon by the end. Watch for the supporting cast if nothing else I guess. 4.5/10

Kingdom Season 2 (aired 2020) - Koreans doing zombies exactly as they should be done with Bae Doona stealing my heart as she was meant to. 9.5/10

365: Repeat the Year (aired 2020) - From beginning to end it was entertaining and moved at breakneck speed. I think there was one plot twist per episode (at minimum). Also the two leads’ chemistry shined here. 8.5/10

My Holo Love | DROPPED EP.3 (aired 2020) - Dull. Never connected with the characters, didn’t care about their story. 3.5/10

The King: Eternal Monarch | DROPPED EP.10 (aired 2020) - Objectively is may be more of a 4 star but my expectations were so high it only fell so much further. A PPL-machine disguised as a drama. 1.5/10

Angel Beside Me (aired 2020. Thai) - Cute, inoffensive kinda cheesy lovestory. No gripes. 5.5/10

Shopping King Louie (aired 2016) - Pure fluff. Brains off, uwu on and take nothing seriously in order to enjoy. Just fun! 7/10

Because This is My First Life (aired 2017) - Started off on a unique, realistic high. Ended on disappointing cliches & an abandonment of what made the first half so great. 7/10

Extracurricular (aired 2020) - Unlike any kdrama I’ve seen. Gorgeously directed, brilliantly acted and though the story is overly dramatic, it’s never to the point of silliness. Top tier. 9/10

Hi, Bye Mama! (aired 2020) - Made me cry which was obviously the goal & they succeeded. Cha Yuri & Oh Minjung are amazing female characters. 8.5/10

Good Casting (aired 2020) - Extremely silly but a fun watch for some ass-kicking women and fluffy romance. Second-romance is shit though. 6.5/10

The Stranded (aired 2019. Thai) - Fits perfectly into the genre it lives in with some characters you’ll love to bits and others you’ll daydream about throwing off a cliff. Speaking of- cliffhanger ending & open plot threads with no concrete S2 plans drop the score. 8/10

Where Your Eyes Linger (aired 2020) - Super-cute romance told in bite-size chunks. Just ignore the dumb premise and focus on these kids being the softest idiots in love. 7.5/10

Strangers From Hell (aired 2019) - Creepy, dark and 100% as thrilling as advertised with themes that will make you think and Lee Dong Wook and his buddies casually slipping into your nightmares. 8.5/10

Oh My Baby | DROPPED EP.10 (aired 2020) - Not offensive, just not for me. Premise advertises a focus on unconventional motherhood. Actual drama is just another run-of-the-mill romcom that does nothing new. Yawn. 4.5/10

The Ghost Bride (aired 2020) - Short series perfect to binge with a fun supernatural setting and easy to enjoy leads, underrated gem! 6.5/10

Mystic Pop-up Bar (aired 2020) - Best drama of 2020 hands down! Stop everything your doing and go watch the most precious found family ever! 10/10

I Hear Your Voice | REWATCH (aired 2013) - I was in drama slump and missed LJS’s face idk. Still as good as the first time I watched it. Perfect noona romance. 8.5/10

Into The Ring (aired 2020) - Best couple of the year? I think so! The characters are amazing individually & together! A heartfelt story and unique directing makes this perfect. 9/10

Strongest Deliveryman (aired 2017) - The leads lacked romantic chemistry and the story was just fine. Had fun moments here and there. 5/10 I Do, I Do (aired 2012) - A cute noona romance with a fierce FL. The romance wasn’t great but I enjoyed the growth the characters had. 7.5/10

Flower Of Evil (aired 2020) - Cha Ji Won is a queen, lets bow down. Hyun Soo deserves only happiness & nothing less. The ending is slightly a let down but everything else is so perfect! 8.5/10

Romance is a Bonus Book (aired 2019) - Another noona romance! Honestly wished they had stayed friends & think the second leads would’ve made better leads bc better chemistry! A fun story about booklovers though so I’m based & would never hate it. 7.5/10

Stranger/Secret Forest 2 (aired 2020) - Slow in the middle and I missed the character moments from s1 that we lost in favour of a more complicated story. Intriguing mystery with important themes & messages and HwangHan continue to be BDE badasses with every breath they take. Loved! 8.5/10

#drama masterpost #2020 #ratings masterpost

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hyperdrivehearts · 4 years

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YouseemedtoreallylikethelastoneandIlovehearinghowotherpeoplewritethedisasterchildrenso Headcanon time! How often do Yusei and Kalin get sick? What makes them frustrated or irritable? Does Yusei get petty towards Jack and Crow? What are Yuseis feelings for Akiza?

DIASASTER CHILDREN IM–?? u right tho, u right,, Kalin and Yus are grade A+ disasters. And yes!! I love when people want to know about my boys it makes me super happy asdgbjsdhlsd

- How often do Yusei and Kalin get sick?

Not often, thankfully! As children, they probably were sick a lot more often, and in Satellite, it’s not that sanitary to begin with so there was a constant exposure to germs and bacteria, which does thankfully increase the power of the immune system later in life. (Kalin probably does get sick more often than Yusei does, due to having, y’know, died.)

The unfortunate flip side to this, is that when they get sick, they get sick hard. No matter what he’s caught, Yusei tries to hide it as best as possible, but there’s only so much you can hide when you’re coughing up lungs from a bad cold, y’know? He’s not the type to want people to dote over him, because he knows other people need him, but he does eventually give into being taken care of, because he knows they only mean well. Though, it’s a challenge and a half to keep him in bed, because there’s always things to be done– even if it takes him longer to recover.

Kalin is very similar: he doesn’t want people taking care of him, but unlike Yusei, he doesn’t eventually give in as easily and it’s like pulling teeth from a crocodile. If you thought he was in a bad mood normally, be glad you haven’t seen him sick. (He’s so lucky that Yusei loves him as much as he does.) It’s honestly like taking care of a child; his appetite vanishes and he won’t eat properly, constantly picking at his food, not to mention that he will just refuse to have any medicine besides his antidepressants.

Yusei is VERY patient with Kalin and Kalin begrudgingly does what’s required of him when Yusei’s taking care of him. When it’s Jack or Crow? It ends in a lot of frustration on both sides.

FUN FACT! Because of Kalin’s lowered body temperature from being a Dark Signer, he won’t know if he has a fever or not, and will play a lot of the symptoms off as him just being cold or just having a headache and needing a nap. There has been a few scares where hes actually passed out because of it

Under the cut again!!

-What makes them frustrated or irritable?

A lot for the both of them, actually! Kalin and Yusei display anger/frustration in two very different ways.

Kalin can and will get angry at very small and mundane things. Someone did something he was going to do? Expect an annoyed growl. Someone touched his shit in his room? Another growl. He is extremely vocal about his anger and lashes out very, very easily and this is something I plan to explore in my fic one I actually get to those parts lmao, but he isn’t afraid to tell someone (or something) to piss off.

Kalin needs immediate release when he’s angry of frustrated. He can’t keep it bottled in at all because it festers and gets worse. He’ll take walks or drives around, something passive. He should not duel in a state of anger, because that damage can very easily turn real when he’s no longer in control of his emotions. It isn’t strange to see him yell at someone, and immediately turn around and punch a wall or tree, because it needs to get out.

If he releases these emotions verbally, there’s usually a lot of swearing involved. (He has yelled profanities at the door frame he just walked into, thanks for asking.)

Yusei is different. He isn’t easy to anger, but quick to annoy and irk. He’s someone where you can tell it through body language and only body language. Narrowed eyes, strangely silent and clammed shut, dirty glares. It’s a very passive aggressive anger. He’ll still talk to you like normal, but he would be much more sarcastic than usual and you can just.. tell that you pissed him off through his actions. (A good example of this would be Yusei revving his engine to get the attention of his friends right in the first episode. Just use your words, boy.)

Piss Yusei off enough, however, he will turn things physical, and he is not afraid to do so. If he can justify his anger, he can justify his hands being thrown. Take Tanner or anyone who has called certain cards worthless: that sets Yusei off, because he knows what it’s like to be tossed aside and called worthless, he’s from Satellite for fucks sake, but he also knows he has worth as a person and those cards have worth to be in someone’s deck and not in the trash. Abusing and taking advantage of people, insulting his friends, and insulting his pride as a duelist are really the only things that make him angry. (Say for Goodwin. Goodwin as a whole pisses him off for a multitude of reasons and he would NOT hesitate to punch his lights out.)

Yusei luckily doesn’t hold grudges like Kalin does, and if you leave him be, it’ll be like smothering out a small, angry flame with a blanket. He’ll forgive you, and things will go back to normal relatively quickly, but he won’t fucking forget.

Sometimes, it doesn’t always smother out, and he’ll think and think about what made him annoyed, until it’s at the point of anger and he can’t focus properly (Instead, he focuses on what’s making him angry.) A scene in the manga describes it better than I could: he’s thinking about Sect while working on his runner instead of resting up, and he keeps thinking about Sect until he’s genuinely angry and SLAMS his wrench to the floor.

TLDR: When Yusei’s angry, his actions speak louder than his words, while Kalin is almost the opposite: both are loud and he’s giving himself a headache.

- Does Yusei get petty towards Jack and Crow?

Crow? Not so much. As I said above, he doesn’t usually verbalize his emotions, and Crow “gets” him quite a lot as a person. Crow is someone Yusei can very easily forgive, because he hasn’t been wronged severely by him. Yusei is still sarcastic as ever with him though, but he’s like that with everyone.

When Kalin became part of the team, Crow was VERY against it, and he made it hella known enough for Kalin to storm outwith tears in his eyes. That, that made Yusei go off in retaliation and it was probably the angriest Crow has seen Yusei, say for the raw anger Yusei felt when Kalin turned to dust in his arms. (Boy was he pissed at the Dark SIgners.)

Jack on the other hand, has wronged him, and has wronged Yusei enough to severely hurt him and his trust. Stealing his runner and card by putting their friend in danger? That took a very long time to heal over (and one hell of an angry cry by Yusei.) Truthfully, I don’t think Yusei will ever 100% fully trust Jack again, but he’s forgiven him. (Mostly, he’ll bring it up when he’s annoyed enough, and Jack is really the only person he gets “snappy” at outside of a duel who wasn’t an antagonist.

Yusei is the type of person to leave a thimble of milk left in the jug SOLELY because he knows Jack is the next one to need it.

TLDR: Yusei petty af with everyone but especially Jack Atlas.

- What are Yuseis feelings for Akiza?

Let me make this 100% clear right off the bat: My Yusei holds absolutely ZERO romantic interest in Akiza, even though she did have a crush on Yusei, it was not requited. Akiza is like a sister to Yusei (and dating your sister would be weird.) Yusei understood that he was the first male in a long time in Akiza’s life that she genuinely felt safe around and that she had mistook the feeling for attraction. (Comphet is a bitch.) Yusei is far from the type of person to lead her on– he can barely tell someone in a gentle tone that he’s not interested, because he doesn’t want to accidentally risk broken bonds. In that aspect, he kinda just let her be but still trusted and respected her immensely.

Platonically speaking, Yusei LOVES Akia. He honestly trusts her with his life (and with Stardust, who he values more than his own life but don’t tell Stardust that.) He knows he can always trust Akiza to give her honest opinion, no matter how brutal it may be, and will seek her out specifically for her advice. Crow’s advice is mostly what he’d do in a certain situation, which isn’t always the same as what Yusei would do. (And Jack gives horrible advice, so Yusei isn’t going to even bother there,) but Akiza genuinely understands him and that’s?? super important to me?? I just really love their their bond??

Yusei thinks Akiza is amazing in every possible way, that she’s strong and absolutely refuses to back down. He knows not to mess with Akiza, because he’s get his ass kicked.

When Kalin and Yusei started dating again during the WRGP, I am certain Akiza would have been at least a little heartbroken, but it’s also the first time in a while that Yusei had been so genuinely happy. By that type, she had built a solid friendship with Kalin because he understood the parts of her that Yusei could not. Akiza felt like a monster, Kalin was a monster. (honestly?? between the three of them, there is a solid support system in Team 5Ds.)

#[yusei vc] im 5'6 and filled with so much anger im vibrating #Anonymous #HEADCANONS:|| Kalin #HEADCANONS:|| Yusei #I LOVE YOU SO MUCH #i knew what my yusei felt about Akiza but it was actually REALLY hard to articulate #shes like a sister whos his best friend #IF YOU WANNA KNOW ANYTHING ELSE PLEASE LET ME KNOW GOD THIS IS A BLAST

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sieben9 · 5 years

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“hyperion heights” impressions

{Quick request to anyone reading: I’m watching OUaT for the first time, and I want to avoid spoilers. So, if you want to discuss something spoilery, I’d be grateful if you could start a new post for that. Thank you!}

::plays “New Season” from Galavant::

…look, I’ve got the thing stuck in my head, and I thought I’d share.

I liked the episode? I think? There’s a lot of set-up and not a whole bunch of plot, but I think I like the things that were set up. And the characters definitely got off to a strong start (with one little problem I’ll get to later), so that’s always a plus for me.

More under the cut.

OK, so the flashback was a good, solid foundation for further conflict. Henry and Cinderella had some solid chemistry, and the twist to her particular version of this tale was one I did not see coming.

murderous Disney princess in a poofy dress on a motorcycle is definitely a Look™

I have to say, getting in a traffic collision with your future partner is... actually very on-brand for every single part of Henry’s family. Glad to see you’re keeping traditions alive, pal. (And yes, that explicitly includes Regina, who found her first girlfriend through breaking and entering.)

And it’s ...let’s say “nice” to see that Lady Tremaine, in whatever universe we see her, still continues to be The Worst. More on that below, but I found it interesting that one mainstay of OUaT seems to be that no, she’s horrible to all her children and not just her stepdaughter. It’s just different kinds of terribleness. I’m also wondering if Cinderella just has the one step-sister in this version (I know for a fact that there are some out there where that’s the case) or if it’s a plot point. And if there really is only one sister, the next question is: where is she? Did something horrible happen? And if so, was it the result of her mother’s terribleness or (part of) the cause? So many questions, so little time~

…can you tell I’m loving this bit? I mean, I hate her guts, but she intrigues me, which is always great. (Me? Latching on to a villain? What a strange thing to happen.)

The closing shot for the flashback plotline is very promising, with Henry deciding that no, home can wait, the strange lady who punched him in the face and almost framed him for murder needs help, first. …you know, I can’t even tell which part of his family he gets it from, because they are all completely bananas.

you grew up great, buddy

Also, just as a closing question: does he have a magic motorcycle? Is that why it doesn’t need fuelling up in however long it’s been since he left Storybrooke? Just asking.

I mentioned my one problem with the modern-day cast at the top, and I’ll just get right into it: my biggest problem at this point is not comparing everyone’s “roles” to the original cast configuration. Like, “Roni” doing Snow’s job (even if her temper is very different from Mary Margaret’s). Henry isn’t Emma, even if he’s the “new guy in town”, and Lucy isn’t Henry, even if she clearly inherited his “little shit” genes. (I love her so much, but how her mother manages her on her own, I will never know. Victoria Belfrey sure as hell isn’t Regina, because Regina would never treat any child of hers this way, thank you very much. In fact, I wonder if she and Cora went to the same school for being a terrible mom together. That’s the level of “I do not like this person” I’m on.

Still, the Hyperion Heights people seem like a good bunch, and I look forward to seeing more of them.

Henry is a lovable fuck-up who thinks he made up the entirety of the show so far and managed to squeeze it all into one book. My guy. I know what the transfer rate from TV to prose is. You could never fit that in one volume.

at least not that one. that’s... what? 600 pages, tops?

And is it just me or did his particular role in the curse take a fucking dark turn? Because it’s bad enough to separate everyone from their loved ones, but giving the guy fake memories of his wife and child burning to death in a house fire? Just… wow. Please let the poor man remember soon because this will be haunting me until then.

Speaking of things that will haunt me…

They didn’t recognise each other and I was not prepared for the complete gut-punch that was. They were sitting there, looking at each other, and they didn’t know. Guh! (And yes, I am 100% convinced that Roni is, in fact, Roni and not Regina, because she might have kept up the pretence for a good enough reason, but she’d never have kept that good a poker face; I also doubt she would have given her son and his not-quite-date strong liquor at before 4pm)

Special mention goes to Henry’s line of “imagine if I were to walk in here and say that I’m your son”, because yeah, imagine you doing that. To anyone. What a crazy thing, right? (

And while I’m on the topic of Roni…

I love her so much. Everything about her. Her attitude, the way she moves, the Looks™ she gives people, her voice… Yeah, I may not be entirely objective on the topic, why do you ask. I am also looking forward immensely to seeing her butt heads with Belfrey. Because of reasons.

this scene is 95% of the reasons

I also wrote in my notes “so the villain this season is gentrification?” and honestly, I don’t think I was that far off. There’s definitely a strong theme of class in this set-up, and I hope the writers carry that through at least a little.

A quick rundown of the other characters, while I’m at it:

I like Jacinda well enough, although her main character trait at the moment seems to be “really, really stressed out”. Which is fair. She’s a single mom with Belfrey as her only family connection. Her scene with Henry in the bar and with Lucy at the well was extremely adorable, though, so I’m optimistic as for future developments. (And Cinderella bought her some goodwill because she was determined and vulnerable and scared and generally amazing in all the right ways. I liked that version of her, and it’s been established that your cursed self hardly puts your best traits on display.) I definitely smiled when she made that wish at the well.

Good on you, not giving up hope. (And I immensely appreciated the way it was set parallel to Henry finally writing that first sentence of his.)

I’m… not 100% sure who her roommate is meant to be, which is going to irk me until I am, but I can live with a little mystery in my life *g*

I have no idea what Weaver’s deal is, but I really hope he isn’t awake this one time around.

please take that man’s head out of the water

Rumple as a police officer is… uh, a special kind of hilarious. A really terrible one, too. And now he’s partnered up with not-Hook, which, to coin a phrase, I’m sure they’ll all laugh themselves sick about some day. I’m interested in seeing what his connection with not-Alice is. Both in the modern-day plot and in the flashbacks, because there’s usually some kind of interplay between the two storylines.

Rogers is… not on screen that much. He seems nice. Which is already a better opinion than I had of uncursed!Hook, and that is a crying shame because they’re all bound to wake up at some point. Still, I’m holding out hope. People have said good things about Hook in this season.

Apart from all that, there’s also an implied mystery in this season that I really like, and it’s “who, exactly, cast the curse?”

I mean, it’s clear that the show is setting up Lady Tremaine as the Big Bad, but 1) I’m not new here, I know how much these writers love their villain fake-outs, and 2) I get the feeling that her whole “magic can be taken away blah blah” speech might be meant to give a hint that it’s not, in fact, her.

god, I hate her so much already; it’s delightful

Which leaves the question of “OK, then who?” and I… have a few thoughts. Which I will keep to myself until at least three episodes in because I doubt that we’ve met all parties involved at this point.

In short: on strength of its characters alone, I am cautiously excited for this new season. Bring it on!

And, because it didn’t fit anywhere else:

The keychain made it through!

#ouat #once upon a time #ouat hyperion heights #sieben watches ouat #sieben talks

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thecrazyanimegirl · 6 years

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Summer Anime ‘18

Here are all the anime and donghua that we watched this summer season (excluding those who have second, third etc season airing).

Yeah, the chinese ones don’t exactly fit in any season. They are still very good though so we decided to put them here!

Of course, this is just our opinion so it may differ from what you think ^^

{ Winter ‘17/’18 } { Spring ‘18 }

Aguu: Genius Dolls

K: It doesn’t have anything to do with balet, so don’t give after the first half of the episode lol It’s a bit different, from the story to animation, but I really liked it ^^

Neko: I like the idea of it, it’s different and interesting

Kitsune: A really interesting idea for the plot and I must say that I love how crazy the villains are! The first few episodes made me hungry for more.

Angels of Death

K: I don’t know which epithets would be enough to describe. I love Angels of Death! It’s extremely interesting, aesthetical, the characters are amazing, would recommend to anyone!

Neko: I love it! Characters are unique and interesting, especially that one of the main characters wants to die and other likes to kill! One of my favorites this season ^^

Kitsune: A unique story leaving everyone on the edge at the end of each episode. Great art-style and lovable characters, all from “good” to “bad”.

Angolmois

K: Much better than I expected, I’m really glad I stuck after the first episode, I ended up really liking the characters and the story ^^ I don’t usually watch history anime, but this one was really good! And the music is amazing.

Neko: I didn’t expect a lot after the first episode and usually I’m not into war anime, but for some reason I really liked this one ^^

Kitsune: I still need to watch this further because the girls seem amazed by it :)

Asobi Asobase

Neko: It is a good comedy, sometimes really funny, but I wouldn’t watch it if it wasn’t an episode per week

Back Street Girls

K: I had no idea what to expect from the description, but I’m so glad I tried it. It’s hilarious, has great humor and a really untypical story. A yakuza in a idol girl body - what more can you ask for?

Neko: it was funny and different ^^

Kitsune: At the first sight of the trailer, I was equally confused as interested xD Although it seems like an anime that only guys would like, the misfortune of the yakuza’s can make anyone laugh!

Banana Fish

K: A roller-coaster for emotions. Definitely in the favorites! I love the characters, the plot, animation, music. It’s intense, it makes me both cry and look forward to each episode at the same time. And I just love them so so much!

Neko: It’s hard not to like this one ^^ One of my favorites, I just love it! I definitely recommend this one!

Kitsune: Love, love and only love for this one!

Beryl and Sapphire

K: I love them! Their interactions, the stories, so cute. It also ranges from cute and funny to I’ll break your heat and you’ll cry moments. Can be a bit confusing at first, but it’s great!

Neko: I love this anime! It is so heartwarming and heartbreaking and it’s just beautiful :’) Words can’t describe how much I love this anime!

Kitsune: If you ever wondered how it would look like if someone made an animation of you favorite ship fanfics in different AU’s, this is how it would be :D

Cells at Work

K: Adorable, funny, educational, I love this! It’s amazing how they personified cells, germs, viruses and all the functions in the body. One of the best this season!

Neko: I never thought I will like educational anime this much and I really never thought I will ship cells XD It is really good anime :D

Kitsune: So good that even my dad peeked over my shoulder sometimes to read the descriptions what each cell does xD

Chio’s School Road

K: Sometimes can be hilarious, but sometimes the jokes get too forced, so if it wasn’t summer and I didn’t have a lot of time, I would have probably dropped this one. But it’s cute and funny, has a lot of cats ^^

Neko: I think this anime would be better if it were shorter because there were funny moments and meh moments, but I guess it is sometimes funny and nice to watch

Kitsune: I kinda needed a few episodes to get used to it but after getting to know the characters better, it became a funny anime to watch :)

Eudemon Quest

K: Only chinese animation I know that doesn’t have an amazing opening song haha It’s funny, isn’t long and even though it’s a bit typical, I like it ^^

Neko: I haven’t watched a lot of episodes so I’m not sure, but for now I like it even though I know a lot of better chinese anime

Grand Blue

K: I think the picture is self-explanatory enough lol It has a lot of comedy, drinking, stupid guys doing stupid stuff and, extremely rarely, it actually has something to do with diving (but like very rare, I got shocked each time they did anything diving related xD)

Neko: It is not really my type of anime so i can’t really say I like it

Kitsune: lol

Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation

K: Yes, I love them. Yes, I’m addicted. The characters are tragic, complex and loveable, the story is amazing, I’m in love with the music. I both laughed (fangirled) and cried, it has everything. And the novel is also amazing! (even though I still haven’t read all the translated chapters like neko did, but I will!)

Neko: *cries* It’s beautiful *sobs* I would give my soul for my babies in this anime, my soul! *crying intensifies* Only love for this anime!

Kitsune: What can I say anymore that the girls didn’t mention xD JUST AWESOME! I have to read the translated parts of the novel too!

Happy Sugar Life

K: Not for everyone, that’s for sure, but it’s amazing! It does deal with sensitive topics like stalking, rape, murder, kidnapping, but the story is great, every character is, well, not normal and a bit crazy. I really recommend it!

Neko: I am amazed by how many mental cases one can fit in one anime xD It is crazy and a bit dark, but that is what makes it interesting.

Kitsune: Each time a new character appeared, I was amazed with how many different disorders they can come up with xD

High Score Girl

K: The animation is different yeah, but it’s a cute anime. More slice of life, not much going on and you can see whether you’ll like it from the first episode of two since all the episodes are basically about the same things. Not amazing, but not bad either.

Neko: Yeah it is cute, it is slice of life about gaming in the past. I probably wouldn’t watch it if it weren’t for the one episode per week, but I still think it is cute.

Holmes at Kyoto

K: The main girl is annoying af, but Kiyotaka makes watching it worth while. The plot isn’t that amazing, but overall, I liked it.

Neko: It is the usual anime of this kind I think. There are few characters I like and there were different cases in almost every ep so it was interesting to watch.

Kitsune: I was not that much impressed with this one but it is worth a try if you need something at the end of the day to relax your brain :)

How Not to Summon a Demon Lord

K: Meh. Basically, a neet wakes up as his game character and saves the world by sleeping with and satisfying his girl companions lol Not really my type of anime, but it’s okay.

Neko: I like the main character, but everything else is not really for me. I don’t usually watch this kind of anime and I don’t know if this is good for its type. I guess the main character was a bit relatable and funny

Kitsune: It doesn’t have much of a plot other than fight -> save the girl -> boobs xD I kinda like the main guy bc of his “demon personality” but if I had to recommend something like this, it would be better to try something more like The Testament of Sister because the plot is more complex.

Island

K: The idea is great and it has a lot of potential, but the anime itself I felt like was poorly done. It really interested me, it gets you thinking about what is real and what is just the characters interpretation of things, it has a lot of turns in the story, but the ending, instead of being an incredible realization, seemed like a convenient solution just so they can finish the story.

Neko: I have no idea what happened at the end. I mean I do, but it could have been better. It started great and it was interesting until the end. It was kind of frustrating.

Kitsune: Interesting plot in the beginning but I found myself avoiding this anime after some time because I lost interest.

Kaifeng Strange Tales

K: Funny as hell, never leaves me bored ^^ I really love the characters!

Neko: I like it! It is short and funny and characters are great!

Kitsune: Just try watching it, you won’t be sorry xD

Lord of Vermilion

K: Why did I watch this again? I don’t regret it, since I had a laugh watching it, but not really something I’d recommend. Has a lot of fighting scenes, annoying main characters and villains who like rambling on and on.

Neko: I have no idea why I watched all of this. It didn’t really leave a good impression on me, but I guess that there were moments when I laughed at this anime (it has stupid moments sometimes).

Muhyo and Roji’s Bureau of Supernatural Investigation

K: Magical law, ghosts and monsters, humor - I really like it ~ The characters are great, there are a lot of funny and cute moments, battles against evil and a really relatable villain.

Neko: I didn’t expect a lot from it, but somehow I ended up liking this anime.

My Holy Weapon

K: I like this one ^^ It has extremely good looking characters, good battle scenes and some humor. Can get a bit typical, but it’s the good kind of typical, so I don’t mind.

Neko: I like it, but I’m feeling like something is missing? Idk I’m weird XD I still think it’s good ^^

Phantom in the Twilight

K: This one is really sweet! The romance is soft, the main girls are not completely annoying and the supernatural beings are typical to the point that they are extremely loveable. Alongside romance, it actually has a solid story and fighting scenes ^^

Neko: I honestly laughed a lot on this anime even though it is not comedy. I like characters and plot wasn’t boring.

Kitsune: I kinda had a bad feeling about this in the beginning because it had a generic anime plot BUT after a few episodes, I really fell in love with the characters and their relationships! :D

Seven Senses of Reunion

K: Not really the most amazing game world anime, but it wasn’t bad. The arguments between characters get a bit pointless and there is a love pentagon, but I’m actually interested in the direction the plot will go.

Neko: I am interested in the idea of this anime, it seems good, but there is like one character that didn’t annoy me so it was hard watching it, for me all those relationships are pointlessly boring.

Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight

K: Considering how confused I was after the first episode or two, I really love it! The plot is interesting and different and there is a talking giraffe with an amazing voice xD

Neko: I had no idea what was happening in the first ep, but it was so weird that I got interested and I kind of wanted to find out more about the giraffe XD In the end, the more episodes I watched, the more I liked it.

Tenrou: Sirius the Jaeger

K: Damn, this is so good! I love the story, the characters and action scenes! Definitely worth the watch ^^

Neko: I love it ^^

Kitsune: The hype for this was not in vain! Awesome plot and animation, each of the characters is really interesting and the fighting scenes leave you speechless ;D

The Beauty Blogger

K: Makeup before guys! It’s casual, everything is fixed with makeup and the main girls love for it is greater than the one for boys and I love that ^^

Neko: I didn’t expect to like this one as much as I do. For some reason, I really love this anime. I also love how the main girl has her priorities organized :’)

The Dream Kingdom and the 100 Sleeping Princes

K: How many ikemen can you squeeze into 12 episodes? According to this anime, a lot. The story isn’t anything special, but there are a lot of diverse characters, it has a lot of funny moments and is pretty cute.

Neko: I don’t actually have an opinion for this one. I just watched hot guys, I don’t know what else to watch here.

Kitsune: Aside from buckets of good looking guys, the plot is not that deep. I liked how diverse the places were through which they travelled though.

The Thousand Noble Musketeers

K: It’s cool that the characters are actually guns, something like touken ranbu with guns and a smaller budget. It was fun to watch, they just didn’t do the best with the story and characterization (the villains were once again my favorite~)

Neko: There are a lot of different characters and for me they were more interesting than the plot, but I guess that was the point?

Kitsune: Bang bang! xD The first thing I noticed is how unnatural one can wield a gun by swinging it around their heads and firing it without touching the trigger lol But well, it is okay and you get to learn a wide range of muskets and a little bit of history too if you google each weapon that appears.

Tsukumogami Kashimasu

K: Cute, relaxing, easygoing, I like it. It doesn’t have a deep and keeps you on the edge of your seat plot, but it’s charming and the small detective story details are great ~

Neko: I agree with Kurohime, there is nothing else to say really

Whited Nightime

K: A cute romance + humor story ^^ It’s short and has adorable characters. I like it!

Neko: It is cute and characters are delightful I’m interesting in the plot too

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rorykillmore · 5 years

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i feel like i send u this every time i cant decide on new characters lol but do u want any canon mates for your charas rn, which ones?

uhhh let’s see... i ALWAYS want canonmates. though first of all a disclaimer: i might do a bit of character cleanout after the revamp and on the chance that you’re considering any of these i don’t want you to like, commit only for me to drop them, so let me know if you are thinking of picking anyone up.....

lucille... idk. it’d be complicated if she got canonmates because she’s already had significant interactions and developments with previous iterations of edith and thomas. so idk. it could be interesting??? but it really depends on the angle

siobhan, i’m gonna be real, i have ALWAYS wanted a livewire for siobhan. livewire would make, like, the perfect addition to the denny guardians. and she 500% deserves better than what she got in canon, so everybody wins!

otherwise maybe a winn?? i think i’ve talked about this before but i have a soft spot for winn and siobhan’s dynamic, and i think it’d be interesting for them to interact now that she’s developed a lot...

(also a cat grant even though her and siobhan hate each other because i’m just like, CONSTANTLY in a state of “denny needs a cat grant”,)

for sara... hm probably one of the legends (idk if i can narrow down favorites, kendra, snart, zari, jax maybe...) or most definitely an e-1 laurel! which would, y’know, cause a lot of catastrophic conflict, but also sara and e-1 laurel deserve their reunion, so,

bramblestar... you know i’d really love to see one of the journey cats on denny?? we had a few of them at various times -- squirrelflight, feathertail, giz tried out crowpaw briefly. but man i would LOVE to have bramblestar interact with tawnypelt, or really... any of his half-siblings, because he and hawkfrost obviously have a lot of conflict, and he and mothwing. never get to fucking interact and there’s so much potential there. anyway if bramblestar had any kind of sibling on denny it would definitely be super interesting, given tigerstar’s presence and the conflict tigerclan presents in general.

or you know who i’ve always thought would be a really interesting warrior cat to see on denny? goldenflower. because i have a lot of questions about her relationship with tigerstar that the books never answered. and also, give bramblestar his mom back,

for dolores.... i think it’d be really interesting to have a teddy!!! they have so much unresolved shit they need to deal with, and it’d be... sad and complicated with dolores dating laurel now. otherwise, virtually any of the characters you apped/tried out were fucking great, or i would love to have a bernard sometime especially with their mounting conflict.

or i’ve always thought dolores would have really interesting conversations with emily....

for sophie-anne.... idk [immediately forgets all the true blood characters]

no but i would definitely love to have a hadley!! that’d be one of those like. “basically expanding a lot of headcanons for a ship we really didn’t get to see much of in canon” things but. what we saw of them was great, and i like my “hadley would ask to be turned” headcanon. or maybe someone like pam or tara??

camille.... well you’ve mentioned wanting to try out jackie and obviously i would LOVE that. camille and jackie’s relationship is really. poignant to me but i also think they have a lot of unresolved, sad stuff going on. i think camille... forgives jackie or is trying to because she’s also trying to forgive herself for what happened with marian, and she loves jackie so much and jackie was sometimes the only thing that made her childhood bearable, but yeah. also there’d be a lot of potential for funny stuff obviously but there’s something legitimately impressive about jackie’s ability to get dirt on EVERYONE so i have to wonder like, what else she’d get into,

and then.... jay tried her out for a bit (and was wonderful with her) but i would fuckin kill to have an amma long term. i think amma is a wonderfully. painfully complex character who you could do a lot with in rp and admittedly i also just, want to give her and camille some kind of closure arc because they REALLY deserve it,

i don’t know if anyone would ever try her out because she’s only in one episode but maybe alice too?? although i might cry too hard for that,

sly’s answer is surprisingly like, “too many to count”, because i realized how many sly cooper characters i would LOVE to see on denny. obviously there’s carmelita but i think fate is still planning on apping her eventually?? so besides her... definitely bentley or murray! how could i not want sly to have his best friends... and i also think someone like neyla has a hell of a lot of potential (good balance of ‘scary villain who would do shit’ and ‘potential to flesh out some legitimate complexity’) and that clockwerk if played right would be a TERRIFYING threat and.... someone like dimitri could make a fun comic relief character, or i have such a soft spot for the panda king

or really, honestly, ANY of the cooper ancestors, and so many of those are fan favorites so i’m always holding out hope that someone will pick one of those up! consider: rioichi and nyssa would get along INCREDIBLY well,

for nightcloud.... hmmm honestly i wouldn’t mind having a crowfeather as much as there is to complain about with that relationship because. i’m always here for rping things out in a more satisfying way than canon,

but also like... god i don’t know. feathertail or... i’m trying to think what other female characters Deserved Better because i would love to give nightcloud a ship with another she-cat that kind of. deconstructs a bit of that jealousy thing she does

for susie i would be SO fucking stoked if someone apped someone else from the suspiria movie, actually. specifically like... madame blanc or sara because obviously susie had very poignant and important relationships with both of them (and i think they’re both great characters in their own right). and like. aren’t we all here for sad gay stuff,

also this might be a weird answer but i’m like... weirdly attached to the remake’s version of olga?? she has like 10 minutes of screentime so idek why except for the fact that i was like, previously attached to olga from the original movie. probably no one would ever care enough to flesh her out and app her unless they were like BIG into suspiria like me or fate or jemi are but, y’know

cordelia.... already has/or has had some great canonmates on denny; obviously i already REALLY love your myrtle. if you’re not still planning on apping her... idk i know you also said you were interested in coco or queenie and they would both be amazing to see. basically any of the coven witches!! or uh... christ idk i don’t have the energy to sort through the other seasons of ahs characters now but, any ahs characters would be really interesting i’m sure

for alana, barring the two you’ve already tried out.... i of course think having hannibal around would be both catastrophic and extremely interesting for everyone involved. or also, possibly a weirder answer, but jack??? idk you know we need some like. Solid Law Types for the mld maybe, and i have a weird soft spot/interest in alana and jack’s relationship. or like... obviously getting an abigail would be really sad and complicated (but also, give abigail a shot at a normal life,) or i’ve always thought bedelia could be super interesting on denny...

but naturally the REAL answer here is matthew brown,

for villanelle... i mean i should preempt this by saying that i can’t think of a like, major or supporting character from killing eve who isn’t fucking delightful and i would be thrilled to see ANY of them. if you continue with irina i would rp with her more in an instant

but also..... i would lay down my life for an eve, i gotta be real..... idk what else there is to say. eve is another character who would be interesting with the mld (though. not for the same reasons as jack. the mld has had corrupt characters and it’s had lawful characters but it hasn’t really had someone who’s... slowly spiraling off the rails yet??) and of course i would throw like 15 million plots at her with villanelle (and my other characters, i guess, >__>). villanelle deserves to have the rug pulled out from under her with eve showing up, so,

okay and then laura.... idk american gods is. SUCH a universe. there are so many potential characters from that who would be fun on denny. to narrow down a couple, obviously shadow and laura have... a lot of unresolved issues to work out and i would kind of really love to play off a shadow because i have a thing for like. sad unresolved ex plots?? and they’d be great for that, nevermind the fact that shadow would have a lot of potential on denny...

ooooor mad sweeney because i have to admit i am becoming a LITTLE bit of a sucker for him and laura as a ship and how could i RESIST the opportunity for things to spiral into disaster if/when she finds out about his involvement in her death. but also like. give me them working through that and becoming better people together. or mr wednesday!! i mean any of the gods would be INCREDIBLE to see on denny but i think mr. wednesday really stands out as far as... how much overall plot potential he has because he is really such a driving force. and i both love him and love to hate him,

#thanks tony!!#are you glad i gave you like 5000 options.#fizzlep0p

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