#anyway anyway when will military era be over so we can have a good full sf9 cb | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

nasa · 3 years

Photo

NASA Spotlight: Astronaut Mike Hopkins

Michael S. Hopkins was selected by NASA as an astronaut in 2009. The Missouri native is currently the Crew-1 mission commander for NASA’s next SpaceX launch to the International Space Station on Nov. 14, 2020. Hopkin’s Crew-1 mission will mark the first-ever crew rotation flight of a U.S. commercial spacecraft with astronauts on board, and it secures the U.S.’s ability to launch humans into space from American soil once again. Previously, Hopkins was member of the Expedition 37/38 crew and has logged 166 days in space. During his stay aboard the station, he conducted two spacewalks totaling 12 hours and 58 minutes to change out a degraded pump module. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Illinois and a Master of Science in Aerospace Engineering.

He took some time from being a NASA astronaut to answer questions about his life and career! Enjoy:

What do you hope people think about when you launch?

I hope people are thinking about the fact that we’re starting a new era in human spaceflight. We’re re-opening human launch capability to U.S. soil again, but it’s not just that. We’re opening low-Earth orbit and the International Space Station with commercial companies. It’s a lot different than what we’ve done in the past. I hope people realize this isn’t just another launch – this is something a lot bigger. Hopefully it’s setting the stage, one of those first steps to getting us to the Moon and on to Mars.

You served in the U.S. Air Force as a flight test engineer. What does that entail?

First off, just like being an astronaut, it involves a lot of training when you first get started. I went to the U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School and spent a year in training and just learning how to be a flight test engineer. It was one of the most challenging years I’ve ever had, but also one of the more rewarding years. What it means afterwards is, you are basically testing new vehicles or new systems that are going on aircraft. You are testing them before they get handed over to the operational fleet and squadrons. You want to make sure that these capabilities are safe, and that they meet requirements. As a flight test engineer, I would help design the test. I would then get the opportunity to go and fly and execute the test and collect the data, then do the analysis, then write the final reports and give those conclusions on whether this particular vehicle or system was ready to go.

What is one piece of life advice you wish somebody had told you when you were younger?

A common theme for me is to just have patience. Enjoy the ride along the way. I think I tend to be pretty high intensity on things and looking back, I think things happen when they’re supposed to happen, and sometimes that doesn’t necessarily agree with when you think it should happen. So for me, someone saying, “Just be patient Mike, it’s all going to happen when it’s supposed to,” would be really good advice.

Is there a particular science experiment you enjoyed working on the most while aboard the space station?

There’s a lot of experiments I had the opportunity to participate in, but the ones in particular I liked were ones where I got to interact directly with the folks that designed the experiment. One thing I enjoyed was a fluid experiment called Capillary Flow Experiment, or CFE. I got to work directly with the principal investigators on the ground as I executed that experiment. What made it nice was getting to hear their excitement as you were letting them know what was happening in real time and getting to hear their voices as they got excited about the results. It’s just a lot of fun.

Space is a risky business. Why do it?

I think most of us when we think about whatever it is we do, we don’t think of it in those terms. Space is risky, yes, but there’s a lot of other risky jobs out there. Whether it’s in the military, farming, jobs that involve heavy machinery or dangerous equipment… there’s all kinds of jobs that entail risk. Why do it? You do it because it appeals to you. You do it because it’s what gets you excited. It just feels right. We all have to go through a point in our lives where we figure out what we want to do and what we want to be. Sometimes we have to make decisions based on factors that maybe wouldn’t lead you down that choice if you had everything that you wanted, but in this particular case for me, it’s exactly where I want to be. From a risk standpoint, I don’t think of it in those terms.

Can you describe your crew mate Soichi Noguchi in one sentence?

There are many facets to Soichi Noguchi. I’m thinking about the movie Shrek. He has many layers! He’s very talented. He’s very well-thought. He’s very funny. He’s very caring. He’s very sensitive to other people’s needs and desires. He’s a dedicated family man. I could go on and on and on… so maybe like an onion – full of layers!

Star Trek or Star Wars?

I love them both. But can I say Firefly? There’s a TV series out there called Firefly. It lasted one season – kind of a space cowboy-type show. They did have a movie, Serenity, that was made as well. But anyway, I love both Star Wars and Star Trek. We’ve really enjoyed The Mandalorian. I mean who doesn’t love Baby Yoda right? It’s all fun.

How many times did you apply to be an astronaut? Did you learn anything on your last attempt?

I tried four times over the course of 13 years. My first three attempts, I didn’t even have references checked or interviews or anything. Remember what we talked about earlier, about patience? For my fourth attempt, the fact is, it happened when it was supposed to happen. I didn’t realize it at the time. I would have loved to have been picked on my first attempt like anybody would think, but at the same time, because I didn’t get picked right away, my family had some amazing experiences throughout my Air Force career. That includes living in Canada, living overseas in Italy, and having an opportunity to work at the Pentagon. All of those helped shape me and grow my experience in ways that I think helped me be a better astronaut.

Can you share your favorite photo or video that you took in space?

One of my favorite pictures was a picture inside the station at night when all of the lights were out. You can see the glow of all of the little LEDs and computers and things that stay on even when you turn off the overhead lights. You see this glow on station. It’s really one of my favorite times because the picture doesn’t capture it all. I wish you could hear it as well. I like to think of the station in some sense as being alive. It’s at that time of night when everybody else is in their crew quarters in bed and the lights are out that you feel it. You feel the rhythm, you feel the heartbeat of the station, you see it in the glow of those lights – that heartbeat is what’s keeping you alive while you’re up there. That picture goes a small way of trying to capture that, but I think it’s a special time from up there.

What personal items did you decide to pack for launch and why?

My wedding bands. I’m also taking up pilot wings for my son. He wants to be a pilot so if he succeeds with that, I’ll be able to give him his pilot wings. Last time, I took one of the Purple Hearts of a very close friend. He was a Marine in World War II who earned it after his service in the Pacific.

youtube

Thank you for your time, Mike, and good luck on your historic mission! Get to know a bit more about Mike and his Crew-1 crew mates Victor Glover, Soichi Noguchi, and Shannon Walker in the video above.

Watch LIVE launch coverage beginning at 3:30 p.m. EST on Nov. 14 HERE.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

#launchamerica #nasa #spacex #crew1 #astronaut #rocket launch #space #science #STEM #Air Force #us military #hope #resilience #Spotlight

8K notes · View notes

writingwithcolor · 3 years

Note

I'm writing an AU of a movie that takes place in the 1880s USA, where a travelling white character and a Jewish character are waylaid by Native Americans, who they befriend. Probably because it was written by and about PoC (Jews) the scene actually avoids the stuff on your Native American Masterpost, but I'd still like to do better than a movie made in the 1980's, and I feel weird cutting them from the plot entirely. I have a Jewish woman reading it for that, but are there any things you (1/1)

2/2 1880s western movie ask--are there things you'd LIKE to see in a movie where a white man and a Jewish man run into Native Americans in the 1880s? I do plan to base them on a real tribe (Ute, probably) and have proper housing/clothes and so forth, but right now I'm just trying to avoid or subvert awful cowboy movie tropes. Any ideas?

White and Jewish Men, Native American interactions in 1880s

I am vaguely concerned with how you only cite one of our posts about Native Americans, that was not written by a Native person, and do not cite any of the posts relating to this time period, or any posts relating to representation in media.

Sidenote: if you want us to give accurate reflections of the media you’re discussing, please tell us the NAME. I cannot go look up this movie based off this description to give you an idea of what my issues are with this scene, and must instead trust that the representation is good based off your judgement. I cannot make my own judgement. This is a problem. Especially since your whole question boils down to “this scene is good but not great and I want it to be great. How can I do that?”

Your baseline for “good” could very well be my baseline for “terrible hack job”. I can’t give you the proper education required for you to be able to accurately evaluate the media you’re watching for racist stereotypes if you don’t tell me what you’re even working with.

When you’re writing fanfic where the media is directly relevant to the question, please tell us the name of the media. We will not judge your tastes. We need this information in order to properly help you.

Moving on.

I bring up my concern for you citing that one—exceptionally old—post because it is lacking in many of the tropes that don’t exist in the media critique field but exist in the real world. This is an issue I have run into countless times on WWC (hence further concern you did not cite any other posts) and have spoken about at length.

People look at the media critique world exclusively, assume it is a complete evaluation of how Native Americans are seen in society, and as a result end up ignoring some really toxic stereotypes and then come to the inbox with “these characters aren’t abc trope, so they’re fine, but I want to rubber stamp them anyway. Anything wrong here?”. The answer is pretty much always yes.

Issue one: “Waylaid” by Native Americans

This wording is extremely loaded for one reason: Native American people are seen as tricksters, liars, and predators. This is the #1 trope that shows up in the real world that does not show up in media critique. It’s also the trope I have talked about the most when it comes to media representation, so you not knowing the trope is a sign you haven’t read the entirety of the Native tag—which is in the FAQ as something we would really prefer you did before coming at us to answer questions. It avoids us having to re-explain ourselves.

Now, hostility is honestly to be expected for the time period the movie is set in. This is in the beginnings (or ramping up) of residential schools in America* and Canada, we have generations upon generations of stolen or killed children, reserves being allocated perhaps hundreds of miles from sacred sites, and various wars with Plains and Southwest peoples are in full force (Wounded Knee would have happened in 1890, in December, and the Dakoa’s mass execution would have been in 1862. Those are just the big-name wars. There absolutely were others).

*America covers up its residential schools abuse extremely thoroughly, so if you try to research them in the American context you will come up empty. Please research Canada’s schools and apply the same abuse to America, as Canada has had a Truth and Reconciliation Commission about residential schools and therefore is more (but not completely) transparent about the abuse that happened. Please note that America’s history with residential schools is longer than Canada’s history. There is an extremely large trigger warning for mass child death when you do this research.

But just because the hostility is expected does not mean that this hostility would be treated well in the movie. Especially when you consider the sheer amount of tension between any Native actors and white actors, for how Sacheen Littlefeather had just been nearly beaten up by white actors at the 1973 Academy Awards for mentioning Wounded Knee, and the American Indian Religious Freedom Act had only been passed two years prior in 1978.

These Native actors would not have had the ability to truly consent to how they were shown, and this power dynamic has to be in your mind when you watch this scene over. I don’t care that the writers were from a discriminated-against background. This does not always result in being respectful, and I’ve also spoken about this power imbalance at length (primarily in the cowboy tag).

Documentaries and history specials made in the 2010s (with some degree of academic muster) will still fall into wording that harkens Indigenous people to wolves and settlers as frightened prey animals getting picked off by the mean animalistic Natives. This is not neutral, or good. This is perpetuating the myth that the settlers were helpless, just doing their own thing completely unobtrusively, and then the evil territorial Native Americans didn’t want to share.

To paraphrase Batman: if I had a week I couldn’t explain all the reasons that’s wrong.

How were these characters waylaid by the Native population? Because that answer—which I cannot get because you did not name the media—will determine how good the framing is. But based on the time period this movie was made alone, I do not trust it was done respectfully.

Issue 2: “Befriending”

I mentioned this was in an intense period of residential schools and land wars all in that area. The Ute themselves had just been massacred by Mormons in the Grass Valley Massacre in 1865, with ten men and an unknown number of women and children killed thanks to a case of assumed association with a war chief (Antonga Black Hawk) currently at war with Utah. The Paiute had been massacred in 1866. Over 100 Timpanogo men had been killed, with an unknown number of women and children enslaved by Brigham Young in Salt Lake City in 1850, with many of the enslaved people dying in captivity (those numbers were not tracked, but I would assume at least two hundred were enslaved— that’s simply assuming one woman/wife and one child for every man, and the numbers could have very well been higher if any war-widows and their children were in the group, not to mention families with multiple children). This is after an unknown group of Indigenous people had been killed by Governor Brigham Young the year prior, to “permanently stop cattle theft” from settlers.

The number of Native Americans killed in Utah in the 1800s—just the number of dead counted (since women and children weren’t counted)—in massacres not tied to war (because there was at least one war) is over 130. The actual number of random murders is much higher; between the uncounted deaths and how the Governor had issued orders to “deal with” the problem of cattle theft permanently. I doubt you would have been tried or convicted if you murdered Indigenous peoples on “your” land. This is why it’s called state sanctioned genocide.

This is not counting the Black Hawk War in Utah (1865-1872), which the Ute were absolutely a part of (the wiki articles I read were contradictory if Antonga Black Hawk was Ute or Timpanogo, but the Ute were part of it). The first official massacre tied to the war—the Bear River Massacre, ordered by the US Military—places the death count of just that singular massacre at over five hundred Shoshone, including elders, women, and children. It would not be unreasonable to assume that the number of Indigenous people killed in Utah from 1850, onward, is over a thousand, perhaps two or three.

Pardon me for not reading beyond that point to list more massacres and simply ballparking a number; the source will be linked for you to get an accurate number of dead.

So how did they befriend the Native population? Let alone see them as fully human considering the racism of the time period? Natives were absolutely not seen as fully human so long as they were tied to their culture, and assimilation equalling some sliver of respect was already a stick being waved around as a threat. This lack of humanity continues to the present day.

I’m not saying friendship is impossible. I am saying the sheer levels of mistrust that would exist between random wandering groups of white/pale men and Indigenous communities wouldn’t exactly make that friendship easy. Having the scene end be a genuine friendship feels ignorant and hollow and flattening of ongoing genocide, because settlers lied about their intentions and then lined you up for slauther (that’s how the Timpanogo were killed and enslaved).

Utah had already done most of its mass killing by this point. The era of trusting them was over. There was an active open hunting season, and the acceptable targets were the Indigenous populations of Utah.

(sources for the numbers:

List of Indian Massacres in North America Black Hawk War (1865-1872))

Issue 3: “Proper housing/clothes and so forth”

Do you mean Western style settlements and jeans? If yes, congratulations you have written a reservation which means the land-ripped-away wounds are going to be fresh, painful, and sore.

You do not codify what you mean by “proper”, and proper is another one of those deeply loaded colonial words that can mean “like a white man” or “appropriate for their tribe.” For the time period, it would be the former. Without specifying which direction you’re going for, I have no idea what you’re imagining. And without the name of the media, I don’t know what the basis of this is.

The reservation history of this time period seems to maybe have some wiggle room; there were two reservations allocated for the Ute at this time, one made in 1861 and another made in 1882 (they were combined into the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation in 1886). This is all at the surface level of a google and wikipedia search, so I have no idea how many lived in the bush and how many lived on the reserve.

There were certainly land defenders trying to tell Utah the land did not belong to them, so holdouts that avoided getting rounded up were certainly possible. But these holdouts would be far, far more hostile to anyone non-Native.

The Ute seemed to be some degree of lucky in that the reserve is on some of their ancestral territory, but any loss of land that large is going to leave huge scars.

It should be noted that reserves would mean the traditional clothing and housing would likely be forbidden, because assimilation logic was in full force and absolutely vicious at this time.

It’s a large reserve, so the possibility exists they could have accidentally ended up within the borders of it. I’m not sure how hostile the state government was for rounding up all the Ute, so I don’t know if there would have been pockets of them hiding out. In present day, half of the Ute tribe lives on the reserve, but this wasn’t necessarily true historically—it could have been a much higher percentage in either direction.

It’s up to you if you want to make them be reservation-bound or not. Regardless, the above mentioned genocide would have been pretty fresh, the land theft in negotiations or already having happened, and generally, the Ute would be well on their way to every assimilation attempt made from either residential schools, missionaries, and/or the forced settlement and pre-fab homes.

To Answer Your Question

I don’t want another flattened, sanitized portrayal of genocide.

Look at the number of dead above, the amount of land lost above, the amount of executive orders above. And try to tell me that these people would be anything less than completely and totally devastated. Beyond traumatized. Beyond broken hearted. Absolutely grief stricken with almost no soul left.

Their religion would have been illegal. Their children would have been stolen. Their land was taken away. A saying about post-apocalyptic fiction is how settler-based it is, because Indigenous people have already lived through their own apocalypse.

It would have all just happened at the time period this story is set in. All of the grief you feel now at the environment changing so drastically that you aren’t sure how you’ll survive? Take that, magnify it by an exponential amount because it happened, and you have the mindset of these Native characters.

This is not a topic to tread lightly. This is not a topic to read one masterpost and treat it as a golden rule when there is too much history buried in unmarked, overfull graves of school grounds and cities and battlefields. I doubt the movie you’re using is good representation if it doesn’t even hint at the amount of trauma these Native characters would have been through in thirty years.

A single generation, and the life that they had spent millennia living was gone. Despite massive losses of life trying to fight to preserve their culture and land.

Learn some history. That’s all I can tell you. Learn it, process it, and look outside of checklists. Look outside of media.

And let us have our grief.

~ Mod Lesya

On Question Framing

Please allow me the opportunity to comment on “are there things you'd LIKE to see in a movie where a white man and a Jewish man run into Native Americans in the 1880s?” That strikes me as the same type of question as asking what color food I’d like for lunch. I don’t see how the cultural backgrounds of characters I have literally no other information about is supposed to make me want anything in particular about them. I don’t know anything about their personalities or if they have anything in common.

Compare the following questions:

“Are there things you’d like to see in a movie where two American women, one from a Nordic background and one Jewish, are interacting?” I struggle to see how our backgrounds are going to yield any further inspiration. It certainly doesn’t tell you that we’re both queer and cling to each other’s support in a scary world; it doesn’t tell you that we uplift each other through mental illness; it doesn’t go into our 30 years of endless bizarre inside jokes related to everything from mustelids to bad subtitles.

Because: “white”, “Jewish”, and “Native American” aren’t personality words. You can ask me what kind of interaction I’d like to see from a high-strung overachieving woman and a happy-go-lucky Manic Pixie Dream Girl, and I’ll tell you I’d want fluffy f/f romance. Someone else might want conflict ultimately resolving in friendship. A third person might want them slowly getting on each other’s nerves more and more until one becomes a supervillain and the other must thwart her. But the same question about a cultural demographic? That told me nothing about the people involved.

Also, the first time I meet a new person from a very different culture, it might take weeks before discussion of our specific cultural differences comes up. As a consequence, my first deep conversations with a Costa Rican American gentile friend were not about Costa Rica or my Jewishness but about things we had in common: classical music and coping with breakups--which are obviously conversations I could have had if we were both Jewish, both Costa Rican gentiles, or both something else. So in other words, I’m having trouble seeing how knowing so little about these characters is supposed to give me something to want to see on the page.

Thank you for understanding.

(And yes, I agree with Lesya, what’s with this trend of people trying to explain their fandom in a roundabout way instead of mentioning it by name? It makes it harder to give meaningful help….)

--Shira

#platypan #genocide #native american #North America #america #history #american history #media #representation #asks

290 notes · View notes

lesbian-deadpool · 3 years

Text

Saving Rosie

Part One of Two: “I’m Not A Spy.”

Rosie Betzer x Reader

Words: 5,768

Warnings: WWII (and everything that comes with that era), Nazis, spy shit, arguing, alludes to execution, sadness... I think that may be it.

Request: No.

Summary: You save the woman you have grown close to over the past few years you have been undercover as a Nazi general, and now you’re going to save her family.

A/N: Me, still broken after watching Jojo Rabbit almost a year and a half ago?? It’s more likely than you think... so, apparently I write Rosie Beltzer fics now lol

Also, just some lil notes. The reader in this is undercover as a male Nazi general, and they’re not actually German in this fic.

EDIT: I accidentally tagged this as a Natasha fic lmao. I fixed it now tho.

Ko-Fi

Commissions

(Not My GIF)

***

"It's a lovely night for it, huh?"

For what? You weren't

certain. Maybe it was the full moon. Maybe, it was the clear sky. The deserted streets, perhaps... what loomed in the following days to come.

Or maybe, just maybe. It was the woman by your side.

The woman hummed, a small sweet smile caressing her face.

"One of the better ones we've had in years. Came her strong German accent. A stark difference to yours, considering you no longer had to mask it. Around her, anyway.

Your smile mirrored hers as it brightened.

"It sure is."

"I can't believe it's almost over. And after so long..." she said, while you grunted, sitting down beside her on the small roof over the open attic window. "This unjust war is finally coming to an end."

"Okay, you're starting to sound like my commander now."

Rosie chuckled at your words, moving to softly lean into your side, keeping her head up to continue looking at the bright white stars that littered the midnight blue sky.

"Why do you always insist on meeting up here?" you grumbled, no malice in your voice, "It's a pain in the ass to get up onto the roof, from the outside, y'know?"

"You're a spy, aren't you? Aren't you supposed to be good at this stuff?"

"Oh cheeky," you laughed, lightly slapping the side of her leg, with the back of your hand. Rosie's quiet giggles following your remark, "And I'm an undercover soldier. Those are two very different things."

"Still." She shrugged.

You sat in silence for a small while. Over the few years, you and Rosie had grown close. Meeting up on her rooftop, at the dead of night, where there was no chance of anyone seeing you together, this way, becoming an almost every day occurrence.

You knew you could trust her the moment you first met, almost three years ago. After you had stolen the identity of a Nazi officer, that looked starkly like you. Luckily, there was hardly any information about this person. So, there was less chance for your cover to be blown.

Soon, the resistance that Rosie had been deeply a part of was un-earthed to you, thanks to your informant and the letter she carried. It wasn't long after that you started working with them too. Helping them better than they could ever hope, thanks to the military resources and information you brought.

"What happened to your neck?" Rosie asked, pulling you out from where you were, deep in your memories.

A hand came up to rub at your slightly sore skin.

"My informant can be cruel..."

Rosie cocked a blonde eyebrow at you, wanting an explanation from you.

You sighed, getting ready to tell her.

***

Eyes burned into the woman from all sides as her heels kicked against the polished wooden, yet stained, floor. Her light brown hair shone under the glowing lights, confidence radiating from her just the same.

"Can I help you?" a German Soldier slid in front of her, she had to stop herself from sneering at the man. For both his being a Nazi and his sweaty stench. But instead, she managed a sultry smirk.

"I'm here to see your General," she replied, in a German accent.

"Don't bother," another Soldier, this one drunk and slightly swaying, called over, from where he was pressed into the wall a few feet behind her.

"I don't think your General would take too kindly to you stealing what they paid for."

"They're gonna have fun with you," he replied, blatantly looking her up and down. Like a wolf would, to a tiny bunny, ready to devour it whole. However, the wolf was not a wolf at all, the wolf was, in fact, the bunny, and the bunny was the actual wolf.

She would tear him to shreds, given the chance.

"The General is in the usual room," the original man said, "Fair warning, though. They're not in a good mood today."

The woman began strutting down the hallway, once again. Throwing, "Aren't they always?" over her shoulder once she passed him by.

When she opened the thick wooden door you resided behind, the sounds of your continued groan began pouring through the crack.

"Sometimes I cannot believe that you got this assignment," she uttered in her original London accent, with her back pressed against the now-closed door.

You finished your groan off and took a deep breath before you uttered your reply.

"Luck-of-the-draw, I guess," you spoke from the floor where you lay on your back, with a shrug, "That, or I look strikingly alike the guy who died. The Nazi prick."

She walked over to you, one foot rising to press her heel into your neck, your thyroid resting in the open space of the shoe.

A choking noise sprang from your mouth as you flailed your limbs around gently. You knew that if she were to press any harder, she would surely manage to choke you.

"You're not suited for this job."

The brunette pressed harder against your throat before she released you. Leaving you to turn on your side, coughing and spluttering.

"Well, no shit. I'm a soldier, not a spy."

"You can tell."

"What was that all about?" You motioned to your neck. Red marks already making their way upon the tender flesh.

"We need to make it seem like we are having sex. Remember? I am supposed to be your hooker after all."

"You're a bitch, is what you are."

She scowled at you as you rolled yourself onto your stomach, sighing when you finally got to your feet.

"Where's the update?"

You hummed, almost as if you were remembering what you were here to do. Removing the crystal tumbler from your lips the whisky sloshing around inside. Reaching behind you, you pulled the file from where it was tucked into your pants and under your shirt. Handing it over to her.

"Is this it?" She asked, weighing the file in her hand, "It's very light."

"Yeah, and so's the information swimming around. Unless you wanna hear about the fish Agatha caught last weekend," you snarked back, moving to point at the file with the same hand that held your glass, "There's some good stuff in there. It's not much. But it's good."

"I'll take your word for it."

She tucked the folder into the long overcoat she wore, then you saw her eyebrows furrow.

"Aren't you supposed to take care of that?" She nodded towards the uniform jacket you had thrown across the room not long after you had entered it.

"You sneered at the fore-talked about item.

"I hate it and everything it stands for." You turned back to face her. "As soon as all of this bullshit is over, I'm burning that fucking armband. And then the rest of the fucking uniform."

"Real calm there, aren't you?"

"Don't start shit with me, Hannah." You took a large swig of your drink, almost emptying the glass. "I know that you wish you had somehow gotten this mission. But trust me, you don't fucking want it. The shit I've seen and done. The stuff that I've had to authorise, just to keep my cover. The fucking horror storied these monsters have told proudly, or as if they're fucking jokes." You were panting now. "You don't want that."

You had her startled into silence. Hannah had never expected this to come from you.

"How's the resistance?"

You grunted. Downing the rest of the brown liquor before moving to pour yourself another glass three fingers tall.

"It's going." you gave a heavy nod. "Still trying to spread the word."

Hannah hummed, slowly making her way towards you. Fingers coming up to razzle her hair, and wipe her lipstick, so it smudged onto her cheek.

"How's the blonde?"

"What-?" you were cut off when she wiped the red lipstick on her fingers across your own lips, leaving a smudge like hers there. "Ugh," you groaned, moving away from her palm, only to utter small obscenities and sounds of pain when her lipstick freehand messed up your short, slicked-back hair.

"What blonde?" you finally managed to ask.

"The one from the resistance. What's her name?" She clicked her fingers together, in realisation, "Rosie."

"Oh! Yeah, she's fine, and so are the kids."

"You seem to be taking a shine to her, from what I hear from the resistance. You and Rosie seem to be something of a dynamic duo."

Suddenly your shirt was ripped open, from the collar to your ribs. Making your eyes widen in shock.

However, you were used to this by now, so they soon returned back to their regular size.

"Yeah, we're friends."

Hannah hummed, something akin to a knowing smirk on her face. As she untucked your shirt.

"I'd keep an eye on her, though."

She opened your pants.

"She's being watched."

Breathless at what she just said, you stood stock still, watching as she walked towards the wooden door.

"Oh." Hannah stopped, her hand upon the handle, pulling some pieces of paper from her pocket and threw them to the floor, "I'll leave you to deliver the bad news."

And with that, she left.

***

You forewent telling Rosie everything from the mention of her.

Thinking it the best if she heard it differently.

"That really sounds like a spy meeting to me," Rosie said with a smirk, knowing it would annoy you to no end.

You closed your eyes before you could roll them into the back of your head. Taking a deep breath, you exhaled, "I'm not a spy."

"So, you've said," she giggled.

"You're drunk," you mumbled to yourself.

"What was that?"

"How are the kids?" you asked, clearly watching as Rosie groaned lightly. Her head down-turned, almost sad looking.

"Jojo's still obsessed with Hitler and everything. And Elsa's doing her best. But I can tell how much this is affecting her. And in what world wouldn't it?"

"She's strong." You nodded. "She'll get through it. We all will."

"And what about Jojo?"

Rosie turned to face you, hair swaying as she did. You could see the glazed look in her eye's, telling yourself to be extra vigilant with the woman upon the roof. You had to make sure she didn't fall off in her drunken state.

"Is he going to be like this for the rest of his life?"

Tears were building in her eyes now.

"Supporting evil dictators, wanting to take over the world, and fill it with hate?"

"No. No, of course not," you whispered. Reaching over, you clasped her cheeks between your rough, war-hardened hands. Wiping away her silent tears. "He's just a boy. A boy who wants to be a part of something, even if he doesn't understand what that is. What monster's he's following. He will realise one day. Trust me."

"I trust you." She nodded. "It just. It's hard. It's so hard. Especially when he plays up, like he did at dinner today."

"He did?"

She hummed with a nod.

"We're low on food right now. I had to go without to feed Elsa. But Jojo, he didn't know, obviously, so he took that too. Then he started arguing about his father-"

You inhaled sharply, shoulders tensing. But luckily for you, she didn't notice your reaction.

"-I yelled at him... we made up not long after, but I still feel awful about it. I'm a terrible mother."

"No, you're not-"

"I am-"

"No. You're not," you said firmly. Grabbing her forearm, gently moving it side to side, to get your point further across, "You're such a caring and amazing person. Your heart is so big and kind. And you're an even better mother. It's like all of that is doubled for those kids."

"Thank you," Rosie whispered, tears in her eyes once again, before she moved to wipe them away.

"Anyway, you're way better than my mother. She abandoned me at a farm. I was lucky a cow didn't shit on me."

She giggled at your little joke.

"I'm so sorry that happened to you."

"There's no need. I wouldn't change it."

Things were quiet for a few minutes when you suddenly remembered.

"Oh!" You reached into your pocket and pulled out three packages, wrapped in brown paper and tied together with string. "I guess it was just lucky that I brought these then."

"What are they?"

"Beef sandwiches, I thought you would like them."

"Oh, you're a lifesaver," she spoke in something close to a moan as she took a bite out of her sandwich.

You gave a small chuckle at the woman seated beside you, "I'd thought you'd say that. I'll have to start bringing food over to these meetings of ours because it's not like I can do it out in the open."

"People would think something was going on between us," Rosie hummed.

"You're right about that. Everyone is so bored around here. Gossip is like their life sauce."

"Would you be surprised if I told you that it was the same before the war?"

"Not at all," you laughed.

Rosie finished her sandwich, and you dreaded what was coming next.

"I need to tell you something," you almost whispered.

She bumped her shoulder against yours when you didn't continue.

"Well? What is it?"

"It... it's about your husband..."

You watched her carefully as you said that, all the while emotions, flew into her while she processed them.

She held back more tears, ones from the look on her face that she had shed more times than she could count. Face contoured into one of concealed pain. Looking away from your gentle, caring eyes while rubbing her hands together.

"He's dead, isn't he?"

"I'm afraid so." You nodded, looking out before you, into the starry night sky.

That's when you felt a tiny jolt beside you. Looking over at the blonde, you watched as a tear trickled down her cheek.

"I'm so sorry," you whispered.

With a gasp and a wet sniff, Rosie wiped her tears away.

"What happened?"

"There was a raid, some members of a resistance was there, your husband included. None of them made it... they saved the people they intended to, however."

She nodded with a sad yet proud smile.

"How long ago was this?"

You swallowed. Hating the words you were about to say.

"A little over a year ago."

You winced when you heard her sobs, ones being held in so hard just so no one could overhear her cries.

And, sickeningly so, the worst thing of all was that you didn't know how to help her.

Placing a hand upon her back, rubbing small comforting circles into her shoulder. Feeling her lean into you, face now pushed into your neck.

"I'm here. Everything's going to be alright."

You left not too long later, after already spending way too much time up on that roof.

Rosie wished you a "goodbye" with the promise that she would be fine. However, she didn't reply to you when you told her not to finish the rest of the wine. That she had been pounding for the majority of the day.

Before you arrived "home" and promptly collapsed onto the bed.

***

The afternoon sun was warm upon your face as you walked the streets of the German town. Watching as children ran around, women worked, and well, gossiped, and Nazi soldiers came and went.

Soon. You thought. This will all be over soon.

That's when you heard the murmured words from the women you had just walked past.

"Yes, the Gestapo. They're here right now."

"Who for?" the other woman asked, voice slightly higher at the aspect of such "juicy" gossip.

Sometimes it surprised you just how detached some of these people were from human lives. But then you took a step back and saw everything that was happening in the world. And you weren't surprised anymore. Just disappointed.

"The traitors wife. Beltzer."

And now you were scared.

"-They should be taking her to the square, right now."

It was like the world had slowed down as you turned to look at them, meeting their curious eyes.

The last thing you heard before taking off at a run towards the town square was a fading, "Like husband, like wife. I guess."

The people you passed by looked at you like you were insane. To see a, what they thought, General, sprinting down streets and panting like crazy, it set them on edge.

But you didn't give a damn about what anybody thought.

You just had to get to the square.

And quick.

***

By the time you got there, you had a light shine over your skin. Thanks to the sweat from both the running you had done and the worry that coursed through you.

"Remove your hands from her," came your faux German accent.

"She is a traitor to the Reich," one of the Gestapo's, seemingly the leader, replied assuredly.

"And what proof do you have of this?"

Rosie was terrified. You could see that as clear as day, no matter how she tried to keep calm. It was written all over her face.

So, you forcefully pushed their hands from the heavily breathing woman and pulling her to stand by your side and away from the group of men dressed in black suits.

"I'll have you know, we have very probable tips from some of the community-"

""Probable"?!" you shouted, causing the on edge woman beside you to jump slightly. To which you pulled her closer to you as a form of comfort. Your hand, coming to rest on her shoulder.

"Yes. Probable. We cannot have risks."

"Well, I say that it is bullshit."

"You have no jurisdiction or authority over our department."

"And I never said I did. I am saying that I vouch for this woman."

"But the tip-off's-" another man began.

"You choose to believe lonely and bored housewives over a General?!" You watched as their faces fell, and they tried to grab onto any straw they could to change your mind.

"There is still a chance-"

"There is no chance!"

"And can you be so sure?!"

"Do you really believe that I, a General, would be with her if you were right?"

"With her?" a third Gestapo asked curiously.

You knew what you had to do to get her back home, safe and away from the men trying to execute and make a spectacle of her. Just like the poor people hanging to your right.

"It means that I have been seeing her. Romantically, if you still do not fully understand, what I mean."

They didn't say anything for a few short moments, only stumbling and stuttering over their own voices.

"So, tell me. Who are you choosing to believe?"

"Uh. Y-You General."

"Good." You nodded once. "Now, I'm going to take her home. Goodbye, gentlemen," you spat. Turning on your heel, with Rosie under your arm, and walking away.

"Are you okay?" you whispered. Not drawing any attention to yourself or Rosie.

"I'm fine. Thank you for saving me," she replied in the same way.

"I wouldn't have done anything else." Your hand slipped down to the blondes dip in her lower back, helping to guide her back home. "Where are the flyers? Did you have any on you?"

"Yes. I threw them down the drain before they could see."

"Good. You did good." A squeeze to her hip before your hand returned to her lower back, just to keep up the appearance of the lie. "They're not gonna find them."

***

Rosie had relaxed more by the time you were at the bottom of her street when you saw a distinctly expensive car parked outside of Rosie's house. A car that everyone knows belongs to that of Gestapo's.

"Is Jojo home?" you asked, just stood there starring at the sight, with Rosie by your side.

"Yes," she husked.

"Shit."

And that's when you both broke out in a run.

You, being faster than Rosie, arrived at the building first. Barging through the door, with her hot on your heels.

Pounding your way up the stairs, only to come face to face with a gang of men, identically dressed to the Gestapo's, you had just saved Rosie from. Along with Jojo and Elsa, in clothes that didn't look like they belonged to her. Not to mention the demoted soldier, holding an identification book.

"What is the meaning of this?!"

"What are you doing in my house?!" you and Rosie said at the same time. Your yell angrier, compared to her more so worried one.

"We are searching the premises," the lead man, who wore round glasses, spoke. Face confused as to why Rosie was still alive. But as soon as he saw the anger chiselled upon your face. He could take a successful guess as to who had stopped the execution.

"Mama, they were just checking Inge's identification," Jojo said as his mother rushed towards him. Her hands, on his cheeks, as she checked him over.

"Oh, yes. Of course." Rosie pulled Jojo along to bring Elsa into her side, just as you had done for her mere minutes ago. "Are you both alright?"

She gained words and nods of confirmation from the two children.

"I think it's time that you all left."

"But-" one Gestapo said, looking to Rosie.

"But nothing," you continued, "I'm sure your associates will fill you in on their mistake. Now, if you are finished, I ask that you leave this house."

"We were just about to, anyway," the leader said, leading the way out for everyone. But not before the ID was handed back to the assumed Inge. With you trailing after, to slam the door behind them.

You turned, leaning your back against the wooden door, sighing deeply.

"Are they gone?" Rosie called down, leaning over the railing, to peer down at you.

The stairs creaked below you, the layer of carpet doing nothing to quiet them. You spoke your confirmation, as you reached her, "They're gone."

The kids looked like they had just been caught with their hand's in the cookie jar.

"So..." the caring woman started, "You two know about each other."

They nodded.

"For how long?"

"A couple of weeks, at most," Jojo said.

"How did you even find out about her?"

"I-I found the hatch-"

"He crawled in-"

"And I found her-"

"He was terrified."

"Was not!"

"Was too."

"Was not!"

"Was too!"

"Okay, enough," Rosie raised her voice, gaining the bickering children's attention.

Taking a breath, she ran her hands through her soft blonde hair.

"And you never told anyone?"

"No." Jojo shook his head. "I didn't want you to get into trouble..." It was at that point, he realised you were silently stood behind his mother, watching as everything unfolded and who you were.

Rosie caught this and looked over her shoulder at you.

"Don't worry," she told both of the kids, crouching down before them. Elsa's face one of mild terror.

This is when it hit you that these kids were exactly that.

Kids.

Kid's that were too scared of their mothers, or motherly figure, scolding them, than the actual, apparent danger that lurked not too far away.

"They're not going to tell anybody. They know. And won't let anything happen. To any of us." she manoeuvred to face you. "Right?"

You nodded. "Absolutely. I will do my best to protect all of you."

"Speaking of." She slowly rose to her feet, walking towards you.

The hand that Rosie placed upon your arm was gentle, almost like she was worried she would hurt you. Fingers curling into the jacket of the uniform you loathed.

"I have to speak with the General. So, you two stay up here. Understood?"

They nodded.

"Good." She pulled you through the open door, but before she could close it fully, her head popped through the door, "Oh. And we're not done yet. We still have a lot to talk about."

Then the door clicked shut.

"You're really good at that."

"What?"

"Being a mother."

"I know. You've told me before."

***

Things had changed rather quickly when you arrived downstairs.

Sat upon the blue cotton cushions of the wooden framed couch. Watching as Rosie paced around in front of you, fingertips rubbing against her full lips, worry etched across her face.

Your eyebrows shot up, and your body straightened when she turned to face you. Arms now down by her sides.

"So, we're together, huh?"

"I'm sorry," you replied, German accent dropped, "But that was the only thing that would get them to back off and drop the suspicions against you."

"I know." She nodded, completely understanding. Before her minimal composure dropped, and the worry came back. "What do we do? Jojo obviously thinks you are a traitor now. What if he tells someone?"

"He won't." You stood abruptly, taking Rosie's shoulder's into your hands, squeezing them gently. "He didn't tell anyone about Elsa when he had so many chances to do so. Hell, he had the chance, not even five minutes ago. But he hasn't said a word, purely just to keep you safe... he doesn't understand that this could hurt him and Elsa too. He doesn't know what's happening."

"But this is different-"

"Yes, it is different. It's better he thinks I'm a traitor, helping his family, than him knowing I'm an undercover soldier."

"You mean a spy?"

"Don't you start with that shit." You pointed at her playfully.

Rosie's smile dropped when a thought popped into her mind.

"Do you think they will still come back?"

"It is possible," you said honestly, "Which is why we should leave as soon as we possibly can."

"And go where?"

"Anywhere that isn't here."

"What do I tell the kids- What do I tell Jojo?" she clarified.

"The truth. You tell them that they could come back and that we all need to leave because we could all be in danger."

With her head in her hand's, the blonde scoffed tearily, "God. This fucking war."

"I know. I know."

You pulled her into your chest, letting her cry into you. Arms wound around your torso tightly.

"I hate it, For so many reasons."

"I know," you repeated again, "I feel the same."

"When will it just end? When will people be safe again?"

Deciding that it would be best to tell her the truth, you said, "I don't know. Soon I hope."

And there you sat, for a small while longer, allowing the blonde to cry into your chest.

***

You had left.

Gone to go gather some of your things, thinking it best to stay with Rosie and the kids while you were forced to stay in town.

All the while Rosie, spoke to the kids about leaving.

"I don't understand why we have to go!"

Was what you were greeted with as you entered the home.

"Because it is not safe for us here anymore," Rosie's voice came, calm but firm.

"But they won't come back."

"That's not entirely true," you spoke, entering the kitchen. Placing the leather bag you carried and the wicker basket upon the small table against the wall, you continued, "There's always a chance, no matter how small."

The young boy watched you silently for a minute. Not knowing what to say.

"Trust me, Jojo. I know how all of this works. I just want to keep you all safe, so does your mother. And this is the best way to do it.2

Jojo sighed.

"Where will we go?"

Rosie looked at you intently when her son asked this, wondering the same thing.

"We'll get out of town first. Then we'll focus on a safe place for us all to go."

"Jojo, would you. Would you go to your room, please?" Rosie asked, "I need to speak with the General, alone."

Just as the blonde boy was about to protest, he was cut off.

"Now. I also have to start preparing dinner."

He huffed and walked from the room, bounding up the stairs rather loudly.

You felt bad for the woman as you watched her grip the sides of the oven, bow her head, and give a great sigh.

"Where's Elsa?"

"She's in her hiding spot." Then she turned to face you. "Y/N, K know that Elsa isn't Inge."

"What?"

"She got Inge's birthday wrong, and he didn't say anything."

Your eye's wandered as you took in the information that was just given to you.

"Do you think he will say anything?"

"I don't know," you said with a shrug, "But I don't wanna take any chances. It's too risky."

"I agree." Rosie nodded once. "So, when do we leave."

"As soon as possible. Tonight if we can. Only pack the essentials. And not yet, we can't raise any suspicions."

Rosie's only reply and indication that she had heard you were a good few nods.

And then.

"What's in the basket?"

"Oh," you said chipperly, "Don't worry about cooking. I brought dinner."

***

Turns out "tonight" wasn't a viable option for skipping town, as with loud, almost deafening sirens of dread filled the sky came the air-raid strike.

"Wouldn't it give us a good cover, though?" Rosie had asked, preparing for bed.

You had resigned yourself to staying over, as a sort of bodyguard, while still in town. And the threat was still very much weighing in the winds.

You looked over your shoulder at her. Being spotted by her through the mirror of her vanity, where she sat. Removing her makeup and then applying some face cream.

"I'm not the only one by a window," you told her. Then moved to peer through the window, at the moving lights in the black, midnight sky. "I'm sure I heard Elsa and Jojo in the attic watching them."

"They are," she confirmed.

"See. We're not the only ones. Too many eyes. A good distraction," you admitted, "But almost impossible. And with two kids added to that? No chance."

A hum came from Rosie.

"So, what are our options?"

With a sigh, you began explaining, "People will be too jumpy tomorrow, so our best bet would be the day after."

The blonde, now ready for bed, came over to you. Moving to stand right in front of you, looking out the window herself.

"Wouldn't it be too risky, staying here that long?"

It seemed it was your turn to hum, shrugging your shoulders.

"I'd rather stay here a few more days than risk it out there. But there is a good side to these change of plans."

"And what's that?"

"Now, we can sneak stuff to the car. And won't risk being caught doing it all at night. That way, all we have to do is get in, then drive off."

"Good plan. Partner," Rosie spoke in a slight mocking about sultry tone. Which only made you roll your eyes good-naturedly.

"Yeah. Yeah. You're welcome."

"Seriously," you halted at Rosie's serious tone, raising your head to peer at her, "Thank you for everything."

"You don't have to thank me." Your lips ticked up in a small smile before you lightened the sober mood and atmosphere. "And you definitely won't be thanking me if I accidentally kick you in my sleep."

Rosie laughed at your words, watching as you said into bed beside her.

"Do not worry. If you kick me, I'll just kick you out of the bed."

"Now that's just rude."

Waking up the next morning was strange for you, to say the least.

With the bright sun shining through the thin drapes, across the cosy room, and onto the bed. Duvet lumpy above your forms.

And then there was Rosie.

The blonde pressed up against your side, head resting on your shoulder, arms curled around one of yours, still fast asleep.

Now that.

That was very unusual for you.

But then again. You were too sleepy to process anything at that moment. So instead, you just watched her breathe soothingly, looking so peaceful by your side, with your eyebrows furrowed and eyes squinted in curiosity.

It was a wonder how someone could look so contest face asleep like Rosie was, with everything that is going on in the world.

The world wouldn't be that way for much longer, you thought, it was only a matter of time before everything was over.

And the same thing could be said for the blonde sleeping by your side.

The wooden door barged open, alerting you fully awake, as Jojo strutted in. Only to stop dead in his tracks at the sight of you. In bed. With his mother.

You could see the slight anger in his eyes, purely out of protection for his beloved mother.

"Good morning, Jojo," Rosie said sleepily as she moved to sit up, looking at the boy with a sleepy smile.

You grunted as she pressed her palm into your abdomen to raise up into a seated position.

"What are they doing here?" he asked, nodding his head towards you.

Rosie looked over her shoulder at you, tired eyes evaluating you. Before she turned back to her son.

"There's something I forgot to tell you yesterday."

You watched the mother and child with slightly wide eyes, not uttering a word, just looking like you wanted to escape this situation.

"What did you forget?"

"The General here-" she patted your abdomen where her hand still resided. "-And I, are seeing each other."

It was a few good long moments as Jojo processed the words. You thought he was going to be angry. It would be natural. You would understand. He was a young boy, one who undoubtedly missed his father and would not be happy with his mother being with anyone else.

But you also had to understand that he idolised you, if only for your -albeit fake- position in the German military.

And yet, you were still surprised and confused by what he said next.

"A lion?"

Rosie smiled brightly, nodding her head, "A lion."

"A lion?"

That was the first thing you said that morning, and it was full of confusion.

But it fell on deaf ears.

Jojo nodded once at his mother before turning on his heel and walking from the room, without saying what he initially came in for.

"What?"

Rosie smiled at you.

"Come on, we should get moving."

The bed shook and bounced as she got up from the bed, preparing to get ready for the day.

"I'm so confused," you almost whimpered, only gaining a soft giggle in return.

***

Permanent Tag List:

@imnotasuperhero, @veteranwerewolf95, @natasha-danvers, @marvelfansince08love, @higherfurther-romanova, @lesbian-x-blackwidow, @sestra-inestro, @thelastavenger-3000, @mixed-fandom-mess,

SFW Tag list:

@peggycarter-steverogers, @natalia-quinzel,

(I didn’t know if you guys wanted to be tagged in this, but...)

#original work #original fanfiction #rosie beltzer x reader #rosie betzler x reader #rosie betzler imagine #rosie betzler #jojo rabbit imagine #jojo rabbit

240 notes · View notes

x0401x · 4 years

Text

Violet Evergarden Movie Summary

The initial plan was to make this a short bullet-point thing, but I felt like there was too much to clarify and I had no choice but use novel references to explain certain parts, so I decided to just write a normal summary. Many thanks before-hand to my friend Yuuki, who gave me all this info.

Apologies for taking relatively long with this thing. Not even I expected that I would end up writing this much. Buckle up for the ride, ‘cause it won’t be fun.

Nope, not kidding. It really won’t.

First thing I need to make clear is: this movie is one and a half hour long and divided into three parts and two different timelines: the times when Violet existed and the times after she dies. Already in the beginning of the movie, Violet is dead.

Yes, you read this right. She’s dead.

Now, I don’t mean that she’s dead in the literal sense. This is 60 years in the future. She might be alive or not, but it’s never said. However, the timeline of 60 years later is considered an era without Violet, apparently because she has retired and her “legend” is over, so to say. It’s also a time where Auto-Memories Dolls don’t exist. That’s one good punch in the face. Let’s keep counting.

The movie is sort of like a tale being read by someone else, which at some point goes into Violet’s first-person POV. The whole thing is kind of a look back on Violet’s life tragectory and how it took a new turn when she decided to continue looking for Gil despite all the mess of the TV series.

The era where Violet exists is an era where telephones are being introduced to the people, so Auto-Memories Dolls are starting to become unnecessary. I would argue that the creation of the telephone isn’t enough for an entire occupation to start disappearing so quickly, since new inventions are normally extremely expensive and not everyone has access to them (or even knows about their existence) so immediately after their conception. Realistically speaking, ghostwriters would still be important as long as there were still so many people unable to buy phones. Not to mention that this is a steampunk world where compulsory education doesn’t seem to be a thing yet, so even in the off chance that everybody can buy a phone, there would still be a lot of people who can’t read or write on their own. But all of this clearly went over the animators’ heads, so not only ghostwriters but also the mail business in general are nearing their doom in the movie.

The one looking back on Violet’s life was Ann, who was telling it all to her granddaughter, Daisy (who, by the way, is voiced by Morohoshi Sumire, the same girl who voiced the seven-year-old Ann). Ann had kept all the letters that Violet ghostwrote for her mother, as well as the newspapers about the CH Postal Company. Looks like the article was printed after Violet left CH, since she isn’t in the picture with everyone else.

In this era, CH’s main office has been turned into a museum. Nerine is shown working in it. Of course, she’s a grandma by then. Speaking of the CH personnel, Erica also quit being an Auto-Memories Doll and became a playwright like Oscar. She appears in the newspaper, though, so she probably a while left after Violet did. Taylor also appears there.

Back to Daisy, she was writing a letter to her parents, in order to learn how to properly convey feelings with written word. The message of this scene seems to be that, no matter the tools, what’s important is that we convey our feelings to the people we love.

As we see in the trailer, Gil’s mom has passed and Violet runs into Dietfried when visiting her grave on the anniversary of her death. To anyone who is wondering: yeah, Gil never went to see his mother and she died thinking that he was dead.

Nobody knew that Gil was alive. Not his mother, not Dietfried, not the Evergardens and not even Hodgins. No one.

Here’s what happened to Gil in the anime: he survived the incident at Intense, of course, but got separated from Violet in that explosion. His tag miraculously stayed on the same spot, though, as we saw in the TV series. Now, since this isn’t explained in the anime at all, I have to make it clear: the tag is that necklace the soldiers wear. It contains their names and ranks, so that their bodies can be identified even when they’re irrecognizable. Without the tag, the people who rescued Gil had no idea who he was, so he was sent to a different place to get treated. He ended up at a monastery hospital instead of the one in Enchaîné. I would debate that his uniform alone is enough to identify him as someone from the Leidenschaftlich Army, or maybe they could’ve just asked him which troop he belonged to after he woke up and relocated him to where his fellow men were, but who even cares about all these plot holes anymore? Definitely not me.

Anyway. After Gil was discharged, he ran the fuck away. Like, literally.

If anyone out there was hoping that Gil would finally have his moment to shine as the self-sacrificing, thoughtful and ridiculously kindhearted character that he is in the novel, I have bad news for you. What we had here was even worse than it being Gil’s excuse movie. It’s like the whole thing was made to drag his character so deep through the mud that he’ll never be able to get up again. There’s pretty much nothing in this one and a half hour that actually justifies what he did to Violet. I’ll elaborate on this as we go on.

Anime!Gil became a nomad and went traveling. He offed his ass to the island where that lighthouse displayed in the most recent official art is located (that’s why Gil and Violet were at the beach on the movie poster). He doesn’t have a prosthetic in the anime because, apparently, he was more worried about disappearing as fast as possible to somewhere he would never be found, and never attempted to contact anybody. So nobody knew that he was alive, hence the grave, which, as we feared, was not a fake one. His family really did think he had died.

This is a point that I have already addressed before, but that also means Gil really did abandon Violet to luck. If anything dangerous ever happened to her (as it did, and it was always very obviously likely to happen, since she was the southern army’s most outstanding soldier and quite literally fled from the military), he wouldn’t even know. If word ever got to him, it would probably be too late. And even if it weren’t, he wouldn’t be able to do anything to help her. More than allowing her to live freely, it felt like he was running away from his responsibilities regarding Violet.

Punch on the face count is currently at six.

By sheer coincidence, Violet learns that Gil is living in that island. She goes to see him and Hodgins goes with her after trying to stop her at first. When Gil finds out that they came to see him, he outright refuses to meet them. It pretty much takes the near entirety of the goddamn movie for them to see each other face-to-face. I say face-to-face because all of the following shit happens:

Hodgins goes to talk to Gil. It lasts about 20 minutes.

Gil talks to Violet from behind a door. This one is about 10 minutes.

Dietfried also comes to the island to talk to him. Also about 10 minutes.

At long fucking last, Gil goes to see Violet. But that, too, is only for about 10 minutes.

Hodgins gives him a speech very similar to what happens in chapter 8. Now get ready to fall back from your seats: Dietfried basically goes there to tell Gil that he won’t run away from taking over the family anymore, so Gil can live freely. Yes, Dietfried is officially a better Gilbert than Gilbert himself. I crave death.

So, after much ado, they come to a conclusion: Gil will stay in the island. In order to completely free himself of the shackles of his bloodline, he stays behind, living the way he wants to. ‘Cause all anime!Gil wants is to rot away alone by the sea, apparently. Now prepare yourselves, for it gets worse. Ready?

Violet stays with him in the motherfucking island.

That’s right, ladies and gents. Another fear became true. She quits her job at the CH Postal Company and goes to live with him. Well, at least, not as a housewife. She starts working with mail services in the island, and Gil helps her with it. Her life goes on like this and she dies in the island as well.

This is where the timeline after Violet passes away comes into light, parallel to the era when Violet was alive. Daisy talks about what happened after Violet left CH, as if it were a tale from the distant past.

That’s it.

The movie paints this as a happy ending. I can hardly see it as one. I know it almost looks like everything was solved, but it just got swept under the rug.

The main point that makes me sad in this ending is that Violet’s character development did a 360 degree flip. In the end, she threw everything to the air and went to live in someone who she always put before everyone else, even herself, but who didn’t do the same for her (in the anime). She’s gone to a crammed little island, where she led an uneventful life away from everyone and everything that’s ever had a positive impact on her. All she has is Gil.

Of course, he’s all she needs, but he isn’t all she should have, and that was the entire point of pushing her to go live on her own. Which is exactly what she earns in the novel: two loving parents, a father figure, a brother figure, a best friend and several other friends and acquaintances whom she formed a bond with. She has all she needs, so she doesn’t have to cling to Gil for any reason. There’s no emotional dependance on him anymore. She doesn’t need him to be whole. She just wants him because he happens to be the best person she’s ever met.

Anime!Violet is most definitely not whole. She almost got there, but then she backtracked completely. And anime!Gil... in my friend’s words, is a weakling. There’s nothing in him actually worth all this undying blind love. Sure, he’s full of regret and shit, but it’s too easy to only act upon it now, by vanishing into thin air like a coward.

The deal with novel!Gil is that he looks around at everything he has, everything that had been burdening him and killing him on the inside all his life, and decides to make use of it for Violet’s sake. He continues being family head and working in the army, amassing money and connections in order to have every means possible to protect Violet should anything happen to her. And as it turns out, he does end up having to use those means, more than once, but he will keep this up for as long as he needs to, because he lives for her now. That’s what makes him worth all the blood, sweat, tears, mental sanity and even body parts that she gave away for his sake: he pays it back. Every cent.

Punch in the face count ends at twelve. Thirteen if I include the fact that the movie ends with a last shot of Violet after she and Gilbert do a pinky swear. Looks like they were really trying to buy everyone with tears.

Oh, well.

I hope this has been a good enough summary. Sorry if I rained on anyone’s parade. I’m pretty sure we won’t get a remake ever, so I really wish we all can get over this soon.

#violet evergarden #fyeahvioletevergarden #kyoani #kyoto animation #violet evergarden movie #summary #gilbert bougainvillea #claudia hodgins #dietfried bougainvillea

352 notes · View notes

ofhouseadama · 3 years

Note

could I dm you this? yes. but also asks are fun even though this question is mean so. how do Ed and Lorraine react to the Vietnam war?

Okay so my Ed and Lorraine are absolutely Kennedy Democrats, are both very excited and enthusiastic about the first Catholic president, but both are against the Vietnam War and US military intervention from the start. Ed's already fought in one imperialist proxy war, he's got the PTSD to prove it, and Lorraine just is truly repulsed by violence of any kind.

And also like, to go completely left field for a minute -- I've been thinking a lot about how teenage Lored were effectively trapped at 17-19 years old. Mostly financially, and in different ways. in 1951, Lorraine wouldn't have been able to have her own bank account. Women wouldn't have the right to open their own bank account until the 60s or have a credit card until the 70s -- her money would have been her father's, effectively. and while probably not maliciously, since she was a young woman she likely wouldn't have had much access to her pay checks unless she was cashing them directly. Ed, meanwhile, while trying to survive a negligent/abusive household, absolutely would have been spending money on things most teens wouldn't have to in order to survive... and that's before getting the draft notice from the Selective Service, which took away even more control of his own life.

So I see Ed and Lorraine getting married young (even for the 50s, they're a few years younger than the median, though the war was actively driving that age down) mostly out of making the most out of what they could together. Ed putting Lorraine on his bank accounts and asking her actively to manage them while he's away, and her depositing her paychecks into his account would give her more financial control in her life than most women of the era. Lorraine's engagement ring (the size of that goddamn rock) is even an insurance policy most women her age and demographic didn't have -- often when women fled marriages, it was only with their jewelry to sell. It's half about Ed's possessive streak, half him showing he's not afraid to give her the money to run, if she needed to.

Anyway -- the trauma of their late teens and early twenties is entirely rooted in the rising Cold War anxieties and the locus of harm done to women in the 50s and I fully see their pursuit of demonology and the supernatural as something Lorraine initially started while working as a secretary for the Diocese, something she did to stay late at work and help people she could physically reach while Ed was away at war. She initially started staying late on the days she knew Father Gordon would be bringing in a scared family or terrified couple or frightened soul in through the back door hours after everyone had left, staying to pray and keep herself nearby, to be an observer to a fight she could be party to. Father Gordon figures her out quickly, of course, asking what interest she has in demons and exorcisms, and figures out she's clever with records and archives, almost to an uncanny degree.

And then figures out to exactly what uncanny degree.

After Ed came home and became the husband instead of the boyfriend, it turned into something Ed could throw all his metaphorical demons onto and a healthy way to exercise his control issues and fear and anxiety that doesn't (generally) affect Lorraine because she's fighting with him side by side in this, when before they were separated by thousands of miles -- the beginning everyone's favorite Catholic battle couple very much rooted in Ed and Lorraine parsing out who brought home metaphorical demons from the war, and who brought home literal ones, and bringing them to Father Gordon when necessary. Rooted in Ed needing to be useful, to dusting off his Catholic school Latin and reading everything he could get his hands on so that he could continue to help, continue to fight.

Lorraine would have been pregnant with Judy during the heightening tensions with Cuba and as Kennedy is sending more and more military "advisors" to Vietnam and Cold War tensions flared the hottest they'd get in the 1960s and I can just see both of their control issues revving up, especially with a few-months-old baby in the mix. Just the two of them laying bed, looking down at their three month old baby girl, wondering if they'd all get nuked tomorrow. If war would be declared tomorrow. If they'd all be dead, if they brought her into the world just to die violently. It's like taking guns off the street. They can't control the White House, or the Soviets, or Cuba or China or or or -- but they know about demons, they know about spirits, they know about taking these bombs off the battlefield, in the war of good against evil, and this is a war they can be foot soldiers in together.

Lorraine would get a bit of relief in the March of '63 when Kennedy dropped married men with children to the bottom of the draft pool, and then dropped the age of the draft pool to 26, aging Ed out of the Selective Service entirely. And then in November, JFK would be assassinated, and the photo of Jackie Kennedy covered in blood, leaving the hospital hand-in-hand with RFK, would be on the front page of every newspaper in the country. It would be a jolt for both of them -- but it wouldn't fully hit Lorraine until seven years later, when she'd have her first vision of Ed's death and fully understand Jackie Kennedy's weary, "I want them to see what they have done to Jack."

After the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in August of 1964, they fully throw themselves into taking cases almost full time. As the war heats up, Ed pulls back from teaching art classes at the VA. If he spends too much time there, he has to face how pointless the violence has been. If he spends too much time there, now, he has to face that he still doesn't know why he survived. Why he lived, and everyone else on board the ship with him died. Because he still doesn't know, he still is fighting to make his life matter in a way that makes sense to him. All he has is his sense of duty, a couple of college credits, and his hands. On good days, he knows that he's loved -- that Lorraine loves him so much it makes it hurt to breathe, that he's a good father to his daughter, who will never be afraid of him.

Ed has a complete PTSD relapse in 1966, with the beginning of the ground war and the full-throated resurgence of the American propaganda machine and military recruitment. He's back in the guilt spiral, the "I never had it that bad, I was only in the Navy for two years, I never had it that bad," just feeding into "why did I live when everyone else I fought with died," back and forth until he can't sleep, can only sleep when Judy sleeps, accidentally ends up adapting himself to her nap schedule and has to sleep with his hand on her chest, feeling her breathe.

Lorraine calls in Chief, after Ed can't get out of bed for 72 hours and misses mass for the first time in his life. Chief, who comes up from Brooklyn to remind Ed of the time their entire ship exploded and Ed treaded water for eight hours and everyone else died. How they spent the next six months getting drunk whenever they weren't on duty and picking fights they couldn't get out of, and that one time they got thrown in the brig because Chief struck a superior asshole and Ed just followed him into the fight. (No, Lorraine does not know about that time Ed and Chief ended up in the brig. She will never know about that time. Judy will at some point in her early 20s learn about that time, when she needs to learn about how her parents are people, who have absolutely made mistakes in their lives.) "You and I spent six months drunk," Chief says, bouncing Judy on his knee in the kitchen over a cup of coffee, Ed refusing to look at him as he deep cleans the stove. "And then your dad died, and your sainted wife handled everything for you, and we realized we couldn't send you home to her like that."

"I still don't know why I lived."

Chief shrugs. "It doesn't matter why, son. The same reason any of us live, and any of us die. It doesn't matter. You have a little girl now who depends on you. She matters more than any goddamn reason -- you live for her, and your saint of a wife, and for all the people that you help. So that you can look them in the face, say you've been down in the hole that they're in now, and you know the way out."

Lorraine calls in Chief, because she absolutely picked a fight after mass that day without Ed, with Judy on her hip. Overheard Dorothy O'Malley running her mouth in the pew in front of her sounding like a national security ghoul and didn't even think before she opened her mouth and unloading the full force of her anxiety and anger on her. Only stops because she feels a gentle hand on her shoulder and Father Gordon murmuring in her ear, "Okay Mrs. Warren, you've made your point," while leading her away. It's the "Mrs. Warren" instead of the familiar "Lorraine" that jolts her back to herself, kissing Judy's head as she tries to shake herself out of it.

"Thank you," she tells Father Gordon, defeated.

He shrugs. "You don't come to confession until before Friday night prayer service. I didn't want you stewing on this all week." Pausing, he takes a moment to fondly tug on one of Judy's pig tails, making her laugh. "If Ed's not... feeling well, I know about that."

Lorraine bites her lip, knowing full and well that Father Gordon served as a chaplain in World War II. That seeing the violence of the Nazis firsthand is what convinced him that the Devil was more than a metaphor, that evil truly walked the Earth. Sent him on his own path, chasing darkness.

Lorraine nods.

"I could talk to him," Father Gordon says. "But it would likely come better from someone he served with."

When she gets home, she finds Chief's number in their phone book, and calls Brooklyn for the first and last time. He comes up the next day, and shoos her out of the house to do something for herself for the first time in months, telling her that he's more than equipped to look after a single three year old.

Ed goes back to teaching at the VA a few months after that, teaching art to the new round of mentally scarred children returning from war. He concedes to group therapy, and a few sessions with the VA psychiatrist to get something to take the edge off. He teaches at the VA until the troop withdrawals in 1970, reducing his class load as he and Lorraine take on more and more cases -- verging towards a hundred a year -- for the Catholic Church, and the media attention that comes along with that, the publicity engagements that help keep their bills paid, the articles and academic talks.

Even still, Ed occasionally brings home someone for dinner, just to make sure that they've only brought metaphorical demons home from war with them, not literal ones.

Sometimes it's literal ones.

#ask #rikertroi #otp: i forgot my pills #emily watches the conjuring #i cannot believe that Sam was just like #''I am going to give Emily an excuse to use her degree and hurt people''#this got... so very long

20 notes · View notes

aeondeug · 3 years

Note

"kubo just really seems to hate Japanese nationalism?" This is the first time I have heard this, would you mind elaborating on how Bleach criticizes Japanese nationalism?

I'm not surprised to hear this as I don't really see it come up much. I have seen a few times critique of Japanese conservatism through Bleach come up, but never quite as fully as I feel the comic deserves. Anyway...The thing to note with Japanese nationalism is that it is highly militaristic and that it is based around forming a very particular narrative about Japan. Namely, one of Japan as a uniquely wonderful and gifted nation full of one joined ethnicity. A joined ethnicity that doesn't vary. Part of this has been managed by the attempt to homogenize Japanese culture as a whole. So Shinto, for example, only became a single religion fairly recently. And in the 40's following the war, attempts were made to standardize it. Since Shinto's more like several religions in a trench coat than a single religion. These attempts have involved creating fake rituals in places like Abashiri, a historically Ainu area, which have the air of an imperial procession. This ritual is claimed to be "local". It's not. It had nothing to do with the local culture until it became convenient to claim it did. So what in the hell does this have to do with Bleach. So Soul Society is the primary method through which criticism of Japanese conservative culture occurs in the comic. Right from the get go we can see like...The kind of mythic identity that nationalists really like. It's a traditional Japan. Everyone is dressed in traditional clothing, though the clothing is fanciful and not actually 100% accurate to any one era. The culture is split up in a form resembling Japanese feudalism, where the militarily powerful are given a great deal of power over those who cannot fight. The Soul Reapers basically being ghost pacifying/hunting samurai? And they are as callously cruel to those beneath them as samurai could be to real people. Complete with killing people for funsies seemingly and getting the hell away with it. Yet Soul Reapers occupy this space of respect. Soul Reapers also have a very Buddhist aesthetic. They dress in black, the color of Japanese priests, and perform things like sword meditation. Now this is not just any Buddhism that they seem to be based off. It's Zen Buddhism, the favored Buddhism of samurai. The Soul Reapers also do have strong ties to noble lines as samurai did. This is most striking to me in that an entire branch of the military is essentially owned by the Shihouin family and that moves were being made on expanding that to the Court Guard as well. An expansion that Soifon seemingly completes, as by the time we meet the Court Guard there is basically no difference between Second Division and the Secret Mobile Unit. This is important as samurai were a kind of warrior nobility. Now this allusion to samurai is important as samurai are a key part of Japanese nationalism as it exists now. Perhaps the most famous nationalist overseas is Yukio Mishima, an author. Mishima is famous for his writing but also for an attempted coup. He and a small militia stormed a military base in Tokyo, captured the commandant, and attempted to get the soldiers stationed there inspired to overthrow the Japanese constitution and reinstate imperial rule. When it became clear this was not going to work out, Mishima committed seppuku after shouting "Long live the Emperor!" And Mishima is just one example. Probably the most famous due to his failed coup and committing of seppuku while spouting nationalist horseshit. But like the point I wish to make here with Mishima is that Japanese nationalism is focused on a "traditional" Japan and has a love of the military and samurai in specific. So we look back at Soul Society. And we see that Soul Society kind of. Sucks? Actually. Rukia tells us it is peaceful there but like most people are living in the Rukongai. Many people's only chance at getting a less shit life is to attempt to get into a military position. And that military is extremely powerful and they make that known. They also have a very particular story about Soul Society that they wish to have maintained and a very particular order that they wish to have maintained. One that involves things like war crimes denial, glorification of the state and its military, and the fabrication of a false history built to instill a sense of pride. People don't know the Soul King is a dismembered corpse of a murdered god. They just know he's the Soul King and he is the highest of the high. And they know that Soul Reapers' work is vital to the continued functioning of the entire universe and is thus just and good. Because that's the story that gets told. And it gets told because if people knew the actual story they'd be pissed. And like all the big problems in the series fall back to this system. All of them. Rukia's execution order, the war with Aizen, the war with Yhwach. All of it falls back to things that Soul Society's god awful hell state have caused. With the two big ones being the false narrative that is perpetuated to control the people and the genocide of the Quincies. Aizen and Yhwach are beaten, yes, but at no point does the comic ever go "The Soul Reapers and Soul Society as it is under them is good actually". If anything, there is a strong point made that Soul Society under them fucking sucks and that these people have a point. And there is that part during Fullbring when Rukia stops and realizes that like. The seeming unchanging mass that is the Soul Society's history may crumble because of the change Ichigo has inspired. It's not the death or removal of power of one particular person she is thinking of. But the change of an entire system. An entire society. Also a cool fun note. Our good boy Ichigo who is the hero? He's mixed. He's not part of the mythic homogeneous Japanese people. He necessarily exists outside of it. Chad's also mixed and, hell, he comes from Mexico even. Chad was also born in Okinawa, which was forcibly annexed by Japan in 1879. Ishida? A Quincy! The victims of one of Soul Society's crimes. The group going against Soul Society and the bullshit its caused is largely comprised of elements that Japanese nationalism would have you believe either do not exist or which should not exist. I do have more thoughts on this subject, but this I think hits most of the bigger thoughts. And it is a bit thrown together on the spot. I do hope it explains why when I look at the comic I go "Wow, Japanese nationalism does suck doesn't it?"

41 notes · View notes

lassieposting · 3 years

Note

Any alive! Skulduggery hcs that you haven't shared? I live by your version of him tbh

Hi anon! I think I covered skug's backstory up to when he signs up to fight and then skipped ahead to when he meets his wife, so you can have the Early War Years

- so when we left skug, he'd been on the pirate adventure and essentially moved in with ghastly's family at age 16, and that's where he stays for the next three years. Ghastly's father introduces him to taking pride in his appearance, Ghastly introduces him to Hopeless, and Ghastly's mother Saoirse introduces him to three things: motherly love, household chores, and the back of her hand for swearing in the house. He settles into the family, flirts with the prettiest local girls, develops an allergy to manual labour, and starts Experimenting™ with Ghastly, who's absolutely besotted with him.

- at 19, he has his surge, and it's bad. Ghastly has his a few months earlier, and it wasn't pleasant, but Ghastly was always going to be an elemental. He was sick and achy for a few days and howling in pain for just one or two. Skug expects much the same: he hasn't used necromancy in years, and he's had the best elemental tutors his parents could find.

- But he's inherited an insanely strong necromancy gene from his biological father, and an insanely strong elemental gene from his mother, and his surge ultimately comes down to two branches of magic trying to destroy each other to be the last gene standing. His temperature skyrockets as the elemental gene tries to burn the necromancy out of him. What looks like black blood seeps from his eyes and his nose and the corner of his mouth. His veins go black as the shadows retaliate. It goes on for days. Ghastly's mother is beside herself trying to get water into him so he doesn't die of thirst.

- If he hadn't also inherited the extremely rare genetic abnormality responsible for magical ambidexterity, his surge would've killed him. But he did, so it doesn't, and eventually he comes out of it and spends the next six months or so just recovering.

- at this point, the sanctuary is pushing recruitment. Ghastly doesn't look twice at the posters, but skug does. Ghastly's whole world is his family, their farm, and his father's tailoring business. But skug's father is a diplomat, he's got extended family involved in the war, he was supposed to go to a fancy French university that ended up being burned down during an attack by some pro-Mevolent riots, he's had to field questions from smaller siblings about when - and if - their dad would be coming home. He's highly educated, politically savvy, and emotionally involved. He decides he wants to sign up to fight.

- Saoirse does her best to talk him out of it, but skug is skug, and he digs his heels in and insists this is what he wants to do. He's going to join the war effort.

- Ghastly and Hopeless think it over and decide to join up with him. Hopeless, because he's an idealistic young man looking for glory, and Ghastly because someone has to watch skulduggery's back and keep him out of trouble, or he'll get himself shot long before he gets to set foot on a battlefield.

- honestly, ghastly isn't expecting skug to last long in the army. Skug is a pampered spoiled rich brat, and he's about to be surrounded by people who will scream in his face and make him do drills and expect him to obey orders, and he thinks it will take a few weeks tops before skug wants to desert

- that is. Not what happens

- like. none of them like it very much to begin with. hopeless has never had to do this much exercise in his life, and he hates it. ghastly is lonely and homesick and just wants to go back to dublin. and their first CO decides he hates skug on like, their first day of training, because he's a smart-mouthed arrogant asshole who's never had to be afraid of anything but his own father, and he does not react well to being ridiculed during drills. skug's ego takes a good solid battering because the other enlistees don't appreciate being given extra chores as punishment for him mouthing off, ghastly has to crack some skulls to make sure he won't be bullied for his scars, hopeless doesn't quite fit in and gets some nasty ribbing over it

- but also? they've got untapped talent, all three of them. they end up black ops fighters for a reason. hopeless tops the class for intelligence and undercover operations, because he can become anyone. ghastly is strong and level-headed and does well under pressure. and skulduggery is a natural leader, a ruthless tactician, and has a tendency to pull off insane plans that would go horribly for anyone else.

- they survive basic training. they get sent into the field. and ghastly and hopeless find that they're actually pretty good at this. they earn the respect of the rest of their platoon. and skulduggery? he starts to thrive

- this is the era of wealthy aristocrats buying their way into leadership positions they don't have the experience or common sense to do well in. almost none of the lower-class soldiers have any patience for it, but as a fellow aristo Skug has the social standing to call them out on it, so he still has a habit of making enemies of his commanding officers. he resents being handed orders by men who are less than he is, less clever, less observant, less capable. he goes out of his way to prove that his way of doing things is better.

- and? it works for him, sort of. he gets promoted several times - first he's pulled out of the enlisted ranks to be trained up as an officer, then he makes lieutenant, then captain - partly because he's Challenging to deal with and partly because he's becoming incredibly competent. it's fairly common for skug to get a flogging (for disobeying orders) and a promotion (because it worked out well for him) simultaneously. he has quite a few stripes by the time he meets wifey. when he starts being given command of a squad of his own, he takes ghastly with him as his number two, and hopeless comes along for the ride.

- at some point, skug gets palmed off on then-colonel corrival deuce. it's phrased as "oh here i'll give you some of my best men", but corrival is experienced enough to recognise "god please take this one off my hands im begging you" when he sees it, and sure enough, he butts heads with skug almost as soon as they're introduced.

- by this point skulduggery's men have developed a reputation for being a bit wild, and they're very loyal to him, so corrival has his work cut out. but? he's got a bit of a different approach to a lot of his fellow officers, because he came up through the ranks himself. so instead of locking horns with skug and trying to flog him into compliance, he turns skug into his pet project, his protégé. he gives him a loose rein, defends his decisions to the higher-ups, and doesn't interfere too much with how skug runs his team, but he also doesn't tolerate backtalk, bullshit or cheek. he's the stern-but-fair mentor figure - the Captain Holt/Captain Pellew/Lord Wellington to skug's Peralta/Hornblower/Sharpe. and skug's never had a very involved father figure, because ghastly's father is massively introverted and his own was short-tempered and perpetually disappointed in him, so corrival trips his "kids want boundaries" switch and actually wins him over.

- corrival hangs onto him after that. as he gets promoted and moved around, skug goes with him, and by extension so do his team. corrival learns to use the sensible members of the group - ghastly and hopeless, then erskine - to triangulate skug and stop his temper getting the better of him. he's incredibly proud of his chosen men, and all three of them really come into their own under his guidance. skug turns down promotion a couple times because it would mean a change of CO, and he knows there aren't many people he'd take orders from anymore.

- and then skug meets wifey.

- when skug gets married, neither his mother or father attend. they don't approve of wifey or her pitiful dowry. they assume, as does kenspeckle, that he's marrying her to Do The Decent Thing because he's knocked her up, and his father reassures him that he doesn't have to marry the girl, just send her somewhere far away and send her money to support her brat, and this whole sorry indiscretion can be put behind him. skug is. furious. he was smart enough not to take wifey with him to announce the engagement, and he ends up having a screaming match with his father that ends with him a) walking out and b) getting disinherited. he marries her anyway, and despite mr and mrs pleasant senior snubbing the whole event, he's got a full complement of parents there all the same - ghastly's parents turn up, and so does corrival.

- it's a military thing - skug's in his military dress uniform, they cut the cake with his sword - the parade sword, at least, the one he's never actually used, they walk out of the venue through the sword arch and skug's team do the rifle salute. ghastly's mother drags him to one side, pulls him down by the shirtfront to fuss over his hair and try to make it lay flat, licks her thumb and wipes a smudge off his cheek, embarrasses him in front of all his friends. then corrival snags him while they're waiting for the bride, tells him off for not having perfectly shiny buttons, redoes his collar for him, and tells him, "You'll do" like he isn't about to cry a lil. he offers skug some whiskey from his flask "for courage" and without really thinking skug says he doesn't need it because he's never been so sure about anything in his life and corrival is just. he's fine. he's not choked up at all. stand up straight, boy, for god's sake.

- he also makes a speech ghastly still brings up hundreds of years later, because it's the soppiest the old man ever got with any of them. along the lines of "i never had a son, and if i had, i like to think he would've turned out absolutely nothing like you, because you are single-handedly the reason i am going grey several hundred years ahead of schedule. that being said, i couldn't be prouder of the man you've become; you are at least half as stubborn and annoying now as you were when i met you, and i think i can claim at least some of the credit." and then, to wifey, "as to you, my dear, you have freed me, this monster is yours now. to your health, and my heartiest hopes that your future children turn out like you, because one of him is plenty."

- wifey laughs until her sides hurt and she's wheezing. skug pretends he's offended. ghastly wolf-whistles noisily and gets clipped round the ear by his mama. corrival tears up a little in the middle of his speech and clears his throat to hide it. and when it's all over and they're about to leave, wifey thanks him for coming because she knows it meant a lot to skug, and he promises her he'll do his best to bring skug home safe and sound until this damnable war is over.

(he wishes he'd been able to keep that promise until the day he dies)

#Anon #fire message #skulduggery pleasant #sp headcanons #skugwife #skug #corrival deuce #long post

31 notes · View notes

abizarreyodelingincident · 4 years

Text

Our Nightly Confidant 4

War Games

Warriors needs fresh air.

The hand resting in the crook of his elbow is soft, but its grip is threatening to cut off the blood circulation to his hand. The pain has steadily numbed as the ladies exchange thinly veiled insults about this or that province and this or that financial ruin.

He used to like this.

The attention, the admiration, the glory! When did it start to taste like ash in his mouth?

If his queen heard that thought, she'd have another one of her brutal truths for him. 'When war stopped being a game and became a duty.'

When he realized that not even being the Chosen Hero of Courage would shield him from the game. That it made him twice the target every other soldier was. When the bodies of fallen comrades couldn't go past the numb exhaustion that took him every evening.

“Lady Farosh, Lady Ordonas, if you'll excuse me for a second...” he says, flashing them his flashiest smile.

Lady Ordonas brings out her fan to hide her rosy cheeks and agrees with an obvious giggle. Lady Farosh, whose fingernails are on the verge of piercing skin, delays her reply by the barely polite amount of time.

“Oh, Captain Link, you cannot abandon me so swiftly,” she tries, eyes flickering to her father, an esteemed general in discussion with Impa.

“But of course not, only a second to freshen up.”

The instant she releases him, he pulls away and bows. Though, despite his instincts screaming at him, he doesn't run a straight line for the glass doors of the Queen's ballroom. Lady Farosh would take it as an insult. He weaves through conversations, dropping the minimum expected of him here and there, snarks at a Legend that looks ready to murder Lord Lonnayru (and Warriors wishes him to succeed), never touches a drink or bite offered that he did not pick for himself, and eventually reaches freedom.

The cool night air is a balm on his skin as it strokes his hair and face.

Even the small, military tents he's slept in during the campaign didn't feel half as stifling as that ballroom. And some of the tents, he couldn't even stand up inside!

Above, the moon shines its silvery glow down to the garden's fountain. With the ball in full swing inside, no one walks the peaceful path of stone amidst the roses and the arches. Shame. It's a beautiful place. His first stroll there had been a pleasant experience, though not his first conversation with his queen. Impa had chased away the rest of the escort and glared the patrolling guards into submission. Any attempt to bargain had been met with stony silence and a dare to prove themselves worthier of the Queen's protection than her Sheikah general and mentor.

Warriors stops by the hedgerow. If he focuses, he can see the spot where Zelda sat down, where she picked a rose for him, and pinned it on his breastplate.

They had had hopes for the future. Have. He still has hopes. Don't get him wrong. But he's a little more tired than he used to be. Where had the time gone?

'Captain Link, I must introduce you to my daughter.'

Must. Must. Must. Always a 'must', never a 'may'. Duty traps him and the wild beasts know it. They sniffed his blood long ago, and he can only ever bandage the wound so much before it becomes infected.

Traipsing around with the heroes of previous eras is a blessing and a reward that Hylia offered him. A thank you, he feels, and perhaps the beginning of an apology.

“You shouldn't be out there on your own, Captain Link.”

Those are normal words, spoken with careful reverence. Nothing about them should bring his walls up this quickly. But Warriors is no longer accosted by the common soldiers. Hasn't in a long time.

The cracks on his heart spread just a little further. Deeper.

“Someone might try to hurt you, sir.”

The reverence is gone.

And the spear points straight at his chest.

He doesn't have time to bring out his sword.

A snarling mass of fur tackles the traitor, and by the time Warriors can react, the cry of fear stops abruptly. In its stead is a steady gurgle, a fading wheeze. A limb that thuds against the garden grounds.

Warriors doesn't flinch. He's seen worse.

Once his prey has been deemed sufficiently mauled, Wolfie turns to him, muzzle dark with blood, and worry clear in his eyes.

“Good boy,” he says, absentminded, a hand ruffling through the beast's sinfully soft fur.

It's a testament to his companion's state of mind that no warning growl responds to the familiarity. Warriors doubt he would hear it anyway. He's staring at the dead body.

The guard was young. Maybe... Hyrule's age. He must have hated the war, if he'd gone to the front lines. Hell is hardly enough of a description for the dance of bodies and hacked limbs. He had probably lost a brother or a father or a cousin to the fighting, if he was earning his keep in the Queen's castle at that age. Maybe Impa had taken pity on him.

“Simple-minded fools who can't resist basic mind magic,” Warriors repeats, a wobbly chuckle in his voice.

Wolfie noses his hand, and the little shock of cold and wet jolts enough that he can avert his eyes from the traitor. Defeated, the events of the night all playing on loop, he drags himself to a secluded spot by the hedgerow. One from which he can see people coming, with his back to the branches. Wolfie plops down next to him.

“Mind magic. What I wouldn't give for that to be the case,” he confesses to the wolf-like companion. “Hylia. I'd take cowards over this. I'm not asking them to fight my battles for me. Not even fight by me. Just...”

His fingers curl into his scarf. Holds onto the lifeline.

“I just want to be able to turn my back on the people I protect. Is that really so much to ask for?”

Soft fur fills his sight. He ought to resist the urge. An officer must be strong. Cannot let the soldiers down. Fear spreads like wildfire. One spark, and the whole army goes up in flame.

He knows this.

He knows, and he sobs anyway. Farore, please, just for an instant, allow him to be weak.

He buries his face in Wolfie's shoulder, relishes the warmth and protection that comes from the sacred beast. It doesn't matter that some blood splatters might stain his official knight armors. It doesn't matter that for a split second, he doesn't scan his surroundings for exits, potential ambushes and traps. He gives the taut ropes of tension inside him just enough relief.

Until he pulls back.

Sniffs twice, wipes his face once and plasters the charmer smile.

“I'm alright, Wolfie... I'm alright.”

Wolfie doesn't buy it. Makes an inquisitive little whine. A question.

His hand trembles in the fur. “I am. I will be.”

Wolfie turns, quick not to notice one's tears. Strange for a wolf, but he doesn't pounce on their weaknesses. They trust he never will.

Silly as it sounds, there's more than a few noble daughters in that ballroom that could take lessons in civility from Wolfie. At least, in his presence, he doesn't feel like a bloody piece of meat dangling in front of a pack of wolves. Now, that's irony.

“You know... you kind of make me miss Midna.”

Warriors jumped back when Wolfie suddenly straightened, his eyes laser focused.

“Yeah, I know her,” he said, feeling a hint of a real smile. “We have a statue for her in the Temple of Souls. Hell of a woman.”

His hands went to his sword the second his ears picked up a low growling noise, only to realize it had come from Wolfie. Was... was their canine companion protective of the Twilight Princess? Or, Hylia forbid, jealous? Goddess, that was too cute.

“Shh, don't alert the others,” Warriors said, hands held in front of him in mock surrender.

Wolfie, with very Hylian-like intelligence, puts a paw first on his muzzle, then scratches one of his ears. It's a good point. He'd know first.

Warriors relents before Wolfie starts nipping. He remembers Time's mud bath. “She mentioned you too. Called you her favorite pet.”

He hadn't know what disgruntled looked like on a wolf before, but now he had the perfect picture. No wonder Midna had loved to tease him.

“She went into battle with this shadow spell. Wolf-companions.”

Wolfie's interest shifts into disguised wariness. There are hints that he might like to pull back a bit, but Warriors' hand remains firm on the back of the wolf's neck.

“Called her main one Rinku,” he adds, waggling his eyebrows. “Reminds you of something, huh?”

Wolfie blinks. Then blinks some more. He's almost completely frozen, like he has no clue what to make of that information. Or is trying to choose the right way to react. And when he does, Warriors bites down on a burst of laughter.

The puppy eyes. The good boy smile. It's worrying how they almost work.

Almost.

Warriors keeps a sly grin on his face and waits. He's in no hurry to return inside the palace.

It takes another change of beat in the music coming from the ballroom before Wolfie gives, and shadows swallow him.

“Since when?” Twilight says, sighing.

Warriors' smirk is immensely punchable, he's aware. He loves to live dangerously.

“Are you implying that I would deliberately play dumb so that one of my fellow Hero of Courage would act like a dog when he doesn't need to? That I knew from the very beginning and asked Wild to take pictures for posterity? For shame, Twilight.”

A vein twitched under Twilight's jaw. “No, I wasn't implying that. I was saying you're an asshole, Wars!”

Warriors fails to dodge the lunge, half-paralyzed by muffled chuckles. The momentum throws them on the grass, and there's a split second of disorientation before his back hits the ground, and a weight lands on his chest. A heavy weight. Goddesses be good, the farmer lifestyle paid, huh?

“Twilight, move your fat ass.”

The mullish expression on his brother's face would have made a raging moblin sweat. “No. We're still doing this. I have a great track record, and I'm not letting you narcissistic goatfiddler break it by being your usual self. Talk.”

His eyes widen in alarm. “Really? This is the setup? Me, suffocating, and you, thinking of a place to hide my body. What is this, a deathbed confession?”

“You could have had the amazing emotional support of everyone's favorite wolf. But noooo, you're too good for that, so spill. Better be fast, because I had double serving of Wild's chili. Gives me gaz like thunder.”

“You. Wouldn't. Dare.”

The silent glare he receives is all Time.

Warriors squirming renews. “Farmhand, I will skewer you on the Master Sword myself if you don't-”

“Why would you go off on your own like that? We were all in the ballroom. You could have gotten any of us.”

“Let's not reverse the roles here,” Warriors hisses, one eyebrow raised. “I'm not the one playing double-life around our group. You can't talk about trust when you constantly hide in plain sight. You want trust? You tell me why.”

The boyish, almost light air between them breaks. Guilt blooms on Twilight's face. He can't meet Warriors' gaze and doesn't even try.

“... It's Dark Magic.”

“I couldn't care less. I've fought amongst noble fighters with dark magic and against monsters with the opposite. Next.”

Twilight's ears droop slightly. It's dog-like, and amusingly fitting for a moment of hesitation. Every second that passes without a word hammer the fact that 'dark magic' is the surface excuse for Twilight's shifty dealings about their group. Warriors tries not to be angry. Twilight did just save his life with that very secret.

“I've had...” Lips mull the words for a few seconds. “Mixed reactions.”

Warriors feels himself frown. “Mixed how?”

“You know me, the country boy, raised in the small farmer village lost in the woods. Country bumpkins, the lot of us... You ever heard what they think of wolves?”

His breath hitches. Slow dread creeps on him. He hates the ease with which images come to him. He's never seen Twilight's hometown, never met any of his family, but he's suddenly overwhelmed by the idea of a mob of pitchforks and pickaxes held high, of dogs barking through the woods as a grey wolf scampers. Narrowly avoids a bear trap snapping its deadly maw on thin air instead of a limb. Overhears angry grumbling about making a pelt out of his skin.

They should be farmers, but he sees old faces instead. Soldiers. Commanders. Officers. Brothers-in-arms he's long trusted. Thought he could trust.

“W-what do they know about those majestic beasts?” he says, jokingly because he's afraid to let the mask slip an inch. (It'd fall a mile, shatter too hard for him to ever glue back the pieces.)

“My father threatened to skewer me,” comes the quiet admission, less than a whisper.

Warriors' heart squeezes. “Twilight.”

“Didn't know it was me though,” Twilight adds, failing at even a small smile. “To him, I was just this wild animal circling the village right after most of the children had been stolen. He... he only threatened me. Just words. Nothing like what you had to deal with.”

“The words are the worst part for me,” Warriors hears himself say. “I hear them in my nightmares, even if I forget what they tried to do. Couldn't tell you who came at me with a spear, with a sword, with a dagger. But I see their eyes in the mirror, the hate as they died.”

“The fear. The 'Get back, beast!' and the screams.”

“'It's your fault!'” Warriors repeat, the same tone that echoed in his head. “'You should have died instead!'”

Twilight's face twists, and there's a split second when Warriors thinks his heart will give out. Even the shadows of Twili magic can't compare to the darkness that covers the blue of his eyes. But Twilight turns his head to the side and spits in disgust.

It hits the traitor's cooling corpse.

“Bastards,” he says, venom lacing his tongue. “Should have made that last.”

He says, with blood all over his face , Warriors thinks dryly.

It's a sharp contrast, that violence on him. Twilight has always had that air of earnest, straightforward honesty. One look at him and strangers will put their trust in him without hesitation. He lacks the battleworn scars (at least where it's visible), is old enough to be taken seriously and his bumpkin accent breeds familiarity with most commoners they meet. Warriors himself has to deploy all his charms to get the same results, and he's still being glared at by a lot of the men.

They peg him a charmer, and not without reason.

“I don't like it either,” Warriors says, quiet.

“What?” Twilight replies, an eyebrow raised.

“The knight act, you know.” And before Twilight's mouth can drop – “At least, some of it. The game. The doublespeak. The mask. It all feels pointless sometimes.”

“I... really?” Twilight's baffled words hurt, just a little.

Warriors scoffs. “Yes, really. I'm not meant to play knaves and daggers. I'm a soldier. An officer. I'm meant to be out there, defending the kingdom I love. Inspiring the people to fight back against darkness, to stand up for their lives. To be at the front of an army, to lead as one amongst the great... it's incredible. It's what I was born to do, I know it in my bones. The act is necessary. But by the Goddesses do I wish I could live without it.”

He sees the way his meaning worms itself past Twilight's gaze, understanding dawning on him. “No matter where one goes, huh?” Sheepish ruffle of his own hair. “Is it something in the water?”

“Like they'd lower themselves to drinking water,” Warriors sneers, a smirk hidden underneath. “Wine only, my good sir. And only the finest year, from the finest yard. Vintage, my good peasant, it's all the vintage that shows breeding.”

“They do know that for everyone else, breeding is something you check for your horses and your dogs, right?”

“I... couldn't tell. I've stopped listening a while ago. I just nod and play my handsome part. It is the only use for a Hero once the King of Evil has been defeated, it looks like. I don't know if I even should call myself a knight anymore.”

“Wild was touched, y'know?” Twilight says, looking up to the moon. “When you called him an honorable knight,” he adds with a sigh. “He's always associated his life before the Calamity to knighthood, to that incredible soldier that had trained for a decade before facing his destiny. Someone whose shadow he chased for months, not realizing it's his own. You might have been the first to call his current self a knight.”

“He is!” Warriors near jumps to his feet. “Wild may be unorthodox, but he is a loyal, devoted man that served Hyrule to the best of his ability despite having lost everything but his life to the cause. Most generals in my army could not even measure up to his standard.”

“Should have seen the look in his eyes when I mentioned it.” There's a hint of sadness beyond the pride and joy of this memory.

He hates the curdling feeling that brings forth. “Remind me to knock a couple of heads together next time we visit his Hyrule, would you?”

Twilight's chuckle is fond, gentle. “Yeah, that's what I meant. I never thought to tell him in those words. To me, he was always good enough. But you saw that side of him too. You know what it's like to want it. I can't relate that well to this, but... well, anyone under your command has to look up to a guy like you.”

Hands ball into fists. Eyes drift to the corpse. “Not everyone does. Obviously.”

Twilight bumps shoulders with him. “I'm sorry, pretty boy. I'm sorry these assholes think they have any right to blame you. To resent you. You're an amazing leader. Much better than me. I... I honestly admire you and your skill.”

Warmth settles in his stomach. He can't... For a second, he needs to blink away tears.

“So he admits it.”

There's a wry, wolfish quality to Twilight's grin. “You speak a word of it, and you'll meet an unfortunate fate, Captain.”

“As if anyone but my Queen could make me fall in battle,” he laughs, pushing Twilight's shoulder, hard.

“Careful there.” His brother's grin sharpens, and the returning shove almost sends Warriors crashing into a bush. “You might touch my cursed stone, and then you'd be stuck as your true self. What would your queen think if she saw a plague-ridden rat try to command her armies?”

Laughter bubbles in his chest. “Be happy to send the rat to infect the goat-loving hillbillies before they spread out of their mudholes! Imagine the half-goat, half-hylians that would invade Hyrule!”

Twilight's gauntlets fall to the ground. Knuckles are cracked. “A'right. Someone needs an asswhooping.”

He could not stop smirking if the Goddesses ordered him to. “Bring it, dog-boy. I'll put a collar on you.”

Taunts, past this point, become superfluous. The breath they would waste could be better utilized trying not to die (lose) against this moblin (his brother) and his freakish strength (no, really, he pushes giant metal crates on ice, the goron-born idiot). The honor of Hyrule rests on his victory.

At some point, they roll over in the fountain.

This does not, in fact, stop their roughhousing.

***

“Should I ask why you both have black eyes and split lips when no one noticed any monster for miles?” Time wonders at his seconds-in-command. “While we were attending a ball?”

“No,” they growl with a ferocity to chill bones.

“Not fair!” Wind protests, to the nodding of most. “Why did they get to have all the fun?”

Ah, youth.

#Linked Universe #Linkeduniverse #LU Twilight #LU Warriors #LU Wolfie

93 notes · View notes

cloudy-reverie · 3 years

Note

Hello I want to ask you something about Mars Red (I don't mind about spoilers) tell me what happened with Maeda and Yamagami-san in chapter 13 and also, do you think the anime was good enough? Thanks.

Hi there! I’ll answer both of your questions under the cut, as this will be a long post.

Do I think the anime was good enough? Well, I have mixed feelings about it, and I’ve been thinking of doing a full post of my thoughts after I’ve watched it all a second time now that it’s complete and easy to marathon. I enjoyed the anime immensely, but I’m not above critiquing things I like, either.

I started reading the Mars Red manga last year, and even now after the anime, I still prefer the manga’s version of events. I haven’t seen the stage play, the original source of material, so I can’t account for how accurately the manga or the anime adapted its events. As I understand it, the anime gained attention just for being an adaptation of a stage play, which doesn’t happen very often. Usually, it’s the other way around. That explains the interesting use of cinematography in the anime, the emphasis on drama and soliloquys and so forth. Some people might find the anime pretentious in that way, but, well, it is what it is, being adapted from theatre. Being an English Literature major, I didn’t mind it, and I also like the occasional artsy series.

Anyway, as a manga reader, I had different expectations going into the anime. The manga is more character-driven, whereas I feel the anime was more plot-driven, and the addition of anime-only characters – as interesting as they are – made the series seem crowded with only 12 episodes to pack everything in. The manga fleshes out the regular cast more (the anime didn't fully touch upon Defrott and Suwa’s pasts, left out Takeuchi’s shock over a revelation, erased parts of Maeda’s personality, left out some fun Code Zero moments, Aoi encountering Code Zero early on, etc.), and it definitely toned down the violence for a more mainstream audience because Shutaro’s manga rescue of Yamagami was far bloodier and terrifying, as Shutaro, agonizingly, begins to realize what he’s capable of and who he may become.

And one example that I still complain about (lol) is that in the manga, Shutaro and Aoi’s relationship is highlighted in the first chapter alone and emphasized in subsequent chapters. It’s clear they care for each other. It’s clear they’re among the main stage players. It’s easier to be emotionally invested in what happens to them by the end.

In the anime, Maeda takes centre stage instead, with the first episode introducing us to his fiancée, Misaki, whom he has never met in-person until she becomes a vampire. From that point onward, their what-if relationship and Maeda’s regret is frequently alluded to, culminating in the final episode.

Typically, whoever you introduce in the first chapter/episode are the characters that you’ll be going on a journey with, so it was a bit jarring for me when I realized Shutaro and Aoi and the rest of Code Zero wouldn’t be introduced until the second episode (well, Aoi did make an appearance, but they had her interact with Maeda more). We never get to see all of the flashbacks of Aoi and Shutaro, never are shown how much Aoi is determined to find Shutaro. We never even get to see Shutaro's “dream visit,” and then that silly vampire (sorry, Shutaro, I still love ya) left visible footprints in her yard after claiming he was a ghost, and she definitely noticed, so she knows something is up. Had if we had received all of that, perhaps the rescue and the finale would’ve been far more emotional for anime-only viewers invested in their relationship.

Instead, there was more feeling for Maeda and Misaki because the anime took care in telling their story. The anime was good in that aspect because they made Maeda and Misaki’s tragic relationship the focus, and so we were able to reach full circle by the end. Meanwhile, with Shutaro and Aoi practically being sidelined, I saw comments from anime-only viewers confused about why they were suddenly a main couple or getting the spotlight in the end. The anime could’ve avoided that confusion by tightening up their storytelling and fleshing out Aoi and Shutaro more as characters.

I also feel the anime focused a lot more on the politics and military, too. There were so many lengthy meeting scenes when it’s more balanced in the manga, I find. Also, just the other day, I was rereading some exchanges between Shutaro and Yamagami, and laughing, and thinking about why the anime didn’t include those because they were funny daily life scenes. There are also anime reviews complaining about the pacing, the random tone changes, and other things that might’ve compelled them to rate the anime higher.

So, do I think the anime is good? I might be biased, but I enjoyed it; it wasn’t a masterpiece, but it was good for what it intended to deliver. Also, I like series based in the Taisho era, so that was a bonus for me. The manga isn’t 100% perfect, either; it might disappoint Maeda fans, for one thing, and it does tell its story quickly (I wish it was longer). I personally prefer the manga over the anime, but I love both.

The way I view Mars Red anime and manga is like this: Fullmetal Alchemist (2003) and Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood (2009) are both favourite series of mine. FMAB is prefered by most people, and is widely considered one of the greatest anime series ever, a modern masterpiece. It adapted the manga completely – only because the manga had finished by then, and I absolutely love the manga. However, it doesn’t mean FMA ’03 is bad in comparison; it just has a different but no less unique storyline that Arakawa also liked. With the manga still running at the time, FMA '03, being as popular as it was, had no choice but to go its own way for completion's sake.

This is the case for me here: I like the Mars Red anime and manga for different reasons. I’d probably recommend the manga first due to my preference for deeper character development. But the anime also tells an interesting version, though it could’ve done with a more streamlined focus. Karakara Kemuri adapted Fujisawa Bun-o’s stage play in her own way, presumably keeping to the general storyline but also adding personal touches of her own (you’ll know if you’ve read any of her works before); Signal M.D. studio handled the anime adaptation with their own team of writers while striving for the theatrical atmosphere of its roots. They accomplish different results.

And now that there’s a game with more information about the characters, the Mars Red universe seems so much bigger in an exciting way.

Now, to your second question:

MAGComi is a monthly manga magazine, and you can read chapters online for free for a limited time. They made chapter 13 available to read while the final chapter 14, newly released, is for premium subscribers. Chapter 12 is still available to view, as well.

Since I can’t read Japanese, I will be excitedly awaiting a translation from Laughing in Quarantine scanlations until I get my officially licensed volumes in English this year and next. Thus, I can only make guesses based on visuals alone while factoring in the anime’s events.

So, in the previous chapter 12, Code Zero encounter Nakajima, as they do in the anime, though the context differs slightly. It’s more menacing, and Maeda is revealed to be inside one of those vampire unit mechanical suits, already a vampire himself, near mindless. Yamagami is enraged. A fight ensues. Then, the Great Kanto Earthquake occurs, as it does in the anime.

In chapter 13, as you can see, the fight continues, dangerously close to shafts of sunlight; the rest seem trapped by the rubble, unable to get to the two in time. Yamagami sees Maeda shed a tear, and they exchange words, and Yamagami seems determined to save Maeda’s humanity. Yamagami then pushes himself and Maeda into the sunlight. They grin at each other, exchanging more words, as they are both swept up into flames, dying together.

Then more incredible stuff happens in the rest of the chapter, as you can see! We’ll have to wait for the scanlation team to provide us more solid answers.

#mars red #ask #these are just my thoughts and opinions; no one has to agree #my post

7 notes · View notes

shima-draws · 4 years

Text

Hi hello I’m here with (half of) another ridiculously complex crossover AU here we go

Legally Blonde AU where Izuku is a semi-famous actor working part time in his father (Toshinori’s) studio while also going to college and majoring in Theatrical Production. His childhood friend and longtime boyfriend, Bakugou, has been dropping hints for the past few weeks about proposing to Izuku. Izuku, naturally, is absolutely thrilled, and has all the support of his friends and peers.

On the night of their big date, Bakugou breaks up with Izuku, saying that he's not "serious" enough for him, and that he only follows the path that was laid out for him and isn't ambitious enough to suit Bakugou's tastes in a lifelong partner. Bakugou tells Izuku he's going to UA, a famous law school that pumps out graduates that support professional heroes. Izuku is totally devastated, and shuts himself up in his room for weeks, becoming depressed.

After a pep talk from his friends, who are part of the production crew with him (Ashido, Hagakure, and Nejire), Izuku decides that he'll chase Bakugou to UA, and with Tsuyu's help, promptly starts studying for it. After making the cut, Izuku yells at Ashido for sending in a production video of him on set as his personal essay--because that shouldn't count!! Izuku hurriedly calls the admissions office and as they prepare to reject him, he gives an honest speech about love and how important it is for a lawyer to be compassionate and hardworking. He gets accepted!

On the first day of class Izuku bumps into a couple of already accomplished law students--Shinsou, who is extremely hardworking and ambitious despite his background, and Hatsume, a girl who's won tons of awards for her groundbreaking inventions and their contributions to hero society. With them is Todoroki, a recent graduate working as a teacher aid/intern under the infamous Aizawa, one of the most legendary lawyers in their era despite his tendency to only take certain cases for underground heroes. Izuku makes a stumbling, awkward yet somewhat eccentric introduction, and Todoroki is immediately smitten despite sensing that Izuku probably isn't cut out for UA.

Izuku bumps into Bakugou before their first class, and pretends that he forgot that Bakugou also attends UA. In their first class Aizawa ruthlessly weeds out the weaker students and intimidates the hell out of them by quizzing them with difficult cases. Aizawa tells them that he has a very big internship every year that accepts four students--and they're practically guaranteed a job after graduation. Izuku is called out for not having done the reading before class, and Yaoyorozu, an upper class, somewhat prissy girl, suggests that he be kicked out of the lecture hall.

Todoroki sneaks out during the lecture and comforts Izuku, saying that he'd been kicked out of class before too, and suggesting that Izuku study properly so he can be prepared next time. Yaoyorozu comes out next and Izuku confronts her about what she'd said, and she truthfully states that he has no place at UA if he's not willing to dedicate himself to it fully--that everyone else had gotten there through hard work and WANTED to be there, seeming to know that Izuku had made it in with different intentions. She idly wonders if Izuku's even capable of studying with that fluffy head of his (it's not meant to be an overly rude comment but Izuku takes it that way). Izuku's heart shatters when he realizes that Bakugou and Yaoyorozu are dating, because apparently they’d interned together before over the summer and Bakugou had been impressed by her intelligence and ambition. Izuku is encouraged by an imaginary production crew of his friends. Izuku decides if he's going to be serious he needs to start off by shaving his head LOL because according to Yaomomo it's the scruffy hair that's one of the big obstacles of winning Bakugou back.

Izuku swings by a salon and meets Uraraka--who immediately discourages him from getting a buzzcut, saying "Those fluffy locks of yours are a godsend and you should NOT sacrifice them to look like a military trainee. Trust me." Uraraka gives him a huge pep talk while also sharing her past failed romances, wishing she can find an athletic guy to be happy with, and encourages Izuku to go after love while he still has the chance, as himself. After that, Yaomomo happens to walk in with Jirou, and the two of them discuss a party they're going to at the end of the week. Izuku shyly asks if he can come. Jirou whispers to Yaomomo to tell him it's a costume party, which she does. Uraraka excitedly says she has the perfect thing for Izuku to wear.

At the party, everyone is dressed business casual. Izuku comes in wearing a slutty bunny outfit and is immediately humiliated. (Yaomomo feels kinda bad esp since she didn't really think he'd dress up--and definitely not like THIS.) Izuku steels his nerves and flirts with Bakugou, who is like "Why the hell didn't you wear this kinda shit while we were dating" and Izuku slyly says, "Well, you never asked, did you?" Bakugou reminisces a bit on their childhood and Izuku says they can go back to the way things were. Bakugou calls him out for saying so, especially given how he looks right now, and at this rate he'll be lucky to even make it through the semester, let alone get Aizawa's internship, which Izuku apparently wants to do despite not having any real conviction. Yaomomo steps in and Izuku snaps at her for the false costume party tip. Yaomomo suggests he leaves before he embarrasses himself further and brings shame to their class. Izuku says his costume was inspired by Usagiyama, a famous hero, and asks if she's an embarrassment too? The whole party gangs up on Yaomomo as Izuku leaves in tears.

Todoroki finds him on a bench outside wearing a very suggestive costume, freezing his ass off, miserable, and crying. Todoroki asks him why he came to UA in the first place--and Izuku reveals his full story with Bakugou. Todoroki lends Izuku his sweatshirt and says he can't feel sorry for him because he'd grown up in worse circumstances--his mother left his father when he was young, leading them to a life of near poverty, and that he's been struggling to support them both. His goal is to become a successful lawyer that can support honest heroes, and buy a house that his mother can live in comfortably. And, most importantly--win a case against his father to protect the both of them for good. Izuku thinks that's very sweet--but it kind of seems like Todoroki has a chip on his shoulder...and Todoroki says he does, and that he's going to take advantage of every opportunity he's given and work as hard as hell to become successful, and not just for himself. He's had to work two jobs on top of having class just to make it this far. Izuku asks how he does it--Todoroki tells him that he works nonstop and doesn't take the time to break, have parties, or spend hours distracting himself with films or theatrical productions. (Izuku feels a bit guilty at this LMAO) Izuku asks if Todoroki's willing to help him out--and Todoroki, strangely enough, agrees to do so.

Todoroki escorts Izuku back to his dorm, and notices that Izuku has barely touched his law books. Izuku admits it's been hard for him to really get into it, because coming from a theater/film background means that all of his studies are practical and on hand, and not from a book. Todoroki says he needs to get over that--and starts throwing out all of Izuku's posters and theater memorabilia. Izuku FREAKS LOL and Todoroki's like "You need to remove all distractions if you want to do this right".

I will write the rest tomorrow if enough of ya’ll wanna read the rest...LOL SORRY I’m so wiped out I gotta go to bed but anyway yes. Fun AU idea. I’m a slut for Tododeku crossovers apparently, ESPECIALLY this one because Elle and Emmett’s romance? Soft AND God Tier

#BNHA #Legally Blonde #Crossover #Tododeku #Bakudeku #Bakugou Katsuki #Midoriya Izuku #Todoroki Shouto #Yaoyorozu Momo #MHA #My Hero Academia #Boku no Hero Academia #Aizawa Shouta #Uraraka Ochako #Long post #Shima's AUs #Legally Blonde AU #Shima speaks #I love this AU I WILL write it thanks goodnight

528 notes · View notes

skullsandwineglasses · 3 years

Text

Arsenal Military Academy (First Impressions - Eps 1-13)

I’m about a quarter of the way through, but I’m really enjoying it so far. The premise is simple: a 19-year old young woman disguises herself as her deceased brother and enrolls in the military academy. Like most dramas that take place during the pre-modern republican era, the main conflict and antagonist is usually about the threat of Japanese occupation.

But this drama is more light-hearted than serious. The Japanese plot line looms in the background, but the main focus (so far) is about the FL’s training at the academy and the missions that the students go on and their interactions with each other. There are some really good comedic moments, and the drama has good pacing.

The Female Lead - Xie Xiang (played by Bai Lu)

I’m going to be making comparisons to The Legends because the reason why I started this drama was to see Bai Lu and Xu Kai again. I know these two dramas are completely difference so it’s not fair to compare them, but I’m going to be talking about these differences.

Xie Xiang is a watchable FL, but I think she’s missing that spark that would make her a memorable FL. She’s not as physically capable as her male counterparts, but she has the perseverance, wits, and martial arts skills that many of her peers lack. It’s a really standard character profile for a cross-dressing FL in a military academy, and tbh, it’s kind of boring. I’m not sure what would help elevate her character more, but it just feels like something’s missing.

In comparison, the second FL has that spark. She’s more layered. She comes from a middle-class, well-to-do family, but chooses to be an entertainer. She’s arrogant, demanding, high maintenance, but she’s also protective of her friends and doesn’t hesitate to stand up to things she thinks is wrong. She’s a haughty firecracker, but what makes her admirable is how she isn’t afraid to be herself. I think it’s an interesting balance for a character to be obnoxiously full of themselves, but to also care about others. She’s probably the first SFL that I actually enjoy watching (even if she might be a potential love rival to the FL).

The Male Lead - Gu Yanzhen (played by Xu Kai)

Speaking of someone who is obnoxiously full of themselves but still has the capacity to care for others, the ML is exactly this. In this drama, Xu Kai plays a character who is nearly the opposite of the character he played in The Legends. Here, Gu Yanzhen is a cheeky, mischievous, spoiled rich kid who loves flirting with women and causing trouble. He’s like an overgrown child (like when he’s jealous and purposely gets himself sick so that Xie Xiang would take care of him), but when he wants to do, he’s also able to show high levels of competence, maturity, and bravery.

Xu Kai really stands out in this drama. He’s quite charming and adorable because he’s allowed to be more expressive. He mopes, teases, complains, smirks, worries, and yearns. Despite playing a noble, self-sacrificing, and devoted ML in The Legends, Xu Kai didn’t completely win me over then. Mostly because his character was a bit flat and so overdone in the xianxia genre. But seeing a different side of his acting in AMA has made him grow on me.

It’s almost as if Xu Kai and Bai Lu switched personalities in this drama where he’s more outgoing, while she’s more reserved. He’s now the loud and impulsive one, while she’s the more conscientious one who wants to do something meaningful.

The Chemistry

So far it’s been very one-sided. Gu Yanzhen figures out that she’s a girl early on and falls for her, while she still finds him intolerably annoying and is instead crushing on the second male lead. Because she doesn’t want to have anything to do with him, the chemistry is kind of lacking. If I hadn’t watched The Legends beforehand, I’m not sure if I would be onboard with this ship.

The story is currently purposely set up so that we see that the ML and SFL are more compatible, and the FL and SFL are more compatible. Gu Yanzhen and the SFL are practically the same person, and they have a lot of playful bantering, so it’s kind of hard not to ship them. But I’m curious to see when the switch happens. We see that Xie Xiang is starting to slightly warm up to Gu Yanzhen, but Gu Yanzhen needs to mature a bit more before she changes her opinion of him.

I’m also living for these stories where he figures out her true identity before everyone else and tries to help her protect her secret, but she’s completely clueless to it. The same things happened in The Legends, and the dynamic repeats itself here.

The second ML is portrayed as being a perfect character. Mature, clever, kind, caring, righteous. It’s hard not to like him. I’m wondering if he already knows that Xie Xiang is a girl because of his glances, or if that’s because the director was purposely trying to make it ambiguous. At least at this point, he seems to be the best match for the FL, even though he currently likes his former classmate, who is actually working for the Japanese.

The Plot

I like how there are a lot of intersecting characters, which helps expands the fictional world. The peripheral characters all somehow relate back to the main leads, so you can’t really skip their scenes because their stories connect somehow.

The colour-grading, costuming, sets, and OST also help immerse you into the era.

Despite being have a simple and stereotypical premise, it’s not easy to predict the endgame of the drama. You know that at some point, Xie Xiang’s identity will be revealed, but then what? After that point, the plot is going to take a turn because it’ll need a new conflict, which will be probably related to the Japanese, but you’re not sure what yet. The drama feels refreshing so far, but I also haven’t watched too many republican era dramas, so it’s not hard to impress me.

Other anachronistic observations

In episode 1, when Xie Xiang uses the women’s restroom while dressed as a man and runs into the second FL (Qu Manting), Manting accuses her of trying to take pictures of her and demands that Xie Xiang take out her camera and delete/destroy the photos. It’s a minor point, but cameras in those days were huge and thus hard to hide, so it should have been obvious that Xie Xiang didn’t have a camera on her.

In a later episode, Xie Xiang struggles to complete the obstacle course because she’s unwell, and while it’s not explicitly stated, I think we’re supposed to assume that it’s because of period cramps, and I applaud the drama for implying this (but it would have been even better if they made the implication more explicit). But ever since the drama started, I wondered about this. Even if someone didn’t have period cramps, how would you hide menstruation while living in the same room with someone? TMI, but when I was living with 4 other girls during uni, the garbage can in our bathroom would be filled with sanitary products during the same week every month. Women back then didn’t have the same sanitary products as we do now, but they still had to scrub and change cloths, like my mom did when she was younger. So realistically, Xie Xiang would have had to spend long periods of time (no pun intended) in the washroom to scrub her cloths. And after she did so, where did she dry them?

Anyway, those are minor points. Overall, this drama is a fun watch, and I’m thankful that Xu Kai and Bai Lu got to collaborate again before the fandoms made things awkward as they do with any rumoured CP (*cough cough* Deng Lun and Yang Zi, and Cheng Yi and Yuan Bingyan). It’s as though the more chemistry two people have together in a drama, the less likely they’ll collaborate again because the fandoms will start to hate each other due to some misunderstanding and/or company management. The irony. So I guess the goal is to have low, platonic chemistry so that you don’t become enemies so as to leave the door open for future collaboration opportunities. Sorry, so that was bitter and a bit off tangent. I just have a lot of thoughts about the toxicity of fandom culture.

#arsenal military academy #烈火军校 #xu kai #bai lu #cdrama #白鹿 #许凯 #cdrama review #cdrama impressions #the legends

6 notes · View notes

dailyexo · 4 years

Text

[INTERVIEW] EXO - 191213 Billboard: “EXO Talk 'Obsession’ Album & Future: 'I Hope that the Name of EXO Can Grow’”

"It’s been seven years since EXO arrived with 2012's MAMA EP, and since then the boy band has spent much of its time atop of the South Korean music scene, with hits like 2013’s “Growl" and 2015’s “Love Me Right” setting them up as a dominant act throughout much of Asia. Last month, they unveiled their sixth LP, Obsession, ending the year -- and the decade -- with both a new sound and a hint towards what the future will bring for the men of EXO.

Fronted by a lead single also dubbed “Obsession,” the 10-track album is bookended by Korean and Chinese versions of the song, which turns the group towards hip-hop-inspired sampling and an intense Auto-tuning, blending their more typical R&B and electro-pop styling with musical elements that at first seem anachronistic and jarring. But it’s the perfect way to set up the story they’re trying to tell.

For EXO, the majority of their musical releases have been tied into fictive narratives revolving around the members and fantastical, sci-fi plot lines, ranging from the extraterrestrial to the supernatural. For Obsession, which peaked at No. 198 on the Billboard 200 chart dated Dec. 14, EXO presented oppositional sides to themselves through a series of teaser images and videos ahead of the album’s release, setting up an epic battle between EXO and their X-EXO clones, which played out in the music video for their single. The song’s apparent disjointment on first listen is meant to go alongside the visual elements, representing a dialogue between the two warring parties.

“Honestly, when we look into a song we think about what kind of performance will work and whether a song will fit the kind of performance we want to put on,” Kai tells Billboard. “So when we heard this song, we thought it was a really good fit in the sense that for the Auto-Tune it matched the idea of the two different EXOs, EXO and X-EXO. The Auto-Tune kind of gives us the vibe of communication between the two different parties having a conversation, so it was a very specific move that we took.” He said he thinks EXO will win the fight, eventually, “Because anytime you watch a movie or read a comic the hero does win. X-EXO is temporary so they’re going to disappear anyway.”

The idea behind the storylines that EXO utilizes to promote their music is to better get their music across to fans -- known collectively as EXO-L -- and also to better relay content in the age of digital media, where visuals are just as important as audio elements. It’s been something the group has been utilizing since their earliest days, and each member has supernatural powers associated with them that often are featured in their branding. “We’re not just a group that sings and dances,” says Chanyeol. “For people watching us, of course they know the storylines are fake. But like watching a movie, it's another way for people to fall for us more deeply. It gives people a back story about how we were formed. Our storyline isn't just incorporated into our music or videos, but it's incorporated really well into our concerts as well. We do feel that it really allows people to become properly immersed.”

Kai and Chanyeol are two of six EXO members that participated in the album, alongside Baekhyun, Chen, Sehun, and Suho, following the enlistment of Xiumin and D.O. in South Korea’s military, fulfilling the country’s mandatory draft requirements, and Lay focusing on a solo career in China. The six other members are expected to similarly enlist and take temporary hiatuses from the industry in the near future.

The new dynamic has given EXO’s members opportunities to explore different sides of themselves, and Chanyeol says that it’s also opened their eyes to how they work together and cover for one another in case of any issues. Each member "has to pull their weight so whether in singing or dance, there are parts that won’t be hidden,” he says. “It would be a really big problem [if we made a mistake] because it would be really obvious.” For Suho, who is EXO’s leader, the diminishing numbers makes him reflective. “The fact that we’re unable to perform with all the members is a little bit sad, so when we look at old videos we do feel like, ‘Oh, there are a lot of members in the group’ and we’d like to come together as a full group.”

As all able-bodied South Korean men are expected to take time off from their lives to fulfill the country’s draft requirements, EXO knows it will be seeing more such changes in the near future, and the act will likely not look the way it once did for sometime. But rather than dwell on the past, the men of EXO are looking towards the future, and 2019 saw many of them work on alternative projects, where it was releasing solo music, such as Chen, Baekhyun, Xiumin, and D.O., or working with new units, like Sehun and Chanyeol’s EXO-SC and Baekhyun and Kai in SuperM, along with numerous other professional activities. “We’ve received so much love for our units and solo projects, but at the end of the day the most important thing is the team and group’s performances,” says Baekhyun. “The fact that we’re able to show all these different sides to us also allows us to show different sides of EXO as a group and show how diverse we are, and how each of us have our own talents.”

When asked how they feel about their career over the past decade and what they hope for the future, Chanyeol responds that the members of EXO feel that they’re focusing on the present and facing each moment on its own. “To be honest, when we do interviews when we’re working we realize that as a group we’ve become very comfortable. Rather than us having to go out of our way to go do something, it’s become very natural for us. It’s grown with time and come naturally, this sense of maturity.”

Though EXO and X-EXO battle it out over the Obsession album, the duality of the release is also reflected in the members’ struggles to explore their identities as individuals beyond the act: how to be both a member of EXO and a man in his own right. As EXO have grown in their career, they have also grown up: youngest member Sehun debuted as a teenager but is now 25-years-old. Unfortunately ill on the day of the interview, he was silent throughout much of the discussion and his health hung over the act like a cloud, with frequent references to how, as they get older, they need to take care of themselves better. “These days, seeing that our physical health is part of our workload, I feel that a healthy life, health in general, is very important,” says Baekhyun. “Rather than thinking about more of what we can do to grow as a group, I feel that we all have begun to focus on seeking individual happiness. Right now, a lot of our focus is on how each person is able to find their own happiness and health, and use that when we come together as a group to move in the right direction.”

Suho echoes this, saying that their branching out as individuals beyond the group is a way to take care of themselves as individuals after years of focusing on the collective well-being. “In the past, EXO’s schedule didn’t allow a lot of individual talents to be focused on but starting from the beginning of this year we were given the time to really focus on ourselves, whether it was internally or externally. It’s not just us as a group, but I think everybody needs that kind of self-care. It was good for everybody.”

Even as they focus on themselves, the group is still the focal point of EXO’s identity. “We came together, got very close, and without the passion that we had as a group I don’t think we would have made it as far as we have come,” reflects Baekhyun. “When it comes to being satisfied, as people I think that we’re never 100% satisfied.” This passion towards improving and always seeking something closer and closer to perfection, but recognizing that is impossible and that there is always something more to be done, is emphasized by the members’ responses when asked what their obsessions are: Kai says he’s a workaholic, and Chanyeol says his competitive nature is to the degree that it could be considered an obsession. (Meanwhile, Baekhyun’s obsessed with games, and Kai jokes that Sehun is obsessed with alcohol, as it is well-known he’s one of the group’s members who enjoys drinking.)

One place where Chanyeol at the very least is satisfied in is EXO’s music. “When it comes to our music, I’m 100% confident that we release quality music,” he says with pride. “It’s almost like we’re not following trends but we don’t fall back behind either.” He and Sehun tried to push their artistic side in a new direction with EXO-SC’s What a Life EP in July, and there was a bit of a negative response from some fans over the title song’s music video, which featured the pair partying it up with female dancers. But he says it’s all good, as there’s no moving forward without trying new things, and it’s always good to hear differing opinions. “We wanted to do something drastically different. You could say it was so completely different from what EXO typically releases. It was a very dramatic challenge for us, and even though there was some backlash from fans, for me personally it was a big motivating factor, that I need to show more new sides and that there are many new challenges to take on.”

It’s important to EXO that their audience takes in all the different sides to themselves that they have to offer, and Chen says he hopes that listeners recognize that there’s a difference between an artist releasing a single and an album. “If you listen to the whole album beyond ‘Obsession,’ you’ll recognize that all of the songs are good,” he says; his personal favorite is “Groove.” “I feel that there is a tendency that people just listen to the title track, but it would be really great if people can listen to the whole album because every song is really great.”

Moving forward, EXO knows they’re shifting into a new era of their career, but they express a desire to always remain as one. “I hope that EXO is able to continue just the way it does right now, but beyond the group I hope that each individual member is able to find his own happiness,” says Baekhyun. “We may not go on music performance shows all the time in 10 years, but we hope that we can release albums here and there. In that we can all live our own lives and come together, happily, as a group.” He pauses, and adds with a wry expression, “I think that in 10 years, hopefully we’ll be able to release something like a ballad or an R&B-heavy song where we can just stand around rather than dance.” Other members quickly jump in and refute this though. “That’s not EXO’s thoughts, that’s Baekhyun’s thoughts,” Sehun says with a laugh, while Chanyeol adds that he hopes EXO is “a very cool group” 10 years down the road; Kai adds that he would like to continue dancing as long as his body allows for it.

“As time passes, like our members, our fans are going to start pursuing their own lives as well,” says Kai. “As they fall into their own lives, when they suddenly have a thought of EXO, I hope that one thought that comes to their mind is, ‘It was a really good memory being their fan.’” Suho echoes this, repeating “A good memory” in English with a nod of his head. Baekhyun agrees with this desire for their time together with fans to be thought of warmly, but follows up with the suggestion that the idea of being a memory, while heartwarming, is limiting. “I really hope that we aren’t a group that is remembered as a group that’s part of the past, because when you think of that you think about these groups that don’t really promote and they don’t really do anything as a team. I hope that, whether individually or as a group, we continue to promote and that the name of EXO can continue to grow.”"

Photo links: 1

Credit: Billboard.

#EXO #EXO K #EXO M #191213 #exo im #exo k im #exo m im #p:news #t:news #fs:billboard #comeback:Obsession

367 notes · View notes