#because. no one else’s arc really works with that and Sasha would have. she would have had the Btock parallels | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

mdhwrites · 7 months

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What do you think about Anne’s, Marcy’s, and Sasha’s jobs in The Hardest Thing epilogue? Was it a good addition to their characters’ arcs? Something nice to make the audience catch up with the Calamity Trio as adults? Or a mix of both?

I know a billion people have said this but they're great. Honestly, while Sasha's is the most blatantly different than you'd expect, to the point where even the show acknowledges she's a therapist now because of all she had to work through, Anne is just so pitch perfect. Even better is that the show knows how to frame it to make it both blunt and subtle.

See, the obvious thing with Anne is that it's her still connecting with her old family. A full circle with her having hated frogs at the beginning of the show. That's all true but I actually want to focus more on HOW she decided to do that. If they just wanted that angle and potentially reinforce her desire to go back, she could have just been a researcher. She extends her eventual interest in the world of Amphibia to now be about the amphibians of our world and keep that focus tighter.

But she works at an Aquarium and is not just a herpetologist but also a tour guide. 'Miss Frog Lady' as she's called. This is an external facing job and she probably doesn't get to study as much as something like a wildlife research position would allow her. I doubt Anne minds though because this allows her to better pass on the lessons she learned from Amphibia's people rather than just reminisce about the past. She gets to open up kid's eyes to looking at their world with wonder. Allows people different viewpoints on things than they might normally consider. Hell, I bet you she's gotten in trouble at least once for focusing too much on getting the kids who show up in her branch of the building from squabbling than her job.

Sasha honestly has layers of that sort too. A therapist has a very complex job with their clients. On the one hand, they are in total control because the client puts a lot of trust into them. A therapist will likely know more about a person than anyone else in their life just because they need such a deep look into the person's psyche to be able to help them. However, a therapist can't really use this control. They have to work with their client to help them heal. Their job is to help you be you after all, not to be the version of you that they want you to be.

It's kind of why therapy and mental health services are so often demonized and corrupted in media because it's an easy place to be vulnerable. *sigh* But that's also why it's nice that an ex-villain is jubilantly just trying to help. It feels like an inversion of the trope while also being sincere and completely natural. And yeah, like the show said: She had a lot of her own issues to deal with and now she's passing her lessons forward.

Marcy is honestly the only one who isn't passing lessons forward but it makes sense since she doesn't have an arc in the show. Her one mistake in the entire show was being a scared, lonely girl who just didn't want to lose her friends, even though she already knew those friends weren't great to her. They didn't try to really connect with her or her interests. Really figure out how she ticked until Amphibia by how it seems, especially Sasha.

FORTUNATELY this is actually what the show pulls on for the through line to her new job. Having been an architect, we already knew she had some strong artistic ability. We even get to see cute drawings from her from time to time like on her wagon. So her drawing skill and love for art doesn't come out of nowhere and with how she already has a mind constantly crafting new worlds for her to want to explore and the like, her being an artist is great.

Her being an independent webcomic artist... Is even fucking better. She could have been in industry and that would have worked but as an independent, we know she had to form a community around her. She had to find those who connected with her work herself rather than someone else being able to do the work for her. As a content creator myself, it's actually the thing I struggle with most. More people nowadays follow me for my analysis than they do my writing and even then, not for my general writing lessons without it being tied to something else.

Being able to believe Marcy found that community though and flourished? It's perhaps the best possible fate for the girl who began the series so alone.

So yeah, just top notch and it's part of why the epilogue is so incredibly satisfying.

++++++=====++++++

I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead. If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

And finally a Twitter you can follow too!

#Amphibia #marcy wu #sasha waybright #anne boonchuy

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ecoamerica · 22 days

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Watch the American Climate Leadership Awards 2024 now: https://youtu.be/bWiW4Rp8vF0?feature=shared

The American Climate Leadership Awards 2024 broadcast recording is now available on ecoAmerica's YouTube channel for viewers to be inspired by active climate leaders. Watch to find out which finalist received the $50,000 grand prize! Hosted by Vanessa Hauc and featuring Bill McKibben and Katharine Hayhoe!

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thekingofwinterblog · 4 months

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Hi, I read a post of yours arguing that Amphibia needed four seasons rather than three to live up to its full potential.

If it was up to you, how would you structure these hypothetical third and fourth seasons? And what arcs would they contain? Would the third season be entirely focused on Anne and the Plantars on Earth, or would it switch back and forth frequently between Anne and Sasha? Would the third season end with Escape to Amphibia, or at another point?

And how would the fourth season be structured? Would it be entirely set in Amphibia, with multiple episodes dedicated to the girls working out their emotional baggage? I know an episode or two with Sasha and Marcy's parents is pretty much a given for you, but what else would you add?

In regards to the third season, i would not add more episodes focusing on Amphibia as a whole, but i would absolutely add way more episodes where Darcy got to flesh their inhuman, robotic chops in the quest to kill anne, as well as having Anne and the plantars learn about this shadowy overlord of Andrias withouth actually learnign the real identity of said person.

As for what i would change i would keep the storyline up to the death of the cloakbot the same, only with more moments where it was made clear that Anne was supressing some major stuff and trauma, as was originally the plan before disney censors butchered it after being pissy about true colors.

After that though, the season should have been about breaking anne down until she finally was forced to confront Marcy's death and Sadha's uncertain fate head on... Which i would have be in the form of coming face to face with one of the two others parents.

Its also here i would have begun exploring Sasha and Marcy's homelife by having Anne react in shock to their parents far different reaction than hers. Also im just going to say now, the following ia how i would have written Sasha and marcy's parents.

Sasha's dad is the only one who seemingly directly gives a shit about his kid, but not in the desperate way Anne's parents did, more in the sense he's just relieved Sasha is doing fine, and she'll come home or not as she as she will.

That should have been an enormous wakeup call for Anne, who has been thinking about this from the same angle as hers, not really understanding anne and Sasha's households, and through them, not truly understanding either of them.

But still, she seeks out both mrs waybright and the Wu parents, hoping to see some of the parental love missing in mr waybright, only to discover to her horror that it was actually the other way around, because while mr waybright has given up on his relationahip with his daughter, he still cares.

Mrs waybright genuinely does not. At all. She left Sasha behind long ago, and never looked back.

As for mr and mrs wu, we dont need a full breakdown of their relationahip with Marcy during this season, as the revelation they chose to leave the city and marcy, behind, speaks more than any confrontation between them and anne ever could.

Have anne really begin to break down as she psychs herself up to tell them their kid is dead... Only for her to discover that they have moved away... This serving as the point where Anne finally has a breakdown, as she realises she never understood either of her best friends, their lives, and seemingly, mr and mrs wu dont care about marcy being alive or dead at all... which in turn is when it sinks in that Marcy DIED.

After this, i would have the following storyline be about Anne beginning to recover mentally, as she stops running from the truth, and begins to regain her confidence and power in full in large part due to support from her two families, climaxing in the return to Amphibia story, ready to face the world she left behind with eagerness and strength... Only to discover a broken, poisoned land.

Commander anne and all it has to offer(reunion with sasha, the new status quo, anne taking over and failing as leader) all takes place over several episodes.

Honestly i would keep pretty much everything amphibia season 3 had to offer, just expand on it, make it longer, and give Darcy a larger role.

As for the big changes, where i would put them depends a lot upon one question.

That being wheter season 4 has sashanne as the winning ship or not.

Personally i very much think this was the original plan before getting told no by disney, but as i dont actually know that, i will present two scenarios.

If sashanne does happen, then it should happen around the halfway mark of season 4. That way you get to explore the juciness of an actual relationship in the aftermath, but also get to use the single most important cut episode from amphibia for that purpose.

Sasha's origin story.

Having Sasha finally open up in full regarding her backstory, how her family fell to pieces and the way it pretty much destroyed her, is pretty much the perfect final stage before a development.

If sashanne does not happen though, then Sasha's backstory and it's placement should be near the very end of the series, right before the finale, and back to back with another, huge important story, which i would have used as the final episode before the climax regardless.

Namely Marcy's backstory episode, where instead of relegating it to a short scene in the three part finale, have an entire episode relegated to explaining Marcy's life, and because its just a flashback, an episode for us, the audience, you dont need to connect it directly to anyone else, the way Sasha telling Anne her background in full needs to serve as a character defining moment.

As for the finale episode themselves, i dont really have many problems with it, other than episode 3 needing a way bigger budget, and the first part needing to stick to a coherent design scheme for Darcy.

The only real change i'd make, would be if Sashanne actually was a thing, where i'd have played that up, but also changed to context of Her and Marxy's talk at the end, where them drifting apart was due to the mundane fact they went to completely different univeraities, and so spent years apart, before coming back together again. It captures the same realities that sometimes you drift apart due to the mundanities of life, only to come back together again, just withouth the massive and inexplicable questions of why Sasha and anne who ended the period pre timeskip seemingly closer than everz only to immediatly drift apart.

#amphibia #anne boonchuy #sasha waybright #marcy wu #sashanne #meta #season 3a #season 3b #season 3 #season 4 #questions and answers

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stromuprisahat · 2 years

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(pt 1) When I watched the episode of Shadow and Bone that gave Aleksander’s backstory, I was really hoping Alina would have a moment at the end of the series that was parallel to Aleksander’s when he accidentally made the Fold (I especially love how Ben Barnes said the “I made something” line and the expression on his face, it really looked like he was already brainstorming tactical advantages he could use the Fold for).

Alina’s concerns and dislike towards the Fold are valid, since the Fold is the reason she became an orphan in the first place. However, I think her reluctance to destroy the Fold and her being kind of overly myopic about that would have been much more interesting if that reluctance was contrasted with her slowly starting to learn more about what the Grisha are going through and how corrupt the monarchy is (I still can’t believe Alina didn’t realize how despotic and useless the monarchy was after hearing Genya’s story, how else could you possibly interpret that). Even if she’s unsure about what the Darkling’s intentions are, it would be interesting to see her have that internal conflict between wanting to help the Grisha but not wanting to use the Fold.

This could have led to a moment where Alina ends up having to expand the Fold in a moment of desperation because many people could die if she doesn’t. For that to work, Alina has to be a protagonist who actively wants to learn things and is empathetic (she also needs a corruption arc). But, Alina is so uninspired and cares for no one except Mal, which not only makes her come across as annoying, but also very unintelligent and I hate it.

I had to send my ask in parts, because it got really long when I wrote it out and I couldn't fit it all in one due to the character limit. I'm sorry if that's inconvenient, but I really wanted to know what you think because I really like your blog, especially all the Grishaverse and Hannibal content.

This is a very long ask (Thanks a lot! <3), so I’ll take it piece by piece:

When I watched the episode of Shadow and Bone that gave Aleksander’s backstory, I was really hoping Alina would have a moment at the end of the series that was parallel to Aleksander’s when he accidentally made the Fold

We already have a parallel, although not a fair one. In the first episode, the creators had Alina intentionally destroy important military maps, so she can cross the Fold with Mal. The similar parts are Darklina both did something horrible that got out of hand.

The differences are greater: Aleksander’s loved one was murdered right in front of him, his mother and people were in mortal peril. If he succeeded, he’d have a weapon to protect them all. Malyen was in danger, but he wasn’t targeted by anyone. Alina not thinking through the severity of the impact of her actions cannot be compared with being cornered to use mythical power one doesn’t fully understand to live to see another day.

From storyteller’s POV, it doesn’t make sense to add character-building scenes that will never be brought up again in any way. Alina wasn’t confronted about her reckless crime- let’s be honest, she’d be executed if anyone knew. Aleksander was painted as a desperate protector, yet the remainder of the season treated him as villain, that needs to be stopped.

I especially love how Ben Barnes said the “I made something” line and the expression on his face, it really looked like he was already brainstorming tactical advantages he could use the Fold for

He totally was.

Plus I’d add some fascination, because Sasha is a curious creature.

Alina’s concerns and dislike towards the Fold are valid, since the Fold is the reason she became an orphan in the first place.

I wouldn’t say so. It might be direct reason, but not the original one.

The Fold is like a great ocean full of beasts, or lava field. It’s dangerous if you wanna get on the other side. It won’t actively chase you around. If Alina’s parents didn’t go there, they would still live, so to find out, what killed them, we need to continue, and ask why would they risk going into such a dangerous place?

Now, show came up with whole new plotline, that probably answers that. Alina comes from mixed marriage. Shu aren’t exactly well-loved in Ravka and- no matter, what the show wants us to see- understandably so. We can safely assume Alina’s mother wasn’t accepted better than her daughter, and Alina’s parents might’ve thought moving West would help them find safer place to live in.

But even racism isn’t the real villain here. That’s a consequence of another problem. Why do Ravkans distrust Shu? Because they’re at war for over a century. Conflict this long means there would be milder times and worse ones. The books tell us there are disputable areas, claimed by either of these countries through the centuries. That means cycles of (relative) peace, when both nations cohabit and mingle, and more turbulent times, when love among them is scarce.

This just happens to be one of the worse times in Ravkan-Shu relations, when Shu feel Ravka’s weaker and weaker, so they’re raiding, murdering and kidnapping... and their ordinary people on the wrong side of the border pay for it.

“You murdered my parents.” is just a sentiment of a hurt child, not a statement of adult with critical thinking. But the writers don’t want the heroine to consider wider implications. She might hate wars and realize her “enemy” has a point.

However, I think her reluctance [not]??? to destroy the Fold and her being kind of overly myopic about that would have been much more interesting if that reluctance was contrasted with her slowly starting to learn more about what the Grisha are going through and how corrupt the monarchy is (I still can’t believe Alina didn’t realize how despotic and useless the monarchy was after hearing Genya’s story, how else could you possibly interpret that). Even if she’s unsure about what the Darkling’s intentions are, it would be interesting to see her have that internal conflict between wanting to help the Grisha but not wanting to use the Fold.

One of the saddest aspects of the show are these cool, or interesting statements that just don’t correspond with the plot. One of those is Alina telling Aleksander she wants to make the world better place for Grisha before their first kiss. Or her saying she’ll come back to help Ravka, when she’s stronger or whatever. The moment her oponent’s presumed dead and nothing stands between her and her return to Os Alta, the only place, where she knows she could learn...

The whole situation is badly handled. The show seems as anti-Grisha as the books, except less showy (LOL).

We don’t see the horrors Grisha have to face. Nina’s a spy kidnapped by enemy forces. That’s occupational hazard, not state-organized genocide.

The heroine is a victim of anti-Shu sentiments. There’s also some war with those. Now imagine, if she met Shu Grisha refugees, saved from one of their laboratories.

Grisha are painted as privileged upper class. They’re arrogant chauvinists and show offs.

Second army constitutes of incompetent fools, canon fodder in fancy clothes.

People are running away from draft to Second Army, not joining for safety offered by the Darkling.

The fact finding a Heartrender in Katterdam is hard because they’re virtually slaves, is conveniently glossed over.

The only people we see at least talk about the real state of things are either unsympathetic- Ivan contradicting Alina’s speech about struggle-, or straight up villains justifying their unforgivable actions against the heroine- Aleksander.

Eight episodes, extra (feeble) Crows plotline and five meadow scenes also mean we never really see Alina live in Little Palace or interact with other Grisha. There’s no confrontation with the Grand Palace luxury. The scenes, where Alina’s painting pictures of Grisha living freely among other Ravkans doesn’t make it look like any of that happened off the camera. It’s even more obvious she lived in her own bubble, when she was in Little Palace.

Genya’s story is presented, when Alina’s full of self-righteous fury and the viewer isn’t supposed to pay it more attention than Alina herself. Or blame it on the Darkling the way everything’s “solved” (in the books).

So yes, it would be nice, if her desire to do something for others wasn’t just empty statement, before she smooches the hot, yearning idealist.

This could have led to a moment where Alina ends up having to expand the Fold in a moment of desperation because many people could die if she doesn’t.

Now, we’re getting a little out of hand. Alina might be powerful, but it should take time, before her skills get on level of (at least) decades old immortal. No matter how much books ignore that little detail. But I understand the sentiment. If we want to pretend the Darkling’s wrong, Alina should face similar situation and solve it better.

For that to work, Alina has to be a protagonist who actively wants to learn things and is empathetic (she also needs a corruption arc). But, Alina is so uninspired and cares for no one except Mal, which not only makes her come across as annoying, but also very unintelligent and I hate it.

I don’t think corruption arc is necessary. She doesn’t need to become “morally weak”, quite contrary- becoming more self-aware and realistic would mean becoming morally better person. I’d say it’s worse to sit by idly, than decide, who will live when you’d want all to survive. One of those will certainly end up with everyone dead. Mistakes are inevitable, but inaction inexcusable.

Grishaverse is a horrible place for Grisha. It’s not exactly nice to “ordinary people” either. Wars are paid by lives of innocents, want it or not. Fighting them isn’t about saving everyone, but managing losses untill you find a way to make the other side stop.

The problem with show!Alina is relative inconsistency. Book!Alina doesn’t give a flying fuck about Ravka or Grisha in the whole first book. Her only concern is Mal and her own comfort.

Show!Alina’s seemingly more active insider her story. She talks about using her newfound influence, she initiates her relationship with Aleksander, she seems to enjoy her time in Little Palace, especially once she “accepts” she’s Grisha... so we expect her to continue that way. Instead she follows Baghra, the Cockblocker, and disappears without a real plan to do anything. When she conveniently stumbles over Mal, she decides to go after the Stag, but what then?

The only logical way forward would be to confront the Darkling, but when that happens, it isn’t on her terms, so she’s not really interested in any sort of conversation. If she really cared about anything but her own hurt, she wouldn’t blindly defy the Darkling and disappear for no reason at all. Show!Alina’s a hypocrite, because she claims she cares, but her actions say it’s only about herself and Mal.

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casswithmywholeheart · 2 years

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You know in your art showing Sasha's thoughts during Reunion when forcing Anne to not go to her parents' party for her birthday, I find it even sadder she doesn't even consider trying to hang out with Marcy without Anne, as in Sasha deep down thinking Anne's what holds her and Marcy together.

Yep. But mostly, in my opinion, it's because of the very significance that Anne as a person holds to Sasha, apart from other matters like her relationship with marcy. It is true that anne links them altogether but more than that, Anne just simply means so much to Sasha to the point where hanging out with marcy rather than with anne could never be an option.

When Anne is not available, Marcy would of course be her next option to spend time with, and i actually do believe those two would have hung out together a plenty of times without anne in such cases, but the reason i didnt make them hang out was because I wanted to focus solely on sashanne and sasha's character.

As much as i ship S and M, it's a huge key component of sasha's character that she has an extra strong emotional bond with Anne incomparable to anybody. Marcy is also a special one who sasha cares for and loves but i say the emotional depth Sasha has towards Anne is fundamentally different from the root. As in the comic, she NEEDS anne just like we need air and the fish need water. She needs her to stick around with her all the time, she needs her to accompany her, and she needs anne to always be by her side no matter what - which is, the most basic but the most immature form of love in my opinion. But pre-amph sasha didnt know how to express love in a proper way nor did know how to ask someone for love. In order to have Anne always stick around with her, she had to control her. She had to control every single situation when she was with anne and control everything about her as charismatically and strongly as she could; or else anne wouldn't be with her. Or else I can't make anne stay with me- that's what she thought. She needed anne so much but was afraid she didn't know how to make Anne stay with her, and the only way young sasha coud think of that would work was coercing and forcing and therefore controlling her friend's actions. Possibily the only thing she ever experienced in her household.

So all the forcings and controllings and End Of Discussions in Reunion, all those words and actions, one by one, felt like a desperate cry for help to me. All I could hear from those scenes were, help, i am lonely. I need you, Anne. Please stay with me, Anne. I need you more than anything. Don't leave me, please. I don't know how to communicate these feelings to you and i don't know how im supposed to keep you by my side if I'm not controlling and forcing. So please help me, would you? I need you so much.

I don't know how I should make you love me, so all I can do is controlling you so you can always be with me.

It just felt like pure desperation. (Which I love in a character.) That was how i interpreted what, like, 90% of her character was. She was literally a personification of craving for love. These impressions were where i got the idea for this comic back in hiatus when i first finished watching the show until true colors. (took a damn long time to put it into action tho)

Sasha is really a character whose essence is full of insecurity and love. I say roughly 99% of sashas character is composed of gay yearning for Anne (lol) or mostly, just Anne. To sasha, anne is her life; her reason, her motivation, her everything. Throughout the journey she learns how to properly express her love in a healthy way, learning that she herself can be loved and is someone worth of loving even when she's not controlling. As we can see, her whole character arc, from being obsessed with controlling out of insecurity to growing into someone who loves herself enough to know that she doesn't need to control, starts with Anne and is finished with Anne.

So, yes. Marcy is special to her, of course, and she loves her friend Marcy, but the depth of emotions is clearly different with Anne.

#sashanne #my stuff #also sorry for grammar mistakes its 3 in the mornin

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jurygarroth · 1 year

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i just read your post about gene and dante, and it really made me think about them. i really love your ideas about how dante feels about gene, and how he feels as though he's almost haunted by the different versions of his brother. but, it made me wonder how you think gene feels about dante.

do you think gene actually hates dante like he says? or is he apathetic towards him? or maybe it's more complicated?

do you think gene ever cared for dante? and how do you think their relationship would grow (since we only see a little of it in s3)? like if you could come up with an imaginary version of mcd, how would their stories go?

these are just some questions i started to ponder after your post. i found it very thought provoking and i'd love to hear what you think (if you want to share it of course)

yes.. if I think about the MCD Bluebros too hard I start seeing shrimp colors

I think Gene did care for Dante, I like to think he became head guard so that Dante and his family could have a comfortable life. he must have told Dante or otherwise noticeably hinted to him about his plans to make the lord's daughter fall in love with him, and Dante fully knew about Gene's underhanded tactics, so he might have held quite a bit of trust in him. it doesn't cross his mind that his sweet little brother would go against him, because he did everything for his sake after all.

when he found out he snitched on him, I'm sure in that moment he really did hate Dante. dying and becoming a shadow knight just amplified that, because Gene is a shadow knight who embraces his anger and hatred. whatever love he had for Dante before, he sees that Dante doesn't care about him in return, so he turns that on him in a "I dedicated my life to supporting you and you betrayed me, so now you have to feel pain equal to mine" way

(actually isn't it funny how Gene is a dead man walking alive, and after being forgotten it's like Dante is dead to his village and parents too? like they're both ghosts in this world?)

I'd keep pretty much everything from canon because it's honestly my favorite conflict in canon MCD, Gene is one of the shadow knights ever and he's so cruel and resentful and I love that he haunts Dante's narrative and then torments him when he does meet him again. I think seeing Dante have a happy family and community should fuck him up a little. he did what he could to make Dante suffer, but Dante picks himself back up while Gene will never have that support and community with the shadow knights, and that pisses him off. I want Gene to stay loyal to Shad because someone's gotta do it while every other shadow knight defects, but his frustration builds from Shad's constant demands and the knowledge that Dante is learning to move on from his past. he was serving the lord when he was alive as a guard, he was serving Zane when he was involved in the shadow knights' plans, and now he's serving the Shadow Lord, and it gets him rewarded with power but it always feels like shit and he can never seem to escape or change. so he sticks with Shad because there's nothing else to do (and he knows Shad would destroy him if he tried anything funny) up until the endgame where it's clear that Shad is just going to straight up destroy the world, and at that point everything is futile so he'll finally pour out his soul to Dante, and then drop dead ✌️

and throughout this Dante is going to continue his arc of finding new family, growing into the role of the steady, always reliable rock for all of Phoenix Drop, he still feels grief over Gene but he's working through his fear of him. Gene doesn't leave him with any time to tell him if he forgives him or not, but when he buries Gene that decision doesn't matter. when he stands at his grave he doesn't have to be the monster anymore. he's just his brother.

it's not a happy ending for Gene but that's just how I think he would go. I want the tragedy! and I'm planning on pawning off the one shadow-knight-redemption-arc ticket for Sasha, she might not make it in the end either but I think it works better to split their fates like this, you have the shadow knight that wallowed in resent after his perceived betrayal, went too far to go back, and the shadow knight that realizes the truth of her perceived betrayal just in time to turn back from falling into that fate

#mcd #court in session #my final message: they need last names #testimonies

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d-lissa · 11 months

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Liveblogging TMA - Season 2 - MAG 46-49

"He removed the scarf to reveal a branching pattern of white scar tissue arcing up the side of his neck."

LITERARY HEIGHTS :

Michael Crew ! The one from "Page Turner", as well as the guy who gave the Leitner to the library where Sebastian Adekoya "Boneturner's Tale" worked at, thus kicking into gear the events of the statement.

Did Michael trap himself and ... Whatever lightning oddity chasing him, into the Leitner ? Does that mean they weren't the same then ? The Lightning and The Sky weren't always together, but Michael made it so then.

Was Michael aware of the outside, from inside the book ? Did he get killed when the book burned then ?

Or did it ever really burn ?

Still, I am glad that the statement this time finally told us what the book was about. And more about Jurgen Leitner in general, even if more gossip-y than anything else.

Back onto Jonathan and his side of the drama, more Spiders and Webs ! Guess they took advantage of the lack of worms ? The Hive and the Spiders don't get along well, I imagine

I hope Jon will be able to linvestigate the tunnels properly, or set up that camera at least.

THE NEW DOOR :

"Does your hand in any way own your stomach?"

... Don't mind me, just casually losing my fucking mind.

Ok so. More about Michael.

God, poor Helen, this all sounds traumatizing. But why did Michael bring her there before deciding to hunt her down for sport ? She didn't "wander" there, he LED her there ! WHY ?

God, love the sound design, just, Michael and his entire thing, and the doors of course. You really hear the difference between the door of the actual Institute and the door of Michael's domain.

Michael and Jon interacting was so weird though. But a good weird. Michael even starts by telling Jon that Not Sasha is lying to him. Of course, Jonathan is too rathhled that he is even there to hear him, or pay attention to what he's saying, but since this all got caught on tape, here's to hoping Jon will notice it later on.

But more information about oddities ! First off, the way Michael talks about the hallway sounds like it is just a part of himself, and so I have to wonder just how many liminal spaces did we see that were just ... The "stomach" of an oddity we did meet. I had said that maybe it was their home or something, but just a another physical representation of what they are also make sense.

"I am not a “who,” Archivist, I am a “what.” A “who” requires a degree of identity I can’t ever retain."

Bypassing the heartbreaking insinuation that this has, what does that mean for Jonathan, exactly ? Because if Michael is a "what", Jonathan is very much a "who", so why call him "Archivist" as if he didn't have an identity outside of being so ?

Because it's true. Jonathan doesn't have ... Anything in his life, that isn't just being the Archivist.

And the implications are worrying me.

What is the Archivist ?

"I’m normally neutral, yes. But the loss of this place would have unbalanced the struggle too early. I’m keen to see how it progresses."

Ok, so. There are multiple sides to this conflict, which is apparently some kind of war. The Hive is against The Spiders, who stands by The Institute for ... Whatever reason and cling to Jon for some reason. There is the Shifter (to whom I should find a more fitting name asap) who is against no one but just the ones of the table, I think ?

The Lightless Flame/Asag (?) who is maybe with the Hive, but are certainly against the Institute, or at least the Archivist.

And Michael, who doesn't have a real name because real names aren't a thing anyway, who's neutral but leaning toward the Institute for now, until it is time for it to be destroyed ?

And let's not even focus on every other players, here are just the confirmed oddities playing a part in all of this.

I guess this is the end for Helen ? Heartbreaking. I quite liked her, for what little she was there.

... She made a map, didn't she ? Or at least, tried to.

Do you think it could help her escape again ?

LOST IN THE CROWD :

I am ... Not even gonna touch the ending of the episode. I just. I can't.

I am loving the new additions to the story telling though, but like ...

Jon, for fuck's sake, mate. At least be consistent and distrust EVERYONE. Please.

Other than that, it was a nice episode. Similar themes to "Alone", and an intriguing setting.

But again about this "Marked" business. Was Mike marked ? Was Father Burroughs marked ? Was Jane Prentiss ? And so many of the others we met thus far ?

Jonathan seems to think that this was Gerard Keay that warned her, but was it ? The attitude and actually trying to help her made me doubt it, but there is no one else fitting this description, is there ?

All that being said, I am curious about Jonathan's willingness to call Michael a "him", rather than an "it" like Sasha did.

THE BUTCHER'S WINDOW :

Well now Jonathan is doing my job for me. What am I even here for at this point, he made the connections and the references and everything ! So unfair.

Only thing I have to add here is about the end statement and the supplemental.

First things first, Timothy, I love you bicon king, but don't two time people man. Come on.

Next, Not-Sasha does NOT have Sasha's skills and memories and so she avoid suspicion by ... Destroying her comuter ? Amazing plan, totally inocuous. If Jon wasn't so taken by trying to get Elias (which, it's good because I too think he's the one to have killed Gertrude), he'd probably find it suspicious, right ? Please tell me he eventually does, come on.

There is a stranger posing as his best friend, with a voice and face completely different ! I need him to go into the storage room and see the table. Do you think the hole is filled whenever the stranger takes the place of someone ? That could be a nice clue, right ?

Urgh. I'm getting desperate here.

Speaking of the storage room, are you telling me that Elias used to be a very different person before starting to work in the place with cursed object that need you to interact with them to research ? The one with cursed stuff out the wazoo ? The one where an actual oddity was in and managed to take Sasha's place under the nose of everyone ?

... And nobody thought to check if the guy was possessed or some shit ?

Unbelievable. Was there ever any Head of the Institute that wasn't laughably bad at managing its workers ?

No, of course not.

I think that should be all for this post. It isn't very long, and I think I could cram another episode in here, but I feel bad for Marcy, trying to catch up everytime.

The quote of the post will be :

"I wouldn’t wish to tarnish your ignorance prematurely."

End Liveblogging.

#tma #the magnus archive #liveblogging #liveblog-tma

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veryspecialfungus · 1 year

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Donatella. Augustus. Classpects. Please?

How about I just do all the adults in a "Probably Would Actually Die and Be Prototyped But Let's Have Fun" set? Minus Truman because I just honest to god couldn't come up with anything. I tried, I really did, but I just couldn't figure him out.

Also this'll be the last one. I'm not doing the Whispering Rocks kids or the Thorny Towers gang. I honestly struggled with these which tells me I've hit a wall and so I'm calling it here. Highly encourage anyone who wants to do them though.

Donatella: Witch of Blood. Donatella, like all the Aquatos, are all about family and bonds. Donatella's character arc would be about, y'know, using her powers responsibly. Like I feel like Aquatos door is always open, but also they will try to drag you inside if you know what I mean.

Augustus: Heir of Void. I mean, it makes sense right? His entire family structure was based on a big lie, a giant mystery. I sort of conceived this as working in tandem with Donatella. Like Donatella works out the team to go explore the mysteries that Augustus trips over?

Sasha: Knight of Doom. I just think it's high time that Sasha gets out of his lab and uses all his creepy experiments to protect others directly. I picture him having to run a brain under his arm like a football past the consorts who hate/fear him because he's experimented on them. I feel like it'd be so easy to make things harder on himself and so hard to improve them that it would be fun to watch him try.

Milla: Maid of Space. This one was interesting, because it was more like everything else didn't really fit? Maybe Hope would also work, but I feel like commanding space would allow Milla to make the universe into the party she wants it to be? Hopefully she listens to her teammates and doesn't make it TOO excessive.

Coach: Prince of Rage. I don't have a fully formed reason for this one, but I do notice that Coach often diffuses the tension and provides comic relief in certain scenes, and I think he could learn to weaponize this. Also I think it'd be funny to see him in those little shorts so...thematic.

Hollis: Rouge of Time. The ultimate organization project. Hollis needs to trust her own skills to determine where all that time needs to go and how to do it right. It's her true final challenge.

Loboto: Page of Mind. I don't know how else to put this, but Loboto has a lot of things wrong with him, through his own mental makeup and the things that have been done to him, which is a good set up for a Page that needs to tap the potential of something. Rebuilding his rational mind on his own terms would be a good way for him to regain some of things that have been taken from him over the course of his life.

#psychonauts #homestuck #sorry to all my non-homestuck followers #I feel like most homestuck fans spend some amount of time apologizing for homestuck #I guess it's better than explaining it

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pensivetense · 3 years

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IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN. IT SHOILD HAVE BEEN SASHA. LISTEN. LISTEN. IF WHAT EVERYONE IS SUSPECTING ABOUT THE ENDGAME OF RQG IS TRUE IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN SASHA. BECAUSE. BECAUSE SHE WAS THE ONE WHO. BARRETT. AND BROCK. AND. AND. AND THE. AND HER ARC. SASHA.

#listen I like actual play podcasts as well as the next person but #the fact that she was killed off rather than fulfilling what every instinct of mine says SHOULD HAVE BEEN HER ARC #that HURTS me. and not in the good hurt delicious pain kind of way #just in the frustration kind of way #every episode I listen to recently there’s just this giant Sasha-shaped hole in the narrative and it’s driving me nuts #I wish that she had been saved somehow #like. I wouldn’t even mind some story engineering if that’s what it took for her to be alive for all of this #because this is utterly infuriating.#not only with Other London being decimated but with the return of Gragg and Barrett. she should have been around for all that.#but ESPECIALLY. Especially with the brain in a jar.#if someone has to take Babbage’s place and SASHA ISNT THERE TO DO IT #I will LOSE IT #because. no one else’s arc really works with that and Sasha would have. she would have had the Btock parallels #Brock being the kindly ghost in the machine looking out for her despite his sacrifice #and then Sasha would be able to do that for the whole world.#goddamn.#WHY.#okay sorry enough speculation I am Distraught.#rqg spoilers #rqg spoilers like woah

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vyladromeave · 2 years

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HI random question?? is vylad immortal? he doesnt have permanent red eyes (which is said to show immortality in shadow knights, said by vincent) but sasha doesnt have red eyes either? and im like 99% sure that she's immortal AHHH im so confused!!!

Yeah so it 100% depends on your interpretation. Its a whole thing. I personally believe he isn't, but ill go ahead and break it down with all the possibilities and stuff.

•

First of all, You're Right, The whole red eyes = immortality thing isn't consistent with what we learn over the rest of the series. We know for a fact both Sasha and Gene are immortal, as they have both killed their previous Lords, but neither of them have red eyes. Red eyes for Shadowknights within the series is usually reserved for when they enter their Shadowknight form. (We've seen this with Laurance , Vylad, and Zenix. Laurance is not immortal, and Vylad's immortality is. debatable. I don't remember if its ever explicitly stated if Zenix is immortal or not off the top of my head, but I think he is?? It’s at least implied he is. So.)

Lets instead go off of what we know actually gives a Shadowknight their immortality. OPTION 1: They have to kill someone they care about. For guards, this is typically the last Lord they guarded, but it can also be family, or someone else they cared about in life.

OPTION 2: They have to kill a large amount of other innocent people. Keep in mind, its likely this method is not canon/reliable, given it only comes up once, and we are given no functional examples of it within the series. Additionally, Laurance does this during the werewolf wedding arc and yet is still not an immortal Shadowknight, as demonstrated by his difficulties with Aphmau in the S2 finale. I personally don't think this option is canon, but there's nothing saying it isn't, so it really depends on your interpretation of things. (Also I can't find the quote right now but im like 60% sure Vincent is the one who tells us this. And given the whole Red Eyes red herring from earlier, his information isn't reliable within the lore of the series. Also also, if anyone has this line onhand, id love to add it as a screenshot on here?)

•

So, does Vylad fit either of these?

FOR OPTION 1: We have to consider who his potential target he needs to kill would be. Given what Laurance says about this option above, we know that because Vylad was never a guard, his target is likely a family member he cared about while alive. Zane never treated him well while he was alive, so it's definitely not him. An argument could be made that even though Vylad was not a guard, Garte is technically a Lord he was close with in life. I don't think his target is Garte because it seems like Garte did not treat him well either, but its technically an option. Garte's state of being is unknown by the end of S2, but if he is dead it seems pretty certain that Vylad wasn't the one who killed him. So that's a bust.

Zianna and Garroth are the only people we know who he liked while alive, which means his target is probably one of those two. Arguments could be made for either one (I personally believe it's Garroth), but ultimately both of these two are still alive. Meaning, Vylad has not obtained immortality through this option.

•

FOR OPTION 2: This one's a bit harder to judge, given there's a lot of information we don't have solid proof on. We don't know how many people Vylad has killed (although it is implied he has done some bad things in the past, so that number is likely greater than 0 at least), we don't know how many you need to kill to become immortal, and we don't know if this method even works or is currently supported by canon. If you believe that YES, you can obtain immortality through the slaughter of many random innocents, and YES, Vylad has killed a large enough number of innocents in the past that this would work? Then sure, he's immortal. But that's a lot of if's, which means its really up to you and what you believe...

•

But uh...... one last thing....

What do non-immortal Shadowknights do that Immortal ones don't? Well, thats a whole can of worms on its own, given we don't get a lot of consistent information on the topic. But touching on the whole Laurance S2 Finale thing again... We know that the Calling not only is drawing Laurance towards the Nether, it is also making him want to kill Aphmau, his target for obtaining immortality.

Vylad says the Calling is usually only dangerous for newer Shadowknights, but hey, everybody was a newer Shadowknight at some point, right? That, and Vylad doesn't seem to be as good at the whole Shadowknighting thing as he lets on, but thats a point for another time. (I also think its interesting that although Vylad informs Aphmau and Garroth on what the calling is, he conveniently leaves out the part where Laurance feels tempted to kill Aphmau, his target for immortality. Was that on purpose, perhaps? I would feel awkward saying that if my own target was standing next to me, listening to me explain it. Just saying.)

What I'm saying is, it seems like if you don't want to kill your target, avoiding them is a good option. Vylad hides his existence from Garroth for all of S1, and even seems to be partially avoiding him in S2 after Garroth returns. (In fact, Vylad spying on Phoenix Drop in early S1 draws some parallels to how Calling-afflicted Laurance lurks around Aphmau in late S2.) He also states that he's never been back to O'khasis, which means he's been avoiding Zianna (and potentially Garte I guess) as well. And despite this, he does actually go to secretly check on her when the party visits Nahakra in S2. (Again, parallels.)

So given that one of these people is likely his target for immortality, he seems to be displaying similar behaviors as Laurance is here. It's likely he has better a control/understanding over this because he's been doing it longer, but that doesn't make problems just go away. TLDR: Laurance exhibits these behaviors because he is not immortal, and Vylad has similar behaviors as well. Meaning Vylad is likely not immortal either.

•

Sooooooo yeah. Is he immortal? Probably not! We don't have confirmation though and MCD lore is a mess, so who knows. could be. I don't think he is though. He has issues. Thanks for reading ^-^

#minecraft diaries #shadowknights #shadowknight #shadow knight #vylad romeave #vylad ro'meave #mcd #ask #big post

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mdhwrites · 1 year

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Ok, so i watched the finale, it was pretty predictable but enjoyable. But during the after cred scene, it really just solidified how aimless these characters are, Willow truly became just 'strong athlete' who serves as Hunters arm candy. She doesnt seem to give a shit about plants anymore ig? shes just 'buff' now.

Gus went straight back to 'guy who likes humans who has a group to celebrate said interest'. Amity is just... making abominations? i guess? Hunter is making palismen, which seems shoved in because caleb apparently carved.

Luz is... magic. yeah thats it. Eda is a headteacher, which feels widely out of place, but whatever. King Is. Other characters are rebuilding? i just- it feels like these characters have nowhere else to go because they just had no personal goals outside of very basic shit.

With amphibia, sasha became a child therapist, anne became a biologist who specialised in amphibians, marcy became a game designer. These are all goals that reflect their journey.

Now I want to start by saying that endings are hard and that character endings can be even harder than that. If you do a time skip epilogue, you have to somehow be able to show that all the characters are happy, successful and moving on in a way that makes sense and is narratively satisfying. You also usually have VERY little time to do this with because it's purposefully meant to be fluffy and sweet and disconnected from the rest in a way that isn't going to fit with the core of the show. The problem is that part of why this is hard is because characters are meant to be complex and their endings should reflect on the themes of the piece as well. Marcy's creativity and wonder about things blooming into a webcomic (I believe it's a webcomic and not games at least, though games works too) is great because she found a healthy way to share those passions with others and make connections through them. Anne's whole arc was learning to find the wonder in others and the strange world she was in and so her aquarium job is dead on the money. Sasha had to learn the hard way how to stop being controlling, angry and manipulative and passing those lessons on is far deeper and useful to others than anything her cheerleader base would have made you expect. It also makes it so when the show states the theme of the piece, about separation being a chance to grow and what you'll find coming back together is all the stronger, it hits SO. FUCKING. HARD. And comparing that to TOH... Well, we got effectively six character endings from what I've seen, seven if you count Lilith but hers is just more of what she was already doing as her job in the series, just now with a harpy form so I don't. Only six are meant to be any sort of final cap on their character/lives. And I'm just going to say this outright: They're not all bad. So from best to worst, with the name at the start of each in bold in case you don't care about someone, let's talk about: Hunter Amity Eda Willow Gus Luz Hunter: It's good. It's genuinely pretty damn good. That's not a joke or a setup or anything either. If Hunter's arc was about rejecting Belos to any extent, then this is a GREAT finish, even without Flapjack. After all, the part of the Isles that Belos himself most directly destroyed through his consumption, greed and wrath was the palistrom trees and palismen. Having it be that Hunter is now helping restore those elements is incredibly potent. Of course, there's also the obvious connection of Hunter and Flapjack but arguably the bird had more to do with his arc than any one character so him influencing Hunter's future just makes sense. I think it also just fits well with Hunter's character though. Watching out for people trying to steal palistrom wood uses his old soldier training but now in a constructive way, he's obviously not a very social person so the isolation is probably nice to him to get away from things and the boy has a LOT mentally to deal with. Working on regular wood while thinking about all of that is going to be a good place to release those anxieties and tensions in a good, creative manner. And for themes of identity, I think it's fine too. While Flapjack was Caleb's palisman, I don't think we ever get it confirmed that Caleb himself carved for a living or the like. That makes this genuinely something Hunter is doing himself and not because of someone else. That includes if he's doing it somewhat for Flapjack because honoring a friend is a very personal thing and very different from copying the dead. And again, frankly, the job feels very right for Hunter because it plays into his strengths rather than his weaknesses and gives him the peace he needs. No notes. Good job show. You got one. Amity: Okay, that's a little mean because Amity's is... Fine. It finally gives a point to her and her father's arc that you can't argue with through "X led to nothing" like angst about her father or the abomaton problem. There is a through line to this, especially with her abomatons. It makes narrative sense and functions.

...Except how much have those things actually mattered to her and in how long? She still rejected her father's hug in Reaching Out and didn't ask Em and Ed about him so their relationship by the end of the show still wasn't good. Escaping Expulsion explicitly said Amity was letting her grades slip so she's been at least distracted from magic for over a season at this point. Yes they claim her hair is abomination styled but it's WAY too light colored for that frankly, making it look way more pink than any sort of purple. Worse yet is that Amity's arc, besides becoming Luz's girlfriend, can be generously claimed as having a theme of becoming her own person instead of what others want of her. This technically works but clashes some by her still following in one of her parent's footsteps. She just swapped from her mother's dream to her father's passions. Now Alador never pushed her to copy him, he was neglectful after all so that would have been hard, so it still works. It is still theoretically a form of abominations that is characterized in the show by being about passion rather than simply performance with Odalia pushing the need for it to be commercial, something Amity theoretically won't care about. Frankly though, with how much her arc tries to push her caring about others, her reading to kids, there even being from what I've seen a sweet moment between her and the Collector... Why not make her a teacher or a caretaker of some sort? That's harder to portray than abomination mechanic but it fits as an ultimate capstone for going from someone who only cared about personal position, being the best and would throw away lives for her goals to someone who rejected all of that. To someone who spent their life now lifting others up and her knowledge empowered her to do that better than she otherwise could have. So Amity gets like a B. It works narratively and for the character but there's some improvement that could be done.

Eda: Oh look, a job that is going to make her absolutely miserable! That is my first thought hearing that she's a headmaster. After all, being the lead administrator is NOT the same as being a teacher. The paperwork alone is going to make her wish she was dead, much like when Tsunade became Hokage in Naruto. But that's not really what you're supposed to be thinking with it. It's supposed to be the ultimate extension of both Momma Eda in her students being her kids but also the fulfillment of Eda going from reluctant mentor to full on teacher. Which... If there were more than two episodes of the series where Eda was actually even attempting to be a mentor to Luz, that might actually mean more and that is EASILY the stronger thread being pulled here. You have to make the students into a more abstract concept for the Momma Eda theme to really fit here. What could you have done with her? I don't entirely know but I would probably have said enjoying retirement with Raine. Living a life finally at peace and without a need to hustle and bustle to fight against the curse or the system. She could have the freedom she always wanted without having to fear for her life. Having her partner by her side also makes it so you know she has family, something she spent so much of her life without. So essentially it's an ending that works from a more meta perspective but when you actually consider the events of the show and the character, it's questionable how much it fits or how 'happy' an ending it will be for her, especially when it ties her down so hard.

Willow: Okay, being fair here, from a setup perspective this actually works better than Eda's ending. Her strength is much of what defined her character, magically and physically, and she decided personally to want to go into sports in S2. Her becoming an athlete fits on both of those levels. For a character who is mostly a plot device, that's not bad.

Except it really doesn't play into anything about how she began and her resentment towards the name Half a Witch. It also has nothing to do with her plants. These elements that the show tried to claim had her seething resentment, that dominated her childhood, are ENTIRELY gone from her ending instead of reclaimed in any way. It's frustrating because it really paints that early stuff as pointless and genuinely just for Amity's sake, not Willow's and that's not great when the athletic stuff always felt tacked onto me in S2 just to give her SOMETHING to do with Hunter.

It also just continues pushing this feeling to me that despite setting up and wanting Willow to be the shy, plant girl archtype at times, S1 especially wanting her to just be willing to wilt away, SOMEONE on the writing team hates that archtype. Just wanted to surgically remove every last scrap of that from her character, regardless of if she was given the time to justify it or the like. That was frankly more okay to me with the shy element than the plant element seeing as she feels BORN to do plant magic by the fact that she was a master practically from the first time we see her use it without no training.

But here's the real reason it's below Eda: I hate her design. It's mostly fine but it's also UNFINISHED. She has one kneepad and ONE SOCK. You can make excuses for one of those but not the fucking sock and it drives me up a wall. I also don't like that the reformed Isles would still have a character like Willow having spikes on parts of her uniform for sports. Get rid of those and imply things have become gentler show. It's not like you've ever cared about keeping the Isles' identity intact before.

Gus: Here is where we go from "It functions but is maybe not good if you think about it" to "You're being way more honest than you're meaning to be show." After all, we have that cyclical aspect of Eda where Gus is returning to the start of the show but there is NO thought put into this.

If there was, if the show was willing to show that Gus had become wiser and more considerate, he wouldn't be studying humans. Not on the Isles. After all, how is he even going to do it on the Isles? Studying Luz? That feels weirdly like being friends with Bigfoot while saying you still need to find Sasquatch and prove the legends are true. Dude, maybe stop being... weird about this race you know exists properly now. It's kind of uncomfortable.

It's not even a hard thing to fix: Say he's here to see Luz off before going through the portal door with one of those glamour stones to cover his ears. He needs to go learn anthropology and the political sciences of our world in order to prepare to be a proper ambassador. That actually might have been neat.

But, you know, that would have taken any thought or care with Gus and we're lucky he was even remembered in the finale frankly. It's a flat failure though and really highlights how Gus hasn't grown and is still mostly a joke to the writers.

So then the question is... If Gus is this bad, can it really get worse with

Luz: *breathes in slowly*

*breathes out slowly*

I've been pretending to grade some of these and if that's the case, I don't even accept Luz's ending. I tell the student that they ignored what the assignment was and just copy and pasted the first paragraph of their wikipedia entry and tried to hand that in as their answer to how the MAIN CHARACTER OF THE SHOW ENDS IT. Because that is exactly the vibe of this ending.

Luz didn't grow and she sure as shit didn't learn anything. Remember: Her theme for her character arc, the worst decision to me creatively, is the fantasy she wants to live versus the consequences of that fantasy. It doesn't even matter how bad that theme is ever handled in the show because this is theoretically the largest, explicit theme of the story outside of personal expression being all that matters.

And Luz literally ends the series chasing the same dream she had at the start.

I... I don't even entirely know how to respond to that. The show, which is a kid's show remember, legitimately said that her running away from her problems to play out one of her fantasy books was such a good choice, it should be the thing she does for the REST OF HER LIFE. That it is the final, definitive note for the character that Luz the Human is going to be Luz the Witch.

And you know what? If Luz's journey to being a witch actually meant anything in the show, this might have literally any justification. If during the course of the show she had genuinely learned a lot as a person over the course of becoming a witch, if magic itself had so many rules as to require you to be a functional human being in order to use it, it MIGHT work. It's not great but it might work. Except... Remember back when I was talking about Eda? About how Eda spends two episodes teaching Luz and that's it?

Remember: Luz is like 90% why the Selkidamus is beat while on the boat. By the beginning of S2, and explicitly with Escaping Expulsion, she is already closing in on the ceiling of her powers. She already outshines most other witches to the point where the Emperor is the only person to give her a real challenge combat wise so long as the series is actually remembering to let her cast spells. Half of her glyphs aren't even tried to be connected to anything but instead, as she puts it, are found from other witch's spells randomly. They're just... There and no one else noticed somehow.

And this is what you want to say her character was leading up to? A profession that in the human realm has no transferable skills because she can't just be spinning Stringbean all the time without it being obvious and glyphs don't work in the human realm. It's actually worse in the Boiling Isles because unless she's going to get employed as a glyph master or something, she still needs a job. Everyone has magic there after all and anyone can use glyph magic with ease. You don't even need to be confident in it. Thank you Gus and Looking Glass Ruins.

It is bizarrely revealing how little thought and care was put into Luz and the themes of the show with this being how it ends. It is just, top to bottom, a failure. The only way it functions is fans of the show being happy she's chasing her dreams into eternity. You cannot think about it for even a second without some sort of question coming up.

And what else would she do? Easy. I've been saying she should have become a counselor or a therapist literally even before S2. That was just the obvious way for her to grow to me. She learns that you need to balance reality and fantasy, your passions with the demands of the world and takes up a job that lets her help kids like her find happiness and a place in their world. Either world. It would imply she understands childhood fantasies are just that, it would highlight her empathy and understanding of others and also is an amazing culmination of the theme of Fantasy versus Reality.

And instead the show's response was probably as far from caring about any of those things as you can possibly get. I don't understand it and it blows my fucking mind.

But I mean... if you want to finally drop the pretenses and just admit that your show is nothing but basic, escapist fantasy... I guess there really isn't a better ending than this, is there? =======

I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead, If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

And finally a Twitter you can follow too!

#The Owl House Criticism #toh critical #Luz Noceda #Amity Blight #hunter toh #Willow Park #the owl house gus

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ackerpreach · 3 years

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This ending .... I can name 500 reasons and I will name them right now, because I don’t think I’m the only one who is upset with how things turned out. (Also, A positive message for all of you at the end)

MAJOR LEAKS SPOILERS/ READ WITH CAUTION

Update: after reading more theories from fellow RM bloggers, and sleeping over it one day, this entire chapter might be an april fools... Don't fully lose hope yet beautiful people. It's me just giving a review on a possible fake April fools chapter

After following this franchise since 2013, so nearly a DECADE. this ending is a pure disserve to the entire fandom. I feel like Yams has rushed it just for the sake of being done with the entire manga. So many things are left open, characters and their developemt are reverted back all the way to chapter 1 or are left even worse than that...

Mikasa’s worthless character development/ Aaronmika’s horrible toxic codependent relationship

Oh honey... Let’s start with how horrible Isayama has treated her. We were all rooting for her, because we all felt like she was so misunderstood. She had a horrible childhood and imprinted on a guy who treated her like trash 99 percent of the story. And then, slowly but surely, she starts to realize she has to stop obsessing over him in the uprising arc with the help of a real man who treats her like a queen, more importantly, he treats her like a real human being. This man sees her for her abilities and that she has the power to be self dependent. She learned parts of herself, that she was able to work together with him like no one else could. She learned parts of herself she was unable to do so if she kept obsessing about Aaron. All this love, care, mutual understanding and RESPECT these two shared.

but...NAH FUCK THAT, right Yams?? Throw all this development away, all this bonding. Let’s make the main female lead even more yandere than she already was in the first season. Let her make out with his decapacitated head (like dude, this is also pure disrespect to Aaron’s dead body btw) and let her obsess even more about the guy who has treated her no better than a piece of toilet cloth 99 percent of the time. The guy who was never really appreciative in front of her for saving his ass billions of times, who always pushed her away, who yells at her and snaps at her whenever he can instead of reasoning and talking calmly with her in mature way. (EVEN PARODY YOUTUBE CHANNELS WHO DONT SHIP ANYTHING MAKE IT A TROPE WHERE AARON TELLS MIKASA HE HATES HER GUTS WHENEVER HE CAN)

Then after all that, suddenly Yams tries to last minute persuade us Aaron’s always been head over heels for her??? He should have build their relationship better which he hasn’t even tried to do so... He must be thinking his fans are stupid for eating this from his hands.

Like seriously??? What is this???

Isayama is just fully contradicting himself. It’s like someone tipped him off with a buttload of money for him to write Aaron like this to satisfy shipping needs and to cash in those extra money’s from it. Even if he tried to cater to Erem*ika, this is not how you write a loving and caring couple which people will root for.

This next two panels just freaking infuriates me to the core of my soul. I can’t even describe how dissapointed I am with Mikasa.

Why is she clutching that head so obsessively like that? Why is she walking and turning her back away from her comrades? After everything they have done for her, after all they’ve been through?! After everything Armin has done? Standing up for Mikasa, beating up Aaron for hurting her. I feel like even Jean, Connie and Sasha have cared more for her in a healthy way. Sure, Aaron cares for her romantically too apparently (What a twist Yams :)), but has he aided her to becoming a mentally healthier individual? Has he aided in her mental stability? The answer is a big fat NO! All I see between these two after today’s raw Chapter’s are too Yandere obsessed individuals who have no clue on how to maintain a healthy relationship.

Love should only go as far as the heart can endure and it seems like her character is not willing to be aware of that. Even Armin was able to let go of Aaron in those latest panels. Why does her entire character resolve around this guy??? I really do not understand. Her Ackerbond and her age is not an excuse for her to throw her life away like this.

Shonen’s disgusting portrayal of women

I’ve seen this countless of times in the many years I’ve watched anime. SasuS*ku from Naruto, Ichih*me from Bleach, Shinji and that oranged hair girl from Neon Evangelion.. Why do these women get decreased to simpletons with one single goal? And that is to obsess over a bland male lead who either treats them like trash or doesn’t notice them up until the last last chapter (LITERALLY WHAT YAMS HAS DONE). Some go even as far as the male leading wanting the kill the female love interest and yet the female lead is still in love with them???. It’s disgusting for him to write the MAIN female character this way.

It’s dissapointing we believed in Isayama doing Mikasa’s character right. That she’s finally being able to let go of her codependency and to live for herself maybe live in Hizuru and find more about her roots???, but every single time she shows some improvement, it’s burried deep in the ground again by the Author. It almost seems like a lowkey kink of some of the male Mangaka’s to write about a girl obsessing over them no matter what. I see this so many times to the point that I truly stand behind it that some of them might have this fantasy.

I wished he didn’t portray her last panels like this. Everyone else is living their lives while Mikasa is still grieving about him. I’m not saying she’s not allowed to grieve and everyone takes it at their own pace, but cmon... Show her living her life too. This is too much. Her being next to his grave and grieving him as her last panels just shoves it in our faces that YET AGAIN, BEING OBSESSED WITH AARON IS ALL HER CHARACTER STANDS FOR.

I truly despise how Isayama handles her grieving, kissing his decapacitated head, carrying it around like some handbag, and her last panels being thissss.

The world leaving Paradis alone miraciously after all that???

It’s so weird and out of place with so many political feuds and disagreements between the world and Paradis, the entire Rumbling happening and we can see Mikasa just chilling outside in Paradis with no one bothering them. You can see the rings of the walls in the picture below. I don’t know the exact reason behind as the manga is still in Korean, but from what I see, the story went the route of: throwing a happy ending without enough proper reason and it was all fixed just like that in a snap! It doesn’t fit the entire narrative of attack on titan for things to be so peacful out of nowhere. When it comes to the narrative, how things work in that world, how hard it is to achieve peace, everything made somewhat sense up until chapter 138. 139 seems so so out of place... It’s like I’m reading a chapter from a totally different manga.

Aaron Yoghurt got defeated so easily/ Aaron’s character assassination

The build up on the first part of the rumbling was great, those kids carrying coins. You could feel humanity’s fear and Aaron’s hatred in those pages. As if he truly had a goal and he has turned away completely from his comrades and his closest friends with no return. The world seemed truly doomed, but he got defeated just like that. He was in the nape all this time (because screw the warhammer power of hiding yourself elsewhere in his ginormous titan body). There is no master plan as we all expected, and in the end he just acts all yandere in the paths with Armin and that’s it... They massacared his entire character as well. Many fan theories created a better ending with his character. Him being reincarnated as Historia’s baby would be so much better. For him to still keep on seeking and to strive for power. It has always been his motive. It’s his personality from the start until chapter 138. Even if things are okay, to keep on going and to seek that adventure, but then.. He’s so weak and directionless suddenly.. It’s so weird... This is not Aaron at all???

Using Aaron for him this entire post, because I don’t want others to invade our tags... :)))

Historia’s baby

The only panel we got from Historia’s child was this. Just a normal kid, normal life... Why did Isayama put so much effort in highlighting Historia’s pregnancy if it was nothing too spectacular anyway? It seemed he had major plans for this kid and for their development too??? It’s again, big plans, big developments, big relationship dynamic, but all got thrown out of the window...

Don’t read the next sentence if you are a minor :’)

It’s like almost ejaculating, but stopping right before it and repeating that every single Arc.

My energy when writing about this chapter is the same as Nostalgia Critic and his hatred for atla the live action

In Conclusion...

I know us fans should not be deciding on how this story should end, because this is Isayama’s story after all, but I truly wished for him to wrap up things much more rounded. There are so many unanswered questions... Again, I think for the sake of being done with this manga, he rushed all of it. He’s become a millionaire from this story and now his pockets are jammed full, I guess he doesn’t need to put in any effort anymore, right? Perhaps a controversial opinion, but I really wished he cared for his fans a little bit more with this last chapter by giving some answers that make sense at least. It’s his fans who gave him this platform and the opportunity to tell his story and for him to at least give in a bit of effort especially in the last chapter is the least he can do. Rivamika being canon or not, he truly rushed it without thinking much about the entire story line. He expanded it so much, he didn’t know how to bind it all together.

Even after all this, I’ll still ship them in the headcanon type of way. I do give credit to Isayama for giving us a template for such a beautiful dynamic between Levi and Mikasa. He decides to waste it, but that doesn’t mean we have to. I want to thank all the people with amazing writing skills, the ones who give us beautiful art like @carmenlee @phit chan @vialesana and many more. I want to remind all of you that we can create something beautiful of our own and we don’t neccesarily need canon lore for that. The art I’ve seen, the fanfictions I’ve read have touched me deeper than Isayama ever could at times.The Mikasa in our mind is appreciate of Levi, is mature, classy and has a strong will for herself. They spend their remaining days together peacefully. Keep writing, keep drawing, stay creative.

I love you all so so much, I’ve only been publicly active since March, but thank you Rivamika fandom for giving me so much joy as a lurker these past 7 years <3

#rivamika #snk leaks #snk 139 leaks #levimika #mikalevi

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crazycartoonnerd123 · 2 years

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Amphibia season 3A rewatch: Hop til You Drop and Turning Point notes

Hop til you Drop: I didn't really have much to say about this episode since it's not my favorite and it doesn't have much plot except for I like the fact that this episode addressed some of the rumors that were going around about Anne's dissaperance. That's pretty much it though. I did, however, have a LOT so say about Turning Point, so I added a keep reading thing.

Hop til You Drop overall score: 6/10

Turning Point:

I over analyzed the hell out of this one so let's get started.

*I legit had to take five minutes to mentally prepare myself to watch this episode because I'm already a mess every time before we hit the five minute mark

*Sasha's "Marcy" always breaks my heart because I think that is literally the first line of dialogue for the episode and the way her VA said it was just so heartbreaking

*When Grime says "There's nothing we can do for her" You can see, for like a split second, Sasha's face go from concerned and scared to heartbroken

*"Anne, Marcy please be okay". This line is so sweet and sad because she has absolutely no way of knowing if her two closest friends are going to be okay so all she can do is hope that they will be

*"So many lose ends, so little time" I forgot this line existed. This, for some reason, intensifies my theory that the night has to do with something celestial.

*Sasha gets noticeably nervous when Grime lies about the whereabouts of Anne and the Planters, and saying that they were there to protect the town. I know this is obvious but I just thought it was a nice detail.

*The way Sasha looked down when Mayor Toadstool called her Anne's best friend and the fact that she can't bring herself to go into the house are such good demonstrations of the guilt Sasha is carrying

*Sasha snuggling with the snails gives me life

*Sasha's literally skipped a meal because she's feeling so guilty

*Sasha can't bring herself to leave Wartwood because then they would be on their own.

*This is where Sasha puts her foot down and says that she's done and she doesn't want to hurt anyone else

*"Lies, manipulation, backstabbing" this is quite literally everything that Andrias did to Marcy

*"Since I saw the consequences" to me has a dual meaning. She hurt Anne and lost her by doing this and Andrias did all of that to Marcy and now, to Sasha's knowledge, Marcy is critically injured or dead.

*The journal scene never ceases to make me cry

*When Sasha tells Grime "Enough with the schemes..." "Sasha's Theme/Heartstomper" plays in a minor key

* And she realizes that by trying to be in control of everything, she was pushing Anne away instead of bringing her closer

*And by having this realization she decides to work towards change and become a better person

*Sasha's confession to the Wartwood citizens is a critical moment for her redemption arc because she 100% owns up to her lies and works towards fixing her mistakes

That's pretty much all I have to say about this episode. I know some people think that this episode should have been a 22 minute episode, and I agree but I think the 11 minute episode was still really good, and it's definitely my favorite Sasha episode, and my second favorite for season 3A (being beat by "Olivia and Yunan" of course)

Overall score: 10/10

#amphibia #anne boonchuy #marcy wu #Sasha Waybright #Amphibia season 3 #amphibia season 3A

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ndkdndkdjdkdjkddjdl · 2 years

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More Lab stuff

(more insight regaurding the lab stuff i mentioned in the last post-)

reminder note: Siren and Sebastian were younger during this time, under 13 years old

oh and if this seems like its typed weird then its bc they were copied from texts so bare with me-)

more regaurding topic about the Lab arc !!

there's a detail regaurding that

so vervain and wolfsbane

those plants were extremely hard to get

(this has always been a thing in oc world-

or Crypttales, i should start saying the actual au name damn i have too many oc worlds- when did this happen 💀)

that's what made keeping Siren and Sebastian risky

they had enough to make them woozy

but not enough to make them pass out

thats why they were always awake during surgical procedures

vervain and wolfsbane was already being taken and used by hunters (the fact that monster hunters were stocked up on these plants is why werewolves and vampires became so "rare")

so the lab couldn't get a hold of those materials

these plants were only found in the wild

and again

monsted hunters are always working in the wild

so the hunters get to it first

anyways, at that Lab, they wanted to study everything about vampires and werewolves. there are plenty of reasons but i listed that in a past post

to be able to operate and keep them alive, they needed to understand the anatomy

and that was the challenge,,

so before getting a look on the insides and the cutting and all that, they dedicated a day before to understanding the outsides

so basically they reached horrifying levels of inhumane and had horrible methods such as overwhelming them/exhausting them in ways (strapping them down didn't work, even if they were woozy with vervain or wolfsbane, being strapped down wouldn't hold them because the adrenaline kicks in)

they never did the studying and the surgical procedures on the same day so at least Sebastian and Siren got a break- they'd just dump them back into their individual cell after gathering information to prepare for the surgical procedures the next day

ofc Kaleb didn't go near them after bc well, he can clearly tell by their behavior that they arnt in the appropriate state-

he was sad he couldn't help comfort them in any way but he at least brought Sebastian a boiled egg (Sebastians favorite food 🤩)

(Sebastian would be huddled in the corner growling at anyone who gets close, so Kaleb just gently rolled the boiled egg too him

meanwhile he couldn't even step into Sirens cell or else Siren would cling to him and not let go, he felt horrible about not being able to do anything for siren (tho Siren didn't really need any comforting, unlike Sebastian, he didn't care as much)

also Kaleb cried

a lot

about what happens to them overall

the only reason he stayed was bc he was the only one giving them a hint of love

after Siren and Sebastian got out

he stayed but with a new mission

to find a way to shut the lab down

he was never successful

until Sasha got older

she started to help him and they basically made it into what it is now (still studies supernatural creatures, but they dont make anyone suffer nor hold any supernaturals there as test subjects)

Kaleb didn't even know half of the things happening either until he was given more authority

luckily he found out about this immediately on his own, the moment he noticed that Siren was being more "clingy" and Sebastian was growling at people (which he rarely does)

he realized that something is wrong

the others were messing/experimenting with Siren and Sebastian's behavior aswell

he was never told about anything going on with them until after he got "promoted", he had to figure it out on his own

which scared him even more because "what if this isn't the only thing they're doing to them?"

(he didn't have access to info, he just had to keep Siren and Sebastian alive and healthy enough)

so yeah Siren and Sebastian were seen as animals and the fact that they were forced into their cryptic forms bc of vervain/wolfsbane didn't help

because with certain supernaturals (vampires, werewolves, and seamonsters) its a fine line between animal and being

and during this time, Sebastian and Siren leaned more towards "animal", and in their cryptic forms, being seen as a being is almost pure luck

they were nonverbal aswell in this arc

so yeah, no surprise that they mostly weren't seen as real beings during this time

extra ramble i wanna add

Ever since the start of forming crypttails, this type of conflict between human and supernatural has been an existing thing! and it still is the biggest factor, and will most definitely have a much bigger play soon,,

The lab arc with Sebastian and Siren is the most direct thing regaurding this. Humans often dehumanized supernaturals, just like Sebastian and Siren delt with at that lab,,

Humans saw them as things like labrats, or potential power sources it wasn't one sided though, supernaturals saw humans as food and/or objects or "pets"

but there are plenty of peaceful/casual dynamics between the two, like Kaleb and Sasha in the lab arc, but also like everyone in the kingdom

and i love to play around with this,,

#Siren Foraster #Sebastian Fleischer

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safekeeperscosm · 3 years

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Anne and Sprig's fate

So we’ve all noticed about the rule of three is in Amphibia everywhere right? I’ve noticed another rule of three; Sasha and Marcy got saved from their near death experiences by the antagonists of their respective seasons (Sasha by Grime in s1 and Marcy by Andrias) So if the Night is going to be the antagonist of s3, then it’ll save Anne from the near death experience.

And this bothered me for two reasons; 1) I’m still hung on to that corruptianne theory, and 2) Why would the Night save Anne, who is supposedly one of the girls in the prophecy to beat him? Which led me to my next theory; what if the Night possessed someone else? Someone Anne cared about?

Before you go nuts let me explain; season 3 is going to be complicated and we already know some of the plot thanks to the new intro. We all know that Sasha is going to have a redemption arc and that there’s going to be another sword fight between her and Anne; but if Sasha is the hero this time, where does Anne stand?

And this is where the corruptianne theory kicks in; Anne made a deal with Andrias to save Marcy and she ends up getting possessed by the Night. This will lead to the sword fight.

Now, if the girls are going to have to fight the Night; someone has to snap Anne out of it, not sure who it’ll be yet but I was thinking either Sprig or Marcy once she got out of that tube.

So we all agree that Sprig’s ancestor is one of the previous holders right? So what if the original calamity had encounter the Night before? So if the Night saw Sprig in season 3, then it’ll recognize him as the descendant of the original and will assume that some of her powers passed down to him.

So right after Anne got free from the Night’s control, it will try to possess Sprig and it’ll turn him into a monster that all the girls will have to fight him. They managed to beat the Night and free Sprig but Anne took a really bad hit that got her bleeding and that’s where Sprig comes in.

His best friend, his sister, is about to die because of him. He has to save her. Sprig did save her but I’m not really sure how he’ll do it, maybe he got powers because from the Night and it activated when Anne’s about to die. But in the end, everyone’s alive and traumatized.

(P,S, this is my first time using tumblr so I don't know how this works, I saw your post about Sprig making a deal to Andrias and I wanted to hear your opinion.)

#corruptianne theory #amphibia #sprig plantar #theory #prediction #yeah safe posts stuff #submission

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nikakistos · 3 years

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The mindset of Eren Yeager: The reason he rumbled the World

The topic I will be analyzing this time is Eren Yeager’s decisions and motivations in the final arc of the series. Many words have been said about our main protagonist, especially after his appearance in the final chapter, which made many question him and his actions. Given the dialogue between him and Armin it is not really hard to understand why. Isayama’s word choices have confused many fans. So, here I am. Trying to explain to the best of my ability what was going through Eren’s mind. Of course, I might be wrong. There have been many interpretations of the character after all, not to mention that Isayama will be releasing a character book the next month, which might explain things better. But, seeing as I will be in the army at the time, I figured I should write this now and compare my view to Isayama’s later on.

To begin with, we have to answer a very important question. What was Eren wish and what kind of life did he want to live? This question can easily be answered just by looking at Mikasa and Armin, Eren’s two most beloved people. These two represent what Eren wants out of life. Armin is responsible for Eren’s desire to be free. The outside world for Eren is freedom. Mikasa on the other hand represents Eren’s desire to be loved. She is his home to return to. You see, these two desires perfectly correspond with the visions Eren shared with his two friends in the paths. He used the paths to see with Armin all the places from Armin’s book that they imagined back when they were kids and he used the paths to live with Mikasa the life they never had the chance to live in the real world. Eren himself says he doesn’t want to die. He wants to live with Mikasa and everyone else. This is the kind of life he wants.

But he couldn’t. And it wasn’t because of some supernatural force that guided his own actions and prohibited him from making another decision. No. It was because of his personality and the circumstances he found himself in. After Eren saw the future his attitude changed. He was by far more silent and sad than usual. He saw himself committing mass-genocide. He also learnt that the world was not what he imagined it to be. Eren wanted the world to be just like Armin’s book described. Empty of humans, but full of beautiful places. However, between himself and his dream stood enemies. Countless people who had never seen them, all wishing them dead. The outside world had betrayed his expectations. For him, all these people that stood between him and his dream were just like the walls in Paradis. An obstacle. This is why, despite knowing that the Rumbling went against the justice he was supposedly fighting for, he decided to complete it. Deep down, he hated this world and he wanted to burn it down. This is in part due to his idea of freedom. For Eren, freedom is living your life the way you want it to, without ever taking orders from anyone. Doing whatever you want. This is why he was surprised by Levi’s follower attitude towards Erwin. With all his strength, he expected Levi to be the freest person in the legion. A world that continued to chain him down and disappoint him was something Eren could not tolerate. And when he got the power, he just wanted to erase it. He was free to do so. It is no coincidence that the panel of his father saying to him “you are free�� appears at the same time that Eren reveals his desire to destroy the world. This burning desire of his to erase the world contradicts his view on people being special because they were born in it. If this world makes people special just because they were born in it, then why the fuck would you completely destroy it Eren? Well, that’s exactly the point. Eren’s though process is entirely irrational. That’s true for all humans to a degree. Our deepest and darkest desires are irrational. The part of Eren that wanted to bring the Apocalypse, just because the world wasn’t like he wanted it to be is exactly that. Eren had to choose between what was just and what made him feel free. He chose the latter.

Moving on to the more rational side of his motivations for doing the Rumbling. That is the safety of his friends and his island. Eren genuinely cared for all of his friends. Mikasa and Armin were special, but he also cared for Historia, Jean, Connie, Sasha etc. He even cared for fucking Floch. And, obviously he cared for the island that he was raised in. He couldn’t just let the world annihilate them. This is like, the core of his ideology. If you fight, you might survive. If you just roll over, then you get fucked. Eren is not the type to get fucked. However, this did not mean that Eren wouldn’t opt for a different solution if a better option presented itself. After all, he did appear in the speech given by the Organization that protected the rights of the Eldians. The first problem here is that when Eren saw the memories of the future he had just 8 years left to live. Zeke had 5. Eren was displeased with this lack of time. The second problem was that he was stuck with a hilariously incompetent leadership. The leadership of Paradis failed spectacularly in finding a good solution and wasted half of Eren’s remaining lifespan. At the rate the Survey Corps were progressing, Zeke would have died and without him they wouldn’t be able to use the Founding Titan at all. Additionally, none of the solutions they tried to find were exactly great. The 50 Y.P. required the sacrifice of Historia and her line, without ensuring with 100% certainty the eternal existence of Eldia. Since Eren cared about Historia and the island, he couldn’t accept such a proposal. The rest of the Survey Corps felt the same way. Hizuru on the other hand didn’t help them at all and Hange’s plan to approach the Organization that wanted to protect the rights of the Eldians failed spectacularly. Eren was left out of options.

The biggest turn off for him though was the revelation of Zeke’s real plan. When Yelena learnt that the SC would visit Marley she approached Eren and told him all about Zeke’s euthanasia and how to contact him. From this point on, Eren really had no other option left to save Paradis. If the meeting with the Eldian Rights Organization were to fail then he would have no choice but using Zeke’s blood, especially given his brother’s limited lifespan. He would never get another chance to visit Marley, nor was it certain that Zeke and he would manage to make contact. Worst case scenario, Zeke dies before meeting Eren, Colt gets the Beast, the Global Alliance attacks Paradis and they get fucked. Or, the SC somehow manage to find a serum to turn Historia into a dumb Titan, have Mikasa and Levi alongside Eren restrain her and use the Rumbling anyway, while also having sacrificed Historia.

Things might have been different if Eren had actually decided to talk about the future he saw. Knowing what would happen if they didn’t try hard enough, might have made the Corps work harder. Of course, Eren just couldn’t predict the outcome of such a decision, so he decided to stay quiet, since, as established above, deep down he wanted to destroy the world.

Eren’s decision in the end came down to this: either he destroys the world or he says “fuck all” and elopes with Mikasa. He loved her enough to abandon everything and live his last few years peacefully with her. His dream about the outside world, Armin, Historia, Paradis, he was ready to turn his back to all of them just so he could selfishly survive with Mikasa. However, both he and Mikasa are incredibly shy people who can’t quite express their feelings easily. So, instead of telling her that he was in love with her, he left it all to her. To top it all off, he framed the question in such a way, that gave her the chance to pick an easy answer, without risking rejection. Then they got interrupted and the rest is history. He said fuck it and accepted his fate.

Attack on Titan’s world does operate under a fixed timeline. Destiny exists. Ever since Ymir became a titan up to Mikasa killing Eren was predetermined. They were meant to happen, exactly as they happened. However, the reason for that is not entirely supernatural. It is just that the personalities of each and every major character led to the result we saw. It is entirely because Eren cared about his friends and because he dreamt of freedom that he chose to rumble the world. It is his and Mikasa’s shyness that robbed them of a future together. Ymir had nothing to do with all that. It wasn’t Ymir who made the Santa Titan dumb enough to not bite Eren properly, nor was she the one who made the Azumabito clan greedy as hell or the Marleyans imperialists.

Eren knew what he would do and this of course played a major role in his decisions. But nobody forced him to do it. And, more than anything, he also knew why. Deep down, he knew. Eren decided Rumble the world, because he wanted his friends and island to be safe and because he hated the world. Eren accepted his fate, because he was left with no choice that he liked, time was running out and because Mikasa didn’t give him the right answer. The result? 80% of humanity dead, some of his friends dead, the ones who survived are mostly well, with Mikasa being the saddest one. The world is slowly marching to war, with the Yeagerists having regrouped and Armin and the co are trying to prevent this. The island’s survival is by no means guaranteed.

Was it all for nothing? I don’t think so. Eren saved Paradis for some time, giving the chance to Armin to save humanity. After all, he did tell him so himself. Eren believed that with the Rumbling leaving the world in the state we saw, Armin would be able to find a solution. The series seems to imply that this is what will eventually happen.

In the end, Eren acted just like himself. Just like he told Falco. His reasons are not that complicated. He kept moving forward, because he was seeing something beyond this hell. We know now what that something was. His actions make total sense. It is just that his deep desire to end the world is rooted in his own childish view of freedom and of the world. In a story about children who need to become adults, Eren remained a child. His two friends on the other hand didn’t. Armin accepted his role as the Commander of the Survey Corps and despite the world not being what he wanted it to be, still fought to protect it from the person he once wished to explore this earth with. Mikasa accepted her role as a guardian of humanity and not Eren’s, like she believed herself to be, and despite wanting to share her life with Eren, she killed him. Eren saved Mikasa and Armin. This is his legacy. A world without titans.

#Eren Mikasa Armin #Eren Jaeger #Mikasa Ackerman #armin arlert #hajime isayama #attack on titan manga #manga #chapter 139 #attack on titan final chapter #aot meta #snk meta #character analysis

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