#but I also like him being capable in some aspects aight? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

mariaiscrafting · 3 years

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ahhhh ty ty ty <3

ok, so I think that what makes Dream act this way (iykyk) is how dreamwastaken became so big so quickly. and by quick I mean fucking lightning speed.

he didn't have enough time to learn enough about cc etiquette, especially in these three aspects: influence, boundaries and fanbase/stans/whatever you call it. I'll try to explain it:

• Influence: Does he know the influence he has? Like, when he hears that he is the myct with the largest fanbase, does he really process that? I remember he talked about not being able to control all of his fanbase and there's bad apples everywhere -- which is true, and that only like 1% of his fanbase breaks his boundaries (that include sending hate for him, harassing, doxing, etc. yk, basic twitter culture lol) but, honey, with your big ass fanbase, 1% is still a lot of people. As a content creator you *have* to be aware of that.

let's take the hbomb situation. First off, as a streamer, it's you that set the mood of the stream. Even if he was only messing around with his pals, even if they did say to do not send hate to hbomb, dt dunking on him created a toxic environment, which caused his fans being toxic towards hbomb and you know what happens next. Hell, when this happened, I was watching Tapl and he was watching them and he was crying laughing over them screaming bc they were just. so loud and so aggressive that it was kinda ??? Sirs, this is literally a Minecraft Stream lmaooo

my point is, that was not the road that dreamwastaken, 21M fans, should've taken. he don't condone his fans actions but he knows his fans are diehard and will always be on his side, he should be more careful before stating negative opinions, especially if its towards another person.

• Boundaries and Fanbase: He posted a list of his boundaries a while ago, idk if you know or seen it (btw please george copy your bestie for the love of god <3) but I'm not talking about those boundaries, I'm talking about the basic boundaries between cc and viewer. boundaries that, in my opinion, should exist between cc and viewer. I get that Dream is an open person, an oversharing type of open person if I may add, but I think he should take a step back regardless. When I heard that he was taking a time from twitter, I genuinely got so glad, not because he couldn't start any drama then, but because it would do so so good for his mental health. I'm not even that fond of him, it's just that for me, any cc taking a break or outright leaving twitter is a win for me. I know how RSD is hard to deal and honestly letting shit out it's better but dream you have dt you have bbh so please don't make things worse online 😭 I know how good can be to feel validation from millions of people but. it's not a good idea, especially in the state that his fanbase is on rn (this topic is kinda sensitive to talk abt for me bc people be outright ableist and hide it as criticism like. say that shit's not helping his reputation and whatever without acting like he's fucking. manipulating his fanbase for being affected by his rsd💀 or, on the other hand, don't say that hes just being adhd🤪 when he's just being an asshole like damn that's a Him thing bro lol)

(omg it's so big I'm so sorry and theres a part two I'm so sorry tumblr user messed-up-gal ToT) - morango 1/2

pt. 2:

Dream is the proof that the people who loves you can be your downfall. istg. Have you noticed that every drama that Dream enters, people usually get more mad abt how his fanbase reacts (85% they'll react in a bad way) than Dream himself? it's not always, but its definitely more likely. I'm not saying Dream is saint, he Is petty and his ego does him dirty and made him choke multiple times before,, But! i dont think hes a bad guy. he's literally just a dude. ok, he's a 21yr old white gamer man that has a trumpie past (maybe?? idk. I think hes cured now ig lol) so he's bound to do some shitty things but he still tries to get better and hopefully he'll mature. 21 is old enough but it's still so young, yk? I kind of lost my mind during the end and my eyes are literally begging to be closed so tl;dr: Its gonna be hard for him to become a better cc bc his fans don't let him be criticized (by infantilizing his adhd symptoms or the mob mentality as soon as someone says anything abt him), the honest criticism get lost between lies from antis that don't know shit, he still has a lot of growing up to do and overall he became famous too fast and he needs to learn things even faster bc as soon as there's not a single one dream hater on sight they'll turn their back and attack him instead lmao I hate twitter i definitely have more to say but I'm tired and my memory is shit. just-- hate dream if you want, love dream if you want, nobody is obligated to have an opinion but I wanted to express mine. have a lovely day! -morango 2/2

Aight, there's a lot to unpack here, so Imma try to only go into the points I have something to add to (here's what I talk about in each paragraph, if you want to jump to a specific point):

Speed of Dream's rise to fame

The "bad apples" in the Dream fanbase

Post-MCC HBomb stream

Not condoning versus actually condemning his fans

Manipulation & RSD

Criticism of Dream, his fanbase, and his brand

The “just a dude” argument, flipped

First, I agree that one of the many factors that has resulted in the current image Dream has set up for himself, the way his fanbase functions, the ways people hate on him, and the way the Dream brand functions, is the speed of his rise to fame. It's unique, and there are probably a hundred social/psychological angles that could be used to examine the exact effects of that speed upon all of these facets of the Dream Name; did rapid fame beget the rapid rise of unrighteous hatred, did those waves of hatred then instigate the rise of a surprisingly overdefensive fanbase, did that rapid fame get to his head and/or result in an inability to appropriately handle all the after-effects of rapid fame, etc.? That point you bring up, about how the speed of his rise to fame requires him to learn even more quickly, is so interesting to me. I think that maybe Dream expected to get pretty famous pretty quickly, hence the preparedness in regards to some mechanics of influencer fame- merchandise, business-building, networking, knowing how to manage his fanbase to best benefit him. But I don't think he expected to get this famous this quickly. This is all speculation of course, as are this entire post and your ask, but I think that he just couldn't anticipate having to learn how to handle enmasse controversy, waves of antis, or every Youtuber speculating/knowing about him; and yeah, that results in him having to learn all of these things very quickly, lest he allow his whole brand and fandom to fall apart.

Second, I disagree with the frequent argument that Dream's fanbase is only marginally toxic. Personally, I think that the circumstances of Dream's fame, his personality and management of his fanbase, and his brand of content have resulted in the very specific kind of stan that Dream stans are. I don't think this is simply a case of "all fandoms have a small percentage of assholes who take it too far;" rather, the nature of the community itself breeds the kind of mentality of "an asshole who takes it too far." I only even know this because I was a Dream fan (kinda a stan, I'm ngl). At one time, I watched every single Dreamwastaken & Dream Team video multiple times; I listened to the Manhunts on repeat, as though they were podcasts; I followed mostly smiletwt and dttwt accounts on mcyttwt; I had upwards of 10 tabs for AO3 DNF fics open on my phone at a time; I watched DNF and Dream Team Being A Family-esque compilations on repeat; I watched every George and Sapnap alt stream I possibly could; I went out of my way to defend Dream against Redditors and Twitter antis regarding the cheating scandal. For the latter half of 2020, and a couple months of 2021, I lived and breathed this part of the fandom; so when I say that Dream stans are a whole other breed than any other kind of mcyttwt stan, I say that because I used to be like that, too. I usually use parasocial very loosely or ironically, but Dream stans are genuinely one of the most parasocial fanbases I have ever seen or been a part of. The level of investment Dream stans have in this man's life, the lengths they will go to to defend him, the amount of psychonalysis and digging they do on his life and character, the amount of emotion he can evoke in them- it's taken to another level, man. This isn't just characteristic of a fraction of his fanbase; this is what the fanbase is like as a whole.

Third, I partially disagree with your take on the HBomb thing, but not in the way one might think? I actually empathize with the way they reacted much more than I thought I would, simply because I suspect I have RSD (also suspect I have ADHD, have for several months now) and I can see myself getting insanely frustrated because of something like that. Like yeah, it was "just a MC stream" or "just an MC game," but that's kinda disregarding the fact that something that might seem like "just a [insert inconsequential thing]" to a rational mind might have a major emotional consequence/take a major emotional toll on someone with RSD, or really anyone who gets easily impatient/angry about video games (Sapnap reminds me of many of my friends, in that way). The issues I, personally, had with the way they handled the HBomb situation is that these are simply explanations and reasons for my empathy; they are not excuses. I have no excuse when I get irrationally angry about something inconsequential in my own life, for a couple of reasons. One, because I am an adult and I need to learn how to handle my reactions and manage my own anger. Two, because as someone with many mental problems, it is my responsibility to learn coping mechanisms to ensure my own emotional stability and livelihood; this includes learning whatever I need to handle RSD- whether that be isolating myself from others when I know I will become violently/passionately angry about something, creating and sustaining a support system that can get me through bouts of extreme emotion, finding healthy emotional outlets for my negative emotions that won't harm myself or others, or a combination thereof. I don't think what they said about HBomb post-MCC was an irreversibly horrible thing, or anything. I think there were errors committed by two men who should be fully capable of foreseeing and preventing those errors, but I don't unconditionally hate Dream or Sapnap for the post-MCC stream or comments. I just wish they had made amends quickly, publicly, and sufficiently, because the greatest consequences from the whole thing weren't even from those two criticizing HBomb themselves; they were from the waves of backlash because of their immense influence on the MCYT fandom, which could've been prevented, if they had acted maturedly and responsibly after the stream.

Fourth, you’re right, that he doesn’t seem to condone his fans’ behavior. I detest the frequent anti argument that one of the reasons Dream should be criticized is because he explicitly uses his fanbase to attack others, or something of the sort. Personally, I think he created his fanbase in a very specific way and interacts with them in such a way so as to benefit him as much as possible, yes, but he never actually tells his fanbase to go and yell at or harrass anyone. Still, there is a significant difference between not condoning something and condemning something. It might seem unfair, and it might be annoying of me to say this, but I truly think that someone with this large a fanbase, especially one as overzealous as Dream’s, needs to be condemned every single time it goes on some kind of rampage/harrassment campaign. Either that, or Dream needs to make a definitive, permanent statement against any kind of harrassment of others on his behalf. I know he’ll occassionally make the odd tweet or serious stream addressing something his fanbase did, but one of the many reasons his fanbase keeps doing the same damn thing is because he’s so lukewarm and spotty about this condemnation. A fanbase like his needs to be given explicit guidance and boundaries for the numerous things they do in his defense- harrassing/doxing antis, harrassing people who criticize him who aren’t antis (respectful criticism, other CCs, other MCYT stans, etc.), harrassing the people he critcizes (i.e., HBomb), speculating about his personal life (his relationship with his gf, his mental health/ADHD, his romantic life, his childhood, etc.), and speculating about his relationships with his friends and colleagues. My personal ideology is that, if you have significant influence over someone or a group of people, you are at least somewhat responsible for the things those people do or don’t do, if it at all relates back to you. I’m so fucking tired of the argument that CCs aren’t responsible for what their fans do. Obviously they aren’t responsible for every single one of their fans, and obviously they can’t fully control their fans at the end of the day. But I think there are certain things that reach such a level of extremity that does make those CCs responsible. This can be measured by either scale or intensity; that is to say, if a CC’s fanbase does things on an extremely large scale, or one person from/a fraction of the fanbase does something really extreme, then the CC is made all the more responsible. Another CC I’ve always had trouble discussing with other people on this subject is Pewdiepie, in particular, about the extremists in his fanbase. Because the things a small handful of his fans have done in reference to him and/or in his name were so fucking extreme, I thought Pewdiepie had to take at least some responsibilty. Along a similar vein, because the things Dream’s general fanbase does are so widespread and on such a massive scale, Dream has to take at least some responsibility.

Fifth, okay. Hmmm. I want to tackle this point you made about the ableism he faces in some criticism of him carefully and with empathy, but not coddling. One, I do think a lot of the criticism he receives for the ways he handles criticism (post-cheating Tweets, reactions to John Swan, post-MCC HBomb stream, etc.), disregard his RSD and can be oftentimes ableist. I’ve actually encountered people irl who criticize this aspect of Dream’s character, and have had to explain to them their disregard for how ADHD/RSD affect neurodivergent people’s reactions to criticism. But - and this is a big, and very controversial but - I think mentally ill/disordered people can 100% leverage their mental illness/disorders for the sake of manipulation. This is actually something I’ve learned from a psychiatrist, regarding the ways people I know and I handle our anxiety and depression. This manipulation can be unwitting or intentional, but it is entirely possible, and the possibility shouldn’t be entirely dismissed as ableist. Living with a mental illness or disorder that others know about/that you are very public about puts you in an interesting position to receive frequent sympathy, empathy, and/or pity. I’m not saying that empathy for Dream having ADHD/RSD is entirely unjustified; on the contrary, I have frequently expressed how I can relate to his ADHD symptoms and have defended him for expressing those symptoms, both on mcytblr and in real life. I am saying that Dream fans tend to use his ADHD as a kind of shield for a lot of criticism levied against him, including the supposition that he could be manipulating his fanbase to defend him because of his public expressions of RSD. So yes, my theory is that Dream knows how to levy every aspect of his life for his personal gain and for the growth of his brand, and that includes his ADHD. I think he has courage for his openess about his ADHD, I think his openness has contributed to the rise in awareness of mental health and empathy for neurodivergent people within Gen Z, and I think at least some of his expressions of RSD publicly/online weren’t intentionally made public. All that being said, I also think he has to know just how much his fanbase cares about defending him for his ADHD, and I think he has to know that some of the things he does related to his neurodivergence endear him to his audience, in a coddling, baby-ing, mildly ableist sorta way. Maybe this is all incredibly presumptuous of me. Of course, I can never know the real intentions behind any Dream video, Tweet, or stream. Maybe I’m just projecting, because I can see myself doing just this, if I had the maturity I had circa 2018-2019. Idfk know, man.

Sixth, I actually agree with you here, people probably do get more mad at his fanbase than him. Dream puts out content pretty seldomly, considering the frequency of content output for other Youtubers/streamers in his field/at his brand size. And yet, he has received masses of criticism. Considering that the things Dream himself does/says do not entirely correlate with the amount of criticism he receives, I think it’s a logical assumption that a lot of that criticism actually goes back to the size of his presence online, rather than the man himself. That is to say, because of the massive community he’s amassed, the exponential growth of his fanbase, their presence on every single social media site and in virtually every single Internet space/fandom, and the size of his metaphysical presence in his fields, Dream is much bigger than the man himself, so the criticism he receives will, at least in part, be a direct or indirect result of all these other aspects of the Dream brand. Something I don’t think many Dream fans/stans, or even most MCYT fans in general, understand, is that Dream isn’t just “one guy” in the eyes of the Internet- at least, not anymore. He hasn’t been for nearly a year. Like Pewdiepie, Mr. Beast, and other CCs who have amassed similar levels of fame and wealth via Internet content creation, Dream is a brand now, and most people will treat him as such. He isn’t just some uwu soft boy playing Minecraft anymore. He is on a whole other level from any other MCYT in his friend circle or colleague interaction bubble. His words will never again live in a vaccum or private bubble, his friend circle will never again be under anything less than intense scrutiny, his past actions will never again be simple mistakes or silly errors, his words will never again be casual tweets or streams for laughs among a couple thousand followers. Dream’s name represents something much bigger than just the one man. As such, all aspects of his brand, including his fanbase, will tie back to him and, ultimately, to any general criticism of him.

I’m not saying I like any of this, and I actually think the evolution of influencers from people to a marketable brand with similar mechanisms, responsibilities, and liabilities as a corporation is some kind of late capitalism nightmare fuel; I’m just stating my own observations and theories as to why so much anti-Dream criticism seems to be directed at his fanbase, rather than him.

Seventh, he’s just a guy, you’re right, but I think a lot of the antis on Tumblr understand this more than you know. As I’ve seen it, the sentiment among much of the “DSMP stans DNI” crowd seems to be that of “Dream/other MCYTs are such ‘bad’ people, so why do their fans stick to these mediocre, racist men, when there are so many better people to watch/better content to consume?” We know this argument is flawed for many of the obvious reasons - the conflation of all MCYTs’ actions regardless of individual identity, the equating of a CC’s fanbase’s morality to that of the CC they enjoy watching, the exxageration of any error MCYT CCs have committed as bigotry/racism, the fundamental misunderstanding and misinformation that led antis to believe this exxageration of the facts, etc. But I want to focus on the general, underlying sentiment of, “why not watch someone better, when your creator is problematic?” Sometimes, I ask this of Dream stans. Yes, being mildly ignorant, getting involved in the scandals Dream has, and being a right-leaning/libertarian centrist in the recent past all seem like harmless things, all things considered. One could say Dream isn’t nearly as bad as many antis who are misinformed seem to believe, and that there are much worse CCs Dream stans could be watching and creating fan content for. But I think what Tumblr antis wonder is, aren’t there also much better MCYTs/CCs people could be watching and stanning? Because he’s just some guy, right? Is his content truly so exceptional or is he really so exceptional a person, that people have to stick by him, despite the things that spike up regarding his current or past actions? I think that’s what made me finally decide to stop watching Dream. I realized he was just Some Guy. The Dream Team was a comforting dynamic to indulge in, DNF was a cute ship to read and speculate about, and Manhunts were fun videos to watch; however, once the Reddit posts came out and I read them in-depth, the cost-benefit analysis tipped over to the “not worth it” side for me. I realized Dream’s content, while fun and comforting, was not entirely unique, and wasn’t worth sticking around for, given what I then knew about his past political leanings. If he is just Some Guy, then there are a hundred more like him out there. There a hundred more ships, a hundred more found family dynamics, a hundred more entertaining and skilled Minecraft players. So while I agree with you on the point of people being allowed to love him regardless because he is just a guy, at the end of the day, I think that, if we are to believe that sentiment or use that argument in such a manner, we should also understand the flip side- that, if he is just some guy, why is it worth sticking around? To that I say, maybe because people just enjoy the simple things they enjoy.

Anyways, I wholly agree with your tl;dr. Thanks for that insanely long ask, this was a fun thing to keep me occupied while I’ve been at work, facilitating Zoom sessions this whole morning.

#ive been writing this on and off since 830 am est SHEESH #dreamwastaken #dream critical #eh i think im relatively lenient of him here given my past posts ab him #but still just in case the blacklist tags for yalls convenience:#discourse #/neg #asks #long post #long posts #this a LONG one bois #morango

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pesewla · 4 years

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aight since this is a loaded question i’ll try to organize my thoughts haha...

will they interact more?

YES, ABSOLUTELY. i have reasons too. several. buckle up

1. we still don’t know why tyki looks like nea.

ofc, this is more of a joyd/nea interaction than a tyki/allen interaction, but i also think learning the answer to this will be crucial for both tyki and allen understanding their noahs, their past, and each other better…

2. tyki and allen are highly paralleled characters.

heck, they first meet each other while both cheating at cards for basically the same reason - for their friends (allen to get krory’s clothing back, and tyki for the fun of it but also because his human friends need money to survive).

their main motive is emotion, not logic. tyki’s noah is driven by the need for pleasure, which he finds through killing and destroying, and tyki’s human side is driven by his love for eze and his human friends. and essentially all of allen’s actions are driven by his residual love and respect for mana. he restores his innocence purely to resume killing and freeing akuma, which he feels so much pity and sadness for because of his experience with mana. allen goes to the black order only because cross (who had ties to mana) ordered him to, not out of his own free will.

both of them recently experienced events that upheaved their allegiances and bonds. for allen, he was betrayed and basically left for dead by the order. for tyki, he’s just beginning to understand how little he knows about the noah’s past and goals; after meeting nea, he expressed a fervent desire to learn more about him, even if that’ll shift his whole world paradigm.

they both struggle with their light and dark sides. the only difference is that tyki finds joy in having both; allen is kind of in denial of his noah still, but he also expressed a desire to learn more about nea after the third exorcist incident.

so all of these parallels lead me to believe that, like other aspects of their character, learning the “truth” should come at the same time for them.

3. literally whenever tyki and allen interact in canon it sets off an unstoppable chain reaction of character development…

for tyki, his inability to get rid of allen led to tyki hardening his (questionable) ideals and putting more deep thought into his actions beyond just killing “for the fun of it”. tyki never thought about innocence at all before allen, which road points out in the ark. dealing with allen seriously forced tyki to consider why he was doing what he was doing, not just how it felt in the moment. even if he doesn’t change his ideals, putting more thought into his actions is kind of the first step towards autonomy & not just blindly listening to joyd.

for allen, tyki is actually pushing him towards a balance between light and dark. this was first hinted at when allen and tyki’s fight in the ark led allen to procuring the white sword from his arm. the white sword resembles nea’s sword, which he used to massacre the noah, but the difference is that allen doesn’t want to kill tyki. crown clown balances between the desires of nea (absolute massacre) and allen (who simply wants to go back to playing cards and peacetime). later on, tyki is the one who encourages allen to figure out just “what” he is, rather than trying to decide between his noah and innocence all at once. seriously, it’s so obvious that tyki is trying to help allen…

4. tyki has expressed in multiple ways that he’s looking forward to seeing how allen deals with his noah.

i doubt he’ll give up on that.

5. no other characters share the same experience as the two of them.

neither of them really understand their noahs, and they usually do so in tandem.

i mean tyki has been present in all stages of allen’s transition into a noah - first in the ark where he becomes the Musician, then in the alma arc where nea awakens, and then when he’s forced to leave the order…etc. so i think it’s likely he’ll continue to play a large part in how the chips fall there

the reason why there are several fics about allen being raised as a noah is because it is plausible. both allen and tyki are people that struggle against their nature and fate, and literally one of the only things separating them is how they were raised. so, they’ll continue to propel each other through their plot and character developments…

what will eventually happen between the two of them?

okay i’m not going to be overly optimistic here.

allen, for the most part, still sees tyki as an enemy or a threat. allen wants to spare tyki and for tyki to live, but that’s only because allen has witnessed his humanity - in other words, he thinks tyki’s noah is bad and tyki’s human side is good.

i think the main part of their development from here will hinge on allen changing the way he sees noah in general, not just tyki. it’s overwhelmingly clear that allen’s perception, and by extension the audience’s perception, of noah is skewed. we don’t have the full information on them, but i imagine they have motives outside of the “destruction and chaos” one-track mindset that was pinned on them in the beginning. most likely relating to the pillar.

it’s very likely that allen and tyki will, more or less simultaneously, learn the truth about nea and the “third side” of the war. allen will be forced to do so since he’s nea’s host, but tyki will most likely seek out the information, as he declared that he would. in this, both allen and tyki will be pushed more toward a “grey” area - coming from allen’s initial white “goodness” and tyki’s initial black “badness”. i have hope that allen and tyki will learn about these facts together. that would be pretty fitting.

as allen learns more about the third side of the war, he’ll be more accepting of tyki and see him more as an equal or, at the very least, another victim of the holy war.

tyki already basically considers allen a comrade or is willing to - even though he was ordered by the earl to protect allen, i don’t think he was faking the shouts of concern as allen took on apo lol. but as TYKI learns more about the third side of the war, he’ll likely stop pressing allen to give up innocence and decide “what” he is. i imagine he’ll sympathize even more with allen, even if joyd still hates him for being nea’s host…

what are your hopes for them?

okay now here’s my chance to be optimistic.

i really really want tyki and allen to have a conversation as equals. their interactions frustrate me so much - tyki has so much respect and admiration for allen but he’s always so coy! and allen, like i said previously, was only able to cooperate with tyki when he was emotionally panicked. otherwise, his “I’M AN EXORCIST” button flicks on and he’s forced to act tsundere.

please, please hoshino let them play another game of poker, just laughing and having fun. i want to see tyki humbled. i’ve been thinking this ever since their dialogue when fighting in the ark.

i want tyki to get mad at nea for possessing allen. i KNOW he’s thinking it. i want that “give the boy back” moment so badly.

i hope that someday they can talk about tyki destroying allen’s innocence. i don’t really think allen’s hurt about it anymore, especially since it was a key factor in his growth as an exorcist, but i wish there was like… some stage of forgiveness or repentance. not that tyki is capable of that, but hey.

other people have definitely said this - idk where the post is but i love that one - but having a meal together like tyki wanted??? that would be so symbolic and AH\

anyways i know this was pretty lengthy but i just think tyki and allen are excellent characters and their similarities and differences speak volumes in terms of the overall good&bad message of dgm. always too long winded. with loves

#dgm #d gray man #tykillen #poker pair #repost cuz the other one broke #tyki mikk #allen walker #d.gray man #they kinda kill me #my writing

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mychemicalxmen · 4 years

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aight here’s the tea on TUA and “It’s Not Like in the Movies” from the Superhero musical

Thank you so much to @mycosmicspacestorm for the excuse to go off on this!! This is probably wayyyy more than you expected, but I just feel like bein a nerd rn. Much love. <3

*Here’s the song on spotify.

*Basically, for me, it hits that vibe of when someone asks you what TUA is about and you want to say it’s a superhero show because it technically is but it also sure as hell don’t feel like it, in tone and plot but especially in the fact that the Academy itself was a really unconventional superhero force. *I’m coining the term Duty Bros to mean 1, 2, and 5, the siblings who seem primarily driven by a sense of duty/responsibility. (Luther with his moon mission, Diego with his vigilante justice, and Five with stopping the apocalypse.) These brothers actively want to save the world and know they’re perfectly capable of doing so. (Allison and Klaus, on the other hand, seem to have been running from responsibility their entire adult lives and are only just now making an effort to change that.)

*Like I kinda alluded to in the tags, there’s two ways I like to imagine this song. If you don’t worry too much about the lyric-by-lyric parallels, you could picture it as Diego/Klaus explaining his past to Eudora/Dave for the first time. The subtext being “Yeah, so here’s this thing that made me Who I Am Right Now, and no one really knows/remembers that about me. No, it’s not how you think it would be. Also, it left me with a ton of weird baggage, so even though I like you, it’s probably best if you keep your distance from me”. The other way is this super abstract Oops All Siblings animatic/amv.

ok let’s go No one can get too close. No one can get inside of you. No one can know the secrets that you keep. Your head is always down, hoping that people slide past you, Almost as if you’re walking in your sleep. I feel this for all of the Hargreeves. All of them have trauma. All of them have walls. All of them have secrets. All of them have behavioral, psychological, and/or physical scars from childhood. (Five, especially, has a hell of a wall between him and the rest of humanity, and he has no time to be noticed in 2019 while trying to save the world.) And most of them aren’t especially eager to be recognized as one of the Academy kids. And you can’t cry, though you hurt. You are always on alert. Though you try and you fly, people die.

ngl, this lyric is pretty weak, but it kinda fits with the Duty Bros. This is what they’ve decided to do, but you can’t save everybody, and there’s no time to be sad about it. Alternatively: “Yo, I’ve seen some shit since I was 12.”

It’s not like in the movies, where the hero’s loved and known. It’s not like in the movies; I spend my days alone.

Again, they’re not recognized as the Academy anymore. They walked away. And currently, they’re all living in some form of isolation. Allison not having a family of her own anymore; Luther on the moon; Klaus’s struggles, etc.

I don’t even get a hug from the kid stuck in the tree. It’s not like in the movies; No one knows it’s me.

The Duty bros can’t really reap any tangible rewards from their service. They barely get recognition. And none of them really got suitable gratification for the missions they did as kids. No real connection to the outside world. You don’t drive a tricked-out car. You don’t work at a lab or the Daily Planet for a boss who yells but has a heart of gold.

The Handler doesn’t yell but bitch doesn’t have a heart of gold either. You don’t bleed or scrape or scar – well, at least not on the outside – And you’re at your peak, though you can’t help feeling old. Snarky Five line. New body who dis. You’re always tired, but you can’t rest. You often lose, though you’ve done your best. There’s no parade, no city key. Just anonymity. It’s not like in the movies. It’s a little more complex. It’s not like in the movies. No CGI effects. I don’t get to learn life lessons from my human family. It’s not like in the movies. No one knows it’s me.

Same stuff as before. The Hargreeves in general. Certain aspects of their careers as children were glamorous, but others really really weren’t. And now all the glamor they once had is gone. I’ve tried to walk away, so I won’t wake each day To cries of anguish in my head.

This could be pretty damn relevant to Klaus, who tries to “walk away” from not only the past, but from even having his powers. Boy literally wakes up in Episode 2 to cries of anguish in his head. And in the Superhero musical, there’s actually a really cool, spooky “Help me” musical motif that shows up whenever this character hears these voices and needs to spring into action. And he fuckin hates it. Spot-on parallel.

Alternatively, for all the siblings: “walk away” = “totally block out the past”. I’ve tried to repress it all and never look back, hoping the memories wouldn’t haunt me. But it doesn’t work like that.

But if I disappear, you’ll all implode, that’s clear. It’s gotten worse and worse with every passing year.

You could swing this for Luther trying to take control the way he does (“you’ll all implode” = “you need a leader”) or you could swing it for Five (“you’ll all implode” = “the world will end; but also, you guys are a mess as people, and you have been for a while, and you can’t fix this without me”). And quite literally, if Five decided to disappear halfway through his big mission, he knows for a fact his siblings would die. A lot of pressure there. I don’t mean to sound so harsh. I’ve also seen the good out there. Empathy and kindness on display. But every time I think I can release myself from this nightmare, someone tries to blow the world away. Duty Bros. Especially Luther on the first two lines. He reads as the least cynical of the lot, and his naiveté and hope is really what keeps him on the moon. Five is the one really living the “nightmare”, trying to track down the one who’s going to “blow the world away”.

And so I don’t want to sound insincere, but I think you should just forget what happened here, ‘Cause no one ever truly sees me.

“I got a lot of baggage, bro, you really shouldn’t get involved.” (You’re Jim, the man in 4-B.) An outside voice, reassuring. “You’re not Number Two. You’re Diego.” “You’re not Number Four. You’re Klaus.” Etc. “This new identity you’ve adopted after all that shit went down? That’s the real you. That’s who you are now.” Now Simon, that’s an ending I would really like to see, But I can’t make a life out of my secret identity. The rebuttal. “I can’t just stop being ‘Number X’. I can’t just pretend that wasn’t part of my life. I can’t make that stop haunting me.”

(Why not? It’s not like in the movies.) No one knows it’s me. You mean, like, maybe I can actually process my emotions like a rational adult, and find a healthy way to cope, stop identifying with the shit Hargreeves put me through, and move on with my life? whack.

anyway........................ where’s that season 2 trailer at huh

#if anyone wants to yell w me about the Hargreeves and literally any musical theatre song I am H E R E #but ye thanks cosmic!!!#superhero musical #tua #the umbrella academy

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emperor-of-blood · 5 years

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Aight so I guess I’m doing a session review?/Prediction?/Analysis of how I think @neonwolfeh session might go.

So starting this off with the premise:

It’s a normal session with no specific prototyping fuckery or trolls or whatever. and I got some brief character summaries:

Ross, Heir of Doom: Ross is a jaded, angry guy who just wants to have -One Good Daytm-.

Luca, Rogue of Life: Pretty upbeat, tries to make the best of every situation (and does not succeed).

Kase, Seer of Rage: Fuckin edgelord, thats p much it. Full of hate and will say slurs.

Abby, Witch of Hope: Basically a shoujo anime protagonist, awkward and peppy and sweet.

Odin, Prince of Time: Embodiment of nervousness and jumpiness. This guy needs a nap and a hug.

Niko, Knight of Space: Like Dave Strider if he was as suave as 2012 fanon interpretations said he is.

And now for my takes on them:

So starting off my initial impressions of the session are complete failure, mostly based on one thing. Odin, the Time player. While he sounds decent enough of a guy you have to understand the reason that every session requires a Space and Time player to succeed. Technically speaking, only a Space player is needed to overcome the wall of creating a new universe. The Time player is needed because the game is just that hard. The image I get of Odin is that he won’t be actually doing much Time traveling, likely too weak-minded to believe that he could pull things off. A lot of pressure would be resting on his shoulders and he needs to answer. As I said in my Patrick Star analysis, I believe that he’s going to be wasting a lot of Time. For different reasons here though, he’s still destined to procrastinate. That is likely going to get people in his session killed. Sburb is hard and everyone involved needs to be doing their part to beat the game.

My analysis doesn’t end with that though. We still have 5 other players to throw into the mix! Moving onto I’d like to talk about the cool cat Niko, the Knight of Space. So inherently here we have a contradictory classpect. The Knight is a protector, in their session they are supposed to cooperate with their Space player to breed The Frogtm. They are meant to be a companion. The Space class is one of solitude, barring their frog breeding partner. Space is a vast domain and both Jade and Kanaya spent most of their time alone. It’s one of their themes. They spend time worried about the bigger picture that with the smaller problems that their teammates deal with. Likely, they are very alone. And that makes me wonder, how much of the “Cool Guy” is real and how much of it is, well, him being lonely? Or a defense mechanism because of that? Keep yourself distant and aloof because that’s where you’re going to end up anyways. No reason for people to get hurt, sort of deal.

Next I wanna talk about Luca, the Rogue of Life. I imagine her as the kind of person who is peppy to the point that it makes people uncomfortable. Trying to bring Life happiness to all of her friends by being a never ending source of sunshine. Which is all well and good, these types of people are well liked and a party falling into the traps of depression is likely to fail. That being said, I can’t help but believe that her failures come from her unending sunshine. Sometimes people just need to be sad. Life has it’s ups and down and that’s natural. People probably feel exhausted around her, much to her dismay. You must go down to rise back up. I feel like she’s probably Odin’s self proclaimed best friend and also a main source of stress for him. “You can do it!” is encouragement (He probably sees it as empty/naive), not useful advice. Her being unable to see that has got to be one of her personal challenges. She’s not responsible for rewriting everyone’s lives or fixing their problems. Those are not hurdles for her to overcome. I feel like every Rogue has some weird interaction with their aspect. As one who steals Life/steals from Life I don’t think it’s meant to be taken literally. She ain’t sucking out peoples souls. I’d say she maybe has an aura of demoralization for her enemies, kind of like a mental attack? Or it could be something more direct like absorbing Life essence through contact or something. Like a magic drain attack similar to the androids from DBZ or some equivalent. The stealing from Life is maybe... just a literal item teleportation ability? Like an actual Thief Rogue. Beyond that, she can probably bring people back to life once just like every other Life player ever.

Ross the Heir of Doom is, well, kind of a loser. but he doesn’t have to be. His main challenge is going to be realizing that his “One good daytm” isn’t just going to randomly show up. It’s something you have to work for. Once he does, he’ll probably be fine. Weirdly enough the fucking Doom player is likely the most competent out of everyone, which is really funny imo. His powers are uh. Well. One who inherits Doom/is protected by Doom. I’m shooting in the dark here despite there being a canon Heir of Doom. I’d say he maybe influences enemies to fight each other? At least early on during the passive protection phase. Later on once he awakens his powers he might be able to suck “Bad vibes” into himself, weakening his enemies and strengthening himself. That might be leeching into Thief territory but I wouldn’t know what else to say here honestly. Maybe he can fix things? Inheriting the Doom of something and taking the damage into himself? It’s up for debate.

Moving on to Kase, Seer of Rage. The dude’s probably a complete asshole. The kind that you question why you’re even friends with them. Probably racist but also hates people in general and claims that it’s OK because of that. Probably gets along really well with animals because of that too. He’s probably feeding into Odin’s insecurities, which, might actually be helping him stay until he’s really ready to time travel. But that’s not Kase’s intention (Ask him about it afterwards and he’ll claim otherwise forever.). He just want’s to be a dick and thinks being edgy or ironic is cool. As on who understands Rage he’s likely well aware that it can be useful in the right scenarios. Maybe he lets himself get taken by the berserker Rage at just the right moment and come back down afterwards. But he hasn’t really come down. You can’t just have a heart filled with Rage and hate and be a normal person the rest of the time. He can probably tell when it’s time for others to let loose as well. But likely has trouble convincing them.

Kase and Ross probably get along really well.

Finally, we have Abby, the Witch of Hope. Honestly? She sounds really basic. She’s gotta be the most “Normal” person out of the bunch. Which, when your surrounded by weirdos, is a good thing. Everyone needs someone sane to fall back on and that’s definitely her. I imagine that’s how she manipulates Hope, just giving people some reference, some piece of mind, that they haven’t gone off the deep end. Or maybe that the have and need to rethink things. She’s probably the one that’ll help Odin figure his shit out. Maybe she drafts up a plan of events he should change. Then in the new timeline he seeks out her help again and repeats this until he can do things himself. While I don’t see her as the leader of the party, she is likely the anchor. She also probably will play a bog role in everyone else figuring out their shit too. Telling Ross to shut the fuck up, Kase to man up and do something, Luca to do something productive, Niko to call her when he the loneliness starts getting to him, just to talk. Her challenges likely revolve around realizing how important she is. After all, she’s just a shoujo protag, what can she do? Everyone is out there killing monsters or solving puzzles or hacking their alchemists. Ans she’s just a plain Jane. But that’s what makes her special. Her powers are probably basic hope lasers and maybe being good at giving speeches.

So with that out of the way how would the actual session go? Well, I think there’s a lot of fighting. I imagine Kase wants to be the leader being the “Only one capable of it” and he’s not exactly wrong. But he’s also insufferable. So it doesn’t matter that he’s competent because nobody wants to listen to him. The only other options are Luca who everyone also likely can’t deal with for extended periods of time for previously stated reasons; or Niko, who is likely to busy with their own shit to also manage the party. So I think everyone has to meet up and decide that it’s probably best for Kase to be leader and that everyone should just agree to follow him and give him some advice where they can. Kase is probably actually competent. He’s likely a bad leader but an even worse follower. I can imagine him just ignoring anyone else as the leader and going off to do his own thing and fucking shit up. With him as the leader, not causing trouble and everyone else in a kind of, secret alliance I guess, the key players are going to be Odin and Abby. Odin needs to be able to fill his role or everyone dies. Simple as that. Abby needs to a) help him figure his shit out if he can’t on his own. And b) help ground everyone else (So they can solve their problems) and keep some semblance of sanity. If they can, there’s a solid shot at victory. If Odin dies before he can Time travel, well, I guess that’s that. There’s a lot of personal challenges to overcome based on a character’s classpect and I think it really comes down to, are these people/characters capable of growth?

Hopefully the way I viewed the characters was how you wanted but with so little to go on I might have misinterpreted somethings. Either way this was fun!

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kennytucker · 5 years

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aight gonna discuss some mental health stuff & kenny mccormick since i’ve thought about this a lot but never put into words. kinda personal too i guess? cw heavy stuff like family issues, substance abuse and mental health related discussion.

aight coming from someone who grew up in a rough neighbourhood and lower end of middle class (and at one point father couldn’t afford to pay the hot water bill so we had to boil water to take a bath haha) kenny’s character hits home? like as a kid u arent supposed to stress about if ur parents are okay or if u can afford to do stuff at school but when ur family is poor it’s so hard to ignore that fact and leads to a lot of anxiety.

there’s also the alcohol and drug abuse which is super prevalent as well. and having parents who fight and u can’t just ignore it cause it’s happening right in front of you.

anyway i think kenny would be deeply affected by this. he does not want to be like his parents and he wants to set a good example for his little sister. he wants whats best for his family but its hard when ur parents are druggies and alcoholics. just character wise i think he’d avoid alcohol and drugs but stress smokes cigarettes when he’s older, but even when it’s a rare indulgence cause they’re fucking expensive.

he probably works a lot to support his family. there’s a lot of sacrifice id think. he has to balance school and work and kenny is smart but it’s hard to focus when you’re tired and things suck at home and you just wanna get out. like kenny is so so so smart and is quick to pick up on things but stress & depression just make it so hard for him to get good grades, and he needs that cause he hopes that by going into higher education he can finally escape the cycle his family has been stuck in.

he’d be good at hiding his fear/emotions and puts up a front to hide the fact that he’s so insecure. he’s scared that his clothes are dirty or have holes in them and that his teeth arent as nice as the other kids cause he can’t afford braces (same hat) and he uses dirty jokes and dark humour and flirting to sorta hide that aspect of him? he feels alone but he also doesn’t want anyones pity. i think that’s why he wears a surgical/face mask or draws his hoodie up because it feels more secure that way and that he can’t be scrutinized.

like his persona on the outside is bright, silly, always there kenny but whenever he hears yelling or smells alcohol his heart races and his hands get sweaty but it’s something that only he can feel and notice. it takes him a long time to stop associating alcohol with violence and fear.

on top of that, he also has that fucking curse and it’s like the universe is just telling him to go fuck himself. at first he’s bitter and angry that no one can remember. was suicidal for the longest time and acted out on that because he’d always come back. it would hurt but he’d always come back and he felt like his life had no value, his body wasn’t worth much cause he’d be back again the next day or so. i think that as he grows older he learns to accept that fact. maybe with the help w/ his friends they figure out what the fuck is wrong with him but his young adult life sucked ass.

kenny mccormick is a smart, capable and brave but he also fears the thought of being abandoned. he’s hard working and diligent but he doesn’t open up about his personal life at all. obvs stan and kyle and cartman suspect but kenny would brush it off easy by making some stupid joke and it was just an easy thing for him but it also resulted in a lot of pain.

he’s sort of selfish, too. and envious. he feels contempt when he hears his friends complain how shitty their lives are when all he wants to scream is that at least you get to go home to a warm bed and a cooked meal and parents who don’t love drugs more than their children. he knows this isn’t a healthy way of thinking cause at the end of the day pain is pain and all worries and anxieties are valid but he’s just so envious. he holds a lot of resentment and doesn’t really let go of that until theyre adults.

i guess in summary kenny has to deal w/ a bunch of shit but he’s a good person at heart and loves the people he cares about, he’s just afraid of being vulnerable. suffers from depressive episodes that persist into adulthood and it was only then when he could afford medication and therapy. he just wants to be better than his parents ever were.

#lol sorry it's so long but ive been thinking about this for forever and its nice to finally get it down #kenny s my Boy #kat rambles #it's not coherent at all and i didn't proofread this but thats a provlem for future me #just some thoughts on his character n stuff ksnkjs

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actualbird · 6 years

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yo you totally made me think about low empathy michael and it like totally makes sense and i think about it a lot when i listen to two player game bc ye like he OBVIOUSLY cares a lot about jeremy and he loves him and like jeremy's stating his problem and michael keeps saying the same solution cause like "that's the answer bro, don't be down" bc he cant wrap his head around the emotions and connect w them that well so in his mind he's just saying this completely fool proof solution i love this hc

yo i got this ask while balls deep in three books of discourse analysis i could only understand by like 10% but because of that was in the mood to just. keep thinking my brain in circles.

so heres a stupidly long answer cataloging canon instances of michael being low empathy af/exhibiting other traits related to this. along with like, characterization to extrapolate from that (at least by my own personal interpretation. obligatory disclaimer that how i see characters is not law, this is just My Take).

but before that, im gonna define some terms outright so we’re all on the same page. empathy is a person’s capability to understand and feel what others are feeling. basically how well you can put yourself in somebody else’s shoes. this shouldnt be confused with sympathy, which is feeling compassion, pity, sorrow etc. for another. empathy is recognition/replication while sympathy is more on the caring about it. here i focus on empathy and the lack of it.

im not an expert on Anything but speaking from experience as somebody who has very low empathy, this causes some complications. when you dont feel what others are feeling, sometimes you dont notice other people’s feelings at all. this results in stuff like bluntness, trouble reading social cues, insensitivity, etc. all things that 1) may happen unintentionally, 2) can be worked through via healthy communication, 3) are not inherently bad, just a result of how one reacts to external emotions and 4) things i totally think michael exhibits because hes a low empathy goblin i love with my whole heart.

let’s get right into it. in more than survive, right after jeremy and michael discover their boyf riend backpacks, this exchange occurs

this seems pretty normal at first glance but it is the first instance of what seems to be michael’s go-to pattern for when he notices his best friend is feeling down, which, at least, kudos to michael, he very obviously noticed jeremy’s feelings. hurrah! so his process for how to fix this goes a little like “step 1: notice jeremy is upset. step 2: cheer jeremy up! step 3: unknowingly kinda mess up step 2“

jeremy is upset about the backpacks but then jeremy provides an out with something supposedly positive. michael latches on to it. it turns out to be negative. michael tries to salvage the situation by cheering jeremy up! by giving him a cool science fact! hell yeah! except it’s a shaky save at best because he does call the both of them losers but in an “it’s okay :D” way.

all in all this is nothing really, just some friendly fast paced banter between best friends. whats important here is the 3 step pattern aforementioned because it 1) shows that michael Cares about his best friend and tries to make things better and 2) is BASICALLY the entirety of two player game

TWO PLAYER GAME is such a BOP and, at its core, is a song about how michael has got jeremy’s back and vice versa. but tpg is also textbook the 3 step pattern with added sprinkle of unintended invalidation. ive briefly spoken about tpg before so this might look a lil familiar but at its gist:

like you said anon, in tpg jeremy tells michael a problem he has, and throughout the course of the song, he continually makes it known that hes upset and has a lot of issues. step 1 has been achieved: michael knows jeremy is not doing too hot. time to do step 2: cheer him up!! and what better way to do that than to think positive with his trademark line “guys like us are cool in college” like, over and over again. because….it makes sense for michael. things might suck now, but just keep swimming yeah? it’ll be better later.

but it’s not better now and thats what jeremy actually needed validation on. michael thinks the solution is to look to the future but jeremy has his problems bothering him in the present. for all that michael says this is a two player game, he’s unintentionally dismissive because he doesnt understand that this isnt something that can be fixed with a simple “look forward to two years from now” mentality. neither of them are in the wrong, really. theyre just not on the same page.

onwards we go to something else entirely. the chili fries

this is a RIDICULOUSLY SMALL MOMENT but it stuck out to me because imo it is pretty obvious that jeremy says “leave me alone” because hes bummed and is being dramatic, but michael takes it literally and uses the opportunity to skedaddle and get his sweet sweet discontinued soda. im aware michael had to be gone for plot reasons and also the discontinued soda is foreshadowing for the mtn dew red, but taken at face value, this is something that happens a lot w/ low empathy: things are taken literally.

jeremy is upset. jeremy said to give him some space. thats cool, i’ll go for a bit and come back with something neat that might cheer him up—hey, where’d he go?

and now let’s jump to something everybody and their dog knows about. michael in the bathroom. except not really. because mitb isnt what interests me so much as what happens before.

pre mitb is very, very interesting. before i say anything i’ll be clear in saying that literally nobody had even remotely a nice halloween night, it’s a disaster for everybody involved, but keep in mind that jeremy goes into the pre mitb scene immediately after the clusterfuck that is do you wanna hang and also getting chased down by a sloshed but aggressive jake. many people have said this before me but i’ll say it again: jeremy was not doing well. at all.

and this is where michael fails step 1 of his pattern. he doesnt pick up on this at all. michael is kinda stuck in his own head right now. hes pissed. hes confused. hes betrayed. he cant understand other people’s feelings and now he has to deal with his own too. his head is a melting pot of AGH and he takes it out on jeremy. yeah, he tries to help jeremy, but he doesnt do it very well. it’s all very accusatory, and jeremy just had a terrible night, so jeremy lashes out.

teenagers are bad at emotions but theyre not bad people for it. //cue mitb notes, we know the drill

to the play!!!

recap for maximum contextualization: jeremy realizes the squip is bad fucking news and wants it gone. michael makes an entrance with the one thing that can kill it. and then this happens

AIGHT okay so the whole “i need an apology” scene is obviously played for comedy, and it does a good job at suddenly diffusing the end of the world stakes with some more down to earth teen friend drama but that aside, this scene is a good candidate to be listed under the definition of the phrase “bad timing” because michael, holy shit. BAD TIMING. like great timing for humor but bad timing as a human being.

here we have jeremy clearly in possessed distress and michael has the antidote but he only wants to give it on a condition. it is absolutely a dick move. yeah, michael is is valid for wanting an apology, but not at this moment with the current stakes. this is michael thinking pretty selfishly. hes stuck in his own head and his own thoughts. he cares about jeremy and wants to help but…this apology important to him. it’s easy to get stuck on things like this when you cant empathize with others. the low empathy means that the only feelings you really get to really interact with are your own, so theres a tendency to focus on them. sometimes even at inopportune moments.

unintentional asshole-ery behold. in fact, this can be pushed even harder by this snippet in the score of be more chill that had some lines from an earlier draft.

the fetus version of michael makes an entrance is hilariously low empathy, oh my god. this happens while jeremy is rolling around on the floor fighting an invisible-to-everybody-else squip and this is the first thing michael says. it’s positively dickish.

SO with that done, a little bit can be extrapolated in terms of characterization. i think michael is low empathy so the dominos fall. michael is terrible at feelings. hes got a tendency to get stuck in his own head and not see what others are going through. his emotional periphery is abysmal, hes like a horse with those things that stop horses from looking to the side. in spite of all this, he still has a lot of love and good in his heart and he tries his best to show that in the ways that make sense to him. post-canon, the rift between his brain and jeremy’s brain can only be bridged by a big healthy heap of communication where michael learns that what makes sense to him isnt always what makes sense to other people. hes a good kid. he can do it.

of course this is, again, all my take. the fun thing about transformative work and fandom is that all interpretations are valid and there will always be somebody out there who agrees. or disagrees. but on this blog, this is my michael. or at least one aspect of my michael. //shrug

ANYWAY im glad you like the hc anon!! ive obviously got a lot of feelings about it since i used your ask as an excuse to aimlessly ramble for, holy shit, 1.6 k words lmao. i hope you have a good day!!!

#be more chill #bmc #i spent too much time typing this so it's getting tagged #if i had to type all this you have to scroll past all of it. ive never used a readmore in my life #i havent written most of this into fic yet but i want to. desperately #hc

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