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soft-sunflower · 4 years

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Flower of Evil Thoughts: Part 2- Episode 11

Back to a very emotionally shook Hyunsoo who's driving away from her, away from his life, away from all he's known for the past 14 years, away from his family, away from love. The only love he's ever had. Jiwon and his daughter. He has tears in his eyes as the memory of Jiwon telling him "there's no reason behind why I've fallen out love" comes. He believes he knows why Jiwon told him this and it was because she had discovered the truth of his identity. How could a strong, beautiful woman like Jiwon ever love the likes of Do Hyunsoo? He's literally fighting tears, clutching at his head as her words continue to sound in his mind.

Then he remembers her telling him she wishes they could switch bodies so that he could feel how much she loves him and you can see how genuinely confused he is. Does Jiwon love him? Does she not want him? Is she abandoning him? And once the case is through, she wants to move to the countryside with Eunha and him. All of these thoughts and memories are too much as he lets out a cry and slams on his breaks to the side of a bridge.

He looks so incredibly lost. He looks afraid, he doesn't know what to do. He's been abandoned now. He's all alone and so he rests his head on his steering wheel. No. He doesn't want to accept that. He's desperate to not accept that, and so he tries to call his wife over and over. He's pleading for her to pick up the phone, that this can't be the end for them. He genuinely does not want to lose his wife. The idea of it has driven him into an emotional burst. Jiwon just looks at her phone but doesn't answer. With the song Feel You playing throughout this whole scene, it just adds to the emotional impact.

Next thing we know, a taxi is pulling up in front of his car and out comes Jiwon. Hyunsoo is already on the verge of absolutely breaking down, but the moment he gets out of that car absolutely wrecked my heart. He's literally struggling his way to her, tears are filling his eyes as she questions him.

"Why are you doing this to me? Why? You can't live as Baek Heeseong anymore. Your identity got exposed. You need to run away."

Oh Jiwon... he's doing this because he NEEDS you. Because he's desperate! Because he loves you, even if he doesn't understand that himself or why he's being like this with her. He does not WANT to run away. He does not CARE that his identity was exposed. He wants to be with you. And I know you're trying... trying so hard and so desperately to help him so he doesn't rot in prison for what his sister did. I know you are.

"What more do you want from me? What more do I need to do for you?"

Jiwon, what he needs from you right now is your comfort, your love, your protection. You don't need to do anything more than what you've already been doing. Just keep loving him, just keep him safe, help him as best you can. Be there for him and for love of god, don't abandon him. He's had enough of that in his life. He's been dealt miserable hands his entire life, and there's nothing that he wants more now than you, his life, his family and to live peacefully. It's his turn for the questions. Hyunsoo is crying now. The first time he's ever really cried.

"Just why... You knew everything. Why didn't you abandon me even though you knew everything?"

Oh... oh my GOD, Hyunsoo... just because you're not living as Baek Heeseong anymore. Just because you are Do Hyunsoo does NOT mean that you are worthy of abandonment. His self-worth is so incredibly small it's utterly heartbreaking. There's no reason WHY Jiwon would've abandoned you because that's just how incredible she is. Yes, she knows your real identity, and yet here she is. She stayed by your side, she told you she didn't mean it, you KNOW she loves you regardless. You have to know this. You have to know you are worthy of her love. How can you not understand why she wouldn't abandon you?? Your trauma runs so deep... you've never been shown by a single person that you are worthy of love except for Jiwon and it's so heartbreaking. So incredibly heartbreaking.

"Do you really not understand?"

No, Jiwon. He doesn't. He's so lost. We know... She bent over backward to protect him, to keep him safe no matter what it took, no matter what she had to do because simply finding out the fact that his real name is Do Hyunsoo did not mean an ending to her love for him. She STILL loves him. She never STOPPED loving him. She would never stop loving him. Ever.

I don't think Hyunsoo is having a panic attack this time. I think he's feeling real, true pain in his heart. I think those panic attacks were the start to this, like I've said in the past episodes. His emotions are completely opening up. His emotions that had brimmed the surface are spilling out in all directions. This takes me back to the beginning scene of when Eunha is crying. He asks Jiwon why, and she tells him "Because there's a lot she wants to say but she can't put it into words yet." I think there is A LOT of that Hyunsoo wants to say here, but he can't. So all he can do is tell Jiwon he is so sorry that he hurt her. He's overcome with his own remorse, regret, disappointment in himself and grief and now all he can do is just cry. He looks so defeated...

"I'm so sorry, Jiwon-ah. I hurt you. I wounded you."

Joongi's delivery of this line right here sent me over the edge full on sobbing because you can FEEL the pain. You can FEEL him in pain. You can FEEL his remorse, you can FEEL how desperately sorry he is that he hurt his wife like this. Joongi has always been able to break my heart and make me cry with his crying scenes, but this one is something so incredibly different. It's not anything like his past heartbreaking scenes in other dramas. You can feel every ounce of Hyunsoo's pain, his desperation, his regret, his fear of losing her.

Years upon years upon years of emotion and tears are just pouring out of him. Who knows how long he kept these feelings and emotions completely on lockdown for so long because of how many people told him he wasn't capable of feeling. Who knows when the last time he ever actually cried in his life? Probably when he was very very young. Maybe when his mother disappeared? Who knows, but it would seem in all his adult life up til now, he has never shed real tears and has never cried, and so now he finally is. He's sobbing like a young one. Like Eunha. And I can't even imagine what's going through Jiwon's head, seeing her husband literally crumbling and shattering before her like this. She's probably never see him cry up til now.

He's in so much pain because of everything he's been through in his life and has never had a way to let it out because he was told he was a monster. He was told he was possessed by an evil spirit and forced into abusive exorcisms. He was told he wasn't capable of feeling or processing emotion. He was told he couldn't love, so he believed any feeling to be unreal and locked it all away to the point he became emotionally stunted, but he can. HE CAN. These feelings have been building and building for so long, unrecognized and have now become evident. His remorse, his aching, his longing, unbelieving that anyone could ever love him as Do Hyunsoo... my heart physically aches for him. I'm shattered.

And the music. THE MUSIC. Oh my GOD this absolutely tragic instrumental is incredible. I don't know how this drama is doing it, but I tell you... the whole time I watched this scene I just cried and cried right along with Hyunsoo and Jiwon. Jiwon can’t stand it and she grabs her husband and pulls her to him. When she gathers him into her arms and holds him after he asks her why again, (FINALLY... I wondered how long she was gonna just let him stand there sobbing his heart out in front of her) and she tells him because it's all she could do, and he leans into her shoulder and wraps his arms around her. The way they are so desperately clinging to each other, as if they can't hold each other tight enough. Hyunsoo's sobs, Jiwon gently patting him on the back. I LOVED the gentle pat on the back because it reminded me all of the times Hyunsoo would hold, comfort and pat Jiwon whether she was crying or resting or whatever. He was there, holding her and patting her, comforting her. Her gentle patting calms him down...

And when he tells her "Jiwon, I want to go home." Oh my GOD... it was almost childlike here. He just wants to go home. Where he's comforted, where he's safe, where nothing can hurt him, where he's loved... I'm getting emotional just going back through this scene. God, Jiwon. Just take this poor baby home.

"Okay, let's go. Let's go home. Whatever happens, let's start over there."

The way he's clutching her shoulder and hair and sobbing again at the realization he gets to go home... just... GOD. Get him home, start over, clean his wounds, get his clothes changed and just let him cry or sleep or talk. Do whatever he wants or needs. Just please please get him home and stay with him. Yep. I'm crying again. My gosh this episode just has me so utterly wrecked. I wish I could explain it better with my words just how much this episode affected me. Thank you Lee Joongi and Moon Chaewon for your beautiful chemistry here. You two deserve massive awards for this drama, but for this scene alone. You both are amazing.

Ooookay, after that overwhelmingly powerful emotional blow that lasted ohhh what... a good 10 minutes? From the time Jiwon busted in to save Hyunsoo, til the very end of Hyunsoo's breakdown... I had to stop so I could cry and get it all out before starting on the next scene.

So now, we're back with Noona and the Baek family. Who is, I believe, faking Noona out with the whole "I'll look into it." Meanwhile, you got Heeseong back there still biting his nails. Haesoo, no... you are trusting them far too easy and you CANNOT count on them. You don't know them. These are dangerous people. Now the mother is asking Haesoo if when she met the accomplice, was there anything that stood out. Sly... she's now talking about the fingernails on his left hand were chewed down short, and here the camera pans to Baek Heeseong biting and chewing at his nails and then him looking at them as Noona recalls this.

AND I CALLED IT I CALLED IT I FUCKING CALLED IT!!!! HE IS THE ACCOMPLICE!!!! HE'S THE ONE WHO SENT THE THREATENING MESSAGE TO THAT LADY, HE IS THE ONE WHO WAS WORKING WITH THE TRAFFICKING RING, HE IS THE ONE WHO WORKED WITH DO MINSEOK. HE WAS THE ONE AT THE FUNERAL SOBBING LIKE IT WAS THE END OF THE WORLD AND HE HELPED DO MINSEOK KILL ALL OF THOSE PEOPLE. The flasbacks. THE FLASHBACKS FFS!!!

Oh shit... the damn trafficking ring leader escaped!!! He fucking tricked the cop with him and escaped. THIS IS REALLY REALLY BAD. This asshole is gonna want revenge on Hyunsoo... and I'm REALLY worried for Hyunsoo's safety since he busted loose. Who knows where he's gone!?

Oh man... time for more tears again, because believe me. This scene made me cry too. I love how Jiwon gently takes Hyunsoo's hand to lead him inside of their home, because he seems almost reluctant to step inside of it. Almost like a "Am I worthy of stepping inside my home? Can I be here? Is it okay for me to be in here?" And then In My Heart starts playing which is PERFECT for this scene. Another fabulously emotional scene done by Joongi and Chaewon. Poor Hyunsoo. He looks like he cried the whole way home, and now that they're home, and he's looking at the wall with the photos of all of their familial memories, Hyunsoo starts to cry again. You think he's going to go into an anxiety attack, but Jiwon grounds him. She puts her arm around him to support him and he turns to face her. He's so so vulnerable right now. So incredibly vulnerable. Jiwon is the rock he needs. She's his strongest pillar of support.

And now, back in their home, Jiwon puts her arms around her husband once more and holds him close. This is them, starting new, starting over, letting him cry in your arms, comforting him, letting him know that you're here, that you love him, that this is his HOME. He is HOME. He's safe here. Our crying couple pulls back to look at each other, and Hyunsoo can't help himself. He cups his wife's face, strokes her cheek with his thumb.I love the way Hyunsoo literally looks over every inch of his wife’s face, as if committing it to memory, and then...

They share the most perfect, emotional, crying kiss that I've ever ever ever seen in a kdrama. It's not messy, it's not overdone, it’s not lacking. It's emotionally impactful, it's so tender and you can tell with all the crying they're struggling to kiss, but are still kissing. And it just sent me over the edge. Just when I thought I'd calmed down from the last scene, I'm crying AGAIN. What is this show DOING to me!? God I love the way he kisses her here. It's so desperate and so wanting. I just can't even pin it down properly with words. It's so perfectly visual.

Alright so we're back to gangster trafficker leader man Yeom Sangchul. He digs out the photos of accomplice from his back pocket and sure enough, it's Baek Heeseong. The REAL Baek Heeseong. Which stresses me out and now I'm INCREDIBLY worried for Hyunsoo's safety... because this man is an accomplice to serial killings, is a killer, worked and involved himself with human traffickers... he is REALLY dangerous. And Yeom Sangchul's words chill me to the bone... "This means... I still have one more chance." And I'm REALLY afraid he's going to use Heeseong to help him get Hyunsoo and attempt to succeed in killing him. Please please please catch him before he can cause Hyunsoo ANYMORE pain.

The whole entire Baek family are nothing but a bunch of shady, murderous bastards who all three deserved to be locked up. Whether they lock the mother up in a mental institution is fine by me, but Heeseong and Manwoo? LOCK THEM TF UP. Hyunsoo is more than capable of it? The man has never killed a person a day in his life, so no... he's really NOT capable of it. And I'm not buying Heeseong's "HE MADE ME DO ITTTTTTTTTTTTTT or he would kill you and dad" crocodile tear bullshit for one moment. This dude is legit psychotic and unhinged. He's fucking crazy. Especially considering he stops crying instantly and asks his parents if they'll protect him and you KNOW these jacked up psychopaths will. I could be wrong, but I think he's pulling off one hell of a big act here. Even if it means trying to screw over Hyunsoo or worse... hurt Noona. I'm currently REALLY worried for her safety too. Especially now that she's involved herself with the Baeks. Funny how everyone would call Hyunsoo a psychopath but not the REAL ones here, the damn Baek family. They've shaped up to be pretty good villains.

Next we're being shown a flashback of Hyunsoo when he was just a 10 year old child. He's running in the woods, not sure of why, but his father shows up and is oddly protective. And then you hear adult Hyunsoo say "That's my earliest memory." We see Hyunsoo and Jiwon sitting in bed together, Jiwon holding her husband's hand in a very comforting, reassuring way as if letting him know she's there for him. It makes me wonder how long they'd been sitting there talking. At some point, she definitely doctored him up and they changed clothes and gotten comfortable. I think they would've been too physically and emotionally battered to make love, though I've seen people question if they did. Maybe it came later. I think they both are pretty ouchie physically and their emotions are a complete wreck since he can't seem to stop crying.

Hyunsoo tells her he was 10 years old with that earliest memory. He also mentions he doesn't recall anything that happened before that. Okay, but why?? Most adults can remember clear back to when they were VERY young... personally, my earliest memory was when I was only 3. What kind of trauma did this poor man sustain when he was THAT young that he would block out? That it would become a repressed memory? He doesn't even remember why he was wandering in the woods, that it was like he was lost in darkness, like he fell in a deep hole. He felt relieved to be rescued by his father, and that's all he remembers. I need to know why. I really hope they touch on this in future upcoming episodes.

I really love why Jiwon questions why he's still wearing the watch she gave him. He tells her that the idea of her knowing where he is makes him feel good. It probably gives him that same safe feeling. Jiwon continues to rescue him over and over. Jiwon was able to find him at the trafficker's hideout if it weren't for that watch. He might have been burned to death if it weren't for that watch. She was able to save him all thanks to that watch, and I am so happy she did. Then she mentions that Hyunsoo is a strange person. Well, that's random, Jiwon lol. What comes next though...? Made me cry again. YES. This drama has made me cry 3 times in ONE episode, though I wasn't really sobbing here. Just really teary. This is all thanks to Lee Joongi's phenomenal acting.

Hyunsoo questions Jiwon to what extent she'd been following him and Jiwon answers since he met Noona in the abandoned building. She finally tells him she heard him say he's never loved her, not even for a second. Hyunsoo can't even bring himself to look at his wife as she explains she doesn't even know how she got home after hearing that. And he looks crushed by this. That was definitely something he never wanted Jiwon to hear. And then he starts to cry again. And Jiwon tenderly asks "Why are you crying again?" Hyunsoo literally says "I don't know." Because he doesn't. He needs Jiwon to help him understand because she's ALL he's ever had to actually help him understand, even if he was never truly open with her in their past, he's being entirely open now and Jiwon knows what guidance he needs. She tells him she knows why he's crying again.

"Because you love me."

Hyunsoo shakes his head pitifully and says in a broken voice "No. I'm not capable of that..."

Oh honey... you've been fed so many lies about what you are and aren't capable of that you believed them and believed yourself to be this awful person, and you are most certainly capable of love. What you're feeling right now is love. That's why you're crying again. Because you love her. Because the very idea of losing her sends you over the edge. You're even remorseful at the fact that she heard you say this. But baby, you do love her. You love her so much. Your love for her is one of the biggest reasons of why you have been so emotionally wrecked the whole night.

Jiwon explains it all to him.

"You always wished for me to be happy."

Hyunsoo "Because I had to deceive you." But is that really it? No. I don't think so.

Jiwon brings up more memories. Stuff that he didn't even HAVE to do to try and deceive her. He just did it because that was his instinct. To protect her. To ease her suffering from loss.

"When I was studying for the academy, I'd leave the library late at night... only to see you waiting for me outside. That's when... I felt that you truly... cared about me."

"When my dad suddenly passed away, it was as if darkness had painted my life. I was anxious all the time and angry at the world. Almost everythingmade me cry. But unlike everyone else, you never pressed me to get better or gave out advice. You learned how to cook instead and made me food. It was all delicious, and that's how I got better again. You love me. I can feel it." And Hyunsoo, tears rolling.

The way he looks at her... "I... love you." He brings her hand gently to his lips and places a tender kiss on her hand with his eyes never leaving her face. "I... love you, Jiwon-ah."

My god the way he says it, the delivery, the tears, the expression and Jiwon being so moved by finally hearing her husband say it, because he knows it. He believes it. He knows he loves his wife. He now understands that all this time, he wasn't deceiving her. He wasn't tricking her. He was doing these things out of love for her. He knows what real and true love feels like. He finally knows. He finally understands. And I just...

The growth and development of Hyunsoo here is just incredible. It's beautiful, it's heartwarming, it's heartbreaking, it's bittersweet, it's emotional and so powerful. So very powerful. Even when Jiwon tells him that tomorrow, there are people who are going to judge him, and he says those things don't bother him anymore, he doesn't care. Jiwon tells him:

"No matter what, don't forget. You are a warm person." And she's right. He is. So much warmer than anyone has ever realized. He's proved it time and time again in the way he takes care of his family. How he is with both his wife and his daughter. The tickling and playing with his family, making meals together, the comfort he provides Jiwon after rough days at work, all of the things we've seen him do for them. It was all because of the love and warmth in his heart for his family. It's just heartbreaking that never realized that this is what it was the whole entire time. I want to see him cuddle Eunha and tell her he loves her too. So badly.

Okay I had to chuckle a bit here when Hyunsoo tells Jiwon "You are even stranger than I am."

LOL My perfectly strange match made in heaven Hyunsoo and Jiwon. ♥ No matter how strange you both are, you are absolutely beautiful. Both of you. And your love can't be matched. Jiwon covers his hand and encourages him to continue telling her his story. She wants to know what happened next. He tells her about working delivery for a Chinese restaurant, and that he met a man Namsoo, and Jiwon eagerly wants to know when she comes in. He tells her to wait a little bit, because before he met her he had to go through 2 near death experiences... wait 2???

“Your path to me was not a stroll in the park.” “Jiwon. You’re the one thing in my life that’s the hardest to explain. It’s unrealistic. It doesn’t make sense.” Okay, so we know that one of those was when Nam Soongil tried to kill him over needing money... what was the one before that?? Oh this poor, precious man... Baby what did you go through? I hope he told Jiwon everything. But I do love hearing him tell her that Jiwon is a moment in his life that he can't explain. It's unreal, it doesn't make any sense. I'll bet they stayed up all night talking and crying and everything til they fell asleep in each other's arms. I love watching him stroke her hand with his thumb. They are just so honest, so pure and innocent, so perfect.

And it hurts in such a good way but a bad way too... because the next morning Detective Choi is pulling up to Hyunsoo and Jiwon's house and getting out of his car... to arrest Hyunsoo. Talk about ruining something so beautiful.

We switch back to Noona all worried that Moojin didn't answer his phone. She can't call Hyunsoo so when she can't get ahold of Moojin, it has her all up in arms. Then she wants to know what happened to his face. Oh, Haesoo... if only you knew, girl. Then she's asking Moojin if Hyunsoo is alright and I was like "NO HE IS NOT ALRIGHT. HE CRIED ALL NIGHT LONG FOR THE FIRST TIME IN HIS LIFE AND HE'S DISCOVERING HE HAS EMOTIONS AND CAN FEEL ON TOP OF THE FACT THAT DETECTIVE CHOI IS AT HIS HOUSE READY TO ARREST HIM!!!!" Noona, I adore you honey, but you need to turn yourself in. You need to turn yourself in and admit the whole entire situation to the police, including why you killed the village foreman so your brother can be free. He's an innocent man. He does not deserve to be locked up.

Now we are back to Hyunsoo sleeping peacefully. Makes me wonder if he cried and talked til he fell asleep last night. Ahhh I love to imagine missing scenes. Jiwon stroking his face and his hair til he finally goes to sleep. It would be so sweet, wouldn't it? Also, I'm loving their new bedclothes. First of all, my favorite color, second of all, new beginnings for them. I'm guessing Jiwon decided to change the bedclothes some time after they got home and settled in to bed for the night. It was perfect and gave a change of color than all the bleakness we've seen much of. It set the mood of the emotional pillow talk. But anyway...

Jiwon is on the phone with Detective Choi, she tells him she understands and then pleads gently with him to please not put handcuffs on her husband. Her wishes are that he takes him as quietly as possible with him. She tells him she'll come out in 30 minutes with him and Hyunsoo is waking up. I wonder if he heard all of that or not? Jiwon tells him Detective Choi is in front of their house. He accepts this quietly.

Next thing, we see them both pretty dressed to impress, looking like a power couple. I love the way they are clutching each other's hands. Jiwon is NOT shy about flaunting to the world that this is HER man. I love how Jiwon holds onto hers a little tighter around his, and Hyunsoo squeezes back while they both stare down Detective Choi with not a shred of emotion on their faces. Nice poker faces, you couple of badasses. Though Jiwon does have sort of a “don’t fuck with my husband” expression.

This episode was by far the BEST one so far of the whole drama and will likely end up being a favorite. I had so many emotions while watching it and the last time I cried like that through an episode of a drama was Moon Lovers. Lee Joongi never ceases to amaze me. I can't wait to see what next Wednesday brings us!! I am very nervous though... I don't want Hyunsoo to go to prison for something he is innocent of!! He needs to be at home caring for his family!

Please, writers and director, please please let them have happiness. Let them have a happy ending. I'm begging.

#flower of evil #lee joon gi #moon chae won #do hyun soo #cha ji won #lee joongi #moon chaewon #do hyunsoo #cha jiwon #lee jun ki #lee junki #flower of evil episode 11 #episode thoughts

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rankdisasster · 5 years

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look what you’ve done

Billy Hargrove x fem reader

“maybe a billy one of the aftermath of the reader and his first big argument? maybe the reader gives him the silent treatment??? (locks her window so he can’t sneak in, goes to school early so he can’t drop her off) your choice if it ends fluffy with a make-up or angsty :”)) I always hate telling a writer EXACTLY what to do, but this was just an idea I had in my head ♡” requested by @delqcour

word count: 2,421

warning(s): swearing, arguing

a/n: made this incredibly dramatic and emo, wanted to give reader a valid reason for doin him the silent treatment, so he’s a giant slime ball in this one. definitely don’t fall for this irl, Billy’s emotionally abusing the SHIT outta the reader in this one. in other words, angst!!!! also girl don’t worry about telling me details for a fic, it’s helpful !

—

You knew he didn’t mean to say what he said, but that didn’t excuse his actions. He crossed a line, and by the look of self hatred smothered all over his sorry face after the words left his mouth, you know he recognized how hateful and mean he sounded and he regretted it too.

“Don’t do that. Don’t pull that shit with me, Y/N. You know exactly what you’re doing, and I know what’s going through that head of yours,” Billy hissed in your ear, taunting you by getting up in your face, even laughing like a maniac as a scare tactic. Right now Billy looked like the poster boy for toxic masculinity and the green eyed monster. He puffed his chest out, making sure you feel smaller than him, and continued his accusations that went on for miles and miles.

It was quite the reach trying to punish you for touching someone else when he didn’t even have proper proof or any trust in you at all. In fact, it just sounded like insecurity bubbling to the surface that had been begging to be unleashed throughout yours and his entire relationship. The blonde backed you further into the corner of your room, wanting to put you in your place, make you feel intimidated. And you were. It was hard emotional labor you did, protecting him from others, but most of all protecting him from himself.

He’d been around the block before, cheated and been cheated on, and he thought in this critical stage of your relationship that you would’ve fled by now. That in this particular point in time it was make or break, so he chose the easy route; break. None of the unconditional love and care you showed made any sense to him, so he was on edge just looking for evidence that it was all just bullshit, that you’d betray him and then ultimately leave him like everybody else had in his life. And when he thought he finally saw the proof, you and your brother’s best friend talking close to eachother at his locker during passing period, he gave you his bratty attitude the rest of the day then backed you into the corner under your own roof not only tell you off, but to utterly disrespect you; not to mention wrongfully accuse you.

“Was he better than me? Bigger too? Mmhm, I bet he was, wasn’t he? Sweetheart,” he practically spat in your face when he didn’t care to wipe his mouth free of saliva as he continued to lecture you. You helplessly took the emotional beating he was giving as you exerted all the energy you had into not letting the tears brimming your scared eyes fall. You shook your head over and over, not finding the words to reassure him that he’s imagining things, and that this is not about you but about him.

“Not even gonna try denying it? Yeah, I fucking knew it. Nothing but a slutbag that just used me for my co—“

“ENOUGH already, you whiny fucking pig! I cannot believe what I’m hearing right now. Can you hear yourself? The way you’re talking to me right now, what you’re really saying?” You pushed his chest forward, not hard enough to wound him but not light enough to allow him to continue freely invading your space. That finally got him to shut the fuck up. “I’m the sluttiest slut, aren’t I? I sure am, because I just can’t keep my legs closed while giving my brother’s best friend the homework he missed! Insane, right?” You raised your voice then pointed your finger at him before he shoved it away from his face.

“Don’t point your fucking finger at me, look at what you’ve done!” His screams were soon replaced with whimpers as his voice grew weak, and in time faded to soft sobs that spriralled into hysterical bawling and you watched the scene unveil until the dam officially broke. He finally let go of all the anger and it got replaced with pathetic weeping. You let him crawl in your arms as you stayed standing while he sunk to his knees, wanting you to save him from himself once again. Pick up the pieces for him. You lowered down to his level and hugged him tight, hoping his tantrum was over so you could get him to finally talk to you and then a specialist. After ten to fifteen minutes, he rubbed his eyes like a child waking up from a nap, utterly exhausted and wiped out from thinking so much and feeling so scared of being replaced by another boy in your life. The tears eventually dried down his face, the mucus also drying from his nostrils, making him sniffle a handful of times. When he looked at you, he saw your own tears trailing down your shiny cheeks and he reached up to wipe them away before whispering, sounding completely broken;

“I’m still so angry with you.”

—

After the weekend went by, you both quietly agreed that you were due for a short break. However, the both of you neglected to communicate an important part and mention just how long the break should go on for, and he clearly thought he could step all over you then come crawling back the next Monday. You had been writing your analysis on one of Shakespeare’s stories for English with your stereo playing softly to keep your thoughts quiet. That’s when a rock nicked your window, and made you withdraw yourself from your assignment before investigating what it could be. And then another one flew, hitting the closed and covered window and by now you knew this was no accident.

You scrambled to quickly turn off your stereo and lower your lights down then hesitated when locking your window. It’s not that you were scared of him, but maybe more terrified of the daunting talk you’ll have to have with Billy in the near future that you just weren’t ready for emotionally. Having your boyfriend you strongly committed to spit at you and call you a whore in your face was hard to even think of alone without feeling nauseous and wanting to cry all over again. Now he was outside trying to come up to your room.

“Y/N!”

You layed low and shut your eyes, putting a hand over your mouth to stay silent, hearing him struggle to climb up before knocking on your window several times, then just giving up and attempting to open it.

“Babe, please. I want to talk. I’m ready now, and I’m sorry. I can wait till you’re ready, too. No pressure. I said some horrible shit, but I’ll — I’ll see someone, then I’ll m-make it up to you, and we can kiss and make up like old times, yeah?”

A minute later and no response on your end, Billy knew it was a no go. It was a long shot to even think she would open her window anyway. Soon he just said his goodbyes, ending it with a soft “I love you” and you heard him jump back down and start his car below and drive off. Finally you felt like you were able to breathe, and threw yourself back into your bed while covering yourself head to toe in your comforter and turned up your music louder than it was before he came, blocking out everything as sobs wrecked through you.

—

Billy was getting shakey and worried without you, drinking way more than what he’s used to, and it’s always whenever he looked in the mirror at himself or saw something that remotely related to an inside joke he had with you, or if it reminded him of your scent, your hair, or even your body. He had done enough self deprecating sober, now he just pitied himself as he drank.

You never shut him out as long as this, and he knew it was bad this time, really fucking bad. The teenager was aware that he deserved all that’s coming to him, but he just couldn’t believe you were really gonna do it. You weren’t going to speak to him, or acknowledge anything. You were going to lock your window whenever he tried to come over, and head to school early every morning so he couldn’t drive you anymore, even take great lengths to hide from him at lunch, which was usually a time you two spent together making out in his car or just talking.

Billy didn’t bother hiding how much of a mess he was at school or anywhere else without you by his side, showing up late to class with bags under his bloodshot eyes. He knew there was an opportunity hidden in this breakup, he could better himself instead, try harder to be a better more understanding and forgiving person. He could grow, and eventually maybe even win you back. Even though he knew he’d be pushing his luck pretty far.

But he just wasn’t capable of handling any of it on his own.

Knowing that this was probably the end of Billy and Y/N, he thought of one last resort at taking to you before he said goodbye.

—

You opened your curtains to reveal yourself this time when he knocked on your room window, but kept it shut as he looked at you through the glass, seeing your face for the first time in days. He couldn’t stop himself from staring at you while you just couldn’t look at him. He waved sheepishly before blowing his hot breath on your window, then writing “hi” with his fingertip on the fog he had made. You shook your head, then wondered what he wanted this time.

“If I let you in, what happens? Are you gonna cry and yell at me again?” You ask, your voice not hiding that you were close to tears and twiddling your fingers to try keeping busy. Billy grimaced at your words, even though they were muffled through the window he still clearly made out what you asked and it wasn’t looking good, he knew that. Couldn’t swoop you off your feet this time, or make a mess and have you clean it up because he was incapable and selfish.

“Checking up on you,” Billy murmurs, scrubbing his eyes in hopes it will keep them from watering. “I need to know that you’re taking care of yourself. I know how you get when you’re upset,” he finishes lamely, and although it was true he also just missed your voice, hearing it comforted him in a way. Made him feel like it was a shield from all harm. He held his breath as he carefully observed your every move, then almost gasped aloud when you unlocked your window and shoved the sliding glass open, allowing him in. It didn’t take him longer than a beat to come in, nearly too big to fit through the damn thing and knocking over things that were in the way, cursing and rapidly picking up what had fallen from his clumsiness. Wiping his sweaty palms at his jeans, he cautiously looks to you before lowering to your level where you sit.

“Have you been eating, baby? Drinking enough water?” He gently asks, seeing you look significantly different. More tired and exasperated than he’d ever seen you, and it was because of him.

All because of what he’d done.

Billy chokes another apology before grabbing your head with both hands and embracing you in his chest, helpless in keeping his soft sobs in. You’re no better, clutching at his jacket for life. You had battled yourself for the past week, not knowing if it would be healthy for you to go back to him and let him get away with treating you the way he did, saying the things that he said. Billy hadn’t ever thought about the affect he had on people, that words hurt even if they’re said in anger and not necessarily true in the long run.

“Your folks home right now? I kinda didn’t look for any cars in the driveway. I just climbed up here when I saw your light,” he mumbled as his lips layed kisses at the top of your head before smoothing our your hair and brushing our little tangles with his fingers.

“Dinner. They’re at dinner,” you answer, not letting him go from your grasp even if he wanted to. You’ve missed loving him and despised hating him.

“Wanna go eat? You also need to get hydrated, babe. I’m really sorry. I — I know I did this to you,” he gets the hair away from your face before caressing you’re cheek.

“I’m real sensitive, Billy. I have feelings and you — you scared me. Scared the shit out of me and just — you’re such a bully, and now you want to feed me, make it all better again? Erase it?” You let out, watching him crumble and look down in shame.

“‘M not, I know I can’t take it back. I just wanna take it fucking back,” he scrubs his face and drags his nails down his cheeks, making his skin turn a light pink. You pulled his hands away from himself to stop him, then held both his hands in yours.

“How is Max doing?”

“Huh?” Billy looked up.

“Max. I asked how your sister is doing,” you repeat for him.

“Oh, um, she like won this skateboarding contest thing. Got a free board for a prize, so she’s pretty happy, the little twerp.”

“Yeah?” You smile. “Good for her.”

“Mmhm,” he hums, stroking your hand in his. “I won’t ask you to forgive and forget, but just— I want to stay in touch, please? Knowing that you’re doing okay and all that. Sweet Jesus, did you even drink any water like I asked?” You snorted at the last part of his speech before he gets up to snatch a paper cup from the restroom and fills it to the brim, handing it to you and demanding you gulp it down while he watches. You roll your eyes but do it anyway, and you can’t hide that it tastes good given you hadn’t been taking good care of yourself lately. Billy stands and fills it for you three more times without being prompted, watching you drink it all.

“Happy?” You ask. He gives you a grin and fills up the same cup you used and drinks it himself while eyeing you playfully.

“Never happier, actually.”

—

if you wanna, you could listen to “look what you’ve done” by Jet, it’s soooo good and moody and that’s where I got the vibe for this.

#stranger things #billy hargrove x reader #billy hargrove imagine #billy hargrove #stranger things imagine

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semi-imaginary-place · 3 years

Text

rewatching decadence

ep1: so... indoctrinating kids that they life their life in service to an upper class. also like, the way deca dence takes care of giant gadoll is to punch it like no giant sword or laser canon or anything just the power of a giant mountain sized fist. this show actually has some good foreshadowing from seeing Natsume from the perspective of Kaburagi’s hud, to Natsume’s dad (Muno) finding the Solid Quake logo at the beginning of the episode and the logo again being shown in the last shot at the announcement signs off with have a profitable day which is a weird public safety announcement but makes sense as a company slogan. I’m still not sure what the “TIME 1:00 POINT SE,07,G” means. I didn’t write it down last time because I was unsure of myself, but my first thought when the cyborgs showed up was VR chatroom for the upper class.

ep2: yeahs that’s totally an advertisement that plays right after natsume realizes the human costs of war as the tankers pay respects to the fallen. I realized what it was with the cartoony designs, the bright colors and patterns, the funky shapes of all the structures aboard the space ship, it looks like a tv show for toddlers. inoffensive and deliberately cheerful to distract from the horrors of a corporation owning your person. the eng subtitles are confusing here it should be “real death(simulation) awaits” in that the company is advertising being able to experience death but not have any of its permanent consequences as a feature of the game. The cyborgs are corporate wage slaves being compensated for their labor in company credits and the only other things we seen them do outside of work is play the company’s mmo, or recreational drugs. “I should be proud of my function and to be scrapped” as property of the company. aaaa that’s terrible. aaa. what are cyborg cores??? and why are they valuable. Solid Quake has no control over the core, only the cyborg’s housing. Is it that they cannot produce more? Considering the others on the team got executed for sentenced to an eternal forced labor camp with appalling conditions, Minato really did pull some strings for Kaburagi. ooh so “time until scrapping” and “operational limit near are two different warnings. the first is a general reminder of lifespan and the second is because oxyone levels are low. now its “TIME 20:00 POINT SE,05,I”. all those new gadoll events probably wreck havoc on the tanker economy. its 400c now and i think it was 500 for 2 earlier. First time through I wasn’t paying attention and totally thought kaburagi was an assassin, but no he’s just clean up crew. ahh yes, come spend you wages at the company run stores. micro transactions... wait so where were people getting the number 13 from?

ep3: ah yes Solid Quake charges to use the media center, truly a micro transaction hell. Natsume’s character arc is about whether to push herself or not. Here Fei acts as part of a continuing dialectic saying that Tankers have no place outside of Deca-Dence, that sooner of later Natsume will die from it, and once again highlighting Natsume’s right arm. In the other level of this though, tankers shouldn’t go outside because that’s not their role in the solid quake mmo, and those who would disrupt the mmo are killed. I like how you can see Kaburagi switch from videogame logic (oh she’s low level so let’s just stick her in the tutorial zone) to real life (what skills and experiences would help in fighting). So several corporations took advantage of desperate people to sell them a service that would augment them with mechanical parts. I get that pipe in a little outfit is funny, but does no one really realize its a gadoll, i meant natsume recognizes it instantly. like the scene where Natsume talks about her right arm, the anime does a good job of showing how her feeling about it are complicated. She’s lived with that arm for years, but it also hinders her sometimes, and people will comment about it. there’s this specific type of humor that pops up in this show and given how its the same joke, my guess is that its the same person behind it. The “joke” being that Natsume is put in a position that references sexual assault. The first is with fennel where she makes up an excuse of having to go see kaburagi to get away from him. And then there’s this episode. There’s also a few stray lines here and there that alarm me in that they imply Natsume has dealt with the threat of assault before. Since they didn’t do anything meaningful with this, I’d rather it just not be there. Minato is in on the secret of Pipe’s existence and by the way the two talk, they’ve called each other before in the last 7 years. Its good to know that Kaburagi wasn’t JUST brooding for 7 years and that the two of them stayed in contact.

ep4: Natsume after having gained confidence in herself takes down several gadoll and earns her place in The Power. Its a fulfilling payoff after seeing her train for several episodes. Natsume is where she always wanted to be, fighting gadoll in the Power. gahh It really is a patch release trailer. Ohh so I assumed that the other structures on the cartoon earth were other corporations, but in this episode we see one of them (the white and red striped cone thing opposite the deca-dence dome) and the cyborgs there are talking about the game (MMO LARPing lol), so either Solid Quake owns multiple of those structures, or these cyborgs are customers not owned by Solid Quake and playing of their own volition. that would makes the cone cyborgs where solid quake is deriving its profit from since its not like it pays its workers. reading comments online, a lot of people missed that because a ranker was found to be cheating (mikey), the rankings were abolished. In the present time, gears/players are not ranked. Ah so Kaburagi was transferred to the maintenance department from the warrior department. Wow reassignment is so much better than the poop jail. I remember it being said, armor repair, doctor, and weapon shop could be employee(cyborg) run so I wonder if the medics and that one armor shop guy are tankers or not. So this anime already snuck in a sex joke with the when the poop gang swapped kaburagi’s avatar with a sex toy, so i wonder if the safetyprivatemode was made so that the mods wouldn’t have to listen to robot sex. I really wish this show could have had 24 episodes. The trend for the past 20 years has been shorter and shorter shows so I know it would have been likely impossible to get the clearance and funding for 24 eps but oooh in som alternate universe maybe... i brought up fleshing out minor characters and character relationships before but there also stuff like Natsume’s right hand almost clamping on ... Mindy? Which usually would be a narrative flag but is completely dropped because of the episode limit. And the confidence Natsume gained last episode come to work against Kaburagi trying to keep her from the suicide mission. Its only from this point on that Kaburagi starts to really change, as of this point he is still a loyal cog to a machine that does not care about him. Kaburagi and Natsume in the 2nd half of the episode continue the same dialectic that runs through the whole of the show, about giving up and learning to try again, about pushing your limit, about why someone bothers trying. On the collectivist versus individualist spectrum, Deca-Dence is on the individualist side with assertions of the importance for deciding for yourself what you will do with your life. Its an interesting counterpoint to The Twilight Mirage (Friends at the Table) which I am currently listening to in that The Twilight Mirage is a western production and strongly collectivist with one of the antagonist being sort of kind of an embodiment of independence/individualism while japanese works as a whole tend to be more about the whole over the individual than western ones. Kurenai talking about why she fights is very good and very important for 2 reasons, first it help flesh out not only her but offer a very needed other opinion on what its like to live as a Tanker, second it segues nicely into Natsume’s memories of her dad telling her about the outside world and him being the only one to believe she can do it (fight in The Power) as contrasted with flashbacks of all the other characters telling her she can’t. This culminates in Natsume gathering her resolve to fight not because of something grand like changing the world or the fate of humanity, but something very personal scale: changing herself and proving to herself that she can do it. The is also the climax of her character arc, the point of no return.

ep5: If last episode was natsume’s point of no return, then either this episode or episode 7 is Kaburagi’s. Rationally speaking, the optimal scenario would have been for Kaburagi to stall long enough for the Tankers to escape before pulling back himself, but emotionally and narratively, there’s no way he couldn’t. After all the build up of deciding for yourself how to live and pushing your limits. Its appropriate that here in defense of the girl that inspired him to live and choose for himself rather than just continue existing in the default of what Solid Quake demands of him, that Kaburagi chooses to release his operational limiter (literally pushing him limit) and derail the company’s plans. How did no one realize purple dude was breaking imprisonment to play on a hacked avatar. Like he’s still as purple and bloodthirsty as ever. He acts and speaks the same. Someone would have totally seen him and gone “eyyyyy [i forgot this guy’s name] is back” and talked to people about it and someone should have heard. So I remember reading comments from various idiots who were mad because they mistakenly thought the anime took place in a virtual space and that Natsume was made of lines of code. And first off even if that was true there’s a difference between objective reality and the lived experiences of a person and what’s to say her experiences and emotions would be any less real than yours. And second, did everyone forget The Hunger Games? Like its just another game that plays with real lives and doesn’t care who gets killed. Solid Quake is just using humans as a stage prop. Man this episode is jam packed. Its like getting punched in the face 4 times. The pacing of the last 4 minutes was really good. The quiet scene as dawn breaks acts in direct contrast to the high energy of the Stargate takedown that preceded it. After time and against not listening to him, Minato still calls Kabu to check in with him. There’s also his certainly that it was Kaburagi that saved the Deca-Dence mech (i need to be clearer when I’m talking about the physical fortress city mech, the mmorpg game, or the deca-dence system itself). And then when the world state gets reset is just so good because it make it clear that the gadoll were never the true enemy. The tankers could kill as many gadoll as they want and nothing would change. Kaburagi’s at an interesting point here, in that he’s no longer in a state of having given up like he was in episode 1 just waiting to die and following along with Solid Quake’s orders, as of this episode he has deliberately gone against the company’s rules, and yet he’s still believes that nothing will actually change. He’s broken a rule and resigned himself to punishment instead of say for example getting rid of the punishment all together. He’s still a good little employee that hasn’t rebelled against the system. And then the “Take care of Pipe” and Natsume turns around and he’s already gone, is sooo good. The final shot too of his avatar face down in the snow! The “This world needs bugs” is in direct contrast to Hugin/Fugin(?) repeating that this world must be rid of bugs, and the same phrase Kaburagi repeated 7 years ago when he was transferred to the Maintenance Department instead of being killed. I wonder how much the cyborgs feel in their original bodies vs. how much they feel in their Gear avatars. Kaburagi doesn’t seem to care about food and no food stalls were shown in the Gear area so maybe they doesn’t have much sense of taste? The avatars also have a lessened sense of pain. And then the limit release sequence shows connections increasing between the two bodies so does it make the cyborgs more attuned with the avatar’s senses?

ep6: eh so this is another example of what I mean when I say some of the humor in this show is in bad taste. They probably put the oxyone port where the ass would be just to make this joke. But this is better then doing to it Natsume. The animators even had a gleam censor for the over where the capsule was inserted as if it wasn’t obvious enough what it was suppose to look like. Spurned on by the the promise that one day if they work hard and behave (”rehabilitated”), the cyborgs will get let out when in actuality its a forced labor camp so that Solid Quake can squeeze just a little more labor our of the cyborgs for even less compensation. The cartoony style here helps offset just how horrific there working conditions are. And Kaburagi still the good little employee (iiko) tries his hardest to play by the rules and win. Except in this game, there is no “win’ written into the rules. So finally he is forced to move outside of the system Solid Quake has made. I still can’t believe they let Donatello keep the gun... Maybe cyborg cores are brains. In 5.5 Kaburagi’s core is in the top half of his metal case, and Donatello’s is also in his head. I’m still not sure what that sequence where Kaburagi takes the head fin and an image of a cyborg core is overlayed, means.

#deca-dence #deca dence #anime #i think too much #reviews #writing

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toast-the-unknowing · 4 years

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11, 14, 18, because I'm greedy :P!

I DID YOURS LAST BECAUSE YOU’RE SO GREEDY. Or because I knew 18 was going to take a while, one of those two.

11. If you could only write angst, fluff, or smut for the rest of your life, which would it be?

I often have a little angst in my fluff, or a little fluff/humor/comfort in my angst, and either some angst or some fluff in my smut, so it's not even just a question of "you don't get to write the others" it's that "you don't get to write hybrids," that's the part that makes this question tricky. I suppose of the three genres, the one that I most often write in its purest form is fluff, because that lends itself to comedy better than the other two, and I like writing comedy. So I’d have to say fluff. But I wouldn’t like saying fluff.

14. If you were stuck on a desert island with only two characters, which would you pick?

Blue for being practical and hard-working and Henry for company/morale boost.

A part of this consideration was picking two characters that get along well with each other, because oof, the last thing you need on a desert island is drama.

18. What is a line/scene you’re really proud of? Give us the DVD commentary for that scene.

I worked really fucking hard on it all will fall, fall right into place and I am really fucking proud of the whole thing, but I think my favorite scene might be the one where Ronan talks to Adam’s mom. So that’s the one you’re getting. I am putting it behind a cut and I am sooooooooo sorry if the cut doesn’t work for people, because it’s long.

Adam's dad is seeing a doctor the next morning; Adam says he might visit in the afternoon, depending on how that goes. His voice is totally flat.

The main reason we don’t get actual dialogue of Adam talking here is just practical, to avoid needing a mini-scene of that conversation, but I do like that it has the effect of distancing us from Adam, stripping some of his agency away from him. So much of this fic is about Adam being disconnected from what’s going on inside his own head, that I like this moment where we take away his voice.

Ronan hopes the nurses will tell Adam that Robert isn't up to visitors, that he got rushed to the ER, that he's dead, so he doesn't leave the hospital after Adam disappears inside of it. He ditches the car in the parking lot and slinks back to main entrance, prepared to pace back and forth for a minute or an hour or the rest of the day.

The hospital visits are set up for a progression where Ronan stays at the hospital longer each time, as the situation wears him down more and more. He’s less and less willing to let Adam out of his sight, but he has to, since that’s one of the very few things Adam actually asks him for.

Except he comes to a dead halt ten feet away from the entrance, because while he was parking, Adam's mom arrived.

Relatively early in working on this fic I had the thought of “oh, FUCK, Ronan’s going to have to talk to Adam’s mom at some point, isn’t he?” It was one of the moments that I was the most interested in writing, so there was a lot of excitement attached to it once the horror cleared up, but my first impression was also correct. I suspected this scene would be an absolute bitch to write and it absolutely was. I worked on this fic a lot while riding my commuter bus and I cannot tell you how many afternoons I spent working on this scene, only to come away with one or two new sentences to show for the entire hour.

He hasn't seen her since that night in LA. She'd caught a flight back the morning after her dinner with Adam, so they hadn't all had to travel together, thank fuck. He doesn't know what he would have done stuck on an airplane with her. He doesn't know what he's going to do now.

The moment of Adam’s mom ambushing him in front of his friends was one of the very first things I knew would happen in this fic; the moment of Adam meeting her for dinner came a bit later, I forget when exactly. It was only MUCH later that I put together that this timeline makes no sense from her point of view. She ambushes him on a Monday; he calls her on either Thursday or Friday. That means she paid for three nights in a hotel or motel, without knowing if Adam was going to get in touch with her (and with more reason to assume he wouldn’t than that he would). I don’t think it’s hard to believe that she would fly out to LA in the first place, once Adam refused to take her calls; it’d be the only way to get in touch with him, and she’d know that the shock of seeing her, and the guilt she could lay on him about how she had to fly all this way because he wouldn’t just talk to her on the phone like a son is supposed to, would be effective manipulation. But it’s hard to buy she’d spend the money staying in LA, and spend the time away from Henrietta when Robert’s condition is so serious.

But I really LIKED the idea of Adam meeting her for dinner, and the scene after dinner is such an essential part of the story – and I don’t think it would have been as effective after just a phone call, although I suppose he’d have been pretty wrecked after a phone call, too. So I had to make a call on whether a character would do this thing that doesn’t make any practical sense, or change it and risk weakening the story.

Sometimes you have to take something out of a story that you really love, but I generally hold that that’s if the element in question is causing problems within the story itself; e.g. if a joke is really funny but is ruining the tension or the mood of a scene. My own writing philosophy is that good scene work is more important that rigidly holding true to details of reality, but a different writer might have made a different call.

So here is an answer to the question of “when did Adam’s mom go back to Virginia,” whether it’s the right answer or not. And, of course, the answer to “why did she go back on a different day than Adam and Ronan did” is “I didn’t want to ruin this scene by having Ronan spend any time with her before now.”

She spots him at the same moment he spots her. She doesn't have the decency to look away or try to hide. There's something eating at her and she's making up her mind about how nasty she's going to be when she lets it out. Ronan hates that he knows that; Adam twists the corner of his mouth the same way.

I like the idea of Ronan – and, by implication, Adam – noticing the ways that Adam looks like his parents. I also liked having the gesture that reminds Ronan of Adam be a negative one. It ties in with the bit later, of Ronan being aware of Adam’s flaws.

"You just going to stand there all day?" is what she goes with.

"What," Ronan spits, "you think I want to talk to you?"

"You could leave," she suggests. "Better for your eyes than gawking."

"Don't pretend you care. You didn't know I existed a week ago."

"Wouldn't've pictured he'd have someone like you," she agrees, breezy in a way that turns his stomach inside out.

Probably Adam’s mom didn’t know he was bi until a couple night’s before this, when he took her out to dinner – I don’t imagine he would have told her before then, and I imagine there was some awkward “so how has the last decade+ since we stopped abusing you been” conversation during that dinner. Which raises the question of how she and/or Robert feel about Adam being in a relationship with a man, but honestly, I didn’t want to muddy the waters by bringing homophobia into the story. I wanted to deal with the abuse, that was the part that was interesting to me emotionally, which is more or less the approach that canon takes, too. So for “someone like you” I really meant it to be more about “someone with a giant tattoo and a foul mouth” but I suppose it could also be read as “someone with a dick.” In either case she’s intending to be very dismissive of Ronan.

"You don't know anything about him."

"But you know me, is that it? I can see you judging me. You don't know anything."

"I know what you two did to him."

"Is that how he tells it?" she asks, like she isn't interested in an answer. "He makes it sound like any of us had it easy? Three people in that little trailer, never any space, any quiet, never enough of anything. Robert'd work all day and come home and there's the kid getting in the way again, making trouble, telling lies...anyone could lose their temper. I did my best to keep Adam out of the way, but I'm just one woman. He never did learn to listen to someone who knows better."

There’s for sure one time in canon where Robert accuses Adam of lying to him (when he finds Adam’s pay stubs, the night of the concussion) and I feel like there are others, but I may be misremembering. In any case I find it an interesting accusation – because it probably is true at least sometimes, Adam would have to lie to his parents in some situations. But there are probably others where he isn’t lying, and that’s an interesting bit of psychology to me, this idea that his parents might think of him as a fundamentally dishonest person -- because they HAVE to think of him that way, because they cannot reconcile “Adam tells the truth” with “we are decent human beings.”

Beyond that: this paragraph got reworked about ten thousand times, and usually that means that I’m never really happy with the result (because maybe one of the 9,999 other ways was slightly better, because maybe 10,001st time was the charm) but this? I’m pretty happy with this paragraph. It’s awful in exactly the way I wanted this scene to be awful.

"Yeah, I'm sure it would have been really convenient for you if he'd just made himself stop existing," Ronan spits. "It would have been pretty great for him if that shitbag had gone to jail."

"Right," she says. "He goes off the jail. Makes a dollar a day. Gets out with a record and now no one'll hire him. Now there's no money coming in, all on account of a couple of bruises, that would've been better for Adam?"

The reason this scene was so hard to write, which was also the whole reason I WANTED to write this scene at all, was that it meant getting into her head and explaining what the abuse looked like, to her. What story does she tell herself about her husband hitting her son? How could she allow it to happen, for years? How does she live with herself? I wanted to get her point of view across, not to justify it, but just to make her an actual person. I didn’t want her to be a cartoon-moustache-twirling villain.

(I suppose I could have had a version of her that had realized what they’d done to Adam was wrong, but that’s so far out of line with the rest of the tone and plot of this story that it literally only occurred to me now, months after I finished the story and months more since I started it. That’s not interesting to me.)

She absolutely believes what she’s saying here: a couple of bruises are better than starvation. On its face, that’s a reasonable sentence! But oh, how convenient it is that she plays down the extent of the abuse; how convenient it is to pretend that those were the only two options; how convenient that Adam doesn’t get to express a preference between those choices.

"Having nothing would have been better for Adam than having you."

She shakes her head, unfazed. "That right there tells me you've never had nothing."

I think it’s reasonable to assume that she grew up poor, which makes this another of those uncomfortable parallel moments between Adam and his mom. Ronan has absolutely heard Adam point it out to him before, when he unintentionally shows off his privilege.

"If you were such a great fucking mom you could've taken him and left."

She doesn't answer right away. Ronan doesn't want to give her any space to feel comfortable in, to come up with these lies, but he can't force any more words out. His whole mind is one blaring siren, lights and sound, emergency emergency emergency.

There’s a bit of advice I’ve gotten in improv, that if you don’t know what else to do in a scene, you can just say how you, the actual improviser, feel in the moment: “I’m confused,” “I don’t understand,” “why are we doing this again?” Endow your character with those feelings.

I didn’t want to give Ronan another line of dialogue here, but I didn’t know what he’d be thinking or why he’d let Adam’s mom just take her sweet time coming up with horrible things to say to him, so I just went with “Ronan doesn’t know what to say and he doesn’t like this and he can’t even make thoughts happen.”

"You think you're gonna marry my boy?"

"Yes." He never figured he'd say that with so much hate. He never figured she'd be the first person to ask.

The whole “are you going to marry my son” bit of the conversation was something I knew was going to be in this scene basically since the moment I realized this scene was going to exist, but this exactly line about Adam’s mom being the first person to ask was one that just happened during writing. It was a complete surprise and I love it so much.

"You think he's perfect?"

Ronan clenches his jaw. Adam is a stubborn control freak with a temper and intimacy issues a mile wide. Ronan knows that, and he doesn't care; he doesn't need Adam to be perfect.

Adam and Ronan recognizing each other’s flaws is one of my absolute favorite things about the ship.

But he's not going to say that to her. Adam is a god compared to her. She should be walking door to door proselytizing for him. She should be proud of him.

When you’re listing things, you generally want to get stronger as you go through the list; if you’re e.g. writing a joke, you want the funniest item on the list to be the last one (unless the joke is that you’ve messed up the list; Leslie Knope’s “I gotta stop ending on that boring thing” is a good example). This one plays out the other way. The list of things gets more reasonable as it goes along, to emphasize how tragic it is that Adam’s mom cannot do this one very reasonable thing.

"You know what marriage is?" she asks. "It's picking a man and saying, I choose this one, even though he's not perfect. If you can't stay with him when he makes a mistake then you don't marry him."

Another moment where Adam’s mom puts words together in a way that is completely true and rational and yet also a horrifying nightmare sentence when you put it in context!

Everything stops.

He can't speak. He can't move. Every living part of him is blasted away by a scalding wave of outrage. His vision blurs out and Adam's mom fades out of existence -- and then it slams back into place, everything too sharp against his eyes, and she's still there.

He wants her to stop talking. He wants to strangle her so she has to stop talking. He wants to drag her through the streets while people throw things and scream her sins at her. He wants her to admit that she did something wrong. He understands, in a sudden, terrible way, why Adam doesn't expect his father to apologize, and he's shaking with all of the things he's not doing.

Oh my lord these paragraphs. THESE PARAGRAPH. I mean this whole scene was painstakingly forged one word at a time, like I was making chain mail or some shit, but THESE PARAGRAPHS probably took a week’s worth of afternoon commutes all on their own. The thing he’s reacting to is so horrifying, but at the same time, they’re just words; from the outside this just looks like a conversation, this looks like nothing. So I suppose some of the difficulty was in walking this line between too strong of a reaction and not strong enough of a reaction.

Also, just, is there a word for that medieval punishment kind of thing, where they drag you through the streets and yell at you and throw things at you? Is there? That sentence alone I changed every single word of so many times, fuck.

I do quite like that moment of Ronan better understanding Adam, though. That is, of course, the actual plot and character significance of this scene; getting inside of Adam’s mom’s head was an interesting puzzle for me, as a writer, to play with, but what actually matters is that Ronan comes away from this conversation really KNOWING something that before he could only know in an academic way, if that.

"You had to make a choice." His voice is harsh in his own ears, but she just looks bored with him. "And you picked the wrong one."

This bit of dialogue is another one that was written relatively early, compared to the rest of the scene, so I’m not sure why it took me so long to figure out that “you pick a man and stick with him” “well you picked the wrong one” sounds like Ronan is saying that Adam’s mom picked the wrong man to marry out of all of the potential men she could have married. It is SUPPOSED to mean, “you had to pick between your husband or your son, and you fucked up,” but I couldn’t really find a way of rephrasing it that made that clearer and that still flowed in the conversation. I consoled myself that readers would probably understand it, anyway. I had to trust you guys on this one.

#moi #not a fic #long post #comicsohwhyohwhy

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theanimeview · 4 years

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Theory: Anz is the 8th Guardian Witch of the Wind!

By: Peggy Sue Wood | @peggyseditorial

OKAY... It’s Halloween, the spookiest day of the year, so I decided to write about one of my current favorite manhwa series that features witches while also remaining not-scary. This is also a series I highly recommend and if Halloween is my vessel to serve you this manhwa, then so be it! Coincidentally, it’s also Saturday, the day ANZ (the favorite I’m alluding to) usually releases, Chapter 55 is probably going to drop on Toomics.com any minute (Link) if it hasn’t already and I am HYPED.

ANZ is a series I started reading right when it came out on Toomics, and ever since then I’ve had this thought... Anz (our aptly named, blue haired protagonist shown above) is the next Witch of the Wind. He, our title-character, is the one who will succeed Cecile, the former Witch of the Wind. Though, there are a bunch of characters in the series saying he’s not the heir--particularly because Iliya, a girl about the same age as Anz, is claiming to be the heir--I am 99.99% sure that Anz is the true heir.

The odds that I’m right might not look so great, but hear me out anyway, because I think there is a compelling argument for Anz to be our Witch. SPOILERS, by the way (if that wasn’t clear before)...

At the start of the story, we learn that there are a select group of special witches called Guardian Witches who are all deeply connected through their magic even if they are not emotionally close. We learn this through the prologue chapter of the series as three of the guardian witches begin to cry over Cecile’s death, despite some of them having never met her or having no understanding as to what is going on. For example, Mule Grace, the youngest of the established Guardian Witches seen thus far, begins crying and asks why she’s doing so despite nothing going on presently to make her do so. Opera, one of the other Guardian Witches shown to be crying, tells one of the people around her that she and, by extension, the other Guardian Witches are crying not out of sadness or personal grief over Cecile’s death but because their bond as Guardians Witches transcends their individual feelings. She can’t help it and neither can any of the others.

Cecile’s death, the death of a Guardian Witch, is thereby marked by the other Guardian witches crying. Despite a handful of other characters appearing beyond the witches, only one other person seen crying during this time, apart from the Guardian Witches, is our title character, Anz (seen below).

Of course he would be crying. After all, Cecile was like an adoptive mother to him in addition to being his mentor, guardian, and caretaker. She trained him in combat, made sure to help him work through moments when he lost control of his blood-based power that wrecks his mind, as well as provide him with important life lessons and social skills. All of which allows us to make the assumption that their relationship was similar to an apprenticeship and found family as the series progresses. This could explain his crying, but then why are we only shown him and three other Guardian Witches crying? Cecile had other people she was close with--friends and members of her knights that were also like found-family. So, again, why are we only shown Anz in this chapter where we learn of Cecile’s death?

By featuring Anz as the only other person crying in the opening chapter that depicts the death of a Guardian Witch and by placing so much focus on it through their introduction of the three other Guardian Witches with no one else, we are given our first hint to Anz being Cecile’s heir.

Next, we have his apprentice-like relationship to Cecile. It would make sense for him to be the heir to her power as Mule Grace comments that each of the Guardian Witches normally takes on an apprentice when they are preparing for death. They slowly pass their powers over to their heir over time and that helps make the chosen heir the next Guardian Witch.

In the prologue, Riz Abramelin, the Second Witch of Frost and the Guardian Witch of Kelren, speculates that Cecile may not have had a chance to choose an heir. Cecile was the Seventh Witch of the Wind and has apparently died young for a Guardian Witch. However, I find it unlikely that Cecile left this world without choosing an heir--and not just because Iliya claims to have been chosen by her. It would make sense that Cecile had chosen an heir to her role and that the heir would be Anz given their close relationship. (Side note, from what I can tell, a Guardian Witch’s number is their literal number in the role’s line, hence Riz is the second witch of frost, Mule Grace is the fourth witch of strength, Cecile was the seventh Witch of the Wind, etc...). (Another side note, if a Witch does not choose an heir, than a new heir rises naturally over time.)

The only known rival to Anz being the heir is Iliya, the “supposed” inheritor of Cecile’s guardian role. However, Iliya isn’t introduced until several chapters later and, in our meeting of her, we do not learn of her ever crying in the same moment as the other witches despite the bond being established as transcendent between both chosen heirs and the current Guardian Witches (we know that heirs are included because Mule Grace, an heir, cries too).

One may argue that Iliya isn’t seen crying because she had yet to undergo her “Second Awakening,” which is when the status as a Guardian Witch is made clear through the awakening of their true powers, but if that was the case then Mule Grace wouldn’t have cried either since her second awakening happens much later in the work. One could also argue that we don’t see her crying because she had yet to be introduced as a character, but this event transpired during the prologue that too would not make sense.

With this in mind, what standing does Iliya have to claim herself as the eighth Witch of the Wind?

In argument of Iliya being the heir, Well, one of Cecile’s Knights (people chosen by the witches as aides and gifted some of the guardian’s mana), Eddie, says that Iliya must be Cecile’s inheritor since he could feel Cecile’s power coming from Iliya. And lending to this idea Anz comments that Iliya’s wind magic feels the same as Cecile’s magic. However this feeling that both Eddie and Anz have about Iliya’s magic can easily be explained by the very thing that defines Eddie as a Guardian Witch’s Knight—mana. Specifically, Cecile’s mana. Remember that each of the Knights of each Guardian Witch are given a fraction of their respective Guardian Witch’s mana when they become knights, making them feel like the Witch they’re a knight too. A perfect example of this is how Anz comments that he can feel Cecile’s mana coming from Eddie (seen in the image below), much the same way Eddie claims to feel Cecile’s mana coming from Iliya.

Heirs are also gifted the Witch’s mana but in a larger degree on top of what magic they already posses.

What is more likely than is that Cecile may have made Iliya a knight by giving some of her mana to the girl when she helped Iliya escape the corruption/corrosion—a place Cecile seemed to have found and saved many people during her time as the Seventh Witch of the Wind as well as a place she found Anz in and kind of raised him in. Cecile making Iliya a Knight would explain why Iliya’s wind feeling like Cecile’s and probably acts like a magical blessing that would allow Iliya to pass or think of herself as a potential heir to the Guardian of Wind’s role.

Anz being able to sense Cecile’s Knights and how the Knights respond to Anz’s approach when he comes to the Winfred Academy of Magic, thereby leads me to believe that Anz is more likely to be the heir than Iliya who can’t sense the other Knights well, if at all. Meanwhile, almost instantly all of the Knights can sense Anz coming close in the same way he can sense them.

What maybe the biggest factor against Anz being Cecile’s heir is his blood-based power, but within the context of the story that doesn’t seem to be a problem because we know that a person can have more than one type of magical blessing (these blessings are essentially the same as saying you can have more than one type of power—a fire user may also be able to use earth, for example). These blessings have no known relation to the heir’s role as the next Guardian Witch.

When it is unclear like this, what defines the Guardian Witch is their awakening, but those awakenings seem to happen only when the Guardian Witches needs and desperately wants to protect other people.

Anz will certainly struggle with this since has been cut off from people most of his life and has never been, as far as we’ve seen, in a position where he needed to protect others. Rather, his experience has largely been needing to be protected from himself, from other people, or even protecting other people from his blood-based powers by someone else.

It isn’t until Anz fights the Alpha monster (and a few lesser monsters) that appeared during what was supposed to be the Academy’s semi-safe training session off-campus that we see him really desperate fight to protect others for the first time. It’s then that we see Anz fighting to protect others for the first time and it is also the first chance we see for him to have a second awakening. However, due to his blood-based power, which he is familiar with and will protect him at pretty much any cost, Anz turns to the “easy” answer of using his blood powers rather than searching inward for the guardian power I believe is present within him.

His blood powers are essentially a crutch that he turns to during desperate times, something another guardian witch heir like Mule Grace who achieves her second awakening during this arc does not have and thereby cannot lean on to avoid reaching her true power as a Guardian Witch.

There are, of course, other hints too, such as Anz’s ability to use many of Cecile’s moves and attacks which other characters attribute to Cecile having raised and trained him prior to her death:

There is also Anz’s “visions” of Cecile, such as in Chapter 50 when he dreams of Cecile and begs her to take him with her, which she rejects by bonking his head and telling him to live his life prior to him waking up in the hospital. As with most comics, dreams give us foresight or define a unique/special connection.

All of this leads me to believe that Anz is the next Witch of the Wind. Though, I suspect that it will take some time before he can fully awaken due to his use and reliance upon his blood-based power.

So, what do you all think? Could Anz be the 8th Guardian Witch of the Wind? or do you have a more compelling argument in Iliya’s favor as heir to the role? I’d be happy to know!

With that, I wish you all a Happy Halloween, and I’ll see you next Saturday with another post!

#Witch of Wind #witch wind #wind witch #안즈 #The Memory of Wind #Anz #manhwa #Charcoal #theory #analysis

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dangermousie · 5 years

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So, let’s talk about Hwi and Seon Ho, aka my murder boys

First Hwi. I was so glad that his walking by Hui Jae in the market was not some sort of “I must pushed loved ones away” weirdness but just trying not to let everyone know what his vulnerabilities are. I love this drama for not dragging things out. And then he comes into that meeting and she doesn’t say a word or move a muscle but her face, her face!

And then what follows is an incredible scene that made me wish I was a Victorian lady with some smelling salts handy. For a drama which has romance firmly in the background and is very spare with its scenes about them, it knows exactly how to deliver everything for maximum effect so it does more with little than most dramas do with much. Because she is bandaging him, and looking at his multitude of scars (it reminds me of her much earlier line that she thought hell was engraved all over Hwi’s body) and she touches him so tenderly (and that must have been such a nonexistent thing in his past years) and he slowly reaches out his hand and holds her, and it is amazing to see that his capacity for tenderness is still ever present, still there, and they just sit there not moving. When she tells him she cannot tell him to stop or proceed but just wants this to hurt as little as possible for him and puts her cheek against his scarred back, my God!!!! It is all so loving and selfless and super catering to my kinks - I mean, he’s wounded and in pain and she is trying to take some of it away and !!!!

And that is why I was so shaken when Hwi told Seon Ho on that bridge that he plans to die once he kills Nam Jeon (presumably by taking his own life.) WHYYYY! I realize he’s had awful, horrifying losses and that he lives in fairly constant pain (he was a magical wuxia illness but I am surprisngly Ok with it somehow; though this is making me worried he’s gonna die from poison or equally awful medicine he takes to be even barely functional) but he has his friends, he has Hui Jae’s unwavering love, I need him to want to live, to find some happiness at last.

Ah yes, that scene on the bridge. I love that no matter how dark Seon Ho goes, he always always always cares for Hwi. When he tells Hwi that he might die in his present condition if he takes on Nam Jeon, there are literal tears in his voice. When he begs Hwi to let him be the one to get revenge instead (and oooooh, his “that way he will be known as a man killed by his own son” is so messed up) but Hwi won’t budge because he’s finally broken and can only see the path he set for himself...Seeing Seon Ho’s reaction to Hwi saying he himself will die once he kils Nam Jeon, I can tell that in the flashforward, Seon Ho is not fighting to protect his father, he is not fighting for power or even revenge. He is fighting to save Hwi’s life, because he loves Hwi, because Yeon loved Hwi. He must stop him from killing Nam Jeon because Nam Jeon’s death means Hwi’s death. (and OMG that preview shot of Hwi running Seon Ho through. I do not want to hate Hwi for the first time in this drama, but I am afraid I will if that happens. How far has he come from the guy, already damaged but still with a full soul, who cradled Seon Ho’s body screaming.)

I can’t believe I am going to say it, but I think Seon Ho might actually be the more emotionally and mentally healthy one. Seon Ho, who exchanges words like razors with Nam Jeon, Seon Ho who plans to kill his own father, Seon Ho who has fallen into a pit so deep he doesn’t bother to clean the dried blood off his hands as he goes drinking with gisaengs.

But then! He still cares for Hwi deeply and for Yeon as well, and this will always be his saving grace. When he almost killed the gisaeng for touching Yeon’s ribbon (and look how clean it is; he clearly takes enormous care of it), it was both terrifyingly dysfunctional and swoony at once. (Btw, I love that both our protags like tying ladies’ ribbons to their weapons. So medieval chivalry.)

Anyway, I am ready for Nam Jeon to be dead but if he is dead in the next ep, what happens in the last four? I suppose he can still make it out but that would be surprising (he is not the type to agree to be Hwi’s dog as Hwi told him in that chilling mirror speech.)

Honestly, if I didn’t know it was 16 eps, with the previews I’d assume tomorrow is the last ep, tbh.

In conclusion - the revenge plans by both our guys remind me of Giant and East of Eden, where protags had complex revenge plans that took years, meanwhile allowing the bad guy to inflict more misery on maximum amount of people. For God’s sake, just chop off his head and be done. Kill him slowly, if you prefer it. Long revenge plans that inflict maximum misery are fine but they are far from certain! But let go, get some Joseon therapy and move on, please! For my heart’s sake if nothing else.

OK, one more thing. I nearly fell off my chair when Bang Gan showed up claiming that he desired Hwi over and over. Dude. There is a long line of potential boyfriend for our screwed up ninja. Get in line!

Bonus 1. Both Hwi and Seon Ho apparently now joined the “we love blood on our faces literally” club. Unhygienic!

Bonus 2. This was everything!

And of course then poor Hwi is super sick and in pain againnnn. I can’t even appreciate the shirtlessness because he’s constantly in agony!

There was also this! Sure, I could slash it. I ship everyone with everyone in this drama.

In conclusion, have a wrecked Bang Won because why not.

I want to say it is weird to have a thing for King Taejo but hey, Six Flying Dragons gave that to me years ago so...

#kdrama #my country #my country: the new age #my country the new age #yang se jong #woo do hwan #jang hyuk #seolhyun

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whorphydice · 4 years

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modern au prompt(question?request?) : give me the saddest, most depressing head canons you have for each character

@hadestownmodern

Oh GOD okay uh.. I’m gonna put these under the cut.

Eurydice: Her mother killed herself when she was very young. It sent her into the system where she was abused in more than one way. Mentally, Physically, Emotionally. Briefly, when she ran away at the end of her teens, in moments of desperation she would let men sleep with her for a roof over her head for a night. Eurydice had it bad, and those ghosts haunt her her whole life. She worries that she will lose to the same thing her mother did. She is afraid of leaving her daughters motherless.

Orpheus: His mother came to take him back when he was three years old. He was little and extremely attached to Hermes and Persephone. She tried to take him back and it scarred him. He had nightmares for years of her coming back for him, waking up in hysterics. He has deeply rooted fears of abandonment. He has anxiety and minor PTSD from it, though that is never formally diagnosed. In addition, his darkest moment cannot be talked about yet bc it gives too much away in terms of future plot point but.. Orpheus breaks, his heart his soul, everything about him breaks over his wife.

Persephone: I feel like her whole story line is trauma tbh. She has twelve miscarriages. Twelve. That wrecks her mental and emotional health, as you can imagine. She is told not to try again because it would kill her. She has Junie anyway, though that is what drives a wedge in her marriage. She spends the entire nine months thinking that she is going to raise her daughter on her own, just like her mother. She knows very well having her could kill her, and she doesn’t care, but she has to come to terms that it would leave her daughter parentless.

Hades: On that same note as Persephone. He was not ready for Persephone to die. He did not think anything was worth losing her, and he stands by that forever. He distances himself a lot when she’s pregnant with Junie, because in his eyes she is celebrating the end of her life. He fully, 100% ,believes, she is going to die. And he will not stick around, he cannot look at a kid that killed her. He is ready to leave, if she dies. If she died he was leaving- he didn’t have a plan where he was going, but he was getting out of town and never coming back. He feels immense guilt the rest of his life for this. He feels immense guilt for how he treated her, and how little he wanted his daughter. He spends the rest of his life trying to make it up to them.

Hermes: HERMES DOES NOT DESERVE PAIN. He doesn’t stress much, he is such a calming presence. However, when Calliope shows up and tries to take Orpheus he is ready to fight. He is ready to throw hands for his boy. He is docile and gentle, but he considers strangling Calliope for abandoning him like she did and then DARING to try to take him from them.

Demeter: I can’t go into too much detail without giving too much away. However, something traumatic happens to her that makes her stop trusting the universe for a while. It breaks her heart, breaks her soul, and the only thing she has to get through it was her little daughter.

#tw suicice #tw depression #tw anxiety #tw ptsd #tw abandonment #ahh these are dark #hadestown modern #hadestown modern au #modern au

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petekaos · 4 years

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Merlin and arthur for your character ask game!!

I sent an ask about merlin and Arthur for the ask game, I hope that's okay!! I don't know if you only wanted characters from bl shows lol but I had to send them, I l o v e them

hiii nonnie!! oh this is perfectly alright, i adore merlin and arthur like no other! bbc merlin was the first show that ever truly... stuck with me. so here goes! (uhhh, pretty pivotal spoilers for bbc merlin in case it wasn’t obvious!)

merlin:

favorite thing about them:

i just love how GOOD merlin is! he’s one of my absolute favourite characters of all time and the way how he tries to help everyone and anyone he can and uses his magic in order to make people’s lives easier is just... wonderful. he literally gets into escapades every episode because he wants to help one person or another and it’s just so so good and funny, i love him.

least favorite thing about them:

honestly you could not count the amount of times i’ve shaken my fist at the screen and told merlin to stop listening to kilgarrah lmaooo, i feel merlin trusts... too blindly. especially when it comes to destiny and all that lark, i wish he would think for himself and realise that destiny is something you mold. i feel that would have made s4 and s5 WAY more interesting and also... better! considering the entire mordred subplot as well.

favorite line:

god... this series is five seasons long and merlin has the most wonderful quotes. but off the top of my head? i have to pick something from the finale, as i will do for arthur as well. “and i use it for you, arthur. only for you.” like... that continues to tug on my heartstrings, honestly. the way he feels the need to justify himself having magic, and the way that merlin went from this young, innocent, stars-in-his-eyes boy to a wrecked mess in the end, living not for himself, but solely for arthur and the good of camelot. this line showcases that beautifully and how merlin needs to heal first before loving arthur. he has the greatest power in the world... and he uses it all for this one man. bro.

brotp:

merlin and gwen!!! merlin and morgana!!! merlin and the knights!!! i love the idea of all of them being a tight-knit and close family, merlin just... meshes well with so many people and i adore all of his friendships, esp with lancelot and gwaine from the knights :’)

otp:

merlin x arthur. yeah, man. the tragedy of it all... the heartwrenching ache of it all... they truly served in a way that no other white non-canonical mlm couple could. absolutely wonderful.

notp:

not really... fond of any merlin ship apart from merlin x arthur but merlin x morgana is Bad, he’s gay and she’s a lesbian and they’re magic best friends!

random headcanon:

this is similar to my one for met, but merlin should use his magic and play WAY more pranks on arthur. i’m talking throwing stuff at him when he’s got his back turned but acting all innocent when he turns back. i’m talking stealing more of his food and shrugging his shoulders. i’m talking sparring with arthur in front of all the knights and cheating so he can win. arthur is fuming but he can never say anything because the knights all love merlin more than him and would never believe any sort of accusation against him.

unpopular opinion:

he should have helped morgana. end of. merlin helps everyone he sees, and the fact that he would just brush morgana off like that is a) shitty writing for more drama and b) a complete mischaracterisation. they deserved to be friends who tried to bring magic back to camelot together in their own ways, and considering that they’re literally opposites when it comes to personality... it would have been SO interesting.

song i associate with them:

vanilla twilight by owl city. i have thought of this as a merlin (and merlin x arthur) song for quite a while now and wrote a whole fic based off of it! but yeah, especially the line “i’ll watch the night turn light blue / but it’s not the same without you” fucking GETS me. i always wondered how merlin coped with his grief, considering that arthur became such a pivotal part of his life, and how he realised he needed to live for himself and heal before he came back. some of that is explored in the fic! i wrote it like... almost four years ago, holy shit, so it’s not that good but have at it if you wish!

favorite picture of them:

have this picture of merlin i actually have saved on my laptop!! he looks so good in the coronation outfit and the light is hitting his eyes just right. glorious boy!

arthur:

favorite thing about them:

i adore how arthur always wants to do the right thing, even if it means going against his father in the later seasons. he also just loves the people of his kingdom so much, even saying he’d lay down his life for the people in camelot... which you need to do as king, obviously, but something about his sincerity... and that’s another thing. he’s so sincere in everything he does! i love him :’)

least favorite thing about them:

emotionally constipated arrogant BRAT fhsnfhsn lmaooo i love him, and he gets better with the arrogance and the emotional constipation (not so much on the brat front :/) in the later seasons. i just... adore his character development so much!

favorite line:

okay. i have two off the top of my head although he has some RAW fucking lines as well. “for the love of camelot!” always gets me btw but that’s not a part of this.

so number one, “i couldn’t bear to lose you.” this ties in with the thing about character development i was talking about earlier, because s1 arthur would have never said this to merlin, even if they had a great relationship. and also... that line is just so fucking raw, especially hearing arthur refer to merlin as his friend when arthur doesn’t refer to anyone else as a friend. just... the fact that he’s saying that he literally could not take it if merlin went missing or died, he couldn’t bear the weight of that on his shoulders as he bears everything else on his shoulders... it makes my heart clench every time. and how open and honest that is, how he lays everything out on the table--merlin is a vital part of his life, so much so that he couldn’t picture his life without him.

and secondly: “just hold me.” it doesn’t matter how many times i watch that finale, that line always gets me. how all arthur wants to do in his last moments is be held by merlin, and as said by the showrunners themselves i believe... he died peacefully in the arms of someone who loved him. the way that he gives up and he doesn’t say anything else, not things he needs to do after he dies or messages to give others... but only three words. “just hold me.” all he wants is to be held, and it gets me every time.

brotp:

aaaaaa arthur and morgana!!! the best siblings, they deserved so much better and so many more banter-y scenes together :(

otp:

merlin x arthur, no doubt baby!

notp:

hmmm, i don’t think i particularly have a famed arthur ship that i dislike... arthur x gwen is good!! just not my cup of tea i think, i like merlin x arthur and morgana x gwen more. do people ship morgana x arthur? if so, no. they’re literally siblings.

random headcanon:

arthur is FASCINATED by magic. in a better world, after merlin had told him about his magic, he would have endlessly pestered merlin about this and that and being so impressed with every small feat of magic merlin did. merlin conjures up a light dragon and arthur is all “:D merlin do that again!!!” i love arthur being a little kid and getting to have the childhood he never had, makes me feel warm :’)

unpopular opinion:

i know it wasn’t his fault but i cannot BELIEVE he gave up right then and there during the finale. they were so close :(( i cannot accept that ending man i’m just sad

song i associate with them:

king and lionheart by of monsters and men. i think the merlin fandom is pretty much unified on the opinion of this being a merlin x arthur song and it’s just... such a good arthur song as well! man... especially the line of “as the world comes to an end, i’ll be there to hold your hand” like... if that isn’t arthur talking to merlin... nonnie you’ve made me emotional over how much i love them again :(

favorite picture of them:

no doubt in my mind that this is my absolute favourite picture of arthur. the tender expression in his eyes as he looks at merlin over at the fire... i don’t have words for it. bradley truly outdid himself here man!

send me a character!

#this really took me back to four years ago when i watched merlin for the first time #and had the breath knocked out of me #it remains to this day one of my top favourite shows #also remember that one picture of bradley with a ds or a phone in sunglasses laying across the staircase? i LOVE that one fhsnfh #merlin #character ask game #rahul answers

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leah-halliwell92 · 5 years

Text

Too Much Love Can Kill You

Summary: Soul marks are found through touch and song, one must sing to find their half and touch completes their connection. To reject your mark is to sentence them to death. You have been on tour with Brian, Roger and Rufus for a year and have known them for nearly four. What happens you find out along the way that you are the mark of one Brian May?

Previously:

“I…I can feel her,” the older man gasped with a breathy laugh.

“And you hadn’t before?” Rufus asked carefully.

“No, I had felt something before but not since we completed our bond,” Brian admitted.

“She’d closed her end,” Rufus said now understanding what had happened to you.

Brian’s eyes widened at that fear now a prominent emotion, “Why did she…?”

“I don’t know. But whatever reason she had for closing the bond, it could be the reason for why she was in the state she was in when da went to her,” Rufus said almost to himself, “She went into shock…from withdrawal.”

Prologue – Chapter 1 – Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Roger felt her small gasp of surprise and couldn’t help give a breath of relief recognizing the action as a sign that both marks’ bond had met. He saw a soft smile start to form your lips and couldn't help the small sad grin that appeared on his.

"He's there...I can feel him," she whispered tiredly her smile growing despite the wince of the phantom pain.

You felt your mark warm and heart thrum as Brian's end of the bond seemed to embrace you. You basked in the feel of your bond meeting his as if you’d been doing it all your lives. This feeling of completion, love and hope...it is borderline euphoric. If it weren't for the fact that their bond and are hanging onto whether or not he accepts them the moment would have been perfect.

In the living room, Rufus sat with a quietly sobbing Brian a supportive hand on the older man’s shoulder.

“She...she knew,” Brian gasped between sobs as the realization of what he had been about to do fell on his shoulders.

Rufus furrowed his brow in wonder at what Brian could mean with that.

“She knew what Bri?” He asked reluctantly.

“That I would reject her, us our bond and she knew why,” Brian said as a fresh wave of tears hit him.

Rufus’ eyes widened at the revelation. He should have known, and taken you warnings to heart, the reasons you’d told him from the moment he found out whose mark you carry and all the reasons you gave him were not out of spite or you being a bitch because of the age gap. It couldn’t be further from the truth, and now is when he realizes that you had taken the time to get to know Brian deeper without doing much in hopes that it would be enough. That this friendship would be enough.

Silence surrounded them as Brian’s sobs subsided.

“She loves you you know,” Rufus said quietly.

Brian looked at the younger man in shock.

“Has for awhile now, since–”

“Since we sang our song,” Brian cut in voice soft and broken.

Rufus nodded silently.

Brian remembered that day… and to this day he couldn’t remember a day you hadn’t looked so happy and yet so sad at the same time. He fell back against the backrest of the sofa and let his head fall back against it. He closed his eyes letting the memory take over.

In the bedroom, you snuggled into the bed and manage to doze off into sleep with the memory of when their bond flared to life for the first time in her mind’s eye. _________________________________________________________________

You took a deep breath in a an attempt to keep your nerves in check…the concert starts soon after all. But you couldn’t help it! This is your first tour with your new found family and friends, who happen to be Queen, and who were you kidding you’re a nervous wreck. You don’t want to embarrass them, especially not Roger who had been more of a father to you than your own had been. And abso-fucking-lutely not Brian.

If you were to have a best friend then he fits the mold. He’s more than understanding, kind and doesn’t mind listening to you ramble about your classes or help out when you’re taking a physics class. He jams with you on his legendary Red Special and gives you tips and tricks to improve your own playing. It’s an amazing friendship no matter what people said about him being older than you or vise versa.

Today proved to be more than just nerves about this being your first tour with Queen but there’s been a song stuck in your head for the past month that is driving you up a wall more often than not. You sat the dressing room you share with the Queens on your own as they did whatever it is rockstars do to before a show, allowing you to put a lyric to the tune. You hear the door open and a familiar poof of hair as Brian walks in a grin on his kind face.

“Hey Bri,” you say putting down the pencil.

“Hey yourself, you doing alright?” He asked taking a seat on the other side of the couch you were sitting on.

You nod with a grin of your own before you give the half written song an unsure look and with a deep breath then asking, “Can you read over this for me?”

Brian shifted closer to you teasingly saying, “And what do we have here hmm?”

As he read the lyrics, you plucked the chords of your guitar here and there playing the basic tune of the song.

Brian looked up at you a bright grin on his face after reading.

“So...what do you think?” You asked curiously.

He hummed thoughtfully and with a small smirk said, “I think I need to listen to the music with the lyric to decide.”

You returned his grin and began to play...

“Woke up sweating from a dream With a different kind of feeling All day long my heart was beating Searching for the meaning Hazel eyes I was so color-blind We were just wasting time For my whole life We never crossed the line Only friends in my mind But now I realize It was always you Can't believe I could not see it all this time, all this time It was always you Now I know why my heart wasn't satisfied, satisfied It was always you, you No more guessing who Looking back now I know it was always you, always you”

You sang the first verse happy and proud at how well the music and lyrics go together. You nearly outwardly gasp when Brian picks up where the second verse starts.

Your world shifted at that moment. Your mark warmed and darkened as your voices mingled and fit… like puzzle pieces you and Bri fit together perfectly. The both of you sang on until the end of the lyrics.

He looked, dare you say it, proud. He looked at you with a bright smile on his face and said, “Quite the song my dear, I certainly can’t wait for you to finish it.”

You nodded forcing a bright smile as you pushed down the urge and itch to reach for his hand. The feeling is excruciating but necessary…

“Five minutes to show time (Y/N),” he said as he stood and made his way out of the room.

“Ok, tell Rog I’ll be there soon yeah?” You say as you put the paper away in your guitar case.

He nods and leaves you alone again.

You feel yourself sag as he leaves, as if he’s taking a part of you with him and in a way he is. You take your time making your way to the main stage. Taking this time to come to terms with the fact that he cannot for any reason know what he means to you and you to him. You hummed your song committing to memory the sound of his voice as he sang along with you. You grinned sadly to yourself as you resigned yourself to living a half life...a life where you and Bri are the other’s marks and he will never know... _________________________________________________________________

Roger slips out of the bed tucking the blanket around you snuggly before leaving the room and letting you rest.

Out in the living room, Roger looked on at the state his closest and oldest friend is in and sighed knowing the feeling of having a young love and feelings that came with it. He’d been in the emotional position of feeling too old to be with the unbelievable woman’s mark and having those feelings of inadequacy due to the age gap between them. As angry as he was with Brian, Roger couldn’t blame the man for wanting the very best under the sun for his mark.

He nodded to Rufus who had stood up when he spotted his da coming out of the room.

Rufus went to go into your room but was stopped by Rog who said, “Let her rest a bit for now.”

He pulled his boy into the farthest room leaving a very clearly distraught Bri sitting on the couch.

“When the time comes, Brian will start going haywire emotionally. I mean...do you remember how I got when Sarina and I met?” Roger asked.

Rufus nodded as the realization of what Roger is telling him dawned. When his da and stepmother met, their bond was instantaneous. Not like yours or Bri’s but near on faster than the speed of light. He remembered how it had taken most if not all the family to sit Roger down and convince him to at least have lunch with her at all! The man looked about ready to jump off a cliff instead of doing it. And it took Sarina even longer to break through the old drummer’s shell before she could convince him that she wanted him fully bond or no bond age gap be damned.

They have all known you for close to five years now, and throughout that time they have learned that you love person based on their personality not based on their age. Age does play a factor but not a major one unless it did bring cause for concern.

“Will it be him going in then?” Rufus asked seriously.

“I think it might be for the best,” Roger said thoughtfully, “Their bond, being newly forged, will be flaring violently now due to their current emotional state…it’s going to be a long night.”

The Taylor men stood in silence for a moment before Rufus asked, “Should we just be as supportive as we can?”

Roger nodded running and hand over his face as he sighed exhaustedly before going for his phone.

Rufus left the room at the sound of him talking to Sarina. His da needs some time with his mark right now.

Entering the living room again Rufus was met with an empty sofa and the door to your room ajar. _________________________________________________________________

If you wanna be tagged shoot me an ask!!! Thanks for reading don’t forget to like and reblog!!!! Feedback is always appreciated!! _____________________________________________

Tag list: @pansexualqueendarling, @queenattheopera, @brianandthemays, @theborhapboysawakenedmywhatever, @ramibaby, @captain–americanna, @awkwardangelshezza, @avengerraven1023, @danamaleksworld, @pastywhiteperson, @readinghorn, @i-was-born-like-this, @redspecialstardust, @reedusteinrambles, @rogertaylorsfalsettogivesmehives, @readinghorn, @subbysharkbabe, @capan-devereaux, @bowieandqueen11, @bellamy1998, @reedusteinrambles

#brian may #roger taylor #rufus taylor #sarina taylor #roger taylor x sarina taylor #brian may x reader #present day brian may x reader #2019!brian may #2019!roger taylor #present day brian may #too much love can kill you #soulmate fic #queen fic

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bipercabeth · 5 years

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So, can we hear your thoughts on TS7? I remember your breakdown for the Ben Platt album and wanted to hear what you have to say about Lover

oh man, i already know this has to go under the cut. i have,,, so many feelings

i forgot that you existed - this song is such a good opener for the album. both the lyrics and production are so light and carefree, which makes it the perfect transition from the intensity of reputation to the softness of lover. she’s not reinventing herself, she’s growing. i love the way she plays with harmonies in the chorus! and i adore how the last line of the verses swells ominously before releasing into the playful staccato of the chorus, i think it’s really indicative of the anxiety surrounding the situation vs the simple and relative ease with which it was all forgotten

cruel summer - tbh i’m glad this wasn’t a single in the place of ME! or yntcd because listening to this was literally a full body experience. it would’ve killed as a lead single, but it definitely hit harder for me hearing for the first time in the context of the album. i read the lyrics of the first five songs when they leaked and genuinely thought i wasn’t going to like this song, but i went absolutely feral at the bridge. (also upon listening i adored the lyrics, so i will no longer be trusting my opinions based on lyrics alone.) if i wasn’t sold on the rest of it, the bridge is what solidified this as one of my favorites on the album. the way the synths build and then cut out for HE LOOKS UP GRINNIN LIKE A DEVIL,,, i lost my shit. astral projected. if this song is playing, i will not turn it off before i get to scream that line. also “i love you, ain’t that the worst thing you ever heard?” is incredible.

lover - words cannot describe my love for this song. my friend veronica described it as the love song of our generation and honestly? she’s not wrong. lover’s lyrics are simple, but hit like a ton of bricks regardless. the key to simple lyricism is finding the words that everyone has always wanted to say (lean on me is a really good example of this but i’m not going to get into songwriting theory on this post) and lover does exactly that. simple descriptions of simple acts are her window to how all-encompassing this love is. the 6/8 timing (a fucking WALTZ y’all) gives it the 2 in the morning kitchen dance feel. it’s a love song in every aspect. i’m never gonna be over it.

the man - a bop. the low notes in this song? incredible, especially in the bridge. those low harmonies took me OUT! the first line of the chorus is so killer as well. and she says bitch twice! taylor said i am 29 i curse and have sex, get over it. there’s less to analyze in this song, but that doesn’t mean i’m not in love with it.

the archer - i am telling you i heard the first goddamn synth note and KNEW jack antonoff was all over this song. i really needed this song to come out when it did, because after those two singles,, i needed some hope for this album. it did not disappoint. the slow build of the synths into one massive crescendo at the bridge instead of the usual rise and fall of most pop music. every single note builds to the bridge, to the anxiety of that repeated they see right through me, to the cause all of my enemies started out friends / help me hold on to you. it swells like the slow draw of a knocked arrow, like an archer taking aim. and then all at once, it fades like the string was released. i adore every single aspect of this song.

i think he knows - my percabeth loving ass needs to take a second to talk about the line i am an architect, i’m drawing up the plans and how it sent me to the fucking moon. but anyway. different post. it is physically impossible for me to stay still when this song plays. the harmonies on that AH in the chorus made me lose it. i want you, bless my soul is so southern and absolutely beautiful. she’s straight up pining in this song, and she knows it. that way she closes the song with that line on loop? sets the tone so well.

miss americana and the heartbreak prince - i have no idea why i didn’t like this song upon first listen, but now i like it! still not my favorite on the album, but the bar is high.

paper rings - god i cannot believe that she said his friends were high at the met gala i’m fucking dead. this whole song is peak old taylor, just grown up. it’s got the same catchiness as stay stay stay, but with a more grown (but still fun) outlook. this one is real experience talking, and it shows. she’s got the love she always wanted to write about! i’m not okay!

cornelia street - her delivery really makes the song for me. you can physically feel how much she loves joe and how real that fear of losing him. that stripped down chorus after the bridge where her voice breaks? she’s so in love. i’m so in love.

death by a thousand cuts - GOD i love this song with everything in me, even more since watching Someone Great. it’s the perfect narrative song for that movie. it also contains the single most Taylor Swift^tm lyric of all time: but if the story’s over, why am i still writing pages? ALSO? WE WANNA TALK ABOUT BRIDGE CITY?? this bridge goes so hard. i can’t convey my love for it unless we’re in the car together so i can scream it properly. ultimate car song.

london boy - so fun! people who are upset over this song gotta calm down, it’s a fun, catchy song. i don’t have much to say about it, but i enjoy it! i won’t go out of my way to queue it, but it’s cute and cheeky and i like it.

soon you’ll get better - i knew from the first goddamn guitar lick that this was going to wreck me, but once i realized what it was about,,, i didn’t stand a chance. i literally went back after my first listen through the whole album and listened to this song on loop for at least half an hour and just. sobbed. it hits home way too hard for me. again with that devastatingly simple songwriting. you’ll get better soon / cause you have to absolutely destroyed me. also, this is a really small detail, but that breath at 2:41 really does me in. it’s so defeated, i can’t. her delivery in this one is an absolute gut punch.

false god - jack antonoff is all over this one and i love it for that. taylor swift said i fuck and i respect that. the sax? get out of here. it’s so perfect. it’s horny, but like,,, emotionally horny. perfect fit for this album. i adore it.

you need to calm down - okay ngl i don’t like this song or ME!, but i’m really glad they were singles because if i heard them on this album for the first time i would’ve been :/ about it. instead we got that right out of the way and now i can appreciate the good parts of them. the oh’s in the chorus are really pretty! i don’t actively dislike this song, but i don’t actively like it either.

afterglow - i love that taylor put a song about fighting on this album. i think this made the album feel so much more real. it’s about love, and fighting is a part of that! we break a little from the picture perfect aspect of songs like paper rings and get a little grittier. people make mistakes, but the love guides the choice to stay, to ask for forgiveness and promise to do better. this makes the entire narrative of lover so much stronger.

ME! - same sentiment as yntcd in terms of it being the lead single, except i’m really not a fan of this song. i can handle it up until the spelling is fun part. i cannot believe “can’t spell awesome without me” is so close to daylight. i appreciate the point of the song and what she sets out to do with it, but i just. can’t get over that damn bridge.

it’s nice to have a friend - i really didn’t like this song at first and i’m still warming up to it, but i definitely am! it’s such a percabeth song. i’m not sure why i didn’t like it, probably because it doesn’t escalate or go anywhere, but i think that steadiness contributes to the meaning of it

daylight - i could literally write an entire essay on this song alone. it’s the perfect closing song for this album. i don’t want to see anything else now that i saw you / i don’t want to think of anything else now that i’ve thought of you are literally the most tender lines i have heard in my whole life. the comparison between this and her notes from red make me openly weep. the bridge of this song literally feels light daylight, it shines and feels warm and god i love love! i once believed love would be burning red, but it’s golden made me cry when i heard it. i can’t stop thinking about that quote that says “lover is the sound of a songwriter getting to write the album she’s always wanted to write”. i could literally cry just thinking about that. she got to write the album about golden love! her whole career is based around singing and writing about love, and now she has exactly what she’s been grasping at all this time. it’s downright poetic. the monologue/outro only did me in more. she’s spent so long being defined by other people, and here she makes that definition for herself on an album that she owns every part of. it’s perfect.

#please do not ask me how long i spent on this #ts #music #anon #iris messages #bless u anon i would die for u #it makes me so happy to know that people want to hear my thoughts on music okay this is my love language #i mean i'm gonna give em either way but its nice to know they're wanted

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argentdandelion · 5 years

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Cross-Fandom Analysis: “I’m Bad, and That’s Good”

Or, “How to Not Die by Falling into Not-Lava”.

Thesis: Ralph’s speech of “I’m bad, and that’s good. I will never be good, and that’s not bad. There’s no one I’d rather be...than me.” also applies to W.D. Gaster of Handplates, but in an opposite moral direction.

(For simplicity’s sake, this article will not be considering the sequel Ralph Wrecks the Internet)

Ralph Context

Ralph: “Sure must be nice, being the good guy.” Ralph: “Here’s the thing. I don’t want to be the bad guy anymore.” Clyde (the orange ghost in Pac-Man): “Ralph, Ralph. We get it. But we can’t change who we are. The sooner you accept that, the better off your game and your life will be.”

History

In the film Wreck-it Ralph, Ralph, who's been the "bad guy" of a Donkey Kong-esque arcade game for decades, doesn't want to be the "bad guy" any more. He's tired of getting defeated by his game's protagonist, Fix-it Felix, over and over and being excluded and not appreciated by everyone in his game. He doesn’t seem to have any friends; when he shows up to Bad Anon at the film’s beginning, it’s his first time.

In his game, Felix gets a medal for his heroism after defeating Ralph; to prove he can be a good guy, Ralph ventures to another game to get himself a medal. In the process, he accidentally brings a mindless killer robot to the helpless game Sugar Rush. Though thought destroyed, the robot actually survived and multiplied underground. He also loses his newfound medal, and in his quest to get it back, he befriends one of Sugar Rush's characters: Vanellope.

Motives

Ralph’s bad-guy status was externally-imposed: he was created for the role of being the bad guy in an arcade game, and the game literally puts words in his mouth to accomplish this. Refusing to play out his role or even just leaving his game for too long comes with the risk of making the arcade game seem broken, and if people think it's broken, it will be unplugged and its characters will become homeless; therefore it is selfish.

Ralph’s initial motives are selfish. The other characters in the game Wreck-it Ralph don’t believe he can ever get a medal because he’ll never be any more than a bad guy. When he gets a medal (by basically cheating rather than earning it), he figures he’ll come back to the admiration of the other game characters.

Execution of Motives

While Ralph’s initial motives for helping Vanellope are selfish, (he wants his hero’s medal back and helping Vanellope win a race will do it) he nonetheless does some kind, altruistic (arguably heroic) things to help Vanellope even before he gets his medal back.

When the other Sugar Rush characters harass Vanellope and tear apart her homemade cart, Ralph (who doesn’t even like her, at this point) charges down and scares the other racers off. He’ll get the medal back if Vanellope wins a race, but Vanellope doesn’t have a car or some place to practice. So he uses his super-strength to break into a car-making minigame facility and help Vanellope make a car, and also creates a racetrack for her to practice on.

Later, he unexpectedly gets his medal back before Vanellope races. the film’s antagonist also tricks him into believing that if Vanellope does win a race, Sugar Rush’s plug will be pulled, causing everyone to flee the game and become homeless game characters. Yet, Vanellope, as a glitch, cannot escape her game: she’ll die.

Ralph thus wrecks Vanellope’s cart so she can’t race, avoiding the outcome that will result in her death. (The scene is emotionally devastating; the author still always fast-forwards through that scene.) Later on, he breaks into prison to rescue Felix, the hero of the game Wreck-it Ralph, for Felix’s magic hammer can fix anything and thus can reassemble the remains of Vanellope’s car.

Speech Interpretation

At the film’s climax, Ralph learns a mindless killer robot (a Cy-Bug) he accidentally brought in from another game survived the crash of the escape pod that brought him to Sugar Rush. Not only that, but it multiplied into a massive army, in a game where there are no built-in controls to its spread. Vanellope, as a glitch character, cannot escape Sugar Rush. The film’s villain holds Ralph high in the air, trying to get him to watch Vanellope die. That’s when Ralph realizes he’s above a mountain of Mentos and lava-like diet cola. He escapes the villain’s clutches, intending to punch the entire layer of Mentos in the mountain into the boiling diet cola: the eruption would draw the Cy-Bugs in like moths to a flame and destroy them.

When Ralph is falling to his (presumed) death, it’s likely he believes he’s brought a lot of suffering onto Vanellope, such as bringing a Cy-Bug in (accidentally) and breaking her cart to start with. It’s likely he believes his sacrifice is the only way to save her.

Therefore, Ralph’s interpretation of the Bad Guy Affirmation would be: “I’ve messed up, and I’m doomed to be a villain. I accept that. At least Vanellope cares about me [he looks at his candy medal during this line], and this is the only thing I can do to save her.”

Handplates Context

Gaster: “It does not matter if they [the test subjects] can understand. It does not matter what they look like, or if they can think, or what they feel.” Gaster: “To even consider...[abandoning the experiment and raising the test subjects more-or-less normally]...such selfish sentimentality gets people killed. There is only one choice.”

History

In the Undertale fan comic Handplates (by Zarla-s), monsters were sealed underground with a magical barrier after losing a war millennia ago. When his son was killed by humans, Asgore, king of the monsters, declared war on humanity. He declared that any humans who fell into monsters’ underground realm would be killed, and their souls used to break the magical barrier keeping them all underground. However, Asgore is a kind pushover of a king, who once adopted human child himself. Going through with his declaration causes him a lot of emotional suffering. To ease his pain, the royal scientist W.D. Gaster tries to find some way to break or bypass the barrier without having the king kill any humans.

To this end, he cut out disks of bone from his hands to grow into “living tools” for his experiments. Yet, they unexpectedly became sentient monster children, causing some ethical problems.

W.D. Gaster, in some ways, is the opposite of Ralph. Though his whole family (and all other skeletons) were killed off in the war, he was de facto adopted by King Asgore and Queen Toriel, who loved him very much. He grew up to be a scientist, and helped the whole Underground with his inventions. Indeed, he gained the singularly esteemed position of royal scientist, with immense resources for whatever project he needed.

However, like Ralph, W.D. Gaster has very few friends. While he’s been alive for thousands of years (Ralph’s been alive for 30), he seems close to only three people: Alphys, Asgore, and Toriel. (and for most of the comic, he believes Toriel is dead)

Motives

W.D. Gaster’s bad-guy status was internally-imposed. Nobody is making him do cruel things. In fact, nobody other than himself and his test subjects even know he’s doing cruel things. He believes he is the only person who can do what he thinks must be done, for the greater good, so his motives are initially altruistic. While his devotion to Asgore and willingness to suffer for monsterkind’s sake is admirable, the way he goes about it is definitely a bad guy thing.

In contrast to Ralph, W.D. Gaster’s initial motives weren’t selfish. He wanted to free all monsters from their underground realm and soothe Asgore’s suffering however he could. Nobody considered him a “bad guy”: he was already admired and had people who cared about him.

Execution of Motives

After a brief period of a more-or-less happy childhood/toddler-hood (Gaster was emotionally unavailable, but not hostile), Gaster believed his “objectivity” was “at risk of being compromised”. He drilled in metal plates into the test subjects’ hands, starting a long chain of very painful experiments. Sometimes, he would perform these experiments not to serve his greater, ostensibly noble goal, but for no other reason than his own curiosity. (e.g., breaking one of Papyrus’s bones to see how long it would take to heal) Indeed, while he told himself he would do what he needed to do (including very painful experiments), sometimes his cruelty (e.g., not giving anesthesia) just isn’t pragmatic.

Speech Interpretation

Therefore, Gaster’s interpretation of the Bad Guy Affirmation would be: “I am, and am doomed to be, callous, unloving, and unworthy of love in turn, but that is good: it means I am able to do whatever is necessary to remove Asgore's need to kill again, and free monsterkind. My actions are unforgivable, but I have no choice to turn away from this course: in the end monsters will be freed, and I am willing to accept any punishment afterward for that goal. I do what I must, because I am the only one who can.”

Final Comparison and Results

(Ralph gets cake. Gaster not only does not get cake, but is erased from reality and forgotten by everyone.)

Both have an extended falling sequence into not-lava: lava-like boiling diet cola for Ralph, and magic “lava” (it’s unclear) in a power plant for Gaster. Both have someone who knows them well trying to save them during this sequence; for Ralph, it’s Vanellope, and for Gaster, it’s one of his test subjects, Papyrus (2-P).

Vanellope uses her glitch powers to glitch through the walls of the mountain on her cart, saving Ralph. (Incidentally, Ralph helped her with her glitch powers and cart driving.) Papyrus (called 2-P) tries to save Gaster from falling into the not-lava using gravity-altering blue magic. However, Gaster told him earlier that if he and his brother ever tried to use blue magic on him, they’d be severely punished, and Gaster proceeds to “demonstrate” by breaking quite a lot of Papyrus’s bones. This experience makes Papyrus hesitate, and so he’s too late to save Gaster.

Yet, despite sharing these similarities, their motives, character development, and actions are almost the opposite of each other. Ralph fell to begin with out of a heroic sacrifice to save Vanellope, while Gaster fell because one of his test subjects, Sans (1-S), who resented him for his cruelty, shoved him off a catwalk in the power plant. This, while the Bad Guy affirmation applies to both of them equally, one shows the descent of a “good guy” into villainy, and another shows the ascent of a “bad guy” into heroism.

#Undertale #Handplates #W.D. Gaster #Gaster #Wreck-it Ralph #Handplates Gaster #Zarla #Ralph (Wreck-it Ralph)

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imagitory · 5 years

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D-Views: The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Bonjour, mes amies! Welcome, bienvenue, to another installment of D-Views, my written review series for films produced or inspired by the Walt Disney company! For more reviews for films like Enchanted, Star Wars Episode III, and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, feel free to consult my “Disney reviews” tag, and please, if you enjoy this review or any of the others, please consider liking and reblogging! I look forward to writing more of these in the future for films like Wreck-It Ralph and Halloweentown, as well as Non-Disney films like Charlotte’s Web.

I recently put out a poll suggesting three Disney Renaissance films for possible review subjects, and although The Little Mermaid won that poll, this film ended up not far behind. (Thank you, @schifty-al and @mygeekcorner for your votes!) It’s one of my personal favorite Disney films of all time...The Hunchback of Notre Dame!

Victor Hugo’s classic novel Notre Dame du Paris, called The Hunchback of Notre Dame in English, seems like a very odd inspiration for a Disney animated family film, and that’s because...yeah, it is! When the Disney animators first brought Hunchback to the table, they were less inspired by the original Hugo novel glamorizing the architecture of Notre Dame cathedral, and more inspired by a graphic novel adaptation of the story, which was likewise much more influenced by the 1939 Hollywood film adaptation. Because of the historical context that 1939 adaptation was made in (premiering at Cannes during the rise of the Third Reich), themes of social justice were added to a story that originally was about how the “edifice” can outlast the flaws and sins of mankind. The “social justice” element is something that Hugo interestingly put more in his follow-up to Notre Dame du Paris, the epic brick book Les Miserables, but has since been similarly tied in the public consciousness to The Hunchback of Notre Dame, despite not existing in the original book.

The project was already an odd choice for Disney to take on thanks to the darkness of the book, but the political themes also were unique for a Disney picture as well. It clearly was a more “adult” endeavor, even though thanks to the success of previous projects like Aladdin and The Lion King, there were studio mandates demanding more comic relief, and even the marketing team was reluctant to advertise Hunchback as anything other than a family film. Rather than showing the artistry and darker scenes, the marketing almost entirely focused on the Feast of Fools and the gargoyles, highlighting the “Ugly Duckling” aspect added to the story and downplaying the more adult themes. In the end, it’s likely thanks to those poor marketing choices and the inconsistent tone of the picture that this movie failed to find its audience on first run. It only earned $21 million worldwide, compared to Pocahontas’s $29 million and The Little Mermaid’s $84 million, with mixed critical and audience reaction. Although it was nominated for an Academy Award for its music and won several others, it was noticeably less successful than other installments in the Disney Renaissance, and even now, Disney often doesn’t give Hunchback that much attention. Like Quasimodo, the film has been sort of locked up in its own tower...but now, today, I aim to bring The Hunchback of Notre Dame out of the shadows and give it the appreciation it deserves.

Our film begins in complete darkness, accompanied by resounding church bells and the amazing vocalizations of the English Opera Company, and from the very beginning, I’m just enveloped by the embrace of Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz’s unbelievable score. Choral music in general has always been something special in my family. My mum and dad were in choirs a lot of their lives: they even first met when they joined the San Diego Master Chorale in the 80′s. Choral music remains one of my mother’s greatest loves and passions, and when I saw Hunchback, it made the choral music my parents loved so much, which focused around a faith I hadn’t been raised with and didn’t believe in, that bit more accessible to me as a child. Mum, who studied Latin in college, went on to teach me about all of the chants and phrases Menken and Schwartz added to each song so that I could more appropriately sing along. It remains one of those Disney soundtracks that cemented our close bond, and I’ll always treasure being able to see the La Jolla Playhouse production of The Hunchback of Notre Dame with my mum and getting to hear the amazing choir and instruments live.

The Bells of Notre Dame, as an opening number, cannot be matched in how it introduces us all to the story, characters, themes, and tone of the piece. In just a few minutes, the music and lyrics perfectly showcases our setting, the theme of what makes a man, the atmosphere of fear and injustice, our villain, and our hero. Menken and Schwartz previously worked together on Pocahontas, but Hunchback in my opinion easily outstrips their previous collaboration. The use of church bells of all sizes to convey the solemnity, mystery, and grandeur of the cathedral at the center of the proceedings, and the clever use of Latin phrases -- it’s just unbelievable! As one example, in the sequence where Frollo (a judge in this version, as opposed to the Archdeacon) chases Quasimodo’s mother up to the stairs of Notre Dame and she pounds on the door, crying for help, the choir sings “Quantus tremor est futurus quando Judex est venturus,” which means, “What trembling is to be when the Judge comes.” And sure enough, the line comes to a horrible, horrified halt when Judge Frollo snatches the woman’s child away and throws her to the ground.

After one of the most epic musical introductions in a Disney film, we meet our sweet, gentle hero, Quasimodo, voiced by Tom Hulce, who is just such a ray of sunshine. Although I loved hearing Michael Arden as Quasimodo on stage, Tom Hulce will always be my Quasimodo. When I was a teenager, I went through a horrible “hating the world” phase where I only ever saw pain and suffering and felt not only powerless to make anything better, but worthless as well. During that time, I turned my back on a lot of the things that had brought me joy, feeling almost unable to enjoy them anymore. One of the very few exceptions, however, was this movie and especially the character of Quasimodo. When I was at my darkest points, Quasimodo never failed to bring me some light, not because he was particularly funny, but because for all of the misery in his circumstances, he never faltered in being gentle, creative, and kind. Looking back on how I’d been, I wish I’d had just a shred of Quasimodo’s grace back then. I wish I hadn’t allowed myself to fall into despair and resentment. Since I can’t go back, however, I keep Quasimodo in my mind sometimes whenever I’m going through something difficult. He’s kind of become a guardian angel of sorts to me, reminding me that my life is a precious gift and I shouldn’t take anything for granted. And really, I couldn’t do that if not for Tom Hulce and Quasimodo’s supervising animator, James Baxter. I truly am grateful to both of them for giving me a character that even now can be a symbol of everything I wish I could be.

Unfortunately along with Quasimodo, we also meet the gargoyles, Hugo, Victor, and Laverne. As a kid, I actually liked the gargoyles all right, but as an adult...yeah, they really break the mood. Badly. The worst offender is easily Hugo, which is a shame because I like Jason Alexander as a performer, but he just goes way too over-the-top-obnoxious. It would admittedly not be as bad if it were clear that the gargoyles were all in Quasimodo’s head, but Djali sees Hugo come to life at one point and they later help Quasimodo fight off the guards. I greatly prefer the way the gargoyles are handled in the stage production, where all of the saintly statues have their own voices that nonetheless reflect what Quasimodo is thinking and when Quasimodo hits his lowest point before Esmeralda’s execution, he forcefully banishes them out of his head.

Even though the comic relief is handled poorly, I certainly cannot say the same for the villain. Judge Claude Frollo is easily one of the most evil villains in Disney history. Tony Jay’s vocal performance is just chillingly resonant, commanding your attention and making you subconsciously shrink in on yourself whenever he speaks. It makes for a despicable, cold, cruel man -- the antithesis of a father, the true embodiment of a monster. Frollo is often compared to Mother Gothel from Tangled in how they both lie to, control, and emotionally abuse their charges (Quasimodo and Rapunzel, respectively), but I personally find Frollo so much worse than Gothel, because he not only cuts Quasimodo off from everyone, but he indoctrinates a gentle, kind soul like Quasimodo in his racism and intolerance against those different from him -- including Quasimodo’s own people, the Romani. Mother Gothel hoards Rapunzel away like a dragon hoarding treasure -- Frollo treats Quasimodo like a burden, beating into him that no one else would want him and that Frollo was such a “good man” to take him in. It’s just vile.

And now we come to my single favorite Disney song of all time -- Quasimodo’s aria, Out There. From the time I was little, this song spoke to me like few others did. Growing up, I was an only child with a huge imagination surrounded almost entirely by adults and who had a lot of difficulty relating to kids my age. I often liked being on my own, but it didn’t change how I often felt different and detached from the people around me, and as I got older, that feeling only increased. I moved a lot in my childhood, making it difficult for me to plant roots, and I rarely followed trends or popular norms, so I constantly stayed in the fringes of the crowd, enviously looking on at those who could fit in more easily than I could. I always tried to hide my insecurities, but they were still there, and when those insecurities took hold, I would often imagine the world being a place where I could be myself, just like Quasi does. Quasimodo’s longing to be “part of them” and lamentation of people being “heedless of the gift it is to be them” has always resonated with me, and even though it’s hard for me to sing Out There without shifting octaves, my heart swells every time I hear it.

The Captain of the Guard, Phoebus, is easily the biggest liberty that Hunchback adaptations have made with the original novel. The book version of Phoebus was more like Gaston from Beauty and the Beast than how he’s portrayed here, but I frankly have no complaints. Kevin Kline is wonderfully dry and witty in the role -- he’s more than a match for Esmeralda, being brave, noble, and sarcastic with seemingly no prejudice for those different from him. And then yeah, as for Esmeralda herself...as Phoebus says later, “what a woman!” Esmeralda was one of my very favorite Disney heroines as a kid, and she still is. The character of Esmeralda is often rather saint-like in her incarnations, but here we see both the “angelic” and “demonic” sides of her -- she’s fiery, but kind; rebellious, yet noble; anti-authority, but patient; distrustful, yet loyal. In the musical adaptation, when Esmeralda is first revealed, we hear Frollo, Phoebus, and Quasimodo sing this about her --

Frollo: She dances like the Devil!

Phoebus: She dances like an angel --

Quasimodo: An angel!

Phoebus: -- but with such fire!

Frollo: Such fire!

All Three: Who is she?

This is Esmeralda’s characterization and her relationship to the three male main characters in a nutshell. Quasimodo only sees the best of Esmeralda; Frollo only sees the worst of her; and Phoebus sees her for everything she is...as a person. And this is why she ultimately chooses Phoebus, unlike in the book where she solely chooses Phoebus because of his looks.

When we reach the Palace of Justice, I’m reminded that I have yet to accent how absolutely stunning every single background is in this movie. Yes, the animation overall is wonderful, whether in the character animation or otherwise, but there are few Disney films that have more atmospheric and beautiful backgrounds than this. It serves to give the movie such a wonderful depth and makes the setting feel that much richer and deeper. Admittedly one weaker aspect of the animation is the now-slightly-outdated CG background characters. They were made by taking a handful of templates and then mixing up their clothes and colors, so as to multiply them ad infinitum and make the crowds of Paris look bigger and more colorful. Even with that, though, you do sort of have to look carefully at the background crowds to notice, as there are lots of hand-drawn characters sprinkled in in front of those CG models that help obscure their repetition and awkwardness. Those CG crowds also make the city of Paris look appropriately overcrowded and huge, so I’m glad that they used the technology even if it was still so in-progress at the time.

Even though Topsy Turvy starts off so fun and festive, however, it soon devolves into a terrible riot where Quasimodo is bound and tormented by the crowd. I admit, the transition is a little abrupt, but it still works for me, as people can be so easily swept away by mob mentality and those in power -- namely, Frollo’s guards -- sometimes flaunt their authority by putting down others. Fortunately Esmeralda is there to save Quasimodo and give Frollo a much-deserved verbal smackdown. The following scene, though, is another example of the mismatched tone, stretching out Esmeralda’s escape with a lot of comic “hijinks” that don’t really add anything to the film and kind of serve as a big time waster, especially after it abruptly cuts off and turns much more solemn and sad as Frollo silently confronts Quasimodo and Quasi returns to Notre Dame in shame.

Hunchback’s focus on religion is, in my opinion, one of the things that made producing an adaptation of Hugo’s novel such a bold decision. I’m not a religious person at all (Agnostic and proud), but it was still really meaningful to me to see both the good and bad associated with religion, represented by the Archdeacon and Frollo respectively. Frollo, along with Pharaoh Seti from The Prince of Egypt, taught me as a kid that evil is not always self-aware and, more importantly, how much more dangerous evil is when it garbs itself in godliness and righteousness. That’s a valuable lesson, regardless of your religious faith. God Help the Outcasts may invoke God’s name, but it could just as easily be a prayer to the world, or even just to you as an individual. The Christian faith preaches that we are made in God’s image...so when Esmeralda asks God to help her people, maybe she’s in truth asking you to try to be the loving God they need.

Something unique about Hunchback is the wonderful friendship that develops between Esmeralda and Quasimodo. From the time I was very little, I made friends with both boys and girls, so it was so wonderfully refreshing to see a story where a girl and a boy became such close friends and supported each other so much. Yes, admittedly, Quasimodo is romantically interested in Esmeralda, but when he sees how much she loves Phoebus, he both accepts their relationship and treasures Esmeralda’s friendship all the same. He doesn’t wallow in bitterness upon Esmeralda not choosing him; he loves her all the same as the first real friend he’s ever had. Esmeralda truly loves Quasimodo and treasures their friendship too -- her choosing Phoebus romantically is never framed as her teasing Quasimodo or leading him on; she simply loves Phoebus and Quasimodo in different ways. And that I find so unbelievably cool. I also like that in Esmeralda’s and Quasimodo’s conversation on the roof, there are some strains of the deleted song Someday in the instrumental accompanying the scene -- you can hear a R&B variation of Someday in the film’s credits, but originally it was meant to replace the more religious God Help the Outcasts, only for God Help the Outcasts to be chosen over it. I agree with the filmmakers’ decision, but I still like Someday too. Quasimodo’s helping Esmeralda and Djali escape Notre Dame by climbing down the towers also beautifully foreshadows Quasimodo’s dexterity in climbing down to save Esmeralda at the end of the film.

Quasimodo and Frollo are both enthralled with Esmeralda, but as mentioned previously, they each only see the angelic and demonic sides of her, which is best encapsulated by the dual numbers Heaven’s Light and Hellfire. Heaven’s Light is appropriately sweet and pure, but I can’t beat around the bush here: Hellfire steals the show, not just from Heaven’s Light but from all other villain songs in Disney history. The song starts with a choral chant praying for forgiveness, which then segways into Frollo’s demented, mad raving about his lust, fear, and hatred for Esmeralda. The words are almost terrifying in their level of conviction and paranoia, which then devolves into vindictive, destructive mania, framed by the mournful echoes for “mercy” from the choir.

Right after Hellfire, we get one of my favorite instrumentals on the soundtrack called Paris Burning. The choir’s bustling, dramatic cries trimmed by the tense strings and horns of the orchestra just evokes fear and horror as Frollo terrorizes Paris. Then Phoebus finally takes a stand, refusing to set fire to the miller’s house and then, after Frollo does it himself, leaping in to save the family from the flames. In the musical, this whole sequence is accompanied by the amazing musical number Esmeralda (which honestly, every fan of this movie should listen to, it’s really worth it), but the film handles it unbelievably well with only a short scene and an instrumental that sears the final “Kyrie Eleison” into the audience’s ears like a fire brand.

Sadly, after this amazing, epic sequence, we once again are subjected to tonal whiplash when we return to the bell tower and the gargoyles decide to sing Quasimodo a song to cheer him up. Although I maintain Hunchback has one of the best soundtracks ever recorded, what stops it from being flawless is this song. A Guy Like You is not an inherently bad song on its own, but when combined with the rest of the soundtrack, its melody, tone, and out-of-place pop cultural references are just ridiculously jarring. It’s like we’ve been transported into a completely different movie, one less inspired by a classic French novel and a critically acclaimed film about social justice and one more inspired by Disney hits of the day like Aladdin and later projects like Hercules. As sad as it is, it’s kind of a relief when it’s over and we’re brought back down to earth by Esmeralda carrying a close-to-death Phoebus into Quasimodo’s tower.

Frollo’s arrival after Quasimodo agrees to hide Phoebus is excellent in its suspense. We can sense Frollo’s suspicion, and all the while, we’re so worried for Phoebus hiding under the very table he and Quasimodo are sitting at. Then Frollo, who we’ve only ever seen as cold, conniving, and controlled, bursts into a rage the kind of which we’ve never seen before, and for a second, he’s a demon himself. After his rage is spent, he sets his cruelest, most terrible trap yet: using Quasimodo’s feelings for Esmeralda so that he can capture her and the rest of the Romani. And at first, Quasimodo almost doesn’t take the bait, thanks to a short-lived pang of self-pity. At first he’s bitter about his heart being broken and considers not helping Esmeralda, as there’d seemingly be no “reward” in him doing so...but the feeling is quelled in seconds by the memory of Esmeralda and how much her friendship means to him. Quasimodo’s selflessness and goodness wins out in its struggle with his more selfish instincts...and this, in the end, is what makes Quasimodo a hero in my eyes.

All right, I guess with our entrance into the Court of Miracles, I should address the elephant in the room. I’ve called Esmeralda’s people “the Romani” in this review, but throughout the entire film, the term is substituted for the admittedly-period-appropriate slur “Gypsy.” I knew nothing about the Romani culture when I first saw this film and I profess no intimate knowledge of it now, but even with that, I have to acknowledge that this movie doesn’t always showcase the Romani in the best light. Although Quasimodo’s parents, Esmeralda, and (to a degree) Clopin are given relative sympathy, the sequence in the Court of Miracles doesn’t do much to endear them to the audience. These victims of persecution are not really given the focus they deserve: we never learn much about their culture or about why they’re persecuted, and we don’t really get to see how they live their lives as ordinary people. To someone who doesn’t know anything about the Romani, I don’t think this film would be the best introduction to their culture and heritage.

Our climax is accompanied by the best instrumental track in the film, Sanctuary! Whenever I hear this piece, I have to stay completely silent, drinking in every single line and note, so as to properly absorb its brilliance. The track has accompanied a lot of my writing in the past: it’s always helped me when I was writing a powerful, emotional climax, whether through the emotion it wrought from me or just from wanting to write a new scene to the music. This entire sequence, from a musical, writing, animation, and character point of view, is I think what made Disney decide to make this film in the first place. The pacing -- the character animation of Quasimodo tearing down the pillars -- the drawn backgrounds of Notre Dame -- the camera whirling over the never-ending crowd’s heads and up onto the cathedral as Quasimodo hoists Esmeralda over his head -- this is the heart of why the movie was made and what the entire film was building up to. This resistance against injustice and the protection of our sacred, historical institutions from hatred and cruelty is what Hunchback is and should be all about. Occasionally this battle scene is inter-spliced with comic bits that once again aren’t really necessary and kind of stick out (Laverne’s Wizard of Oz reference and Hugo’s impression of a fighter plane in particular are out of place), but it doesn’t ruin anything for me. Fortunately as the climax grows darker with the arrival of Frollo and the transition from Sanctuary! into And He Shall Smite the Wicked, the gargoyles take a backseat, and we get focus where we should’ve always had it: on Quasimodo, Esmeralda, and Frollo. Thanks to his love for his friend Esmeralda and the realization of his own self-worth, Quasimodo finally stands up to Frollo and breaks free of his poisonous influence once and for all. This line of Quasi’s has always stuck with me --

“All my life you’ve taught me the world is a dark, cruel place...but now I see the only thing dark and cruel about it is people like you!”

Even now this line is just so powerful. There was a point where all I saw of the world was its cruelties and injustices...but like Quasimodo, I’ve come to see that those cruelties are not inherent to the world or even to mankind as a whole. Humans are capable of both great evil and great good, but as long as the evil people of the world are allowed to seize control and exert their toxic influence over everyone else, the world and mankind overall will never become better. Like Quasimodo, we must stand against those who’ve embraced cruelty and hatred over acceptance and love. We must protect the brighter parts of the world that evil so wishes to snuff out. It’s a moral I think has only become more relevant and important over time.

Unlike in the book and musical, Esmeralda survives, and as much as I’ve heard people try to argue Esmeralda living is not true to the spirit of the original novel, I think it really suits the story being told and really feels just for both characters. Quasimodo deserved happiness; Esmeralda deserved happiness; and most importantly, this all the more highlights how different Quasimodo is from Frollo. Frollo says to Esmeralda, “Choose me or the fire” -- basically, if he can’t have her, he doesn’t want anyone else to...but Quasimodo doesn’t think that way. He cherishes Esmeralda and her friendship without any caveats or conditions: therefore him losing Esmeralda, whether to Phoebus or to death, doesn’t prompt him to commit suicide like he did in the novel. It’s not only a more uplifting ending, but I think a lesson in the selflessness of love, even if it’s just platonic love. And because Esmeralda loves Quasimodo just as much as a friend, she leads him out into the sun, where he finds even more of the love he deserves from the city he wished so much to belong in. Quasimodo doesn’t get the girl, but that was never what he wanted in the first place: it was merely to be accepted as he was.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame was one of the most formative films of my childhood, right up there with Beauty and the Beast, The Prince of Egypt, and Anastasia, and it remains my second favorite Disney animated film of all time. With time, I’ve seen more and more of its flaws, but those flaws don’t ruin what in the end is one of the most daring, revolutionary projects Disney Animation has ever tackled. Its artistry, from the backgrounds to the character animation, is exceptional; all of its major human characters are multi-faceted, complex, and real; its themes are eternally relevant and powerful; and its score and nearly all of its songs are just through the stratosphere in their quality. Hunchback, along with Beauty and the Beast, made me fall in love with France from afar as a child, a love affair that has only become more and more intense through the years, and Quasimodo and Esmeralda even now are so close to my heart. I wish so much to be as kind and gentle as Quasimodo and as brave and noble as Esmeralda, and I can only hope that at some point, if I ever visit Disneyland Paris, I might finally meet them. The Hunchback of Notre Dame may not have gotten the appreciation it deserved when it first came to theaters, but I’ll always be happy to hear Disney fans remembering it as fondly as I do. Who knows? Maybe someday, the world will be wiser and will give this film its time in the sun at long last.

#d-views #disney reviews #the hunchback of notre dame #disney #opinion #analysis #reviews #oh boy here i go

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