#didn't mean to sideline her but her feelings about stuff are more speculative and probably need a post of their own

[ambrosiagourmet]

I think one of the biggest tragedies of Laios & Falin and their relationship is how much his actions impact her life. But like. Specifically how much they WOULDN’T impact her life as much if they weren’t both stuck in such a shitty abusive situation.

This part of the Falin-tries-makeup daydream hour comic is what got me thinking about it again because truly it just... it seems like such a like an offhand comment that I'm sure Laios didn't mean to be cruel or anything. That's just like. A little kid not thinking about what they are saying. ESPECIALLY when the kid in question is Laios.

But man they depended on each other SO much as kids. Too much. It really feels like they didn't have any other source of positive reinforcement, or anyone else to share themselves with. So of course an offhand comment like that has a huge impact on Falin.

Or this little bit from one of the flashbacks:

This tears me apart. Do you think it tears him apart to think about? I think it does. I think Laios holds every small failure to care for Falin against himself.

And then there's the Bigger stuff. The way that him coping with his own trauma ended up impacting her.

Like his interest in monsters. Like him going to find a ghost, and accidentally revealing Falin's magic to the whole village in the process.

Like him needing to leave. And leaving her behind.

He shaped her life so much, and he carries so much guilt for it. And again, there should have been other people there to help. The same things that made Laios need to leave home are the things that made his leaving so hard on Falin. She ate alone after that. She shouldn't have had to eat alone just because Laios wasn't there.

She was 9 when he left for school, and he was 11.

Nine. And Laios feels like he failed her because he didn't stand by her through this better. As an eleven year old.

Both of these kids deserved so much better from the world.

#dunmeshi analysis #dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #falin touden #laios touden #dungeon meshi spoilers #AND this isn't even getting into her leaving the academy & how much it seems like that was directly tied to how poorly he was doing #there's a comic in the adventurer's bible where marcille is like 'yeah she had a job lined up and everything' #and like. do you think he feels bad for that too #like he wrecked her life by leaving #and wrecked her life by showing up #what do you even do at that point. if you feel like a failed protector when you are away & and a burden when you return #unable to make yourself accept. unable to make yourself resist #Laios strongest moment is when he lets himself accept that. the contradiction of his life & his relationship with Falin #that he has to kill her to save her #as a small note this came out a little more focused on Laios' POV with this stuff but Falin's experience of it is v important to me too #didn't mean to sideline her but her feelings about stuff are more speculative and probably need a post of their own

[scriptscribbles]

I know you didn't reblog it but I saw an ask post on my dash about "5 things you'd change about a TV show/book/fandom if you could" and it seemed like something you may like doing sooooo (1/2)

I give you: Davies Who, Moffat Who, Sherlock, Game of Thrones, ASoIaF (as a separate 5 things to the show), Star Wars, aaaaand Class for good measure. Have fun! 😉

Thanks, anon! This sounds fun!

Davies Who 

Donna remembers. I don’t care how. Just, not this violation of her agency.

Use Donna to call Ten’s hubris out.

Kill Queen Victoria. It was the original plan for series 2, and it works far better for the story arc. The whole thing is about consequences for Ten and Rose and their behavior, them creating Torchwood through their irresponsibility, but as is I think it lacks the sting.

Have Rose not end up with the Doctor. I know, they’ve got star-crossed true love and all that. But I think part of what made them compelling was that they were so gleefully, ignorantly doomed. They were grinning and laughing and flirting from battlefield to battlefield and there’s a wonderful contrast in that. But they also need to face the consequences. I think something like Hell Bent for them would be better, something pushing Rose to realize that it’s in her best interest to leave him even as it breaks her own heart. I think the parallel world stuff is good, though, particularly since Jackie ends happy.

Give Mickey and Martha their own stories in their episodes. Let them be appreciated more for their own strength rather than sidelined by the Doctor’s dismissive attitude. And, uh, don’t have them randomly in a relationship out of nowhere. Build it up or don’t do it. Also, have Martha remain a Doctor rather than a soldier.

Moffat Who

I hate calling for monster returns, but a story of something like the Mara for Amy in series 7A or 6B. Something to suggest the trauma she’s had and the abandonment through surreal imagery. Stuff like Asylum of the Daleks or The God Complex acknowledges it well, but I want more. It’d be even better if she realizes she’s being taken over early but struggles to tell the Doctor or Rory because she’s afraid of them dismissing her. Moffat’s really good at inside head stories so it’d work well I think, particularly if they got Hurran in for it like so many in that era did.

Show us River’s wives. Clara and Jane Austen. Canton’s husband. I know these things are incidental to the plot, but the representation means so much more when you can see it. I love it as it is but I do think more is called for and is a reasonable request.

Cast something other than white people in The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People. Like, I think it’s a really underrated script, but a story about the plight of the oppressed needs a diverse cast, and it just utterly fails that.

Paternoster spinoff. Let it be the SJA to Class’ Torchwood, eh? They lend themselves so much to silly adventures, and they provide amazing representation. Only hurdle I could see is in their heavy makeup work, but I’m sure there’s ways around it, like Strax wearing the Sontaran helmet or Vastra her veil.

Get Davies back for an episode. I know Moffat’s tried, but, like, try harder. Please?

Sherlock

Make the nature of Irene’s sexuality and her attraction to Sherlock clearer because that discourse is hell

Reduce the quantity of not-gay jokes. They do make sense in acknowledging a long history of speculation and I don’t think they need to be excised entirely, but there is a bit too much

Kill John instead of Mary. It’d change up the shape of series 4 a fair bit, particularly given Mary has far less aversion to killing and would probably make quicker work of Eurus’ puzzles, but there’s gotta be stuff to be done with that. Perhaps her not being willing to kill anymore after seeing John shot? That could be interesting. I dunno. I just feel like, good as series 4 was, there’s a better version where John takes Mary’s place and Mary John’s.

More Sally. I know the actress was unavailable for series 3, but it’s a huge blow in diversity to a show that has basically none.

Cut The Blind Banker.

Game of Thrones

Get rid of all straight white men in the writing staff. Let me be clear, there is nothing inherently bad about someone being straight, white, or a man. But as there is so much ignorance towards intersectional issues in a text that needs to be aware of and critiquing them (something Martin generally does well in the books and is sort of a main point of the series), that needs to be shaken up.

Stannis would never burn Shireen and that was the dumbest plotting decision ever. No. Just no. Now, his wife, she would. Melisandre would. His soldiers would. But he wouldn’t. Seeing him pressured to burn his daughter or else the troops will leave him for not being sufficiently devoted to the red god could be a good way of keeping the beat while removing the out-of-character side to it. But as it is it just does not function. At all.

More of Sam’s book scenes. The show gets a bit too fixated on the upsetting material, upping torture and violence to extreme levels, when some of the strongest material is in the quieter character work. Sam and Gilly taking the boat south is one of those.

A different direction for Sansa. I’m not saying keep her in the Vale and out of the plot, I get why that’s an issue. But don’t subject her to Ramsay. Or to rape. Actually, too much Ramsay is easily one of the show’s biggest problems. They seem to think he’s compelling because he’s awful, but instead he’s just awful.

Make Dorne the planners like they are in the books. The show has gotten so much drama out of the likes of Littlefinger and Varys, surely the plotting of Dorne like in the books could make for excellent television. I’m not saying it needs to be the same as it was in the books, there are changes for a reason. But they were changed in the show to the most ridiculous and incoherent thing yet.

ASoIaF

Cut characters/plotlines. Yes, they all have thematic points to make. No, that does not make them all good storytelling. Many of the strands could be condensced, combined, or cut entirely. Not to say the show is the best example of that, just that there is sound logic in changing it because it just doesn’t flow as a story.

If you have to keep alluding to the sexual violence and critiquing it, please muster more sympathy for the victims. Would it hurt, for example, to have a PoV chapter for Shae, right at the end, so we know who she is? Or for Jeyne to get some agency rather than focusing just on Theon?

Have some victories. So many of the plotlines are subversions of classic narratives, like with Robb or Quentyn or Ned’s downfalls. But there comes a point when it gets too repetitive. There’s other twists stories can take that also build in the drama of the world. And if they’re so important to subvert, a standalone novella might be a better approach. For now the amount of these dead-end plots clutters an already chaotic series to make the pacing turgid and the overall scope confusing. Plus, the basic pleasure of telling a story involves victories as well as twists and horrific fates. I know this series is about subverting those pleasures, but it should do that by also finding new pleasures in unexpected places.

Deliver on teased developments. I know a lot of that’s a problem because A Feast for Crows and A Dance with Dragons are transitional pieces to get the characters in the right place after the climactic events of A Storm of Swords, but it means after five very long books we are still reading setup for things we have been expecting for literal thousands of pages, with new characters dropping in for even more setup. It makes the books frustrating to read at times. And saving all the shocking twists in all the storylines for the end of each of the books just makes it even tougher going.

More of the original cast. The series keeps adding in new characters, and while many of them are indeed interesting, it’s frustrating when Sansa, Jon, Daenerys, and Arya’s arcs are all grinding to a halt and their chapters become increasingly spread out. At the very least, if you’re going to keep adding PoV characters, do it like, say, Brienne was done. Have them expand from a prominent character’s storyline and then branch off into their own. Like, I love Jon Connington, but the man is utterly disconnected from basically everything. And there are so many disconnected plotlines now that many of them barely move at all.

Star Wars

Erase every racial stereotype alien

Poe kisses Finn on the forehead or something while he’s unconscious in The Force Awakens. Maybe an “I love you.” I need it for reasons.

No kid!Anakin or kid!Anakin flirting with Padme.

Either make Padme or Obi-Wan the main character of the prequel trilogy. Padme is a more interesting angle to see Anakin lose it from I think, and has better access to the political storyline Lucas clearly wants to tell. And Obi-Wan gets a lot of the most compelling material, his plot in Attack of the Clones in particular feeling like a hint of a far better film.

Cut the Bodhi interrogation stuff toward the beginning of Rogue One. Just have the pilot talked about a lot like they do and have them not actually meet him until the cell. Because as is, he breaks up the first act’s pacing quite badly and distracts too long from Jyn’s story.

Class

Less dialogue. I love a lot of the dialogue, but the show really needs more showing and letting the actors emote.

Make the two-parter one part. As it is the pacing just does not work at all.

Put Detained before the heart stuff. At the moment, the characters take too long to come into focus, not really doing so until Detained. It’s a good opportunity to take an already dysfunctional group, identify their flaws and tensions, and make that a focus of the series earlier on.

A different approach to the Shadowkin. Commit to an approach. Are they comedically rubbish? Terrifying menaces? A parody of toxic masculinity? An othered evil species? They don’t quite hit right and that hurts the plot arc. Also, their voices are edited poorly and that makes them hard to hear.

Promote the damn thing. Air it in a reasonable way in a reasonable hour when people will actually see it. Don’t just cut it loose and expect the Doctor Who brand will save it. If it utterly fails to get renewed, it’s down to how poorly it was promoted.

#anonymous #replies