#i am still not confident abt my characterization of her but shes so good at her job even im confused abt her

[lovesickeros]

can.. can I ask for an affectionate reader with characters who aren’t normally like… used to the love? like, not just through words but physical affection like hand-holding, kisses, hugs, all that shebang. probably with a few people like yelan, ei, basically any character that is either cut-off from society or seems socially distant or isolated. 😞

☆ affectionate reader with yelan, ei, & furina

[ 4.2 Archon Quest spoilers ]

× yelan

Varies between how you display your affection, to be honest. Just like being affectionate with people? She's cool with it as long as you don't pop by while she's working (mostly because she'll end up dragging you into it for a bit of fun). I don't think she's all that touchy feely herself, but she'll absolutely get you gifts instead– like pretty knick nacks? She'll make sure to snag any she thinks you might like. Like a good meal? Sure, she'll take you out to one of the restaurants in the city, doesn't matter how expensive. Her treat. If you do prefer physical gifts rather then being taken out, you'll eventually get used to the random unmarked letters and packages showing up where your staying pretty often. It's obvious to know who it came from even if she never signs anything.

Flirty reader, though? Whole nother can of worms and now it's a challenge. The more confident you are the more interested she is. The other acolytes would absolutely seethe at the idea but she has no hesitation at just straight up flirting back– she's as charismatic as they come and she's got a poker face that's basically impenetrable. She'll probably also make a bet to see who cracks first (she always wins, unsurprisingly). Probably won't get dragged into any of her schemes this way but if you ask politely maybe she'll consider it, anyway.

The smell of freshly brewed tea and the clatter of dice across wood was a common sight at the Yanshang Teahouse– less common was the woman secluded in the far corner, her lips pulled into a grin that flashed fangs and a look that would scare off the most confident of men.

She'd normally try to scope out any new blood that'd made the mistake of stepping into her teahouse and was equally stupid enough to accept a gamble against her just for the thrill of it, but she was far too absorbed in the warm body at her side, one of her die clasped tightly in their hand as she guided them through the motions– they had a knack for it, she had to admit. The thought made her preen, the clatter of the die as it rolled across the table giving her that subtle, familiar rush.

Even if she knew exactly where it'd land.

"Six. Hm, maybe you're just lucky," She muses, plucking the die from the table and holding it up to her eye like a prized jewel, "Or maybe you're not as innocent as you'd have us believe." There's a sharp glint in her eyes at the prospect, but everyone else has the sense to keep their heads down and their words to themselves as she tosses the die herself.

"So why don't we find out and make a bet, just between you and me?"

× ei

Varies between Ei and the Shogun, because you'll probably be seeing either as much as the other. Sometimes you gotta really squint to tell who it is sometimes, but you get used to it. Both are fairly similar, though, in that their first instinct (especially in public) is to tense up like you're about to attack them or something. Difference is Ei eventually relaxes after a solid minute of trying to process your sudden affection and, if no one else is around, she might even reciprocate. Just don't tease her for being a little stiff and awkward about it, she's trying. That's what happens when your only company is a robot and uh. Nothing. For like 500 years. She's trying. Raiden, on the other hand, is just about as awkward as you can imagine. She's polite (blunt) about it because Ei is fond of you and also you are. The Creator. But she's not really built to deal with personal relationships and so she doesn't know how to deal with affection.

..Depending on what you do you may or may not blue screen Ei hard enough that she retreats back to PoE

Ei usually isn't fond of sitting still, unless it's to meditate. At least then she goes in with a purpose, something to achieve– but now, she's just focused on trying not to make a fool of herself. Her muscles are starting to ache from how hard she's tensing, though, in an effort to sit as straight and still as possible as their hands glide through her hair, weaving it into a single braid.

She can just barely hear the subtle lilt of their voice as they hum– and though it is soothing, it is also..very distracting. She can't focus long enough to try and meditate, too lost in the gentle rise and fall of their voice and the care they take to braid her hair. If she'd had a heart, she'd sure it'd be beating so wildly against her ribcage they could hear it.

But then it stops– their hands fall back to their sides and their humming falters. She freezes, too, racking her brain for any slights she must have committed. Instead, she is met with a calm, tender touch on the back of her neck, making her inhale sharply.

"Am I making you uncomfortable, Ei? You're so tense.." She has to grit her teeth to stop herself from bowing so low her head presses against the ground, her hands folded in her lap, clenching instinctively. "..No, Divine One." She answers simply, trying to contain the adoration swelling in her chest.

Yet as much as she tries to relax, to ease their worries, she finds that she cannot.

"Hm." That small murmur, a simple sound that nearly made her jump, was the only warning she got before they scooted closer, wrapping their arms around her stomach and resting their chin on her shoulder with a grin she would liken to Miko's, if she dared to make such a comparison. "Really?"

She swears she must've been feverish at the affection, lightheaded and dazed until she thought she might simply perish at the brush of their hands against her own.

Much to her embarrassment, however, she doesn't realize she's instinctively pulled back into Plane of Euthymia until she sees the familiar dull purples engulf her vision once again.

Though only a small solace, it seemed a little..brighter, this time.

× furina

Varies between pre 4.2 and post 4.2 archon quests to be honest.

Pre 4.2 she comes off as very vain– of course the most Divine would see fit to spoil her with affection! She deserves it, and is obviously their favorite! Just don't look too hard because she's terrible at hiding how flustered she actually is. Absolutely goes home right after and screams into her pillow for at least thirty minutes minimum.

Post 4.2 she's a lot more openly bashful and flustered. She's really not used to affection and even the smallest show of it has her folding immediately. Now that she doesn't need to worry about being found out she's a lot more receptive to affection. Cup her cheeks and compliment her and her knees are buckling. Like. Especially weak for compliments and praise (she deserves it. please spoil her).

She swears she must be hallucinating– she had been having trouble sleeping recently. But..no. The visage of the Creator was as real as the sweat beading on her brow as she stared at them for a long, awkward moment. Should..she let them in? But then they'd see the pathetic state she was in, and the last thing she wanted to do was make a fool of herself in front of them-!

Her choice was quickly made for her, anyway, as she let out an undignified squeak of surprise when they suddenly tugged her forward into their chest, enclosing her in a hug.

Her first reaction was to freeze– her second was becoming absolutely flustered, her cheeks flushing a soft pink and her mouth closing and opening as she tried to find her words.

"I– ah..um." She stumbled over her words instead, floundering like a fish out of water. Yet she felt a distinct sense of emptiness wash over her when they finally pulled back, looking a touch sheepish. "Sorry, sorry– you just looked like you needed a hug."

The silence spoke for itself, her shoulders tensing slightly. But the way the concern and affection bled through their voice made her waver, her hands trembling as she let out a shaky breath that almost sounded like a sigh.

"It's..It's fine! Fine, I'm fine." She repeated, trying desperately to ignored the way her voice cracked and how hot her face felt– though it was more an attempt to affirm herself that she was not thinking about how warm they felt, how much she..actually enjoyed the hug. She wasn't thinking about it all! Absolutely not!

..Maybe a little.

"Just warn me next time, please?"

#asks #sagau #genshin sagau #self aware genshin #genshin impact sagau #self aware genshin impact #fic tag #genshin cult au #genshin impact cult au #yelan #furina #ei #THIS DIDNT SHOW UP IN MY INBOX UNTIL LIKE #NOVEMBERBIM SORRY IM ANSERRING IT SO LATE?????? #tumblr working right is a miracle that will never happen #anyway can u tell i have. biases. there r so many characters I wanted to write for this (shenhe.........) but I forced myself to limit it #to 4 for my own sanity and everyones elses #also didnt know if u wanted just yan or sagau so I went for my specialty 🧍‍♂️ #was gonna include my beloved cryo archon but decided against it #ei the pathetic lesbian that u r....mwah #I'm sorry this took so long it took me 50 yrs to figure out yelan.. 😭 #i am still not confident abt my characterization of her but shes so good at her job even im confused abt her #reading her lore crying and sobbing in the corner. shaking her like a can of soda #checks note idk uhh cocky doesnt let herself form personal relationships charismatic uhhhhhhhh #idk dont ask me i just started praying and hoping for the best here #i think she'd get a kick out of getting reader into like. fudging rolls and shit. create an absolute menace out of reader #set them loose and see what chaos happens #just kicks back and watches it all unfold internally laughing her ass off #i didnt know whether to just do headcanons in uh. bulleted list or like #full on drabbles

[misqnon]

hi. march. slowly shortening this introduction to my posts. sorry if this is a little incoherent i woke up in the middle of the night and im getting sleepy again

i tried looking up fanfiction involving hannyabul and magellan the other day and there was almost none??? i really thought theyd be .. at least a little popular ... the dynamics... arent the dynamics similar to zosan or cavendish and bartolomeo.. dont people like that.. (i wouldnt know since ive never really been a fan of the enemies/rivals to lovers trope)

im pretty sure kidd wears a beast pirate disguise? and like .. good for him... (good for me).. hes got the titties out. i love men. i also rly enjoy the few frobin moments we get when theyre in disguise, theyre super cute!! it seems like u havent been spoiled on the Biggest Moments in wano so im very very glad to hear that. it also kind of has a mystery aspect so i think its probably way more enjoyable to go in blind. there IS a special kind of anticipation when u know what's coming but.. imo its more fun to guess how things will go rather than know and be excited about it

honestly i didnt care for the setting either. in the anime tho .. big mom's introduction is so good. theres a song that plays (its in the manga too but it's way better to hear it rather than... read lyrics) and when i started wci i was still watching the anime, so i got to listen to the song. it was stuck in my head for days. very catchy. i love how theatrical it is and it really made me excited for the arc .. and then i ended up barely enjoying it LOL. also i do actually love pudding but her age also makes me go... ewww. oda made an awful decision making her 16 . gives me kyros flashbacks.. although sanji doesnt seem to be genuinely interested in her. but still like why did oda do that... why... what is the point ... wci does pick back up a bit imo after they get sanji back (which i think is the part ur at? or a little bit after?) and i honestly think it wraps up quite nicely. and yeah.. most importantly.. katakuri is introduced in the second half. lovely guy. i heart him

robin's va did that in. one take??? that is Insane?? she genuinely channeled robin in that moment wtf

i will definitely talk abt opla if/when i watch it. even if zoro doesnt have his goofiness at least i can thirst over him. am i into mackenyu? no.. zoro? yeahs........ also i can definitely see how jacob being too hot is an issue for usopp LOL. some people just.. ooze confidence.. and are too smooth. i think ill probably enjoy his characterization anyways tho cuz i adore usopp

i cant draw women for the life of me but transfem sanji is haunting my brain and.. she made me attempt .. attempt to draw a lady. its her. shes the lady.

YOU THOUGHT OF ME??? im so flattered U have no idea aikfjshdjd. law.. i.. hes a little fucked up.. human art pieces . actually as someone who's done a bit of sculpture (but not abstract art. and it was ceramics) i can appreciate it. if he didnt use real living people in his art i would definitely appreciate it more.. but i imagine seeing a severed head on a sculpture and then they start talking to u.. i imagine that would be a Little.. scary... just a little . i think he should go to therapy probably. ur mental illness is showing law .

i think its semi canon?? theres a moment in the anime (idk if its in the manga or not) where bepo gives law.. puppy dog? eyes? but like .. polar bear version. and law is clearly weak to that. also he calls chopper a tanuki even after being asked not to bc chopper has a cute reaction (he gets mad). so i think he IS weak to cute animals. he is very similar to robin like that... they would definitely bond over choppers cuteness. and they both have weird taste.. in cute animals. its not bunnies or idk. dogs or cats. robin likes pathetic animals (the dragon that had to carry them all up to zou) and law likes . bepo. a 7 foot tall polar bear man.

THATS SUCH A STRANGE COINCIDENCE. this is my first time moving since ive lived in the same place my whole life .. so its kinda exciting and also kinda scary.

OH so u can send images but it just cant be on anon. im.. one day... one day for sure.. (soon). i grew up on twitter tho .. yeah. and before that it was youtube. i have been on the internet since the beginning of time (since i was in single digits. like 5 maybe idk, but i do remember being able to make my own youtube account at 7, and i had been using my brothers before that). my dark past. since ive been on the internet so long i just accept that theres probably a load of my personal information out there for anyone to see. and also a bunch of embarrassing things I've said from years ago. sometimes i come across a youtube comment from when i was like 9 and its always a bit shocking LOL

I HEARD WHAT HAPPENED WITH SESSHOMARU. when i found out .... it .. it .. i.... i dont have words. its so upsetting 😭. actually ive kind of been trying to get into vocaloid bc i recently (like 2 years ago) found out i had been listening to it.. and i didnt know. i didnt realize it was vocaloid

LOL, i say IT COUNTS. i dont draw in my mind cuz i have slight aphantasia. i imagine drawing in ur head is way more relaxing than actually drawing... cuz like... the struggle of anatomy.. proportions.. lighting.. colors.. yeah art is so hard.

there havent been any sbs's recently i dont think?? like they stopped at some point during wano and .. idk what happened. i miss it .. i want to ask about the giant snails that pull germa's ship... well i want someone else to ask about it really . not me. but yeah i have a lot of questions and i just hope it comes back soon 😔. maybe im just missing them somehow but i have checked multiple places. but for some reason i dont see anyone mention it.

RIGHT?? RIGHT???? dont worry the colorism stays /s. they have characters in the latest episodes that are dark skinned and they made only the girl lighter skinned. oda didnt do that. oda made them all the same in the manga. its infuriating.

an issue i have post timeskip is that i actually cannot tell the women apart half the time. they all look pretty similar in the manga, although theyre distinguishable by their clothes and hair. but there was a spread (not colored) that had the main one piece women all in different clothes and with different hair and i sat there for multiple minutes trying to figure out who was who. like i genuinely couldnt tell. i miss nami's short hair,, it had so much character.. and i also miss robins short hair.. again.. it had so much character.

even on a colored cover i had a moment where i was like "is that vivi or is it nami" because it was just a solid blue. i assumed vivi based off context clues and bc.. blue. but if i hadnt had that.. i dont think i wouldve been able to tell. i have no problem with character design changing but oda makes most of the women next to indistinguishable from one another now. its really upsetting. if they had different skin tones or even just. different eye shapes. or different figures. it wouldnt be that much of an issue. but nooo he cant do that. all women who are supposed to be attractive have to look the same.

YEAH ive seen that video!!! u show up a lot on my feed but most of the time its just... the same few posts... which is kind of funny. I ALSO LOVED THE NEWKAMA!! like wow!!! queer representation??? i feel a kinship with these characters?? bon clay literally made impel down for me. my favorite boygirl girlboy. i adore u bon clay.. i adore u.

im a big fan of fukaboshi so i think anytime he was on screen my enjoyment was elevated. also zoro fighting hody(is that who it was) underwater was so cool . like how are u better than a fishman in water??? and the moments with noah... it felt like it was setting up some rly big things and i always love stuff like that. LOL YEAH sanji was even grosser on return to sabaody. i think its just not talked about as much because it wasnt a long arc and he wasnt on screen for a lot of it

oh they for sure have some good points. i also miss the silly shenanigans of pre timeskip. but overall im enjoying post timeskip more, and i do think theyre at least a LITTLE BIT blinded by nostalgia. its hard not to be tbh. i do really miss seeing all the crew together. i dont exactly mind them splitting up but .. i feel like a lot of them end up kind of sidelined. we dont get to see (just some examples) brook or chopper or nami fight much and i. i love them.. i love them just as much as the rest of the crew. i think nami has a really interesting fighting style. and brook is just fun. and people complain (validly) that chopper has been mascotified. which i wouldnt mind so much if he got more cool moments but he doesnt!! we dont even get to see him being a doctor that often :(.

like the writing is still fantastic but yeah. i agree. oda has basically run the jokes that were already pretty tired. into the ground. sanji being the one who suffers most from it. i dont mind robin having more moments where she imagines a really gruesome thing has happened to someone, for example. because she barely did that pre timeskip, and now she only does it occasionally so its not like "oh my god STOP". its still enjoyable. but. idk if theres even a prominent example of someone's character joke being awful other than sanji. like hes the only one who has a consistently awful joke. that in my opinion has never been funny. and its been made into a huge part of his character. i still love post timeskip to death bc. look at everything thats happening!! but i have a lot . lot . lot of gripes with it.

fellow impel down and dressrosa lover 🫡. i do rly like water 7 but . i dont know why but i never enjoyed enies lobby all that much. i think thats probably super controversial LOL. oops.

oh friend... u have no idea..... i have SO many one piece thoughts ... i have paragraphs upon paragraphs of one piece thoughts... the hyperfixation is actively killing me /j

wait let me. find . some.. i send them all in my private (as in its just me and my irl best friend) discord server so its not only in chronological order from when i sent the messages but its also extremely disorganized.. hmm a lot of these are/involve huge spoilers LOL

wait. how do u feel about sanji with heterochromia. one eye is blue and the other is brown . u get the best of both worlds... i felt like i was smart for this but ur the resident sanji lover. u have the say (in my mind) of what is best for him,,,

i saw someone say usopp would get conquerers haki and i big time disagree. he has the best observation haki in the crew and i feel like him getting conquerers haki would kinda cheapen that. and it cheapens his growth. why does he need to have conquerers haki to be a brave warrior of the sea? hes doing perfectly well without it. and also i dont think it fits his character. hes cowardly, has no self confidence, runs away from battles sometimes out of fear, and definitely has a huge sense of shame. from what i know, people with conquerers haki are usually super self assured, strong in a pretty traditional sense, and dont have much self doubt. usopp is like the opposite of that. i think hes very brave because he fights despite how scared he is, but the character archetype just doesn't work imo. like usopp without those characteristics is. to me. not usopp. tell me what u think!! also im like 90% sure none of this is spoilery but if it is i am so so sorry

obviously i havent seen the live action yet but live action shanks looks too hot to me.. like hes too conventionally attractive. i want him to be.. a rat man.. greasy .. but extremely charming.. and hes NOT!! hes just regular hot!??

do all places in one piece just have extra chairs or tables that are bigger? cuz there are some characters that arent of the giant race but are huge. and yet they fit on regular chairs. do u have a 8 foot tall guy walk into ur bar and u have to say "wait a second, we need to get out the big chairs" and then drag out a chair twice ur size? is that the case EVERYWHERE? or do some places not have big chairs so if ur extremely large u just have to sit in a chair thats too small for u.. or maybe u just sit on the floor. or stand.

that scene in sabaody of usopp asking rayleigh if the one piece is real, and luffy gets mad and tells usopp that he doesnt want to know, and if he finds out he will quit right now because he wont go on an adventure that isnt any fun. luffy is such a chill, silly captain, that im sure him snapping like that must be scary. usopp looked so shocked. i love their relationship. i think moments like that. really solidify how real the characters feel. like yeah, they have strong, defined morals. and they will argue and be childish and yell for the sake of their morals. i feel like a lot of media has characters with morals but it doesn't ever show them actually disagreeing with someone. let alone a friend. idk im not wording this great but i think this moment is so good. i love the moments of childishness in one piece. its very humanizing to have immaturity in ur characters

ok thats what ill leave u with for now :)

IM GLAD THAT MADE U LAUGH!! i felt really called out by constantly seeing it bc.. yeahm.. admittedly .. cannibalism is sexy sometimes.. i recently admit this to myself...

"i think he should go to therapy probably. ur mental illness is showing law ."

i think he should go to therapy probably. ur mental illness is showing march .

*nods* march 🫡

i dont think i’ve ever actually met someone who doesn’t like enemies to lovers before?? ik its popular bc its one of my favs and im happy about that bc im always nosedeep in the content SFNKJDN. valid tho. i cant speak bc ive written two 50K+ zosan fanfics and will probably write more 🧍I’LL USE THOSE SKILLS TO WRITE HANYAGELLAN FOR YOU. HAHA JK …UNLESS

so ive only met kidd once or twice right. i met him in sabaody pre-timeskip when the worst generation got introduced and he’s had a couple small moments since then. but i just feel and know in my heart that i would be a kidd girlie. red haired angry anime men are one of those specific niches i’m like YEAAA YEAAA [CHEERING] and people are always talking about his tits in the one piece server i’m in so. DFJNVIDJ HELL YEAH IM READY FOR THAT

and frobin…hell yea…theyre so cute…my weirdo couple…

actually!! im reading the manga on tcbscans and there’s a comment section under every chapter that i like to read bc its cool seeing ppl’s reactions (as i’ve said) and in big mom’s intro chapter someone was like “if ur manga only look up her song rn its actually so good” so i did and YEA. ITS SO FUN?? AND THEATRICAL?? AND I LOVE THE MELODY?? like ok big mom go off

yea i already knew pudding was 16 bc i was all up in sanji’s business and reading about wci when i joined the fandom but I DIDNT KNOW ABOUT KYROS AND I WAS SO MAD WHEN THAT REVEAL HAPPENED!??!!? I WAS LIKE DAMN ODA HAS DONE THIS SHIT LIKE 3 TIMES NOW?? for the third one i count shirahoshi. even though she didnt have a love interest it was nasty for him to make a character so obviously meant to be so beautiful and sought-after and sexualized and then make her a teenager. plus vander decken . existed.

OOH YEA THEY JUST GOT SANJI BACK AND THEY’RE TALKING WITH BEGE ABOUT AN ALLIANCE RN. I PLAN TO READ MORE TONIGHT SO WE WILL SEE ���️

“am i into mackenyu? no.. zoro? yeahs........” this is so real

U DREW TRANSFEM SANJI?? HAH?? HELLO?? HELLO MAY I SEE??

i have an art degree and tbh i support law and his human sculptures wholeheartedly. its very dada of him imo. but abstract art seems more up his alley. regardless i know some of my professors would have been like “live human sculpture…wow…that is so Art” very marina abromavic of him as well. but um yeah he should still go to therapy tho. yea

robin and law 🤝 “cool and collected” characters thinking fucked up weird animals are cute

i’ve moved like 9 times in my life this is just another day in the life [eyebags the size of dinner plates]

(looks at the other ask in my inbox) oh yeah…very soon

omg. i started getting on the internet in single digits but to like. get on mylittlepony.com and play facebook games. i started being more “ONLINE” around probably 10 or 11 though and i made my tumblr account when i was 12 💀 i, too, sometimes see something old i posted and just go Oh God 

and i DEF had/have too much personal info online bc of that but i’ve tried to cut it down lately in the interest of ~ internet safety ~ . i dont use my first name online as much (hence going by mont in addition to the. trans-ness) and i took all my selfies off my blog. but who knows what else i put up and have forgotten about

RUMOKI TAKAHASHI I WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU ‼️‼️ RUINING BEGRUDGING FATHER/ ADOPTED DAUGHTER RELATIONSHIPS FOREVER (jk i still love it but now im always just scared of. betrayal)

I LOVE VOCALOID!! i’ve been into vocaloid basically since i started being online (although i dont keep up with a lot of CURRENT vocaloid news so im like an old man who didnt keep up with the times. i love the original crypton 6 (miku, rin, len, meiko, kaito, luka) + gumi and gakupo but until a couple years ago i was like “What The Fuck is a Fukase” jbfvhjdn

i’ve caught up to date a little bit and still consider myself currently a vocaloid fan but yea im like a genwunner of vocaloid but just bc im lazy not bc im pretentious djsnkj

i actually saw kikuo (my fav vocaloid producer) in concert in january!! my first and only vocaloid concert…(but only bc he happened to be touring with bo en. no miku hologram for me)

ur like the third person ive met with aphantasia! and. yea its much easier in my head </3 why did i major in that shit </3 

WAIT REALLY?? THEY DONT DO SBS ANYMORE?? I LOVE SBS :( I ALSO HAVE SOME ONGOING QUESTIONS I WANT ANSWERED!! (that i want someone else to ask kjvfnkfn) i looked it up and didnt see much at a cursory glance aside from the fact that sbs happens every volume instead of chapter (?) who knows but i hope they didnt stop completely…

toei feel my wrath re: the racism. oda also feel my wrath re: the sexism. and the racism (why do you use the same skin color for everyone in the colorspreads…oda PLEASE) and the worst part about the nami clone thing is that we know he can draw women differently. have u seen how he drew young big mom. she was so hot. and yet he chooses NOT TO!!

FKJNKDLS WHY AM I WHATS NEW PUSSYCATTING ON YOUR FEED. WITH THE CANNIBALISM POST TOO. I POST SO MUCH GOOD CONTENT TUMBLR WTH </3 (LYING)

YEA I WAS ACTUALLY SURPRISED HOW WELL DONE THE IMPEL DOWN REPRESENTATION FELT?? THAT WHEN WE GOT TO KAMABAKKA I WAS LIKE why did we go…backwards…but they cant take the impel down newkama land away from me. that scene where iva makes a speech about gender and does a little performance made me feel so seen on screen even if oda meant for it to be tokenism or something. i think he thinks we (gay ppl) are cool but doesnt quite get it. like he saw gay ppl and went “this would work with my silly art style so well. transgenderism is a thrilling character trait” and then did not attempt to understand much after that KDCKJS

FUKABOSHI MY BELOVED actually all 3 of the fishman princes…when they cheered up shirahoshi during the scene where their mom was murdered i actually cried as they danced and sang through their own tears. like wtF. AND YEA ZORO ALMOST DROWNED SO MANY TIMES THAT ARC BUT HE WAS STILL COOL AND HOT 😔 the noah was also a cool concept!! you see the noah’s arc thing come up a lot in anime for some reason?? like my d gray man loving ass was like huh…okay two nickels…

ur so right about the sidelining (its like anyone that isnt the east blue 5) and especially about chopper. aside from being mascotified i wish he wasnt baby-fied too (which stems from the mascot problem). like…he’s 17. chopper is a full ass teenager, not a child. I GET that he’s a reindeer and also very naive but imagine how cool he could have been post timeskip…horn point chopper is my fav bc i just love the design but IMAGINE IF HE LOOKED LIKE THIS ALL THE TIME!!

and he could have so much more development in terms of constantly seeing his crewmates near death and always having to fix it…or just him improving as a doctor! i dont think we get to see chopper doctor enough but we also dont get to see him struggle! (m really just over here advocating for more depression and more hardship for chopper im so sorry king)

a lot of the running jokes i can still get behind (zoro getting lost will never not be funny to me idk how it hasnt gotten old but it hasnt okay) maybe bc its so harmless?? robin’s gruesome joke i agree, its not overdone so i still like it. mean nami slapstick i’ve never liked but can get a chuckle out of me every once in a while. brook panty joke L 👎brook skull jokes would be funny but they’re always too easy 👎 and yea sanji is the worst victim. i found it somewhat funny/endearing pre thriller bark when it was mostly harmless swooning and heart eyes but nowadays uhhh [beating him to death with hammers] 

u know what i see ur point on enies lobby. for water 7 it had great new characters and an AWESOME bright and beautiful water city setting but enies lobbies is. just a bunch of white government buildings on an island. the high point is definitely just robin’s moment. and kaku saying “I LOVE GIRAFFES. GIRAFFES ARE AWESOME” 

one piece brainrot is ruining me i have MUCH IDEA !!

OKAY LISTEN . I HAVE HEARD BOTH ROBIN HETEROCHROMIA AND SANJI HETEROCHROMIA AND LIKE. I DONT THINK EITHER ARE / COULD BE CANON BUT. robin heterochromia is so fun. and sanji heterochromia although for some reason i dont feel like it fits him HAS POTENTIAL bc imagine when he comes back post timeskip with his bangs covering the other eye now and the crew is like “🤨 wait i thought you had blue eyes?” ugh i need it. ive seen a LITTLE art and like 1 fic of heterochromia sanji and its very entertaining for sure i always eat it up even tho i dont necessarily headcanon it. i am so glad i have authority on this in ur mind btw. [clanging my sanji gavel] order in the court

i agree about usopp and conqueror’s haki! like damn we already got two of them with it dont we…although i saw someone on youtube somewhere suggest he could have “conquerer’s observation” ?? idk enough about haki to understand that but it sounds cool 👍 its not spoilery so dw! although that yt comment made me think like “if there’s multiple types of conqueror’s haki it it like..all based on one guy? one original conqueror ?? and who was it…” who knows…i mean i know zoro has conqueror’s haki bc of spoils but idk how or when that happens (wano, i assume. idk how i feel about that yet bc much as i love the green guy sometimes i feel like he’s favored a bit for the op stuff) and you made some really solid points about usopp’s character too!! part of me was like “damn sanji the only monster trio member not to have conqueror’s haki…” but he could not have it for. several of the same reasons u listed for usopp lmao AND THATS OK!! THOSE THINGS ARE REASONS I LIKE THEM BOTH 

“live action shanks is too hot” ok then explain this

you know what. that is. a good question. why do they get so big btw. like humans come in all sizes but why. is it to do with the gravity of the planet cause its so huge and got so many moons…thats how i explain half of the unrealistic things in this show lmao. maybe they just stand. its more Intimidating™. sorry villains dont get to sit (although that makes me think about that time doffy was just sitting on the table in the middle of the warlord meeting?? did u see that post?? its a screenshot like why did they let him on the table like that. evil cat behavior from local bird man)

THATS A GOOD SCENE TO POINT OUT. YEA YEA YEA YUOU GET IT. i loooove the serious luffy moments. ive said it a million times but luffy is intelligence 5 wisdom 20. luffy is actually very selfish but in a way that i dont hate…he just wants to be free. and free others. and he lives so in the moment. he’s so different from so many people that he’s very fascinating as a character to watch, esp bc he DOES have moments like u mentioned that make him feel real and have boundaries. u know its funny bc luffy is like the most open accepting character that its hilarious how many times ive seen something oda has written/done and been like “luffy would never do this. the character u made up and continue to write would be more accepting than this.” like luffy is totally chill with women, doesnt see them as lesser, never even hints at this like even zoro does, luffy’s super chill about bon clay and the newkama, luffy doesnt discriminate based on characters’ races etc etc etc. and yet oda DOEs do all this its like. oda u have to see if bc u MAKE it so why cant U BE MORE LIKE THE GUY YOU MADE UP FDJVKND. i think the only moment i can think of that even vaguely implies luffy knows what a gender role is is when he’s in amazon lily and they put him in a frilly shirt and he’s like “i dont wanna wear this. this isnt my style at all” but its all about his OWN preferences and not about anyone else’s. u get me??

“cannibalism is sexy sometimes” u get it. u get it. u understand. we are kindred spirits rn. join me

and the end KJFNDKJEN ITS OKAY MARCH LET’S GO TO THERAPY TOGETHER 

to end off here are some of my one piece headcanons (some of which probably will never be canon and im okay with that)

first off sanji is a repressed bisexual and u can tear this from my cold dead hands. post kamabakka he’s gnc too he just wont admit it bc hes a scared little baby bitch. ik it was anime only but that scene were he’s fighting in a dress and caroline keeps telling him to accept himself or some shit as a flower slowly blooms metaphorically in the in-between footage was transgender as hell. also that time someone sent a message to oda in sbs saying like “i’m so glad sanji is girl crazy and not boy crazy” an oda responded “uh, totally” …like is the translation just coming off sarcastic or am i reaching-

i think zoro is gay. he just gives me that vibe ok. 2nd choice he is aroace and luffy is like his qpp or somethin ok (i dont ship zolu but i can admit those bitches got a point bc MAN they really love each other. i like it much better as friendship tho) and on that note luffy is aroace too.

nami is a lesbian. im aware all 3 of these are the popular fandom hcs but idc. this one i have actual evidence for have u seen how she latches onto every woman in each arc. she’s just as bad as sanji she’s just more chill about it /hj

FRANKY IS STRAIGHT BUT HE’S A REALLY LOUD ALLY OKAY . HE’S JUST A COOL DUDE

contrary to fandom hc i think robin and usopp are probably straight. robin would make a very dignified lesbian or bisexual but i think she’s just a weirdgirl straight who’s being a supportive ally with franky. 

brook is probably straight but i think he was also simultaneously in love with yorki a little bit and doesnt talk about it bc yorki is gone now so its not like its gonna happen ever again. soul king “im straight but i had a boyfriend one time” brook

chopper is a reindeer

god what else do i have aside form sexuality headcanons. OH !! this isnt a headcanon but i have a running theory that many of the strawhats are based on classic characters from fiction/pop culture…i keep meaning to make a post about this but im busy

zoro is inspired by zorro. okay easy next

chopper is inspired by rudolph, obviously

usopp is inspired by pinocchio but I DONT SEE THIS ONE MENTIONED AS OFTEN: CYRANO DE BERGERAC!! down to the lying and the long nose and the crush on the rich girl out of his league!!

robin is inspired by matilda in my mind. weirdgirl with mind powers abused by her caregivers and obsessed with books…like okay oda just tell us u read roald dahl

i know sanji was inspired in looks by mr. pink in reservoir dogs but i havent seen that movie so i cant speak on anything else LMAO

i feel like its possible the others were inspired by more that i just am not aware of / might be japanese pop culture and therefore harder for western fans to spot…thoughts?

#asks #replies #march anon #but like...i know ur name now....wack #long post

[theseerasures]

YOu have a lot of interesting thoughts abt Winter what dyou think will happen with her this season?? Iknow you already said she won't die but. other stuff?? What do you think of the idea that she defects to salem

y’know, anon: i was actually gonna write something to this tune unprompted before the hiatus ended? i didn’t, because when it’s inevitably revealed that i was wrong about Everything and the village children throw their eggs and laugh i didn’t want to give them any more receipts, but now that someone has asked i might as well

quick disclaimer before i start! these are subjective speculations about a character who has thus far been--particularly in 8.1--sparsely and ambivalently characterized, on purpose. i am spinning from the same subtext as anyone else, and if i am reading it differently, then all that means that i am reading it differently. Mr. Teeth is not sending me secret data. i am not the Steve Kornacki of RWBY Defections, as hilarious as it is to imagine someone like that existing.

okay? okay. below are some ideas and theories about where Winter could be going this season

The Defection (no not that one yet)

yeah, i’m still an “AceOps defect as a team” truther. this one actually has the least to do with Winter, and most to do with story economy. and the story of the AceOps is this: under Clover they were “the perfect team”--efficient, powerful, professional, and the perfect emblem of Atlesian values. law and order above all else. the mission matters more than the team. don’t get attached.

Clover’s absence from the team begins in late season 7, which means all that shiny varnish is stripped from Atlas at the same time it’s stripped from the AceOps. it turns out that the law isn’t always right, it turns out it’s super easy to turn “the needs of the many” into “the needs of the few who have many,” and it turns out once you go even a single inch past their facade the “best Huntsmen in Atlas” are conflicted, directionless, and squabble like children. they have a better showing against Penny this season, but their continued dynamic shows that fault lines--particularly between Marrow and Harriet--are reaching crisis. The AceOps model is unsustainable, in the same way that all of Atlas is ultimately unsustainable.

then Ironwood puts Winter in charge, and at first i did think: well, this is probably just to accelerate the inevitable fallout. they are, by their own testimony, emotional strangers to each other, and now some of them disagree on ideological grounds to the point where they can barely stand to be in the same room; slapping an abrasive volatile live wire on top of all that is pouring gasoline on Rome while Rome burns.

but the revelation of Renvision was that they’ve been lying--about HAVING feelings, but also about their feelings with and about each other. moreover: Winter’s own emotions mirror theirs. they’re speaking, in whatever horrifically repressed way, a similar language.

i’m not going to discount the possibility that this kind of ice-water-in-the-face moment might not be enough for some of them; one thing i’ve always respected about RWBY is its unwillingness to flinch away from the idea that sometimes it IS too late for people. but when it comes down to the AceOps, i think the operating question isn’t “will they pick JOYR over setting off the bomb,” because they’re not ready to make that kind of decision together as a team yet. no, the operating question is: if it comes down to one of them, or setting off the bomb, what will they choose?

Clover would set off the bomb, without hesitation or remorse. the mission and protocol HAVE to come first, and in this case there’s a compelling argument that it’s the right call. the team under Clover would have followed suit. the team without Clover would have likely done the same.

the team under Winter...

well, the thing about Winter is that she’s NOT Clover. not a perfect soldier, but--let’s stick with “not a perfect soldier.” she cannot lead in the same way Clover did, with that infuriating mixture of self-assurance and personal charisma, but i don’t think she thinks of herself as any less in command, which means that for the time being, the AceOps are her team. i can’t be certain what Winter would choose in this situation--whether her personal feelings can win out against years of consequentialist thinking--but i do feel fairly confident in saying that she’d be more willing to sacrifice HERSELF in order to choose both.

and in this crucial moment where the AceOps are forced to re-evaluate how they feel about each other, and the team, that might count for something.

so tl;dr #1: the AceOps find a team identity separate from the Atlesian structure. whether they defect to the RIGHT people, or survive defection, and whether Winter counts narratively as one of the AceOps by that point, i’m less sure about, but a cursory stab in the dark would be: yes, not all of them, and no.

The Return

how much do the writers care about the Winter-Ironwood dynamic? probably less than i do, but i also care more than any human should be permitted to under the law, especially since people have moved onto speculating about all the hot NEW abusers she could have in her life. whatever--it is something that needs closure, and i think the writers know that. my preference is still that they confront each other in person, at Atlas Academy (Qrow having fucked off via either healthy decision making or force). if this does happen, i don’t think there’s any chance that both of them will make it out alive; Winter would ONLY confront Ironwood if she’s forced to--either by him or other forces--and both of them are too rigid with themselves and with each other to offer any kind of give, or forgiveness.

that’s what i’d prefer, but it no longer seems the most likely option; Winter clearly has no plans to make it back, and the queue for “people who want to slug it out with DILF Jimmy” just keeps getting longer. it’s possible that they’ll end on the same personal-impersonal teeter-totter which they’ve always resided, where they’re just voices in each other’s earpieces, and she’s giving him a report, and he is issuing her orders.

there’s a way to make that meaningful, though: Winter HAS just disobeyed an explicit order--the first she’s done when she fully had the capacity to carry it out. her own treasons are piling up, and it’s a secret that he should know, for plot and character reasons. the obvious choice among the AceOps to tattle is Harriet, but i also think there’s a nonzero chance that, if asked, Winter herself will tell him. for all her flaws, i do think Winter is capable of owning up to her decisions (it’d make a nice parallel with Yang telling Ironwood about what she and Blake did during Gravity, but that’s neither here nor there), but even more importantly...i think she’d tell him because she wants to be reassured. that she did the right thing, but also that they’re still on the same page, and that he’s still the same person he always was, with her.

he won’t reassure her, of course. especially after he finds out that she disobeyed him for Ozpin. she’ll have no one left.

tl;dr #2: Winter and Ironwood have to reach some kind of End by the finale. whether it’s with a bang or a whimper i’m again less certain of, but if it DOES end with a bang one of them will die, and it’s going to be Ironwood.

Winter Alone

i, like many others, assumed going into the season that Winter’s core dilemma would be something like “her family or her family,” meaning: her sisters or her (adoptive) father. but i think as far as the show’s concerned that conflict was resolved when she let them go in The Enemy of Trust, and it’s not worth re-litigating. since the season started she’s just missed Weiss and/or Penny TWICE by narrative contrivance--during the Amity heist, and the abortive recovery mission--and she’s been sent away from Ironwood. it’s increasingly looking to me like Winter and Weiss will not talk to each other at ALL this season (do they have Scroll reception in the whale? i guess they must if Watts talked to Tyrian), or at most will only catch a tantalizing glimpse of each other before being whisked away again. all of this points to the issue not being “whose side will Winter choose,” but “what kind of person IS Winter, when she doesn’t have anyone else’s ideology to fall back upon?”

which is very exciting to me! the What You Are in the Dark trope is an obvious staple, but i’m especially a sucker for it when it happens to characters like Winter, who lucked out in the sense that their more selfish motivations (protecting herself from Dad) have never quite conflicted with doing Good (protecting other people). the cognitive dissonance for that with Winter has already been played up to the max, so for it to come to a crisis for her, at a point when EVERYONE WHOSE OPINION SHE CARES ABOUT HAS ALREADY FUCKED OFF, is just great drama. it’s made all the better by the fact that RWBY specifically has a lot of villains whose backstories involve them being put in a similar situation, and choosing wrong: Adam chose spite. Raven chose cowardice. getting to see someone make that choice in the story proper, then, adds to and complicates what RWBY has to say the conditions of possibility for heroism and villainy.

furthermore, and this might be where my biases become delusions: that Winter is being maneuvered to make these decisions for herself, BY herself, points to the possibility that she might be graduating from a mostly region-locked character (Ilia, the Belladonnas, Beacon staff and students) to full-on supporting cast (TRQ, Maria, the villains). if Weiss and/or Penny reach out to Winter in a climactic confrontation this season, then the story isn’t NOT about Winter, but it would place more emphasis on Weiss and/or Penny, as main cast members, and their ability to save a person they love. but if their relationships are given more space and time for breathe (or fester!)--if Winter gets to change away from Weiss in the way that Weiss changed and grew away from Winter in Mistral, for example--then it points to a greater parity in terms of their mutual importance in the story.

tl;dr #3: Schneester Bowl might have to wait at least another season, because Winter’s too busy trying out independent thinking. now, whether Winter will make the RIGHT choice, or the story will LET her make that call after she’s decided...

2Defect2Salem

i actually touched on this before, so tl;dr #4.1: i do not find the ways that people talk about HOW Salem gets Winter to defect to be very convincing. the idea that Salem could easily manipulate Winter because they have similar backstories makes me...tilt my head, but i think that’s more due to my personal belief that people who are similar in those ways actually tend to be each other’s blind spots (i also think this about Blake and Winter, FWIW). more to the point: my personal reading of Winter locates a streak buried deep within that is unyieldingly CATEGORICAL. despite being embedded within Atlesian rationality, despite her mentor being James Ironwood, there is something in Winter that instinctively judges an immediate instance to be right or wrong, and she’s never been able to suppress that all the way.

and with that in mind, i genuinely don’t think Winter is enough of a long-term, big picture thinker to give herself over to despair for Atlas as a whole. oh, we see her parrot “for the good of all, not just a few” just fine, but if she was already having trouble internalizing that when it was coming from IRONWOOD, a man she loves and trusts, then why would Salem--a person she is predisposed to distrust--be better at convincing her that the ends justify the means? why would she believe that submission is preferable to extinction from someone that EVERYONE SHE KNOWS considers an enemy? it’s hard for me to conceive of a Winter who, perched at the lip of the despair event horizon, will a) think enough of herself to make a decision for everyone and b) accept that the decision is imperfect and compromise, when she could just do what soldiers do, what she’s been asked to do, and die for an impossible cause.

(also not to belabor the point, but: ...how is she supposed to deliver Atlas to Salem? are we assuming that the Atlas Military works via Klingon Promotion, or that Ironwood gave her all his passwords?)

this is not to say that i think Winter will completely no-sell Salem (though that would be VERY funny). assuming that she and Salem do end up in the same room (which is still up in the air), i can easily picture a scenario where Salem manipulates Winter into making a bad decision (though honestly, Winter’s been doing just fine with that all on her own), but the distance between “a bad decision” and “a decision that she knows will help the Big Bad” is still quite far. i can similarly picture a scenario where Salem gradually sways Winter--not a single Anakin-style dramatic reversal, but an Atris-style descent-by-inches, through a million little non-choices--but that’s the thing: manipulation takes TIME, no matter how good at it you are, and we’re running up against the fact that the season ends in 6 episodes, and Winter is only one of about a trillion dangling threads.

tl;dr #4.2: the only way i can see Winter defecting to Salem THIS SEASON, then, is if it’s not her choice at all. for me, this makes the most thematic sense--that she’s been playing keep-away so long with her own agency, and Salem ends up resolving the issue by taking it away from her completely. that she wants so much to be sure she’s making the right choice, or to not have to make the call, and Salem gives her exactly what she wants. she’ll never have to think for herself again. we know Salem is capable of something like that, because we’ve just seen the Hound. Winter won’t be another Hound, if only because churning out the same horror will only yield diminishing returns, but she might be...something else.

regardless, tl;dr #4.3: if “Winter defecting to Salem” shakes down in any way--either as originally posited or as i just described--it would be an FANTASTIC story and character engine. i’ve already talked about the potential conflict this could create within Team RWBY, but like...imagine Weiss talking to ANYONE about her sister. imagine Weiss talking to Emerald, who would have just joined the heroes, whose decision to cut herself off from Cinder would feel like a portent. imagine Winter with the villains! not just Salem, but Cinder! imagine the subtextual parallels between the two becoming TEXT. imagine the two of them having to work together! imagine how Cinder would feel to lose Emerald and get Winter. imagine how Mercury would feel! can you imagine Winter and Mercury bonding over their daddy issues?? because i can’t! but i wanna. my love for Winter isn’t contingent on her making the right choices, but on her getting the right material. this would not only be the right material, but A LOT OF IT, and if the writers do choose to go in this direction, i trust them enough to be excited about where it might go.

#Anonymous #winter schnee #rwby #happy to announce that i am here to disappoint everyone on both sides of the 'will winter defect or nah' fence!! #don't you all feel lucky #'i wish hornets didn't sting me' complains area woman as she swings a bat wildly at a hornets nest #helen writes meta

[thethirdwheel404]

Med Rewatch Series (#10)

S3 E10: Down By Law.

Episode Description: Dr. Manning sustains an injury while helping a drive-by victim and Dr. Rhodes finds himself in uncomfortable waters.

Connor being in ‘uncomfortable waters’? I can hear Ava bullying him already.

(also i wrote a little thing abt maggie giving ava a red bull so enjoy that little bit of content)

Let’s get into it.

-barry just yeeted natalie against a car holy shit that’s fucking hilarious

-will needs to chill the fuck out

-YESSSSS

-THIS WHERE CONNOR BRINGS THE WOMAN HE WENT OUT WITH UP FOR MEDICAL TREATMENT. AND THEN AVA HARASSES HIM FOR IT.

-this is one of the most iconic ava moments. (it’s first thing that pops up under the tumblr tag)

-ava overhearing connor not knowing his date’s last name. and ava walking over, already getting ready to make fun of him. barely concealing her smile

-the confidence with which she set down the file. she was too prepared and too excited

-this could just turn into a list of ava quotes

-”It must be hard, remembering all their names.”

“You know I read Derek Jeter used to send his conquests home with a gift basket. But a full cardio work up is... It’s much classier.”

-ava bekker secret baseball fan?

-Connor: “Jeter? You a baseball fan?”

Ava: “Oh, no. It’s much too boring. But I love gossip.”

-interesting. very, interesting... is it weird to anyone else to think about ava liking gossip?

-like the idea is fun and all but i hate the idea of ava being suuuper obsessed with gossip. it makes her seem way too shallow in my book. that being said, one of my hcs about women gossiping about all the shit men do to ava bc they know she’ll call them on it now has a lot more precedence

-i know she explicitly says that baseball is boring but i can’t get the idea of ava being a secret baseball fan out of my head. its just so novel

-HER SHIT EATING GRIN

- Connor: “Well, we will get you in and out of here as quickly as possible.”

Ava: “That’s what Dr. Rhodes is renowned for around here. Quick in and outs.”

Connor: *turns to her condescendingly*

Ava: *two finger salute* “I’m Dr. Bekker, by the way.”

-the lesbian icon jumped out

-also the fact that in the previous episode Ava’s mentor did the exact same salute. idk what it means but it’s not that important

-ava trying to hide her smile when asking the woman if she wanted them to contact her husband

-ava overhearing again when latham tells connor the woman he was with was doing cocaine

-ava smirking when connor says that he thinks the heart attack was from his sex and not the cocaine

-connor thinking he’s so good at sex he’s going to give this woman a heart attack

-he really drives All the ladies wild in EveryWay (sex, suicide. he’s the whole package)

-latham asking connor point blank “did you partake in the cocaine?”

-the ct team gives connor so. much. shit. it’s so funny

-also. ava just chillin at her desk looking at scans? that’s the kind of content i want to see. just her just being there. doing her own thing. that’s what i want

-THE GUY WITH A TEENAGE WIFE IS A REVEREND HOLY SHIT

-counting down the minutes til natalie drops dead (passes out but yk a girl can dream lol)

-sarah. back at it again with her rayon jacket and button up and backpack. the coffee cup only adds to the aesthetic

-connor being surprised that latham isn’t gonna let him do surgery on the women he fucked (twice, he might add)

- whatever you do, don’t think of a brown bear. are you thinking about it?

-maggie dealing red bull to people who need it. that’s a very soft idea

- ex:

Dr. Bekker is sitting at the desk in the ED. Well, sleeping, more like it. Her head is resting on her fist, her elbow precariously close to slipping off the the chair armrest, and her eyes open by just a hair.

“Dr. Bekker.”

Ava jolts awake.

“Maggie,” Ava says, strong accent cutting through, acknowledging the person standing over her. Hastily, she adjusts her jacket and scrubs, smoothing them back into place.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this tired.”

Ava shrugs, seamlessly slipping back into easy confidence.

“Rough couple of cases. Nothing I can’t handle.”

“Uh huh,” Maggie says, unbelieving.

She sets a can of Red Bull on the desk with a knowing look.

“You need this more than anybody.”

Ava scoffs. “Those things? They are murder on your heart, come on.”

Maggie hums and walks away. Ava watches her leave, and when she’s out of sight, Ava darts forward, grabs the energy drink, immediately cracking it open and downing half of it.

- anyway.

- @punksarahreese that’s on you for making me believe ava loves energy drinks

- let’s continue

- sarah looking at charles telling her not to do something: I am not going to do a thing you said

- go off babe. it was the wrong decision but go off

- all the nurses watching this guy call nat a bitch:  👀 👀 👀 👀

- will being like: god that guy called you a bitch i fucking hate him

- and natalie being like: he is also refusing to let us treat the 14 yr olds cancer but you obviously have priorities

- sarah is so logical. she’s good at talking to people. can you FUCKING IMAGINE IF SHE HAD BETTER GUIDANCE (oh and less trauma)

- this is also the one with that hilarious screen cap of sarah holding a knife

- the way she is so calm about handing this patient a knife gives me anxiety

- THIS SCENE IS SO HARD TO WATCH IT SCARES ME SO MUCH

- sarah just in alone in a room with a man who keeps having visions of stabbing his wife. and her just handing him a fucking knife oh my god i have too much anxiety for this

- rewatching the series and getting completely confused bc norma is 5′7″ but she looks so short next to colin and the guy who plays latham

- AND RACHEL IS ALSO 5′ 7″ BUT THEY BOTH LOOK SO SHORT - WHY EVERYONE ON THIS SHOW SO TALL

- anyway. ignore that that’s not important

- I... the parallels btwn sarah offering this guy the ability to slit her throat (for therapy) and ava cutting her throat... i don’t know what to do with this information

- idk but sarah holding the knife got me feelin some type of way

- the way connor looks at ava with such contempt bc she... does her job (and his but yk) especially during the hug wtf dude honestly just stop looking at her

- this is also the episode where ava pawns off the patient’s hug onto connor. while yeah, it could ava just being annoying to connor by forcing him to hug his one night stand’s husband, but she did give connor due credit. (and something to be said about her being confused and a tad uncomfortable when the patient hugs her, which is why she pawns it off to rhodes)

- she also doesn’t hug the guy back, which is kind of funny, she never moves her arms and just shrugs out of it

- and like after the hug she takes a few steps away from the guy, really not wanting any more physical contact or attention

- there’s something interesting in ava’s expression when connor gets hugged by the guy, can’t quite explain it. i’m gonna go with it’s her trying to keep a straight face while connor hugs a man he just helped a woman cheat on, but that’s not all of it so

- or. okay, I think i got it. i think that that little expression when connor gets hugged is her rolling her eyes at him getting credit when ava did most of the heavy lifting. yes. final answer. i’m satisfied

- and her looking away from them is her stopping herself from laughing, bc connor is obviously not enjoying this

- and he’s so sad and angsty he can’t even play along with the jokes

- and ava smiling at him with pity as she walks in to talk to the patient, bc that’s really what it is. she feels bad for him bc connor is so obviously lonely

- and connor’s annoyed bc ‘dammit she does have a right to pity me i suck rn’

- med pushing the women are tough agenda LITERALLY SHUT THE FUCK UP

- you hate your women characters so much just fucking shut your mouth

- and will being like ‘ i have a lot to learn about women not being objects’

- and nat saying ‘you are way further along than most’ like no, he’s not. the bar is on the ground and he still can’t jump it

- i’m pretty sure this show doesn’t pass the bechdel test. holy fucking shit it doesn’t. you’ve gotta be kidding me. (at least this episode doesn’t)

I can’t believe this episode didn’t pass the bechdel test. The only convo btwn two women were like maggie and sharon and they talk about barry and oh my god this is infuriating god med the bar is so low. And I’m pretty sure most episodes don’t pass the test anyway. Will is literally the representation of med. He gets lots of credit for doing bare minimum things like giving women rights.

Anyway.

This was a good episode. We dissected a lot of unspoken Ava things, which is very good. Ava had a lot of moments where she was there, but didn’t say anything, and when your characters can do that, that’s when you know your characterization is very good.

The moments where Ava isn’t really doing anything to forward the plot of the episode but she’s still just there, doing her own thing, are hands down my favorite. Her sitting at the desk looking at a scan while connor tells latham he didn’t do cocaine could possibly my favorite ava moment in the series, just bc it shows how much of her own character should could’ve been.

I drew an interesting parallel btwn sarah offering the guy to slit her throat and ava’s death. i have nothing for that but go wild

This episode also showed us Ava pitying Connor, another new aspect. she gives him shit but she also pities him. very good ep for little ava moments

as always, thanks for sticking through it

-

read the rest here:

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4 / Part 5 / Part 6 / Part 7 / Part 8 / Part 9 / Part 11 / Part 12 / Extra

#chicago med #ava bekker #med rewatch series #down by law #mine

[feelslikelalala]

dude im starting to foam at the mouth at tmr. whats ur characterisation of the mains i need to hear the tea

when i first read this i was like MY characterization? but eye didn’t do anything.. and then realized james dashner and whoever wrote the screenplays didn’t really do anything either so.

i feel like (much like Avatar, 2009, Oh, Wouldn’t You Know) tmr focuses more on building a world than building its characters, now i don’t really mind this as i happen to be a fan of Places and Things, but i AM annoyed bc memorable characters = relevancy and thats a setback for what i’m trying to do here

i’m literally not even saying the characters are bad i like them but they needed rebranding. if thomas had some sort of unique physical distinction synonymous with who he is and his backstory, destiny, and legacy maybe we’d have a maze runner theme park at universal studios rn you know.

ok ok but the funny thing abt tmr is it’s basically a teenage boy hivemind..... the only thing they CAN think about most of the time is how to not die, they don’t seem to individually represent anything, and they all have their fucking minds wiped so there’s nothing about their past to shape them or motivate them or anything like that.. in this post apocalyptic hellscape the core goals of the heroes AND the villains are just going to be about survival and while that’s not uninteresting, none of that makes it easy to create distinctive characters. ahdjdkkd sorry i’ll stop myself and talk more about that later and now i will actually try to chat abt the tmr characters !!

okay so i mentioned none of them having backstory which is a lie because THOMAS, hello, actually has a backstory, and it is completely wasted on him which is so funny to me. like he’s a very in-the-now person who willfully ignores the fact that he has a past and honestly that doesn’t matter bc it barely affects his current reality at all besides people from WCKD already knowing who he is. like i strongly think if thomas was just some random he would still do everything the same and everyone would still be trying to kill him. thomas (alright besides his magic blood i’ll give you that) is not actually special but it’s like HE is the only one who knows that. everyone’s like why is thomas so special why is thomas different, but i think (again, besides the blood) he’s genuinely not, he’s literally just stupid. it’s implied maybe he used to be really smart but that obviously didn’t work out for him because now he’s just a newborn calf who’s dumb and brave and impulsive and it WORKS !!!! he’s naturally very curious, which is why he’s a good protagonist for exploring our fun settings and (more importantly) another reason why it’s SO funny he does not care to know about his old life . and thomas is a circumstantial leader. i think most YA protags in things like this don’t want to be the leader but are good at it once they try and usually NEED to be the leader for whatever reason. thomas leads when it makes sense for him to lead, like when they need to take immediate action or someone needs to yell “RUN!!!!” otherwise the leadership role goes to someone who is capable like alby or minho or newt or if they’re lucky enough to find literally any grown up who isn’t evil it’ll go to them. i think it’s nice that thomas pushes when something’s important to him but otherwise is fine with whatever he’s given. if one were to use cats 2019 terms i would say most of the time thomas is victoria if she was the jellicle choice but he’s jennyanydots when he’s alone (he sits and sits and sits and sits)

i think it’s significant TERESA was the only one who got her memories back and in the movies she doesn’t really become a person until she finds her purpose from those memories and her former self’s morals. thomas was like “yeah there’s no way i’m fucking with WCKD again because they suck. they put me and my friends in a killer maze. i ain’t reading all those memories. i’m happy for me tho. or sorry that happened.” but teresa needed to know and needed to justify her choices. if thomas doesn’t think he’s different, teresa definitely thinks she is! and she is unique, once she gets her memories she’s SMART AGAIN she’s a teen scientist wunderkind which i will never stop thinking about like how does she really feel about thomas who she KNOWS has lost all intelligence on PURPOSE and is on the right side of history because of it. what teresa did wasn’t even that bad i guess she had noble intentions but she betrayed the boys and that is not on. teresa is what always sunny would call “the useless chick” for most of the time in this fun little series but her shining moment is when she entered the maze and was like IMMA START THROWING ROCKS AT ANYONE WHO IS NOT DYLAN O’BRIEN (a very accurate and impressive representation of a teenage girl). and can i mention the dynamic between thomas and teresa would be a lot more interesting if they were twins. it’s the drama of the last of your family making a decision completely opposite your own instead of some random coworker you have no real chemistry with

BRENDA is just like Cool Action Girl i have no thoughts on her but i don’t dislike her. i don’t think we like ever see her interact with the whole maze group but they’d all be scared of her because she’s not fucking around and i think she would be mean if needed. she’ll fit in

this is the part of the tumblr post where i get to the best characters but have nothing to say about them 😔

MINHO is too cool for this series. i’m confident every single one of these teens is in love with him and he knows none of them are good enough. in cats terms he’s munkustrap because without him everything would be a mess but he’s got the range for the rum tum tugger. minho is the one who says “guys why don’t we just say fuck like normal people” after a week of everyone saying stuff like “shuckface” to which gally or any other rule abiding freak is like okay that’s IT time out. get on top of the fridge. and he screams THIS MAZE IS A FUCKING NIGHTMARE

newt :-) NEWT is mr mistoffelees in cats 1998 (NOT 2019) because he’s gay, he has the panache of a cat twirling around in a light up jacket shooting lightning out of his paws, and he’s saying things like “the rum tum tugger is a terrible whore” to RTT’s face and getting away with it. i love when he asks thomas if he still likes teresa and gets in his face about it and screams like what was that even about that was homosexual activity. i really love newt.... like can i talk about his fashion choices again the scarf and fingerless gloves in scorch trials even tho it’s a thousand degrees he looks good. and the shearling jacket in the death cure literally STYLIN... it’s very important that newt is the only british person in this whole thing i think. what’s up with that. i love it. he’s the most likely to think “wow this glade thing is kinda like love island” but the least likely to say those words out loud

#okay wow that was a lot i dont even know what i said at this point #tmr #x #asks #anon

[red-sterling]

thanks for answering!! i hope you don't mind if i send more charas...how about green and/or lillie?

fhgjkfdg aw yea thank u!! hopefully this doesn’t publish before i’m done typing lol

also this definitely needs a readmore bc i got emotional abt Green oops

Green

favorite thing about them

first of all: the fact that Green canonically has a rivals to best friends arc with Red fills me with so much joy and YES they are on their alolan honeymoon you cannot convince me otherwise

okay like. gen 1 Green just perfectly encompasses what it’s like to be a ten year old in a way? like ofc he’s written like a kid bc he is a kid, but i feel like the writing on him just feels so genuine as compared to some of the other 10 yr old rivals you get in other regions. even though he’s kinda a brat at the start, he kinda eases up a bit as you go along your journey and starts giving you progressively nicer/more praise-y end lines when you beat him (going from “i picked the wrong pokémon!” to “so, you are ready for boss rocket!”) but still retains this childlike rivalry and competitiveness and i love that about him

and like. fucking beating him at the Indigo League still completely breaks my heart because even after he did become the champion at age 10 the first thing that happens is you beat him and Prof Oak just yells at him for being bad at things and like. ow. 

this is why i headcanon that Red actually took awhile longer to get to Green like please. please give my boy a chance to be happy and proud

also Red was caught up with Team Rocket anyway so i imagine he must’ve fallen a little behind at some point? anyway

the development on him across regions is so choice!!! he’s so much more mellow and even kinda melancholic when you find him in gsc/hgss, like he’s calmed down over a few years and he obviously misses Red so much but like, it’s clear that Red is kinda the reason Green does settle down and he seems to have worked on his character and become a nicer person - and he still has that sassy flair to him! he’s just got that gradual slope from asshole rival to kinda aloof gym leader to friendly/sassy battle legend and aaaaa i love my boy so MUCH

also huge point: he’s so fucking driven??? he’s got the most drive and the most passion for battles/pokémon in general out of all the rivals i feel. he’s only closely matched by Silver, but Silver seems to be more aggressive than passionate, and somewhat out of necessity too (like, Giovanni abandoned him what was he to do), whereas Green just really like. he genuinely just cares so much about battles and about pokémon in general! he literally calls you in hgss and just rants about how many different kinds of pokémon there are in the world!!!

also in Alola he’s like???? just so sweet?????? he congratulates you and is like hey you’re really strong lets battle like!!!!!!!!! supportive boy!!!!! he has come so far over so many generations and i cry

also on Four Island when you play frlg he legitimately says “Be smelling ya!” when he leaves and how do you not love this idiot

least favorite thing about them

i mean. while i get that you beat Green right after he becomes the champion in the kanto games i feel like there should’ve been more pomp and circumstance for him and i’ll never forgive gamefreak for giving this boy his dream, then making you rip it away from him, and then watching his own gramps yell at him for fucking up like. again it’s that drive, i get why Red keeps such good pace w Green but i just feel like he worked so hard and he deserved so much better than that

also while i’m very biased towards him bc Big Emotions, i feel like if i knew this boy irl who was constantly i’m so great and you’re a loser i would probably punch him eventually lmao. in theory it’s kinda endearing but as a real person that’d be grating 

favorite line

on one hand, “smell ya later” is so fucking iconic, but on the other - 

“I’m Blue. Man, this guy called Red brought me down in a heartbeat. I haven’t seen him in a long time…I wonder where he is and what he’s up to… Come to think of it, you look a little bit like Red. Yeah, you do. Just…Just a little bit. Whatever…”

my namelessshipping heart

ALSO NOT CANON BUT GREEN RANTING TO YOU ABOUT RED AND GETTING SO DISTRACTED THAT HE FORGETS TO GIVE YOU THE POKÉDEX????? BIG GAY

brOTP

for long elaborate headcanon reasons, i see him as being a good brotp with Kris - i headcanon her as also being really driven the way Green is, but more quiet about it, she’s kinda a good balance to him and they probably do pokemon research together. i also feel like she kept him sane while Red was still missing/before they found him on a fuckin mountain

OTP

do i really need to tell you that i’m 100% namelessshipping

like they perfectly balance each other. Green has all this energy and all this spunk and Red is just like… so opposite of him y'know? he’s quiet and he’s more measured in his behavior i feel, he doesn’t really rush into things as much, and yet they both really just took Kanto by storm when they were kids, and i like how they have this foil dynamic and are both still so successful? they’re so different and they complement each other in that way, and they both find success in their own ways

like one of the reasons i hate that Green’s championship gets undersold so much is that he did beat you to the punch, and he has been one step ahead of you, and there’s so much passion there and it’s so loud - and yet you as Red are just as driven, you take down Team Rocket, you’re always right on his tail, so close but not quite there, you’re the only one who can keep up with him and you’re the only one he cares enough about to slow down for

so like. idk with even all my headcanons about namelessshipping aside (and i can infodump those another day lol), i feel like the in-game representation of them just works. they just work so well together, they balance each other without ever holding each other back, and there’s something really beautiful about that in a relationship y'know

…..i feel bad abt not putting as much infodump about isshushipping now but oh well

nOTP

i don’t really have a notp with him? i kinda like. i basically just do namelessshipping, but i don’t get a visceral eugh when i see other ships with him, just kinda a well it’s not nameless so i’ll be on my way. idek what other ships w him are popular?? i’ve been in nameless hell since 2012 so 

random headcanon

while Red is still living on Mount Silver, Green is not coping well with having him so far away, and so Green massively overworks himself to the point that he keeps just not being in his gym sometimes bc he’s bouncing between the gym, training multiple teams, pokémon research, and ofc going to visit Red whenever he can. this leads him to be kinda temperamental after he’s been working on 2 hours of sleep a day for like a week until he just has an emotional meltdown and crashes, and then he gets right back into it because he has no self preservation

…….. nicer headcanon; Red can only cook two (2) foods, so Green cooks all the food for them when they move in together. he has attempted to teach Red how to cook, but Red pretends not to understand so Green will keep making him food. Green knows Red is faking it and doesn’t call him out bc he thinks it’s cute

unpopular opinion

look i’ve played through classic red version a few times and when i say he wasn’t that much of a jerk, i do genuinely mean he was not that much of a jerk. he’s like ten. ten year olds are just Like That. i guess this isn’t too unpopular anymore but it was Back In The Day and in some parts of the fandom he’s still seen as a jerk and like Bro He Is Ten In RGB/FRLG cut him some slack

also genuinely unpopular - Green is taller than Red. i know namelessshipping has fallen into the bara Red and twink Green trope but i refuse to let go of tall Green/short Red fuckin fight me why dont you

song i associate with them

a lot of the Pray For The Wicked album by Panic! at the Disco gives me Green vibes, more for the sound than for lyrics necessarily, but for some reason Roaring 20s just like. has the sound of Green to me. it’s somewhere between flamboyant pride and underlying insecurity that i think really encapsulates Green (or at least his subtext)

favorite picture of them

i genuinely love his let’s go concept art he’s such a sweet good boy?? 

and for the life of me i cannot find the op source on this but this is my fave pic of Green/namelessshipping in general that i’ve had saved since like 2012 maybe???

yeah if anyone can help me source that i’d appreciate it bc reverse image search only brings me to pinterest and random wattpad links :/

update: source seems to be the artist くる (pixiv id=982894) on pixiv, even though the original post got taken down (ty anon!)

Lillie

favorite thing about them

by now i guess you know im a sucker for character development, but i think they did a really good job with her!! i feel like her turn is a bit more in moments than it is with Green, who gradually evolves (lol) over the course of Kanto/all the gens overall. you see more discrete moments where Lillie starts to shift and gain confidence in herself and i am so proud of her ???? like the way she gets excited when she sees Olivia doin’ her z-move stuff, she starts buying her own clothes and getting ahead of you, etc etc

and like, she still has moments where she’s scared, there’s still some fundamental Lillie in there yknow? you don’t lose any of that softness that characterizes Lillie, she just like… she gets better, she develops without losing her Lillie vibe and i love that abt her. she overcomes a lot of the shit she had to deal with when she was stuck with Lusamine, she stands up to Lusamine eventually, and ghfdkjsg gah she’s a sweet gorl i love and appreciate her

also like. the writing on her backstory is so subtle in-universe. like yeah she literally looks like Lusamine’s daughter and you see her in the opening cutscene leaving Aether, but as the protagonist - like as Selene lets say, there’s little hints about where Lillie came from, and if you suspend your disbelief and put yourself in the pc’s shoes, there’s subtly to her character arc that i like 

also like. when she changes her outfit and starts being more protagonist-y, like more confident and kinda bubbly instead of shy??? love that shit it’s so cute can i have custody of this child pls

least favorite thing about them

i like. sometimes feel like she’s too soft of a character for me to really get into? like i love her and Hau, they’re sweet good friends, but i tend to personally gravitate towards characters that create a little more tension (ie Green and N)

(though on that note, Hau can be kinda savage. he just calls Faba out and sarcastically calls Gladion “a ray of sunshine” at some point i think?? Lillie is just very tender and i will support her forever, but i think that also makes her almost too soft to keep me fixated on her yknow. it’s not even a flaw in her character but just not something i fawn over as much)

favorite line

“I’m so glad I got to meet everyone. I’m so glad I got to meet you.”

like that ending kills me but that line almost feels like. I Feel That So Much like i feel so happy to have met all these new characters and to have played these games, and i feel like some of the player’s energy and enjoyment of the game is channeled into this last line of hers 

also GET IN THE BAG

brOTP

probably her and Hau?? idk, i don’t have a specific brotp for her but i like her just hangin around w the other Alola kids, so like her, Hau, Gladion, and the protag kids. they’d raise hell together and Lillie continues to be the only one with some impulse control

(Gladion also has some impulse control but keeps getting annoyed by Hau and so he gets dragged into their nonsense anyway)

OTP

Selene and Lillie is. Good. idk what the ship name is but it’s canon

nOTP

i dont even know if people ship her with Gladion but incest is a big no-no in my house

random headcanon

when she goes to Kanto, i bet she’d pick Bulbasaur as a starter if she was given the opportunity - and if not, she’d probably catch a wild Vulpix 

unpopular opinion

idk if have any unpopular opinions for her?? 

song i associate with them

i have no reason to associate this with her but the Rainy Day theme from acgc just. has a vibe about it. i think a lot of ac music feels like it suits her

favorite picture of them

i found this art of her through a lofi remix of her theme awhile back and it’s so pleasing to look at? her hair is nice and the colors are so warm n happy gjhkfdgf

if you read this far, congratulations!!! and i’m sorry

#thank u for asking again and i'm sorry this took so long and *is* so long lol #sterling content #Anonymous

[holy-shit-dangan-ronpa]

opinions

@cheinsaw said: gimme that nanami/sonia hot take

Don’t really ship it, but that’s probably because nanami just isnt a favorite character of mine. Romantically? It could happen. I’d be okay with it. I just can’t really find myself being invested in them as a pairing bc i just dont care too much about chiaki.

Anonymous said: opinions on toukomaru post-dr3, and on chihiro x chiaki?

Toukomaru: they love each other. Platonically or romantically they mean the world to each other and both are great characters and i love and support them. I dont think danron will ever have wlws that are as top tier. That said komaru is a minor and i am so tired of panty shots with her. We dont need em!!! The touko i know is going to grow outta her togami crush and realize komaru was here all along

Chiaki x Chihiro: i cant see this romantically. they dont really have any canon connection but i see chihiro as more of a parental figure for a.i. chiaki, even though, all things considered, they probably arent the one responsible for creating a.i. chiaki.

@roomofangel-s said: saimota or rantaro x shuichi

as in which one i like more? saimota. i love saimota so so much, man. as for amasai, i like it! the game makes rantaro out to be ace but i can still kinda see them together? rantaro often gets characterized as a playboy but he isnt, but i can imagine him being flirty if he like, gets permission, if that makes any sense? hes the kind to respect boundaries and all that and that is very valid of him. saihara is a bi disaster and definitely thinks he is hit bc lets face it, he is

Anonymous said: Shuichi/Happiness

yes!!! i am so down

Anonymous said: Kaede/Living

Real talk? i am like the only person who was glad kaede died. call me what you will, but i just didnt really like kaede. her design irks me, and she strikes me as “genki girl” in a lotta ways. it was cool seeing her go outta her way to murder. seeing my favorite character become the protag and basically be guaranteed to survive? oh i was so happy, because until then, i was so certain he was a goner

Anonymous said: How do you feel about Haijime and Mahiru as a ship?

Personally, Mahiru just Strikes Me as Lesbian, or at least, bi with a women preference. I can see them as good mlm (hinata being bi) wlw solidarity. great life partner friends, but i cant really see them as in love with each other. they definitely both shittalk their teachers in private though after becoming friends

@birded said: give me all your favorite dr trans hcs! 😍

i dont have too many? but saihara does give me Vibes. feminine voice, self-confidence issues, all that. in a non-despair au maki has to help him take his shots bc he has butterfingers and is also afraid and bc kaito still needs some help with the whole internalized homophobia thing (he would be understanding it’s just he grew up with old people so. yeah)

(the rest of these questions are also from birded im just not gonna tag them a bajillion times)

what's your favorite piece of dr content? mine is dr0 owo

i really liked all of them tbh? i really liked the atmosphere of dr1, the dr2 characters, the v3 ending... i really like drae but god i wish i were the creative director so we could remove that weird tickle minigame and all the komaru panty shots and kotoko undressing. i cant convince myself to read dr0. oops

what's some obscure or little/meaningless stuff in throughout the dr series that you really enjoy? what's some stuff you wish people talked about more?

definitely the use of honorifics! the nis translation removes them which is really sad bc they tell a lot about how the characters feel about each other! ishimaru uses -kun for everyone, which is kinda boyish but respectful! naegi uses -kun/-san bc hes nice, along with saihara and akamatsu.  hinata is just plain rude and uses none of them! i wrote a post abt one of my fav honorific moments here

what are youre thoughts on trans girl chihiro? what about thoughts on touko/komaru?

toukomaru i said up above, but, as for trans girl chihiro. please dont fucking kill me but. it’s not canon. danron 1 was written in 2010 and i doubt kodaka really wanted to make a cool story about a trans character. if chihiro was female, they wouldnt go outta their way and say that they’ve been “lying” to everyone. the game makes it clear they identified as male, and only dressed as a female due to their weak nature. trans people are the gender they say they are, and chihiro never goes and says “im actually a girl,” ya know?

in fics and stuff though? hell fucking yeah. go for it. if you think chihiro is trans go fucking ham but at the end of the day it isnt what kodaka wanted to write, just as much as i think maki is a lesbian and he went and wrote kaitomaki. youre allowed to take fiction and rectify shit you dont like in your art bc sometimes content creators are just bad. go wild

#meghan responds #meghans opinions #im not tagging the characters #Anonymous #cheinsaw #birded

[fuckmaniknowbuthey]

i took 3 grams of magic mushrooms & saw ghost in the shell (rupert sanders, 2017)

ramblyyyyyyy but here we go

- not an adaptation of the oshii film or the manga and a distressing amount of dipshit fans & critics will scorn it for this but fuck 'em - very very aware of the multiple schools of thought on ghost in the shell (in conceptual reverence as much as aesthetic, this was clearly a film made by ppl who had intimately explored the possibilities of ghost in the shell & decided that this would be the most palatable configuration for an american audience in 2017 - the script, as a consequence mostly of the "for an american audience in 2017", is very banal & while it respects franchise legacy & prior characterizations it is also A Superhero Origin Story so that scarjo can have a non-marvel franchise BUT as a standalone film aside from the screenplay's cloying ambitions of franchise-building it is very good & enjoyable - kin very much 2 johnny mnemonic & for more reasons than just being a highly polarizing hollywood attempt at cyberpunk w/ a prominent beat takeshi supporting part, it has that same strange glee abt taking the big studio budget and going "now let's tease out past/present/future of an aesthetic", it's a film built entirely in its tiny little details (costuming, set design, the general dreamlike vibe, the sound editing, physical gestures) - scarjo is amazing in this!! i am generally not a fan but her interpretation of motoko kusanagi is fucking fascinating & weird & very much in the spirit of standalone complex's ver. of motoko (not quite at that level of brashly confident & comfortable yet, but possessing the same intensity & directness); she approaches the idea of "playing a robot" like, not just as "oh i've gotta be clumsy w/ my speech & motions + not emote very much" but instead like, genuinely behaving in a kind of alien impression of what "humanity" is??? like it's not even the usual sort of "robot that wishes it was real" shit, like she's hostile & inscrutable in affect in all moments where she isn't being hostile & there are so many weird little facial twitches + bits of odd body language she uses 2 communicate this is idea of like, struggling w/ being a constructed version of human rather than an authentic person and the arc is that she kinda just makes peace w/ the idea that she was once a person and now she isn't but she still retains like, this faint shred of this prior experience + she'll use it as fuel 2 live her new one fully in the terms afforded her, it's fucking weirdly heavy-lifting in acting terms for what plays out in plot beats as basically just tryna chum up ghost in the shell's whole franchise history into a post-raimi superhero origin story - the scene w/ the prostitute that's been in every trailer since the earliest teasers is a great moment for showcasing this performance's general vibes in a nutshell, she's like...not just doing bog-standard "oh wow this is a real human, how i'd love 2 be her" sorta wistful detachment, she's forceful + very fixated on how tactile & real the other woman is, like she wants 2 touch her not because she doesn't understand touch or the form of a face or the nature of skin but because she has an intense hunger for her original human perceptions of these ideas and she's got 2 find a way 2 reconcile this w/ her new body in a tangible way instead of just intellectualizing it - michael pitt's hideo kuze on the flip feels very much like a gimmick performance, but it's also a fun one: he's working w/ a lot of the same basic themes, but like cast as a villain for the bulk of it he's gotta dumb the shit down 2 shtick + so he's got the prosthetics & CGI freak body + he does a max headroom meets microsoft sam voice and he screams clumsily w/ every mannerism "I WAS HUMAN, I FEEL THAT I MAY STILL BE, BUT THAT I AM UNSURE I AM HUMAN IS AN IRRECONCILABLE TRAUMA" but he's fuckin' michael pitt so he's having a lot of fun w/ it and it's an interesting contrast of scarlett fucking johansson doing this very subtle character work while pitt's ham monologuing w/ scratched CD stutter tics at her from under cover of darkness - like seriously fuck this dumb screenplay it's very trite but unhelpful 2 focus on cuz this is a film that functions on so many more levels in ways that are compelling - the action is cool, riffing a lot on the peppier moments of oshii's films + kazuchika kise's arise OVA series but never just settling for carbon copy, uses 3D well (reminded me a lot of the sense of texture & movement & space in tron: legacy, which is a tragically overlooked film that maybe just doesn't work quite right outside of a theatre unfortunately) - pilou asbaek's batou is surprisingly good, i had him written off as far 2 generic action man but like he clearly did his research, his batou has a heart & a sense of humor & he absolutely has the body + the voice necessary 2 pull this character off (he manages 2 make the inherent goofiness of rendering batou's tiny camera eyes as a real thing on a person totally workable by having batou be proud as fuck of his augments & not remotely uncomfortable at the notion of them as a replacement for his real eyes, which considering they give him a dramatic "he got hurt on the job" moment after introducing him 2 the audience as a dude w/ normal eyes is cool & not corny cuz any other fucking film would've milked this for a subplot where batou could go "MAJOR, I ALSO FEEL YOUR PAIN, FOR I LOST MY EYES AND THEY GAVE ME ROBOT ONES, THAT'S JUST LIKE LOSING YR HUMANITY, RIGHT??" and that would've sucked) - beat takeshi gets way more screentime than you'd expect and as much as his performance is very much just him Doing His Thing that's honestly an ideal vibemarriage for the daisuke aramaki character + this also feels like a corrective 2 how sloppily he was used in johnny mnemonic hahaha like hollywood just karmically owed this dude one and he finally got it - chin han is a very good togusa, like all incarnations of togusa tho he gets fuckin' paltry screentime compared 2 everyone else and he also is just there 2 be like "he's the normal guy who is a pretty good cop" which is a downright shame - the rest of section 9 all feel like characters who are begging for a sequel and/or spinoff 2 rly flesh out proper but that also means they serve in a perfect capacity for fulfilling both the superhero origin shit (give you a hook 2 intice you 2 dig deeper) and also just like the general cool fringe sci-fi genre piece vibes (everyone looks badass, there's some neat little distinct tic or visual quirk on top of said general badassness that makes you think "maaaan i wanna see more of this guy" which fucking like all of these movies have, like again johnny mnemonic, that's an entire film of characters like that) - i love the retrofuturist plastic shell cars, it's extraordinarily "some high school kid's loving blade runner fanart" but it's executed w/ a respectable unwinking nature abt its whole shit, like it doesn't try 2 make this like the slick CGI ver. of a retrofuturist plastic shell car, it's just a shitty old car w/ hyper-stylized plastic shell on it hahaha - most of the spider-tank scene pales in comparison 2 mitsuo iso's beautifully animated take from the oshii flick but the actual exact sequence where motoko breaks 2 pieces prying the tank open is fucking gorgeous & riffs on iso + oshii's original work sublimely w/o just straight-up jacking it (this is a moment where the 3D rly shines, the frantic swaying of the arm as the last tendons shred and it pops off)

overall this was dumb as fuck but very gorgeous & kept compelling by performances that are strong & play well w/ the genre elements

#movies #long post

[theoriginalmysteryincorporated]

possibly the saltiest thing i have ever written. analyzing ruby volume by volume (from memory so i may get things wrong but like. the salt runs deep).

read at ur own risk. it isnt nice at all. and again, this is so long, im so sorry if ur on mobile

ruby v1

i love her

hyper anxious kid who wants to fight monsters and play with swords rather than talk to anyone ever?? i LOVE her

and theN CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT

not only do we see that she’s a rly good person despite her social skills being less than spectacular (see: ruby indulging jaune abt his sword and shield but still fumbling through the scenario, see: ruby befriending a boy who literally threw up on her sister’s shoe, see: ruby running off to be with her sister but still promising to catch up with jaune later despite knowing he’s not a gr8 fighter just bc he’s a “nice” guy who clearly needs a friend just as much as she does.........

this is like all in the first 2 or 3 eps and from memory so excuse me if i get anything wrong, but like my point is, we get a lot of good showing (for the time limit and compared to the rest of the show) that ruby is a good person. socially anxious yes and a lil hyper and childish but like, she’s 15 and she’s fighting bad guys. like hell, she even asks the shopkeeper dude if she can go after roman, or if he wants her to wait with him. likE WHAT A GOOD KID

she grows as a leader, which we see in her discussion with jaune in the hallway (remember when jaune actually was a foil for ruby bc he’s also got terrible social skills and he can’t fight or lead for shit?? yeah me neither)

so like yes, v1 left a lot of questions, but ultimately i watched and rewatched it like a hundred times cuz i loved that team and i could put aside a lot of the problems bc of a limited time per episode, and like. i loved. those. girls. ruby included. like, i am ruby. her personality in v1? me

ruby v2

god

i dont remember v2 very well tbh cuz i hated it

there was a dance and weiss got stuck with a love interest and ???

literally what even happened

uh

we got yang backstory!! but this post is supposed to be abt ruby so like

all i’ve got on ruby was that she was upset abt blake not attending said dance, which like. ruby ur crush is showing

but again, fits with the whole ‘no one’s getting hurt on my watch’/’i care about all people and if u hurt them ur gonna answer to me’ attitude

ruby is Pure

ah yes. now it hits me

i must have blocked out the 2nd half of v2 bc im so mad at ruby. like this. is where it begins. truly begins.

mount glen(n)?

going off with oobleck and fighting (finally), moving the plot along, or so we think

except...........

ruby. doesnt care abt her team at all anymore?? doesn’t check in with them when they’re upset? like very visibly upset or shaken? just plops down with a happy ‘nope’ when yang asks if oobleck has questioned her motives for being a huntress and moves on??

like ok. i could forgive this if it were just blake and weiss. ruby’s social skills, as we know, aren’t gr8. but like. that’s yang. her sister, her rock at beacon. being upset. and im supposed to believe ruby doesnt ask her if she’s alright? or even look like she notices anything is wrong?? like ruby has had her own confidence issues in the past, surely she should be able to see it in her sister.

WHATEVER

and then she runs off again and who rly cares abt the end of v2 bc it didn’t matter at all

(also. the dog is stupid. im sorry but that dog has more characterization than the 4 girls combined and i can’t. stand it.)

anyway, this is where ruby’s character literally started unraveling for me. this has just. made me mad for a long time (and suggests a very definitive imbalance in yang and ruby’s relationship. which i would happily believe tbh (cuz i love angst), if we had any backstory with them growing up other than 1 line from yang abt tai shutting down, suggesting (tho not proving or showing) that yang had to take on a mothering role for ruby, which is why she’s hyper-tuned to her sister’s feelings and needs but ruby isn’t the same to her cuz yang is her rock, not the other way around

god i could go on and on and on abt how dynamic this sorta situation would make their relationship, bc of how guilty ruby feels for yang always being there for her, but not feeling like yang needs her the same way, ruby feeling like the burden to her sister, holding her back, which would be an awesome contrast to v4 rn

or ruby always assuming yang is okay cuz yang /is/ always okay in her eyes, always wiping away her tears, never shedding any of her own in front of ruby, ruby not realizing yang is hurting too......)

but let’s not get carried away. that doesn’t happen. we have no backstory for them, no idea what their relationship is like. all we know is that ruby is supposed to be all about saving people and looking out for everyone, especially her teammates, cuz she wants to do good in this world

but she can’t even tell when her own sister is upset.

im. mad.

ruby v3

my favorite season! tho honestly maybe tied with v1 bc jaune and neptune have soured a lot for me at this point

but a good plot (full of plotholes but whatever i forgive it, things are happening)

it takes a dark twist, but like. im here for that. give me more angst

the scene in the dorm with the whole team and yang is a good one. im not just saying that cuz my shipping heart will never forget weiss blowing up at blake for not believing yang’s word (again, somebody pls give me a soundclip of weiss saying ‘she’s hot’ bc weiss literally says that yang is ‘hot-headed, not ruthless’ and if u cut out everything after headed, you get weiss saying yang is hot. pls)

anyway, i guess if yang is literally crying ruby can tell she’s upset? good job little sister u did it

ruby sleuths around for awhile, gets ‘traumatized’ by penny’s death, kicks ass fighting, all p good

abuse mention below

(i have, for the purposes of this post, left out my feelings abt ruby’s reactions to winter slapping weiss. arguments from when this occurred made me nearly delete my blog bc i was just. so angry. i consider what winter did abusive, for a variety of reasons i’ve gone into before; however, i love winter as a character, i don’t think she’s being abusive on purpose, or even realizes its abuse. in fact, i dont think weiss thinks it is either, cuz at this point its just a way of life. i think not calling what winter did abusive subsequently means ignoring that winter was also probably abused, and that’s where she learned to treat people this way, and why she thinks its okay to do that to a person, even if you love that person very much. i also would like to venture that a lot of people who have been abused were made seriously uncomfortable by the behavior winter exhibited, and whether or not it was intended to be abusive doesn’t change the impact it had on people watching.)

so i’ll stow my feelings away on ruby’s reaction to that cuz that was a Bad time in the fandom but im sure you can guess my thoughts

ruby v3 continued

mostly the rest of this volume is just. ruby left. like what the fuck

at this point we had no real indication of how much time has passed. we have no idea if ruby’s tried reaching out to yang after her one failed attempt. we don’t see her interact with yang at all after that, we just see her walk out the door?

again, im mad

there was so much potential for actual discussions and bonding time but nope, we’ve skipped over all that

(i know this post is about ruby but can i just also talk abt how toxic qrow is to yang here? yang’s words to ruby are exactly what qrow’s had been to her, ‘sometimes bad things just happen’ and then they stay that way, they don’t get better. like qrow. u need to up ur comfort game like, a lot)

anyway. that’s where we left and at this point. still bitter abt v2, i’ve been that way since it happened, it isnt going away. and then ruby just...leaves

which brings me back to ruby not really getting any characterization, kinda de-evolving really??

like until qrow (which yeah, v4, but gimme a sec) but until qrow gets hurt, we don’t rly see her ‘care’ a whole lot about other people the way she says she does. with the promises to qrow about stopping cinder and her constant goody-two-shoes speeches which at this point are just annoying and cliche and telling instead of showing

we don’t see her concerned about penny or pyrrha for more than 2 seconds, we don’t see her concerned about yang for more than half a scene, and we just. don’t get any sense she is seriously attached to anyone at this point, cuz she literally does NO MOURNING. EVER.

im getting ahead of myself, so v4 here we come

ruby v4

ok so. i left off with ruby not mourning for anyone. no mourning for ren when he discusses his parent’s literal deaths. no mourning for pyrrha, just ruby watching jaune mourn pyrrha?? for some reason?

no sensitivity to jaune mourning pyrrha (which again, i don’t care about jaune, but like. come on ruby). what im referring to is actually something someone in another post pointed out abt ruby making fun of jaune’s bunny pajamas which he got from sending in boxtops from pumpkin pete’s, and how that cereal actually kinda has emotional context behind it now, and also. back to de-evolving ruby’s character, why is ruby laughing at him?? shouldn’t she have pulled out her own bunny pajamas and been like ‘omg same??’ she’s exactly the kind of person who would do that but like. ok

and then qrow gets injured and ruby makes another preachy speech about nobody getting hurt on her watch and im. tired. cuz she really doesnt care after anyone does die on her watch. we have never seen her caring extend past a single episode. and im. so. tired.

and that is all folks

#tune in next time for more salt #rwde #this is #so rwde #and rly long #abuse mention but i separated that part so you can skip it if u dont wanna read it #this is all the reasons i can no longer tolerate ruby having screentime #related to ruby #there are more #but those are jaune's fault #so im not going into them #he gets enough attention #and this post is already a novel