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hotheadedhero · 10 days

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Like 'em Big

AN: I have so many stories to write but I had to do this. Blaming being sick, m'kay? Fever has got me bad and these meds got me loopy. Thinking we need some good, silly fun in our lives, right? Plus, now that I've watched Rise, I'm hungry for some big Raph appreciation. I know I ain't the only one

All characters are aged up

Raphael x Reader

Warnings: near peril, easily smitten, possible errors due to fever (what kind of fever is up for deliberation🥴)

Cutting right to the chase. You like big dudes. That doesn't necessarily mean muscles, either. You just love you a big man - someone with a bit of something-something to them. More to love, you know? Given your track record with the greater world, it shouldn't be all that much of a mystery. Cats? Get yourself a tiger that you can cuddle into. Jumpers? Comfort central, baby. Beds? If you can't spread eagle then you see no point. The old-age saying does declare that the bigger the better, so who are you to disagree? How true that is may be up for debate but it’s merely as simple as understanding what your preferences are.

However, this makes dating a difficult ballpark to play in. No matter how tall, jacked, or voluptuous someone is, it never feels like enough. Human biology and genetics can only go so far in the conceivably possible sense. You just want to be absolutely engulfed when you get a hug. Is that such a crime? Apparently, it is. Unfortunately, you also seem to come across the worst jerks when you attempt to date within this set of criteria. One might argue it's your karmic justice for being so superficial and picky but a woman has needs. Not those kinds of needs, either. Get your head out of the gutter.

All hope seems lost and after yet again, another failed date, you decide to call it in for the evening and make your way home. A fresh failure and another wonderful outfit gone to waste. By no means is it anything flashy but you put a lot of work into it: pencil skirt, turtle neck sweater, and a nice pair of boots to compliment the look. The whole shebang! All of that effort for nothing. This is the last time you spend three hours doing your hair and makeup. Block after block, your feet grow heavier with every step. What you would give to come across a mountain-like man you can climb who is also a kindred spirit. Perhaps this dream guy will forever be that - a dream. Men like that don't just fall out of the sky.

"Look out!!"

The sudden shout almost scares you into tripping over and you look behind yourself, wishing you hadn’t. Two very large, very dangerous-looking figures entangled in battle, those of which are approaching your helpless little self. You quickly duck as the giants hurdle over you. One falls on its side whilst the other claws and skids against the ground, regaining its balance. It shakes its head and locks onto you, a guttural snarl rumbling past its jowls. Such a creature is surely from the stuff of nightmares. An indescribable nightmare whose sights are set on you. The smart option would be running away but it's as though your shoes have melted into the pavement. Pawing into the tarmac, the beastly thing growls and lunges for you. Great. This is how you die: torn limb from limb by a demon dog. Well, assuming your clothes join you, at least you’ll look like a total babe in the afterlife.

"Oh no ya’ don't," the other one yells from behind the predator, grabbing it by its tail. “Pretty ladies are not food!”

With a mighty tug, he pulls it back and swings it as far away from you as possible. You release a shaky breath, legs trembling beneath you. That was far too close for comfort. The fight isn’t quite over, however. Just as it approaches him, the green goliath swivels on his feet, full 180, and whacks the creature's jaw with a closed fist. His speed alone has you in awe but the force is astounding, practically earth-shattering. It completely knocks the air around you and pushes you onto your backside.

When the dust clears, the first thing you see is your saviour panting, his spiky shell(?) pointed towards you. Just past him in the distance, you notice three more figures in blue, purple, and orange taking a closer look at the unconscious tyrant. You swear one of them pokes at it with a stick. Witnessing strange beings such as this isn't entirely new. Anyone who's watched Chateau Pretenche knows about the celebrity chef turning into a grotesque pigman. To describe it in one word? Horrifying. It's just whether people choose to believe it genuinely happened or if these bizarre entities exist. Being up close and personally observing it now puts your scepticism in check.

As the humanoid turtle calms, he turns to face you, recapturing your attention. A red mask sits over his eyes and there’s a noticeable snaggle tooth poking past his upper lip. Typically, the prerogative is keeping out of sight but it’s much too late for that. He gradually advances towards you. You watch him warily and he keeps his movements slow for that very reason. It wouldn’t be a shock if you were to try and make an escape. He wouldn’t blame you. Currently, all he wants to do is make sure you weren’t hurt during that fiasco provided you don’t suddenly come out of your bewilderment and run off. You have good reason to but he just saved you. Either that or he’s as ravenous as that beast and wants you all to himself. The irrational conclusion remains as such - irrational - when he descends to one knee and outstretches a hand. There’s an irrefutable kindness in his eyes; a caring nature that can’t be replicated in the face of savage brutes.

"You okay?" he asks.

You continue to gawk without a word but, bit by bit, you reach out for his offer. Your fingers lightly trace the centre of his palm before comfortably trusting the proposal. His hand engulfs yours completely and Raph hopes to mercy that you don’t realise how sweaty he’s getting. He can feel his heart beating like crazy. He wonders how much of that is the adrenaline from the fight and how much of it is being in the presence of such a beautiful gal. As he helps you to your feet, he rises to his own. Someone of his stature shouldn’t be capable of being this delicate but he is. It has you running through a loop and you unintentionally stare at the remarkable behemoth.

Quite pathetically, you nod, unable to verbally respond to his question. How can you? You are effectively starstruck. Once you gloss over the turtle-y features, all you see is the sheer size of him as he towers over you. Height, width, the magnitude of those arms! All of it is glorious. You can hear the universe asking, “You want a big man, huh? How about one who isn’t human?” to which you answer, “Who gives a damn?”. If the only way a man can be this big is not to be human, so be it.

Amidst a whisper, your mouth moves on its own, "You're beautiful."

"What?"

"Huh?" Blinking out of your trance, you realise what you’ve said and giggle sheepishly, "I mean, you're be... ba... booming! Totally awesome with the whole- uh... saving thing." Nailed it.

He blinks right back down at you. This is certainly a first. He can feel his face heating up and he withdraws his hand lest you endure the wrath of his bashfulness, opting to hold the back of his head. At this moment, he seems to look anywhere but you.

"Heh. Gee, thanks." His humility is adorable and you’re glad he doesn’t question your initial statement. He turns to you once more, regaining some composure. "You sure you're okay, though? That thing was pretty scary looking."

It’s clear that you haven’t sustained any physical injuries but even bearing witness to something so unsightly can have lasting effects on one's mind. His brows furrow gently in concern down at you and it occurs to you that there’s a soft heart under all of that shell and muscle. Bonus points. This makes you smile for the first time in front of him and Raphael is sure that the streetlights got brighter.

You laugh fondly, “Yeah, I’m okay. Thank you.” Twiddling your fingers, your lips purse up in his direction. “Is there any way I can repay you?”

He places his hands on his hips and chuckles cutely, “Just doing my duty, ma’am.”

He may be indulging in his alter ego - the Red Angel of Preventing Harm - but it’s not every day he gets paid thanks when he saves someone. It’s also not every day he gets to save such a pretty woman, either. You, however, can’t just leave it at that. There must be some way in which you can properly thank him. Ulterior motives include getting to know this already loveable lug better but shh. It feels like the odds are finally turning in your favour and you won’t let this slip away from your grasp. That’s when it hits you.

Muttering under your breath, you erratically search through the confines of your little handbag. You are certain that you had one in here somewhere. In the spare pocket maybe? Ah! Found it. Fumbling to take the lid off of your pen, you hold out your hand, gesturing for his. He slowly complies, to which you jot down a series of digits on his palm accompanied by your name and a tiny 'x'.

"Gimme a text sometime," is the last thing he hears before you disappear around a corner.

Oh? Oh. Ohhh. Wow. Getting your number is the last thing he expected. Did he get hit on the head during that scuffle or something? Was everything from the last few minutes a dream? He bores holes into the writing on his skin, scanning it over and over, scared that it’ll disappear if he so much as blinks. A dumb, wobbly smile not so gracefully decorates his lips as he trudges back to the turtle tank. He takes his seat but it’s obvious that he isn’t all there. Being so caught up in his rose-tinted bubble, he doesn’t register his brothers' voices. In an effort to gain his attention, Michelangelo jumps onto his shoulder, partly intrigued by what their leader is so absorbed by.

"Oh me gosh!” the young brother screams in shrill excitement, “Raph's in love!"

Careful not to smudge the neat ink, he’s quick to hide his hand against his chest. "That's crazy talk!”

Donatello sniffs the air and mockingly covers his nose. "The overwhelming manifestation of your nervous stink indicates otherwise, dear brother."

"I got a girl’s number!” he continues to defend, feeling his face go all kinds of red. “'Course, I'm nervous but that don’t mean I’m in love."

Lies and slander. It was practically love at first sight. He just doesn’t like the idea of his brothers knowing that. It’s easy pickings to be made fun of.

"Don't worry, Big Red. Lucky for you, you got a guy who knows all about the charm." Leonardo points both thumbs at himself as he falls back into his seat and props his legs up on the dashboard. "First, you just need to..."

The "helpful" advice drowns out as the large snapper opens and gazes at his palm again. He just can't comprehend how a gorgeous individual such as yourself could take one look at him and give him your number. It's puzzling but he supposes there’s a first for everything? That also doesn't mean he won't text you. The only thing getting in the way of that is fear. Raphael thinks he’d rather go toe-to-toe with that mutant dog again than have to face the risk of embarrassing himself. To anyone who knows him, it’s no surprise that he caves under pressure. No. He will do it! A chance like this is one in a million.

Oh boy. What could possibly go wrong?

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meimi-haneoka · 6 months

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Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card Chapter 80 (FINAL): Comments + JP-ENG translation differences

CCS Faaaans!!! Welcome to our last (?) monthly appointment with the analysis, commentary and list of translation differences for THE FINAL chapter of Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card!!! 🥹🥹🥹

Aaaaaah, I can't believe that after seven years and a half of serialization, we're finally here!!

I still remember the strong emotions I felt when I had seen the pages of Nakayoshi for chapter 1 in advance, back in June 2016....it seemed like a miracle, to me. Like a "mirage". And back then I still didn't know just HOW MUCH of a precious miracle this sequel would've become to me!

So it's with shaky hands and a trembling, emotional heart that I write this post to you...I hope you can excuse the length of it (maybe take a break in between?), I'll do my best to highlight the translation differences (unfortunately we definitely got some for this finale, one in particular made me quite mad) so you can spot them immediately among the sea of words and feels I will inevitably pour into my writing...

The "Beaver Moon" was big and shiny just a few days ago, and like all the full moons at the end of the month, it brought us a chapter, a very special finale for this series.

And as I usually do, I really cannot skip this silly moment that accompanied me for so many commentary posts, so here you go, my dear readers, the last Gif Of The Month!!!

I had already decided that, no matter the content of the chapter, I would've used this, because it is my intention to give my congratulations to CLAMP for reaching the end of this wonderful story and also thank them for giving me a multitude of emotions over the years. I've been happy, angry, excited, teary-eyed, frustrated, confused, hopeful, in pain, in love. I'll always be grateful to them for changing their mind and deciding to give us a sequel of this beloved series, after so many years of dreaming of it, and for making me fall in love with the new characters, none excluded!

So, off we go, under the cut for this commentary of the finale!!

The Color Page

Oh my heart 😭😭😭 I really wondered if they would go for it, if they would shoot us with feels right from the first pages and they did, they paid homage to the color page of chapter 50 of the old manga!! ❤️ We can see the same bluebirds that were featured back then, still holding in their little beaks lots of ribbons coming from the pink roses bouquet that Sakura is preciously holding... And that also made me realize that these are the same birds that were featured last month for Akiho and Kaito's color page too!!! ✨ They definitely, definitely wanted us to get the message that all of them will be truly happy from now on. ❤️I actually appreciate even more that Mokona-sensei took care in including those birds for the color page of Akiho/Kaito too.

Back in the old manga, CLAMP had given a comment for the illustration of chapter 50, saying that it was created that way to give a sense of looking forward to the future, and the absence of the Star Wand here was a precise request from Ohkawa to Mokona, because Sakura would've tried her best from now on, without necessarily relying on her magic.

Here, in chapter 80, we can somehow see the same theme but Sakura isn't proceeding "forward" towards a specific direction, it seems more like she's floating comfortably, assisted by her loyal Flight Card, embellished for the occasion (it makes it look kind of "upgraded", right?). I get a sense of Sakura feeling way more comfortable with her natural gift than she's ever been.

The blue sky, the ribbons, the bluebirds, the bouquet of pink flowers, the presence of a flying Card, Sakura's bare feet and her beautiful smile are definitely elements common to both illustrations.

Here Sakura wears a longer outfit, more elegant, which of course makes her look more grown up, as it should!

The editorial text on this last page doesn't carry words of thanks like in the color page of the final chapter of the old manga (those this time around were printed directly on the cover of Nakayoshi), but actually "My invincible spell is....'Everything is surely going to be alright' "! I think it was a very nice choice to feature the Invincible Spell in the front page of this final chapter. ✨

Between this and the absolutely divine Sakura on the cover of Nakayoshi, I can feel my heart softening and filling up with lots of hope and comfort, helping me to cope with the imminent "loss" that I'm going to experience.

BUT! It's not time to let us be caught by those mischievous feelings that want us to cry at all costs, and so we're gonna proceed for the actual chapter!!

The Books In Fujitaka's Library

The final chapter starts with Sakura chatting with Eriol and Kaho in a videocall over the phone!! The thing that immediately stands out is that Sakura is still wearing the full-winter uniform, so it's apparent right from the first panel that rather than turning back, the events are proceeding forward from where we left them, exactly as Sakura wished.

It's still winter, spring is almost here and we're almost towards the end of the 1st year of middle school for Sakura & co.

Another thing that I, as a foreigner, couldn't help but doing is calculating what time should've been for Eriol and Kaho, since they live in Europe like me! 😂😂😂 Having followers and friends all over the world, it's just normal for me. Well, if this is early morning, it should be night for the Europeans, so maybe that background at the window should be black?? 😂😆 Who knows if sensei will fix it, in the tankobon?

But enough with the silly things, let's see what Sakura is discussing with these two.

The very first thing we hear is quite shocking: Sakura slept four entire days to recuperate from the insane fatigue after the last battle!!

When I've heard that, my immediate thought was going towards all kinds of realistic, very practical issues like "did they keep her hydrated, in these four days? What about the bladder? 😱" but come on, way crazier things happened in this finale and this is the last thing we should worry about 😂

Eriol sweetly says that everyone waited impatiently for Sakura to wake up (I can imagine that!! Syaoran and Akiho must have died of anxiety). In Japanese, his sentence is somehow left trailing off, it gives me the impression that he wanted her to know that she's cared for, but in a very polite manner and avoiding to make her feel guilty for it. Sakura, as the good girl she is, tries to apologize for making them worry, apologies that Eriol doesn't need, so she ends up thanking both him and Kaho for what they did for her (and we can see Kaho peeking in the videocall! I'm glad she recovered too! As usual she's wearing nice outfits, the transparent veil over the skirt is interesting!).

Kaho, with her usual "maternal" aura, says that seeing her in good shape and hearing her cheerful voice over the phone is more than enough to her, which makes Sakura happy.

Eriol then proceeds to ask a question about the books he saw flying away at full speed after Sakura removed all the spells and the graphics from the artifact (the huge book), which then transformed into said smaller books: he wants to know where they ended up to, and lo and behold, they're nowhere other than in Fujitaka's library, in the basement of Sakura's house! 😱

So we can see a flashback depicting a scene right after Sakura woke up (she's still in her PJs), and her father shows her a pile of ancient-looking books sitting on his desk and on the floor.

Yes, those are all the magical books that Akiho had read and (unknowingly) engraved on herself, which were about to crush her soul. There's really a lot of them, so I don't have a hard time believing that she was really on the verge of losing her soul forever.

As Fujitaka tries to explain himself, it seems Sakura worked so hard and in the end those books ended up landing right at their house!

And then, in a very moving scene, we see Fujitaka being just so happy because finally, after so many years (since 4th grade) of just watching over his daughter going through several hurdles and not being able to be helpful in any concrete way (because he didn't have magical powers, and even when magic was passed onto him, he didn't know how to use it), NOW he can finally be of assistance to her.

He then tells her not to worry, because he already got several "weird" books in his collection (hell we knew, the Cthulhu books were surely a surprise 😂), and that anything goes where it's supposed to go, when its due time comes. He believes these books, too, will reach their new fated destination one day, so until then, he will take care of them. ✨

By the way, you all saw it, right?? YES, it's there again. Fay's tattoo on that book! 😂CLAMP REALLY wanted us to see it, didn't they?

Is this insistence in featuring elements coming from Tsubasa a sign of something in the future...? Or are they just messing with us....?

I bet even this book one day will find its way to Celes country, to have that tattoo used in the way we all know.

Anyway, I REALLY loved this scene because it just shows CLAMP's firm intention to involve *all* the main and side characters in this collective effort to help Sakura solving Akiho and Kaito's situation (Fujitaka was indeed the one missing from the support group!).

It's just so good to know that a tiny frustration that Fujitaka expressed in this arc (how he couldn't be of help to his own daughter) was finally put to rest too, with this new task he took upon himself.

I strongly believe that Sakura, once again guided by her infallible instinct and empathy, subconsciously wished those books into her father's library, because she just knew that her father would be the perfect person to guard them and keep them safe for the time due.

The Cards

Back to the present, Eriol comments that Sakura's father is really dependable, and she can only warmly agree!

But Sakura's got questions of her own, for Eriol. She asks what happened to the transparent cards (note: even this time, Sakura keeps calling them with the japanese term 透明, "transparent", and never calls those cards クリアカード, the English term that gives name to the arc).

Eriol gives his own explanation: the transparent Cards were probably bound into the book of the guardian Sakura met (and not "befriended" like the ENG wrote), and as such, they became magical power used to activate the "forbidden magic".

About the newly created Remind and Blank Cards, Eriol guesses that the last magic that Sakura summoned thanks to those two Cards was so "violent" (the term used 凄烈 means "violent, intense, fierce") that it ended up exhausting completely the Cards' magical power.

Sakura says "so...they're gone", confirming that yes, even those two disappeared after being used.

Eriol asks about the Cards Sakura had from before, our dear Sakura Cards, and she releases them in the room to show to Eriol their current appearance: it seems like they have taken up some elements from the transparent cards, mixing up their designs! They look really cool and empowered, like this! Eriol attempts to explain this occurence as an influence of the fact that Sakura used some of them with her new Dream Staff, hence why their new appearance!

It seems like she'll be able to use all of them with that staff from now on, so this is a first hint to something that will be referenced in a stronger way in a few pages.....

Kaho gets closer to Eriol's computer and says "Don't worry, I can see they still love you all the same, Sakura-chan, there's no problem about it!" and then she spots Flight among the deck. Sakura confirms happily that it's still here and Eriol says "it's a testament to its perseverance!".

And then, Sakura wants to talk to Eriol about Akiho and Kaito too......but we're not allowed to hear it yet, because we only see Sakura nodding and "uh-uh"-ing at the phone and then Kero warns her that she's going to be late for school, so our girl hurriedly hangs up with her friends abroad.

Her dear small glutton guardian tells her to not push herself since she barely woke up yesterday, and when Sakura goes to pick the pin she wants to use today in the jewelry box (it's the pin Yukito gave her as a present in chapter 1!), she picks up the Star Key. And here, unfortunately, I have to point out the first concrete translation difference of this chapter in a scene that many were waiting for:

ENG: "This key....I wonder if it'll leave someday, too. To go to where it should be, to the side of the person it chooses to be with"

JP: "This key, too...I wonder if one day it'll go...to the side of the person it should be with"

Now, what irritates me here is that in their usual need to embellish the translation, they added an unnecessary "the person it chooses to be with", which is something they made up because there's no mention of the verb "choosing" or anything like that in Japanese, and so it makes it seem like the key will one day just go away on its own, on its own volition.

Now, this is a VERY important scene because we all know what this is foreshadowing, the transition of the Star Wand from Sakura Kinomoto to the Reborn Sakura Clone in Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle through a dream, that cameo that made us scream all over the world in 2009. That scene was accompanied by a very beautiful and mature speech by Sakura Kinomoto herself, a sign that this "handover" was totally a well pondered choice of Sakura herself, not the key's.

The translation of this scene here in Clear Card tampers with the understanding of the events we got from Tsubasa and it really makes me wonder if the translator knows of this reference at all.....

Continuing on, Sakura goes downstairs and meets Touya having breakfast (and omg Kero goes to him!!! I still can't get used to these two interacting in the open), as usual Touya teases her calling her "monster", to which Sakura stiffens, but she shakes it off to thank her brother, to which he answers "no snacks for four days"!

Sakura at that point gets angry asking why, but he diverts her attention pointing out that she's gonna be late, so the girl bolts out of the door......not hearing her brother saying "that's the amount of days you haven't woken up, you silly!" (and Kero goes along with it).

Now, the ENG translation here interpreted this as a "payback", like Touya isn't going to make her snacks for 4 more days as a "payback" for making him worry like that, and initially I interpreted it like that too. But as I checked the Spanish translation, they interpreted it differently, as if Touya wasn't talking about the snacks that he won't prepare for the next 4 days, but actually the ones Sakura didn't eat during the period in which she was sleeping, and I think they're right because Touya calls Sakura "dummy, silly" so he might be referencing the fact that she misunderstood, here! Anyway, it's not a serious difference but I wanted to report it here anyway.

Sakura finds Syaoran out of her house waiting for her, and we see him all happy and embarrassed to go pick his girl up right outside her house to go to school together 🥰Syaoran got contacted yesterday from her (I don't know why in the ENG there's "last night", it's just "yesterday"), telling him that she was ok now, but of course that wasn't enough for our worrywart prince charming, so he's here this morning to escort her to school! Sakura can't avoid commenting "aw, you were worried about me!" and Syaoran honestly but embarassedly answers "that, and I wanted to see you as soon as possible". Omg these two...flirting like crazy in front of the audience even in the finale!! 😂(well of course!!). As one of my friends reminded me, this line was already said by Syaoran before, when he was revealing the whole truth about the Sakura Cards and was explaining to Sakura that he came back to Japan earlier than scheduled also because he wanted to see her sooner.

After a good dose of blushing which is always good for the health in the early morning, Sakura thanks Syaoran not only for walking her to school, but also for all the rest that he's done. She's clearly referencing the events of 4 days ago, and Syaoran answers that if he helped her even just a little, then he's happy. This vague reference to the events of 4 days ago seems lost in the ENG, as Syaoran casually answers that he's happy if he can help her sometimes (?). 少しでも means "even just a little", not "sometimes".

On the way to school, Sakura says that she already contacted everyone to say that she woke up and to thank them, but she seems to be wanting to go thanking Yukito directly at his house later, also because Nakuru and Suppi are there! As Syaoran adds, Sakura can see Tomoyo and Akiho later at school. Sakura says "...yes" with a slightly sad face because she already knows something about one of them.....

We switch to Yukito's house for the last look at our "snow bunny", still in Nakuru's company (when are they going back to England???) and wondering what kind of sweets should he offer to Sakura today, while Nakuru is hellbent on finally having Sakura call her "Nakuru-chan" today (I told you, she's like a 5 years old girl, she sees herself as a kid like Sakura 😂).

Then, turning suddenly serious, she says to Yukito: "Don't you dare doing anything else that requires a 'payment', understood?", which immediately made me realize that Nakuru remembers about Yukito's pact with the Tsukimine Shrine!! Then, they didn't just recover the memories strictly relating to Akiho!!!

Yukito, with a big smile, says "well...I can't promise you that" which understandably triggers in Nakuru a "Yukito, you're really stubborn!!" from the bottom of her heart! 😂

But there's a kitty sleeping on a cushion (or feigning to?), our dear Suppi who thinks to himself "All of you moon-aligned types are stubborn!!" and let me tell you, this arc showed us ALL the proofs of that! 😂(Yes, Kaito, we're looking at you! 😂😂😂).

Brand New World With You

Homeroom is starting in Sakura's class and Tomoyo makes sure that Sakura will take it easy since this is her first day back at school.

The teacher comes in, and she's already got a news for everyone (and here my heart already knew what it was): Akiho Shinomoto will be transferring away in one month! (Yes! it's Shinomoto again!)

The class is shocked, as Tomoyo is, but Sakura smiles and doesn't look surprised at all...

At lunch, everyone is so sad about Akiho transferring and Chiharu expresses how much she'll miss her, but also Naoko who loses a precious advisor for her scripts and a great actress since she wanted to cast her for the next play, seeing how wonderful she was in "Alice in Clockland". Tomoyo says that the chorus club will miss her too, and Yamazaki comments that Akiho lived in Hong Kong before transferring to Japan, so he asks her if she's still going abroad, even this time around. Akiho confirms, and then remembers that she needs to go to the teacher's room. Sakura insists to accompany her even if Akiho knows the way by now (and here we have a sweet, nostalgic recall to the same scene of the first chapter Akiho appeared in, chapter 7! Even the lines are almost the same). Of course, Sakura insisted because she wants to have a private chat with her....on their way there, she says she heard from Eriol that morning that she would be transferring abroad, but she would like to ask the reason why to Akiho herself.

Akiho says that, after all that happened, that same night she talked to Eriol (she calls him "Hiiragizawa-san" ❤️) for the first time.

He told her that he would be supporting her in any choice or anything she'd want to do from now on (the "anything I would choose" is missing from the ENG translation), and support her even with Kaito's circumstances.

Akiho was told by Eriol that Kaito kept hurting himself the more he used time magic, and that he shouldn't have been in a good condition after messing even with the "forbidden magic"....but apparently, Sakura managed to work a little miracle when she used Rewind on him.

When Sakura brought Kaito back to his original appearance, the pocket watch she used was almost completely repaired and its time stopped, and thanks to that, Kaito's time is stopped too.

I had already noticed that Kaito's life seems to be strictly connected to that pocket watch, as the more damage he took on his body, the more the watch broke. Sooooo in this scene we have some important information:

1- Eriol mentions the time magic Kaito used, how he kept using it and also the effect it would have on him, so it's legit to think that even him recovered the memories of the unrewritten timeline, not only the stuff strictly concerning Akiho.

2- Kaito's life is in a halted state (reminds you of someone?) and this means that his life is not flowing like other people's: he won't age, but his physical condition won't also get worse, as Sakura infers right after. The ENG translation suggests that Kaito won't be feeling any pain at all, but that's not the case: Sakura uses the words もっと辛かったり痛かったり, "more in pain and have a rough time (than this)", so he's still going to feel not so well from time to time, but at least his condition won't get worse than this.

Akiho confirms, and explains that because of this, they're going to look for a magic that will be able to heal Kaito and, in addition to that, a magic that would be able to make his stopped time move forward again. This won't certainly take short time and it won't be easy....but Akiho smiles beautifully while saying that she's sure that there is a book that carries those spells she's looking for.

And then....with a sad smile, she says there's another reason.

And here my heart sinked because I wanted to see her so badly and I got the confirmation she wasn't with them.......😭

I'm talking about Momo, of course, and Akiho agrees with me because the other reason they'll travel around is that she wants to see her beloved Momo and even the "Alice in Clockland" book.

This indeed sounds a lot like the resolutions of the characters of Tsubasa in their own finale, but after all, we've been saying for long time that Kaito and Akiho had many situations paralleling those of the SyaoSaku in TRC.

Akiho, with the most radiant and beautiful smile she's ever had, says that she's sure she'll find so many other books she's never read, beside the ones she'll be looking for.

"Because now I can go wherever I want, whenever I want, all by my own volition. Together with Kaito-san"

Sakura points out that books are, indeed, really special and important to her.

And really, Akiho's smile on this beatiful spread was enough to heal my heart from the disappointment of knowing that Momo wasn't with them, because Akiho really looks happy to start this journey with Kaito...she feels free for the first time ever.

No more clan dictating where she should go or what she should read, at her own expense at that, but also the situation between her and her beloved Kaito found its solution, with her stating loud and clear that even if he's her most important person and he did all of that for her, she's the only one who can decide her own happiness and change her own life. Akiho is finally free from all constraints, both from evil and from love, and honestly it's so comforting to see her so confident and happy.

My True Name Is....

And talking about Kaito, we switch to the Shinomoto mansion, where we see him in bed (he's still recovering - also we see his room for the first time!) and Akiho is telling him of how her friends took the news of her transferring abroad.

She was happy to hear that they're going to miss her, I bet this was the first time that people took any interest in her, so much to get to the point of saying "I'll miss you".....which totally explains why she's glad to hear that. She finally made true friends, here in Tomoeda.

Kaito is pleased to see her happy.

Akiho says that she's going to prepare dinner (my heart got warm thinking that now it's her the one cooking for him and he doesn't protest or anything) and she's going to make the no-fry croquettes that Sakura taught her (remember??? They had dedicated a chapter to that, and they were so important because Akiho learned them precisely for Kaito).

But Kaito kind of "interrupts" her, saying the thing WE ALL were waiting for him to say:

Kaito, JP (lit.): "I'm sorry. For having thought (all that plan) on my own and decided things without your permission. Even though I know that you're someone perfectly capable of writing her own chosen future on her own blank book"

Oooooooh. The feeling of puzzle pieces going to their right place, the sense of accomplishment, the satisfaction in reading these words from him. HE FINALLY UNDERSTOOD. And it took almost k*lling himself and causing to the very person he was trying to make happy an indescribable grief, to come to this point.

What a lack of self-esteem and underlying depression can do.

But thankfully, they all managed to save things at last minute and now he's learned his lesson. So the first thing he does when he's able to, is apologizing to Akiho. But not only that.

Akiho says Kaito's name, probably wanting to answer something in return, but he interrupts her again, saying something I've been dying to hear him say (lately I expressed here and on Twitter my wish to see precisely this scene in the finale):

"That's my alias"

Akiho is shocked at hearing that, and he says, with a serious face, "Can I tell you my true name?"

At this point, I was hollering, I won't really hide it or anything.

If you're CLAMP fans, you probably know how IMPORTANT and VITAL is an information like one's true name, especially for a magician. Yuuko in Holic said that if you give someone your true name, they can take your soul.

And I'm 100% sure that even Akiho knows how important true names are in the magic world, this is something that Momo already mentioned in one of the Drama CDs but here she confirms it herself, saying hesitantly: "Are you sure I should be hearing something so important?"

With the next thing Kaito says, I was almost calling an ambulance.

Heh, I know, this is me, what can I do? Their story got me by the throat and coming to this point is such an achievement, for me. 😅

"I want you to know it"

That あなた between brackets is so powerful. "You, above all".

In that "you" there's all the things he's not saying aloud, how unique and important she is to him. How much he trusts her with the most vulnerable part of himself. How much he's willing to give his entire soul, his everything to her, but this time in the correct way, without damaging anyone.

Akiho must be noticing all of this, because Mokona doesn't allow us to see her face, only her closed hand rising up, but from her ".....okay" I'm sure here she was quite touched.

So Kaito finally proceeds to reveal this secret that everyone was wondering about ever since chapter 51:

"Cristaux. That's my true name".

Cristaux is written with the katakana クリスト (pronounced kurisuto) which has already been misunderstood by many for "Christ" 😂, but thankfully CLAMP have put in the furigana the correct spelling in romaji.

Cristaux is a french word used to indicate crystals. Yes, plural.

So our crazy magician was named after crystals at his birth.

Of course, of course. Isn't crystals the overwhelming theme of this arc, after all? CLAMP made sure to feature some in many many color illustration they've done.

Also, while talking to a friend, I realized that now we might understand a bit better why Kaito made a very pensive face, disguised as Syaoran, when Sakura pointed out in Clockland (ch. 66) that the castle of the Queen had foundations made of crystal........

As usual with CLAMP, we've had the solution to the mystery under our nose the whole time! 😂This feels like Tsubasa 2.0, for real! 😂

It is surely an inusual name, but I mean, it seems many of the names CLAMP choose for their characters aren't that common, after all.

With this reveal, Kaito decided to start anew with Akiho, this time around from a basis of honesty and trust. He's never going to put up masks with her ever again (and even though it's confirmed they still talk in keigo to one another -which is something I've always imagined-, we've seen him using his true pronoun "ore" with her in chapter 78). This is the perfect foundation for a relationship based on communication and trust. Bravo Kaito, you did your homeworks.

Akiho places a hand over her chest, as if the precious name entered her heart, and says something that made me completely melt:

"I've written it on the most important page of my book. So I can never forget it".

This line makes me particularly emotional not only because it sounds SO SWEET, on the verge of flirting, but also because it seems to me like a callback to something that was said in a sadder situation.

Back in chapter 35, when Sakura ended up trapped into Akiho's artifact, she experienced Akiho's past on her skin. The day of the magic ceremony that turned Akiho into an artifact, some people from the clan/Association said "let's engrave all the magical books we can find into this girl's body, so she can never forget them. Just like a blank book".

Back then, these horrible words were used to abuse a poor child, but that child today turned them into the power to choose for herself.

She appropriates the same "book" analogy to turn it into a way for her to choose on her own. Kaito's name is a precious information that she chooses to write on her heart so she can never forget it.

It is a way for her to cope and have a catharsis for her trauma.

I honestly keep getting such wonderful messages from the story of these two characters, and I'll never thank CLAMP enough for creating them.

Kaito smiles softly at Akiho's words.

Then we go back to Sakura, Syaoran and Tomoyo, the "fab 3" who are going back home together, and we get some more information: it seems Eriol called Syaoran too (man, this guy called half the world to give explanations left and right 😂) and told him that he's going to buy Akiho and Kaito's house and look after it for them.

Sakura is really glad to hear that because it means that Akiho's huge collection of books will be safe and guarded in its library.

Tomoyo asks what they're going to do about Akiho's room at the Kinomoto house: in fact, if you look at the first panel of this chapter, you'll see that the additional portion that sprouted on Kinomoto house is still there: this means that Sakura gave everyone back their memories, but that magic didn't affect the discrepancies that arised from the rewriting of their world, hence why Akiho's room is still there.

Sakura talked about it with her dad and they decided they're gonna leave it untouched, as it is, so Akiho can always go back to it at any time. Did I cry at this? Yes, a little, because this is a sign that the Kinomotos will still keep considering her one of the family even if she'll be away, even if she'll have her life with Kaito, and I couldn't ask for anything better, for my sweet Akiho. It is so important for her to keep the bonds she created over time and know that now she's also got a network of people there for her. A second family where to turn to.

Sakura's having a real hard time accepting that Akiho will go away, and her smile becomes sad, before hugging Tomoyo and crying out "But I'll still miss her so much!!" 🥹poor Sakura 🥹I know, it's always so sad when someone that important to you leaves...

You'll Be Together Forever!!

One month passes by, and we can see some sakura flowers starting to bloom, this means we're at the end of March (and so we were in February before, just like I imagined). School year must be over pretty soon.

It's the big day, the day of departure for Akiho and Kaito, and Sakura+Syaoran went to see them off. Have you spotted it, on Sakura's scarf? Yes, that's the pin shaped like a teddy bear, the same Kaho gave her as a present and that she was wearing in the OG manga during the run at the bus stop to tell her feelings to Syaoran!

Akiho thanks Sakura for coming so early in the morning, and Sakura says she absolutely wanted to be there to see them off, actually she apologizes for making them delay their departure due to this meeting. Akiho is dressed with a cute outfit that is very remiscent of the one she's wearing in the color page of chapter 79.

A little separated from them to give their privacy, we see Kaito and his big suitcase, standing next to Syaoran. OMG it's so inusual to see them like that!!

Then, Kaito says "Time magic....I can teach it to you, if you ever want to use it". Syaoran is very surprised to hear that, and Kaito says that when he was still in the dragon form, he heard him apologizing to Sakura for not being able to use that magic because he hadn't learned it yet, remember?? 🥹

And Kaito just offered himself as a teacher, surely as a way to thank him for everything he's done to save him and Akiho.

But not only that: in a very sweet panel, he says he knows Syaoran won't use it in an inappropriate way, and I can totally hear that implied "as opposed to me". Oh yes I hear it loud and clear by the way this is phrased in Japanese. 😁

Then, he happily takes out his phone and asks him to exchange contact numbers, because they can be convenient for any occurrence! I feel like that was a good idea because they're surrounded by magic matters so much, it's always good to be able to count on the experience and knowledge of other magicians.

We see Syaoran being a bit perplexed at the request, but then reluctanctly (?) takes out his phone 😂oh lord his reaction is so funny....and this is also another proof that the characters remember what happened before, because Syaoran could have this reaction only for that reason 😂😂😂

While looking at them interacting so funnily, Akiho takes the chance to get closer to Sakura and whisper a very important information to her (it came!!! it came for her too!! I KNEW IT!! It's not WHAT I imagined but I've been saying forever that this would come 😂):

Akiho, JP & ENG: "My real name...is Cosmos"

What you guys can't see if you're reading the ENG version or any other language, is the duality of Akiho's true name here.

It's actually written in Japanese kanji, but the furigana that tells how to pronounce it are katakana for "Cosmos".

So it's like this:

Japanese name: 秋桜 (pronounced Akizakura, it's how Cosmos are called in Japanese)

Furigana (reading): コスモス (Cosmos)

It's not uncommon to find the Cosmos flowers being called directly with their katakana spelling, in Japanese.

All of this makes total sense for Akiho because her favorite flower is a specific type of Cosmos, the Chocolate Cosmos! They say they really smell like chocolate! So, just like Sakura, she's got the same name of her favorite flower.

But this duality of her name also allows Akiho to say what she's about to say:

Akiho, JP: "When we met for the first time, I was happy to learn I had one same character in my name as yours!"

I'm glad to see that more or less all the foreign translations did their best to explain the trick of the kanji, adding an explanation in the bubbles (they were big enough, thankfully). The ENG for example talked about "sharing a name" but Akiho here is meaning more "sharing a character" of the japanese name.

Sakura is of course really honored and happy to hear that, and thanks her for sharing such an important detail about herself.

And now, hahaha.....comes the part where I laughed SO, so much, because while to some it might sound strange for Akiho to do something like this, to me it isn't strange at all! Cause she's like that, her personality is far stronger than most think...

Our little mischievous Akiho here reveals to Sakura, still whispering, that she isn't going to share her real name with Kaito yet, because she's still a bit upset with him!! 😂😂😂

Oh lord, Akiho....oh dear....you have all the right to still be a bit upset, make him work hard to get such an important information from you!! 😂 I can't believe right now we have Kaito basically in Akiho's hands while Akiho, the one who seemed the most in love out of the two, is actually still withholding that from him! 😂😂😂 aaaaahhh trust CLAMP to always give you something interesting....this is totally in line with how I perceived her personality. 🤭I loved it!

Kaito needs to be really, really careful from now on! She's not gonna take any crap from him! 😂

And now I have to warn you because precisely as we reach the very last line Sakura will say in this arc, there is going to be another translation mistake, which I consider far worse than the other one I pointed out. I think getting it wrong precisely at the most important emotional point ruined a job that wasn't overall so bad, with this chapter (compared to others....).

Sakura, smiling, supports Akiho's idea, saying "Sounds good!", and then, utters the very last line of the arc:

ENG: "After all, we have a long future together ahead of us!"

JP: "After all, you'll be together forever from now on!"

I think you can easily guess why this translation mistake irritated me so much. I've checked the other translations and the Spanish one, the one I trust the most, agrees with me, just like the French one.

This translation is a failure for two reasons:

it failed to convey the fact that Sakura here is using almost exactly the same words she used in the OG manga at the end of volume 12, when she ran into Syaoran's arms, saying that they would be together forever from that moment on. I think iconic lines like these should be translated in the way the readers know them from the previous work, otherwise it's useless. You don't get the reference. In Japanese, back in volume 12 of the OG manga, it was "kore kara wa zutto issho da yo!" while here it is "kore kara wa zutto issho nandakara". And there is a reason for that.

this translation inexplicably made it about all of them, when Sakura was talking specifically about Akiho and Kaito instead. That "nandakara" at the end suggests that this sentence is strictly related to the one that came right before, "sounds good", as an answer to Akiho's plan to withhold her true name from Kaito for a while. Sakura here is simply saying that Akiho's idea sounds ok to her because those two will be together forever from now on, so she'll have all the time of this world to tell him eventually her true name, when she feels ready. Also, in Sakura's words, there's a deeper meaning: it's the last wish of happiness for those two, which comes from her own lived experience. At the end of volume 12 we saw Sakura uttering those same words, in her happiest moment of reunion with Syaoran...Sakura knows that happiness, the happiness of reuniting and be able to stay all the time with the person you love the most. This is the same thing she's wishing for those two right now, with these words. To be together forever and savor that same happiness she's living herself everyday. But if the translation makes it about all four of them, or even just about Sakura and Akiho, this underlying message, this last parallel between the two pairs is completely gone. Also, what's the sense in saying "we have a long future together ahead" if Kaito and Akiho are leaving?? It doesn't make sense to me. They once again managed to remove any hint of Kaito and Akiho being destined to be together for life, and bent the phrase to include everyone, just because they could. I find that quite disrespectful in my opinion.

Anyway, if you made it this far in reading the post, you now know how that line should actually be. I feel so embittered and disappointed that this happened precisely at the end...

But this time, as opposed to the OG manga, there's one more page to bring this arc to a closure: we can see the back of the new empowered Sakura Card (on the Card there's a mix of both the Star circle and the Dream circle), and the text reads:

JP, lit.: "When all the Cards are gathered, that's the beginning that comes from an end. A beginning to move on"

You have surely recognized it , this is exactly the same page that appeared at the very beginning of this arc, it's just that back then we had a Sakura Card's back, a more unsettling background, and lots of blank cards floating. Right now we have the back of the empowered Sakura Cards, a more serene background and instead of the blank cards, we have cherry blossom petals! ❤️

But most importantly, the sentence slightly changed too, communicating to all the readers that from the end of all the tribulations that our characters went through in this Clear Card Arc, they finally managed to move onto a happier life.

I think it's very beautiful how CLAMP decided to conclude this story, with a message of hope that not all endings are necessarily something bad, but they can simply hide behind them the beginning of something new and more positive.

Lord knows how much I needed to be reminded of this, in this moment of my life.

And surely this is also true for the end of this beloved series for many people around the world: after 7 years and half it's so hard to say goodbye to such a beloved story, but CLAMP want to give us one last present before saying goodbye to it for an indefinite period!

On the right side of the Japanese last page (this was not translated in the ENG one) we find the announcement that the April issue of Nakayoshi on sale on March 1st 2024 will bring us a special chapter of Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card! Precisely one month before the release of volume 16! There's no info about how long it's gonna be, but anything is strongly welcome to say goodbye in a more gradual way...I wonder what it'll be about? This can be literally anything!! I would love for them to feature a situation in the future, rather than in the past....

Beware, because I've heard that Anime News Network translated this as a "special arc" in their news and that caused a ruckus...I've already tried to warn people on Twitter that's not correct, "tokubetsuhen" is the same term they used for the special short chapters they have published till now.

And so...it ends. We've reached the end!! Omg! I still can't register it fully....🙈

I will write some short additional comments about the chapter here but you'll have to wait for another, separate post to have my impressions and commentary on the entire Clear Card Arc.

I just want to say that this finale didn't feature everything I hoped/wanted to see, but other things were definitely granted.

It's just impossible to make everyone happy so I completely understand that.

And even though I'm truly disappointed about Momo and the choice to make her leave her two kids like that, I feel overall this disappointment doesn't stain my appreciation for this finale.

The things I wanted to see and got, the general happy and relaxed atmosphere, seeing all four of them so friendly with eachother, Sakura's final blessing with those words are enough to make me feel still quite satisfied with the finale.

Also, this feels so much more open than the OG manga. A lot more open. There are tons of elements one could grasp to in case they wanted to make a spin-off, or feature some of these plot threads as a cameo in another work. Akiho and Kaito's situation in particular, with their travels around the world, seems to be screaming "you'll see us again soon". I don't know if I'm just delusional but I've seen so many people saying the same.

And I have to say that despite my first choice was for Akiho and Kaito to stay in Tomoeda, they gave me enough good reasons to justify them departing again. I did, in fact, predict that an eventual resume of their travels could be plot related (if they had to continue escaping the Squids' radar or if they had to find a way to fix Kaito's situation).

Plus, Akiho seems so happy and free. How can I rebel against that, when they depict her so happy of her choice?

Also, nice of Eriol to step up and help those two. He's the other poweful and experienced magician who can put at their service all of his knowledge.

And then, Kaito's character development. Even here, I felt like I would've wanted him to say more, but then I remembered that Ohkawa in a Space long time ago had already said "I would want the readers, once it's over, to re-read this trying to understand 'why this character acted in this way?' " and it was clear that she was referring to Kaito. So, not exposing in detail Kaito's heart and the motivations that brought him to this point is totally intentional. She wants us to get there on our own. After all, she gave us another huge hint in this chapter, by making him reveal his true name to Akiho. I can only be grateful for that, especially for how he worded it.

Cristaux and Cosmos...while I'm really happy they have the same initials, I'm still trying to get used to those new names! 😂even though I know they'll keep using their aliases so it's not a big problem, we'll keep calling them Kaito and Akiho!

(And yes, I'm a bit disappointed that Akiho's true name isn't Alice! 😂)

It was nice to see SyaoSaku blushing and flirting in this finale, especially now that Touya gave his blessing to Syaoran, he can go pick her up for school when he wants!! 😂 I'm sure we'll get more SyaoSaku fluff in the special chapter, as this finale was mostly used to wrap up other stuff.

As I said, I adored the few panels of interaction between the two Moon Boys, Akiho's mischievous prank to Kaito....yes, I still have lots to be grateful for, in this finale.

I think this post just won the record for the longest one, so let me just take this space really quick before wrapping up to thank all of you who have read my posts, shared them, supported me, chatted with me about the story, and overall contributed with interesting discussions in this little personal corner. I would've never imagined, not even in my wildest dreams, that the existence and content of this blog one day would've reached even CLAMP, and this will stay as one of my biggest gratifications, especially cause they seemed to appreciate the effort. I just wish their story was treated better by some official translations.

I tried to do whatever I could to spread warnings about heavy translation mistakes, in addition to my interpretation of the story as I was reading it and analyzing it, since I've seen it helped many people understanding the story better and coming to terms with frustrations they had about it.

Clear Card Arc is undoubtedly more complex and requires a lot more of attention than the OG manga.

But I'm positive that re-reading everything in one go might help A LOT in that regard, maybe keeping my translation posts beside you....so I urge everyone to re-read the story when you have time, because it's worth it. Really.

That said, I'm not going anywhere for the foreseeable future: of course I'll comment the special chapter, but I also have in store the "Clear Card Trivia" series of posts, a post with the timeline of the events and a master post about my own review of the entire Clear Card Arc. And then, there's the season 2 of the anime too! You can bet I'll be here to comment on it every week!!

In the meantime, I want to thank all of you again for your patience, for reading me till now, and I also want to thank once again CLAMP-sensei for the wonderful sequel they brought to us in these past 7 years. ありがとうございます 🙏

See you soon!!

#card captor sakura #cardcaptor sakura #clear card arc #ccsakura #ccs spoilers #clamp #sakura card captor #sakura kinomoto #syaoran li #akiho shinomoto #yuna d. kaito #chapter 80 #translation differences

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ronniaugust · 11 months

Text

How To Write Good Dialogue (Part 1)

I'm gonna start this by saying I'm not trying to sound like a know-it-all. I am just tired of posts like these being absolutely fucking useless. I am aware this is basically me screaming into a void and I’m more than okay with that.

This guide is meant for intermediate screenwriters, but beginners are also absolutely welcome. :)

(about me)

-♠︎-♠︎-♠︎-♠︎-

I've noticed a rise in film students who want to make films that have no dialogue. Probably after your professor showed you Doodlebug, right? Fuck that.

I'll make another post about writing a short film, but all you need to know is: Don't waste the audience’s time. Most of these no-dialogue shorts have very little substance and take way too long to tell the shortest possible story. Not a good idea.

Useless Dialogue

Plain and simple, don't write useless dialogue. Useless dialogue is dialogue that just doesn't fucking matter. Dialogue matters by having ✨subtext.✨

What is subtext? Subtext is the meaning behind the action. That's it.

If I tell you that I love you and I got big doe eyes while I say it, it means I love you. If I tell you I love you through a clenched jaw without looking at you, I don't necessarily love you right now.

Simple, right? Great.

Now think about the subtext behind every line. Does your character mean what they're saying? Are they doing it to get what they want? What is going through their mind as they say it? As long as you know your character, you’ll have these answers ready to go. If you don’t, you’ll figure it out eventually. Just keep writing.

When you write your character walking into a Starbucks and saying, "One venti iced coffee," does that do something? Why do I need to see someone's boring Starbucks order? Do I need to know that your character's boring? Why are you writing a boring character? [Of course, in the rare situation where this is some revealing clue to the massive crime investigation, then it makes sense.]

Useless dialogue is any dialogue that has no meaning or purpose in your script. Delete and move on. You don't need to write entire conversations or scenes that bore us, just write what we care about.

I took a class once where my professor called a version of this "trimming the fat." Get us into your scene and out of your scene in as little time as it takes to have it achieve its full purpose in the script.

[P.S. You don’t “inject” subtext into your lines. Idk who started that vernacular in subtext teachings but I hate it.]

Show vs. Tell

I remember a glorious fight I got into with a Redditor last year about show vs. tell… TL;DR: Dialogue is “show” if you write it with intention and subtext. If someone says that dialogue is inherently “tell,” they’re wrong and can go fuck themselves.

Dialogue that is “tell” is expositional dialogue. But, hot take: Exposition isn't just in dialogue. It’s also those annoying clichés that make you roll your eyes in the theater (which we just call clichés and not exposition). I’m sure every professor I’ve had will disagree with this and then get me into a long conversation about it, but let’s ignore that for right now.

Have you ever seen a movie where a character rubs an old, worn-out photo of a young girl while looking depressed? That's exposition. That character has a dead daughter. No shit.

Clichés are incredibly annoying. We all know that. Assume that any cliché you see - in this context - is exposition and try your best not to write it. (Tropes are different and sometimes necessary, so I’m not talking about that.)

Point blank: When you have subtext in your lines, they are "show,” not “tell.”

Before moving on, I'll bring up that while technically the dead daughter photo is subtextual, it is as close to the character saying “My daughter is dead,” as you can get. Don't treat the audience like we're fucking stupid.

The First 15

If you don’t know what the Inciting Incident is, please look up “3 Act Structure” before reading this.

The first 15 pages of your script is the part that comes before the Inciting Incident. This is the part you want to get right because, although people probably won’t leave the theater, they will absolutely find something else on the streaming service they’re using. The people making said movie will also just toss your script in the trash before it’s even produced, so it's best to get it right.

Dialogue in the first 15 generally follows the same rules, but carries a heftier additional rule. All dialogue in the first 15 minutes must, must, must tell us something about your character.

Remember when I talked about that boring Starbucks order? Why is your character boring? Don’t write that. Don’t write nice characters. Or pleasant characters. Or friendly characters. No one cares.

You want empathy. This does not mean “relatable.” It means “empathetic.” There is a difference.

I personally relate to Vi in Arcane, but I empathize with Theo in Children of Men. Both are excellent, but one personally resonates a bit more with me. You cannot write a character that deeply resonates with every single person, it is impossible.

With each line of dialogue, you must be saying something about your character that generates the empathy. Instead of telling you how to do this, I’ll direct you to a movie that will do better than an explanation: Casablanca.

Watch how Rick interacts with the world. What kind of man is Rick? Watch what he does, what he says, and how he treats people and himself. Watch that empty glass on the table. Watch his contradictions. Everything. Those things matter and it’s what makes you want to watch Rick for the entire duration of Casablanca.

“Realism”

This is maybe more directorial, but make your characters human enough, not too human.

Too human is when you’ve tried your best to capture all those little life-like speech patterns. You know, the ones that no one fucking cares about.

If your character coughs, they’re sick. If they clear they’re throat, they’re uncomfortable. If a bruise isn’t going away, they’re going to die. Simple.

Every moment on screen matters. Everything the audience sees is meant to lead them to a conclusion. Not the conclusion, just a conclusion.

The realism you want is in the choices your character makes, not how many times they say “Uh,” in a sentence.

Conclusion

Dialogue matters and should not be treated lightly or without care. Once you have this all engrained in your mind, dialogue should become effortless.

If you want an excellent way to think about this, Robert McKee's Story has an excellent chapter that helped clarify this all for me. Here's an excerpt and the context.

Warning, spoilers for Chinatown.

"If I were Gittes at this moment, what would I do?"

Letting your imagination roam, the answer comes:

"Rehearse. I always rehearse in my head before taking on life's big confrontations."

Now work deeper into Gittes's emotions and psyche:

Hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel, thoughts racing: "She killed him, then used me. She lied to me, came on to me. Man, I fell for her. My guts are in a knot, but I'll be cool. I'll stroll to the door, step in and accuse her. She lies. I send for the cops. She plays innocent, a few tears. But I stay ice cold, show her Mulwray's glasses, then lay out how she did it, step by step, as if I was there. She con-fesses. I turn her over to Escobar; I'm off the hook."

EXT. BUNGALOW-SANTA MONICA

Gittes' car speeds into the driveway.

You continue working from inside Gittes' pov, thinking:

"I'll be cool, I'll be cool ..." Suddenly, with the sight of her house, an image of Evelyn flashes in your imagination. A rush of anger. A gap cracks open between your cool resolve and your fury.

The Buick SCREECHES to a halt. Gittes jumps out.

"To hell with her!"

Gittes SLAMS the car door and bolts up the steps.

Story by Robert McKee, pg 156

The context of this page is McKee's way of explaining how to write characters. I found it very helpful.

-♠︎-♠︎-♠︎-♠︎-

Thanks for reading! I probably forgot something, so I made this a “part 1.”

I hope this helps someone since I’m really tired of finding short films on YouTube that are all fucking silent. The few who have done it well have been copied to death, so please write some dialogue. I promise you it’s so much better if you do.

Asks are open! :)

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faulty-writes · 2 months

Note

Oh oh I’ve got one! Vash Stampede flirting/dating a shy reader headcannons ♥️ please and thank you (sorry had to resend bc I was afraid my asks wasn’t sent)

It's cool dear anon. I'm so excited, my very first Trigun Stampede request! Please let me know how I did, I adore Stampede Vash but I absolutely love the Vash from the 1998 TV series. Not to say the Vash from Stampede isn't loveable, he's downright adorable. But I don't know, right now I'm a sucker for 98' Vash. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this request and please don't hesitate to request more if you happen to like it <3

"Come on needle noggin!" Wolfwood snapped after punching Vash in the head. "Just go over there and say hello! It's not like your dumbass hasn't talked to worse. You've stared at them enough to make a point!" While Vash didn't necessarily agree with Wolfwood, it was true that he had fixated on you recently.

"H-hi there!" were the first words he had spoken to you after casually walking up to the counter of the saloon you worked in. You remember how bright and friendly his smile was but how you stepped back out of instinct. "Oh, shy, right? S-sorry, I didn't mean to disturb you! Heh, heh," he awkwardly waddled back to his seat knowing the last thing he needed to cause was trouble for you.

His second attempt started with "Hi there, heh…just thought I'd try to talk to you again." He chuckled as he laid his hands on the counter. "I heard your name is Y/n," he smiled sheepishly, "what a pretty name." Maybe all you needed was a compliment to make you smile, he'd sure love to see that.

"I don't know, I mean they seem pretty shy. I wouldn't want to push them out of their comfort zone, you know? That's kind of not nice," he said, politely turning down Wolfwood's idea to ask you out. "Pff, suit yourself," he mumbled in reply, "but wait too long and someone else is going to snatch them up and you won't like that."

"Hey…it's me again," he said on a quiet night when the saloon was empty of customers. "Sorry if I've been bothering you lately, I know you're kind of shy but…" he chuckled and rubbed the back of his head. "I'd be interested in…well t-talking to you, heh. I'm willing to listen to anything you'd like to talk about!" Everyone deserved that, right? And since you were busy dealing with customers all day, he was sure you had a lot to say.

You didn't realize his flirting attempts were flirting attempts at all because well, they didn't exactly make sense. "You know…I really admire the way you fill the glasses up," he chuckled. "You're always so careful to make sure the foam doesn't spill over the top," he smiled at you, hoping you'd say something in return, but you just thought his words were as strange as he was.

After a while, you grew accustomed to his warm smile and gentle voice so much that you looked forward to his visits. You also started to get to know his friends, who seemed a bit on edge but friendly. Vash noticed this slight increase in confidence and couldn't be happier for you.

His idea of asking you out was to suggest something quiet to do together to make you feel safe and comfortable. Of course, you never imagined it would end with the two of you staring at the five moons that hovered in the sky.

It surprised you that Vash always leaned close when you spoke and maintained eye contact. Of course, you weren't used to having someone's full attention. But it was still comforting to know that he was always interested in what you were doing or saying.

"Oh, heh sorry! I d-didn't mean to, really um..." The first time the two of you had fallen asleep together, you woke up to Vash's arms securely wrapped around you as if he were afraid that you'd get up and leave in the middle of the night. Of course, after hearing a few things about his past it was understandable why he felt so scared to lose you.

"Sorry…I guess I couldn't help myself, heh…" His face was completely flustered after he kissed you, as was yours. "I…understand if you don't feel the same way, not many people would want to be with…Vash the Stampede. Heh, the Humanoid Typhoon." He nervously chuckled before asking, "S-so…how do you feel?"

"What?!" Meryl snapped, grabbing your shoulders. "I'm happy for you but are you sure this is what you really want?" she asked. "Why don't you let them make their own mistakes, little miss?" Wolfwood said, stepping between you two. "If they want to date needle noggin, then that's on them…" Although he knew that if Vash messed up, he'd receive a beating.

"Ta-da!" Vash exclaimed as he uncovered your eyes to reveal the ruined city of July leaving you in shock. Why would he insist the two of you come here? "I know it's a little weird, but I thought I'd bring you here for our date because..." he reached over to hold your hand. "I think it's about time this place had good memories again."

He always stuck to his belief in protecting something more than anything else in this world: you. This meant he'd step in front of you whenever suspicious characters were around, or people looked at you the wrong way. Blocking their view of you and being ready for action if the situation escalated was something he was all too willing to do.

#vash x you #vash x reader #vash the stampede x reader #trigun x reader #trigun x you #faulty writes: trigun: 24 #faulty writes: trigun: headcanons: 24 #faulty writes: vash: 24 #faulty writes: vash: headcanons: 24

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skyeslittlecorner · 3 months

Text

Orphan from Hades, outcast from Gehenna

I've wanted to do this for a long time, and I finally got around to it. Here I collect all the details that this sweet lamb has in common with Hades. ...aaand some rambling about him and his Solomon thing, because why not.

Yes, I miss him very much. Yes, I did it just to look at his beautiful face. Get ready for a collection of screenshots.

We all know that Sitri is a little... ok, very delulu about Solomon. As strange as it may sound, this is the most superficial of problems. This is eye-catching. But underneath the irritation he causes there is much, much more, and it is not good for him.

In the first part we will go through the facts and his connection with Hades, the second part is my long rant. You will have marked what is where.

PS. Sitri lovers, don't worry. I belong to this nation myself, it's not a hate rant.

Jealousy and distrust

Do I even need to mention it? He's regulary call out for this. And this is the jealousy he feels especially towards the Solo MC. During the Halloween event, he was even called out that, paraphrasing, "at this rate, maybe you really should leave Gehenna and go back to Hades". Unfortunately, I don't have this one screenshot, so you'll have to take my word for it.

Not only MC is a person which makes him jealous, but also his king. Offtop, Satan knows this and really enjoys irritating him. Apart from Sitri, MC and Leviathan (so probably all others kings too), I don't remember Satan trying to annoy anyone so purposefully, but it may be me just not remembering.

Additionally, constant doubts. Sitri has always distrusted Leamas, and if it weren't for Satan, he would have killed him on the spot. The first thing he does when Marbas appears and threatens us is pulls out a gun and puts it to his head (he is justified here because the kings did the same). In the Christmas story, whenever he sees Gabriel, he immediately throws knives at him.

Who else kills everyone who has even a 1% chance of threatening Hell?

Let alone the thing that they know and remember each other.

It doesn't mean that they knew each other very well or that they were friends. But, for example, Sitri and Bimet did not know each other. Since both Sitri and Leviathan remember each other even after some time, Sitri must have spent a lot of time in Hades. No wonder he took over their vibe.

Also, a little spoiler of ch5, just as Sitri only called us by our name when we drifted off into the land of sleep, Leviathan in his H-scene only softened when we were so unconscious that we could no longer remember it.

Weapon of choice

I have already addressed this topic here. There's no point in me dwelling on this too much. His weapon is straight from Hades. We mark this point off as obvious.

Mark & clothes

Here's a slightly more interesting thing, I admit that I noticed it only later. The tattoo on Sitri's neck. We see that it is a pentagram assigned to Satan and Gehenna, but I want to point a little curiosity.

At one point, the Sitri's symbol on his neck and Leviathan's symbol in his eye were the same. Also, very distinctive - Levi's symbol on someone's neck.

The second non-obvious thing is his clothes. Sitri is the only noble of Gehenna wearing all black. Nobles from Hades also wear black. Does this refer to this? Not necessarily, because we know that Satan's closest commandos wear dark uniforms the same as him. Sitri as a noble and Satan's right-hand devil may combine these two features.

Some headcanons and rambling

The part where I tried to be objective and draw facts ends here. Now let me happily chatter on how I interpret his behavior

bUT FIRST, I still have some unused screenshots, and how can I miss such an opportunity? PB why did you create something so beautiful?

My aesthetic sense is satisfied~

So. Let's go to my ramble. This sweet creature has huge abandonment issues. He is intelligent, and even Ppyong is confused and explains that Sitri is usually really smart, but with us he goes crazy. Besides, you can see that he behaves quite normally around others (the only exception, he can sometimes become detached around Satan).

As for our name, he knows it, and he is aware that we are not Solomon. The famous words at the end of his H-scene. So why does he call us Solomon? Because he is unable to come to terms with his departure? The easiest excuse is that he misses him and projects him onto us. That Solomon never left them and those years never existed. That Sitri doesn't care about us, that he only really wants Solomon.

But I like to think of a slightly different version.

To Hades belong the orphans, to Gehenna the outcasts. And Sitri belongs to both. We don't know what he went through, we don't know what's going through his mind, but we see his behavior towards others. He is calm and perfectly controls his emotions even during his H-scene. He is smart and morbidly suspicious, what we see a lot. Finally, he must have everything under control, to such an extent that in some matters even Satan does not try to fight him (the most striking example is that he is the only one who gives Satan blood).

When he saw us, of course, he felt the familiar spirit of Solomon. But what he really liked was us. His emotions were out of control and it scared him. So he dealt with it the only way he knew how. He can't afford to trust again and be let down again, so he forced his true emotions that he felt towards us into the "it's just love for Solomon" box. Because he has already experienced mourning for Solomon and he can cope with it somehow, maybe not well, but enough to function on a daily basis. If he was rejected again, he wouldn't be able to cope. And he can't afford it.

He is Satan's henchman, prince of Hell and The Guardian of Gehenna. He can't show weakness. He can't break down. So the defending remnants of his sanity did what they could to maintain the fragile status quo.

Does he know what he is doing is wrong? Of course. Does he realize that he is hurting us? Of course. But he is one of the highest generals in a country at war, he has to deal with all the nobles, he has to support the king, he has to be ready to fight at any moment. And his Hades mentality makes him willing to sacrifice his happiness (and last crumbs of sanity) and our liking for him to protect his king and country.

Emotions cannot be controlled. But he tries nevertheless. If he didn't feel such strong emotions towards us, he wouldn't try to deny them. If someone is traumatized, they do not always know how to properly cope with it, and his mechanism is not healthy, it harms himself and us. But what else is he supposed to do? We know the approach in Gehenna. Only strength counts. Besides, he is the "responsible one" who would listen to him and help him? We? The moment we deny him, his psyche will collapse like a house of cards.

Maybe I'm exaggerating, overinterpreting, or it's just a running joke. But after how well-developed the characters are so far, I don't want to believe that his brain just turns off with the snap of his fingers.

After all this, I only have one question.

Sitri. Baby. Who hurt you?

#whb #what in hell is bad #whb sitri #woah I didn't expect it to be such a long talk #I really missed him #maybe I'm oversensitive because I'm a writer myself #I would really love to dig under his beautiful head and find out what he thinks #he has such potential to be a complex character and that's what makes him so fascinating to me #my delusion is as strong as his thats why we should kiss

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terminatorbuns · 2 years

Text

Frye is the new Marina: Exploring Frye and Minority Anxiety (An essay by @Terminatorbuns)

I'm gonna preface this with something very important: Frye is best girl. Fight me, I write lore essays. I wrote that other essay on Deep Cut and I've continued to obsess over them since, especially on Frye, who's been an extremely interesting character for me to analyze.

We know Frye, she's the chipper Inkling idol partner to the more sophisticated Octoling Shiver. There's obvious parallels to be made with the previous idol group, Off the Hook, since Frye is like the energetic Pearl and Shiver is like the cool Marina. And uhh .. that's probably all there is to it, essay's over, everyone go home.

No but seriously, what I want to share instead today is the personal, alternative interpretation I arrived at after obsessively overthinking the situation since release. It's not fully supported by canon, but this is a reading of Frye constructed from the most subtle lore details a Frye-obsessed lore nerd could find, and I hope to at least highlight some lore elements the community might have missed. I want to demonstrate the layers upon layers of complexity that can be read into Frye as a character, and why I care so fucking much.

Frye isn't the new Pearl, she was the new MARINA this whole time and it took me months to see it. Yes, it has absolutely everything to do with their skin color. Splatoon's world is designed with real life racial diversity in mind and, intentionally or not, are also influenced by real life racial dynamics in turn. Like Marina, the analysis of Frye absolutely OPENS UP if we examine her through the lens of her real life racial status, we start to infer stuff about her motivations, her fears, her secret needs and wants, EVERYTHING is on the table. Good news for Shiver fans, I can't talk about Frye without digging into her relationship with Shiver (platonic or otherwise) so that's going to happen too. We need to talk about our precious brown baby.

1. Frye the Minority

To state the obvious, Frye's ethnicity is South Asian, probably India. The Splatoon world doesn't really have a Squid India in it but it's clear what her real life inspirations are. She's very brown, she wears Aladdin pants and mango chutney on her head. She's got a snake charmer flute thing going on and all her musical motifs are played with South Asian instruments. It's a bit on the nose.

Thing is, Splatsville is a Japanese city in design. Splatsville is called Bankara city in Japanese, it's named after a literal Japanese fashion movement and the visual design elements of Splatsville are reminiscent of a rural Japanese city. Splatsville takes little visual inspiration from South Asia, and that makes sense since Splatoon is made by Japanese devs who would be most familiar with Japan.

The consequence of this is that Frye stands out as a uniquely brown-coded person in a world where nobody else looks like her. Not even playable inklings with dark skin look like her, what with her teeth and her pointy mask and her big forehead. It's worth noting that the Octoling narrative in Splatoon 2 takes inspiration from the experience of Black Americans, and the dark skinned Octolings of Inkopolis are mostly coded black, not South Asian. Even if the racial identities of squids don't necessarily match real world racial identities, Frye is recognizably a minority both visually and culturally in-universe. This is reminiscent of Marina, who was one of the only visible Octolings in Inkopolis until playable Octolings were formally implemented.

It's worth noting now that Shiver, in contrast, fits in perfectly: she's a traditionally attractive Japanese girl (we're talking about fem Shiver right now, bear with me) in a Japanese city. Even though Octolings should be an in-universe minority, and even though she too has somewhat unconventional features, the idea that she's a minority just doesn't track visually. We'll circle back to this and discuss why it doesn't really work for her character narratively either.

2. Frye the Villain

I've covered this in my previous essay but Frye is a stage villain by trade, and her style of performance is inspired by Kabuki. The Japanese inspiration makes sense, even though she's an ethnic minority her sunken scrolls suggests that her family is well established in the region, meaning they immigrated a long time ago and Frye's grown up in Splatsville. Frye is a Japanese national with roots in South Asian culture, it's understandable that she has adopted mannerisms of both cultures.

But like, why a villain? And what's the deal with Marina also representing Team Villain in the heroes vs villains Splatfest? I was wondering if there was a connection there until it hit me, Frye's TOO BROWN to apply for hero roles. In real life, the Japanese entertainment industry famously has problems with colorism and racial representation. Even darker skinned Japanese people have trouble landing gigs as leading heroes because the industry favors light skin, and Frye is both very brown and not conventionally attractive by Japanese standards. Film industries in the West have very similar problems with colorism so it's a recognizable problem to western audiences, also. Frye's career choice as a professional villain is informed by the fact that people like her literally cannot land jobs as heroes.

That's not to say Frye resents her role, Frye loves being a villain. Her poses are dynamic, her speeches are charismatic, she's at her happiest when she is playing an antagonist. If you look at her blasting off with her smoke bomb, she has the happiest smile on in direct contrast to Shiver who's comically losing her shit. Thing is, Frye identifies with the underdog villains who never win, because Frye herself struggles in an industry that does not favor her. This also explains her sympathies for the underprivileged, and why she's made it a personal mission to raise money for the poor. Looking back at Splatoon 2, Marina was sympathetic to villains for the same reasons, as an Octoling (and as a black person) that was villainized by the society she lives in.

Frye brings her cultural identity into her performance, where she incorporates traditional South Asian dance and snake/eel charming into her fighting style. She takes her heritage seriously too: where Frye comes off as a clown elsewhere, she's deadly serious when using her culturally inspired techniques in a fight. The fact that she has named choreography for each phase of her fight is proof enough of that. Deep Cut's boss fight theme also opens with South Asian instruments and they are the most prominent thematic element throughout, highlighting the fact that villainy is Frye's domain of expertise, not Shiver's. Frye sees both villainy and her cultural background as core parts of her identity and expresses herself with a combination of both.

3. Frye the loner

Thinking back to Splatoon 2, Marina and Pearl had a very clear extrovert vs Introvert dynamic: Pearl likes networking and building musical connections, and Marina is shy and prefers to hole up in a comfy chair and write music all day. We do in fact see this again in Deep Cut, except Shiver is the extrovert who flourishes in front of an audience or a camera. She's eager to play tableturf with agent 3 because she just likes social interaction and competition. The Anarchy Splatcast version of the Deep Cut theme instead features Japanese instruments, signaling that newscasting in front of a camera is Shiver's area of expertise. Shiver's design and mannerisms also visually invoke that of a Geisha, who are professional entertainers trained in hospitality.

You see where I'm going with this, I hope. In a wild fucking twist, the cheerful energetic Frye is secretly an INTROVERT. Frye's area of expertise is the desert wastelands, she's at her most comfortable when there's almost nobody around. She's happy to be on camera with her friends but she also squirms in her seat, being not completely comfortable. Her go-to stress reliever is fighting salmonids who do not speak, and Shiver tells us that Frye runs away from the group during a Salmon Run shift to fight the bosses. Also, Frye's villain specialty isn't well suited to making friends when she kinda attacks strangers on sight.

Frye's tableturf habits are most revealing because she does not make eye contact with Agent 3 sitting across a table from 3. Frye's zoned out thinking about Big Man and Shiver, her closest friends and the people she's most comfortable around. In the news room Frye's attention is also focused on her friends and rarely makes eye contact with the camera. Without her friends nearby, Frye can actually get a bit lost in a social setting.

This reminds us of Marina who's also shy around people, except Marina's anxieties come from being a literal enemy of the state. Marina actually has quite a few contacts in the Octoling community despite being nervous around Inklings for good reasons. Frye has habits that ACTIVELY avoid people, and currently we're not sure she has ANY friends outside of Deep Cut. There's likely a racial aspect to this, of course, the same cultural biases that prevent Frye from playing hero roles are also likely affecting her ability to connect with new people, and it's not a big stretch to guess how it affects her personal habits. Frye doesn't have Shiver's conventionally good looks, she makes a poor first impression as a pointy big headed brown girl in a Japanese-coded world. This might feel a bit familiar as we've seen a similar process play out in real life since Shiver was a lot more well received at launch and Frye took more time to grow on the fandom.

4. Marina and minority excellence

So we've established some similarities between Frye and Marina in that they are likely both introverts affected by racial anxieties, but it's also worth discussing the ways in which they differ. I feel that Frye and Marina take two different approaches to address their racial anxieties, and this accounts for their very different personalities as characters.

Marina represents a picture perfect image of black excellence on an Octopus. She's a prodigy composer that knows every fucking black music style and a genius engineer and she can even draw manga; girl works three jobs. Marina's approach to her minority status is to work hard to be an exceptional representative of her people in the hopes that it will help them be accepted in Inkling society. She's determined to be presentable to the degree that she will hide some parts of her past (although those parts involved a lot of weapons engineering so maybe it's for the best that she's not proud of that). Also, and this is a very lukewarm take, Marina is hot.

Frye has to take a different approach out of necessity, because Frye is not a genius. As talented as she is, Frye is a more average person with anxieties and flaws that she can't hide, and she doesn't have the talent to excel in multiple fields of expertise or the patience to learn how to present herself in polite society. Rather, Frye channels her flaws into her art: her violent tendencies and her social anxieties both inform her villain performance, giving her a distinct edge and charisma that suits her chosen art form. In Japanese, Frye also speaks with distinct country bumpkin mannerisms which are also associated with low societal status. Thing is, Frye embodies Splatoon 3's theme of Chaos as a non-conformist: she can't succeed by conforming to polite societal standards, so she chooses to promote her own, rough around the edges style as a viable art form.

I'm fascinated with this particular interpretation of Frye, whether or not it was intentional by the original designers at Nintendo, because of how much depth it gives Frye's personality. Not only that, but this version of Frye also creates some interesting implications for her contrasting partner, Shiver.

5. Making sense of Shiver

Shiver's role in Splatoon 3 is rather mysterious when you think about it. Our previous understanding was that Octolings was an oppressed racial underclass that come from the military dictatorship in Octo Canyon and have only been integrated into Inkling society for 2-4 years. And yet, Shiver's family history goes back pretty far with very specific artistic traditions that they've preserved, and she has distinctly different visual features than the Octolings of Octo Canyon. I should also point out that the systematic oppression of Octolings draws heavy parallels to the experiences of Black people in America and Japan, and Shiver is… very not black.

Shiver doesn't really work as an Octoling from Octo Canyon, but she also doesn't have to. The Splatlands is a new region with new history and racial politics, Shiver starts making more sense if we assume that she's been in Splatsville this whole time, and her family simply wasn't living under DJ Octavio's rule. If Shiver's history isn't tied to the Octo Canyon narrative, then we have some very interesting angles to explore through the lens of her IRL racial identity as a Japanese girl and how that effects her design and personality. If we follow this line of logic to its conclusion, we'll start to understand how Shiver is actually the new Pearl.

Shiver as a character design is defined by privilege, or at least, the ILLUSION of privilege (more on this later). She's conventionally attractive by Japanese standards in a Japanese setting, so she has the natural advantages of being a member of the racial majority where Frye does not. Shiver's Japanese dialogue speaks in a very formal theatrical tongue which is… fucking weird admittedly but also a clear allusion to high social status, in the same way people use Shakespearen English to sound fancy as shit. Shiver has the looks and mannerisms of a highly presentable racial default Japanese entertainer and she takes advantage of that to achieve her personal goals.

Shiver's goal is to be on TV. Shiver is Deep Cut's newsroom specialist, she wants to be on camera and to be seen by everyone, she's a little obsessive about attention really. Shiver knows her looks are naturally appealing and wants to be in a format where people can see her face, and she uses stage makeup to accentuate her strengths. This is in direct contrast to Frye who prefers stage performance for smaller, curated audience's, and even then Frye uses a mask to hide her face in battle.

This is where Shiver's relationship with Frye starts to resemble Pearl and Marina. Shiver is perfectly aware of her natural advantages as a fair skinned person and has extended that privilege to include her dark skinned partner. This is similar to the same that light skinned Pearl makes it a mission to promote Marina as a minority artist (Pearl's privilege in this case being mountains of money rather than attractiveness). Even though TV is not Frye's specialty, Shiver insists that Frye (and Big Man) be included because Shiver thinks they deserve a spotlight.

That being said, Shiver's style of partnership differs greatly from Pearl. Pearl has a partner with confidence problems, so Pearl takes a very hands on approach to push Marina to seek out new artistic styles and opportunities because Marina is directionless without guidance. Pearl has high expectations for Marina because Marina is a prodigy who will rise to meet those expectations, and Marina appreciates Pearl's involvement greatly. Marina in turn helps Pearl with her destructive vocals, they fill in each other's weaknesses while working towards a similar goal.

In contrast Shiver takes a hands off approach to Frye. Both Shiver and Frye are confident entertainers in different fields of expertise and do not need external motivation, so they do not need to push each other in the same way Pearl and Marina do. What they instead do for each other is provide safe spaces to participate in each other's art forms without judgment: Frye comes to the TV studio despite being awkward on camera, and Shiver gets to play a villain despite being clumsy and manic on stage. Big Man gets to show up to both despite having little ability in either field.

6. Shiver x Frye

I'm not saying Shiver and Frye have to be a romantic couple, they form an excellent platonic duo dynamic that is just as narratively valuable to the world of Splatoon. I would never be so crass as to suggest that Shiver and Frye should kiss passionately on the mouth. But like, with the information we now have we can dive a little deeper and make some educated guesses on the inner workings of this particular pairing.

Shiver and Frye directly influence each other's personalities, each member of the duo changes when the other is around. Frye becomes softer around Shiver: Frye on her own is tough from a life informed by adversity, she's focused and takes losses with dignity. However, Shiver is using her personal privileges as a light skinned, presentable Japanese girl as a shield for Frye's racial disadvantages to get Frye TV opportunities that Frye would not have had access to alone, and I think Frye appreciates the protection. Frye feels safe enough around Shiver to let her guard down, she feels less pressure to be strong and competent and has an opportunity to be goofier and more vulnerable. This is the Frye we see most often on screen.

Shiver becomes edgier around Frye: Shiver gets to play a villain when treasure hunting with Frye, And we discover that her villain performance is BUCK WILD. This is the second layer of Shiver's personality that I've only alluded to so far, but it's very important to discuss what Shiver gets out of her relationship with Frye.

Shiver's character is about presentation; she has gone to great lengths to learn the behaviors of a traditionally feminine, high class entertainer. She's polite to a fault and extremely particular about her movements both on TV and on a dance stage. There's no reason to believe this is a facade, Shiver has put so much energy into her act that it's more likely that this is Shiver's idealized self, the image she actually wants to present to the world.

What is simultaneously true is that Shiver DOESN'T perfectly conform to her own idealized self image. There's a messier side to Shiver's personality that she tries very hard to hide: she's competitive, petty, and vindictive under specific circumstances, all traditionally unfeminine traits. She's not doing a great job at hiding them either, these traits are part of her personality and slip out despite her best efforts. It's important to consider that Shiver likely also grew up in Splatsville, making her a country girl too with the same rough rural upbringing as Frye. This just makes her attempt to present as high-class even funnier.

My personal interpretation of the dynamic of Frye's relationship to Shiver is that Frye accepts all of Shiver's messier personality traits, enjoys them, even. Frye is a deliquent that stands for conflict and non-conformity to begin with, so Frye offers a safe space where Shiver can both embrace her messier side and be celebrated for it. Shiver can take nasty verbal jabs at Frye and Frye will fire back cheerfully. This is why Shiver is so wild as a villain, the repressed parts of her personality comes out in full display when she's in a space with only Frye and Big Man, and Frye in particular seems to know all of Shiver's secrets to a level that Big Man does not. This way, Shiver feels no need to erase the messier parts of her personality, she simply saves it for the people she trusts. And Frye is the person Shiver trusts the most.

7. Shiver's Gender

I saved this for last because we have little evidential support for it in canon, but the Shiver character analysis really isn't complete without it. Up to this point I have referred to Shiver with She/Her pronouns because that is Nintendo NA's current official stance on the matter (I'm going to keep doing it for consistency but I really don't feel strongly about this), and my analysis is written with the assumption that Shiver is a cisgendered woman. BUT. I actually see no reason that an alternative interpretation cannot be true.

The overall art community has already figured out that there's a VERY potent TRANS narrative that can be told with Shiver. Shiver's narrative is about presenting as a traditional cisgendered girl while struggling with all the ways she does not conform to tradition, but there's an entirely new layer of meaning to this if Shiver is not, in fact, cisgendered in some way. There's a lot of visual information that initially led the community to this interpretation, Shiver's features are more androgynous than feminine, she wears a Sarashi wrap that has cultural connotations of being a binder, and she has a half shaved punk hair cut which is traditionally considered to be very unfeminine. Shiver's art form itself is gendered, as she has the design elements of a Geisha which is a feminine job, but the gender she presents on the job doesn't have to match her personal gender identity: drag queens exist, for example. I'd also like to point out that historically, there were in fact, MALE geishas that went by the title of Taikomochi, they are just less common in modern days.

In practice, Shiver's gender expression is so complicated that ANY interpretation is viable. Not only that but the various trans interpretations have VERY interesting implications. This would recontextualize Shiver's advantages not as majority privilege, but PASSING privilege, or the ability to LOOK heteronormative while not actually being that. It adds a lot of meaning to Shiver's focus on presentation, and her desire to be validated by a lot of people on TV.

Additionally, this would reinforce the idea that Shiver needs an outlet to address her gender nonconformity off screen, and trusted, accepting friends to keep her secrets while she perfects her preferred forms of gender expression. It's the exact sort of thing that would draw her to the delinquent Frye who has no respect for tradition, and who would encourage Shiver to embrace the most literal interpretation of "be gay, do crimes". It would connect Frye and Shiver as two parallel interpretations of minority anxiety in the same game: one who passes for "normal" and one who does not, and how differently they see the world. And that's… kinda beautiful?

At this point I don't have the relevant personal experience to dive any deeper into possible trans interpretations of Shiver, I think there are other artists with more relevant backgrounds that are already exploring this topic. Just know that I've seen the art that depicts Shiver with top surgery scars and they are my favorite.

8. Conclusion

Deep Cut's only been out three months and I've already written this much about their lore, good lord. I'm an artist who works on Splatoon fan fiction so the story and themes of Splatoon matter a lot to me as they influence the direction of my work, but my god, does Deep Cut give me a lot to work with. Some of this will have to be retracted as we learn more about Deep Cut's lore, there's lots of ways Nintendo can introduce canon to contradict my take, and that's fine GIVE US THE LORE. Regardless I plan to be making more Deep Cut fan content in the future and I really wanted to share the information that my future work will be based on.

#splatoon 3 #splatoon #deepcut #shiver x frye #Frye #Shiver #fryerweek #long post #splat3

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butch-with-a-deep-voice · 5 months

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What made you feel like using the term “butch” to describe yourself despite some of your obvious feminine qualities? (This is an absolutely genuine question coming from somebody who is trying their best to figure out “which box” they fit into).

I guess I’m having a hard time figuring out if I’m “butch enough” which I know sounds ridiculous. I know that there’s such a spectrum and not everybody is strictly “butch” or “femme” but I guess I feel called to butchhood. But I invalidate my own feelings by finding all the ways in which I’m “too feminine” for it.

I’m genderqueer as well so it can be hard for me to find the right balance between my masculine and feminine features that make me feel euphoric.

Hey anon, so this is a very good question, and one I really want to take some time with. As such, I will provide two answers. A short copout answer if you don't have the energy to read a lot, and a long answer.

Short answer, and I really hate when I have to pull out this answer but well...

It's no different than gender euphoria in of itself. Each person is different, and it is based off of well, vibes. It's things like how I can be beside my he/they nonbinary friend, let's call him C, in the exact same outfit as him, and all our friends are like "yup, Nomi looks butch, and C looks boy-adjacent". It's vibes, and there's no real easy way to explain it further than that.

Now lovely anon/reader, if you want something a little more... nuanced (and just as inconclusive), strap in. Pun fully intended.

So I've been mulling over this for a few hours already before typing, and of course my overly analytic ass started scripting this whole thing around exploring the history of butch and femme identities, the gender politics of the matter, the racial contexts, etc. before realizing that doesn't answer your question; how did I specifically, a trans-feminine two-spirit person, reach butch being where I felt the most at home in myself despite apparent feminine aspects of myself? Understanding the history, cultural implications, and other nuanced portions of "butch" as an identity was a huge part of how I got there, and so I'll briefly go over that, but it's also important to keep my copout answer in mind as well. You know yourself best. It's well, vibes.

Let's start with the barebones identity of butch. I think a good place to start is understanding that while all butches are masculine, not all mascs are butch. Same with femme vs. feminine. It's something you claim, you embody. It's well, an identity. For many, myself included, it's an inseparable part of ones gender identity to boot. And like all identities, it is often intersectional with other facets of your life. Gender, sexuality, race/ethnicity, culture, etc. For me, Butch ties directly to my Two-Spirit identity. Part of being a Michif (Métis) Two-Spirit person is holding both the masculine and feminine at all times. While not necessarily a woman in the western sense, I feel woman-adjacent. My "feminine spirit" comes from feeling woman-adjacent, and honestly when around other Michif women, like a Michif woman (but that's a conversation for another day). My "masculine spirit" comes from being a butch Michif lesbian, amongst other things. If I had to describe how my gender "feels", Two-Spirit Butch feels honestly the most accurate, even if that doesn't fit into a Western queer lens that nicely. I may have, as you said anon, apparent feminine aspects to myself that counter my masculinity, but part of being Two-Spirit is holding those with love, honor, and compassion. Feminine spirit doesn't negate my queer masculinity, if anything it augments it. But, exploration of my Two-Spirit identity and how it relates to being butch likely won't be of much help to most of the non-indigenous readers.

Let's look at a more Western approach, because Butch is just that, a rather Western queer term. I do want to preface that as a trans-feminine person there are many within queer spaces that believe I do not have the right to claim butch for myself. To them I counter, bugger off terfs. I would also like to point out that while in a modern sense butch more or less refers to a masculine lesbian identity, that was not always the case. Butch for many many years was an identity to describe queer masculinity as a baseline, regardless of lesbian, gay, bisexual, etc. Especially in queer BIPOC communities. Butch becoming a lesbian-centric term is much newer within the queer lexicon (with some pointing to white queer culture stealing a term from BIPOC queer culture, but that is a topic I do not have the expertise to go into). While both butch itself, and queer masculinity as a whole have evolved since those times, I think keeping that historical context in mind is important.

To me, part of why I claimed "Butch" specifically is how it relates to non-conformity of expected womanhood. While I do not claim woman in the Western sense, during the early phases of transition, I began by identifying as a woman, and trying to abandon all of masculinity and what it came with. You can find a bit more of how that went in this post. I dove headfirst into femininity and hit my head on the floor of the pool so hard I ended up right back in dysphoria central, just a different kind. But, that exploration of womanhood and femininity were integral in why I claimed butch for myself. I don't think I ever would have claimed it had I not. One of the common factors with every AFAB butch I've met is a rejection of the expectations of womanhood that Western culture thrusts upon them. Personally, I don't think it would have been right for me to claim butch without having first explored Western femininity and it's expectations to the extent I had.

Eventually I finally admitted to myself that, while I knew for certain I wasn't a man, I didn't feel right as a feminine (Western) woman either. So, what was I? I felt more at home, more welcome, and more loved amongst queer women, lesbians especially, than I ever had with queer men. Hard androgyny and genderqueer (which btw I do not identify with genderqueer, not upset with you though) didn't feel right either. There were aspects of classical womanhood from a physical standpoint I knew were in line with myself after many years of HRT. Breasts, my waist line, my now feminine skin texture, my legs, honestly my entire estrogen-sculpted body. Hell, while I haven't gotten full vaginoplasty for medical reasons, I would if I could, Stone Top identity aside. I felt at home around women and lesbians, as a Michif woman/lesbian, but not in femininity. As described in the post I linked in the previous paragraph, the first true step was reclaiming masculinity, and making room for healthy queer masculinity separate from gender.

I want to bring up this exploration of the meaning behind the colours of the lesbian flag for a moment. For me, Butch and all it encompasses, is a part of all of these. Gender non-conformity I think is self explanatory. I am a walking defiance of gender norms and expectation at this point, and butchness as a whole is as well. Independence can mean many different things to different people, but I feel self sufficient as a butch. I feel competent. I feel secure. Mostly importantly though, it is an identity I feel independent in. For years and years I let my expression of gender and sexuality be defined by those around me. Past partners, friends, family, coworkers, etc. I could not claim butch until I took a step away from all of those. I stopped letting them dictate who I was, and let myself learn who I was independently. Community and butch is always going to be linked. Butch is a community-centric identity. When I tell someone in the queer community I'm butch, they know what it means. In a single word I can describe large swathes of my experience and how I relate to the world. But it also comes with community role and responsibilities. Butches and Femmes protect eachother. Butches provide safe masculinity in queer spaces that heals wounds for so many people, including other butches. Butches take up space in a room to ensure other non-butch women have space. We protect, we heal, we love. Butch love is so fucking unique and important to a community. Butch comes with a community meaning, but also community role and responsibility, and to me that is a big part of why I feel comfortable claiming it. Serenity and Peace is so many things. Both internal and external. I have peace within myself as a butch. I feel more peace with myself now than I did for so many years. When I finally said it outloud, said I was a butch lesbian, and people affirmed that, it was like a weight I never even knew existed was lifted. I've felt happier in my time openly being butch than I have in ages, and everyone around me as noticed it too. Friends, family, coworkers all comment on just how happy, confident, and at peace internally I've been. Love and Sex this is a doozy of a topic that I truthfully do not have the desire to explore right now. It is important, but I am not in the headspace for it. But butch love is unique in itself. As for sex, well. Please refer to the wild swathes of queer theory and discourse out there. As an off-hand example relating to myself though, see Stone Butch. Unique Relationships to Womanhood/Feminity. I explicitly wanted to link these together. As a Two-Spirit butch, and a trans-femme one at that, my relationship to womanhood and femininity is unique, complicated, and at times inexplicable. The fact that I can say I don't identify as a Western woman, but with other Michif woman I do feel like a woman, is one confusing way. The fact that butch being a gender identity to me is another. But one aspect I want to explore is this notion that masculine and feminine are antithetical to eachother, when I don't think they need to be. I'm not androgynous. I hold both masculine and feminine, not a middle thing. My masculinity is queer masculinity, and I genuinely think queer masculinity MUST be in some way shape or form partially feminine. There is a softness to queer masculinity. A vulnerability. A tenderness. Queer masculinity is often gentle, loving, soothing. All things associated with Western notions of femininity, not masculinity. But queer masculinity, non-Western masculinity, makes room for those things. You wouldn't look at a mother bear protecting her cubs and say "that's not motherly behaviour, that's not womanhood". My relationship to my feminine self is in relationship to my masculine self. They are tied, and being butch, being a soft butch at that, encompasses it.

I think finally a topic I've been dancing around, though alluded to multiple times, is that first copout answer. Vibes, and gender euphoria as a part of vibes. From the vibes standpoint, what I have to offer is this anecdotal piece. When I told my friends that I was mulling around with the idea of claiming butch, basically every single one went "... yeah? You didn't know that?" Off of vibes alone every single one of my queer friends already knew I was butch. From behaviour, to what I was most comfortable in fashion wise, to how I related to others, they all knew that my "vibes" were butch already, well before I had even remotely considered it. As for the other hard to define aspect... As a non-cis person yourself anon, you mentioned it already. Gender euphoria is a weirdly difficult to attain thing. I spent years on years of experimentation, exploration, and rumination trying to find my euphoria. Trying to find the spot I'm in now, where I find myself loving what's in the mirror every single day. Butch got me to the point that I legitimately look in my mirror and love what I see Every. Single. Day. I take selfies of myself because I love what I look like, even in just a hoodie in sweats, every day now. I put more casual care into how I look now, because I love myself, more than I ever did before. I take better care of my health. I have more self confidence. I'm happier and more stable emotionally. Hell, I'm a better friend, coworker, and community member now as a butch than I ever had capacity to be beforehand. It's not just me noticing that too. Near everyone in my life started making note of it anytime I took another step into fully claiming butch for myself. The biggest reason I feel right in claiming butch is that frankly, how can you look at secure, holistic, stable happiness like this and not say it's right.

There's a lot more I want to say here, but I've already been at this for nearly three hours, and that's on top of the two hours I spent just thinking on the matter to boot. I hope I was able to answer your question at least partially anon, and that it helps you with your own gender expression/identity journey. I think the only other thing I want to say is that it's okay if what you identify with now changes. It doesn't invalidate what you feel now, just like how you are now doesn't invalidate what you felt was right for your say, 5 years ago. Human experience and identity evolves, it grows, it changes. If you feel right with butch now, excellent. If you end up realizing that it was just a stepping stone in discovering your unique patch of gender euphoria, that is just as excellent. Rootin' for ya anon 💕

#holy crap i went way harder on this than i meant to #but i also think this is a topic that deserved some effort #thank you for the thoughtful ask anon #bite me #ask nomi #trans #transgender #butch #trans butch #lesbian #nonbinary #two spirit #sapphic #stone butch #queer #queer theory #gender

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respectthepetty · 8 months

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Color analysis is your big thing around here. Have you always been into colors in shows and movies, or was this new for BL? What are some of your favorite examples of color use from some of your formative works?

@bengiyo, I would like to believe hysteria is my "big thing" but I can see how the colors label would come up every now and then regarding me. I've been seeing you and the smart people squad asking origin questions, so I appreciate the inquiry! However, you already know this is gonna be long, so . . .

Have you always been into colors in shows and movies, or was this new for BL?

When you read the following statements, you can't read them like a tragedy. You have to read them with an air of whimsy because this shit is funny.

My mom thought I was crazy when I was little. Like, thought I needed medication because I kept rambling about seeing patterns in colors. But this wasn't like Care Bears or Strawberry Shortcake kind of colors where each color aligns with a character and emotion. No, this was like I wouldn't eat foods of a certain color or foods served on plates of a certain color because there were good colors (blue, yellow, white), and bad colors (red, green, black), and I got this idea from movies and church. For example, the devil is bad. The devil is red. Therefore, red is bad. Death is bad. Death is black. Therefore, black is bad. Angels are good. They are white. Therefore, white is good.

As a less creepy religious example - If Heather Duke was green because she was envious of the devil aka red Heather Chandler

When Heather Chandler died and Heather Duke took her place as the new queen bee, Heather Duke would naturally start wearing red because she was the new devil, right? Made sense to me!

But my poor mother was stressed. She brought in all of the professionals, and although none of them truly understood what I was saying, they assured my mom I'd grow out of it.

LIES!

I kept seeing patterns, so I was tested when I started school and was promptly placed into the gifted program, where I was shown that green and red weren't necessarily bad. Like when Amélie wore green because her father forced her to live a calm and peaceful life since she was such a rambunctious child.

Only to start wearing more red as she rediscovered her passion for life.

So I remember that pattern of safety and peace versus passion and courage as I'm watching I Feel You Linger in the Air.

What are some of your favorite examples of color use from some of your formative works?

Since I've always noticed colors, nothing really stands out to me as my favorite since it all seems normal to me, so I'm going to flip your question - What was my least favorite example of color use:

The gay(er) one is red.

Remember that I associated red with negativity as a child, so it would really bother me to see the character who knew he was gay and couldn't hide it be colored as red as if he was the mischievous one.

As if the red character was a temptress leading the loyal blue character to hell.

However, using the (coping) mechanisms I learned in school and life, I now see why the characters who can't hide their queerness would have to be more bold, not just in personality, but in color as well.

Their queerness doesn't allow them to hide, and their color depicts this.

How you write about liking characters who "know," I like that the colors reinforce the "knowing."

So "the gay(er) one is red" doesn't bother me at all anymore. I now openly advocate on behalf of these Red Rascals and named them such because much like me telling countless counselors and doctors that the way I see the world comes naturally to me, I understand their refusal to fit into the norm to make others comfortable.

It isn't bad to stand out, mostly because we cannot hide who we are. How we are feels normal.

And the colors helped me see that.

#the colors mean things #and it means I'm normal #and so are all of us #colors are universal #so the fact that everybody color codes is a magical humanistic connection #even if we don't all recognize them #they still exist #and this is about being queer too

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desceros · 4 months

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Re: ableism w/Symphony Donnie: Definitely some internalized ableism but I think that’s unfortunately due to not many people knowing what exactly neurodivergence looks like and how people with it processes things differently.

Like, honestly, my biggest gripe was the recording and even that, for the SPECIFIC context of this story and Donnie as a character, it makes sense. Does it make it right? No, but if Donnie never had to think about these things before, for him it’s the same as recording everything to protect his family. Just something he does.

Also, even though my heart broke with Reader’s at her realization, MULTIPLE times reader has said Donnie says what he means and even at the beginning with the “I like you” thing I was like, “Girl, I’m going to need you to define the relationship with him.”

And I think, with Leo, even when writer’s do write him as neurodivergent, what I’ve read always has him as the he better masker whether it’s explicitly said or not. Idk if Symphony Leo is neurodivergent or not but STILL, reader has picked up that he’s good with masking which usually comes off as charming or “easy breezy beautiful cover girl”.

Idk, maybe because I know a lot of people like Donnie irl but if anything I was more frustrated at the obvious miscommunication between both of them than him directly, because as reader said, she projected her feelings on to him when he’s been super direct with his intentions.

Basically, there are sometimes where I wish people would just realize that processing the same thing between two people doesn’t always look the same and that one isn’t necessarily bad.

well-said, anon-chan!

edit: this got SPOILER!! HEAVY!! for chap. 22 and also soooo long so i'm going to tuck it under a cut. but here's some meta on symphony to explore this a bit since it's something that's very important to me and also... pretty critical to the fic itself! i don't typically like explaining myself outside of the text and letting the fic itself speak but. hm. i suppose i shall let it slide for today!

as you all have hopefully noticed by now, as an author, i like to be. hm. more subtle with things. i prefer to tuck things away versus having things be blatant in the text. and this is kind of coming back to bite me a little with donnie and his neurodivergence, i suspect.

i've tried pretty hard to make it contextually obvious that donnie's autistic. i've all but used the word. the way he behaves and communicates is heavily autism-coded.

meanwhile, the story is from viola-chan's pov, and she's neurotypical-coded (well. as much as i, an adhd-riddled autistic cat in a trenchcoat can manage).

as a result, she doesn't... pick up on donnie's problems with communication. not right away. but here, in this chapter, we see where she finally figures out what their issue has been the entire time:

…Oh. Oh god. He really doesn’t get it. You’d known, of course, that Donnie wasn’t great with people. That he doesn’t communicate well. He doesn’t pick up on cues, or use them himself. No wonder he’s always so frank in his language, you realize. No wonder he’s so comforted by the firm rigidities of science. No wonder he looked so lost. No wonder he was so perplexed.

then, she puts that into practice by being specific and precise with how she talks. and we see that she now knows how to communicate with him in a way that works for both of them. and it works for them:

God; it’s like—a breath of fresh air, you think, staring at him in a little bit of awe. It’s so easy to talk to him, now that you’re just… letting it all out. Being honest. Frank. Infuriating that you hadn’t done this earlier. Feeling your irritation deflate, you nod. “…Okay. You just—need an explanation. Clarification.” “Yes, please,” Donnie gushes, fretting a little.

it's going to take some work. she still takes things he says personally and extrapolates past them (the whole "leo being an important person" thing). but she immediately nips it in the bud and is like. no. we're not doing that anymore. so, going forward, her relationship with donnie is one that's built on learning how to develop this open communication.

of course, it's not perfect, because they're human. donnie twisting her arm into still talking to him by calling in the favor is shitty behavior. a desperate bid to keep someone close that, for some reason, he can't imagine being without. not cool. the recordings of them having sex were shitty behavior to us, people who Know Better. but when violist-chan said 'hey, that's not cool, don't do that' and donnie was given a reason why not to, he just says ok. he might not understand ("but i record everything"). but he acknowledges that there's a concern there, and he agrees to be more conscientious in the future (having a consent sheet).

now then, let's look at leo's behavior in comparison.

donnie's biggest fault was that he didn't know to check in and make sure they were on the same page with everything. leo's fault, on the other hand, is purposeful, manipulative, and cruel. his open admission that he's been manipulating her from the beginning. manipulating donnie. lying to her.

to me, this is much, much worse than what donnie did. even knowing that at some point he starts developing friendly feelings towards her—and some of their interactions were indeed genuine!—i'm with violist-chan here. i'm not going to be digging through every one trying to parse out which ones were real and which ones were him being a dickhead. they're all tainted by the stain of betrayal.

also. because it has come up in a different ask that i will be publishing probably tomorrow bc of spoiler reasons: someone said something to the effect of 'why didn't he just not say anything? he could have taken that to his grave. how selfish'. i will remind you of a conversation between violist-chan and leo that happened in the previous chapter:

“Most of all, he’s honest,” you keep going, tangling your fingers together, staring down at the way they knot at your waist. “If he says something, I can take it at face value. There’s no hidden meaning. Nothing deeper. If he says something feels good, I know it feels good. If he says he likes something, he likes it. If he doesn’t like it, he doesn’t like it. If he asks for something, I don’t need to ask if he’s sure. He asks, so he’s sure. It—It’s a breath of fresh air. If I want to know what he’s thinking, really thinking, all I have to do is ask. And...” [...] Leo’s still as stone for a few moments longer, looking at you like he’s trying to decide if he wants to say something; but finally he relaxes and comes back to you himself. Reaching out, he flicks your forehead, causing you to wince and rub at it.

i think... leo maybe wouldn't have ever said anything about it. but then you said this. how donnie matters to you because he's honest. there's nothing deeper with him. it's all at face value. you never have to worry about what he's doing, what he's thinking. and that i think... really messed with leo. because he knows he hasn't been honest with you. you can't trust what he says at face value. you do have to worry about what he's doing. and for you to say that that's the main thing you love about donnie—it messed with him. so, even though he knew it would jeapordize the relationship with you, even knowing he wanted to put this off for as long as he could, even though, even though, he decides he has to tell you. he has to come clean.

so even though it feels like shitty, selfish behavior... it's actually him trying to do right by her for a change. to conform to what she looks for in a relationship (both romantic and platonic). it just... didn't go over so well, predictably. most people don't like hearing that not one, but two of their most precious relationships were built on a foundation of misunderstandings or lies.

side note. i do headcanon leo as having adhd that primarily manifests itself as an inattentive form. i don't suspect it has much to do with his behavior here... save perhaps for some possible rsd being triggered when violist-chan is like 'ok actually go fuck yourself i'm out of here.' i don't find it particularly relevant to the discussion of ableism, in this context.

so anyway. long post aside. it's... interesting to me. to see people saying 'actually fuck both donnie and leo equally!!! bleh bleh bleh!!!!' i don't know that it's. hm. active ableism. i'm certainly not accusing anyone of the sort. but it is, at the very least, indicative to me that there are a lot of people who don't read into the text as deeply as perhaps i would like on certain character traits, if i had a magic wand to wave.

....and also perhaps just ableism, haha.

#ask tag #symphony tag #rare desceros meta post #symphony meta

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blossomthepinkbunny · 26 days

Text

Stolas & Loona should have friends

(something I feel would work well for their characters)

I feel like Loona's and Stolas' character would really benefit from giving them friendships. Relationships that could help to humanize them, make them more sympathetic or help to develop/change them as people.

For Loona it makes sense to go into that direction because this huge part of her character is dealing with the fact that she grew up sheltered and never had someone who really cared for her. Blitzø is the first real parental figure she has in her life and she is often pretty cruel to him because she never learned to interact with others who genuinely wanted to be kind to her.

I think giving her more of a social life and potential friendships like we kinda got to see in the Beelzebub episode is something they are working up to with her character, though I find it weird that we didn't really get to see her in the new s2 trailer (or in any of the last 5 episodes for that matter). It seems like Loona wont have any focus on her which is dissapointing because right now her character is in a state where she is still pretty unlikable and comes off as just rude more often.

The show had three good opportunities to give Loona someone to be friends with. First one was Tex which didn't work out because she had a crush on him and even after meeting his girlfriend being defensive and jealous rather than realizing that maybe they'd be better as just friends. Second one could've been Beelzebub (if you ignore the fact that she's the one organizing the pounds for hellhounds) but she is Tex's girlfriend so Loona immediately doesn't like her. And lastly Loona and Octavia, who they were kinda setting up as having a sister-like bond in "Seeing Stars".

But Loona and Octavia have never interacted after that as far as we know. Like I said, Loona basically hasn't shown up in a relevant way for 5 episodes now. It could've been small stuff even. Like maybe in "Western energy" instead of having the stupid nursery subplot it could've just been mentioned that Loona and Octavia are hanging out while Stolas is on his meeting with Stella and Andrealphus. Or just see them chilling together in the background of some episodes.

Giving Loona friends would give her someone she could share her feelings with and that could make her less toxic because she can get her emotions out in a non destructive way. She needs someone who isn't Blitzø, someone who is closer to her in age and someone who will understand her and help her with socializing. And in my opinion that someone shouldn't necessarily be a love interest either. We already have so many romantic/sexual relationships in HB and rarely see relevant friendships which I think is a huge missed opportunity, especially in Loonas case.

And for Stolas, giving him a friend would maybe show more of the sympathetic aspects of his character. Right now I don't like Stolas at all and I don't see a reason to either. He forced Blitzø into a sexual relationship so he can do his job and then starts to whine about Blitzø not loving him back. Knowingly or not, he made great use of hells classist system and basically neglects his daughter as well in the process (though the show will tell you that he actually cares a lot despite us not really seeing that on screen).

What pisses me off most about his character is that they don't acknowledge him being a terrible person. I don't care if he's bad as long as the show doesn't try to woobify him out of nowhere. If they pointed out what he does and he would recieve consequences that aren't treated as unfair or mean i'd like him a lot more because then they could also genuinely show him becoming a better person. A characterization similar to Rex Splode from Invincible would really do wonders for him (I've only watched the show for Invincible so I dont know if/how they move his character forward, but so far I really like it).

Anyways, giving him a friend or something could also help. HB tries to make a big point about people having layers and showing that someone who does harmful stuff can still have sympathetic sides to them. Stolas' problem is, that the only focus he ever gets is in relationships where he is acting bad. I already mentioned how he treats Blitzø and with how hard they're pushing them as a couple they're showing Stolas to be pretty terrible in retrospective. We also don't really get to see how hard he apparently cares for Octavia. Giving him a relationship that shows the sympathetic sides to his character could be done by making his relationship with Octavia be actually good. Like showing them hanging out, actively interacting in positive ways and basically making him a great dad but bad partner sort of guy. Giving him a friend would also work as I said. Maybe Asmodeus could've been that or just a new character. Something that makes him more sympathetic because we get to see a positive side to him with how he cares for this other person.

I really hope they put some focus on Loona again because I kinda care for her and I think dealing with what she has going on could be nice and cute. And for Stolas idk. It might already be too late to make me not dislike him. He is just way too far into being victimized already for me to assume that i will sympathize with him anytime soon.

#helluva boss critical #helluva boss critique #helluva boss criticism #vivzepop critical

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desultory-novice · 7 months

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Have you gone over your interpreted dynamics that Magolor, Susie and Taranza may have with each other? (asking for 1-on-1 each, so three dynamics total)

My apologies if you've gone over them already, I just don't recall.

I have not!

In fact, I don't think I've done many character + character dynamics, so please, everyone interested, I request you send me even more combos! (Must...clean all this angst...off my dashboard...!)

Now then! Onto the dynamics!

Magolor + Susie

[Continued Below]

These two are possibly my favorite dynamic-holders of the Wave 3 gang! You've got your classic red oni blue oni except that Magolor is the exuberant one and Susie is the (slightly) more reserved!

Magolor is interested in ancient tech for its ability to make his dreams come true. Susie is interested in turning it INTO something that can be used to make dreams come true. Re-use vs repurpose.

And I think that old tech > new tech disparity would be at the center of their dealings with each other. (Frankly, everyone in the cast is "old tech" compared to Susie but someone has to be at the top XD)

Susie operates on a planetary scale: "How can my (father's) company be used to make things better?" whereas Magolor is very "I will make a thing that people will come to from all over to feel better!"

They're so near to each other's way of thinking but fundamentally different in a few ways that means they don't quite see eye to eye. But I think they can absolutely get involved in long drawn out discussions that involve lots of "Yes! And...!"

Clash indicates to us that Magolor DOES find Susie somewhat pesky. I can't help but wonder if part of that comes from a (potentially incorrect) assumption that Susie must have had EVERYTHING she ever wanted while Magolor had to dig around in the dirt of Halcandra alone for X number of years hoping to find a magic theme park building doohickey amongst the wreckage. (We know Susie's childhood was anything but ideal but HE doesn't.)

I guess DX josses the idea that the two of them met while Magolor was wandering AD, which is a shame as that was a very neat headcanon, but even if they had, I always assumed it would have been a neutral/short-lived partnership. Not enough to dramatically change their feelings toward one another.

...I also think that Susie will be constantly looking for opportunities to opportunities to turn the Lor Starcutter pink (which it wouldn't necessarily mind, but Magolor is vehemently against!) So, yeah, I would say "great collaborators when they're working together but not all the time, and Magolor is usually the one to snap first."

Susie + Taranza

I've said I only "ship" one ship in this fandom, and that's true, but I am also guilty of thinking, "Susie/Taranza kinda makes sense, right?"

I mean, he very much seems to be preparing himself to flirt (?) with her in the Star Allies opening sequence. He's looking for a new queen to worship, and would Susie find that so awful, really...?

Not that I want to characterize Taranza as a pitiful loser simp-type for her, so I think it would be nice if they approached each other on more equal terms. In this case, I would think that their dynamics come from a shared appreciation for beautiful things.

If you were to stick all three in one living space, Susie and Taranza would be the neat freaks, making sure everything is organized (and laid out in an aesthetically pleasing fashion too!) meanwhile Magolor lives on half-finished energy drinks and sleeps on the floor. XD

They are also, obviously, notable for being the two major characters in the modern games to have lost a loved one on-screen in a big Kirby game event. They really should be allowed to use this to bond.

And I'd like to think they have.

So they're kind of low-key get along. Nothing bombastic - they don't set the world on fire with how good they get along, but you're not too surprised when you see them out shopping together either.

Taranza + Magolor

I have a LOT of thoughts about the wizards. (In fact, I keep creating backstories for these two, because despite there being a few dedicated fans of this ship, I don't see a whole lot of people dig into Magolor having a shared backstory with Tara and Secty?!)

Despite that, my feelings on them tend to change depending upon how important I find giving them a potential backstory together. Because when on screen they feel very... neutral? They don't have the dynamism of Magolor and Susie's potential clashes, nor the obvious "lonely spider seeks confident beautiful queen" of Taranza and Susie.

Clash!Taranza sits on Magolor's shoppe, chilling out, and that is... really the best way I can describe them? They are very chill.

The concept of them talking deep magic with each other is interesting, but Taranza is a follower type of character. Someone who needs someone to be a catalyst before he will go off.

Magolor could be that for him, but I think Magolor needs to get in over his head first before he will go to Taranza for assistance.

Having said that, I think that what these two have over the other Wave 3 pair dynamics is the highest level of TRUST.

I once read a Japanese doujin about Magolor that was, frankly, even more depressing than MY most depressing works (if you know, you know, but I'm not linking it) but there was a moment when Magolor talks to Taranza about a serious issue and watching the two talk serious to each other (interspersed with some moments of comic melodrama from Taranza) was utterly FASCINATING~

I don't think they become their "true" selves to each other often, but I think that when they do talk about srs business, they are two of the strongest characters in the whole cast to do so...! (Which is probably why I would never "ship" them in the classical sense? I don't see them as going out on dates or sharing the same dessert or coffee shop stuff. When they are at their "closest" they are discussing forbidden history or the skeletons in their prospective closets....)

So, on the surface? They have a very vanilla friendship with nothing to stand out. But these two COULD (if they wanted to) get up to stuff so cursed it would drive even Marx from the room.

#Kirby #Dess Rambling #Magolor #Susie Haltmann #Taranza #Wave 3 #This was fun so yes send me more...!

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asexual-society · 2 months

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Hii hope you have a wonderful day today! -I wanted to ask something to make sure im not being mean but- is it possible for an Ace person to be Aphobic? Im in a fandom where there used to be a Ace character- he said he was- thing is, the show never said he was SexRepulsed- but fans took his lack of interest as such. believed he was in fact SexRepulsed. -that character is gone- now, there is yet another character (think, a reboot of the old one) believed to be Ace but this time, he seems to be ok with touch an even seems very friendly ~ with only one character. my ask is, if some people view this second version, as still Ace. but sex favorable, is that aphobic? is maybe having another view on this chracter that is questioning himself, a bad thing? because this is said a lot, that ppl is being aphobic for "refusing to accept he is sex repulsed" or "using the fact he is questioning himself to ship him" (mind you-most shipart is literally hand holding and being buddies) hope Im making sense- im so lost and I trust your blog to help me (because im also scared to be harrased for asking this inside that fandom)

Hey! (We got your other ask, I got half way through answering it and then forgot, so I will get to that soon I promise) Good to hear from you again :) I ended up going a little off topic here, but I hope I managed to fully answer this (if not, just send another one). Also get ready for some parentheses.

In answer to the first part of your question, yes ace people can be aphobic (many ace people can be arophobic, but also acephobic, both to people who share their own identity and others who have a different identity under the ace umbrella).

This is a pretty interesting question actually, because there is acephobia at play in the situation you're describing, but not necessarily in the way those people mean. It is NOT acephobic to have a sex favourable ace character, that's fine, because there are sex favourable aces out there and they're just as much a part of our community as those who are indifferent, averse, repulsed, or some sort of mixture. Sex favourable aces have just a much right to see themselves represented as sex averse aces, but unfortunately, there is so little asexual representation that it can feel like if one flavour of ace people are represented, that that representation has been taken away from aces of other flavours.

It's totally understandable to feel that way, but that doesn't mean those feelings are actually justified? And people get pretty negative reactions for complaining about any lack of rep, which can lead to bad feelings all round and just creates even more of a divide between us. We have to understand that our individual experiences not being represented is NOT the fault of other ace people. It's not fair to want one group to miss out on representation, just so another can get theirs. Additionally, it can be important for people who are questioning or struggling with their identity to work through that in their art, and explorations of things like touch aversion and touch starvation can be very nuanced because one person can experience both to very high degrees, and they each can even compound the other. And, a sex favourable asexual person will not feel the same way about sex as an allosexual person, and that is an equally nuanced and interesting (and fun) thing to be able to explore.

I don't know what media this ask is about, so I can't comment on specifics, but I can admit, I've been frustrated by this sort of thing in the past; it can be really hard to shake an instinct to push back when you feel like you're being treated unfairly, but sometimes we do have to step back and understand that everyone in our community feels the same way, we just want to see ourselves and to feel seen by others. As a person who is both aro and ace, and doesn't want to have sex or be in a romantic relationship, I don't feel represented by characters who are alloace in the way an alloace person does, or sex/romance favourable aroace characters in the way sex favourable aroace people do, but they probably feel that same way when they see aro characters or sex averse characters. It does really suck when people outside of the community ignore and erase the identities of aspec characters because they don't feel our experiences are interesting or valuable enough to represent and explore, but that isn't what's happening on an intracommunity level (as in, within the ace community).

The recent discourse about shipping aroace characters has sort of been getting me down, because it's a complex topic and rather than being a black-or-white, two sides thing, there are people with good and bad takes (mostly bad, let's be real) coming from so many different directions, there is so much nuance it would take me much more than one little answer to cover (and let me tell you, if I were to try, it would not be on this blog!). I might have said this before, but I tend to avoid fandoms of media with canon aroace characters for the most part for this exact reason, and within the community we are SO far ahead of where the rest of the world (and even the rest of the queer community) sees aspec people, I genuinely believe (call it cynical if you like) that this will continue to be a problem for several more years. And like, you can just block people and move on with your life, your fandom experience will be so much more enjoyable if you block people who say shit you think sucks, aphobic or not. Everyone should do this.

I think this is probably long enough now, and I've definitely missed something important, but I hope it helped.

~ mod key

#asks #discourse #mod key #dk-vtf-count #long post #asexual #aroace

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familyvideostevie · 11 months

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hiiii:))) i’d like to request: SEASHELL: let's look for beautiful things on the beach! send me a line from a book, song, or movie/tv show and a character

“i’d trade all I’ve got in my name for you instead of this pain” (from give me a minute by (my gf) lizzy mcalpine) x either steve, remus or james you’re free to decide<3<3

thank you so much for blessing my eyeballs with your writing<3

thank you so much! this lyric is quite sad, as the song is about a breakup, but i've tried to make this end happy because i can't leave it at angst lol. so here's resolving a fight with james!

You aren't going to cry. You chant this to yourself silently because if you cry then it will all be over and James will hug you and say you can talk about it later but you need to talk about it now.

"I think it's true," you say. You clutch the cuffs of your -- his -- sweatshirt and cross your arms. "I haven't been there for her. And you don't spend time with your friends like you used to."

James takes off his glasses and runs a hand down his face. He's standing on the other side of his kitchen island. "But we do see them. A lot, and you know it. Your friends, too."

The night started out nicely. You'd been out to dinner with some friends of yours you haven't seen in a bit. But once you got there, eager to catch up and show them how happy you are, you realized it was an intervention. They wanted to tell you -- kindly, from a place of love -- that you've disappeared into your relationship and they don't feel like you're accessible to them, no matter how much they like James and how good he is to you.

It took you coming back to his apartment and finding him on the couch for you to sort it out, but you think you agree with them. You really do spend all of your time with James -- which isn't a bad thing, not necessarily. You two are just a bit wrapped up in each other, and it's made you into a girl you swore you'd never be: a bad friend at the expense of your own relationship.

"That's not the point, James," you sigh. This is going to sound cruel no matter how you spin it and he'll be hurt, but it needs to be said. "We spend too much time together. We've created our own world and we need to...go outside sometimes."

As you predicted, he looks as though you've punched him. "Less time?" he croaks. "You want to spend less time together? You can see how that's not what a bloke wants to hear, right?"

"The boys clearly haven't said the same thing to you --"

"No, they bloody well have not!" He shouts. You shrink back a little but he doesn't notice, too caught up in his own hurt for the moment. "Because they know I'm happy when I'm with you. I don't understand why you can't see that I'd give everything else up if it meant I could be with you."

You take a steadying breath. "Don't yell, please," you say, as calmly as you can. He looks sorry immedietly, but you keep going. "And while that's lovely and romantic, it's not realistic, and I don't expect that of you. I want us both to have lives. We need that, outside of this. It only makes this more special."

He sits down heavily at the kitchen counter. "I'm -- fuck." He tips his head back, black curls a riot as always, and exhales sharply. "Could you come here, please?"

You cross the kitchen and stand in front of him. He gently reaches for your hands, uncrossing your arms and twining your fingers together as he looks you in the eye.

"I'm sorry for yelling," he says, softly. "I'm not mad at you. I think I'm mad that...you're right?" He sucks on his teeth. "You are the best thing that's ever happened to me and I think that if I stop holding on so tight you'll disappear."

It makes sense. You feel the same, but you know it's not true. "But I won't," you tell him. He nods.

"I know," he agrees. "I know. I do. And I think this is worth discussing more so we can figure out how to deal with it. But you look like you're going to cry and I can't stand that I've done it --"

"I was just a bit overwhelmed --"

"So I'd like to spoon, please," he continues over you. "Is that alright?" You step fully into his space and flop against him, your arms tangled between you.

"That's fine with me," you mumble into his collar. You'll figure this out -- you always do.

join the celebration!

#fvsbeachday #james potter x reader #james potter x y/n #james potter x you #james potter fluff #james potter angst #james potter fanfiction #marauders fanfiction

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acourtofthought · 3 months

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The only thing that worries me is the amount of times Sarah said she is excited for the next book, the same way she is excited to write Azriel's journey (not just his bedroom habits, which she said before she has a few scenes planned out in her head). Like she has plenty of projects she'll have to work on after the release of acotar 5, so why would she say this if she's going to wait a really long time to actually get started on it?

I think for the same reason she once spoke in interviews about how Lucien was one of her favorite characters, called him "My <3" on her Tumbler, based him off of Sam Heughan's Jamie Fraser after saying she was obsessed with Outlander, and (in what I think is a fair statement) put more effort into his character arc than she's done for any other male in the ACOTAR series yet some still think she's going to push him to the side yet again.

For the same reasons she told us long ago how the moment the sisters came back onto the page in ACOMAF, she realized they would have journey's beyond what Feyre was seeing, confirmed that Elain would be getting a book that she was able to leave crumbs for as early on as MAF, ACOWAR and continuing through SF and spoke of the research she did for Elain's book while she was pregnant with her first son.

If the author was able to say all those things about Elain and Lucien over the past how many years, where we've got unresolved storyline after unresolved storyline for them, where she envisioned where they'd go on vacation, where she (in the book and not just an interview) told us that Autumn Court males have fire in their blood and fuck like it too) yet some feel she's going to sideline them in favor of Az and Gwyn, then why can't we reverse that and say it doesn't really matter how excited she is to begin writing Az's journey (which does not necessarily translate to him getting the next book since a characters journey can take time to build), she could still put his book on hold until Elain and Lucien first have their story told?

I've said it before but SJM was very tight lipped with EVERYONE (even her husband) about the ending of CC2. She was very tight lipped on Rhys before ACOMAF. And that was because she wanted to surprise as many people as possible. So we just don't know if her freely talking about Az right now is because she's gearing up for his book or because she's trying to misdirect so she can shock the readers when she announces an Elain and Lucien book.

Also, if she plans on writing the next ACOTAR book then wants to focus on other protects, why would she leave Koschei unaddressed if he's meant to be the final big bad? Why walk away from the big finale to focus on other things for who knows how many years?

To me it would make sense if Elucien were next and she closed out the initial arc of the spin offs (focusing on the sisters) then stepped away from ACOTAR to focus on those other things only to pick ACOTAR back up down the line with her new focus being on Mor, Az, Emerie, Gwyn, the Valkryie, Illyrians and time travel / crossover stuff.

#elucien #pro elucien #sarah j mass #acotar 5 #acotar 6

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thelikesoffinn · 6 months

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hello - hope you're doing great! I love your analysis, and I wanted to ask about something I've been thinking fanfic wise but also applicable to real life (I think).

So Astarion gets paired a lot with Tavs who also have tragic past experiences (hard to be at his level of tragedy, but some get close). Which is all well and good, cause I see how writing these characters and reading about them is cathartic to many, but I also see plot-wise, it makes it "easier" for him to connect with Tav in a way, kindred souls and all that.

My Tav's background is one of someone who either had a fairly good and regular life, and, if trauma occured, it's been healthily overcome. So at the beginning of the BG3 story she's actually at the end of her own initial "character" arc.

Now my issue is, can Astarion connect with someone who has no idea at all of what he went through? My idea is that's he'd infantilize her, or openly antagonise her (in his charming way) because she's got no right to understand (especially with how he thinks it's fine to be racist and hurt the weak in the first act).

And she'd be understanding and wanting to help and all, but how can people with no/little traumatic experiences connect with those who went through hell, even with the best intentions? It's a dynamic I'd like to explore, because I've seen it played in real life a few times.

Sorry for the poem!

Hello, flower! Thank you so much, I'm glad that you enjoyed the analysis ❤️

As for your question: Eh, I do see why that dynamic is a rather difficult one. People who've survived through a lot of traumata tend to be somewhat hesitant and guarded in front of those who had normal lives at the best of times, and we all know that Astarion rarely has a "best of times", especially early in the game.

Infantilising them is something I definitely see with him. He's the type to do that with anyone anyway, but especially so with those he considers "sheltered". And sheltered is likely something he inevitably will consider Tav, as that is often the case with those who experienced trauma.

Trauma tends to age and harden you, in a way, so oftentimes people who simply grew up normally, with normal ups and downs, are viewed as "sheltered" or "spoiled" by those who didn't, even if that wasn't necessarily the case. That label isn't used or assigned maliciously, and it's simply based on the fact that other people's "normal" seems like the very best to someone who had it worse.

I can also see a huge amount of antagonism, yes, but how it shows will depend on when your story is set.

Is it while he's still dependent on Tav? Then I think he'd try to refrain from being more antagonistic towards them than necessary, since he needs to stay on their good side. So, he'd likely stick with his base-line arseholeishness, if a bit more intense at times. You know, in a sense that you side eye him and wonder if he just actually insulted you or if he's still joking around.

But if he's not dependent on them? Oh boy. Yeah, very likely that he'd be extremely mean and Tav would definitely 100% know that he means everything he says, even when it's uttered with a smile. Think how he talks to the Gur hunter in act 1 because let's be honest…that was far from subtle.

Astarion as a whole doesn't take kindly to anyone prodding his weak spots, albeit he mellows a bit towards Tav over the course of the story, and if would be even worse with "sheltered" Tav. He would likely flip his shit really hard and become extremely cruel with them, staying on their good side be damned because how dare they prod where they have no business being?

It's something I've seen at work before, and let me tell you: It's never a pretty sight. Many people who experienced trauma usually don't want to hurt others - quite the contrary, a lot of them would rather sacrifice themselves before watching anyone else get hurt like they were - but that doesn't mean they're not good at it. Precisely because they're often so hypervigilant, they have a talent in picking out your weak spots and if you test them enough, oh boy. They'll hit them with such aim and grace, you'll find yourself reeling. And that's the super sweet and kind clients, not the Astarions.

Here it's important to mention that the things people say in those situations are rarely what they really believe. It's mostly is just a well aimed assassination of your soft spots to get you to back off and leave them be.

So "sheltered" Tav will have to be extremely careful regarding any sore spots if they don't want to be hit by the full force of protective-malice.

Does that mean Astarion and your Tav won't be able to bond? Aabsolutely not, but it will be a tad bit difficult because he'll likely take a lot longer to open up and their bond will have to be built entirely from scratch. The shared understanding of their trauma can’t function as a temporary foundation – temporary because a bond entirely based on [shared] trauma will eventually become instable, if not fortified by other things – so they’ll have to put in a lot of work to even get to having a solid foundation to build on.

I'll give you a bit of a general rundown on how I was taught to tackle clients like that, maybe any of that will be helpful for you!

So, firstly: "Sheltered" Tav will need to be careful and understanding and they'll have to be able to take a blow and live with it if they accidentally step to close too early.

Important to note: They'll have to be able to take a blow but they can't be too lenient either.

Astarion seems like a person who's attached to 'respect'. Not in the 'respect your elders' way, but in the sense that he treats those he respects a lot better than those he doesn't. It's the nobility’s definition of respect - some "deserve" it and some don't and who is who is entirely based on personal understanding - so it's very in line with his background.

So, while your Tav will need to be able to take a hit, they'll need to know when to call him out on his bullshit. If you let Astarion walk all over you, he will eventually lose all respect and then this is a lost cause. Don't let him push you around.

If he's being too cruel, don't be cruel back, but definitely call him out on it and let him know that he can always ask you to stop prodding but you will not stand around and let him insult you.

Be understanding, but don't be a doormat.

Then, in order to get someone to open up, you'll have to have a lot of patience. Don't demand anything, don't force anything. Every question you ask has to be careful and phrased in a way that won't corner them, which can be really difficult in casual conversation. So, mishaps can and will likely happen, which is great material for a story anyway, so that's great! (Not so great at work though, haha.)

In case of "sheltered" Tav, it's probably best if they wait for him to come to them. Listen when he rants, listen to the tiny things he mentions and if you ask questions, make sure they directly relate to what he's told you just then.

So, if he talks about Cazador essentially making him choose between eating putrid rats or getting beaten, a question like: "Did he do that a lot?" or "Was it always those two options?" could potentially be alright because the red string is easily visible for both parties. Astarion can tell why you would ask something like that and he can follow your line of thought easily.

But a question like: "What else did he do to you?" or "Did he do other things as well?" would probably have his defences going up. It's too broad, too unspecific, and how is that any of your business anyway? What is this, an interrogation? An interview so that you can ghost write his sad memoirs? Back off.

While a question like: "How exactly did those dinners go?" or "Beaten? How?" is too specific. You're practically asking him to relive a painful moment in great detail for your own "enjoyment". Why else would you want to know? Why else would you ask how exactly he'd been hurt and humiliated, if not for that? Maybe you were planning to do the same to him. He won't let you. The past is the past. Let. It. Rest.

So, as you can tell, it's basically playing question-hot-foot!

But even if your Tav should cross the lines in that regard every once in a while - it happens, every question is a gamble - it'll eventually be fine. The closer they get, the easier it will be to ask questions, because he'll realise that he can actually trust them.

The one word I would really really avoid - and I cannot stress this enough - is 'understand'. God never use it. Tav, omit it from your vocabulary, you'll never "understand" anything ever again!

"I understand what you went though was horrible, but/and/however…" - No, you really do not. You can't understand, can't even imagine what he's faced over the years so never pretend that you do.

"I won't pretend to understand what you went through, but I want to/you can trust me/I can still listen." - Always said with kindness, but that one really is nothing but an empty platitude, at best. Hearing someone say that they don't understand you so directly is never really encouraging either.

"I just want to understand you." - Great, but you don't need to know the barest parts of a person's soul to be able to understand them. If you can't do it without that, maybe you shouldn't. And, all in all, this phrasing of the last one feels really iffy anyway, personally speaking, because it has a very manipulative edge to it. 'Hey I'm just overstepping your boundaries because I want to know you and understand you better. It's all for you..." and blegh. I hate that one, but that might be totally personal so please feel entirely free to ignore this paragraph.

Anyway, as you can see…never "understand", even if it’s just meant to encourage him. Just don't. I've seen clients who asked to be transferred to a different social worker or ended up leaving completely because someone used one of those lines, so I'd really strongly advise against them.

Instead, opt for things like "I'll listen to whatever you want to say." or "Can you explain it to me?" because that way you're not lying to his face and you're leaving everything up to him. He gets to decide where this conversation goes and, more importantly, how far it goes. Not an interview, not an interrogation, but a conversation that he controls.

And well then, flower, that’s it! Of course, there’s a lot more to it, but we’d still be here by the time Baldur’s Gate 8 is released if I went over every tiny thing, but I hope this was enough of an overview to help you build your story 😊 If you end up sharing it, don’t be shy to let me know, I’d be excited to check it out because, as you said, it’s a really interesting dynamic that isn’t explored as much as it should be. It’s a difficult dynamic, but it is so rewarding to write, read and experience. I wish you all the best ♥

#bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #baldurs gate 3 #baldurs gate #baldur's gate #bg3 tav #tav #astarion x tav #baldurs gate tav #astarion #astarion ancunin #astarion romance #bg3 astarion #bg3 asks #astarion x reader #ascended astarion

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