#if anyone has more suggestions of parallel scenes let me know

[lemotomato]

Peter/Rose and Olicity parallels (2 of?) The Night Agent 1.08 / Arrow 7.08

#when the tech badasses want to move things along #to the surprise of their significant others #olicity #peter x rose #Arrow #The Night Agent #if anyone has more suggestions of parallel scenes let me know #my gifs

[writerquil]

Spoilers!

TW! A rant. Mentions of S@ and Abuse

AHEM! Alastor apologist (and apparently now partial defender) to the rescue!

This post is for anyone switching up on my guy after the newest episode. And the switch up originates from that one scene, you know, the scene below.

(EDIT: Sorry for the random censoring lol, I don't feel like going back to edit it and its an old habit of mine).

Yeah, we all know this scene. Basically the one where Alastor lashes out at Husk.

Immediately after seeing this scene I had TWO different reactions, in which consisted of “wow that was cool” and “people are going to twist this, aren’t they?”

And people did! So here I am!

I’m basically going to show a bunch of reactions and concerns to said scene that I disagree with and then I’ll say why!

1. “Alastor is like Valentino!”

Don’t even say that. PLEASE NO.

I like to think that I’m pretty good at letting my liking for characters go the moment that I realize they’re wretched in specific ways, but this never occurred for Alastor.

You wanna know why? Because he is NOTHING like Valentino apart from the fact that they’re both overlords who carry soul contracts. I don’t think I really need to pick apart their personalities because we can already tell how different they are.

The only reason why the two were “grouped” together was because Husk and Angel were stuck in situations both caused by soul contracts and an overlord which caused the two to be mentioned alongside each other.

2. “Husk’s relationship to Alastor is EXACTLY the same as Angel and Valentino’s!”

Nope. Both relationships, admittedly suck, trust me, I’m not discounting either relationship or saying “ok well one has it worse than the other”.

But come on guys, the relationships are not the same. Alastor sucks to Husk, obviously, considering he is forced to do his bidding for who knows how long? But there’s obviously a fine line between the two relationships.

There’s parallels of course, with the chains and the soul dealing. The situations aren’t completely the same but they have similar sources so parallels are bound to occur.

Valentino is an abusive ass whom frequently physically and emotionally abused Angel and Alastor (from what we’ve all seen) can be a jerk who drags Husk into clearly many “favours” such as working at the hotel and possibly many more considering he’s clearly met more of Alastor’s colleagues and friends before.

They’re both forced into things and with their souls under contract, they can’t do much about it. But the things they’re forced to do are significantly different. Once again, this isn’t me saying anyone has it better, because it’s not a competition.

But the relationships are not the same. The two are brought in for significantly different things. Do you really think Alastor is s3Xua!!y abusing Husk whenever he’s brought in? Yeah, no, me neither.

Do you think he’s mentally abusing him too, or that a situation like what was displayed occurs often whenever Husk does come in? Because no. Didn’t you see how startled Husk was? This clearly wasn’t just an average event that happened between the two frequently and the fact that Husk was willing to push Alastor’s buttons a bunch in the first place just shows that he wasn’t expecting it to happen either.

And for the people so insistent on Alastor abusing him like that. I suggest you hide your weird k!nks better.

3. “Alastor tortures Husk frequently!”

Okay and what gave you that idea? Was it the way that Alastor lashed out? Because he didn’t lash out of the blue as you may think.

Husk pushed his buttons and Alastor got angry. Trust me, I love Husk but he played a stupid game and got surprised when he won a stupid prize.

Considering Alastor abusive after pulling Husk to the floor is strange. Trust me, if he was supposed to be abusive, it would be explicitly showed throughout the episodes. And before you say “well it was implied”, I really don’t think so.

And once again, Husk was clearly extremely startled, which means this probably doesn’t happen very often. Which also discounts you all considering him to be similar to Valentino, who displayed hurting behaviour frequently.

Like the most we’d even seen interaction between the two was in the pilot and the recent episode. I think we’d get more display if there was more violence occurring in the relationship.

4. “I used to like Alastor before…”

Then what? You realized he was evil and did evil things? YEAH, he’s bound to threaten someone here and there.

Like if you don’t like him after witnessing his literal evilness then sorry to say, you never liked him in the first place.

I’m sorry for this guys but seriously. You can’t switch up on an evil character for doing evil things. He’s going to threaten people. Just know that when he does, it doesn’t signify he’s abusive or assaults Husk on a daily basis.

#hazbin hotel episode 5 #alastor hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel #alastor haters are gonna make me cry #hazbin hotel husk #hazbin alastor #rant #angel dust #hazbin hotel angel dust #hazbin husk

[dankmaths]

god fuckign dammit i cant stop thinking about thefucking hospital scene

just rewatched it and i don't want to spend 5 hours formatting a long unhinged twitter thread so here we are. i am mishmashing the game and anime and manga scenes together in my personal canon blender. p4 spoilers of course

cause like, naoto is the one to suggest they throw namatame into the TV. and kanji's on board with it too. but the one yu has to fight over it, the one yu has to think carefully about and talk down, is fucking yosuke hanamura.

of course everyone has a personal stake in it considering namatame was going around kidnapping everyone, but yosuke specifically...

he phrases it like "we have to stop him before he hurts anyone else," but it seems like a big part of his motive is revenge. saki's kindness meant a lot to him, regardless of how real it was, or selfish his motive is, and it wasn't fair she had to die. so now he's gonna kill namatame. and it doesn't matter if that goes against his morals, or if no one else is willing to do it. he is absolutely dead set on killing namatame (pun intended). the only thing stopping him from doing it is yu.

it's ironic looking back. because like yosuke, namatame also lost someone important to him, and is trying to use his power to do what he thinks is right in his own way... just like yosuke wanted to be a hero, namatame wanted to be a savior, but yosuke is too blinded by rage in the moment to see that. the big difference is who got to them first. yosuke's had yu with him the whole time to keep him grounded, and eventually, the whole investigation team- namatame got adachi.

(side note- i more often think about yosuke+adachi parallels; how they're both bored with everything, but yosuke has the team and adachi pushes everyone away, but that's not really relevant rn lol)

there's also the scene where yu goes to confront the true killer alone, and yosuke's waiting outside when he comes back. and at that point he's not angry anymore, just… disappointed. (feelsbadman) but i don't think it's because he changed his mind.

after you calm him down in the hospital, he's STILL thinking about doing it:

(another side note- the va in this scene is top notch. this line gave me chills rewatching it. first time i saw the hospital scene i was getting a little scared lol)

and after learning the true killer's identity he fucking hates adachi. even after defeating him he never really forgives him. he still gets pissed and tries to attack adachi when he shows up unexpectedly in ultimax:

yosuke was 100% willing to kill someone, and he'd 100% do it again if his partner gave the okay. but as much as he hates adachi, he understands that he's important to yu, enough to know yu would break their promise and sneak into the TV alone. and despite how he might feel, he doesn't want yu to lose someone important to him too.

there's also the scene in the anime after the hospital, where after yu tries to send everyone home promising he'll be okay, yosuke comes back to comfort him. he's still upset, but he's deferring to yu's leadership and more importantly, making sure that his partner is okay comes first.

that's why i think it's great the anime puts the fist fight after the hospital scene. cause he spends his whole social link struggling with his grief and insecurity and jealousy; and then, in december, with tensions running high and these nasty revelations about himself and awful feelings swirling inside, it all finally comes to a head. and he tries to get it all out in the only way he knows how: two dudes beating the shit out of each other. Thats True Love Babey.

not much of a point to all this, except that i really love yosuke's character (and souyo) lol. something is wrong with him. I Know What He Is. he's like the team mood maker and he's always joking around (and i think golden especially looooves to play him up for comic relief), but perhaps the moments when he lets the veneer slip are the moments where he shines the most.

#p4 spoilers #“i like it when yosuke stops joking around” #(draws almost exclusively yosuke joking around) #“i dont want to spend 5 hrs formatting a twitter thread” #(spends 5 hrs formatting a tumblr essay) #Welp #i usu keep the musings to myself cause saying all this shit out loud makes me feel delusional #persona 4

[autistichalsin]

Sorry, another "and one more thing" about this Halsin stuff, but there is one aspect of this Halsin vs Minthara debacle that is causing me, as an abuse victim, a lot of pain. And i know I am probably projecting here, and I am fully willing to accept that. But.

It just really bothers me to see a plot where Halsin, abused by Minthara, is being turned on for not being "nicer" to her, just because she has a convenient, "the devil made me do it" excuse.

My abusers had sob stories too. They weren't responsible for their actions because they were drunk and high! How could I not feel pity for them, didn't i know how much they were suffering? Why was I being so MEAN by being ANGRY at them? Wasn't I a better person than holding grudges? How could I be so cruel as to take delight when one of them ended up in jail for unrelated reasons? And don't I know better than to think that what they said and did while drunk/high was really them? And plus, I wasn't perfect myself, I made mistakes before, so that pretty much means I'm evil for not wanting to forgive them/be around them!

I see a lot of parallels to that here, which I'm sure are unintentional on the parts of those saying it. I'm sure in their eyes, it's just defending the character they love. And I don't blame them or hold that against them at all! I get it and I'm sure they feel just as strongly that Minthara should be saved at all costs.

But the parallels are there. To the way abuse victims are pressured into "forgiving" their abusers. As though they owe it to the abuser. By being abused, they have become indebted to their abuser, and that debt will only be repaid when they forgive. Notice that there is NO expectation of ANYTHING from the abuser. The idea that they should have to WORK for that grace is treated as repulsive. (Why is no one angry that Minthara didn't make her case better to Halsin? Didn't apologize? Didn't say "I'm glad your Grove wasn't slaughtered" or "I'm glad you survived" or literally anything to indicate she cared about Halsin's suffering?) The onus is solely on the abuse survivor to forgive, whether or not the abuser has actually changed at all- let alone whether they've tried to show the VICTIM they had. Already, there is an implicit suggestion that Halsin, as the victim of abuse, should have put up with it, and that he should just accept that Minthara, as his abuser, should get what she wants just by asking. And no one cares that Halsin is afraid for his life and the player's, independent of forgiveness... his feelings are secondary to his abuser's.

This discourse is already leaving a very, very bad taste in my mouth.

If one wants to criticize other aspects of the writing in that scene, I get it, and can appreciate many of the concerns that have been voiced (like whether it's actually in character- I think it is, but can understand disagreement- or etc). But this particular thing, the overarching theme of "Halsin should not object to sharing a living space with the person responsible for his torture, and that he won't is a black mark on his morality" is bothering me. I hope I haven't offended anyone here, but that is how it's already starting to feel.

#halsin #bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #abuse tw

[riddlerosehearts]

idia/vil is such a sweet and interesting ship to me and does not deserve to be a rarepair i'm serious. this might end up a bit incoherent and disorganized because i'm not great with words, but listen. the thing is that while on a surface level idia shroud and vil schoenheit--a nerdy shut-in with anxiety who likes to game all day and a mega famous celebrity who's strict about self-improvement--might seem completely incompatible, their actual interactions show us that that just isn't true!!

like, for example idia's starsending robes vignette is a big one!! the way that vil sees idia trying to hide when he's supposed to be at the ceremony, and idia says he's terrified that people will make fun of him, that he's not like vil and can't just go out and not care what anyone think the way he does. and then vil... tells him he's wrong, that it's the opposite, that he cares so much what other people think but has enough of a grip on himself that he can ignore it and appear confidently in public. the way vil admits to idia that they are so much more alike that he thinks.

also, the way that (in this fan translation at least, as well as in other TLs i've seen--the localization translates it to have the complete opposite meaning, for whatever reason) idia then says "so in other words, you've got to level up your ignore skill", and instead of getting annoyed at him for translating his advice into video game terms vil just says "isn't that obvious?". he's going out of his way to try and give idia genuine advice and is willing to speak his language to get him to understand it. he even does a similar thing later on in book 6, when he tells idia that it's worth taking chances because after all, the star rogue protagonist took his chances and went from zero to a hero.

and on that note, book 6 is so good for them. book 6 has idia get all excited and carried away while infodumping about star rogue, only to abruptly lose his enthusiasm and start talking quietly and stuttering. and who is it that tells him he shouldn't act so embarrassed and that they weren't judging him? it's none other than vil. vil who also shows an interest in gaming, much to the surprise of idia who believed, in his own words, that a "sparkly, gorgeous supermodel" like vil couldn't possibly like any of the same things as him! but no, vil wanted to try out the games they had and vil expressed a desire for idia to talk about his passions without fear of being judged. vil enjoyed playing star rogue and he was glad to discuss the movie adaptation with idia and ortho.

it's also vil who, when idia expresses his disappointment at the star rogue sequel being canceled and his wish for the original team to get back together and create a sequel that would be made with passion behind it, is the only one to genuinely understand where he's coming from (as opposed to jamil who's like "is it really that complicated?" and leona who suggests that he just throw money at the creators). vil is the one who encourages him to take a chance at doing what he can to make that wish a reality, to let the original team know that there's a passionate and loyal fanbase waiting for a sequel, and tells him that he just generally shouldn't give up on changing his future and achieving his dreams before he's even tried. of course ortho heard this advice too and took it very much the wrong way, but vil showed a surprising amount of understanding and support for idia and i feel like it was exactly the kind of thing he needed to hear.

also. remember the scene in disney's hercules where hercules temporarily gives up his godhood and his youth by diving into the underworld to save megara? because vil literally did the same thing to save idia. yeah, he may say he only did it for plot reasons, but like come on, how am i supposed to just not ship them after they parallel one of my favorite disney couples like that? vil is a world famous actor and model who was terrified of aging, and he still took such an insane risk!! i'm sure idia would have a crush on him after that.

i'm trying to wrap this up now because it's already too long but also idia has actually been said to have great fashion sense as his online persona and shown to enjoy cosplay and dressing up on occasion (for example, he went all out on his pumpkin knight costume and this hasn't made it to EN yet but he liked wearing the masquerade outfit). vil had pretty high praise for his design sense when he saw ortho's burst gear. and vil gets along incredibly well with ortho and is in the film club with him post-book 6, which is something i imagine idia would appreciate a lot. the contrast between them and the things they unexpectedly have in common are just so neat to me.

so, in conclusion,

i love them and i think they should be boyfriends

#twisted wonderland #idia shroud #vil schoenheit #vildia #idiavil #vilidia #i am once again forcing everyone to think about my favorite rarepair #okay also i didn't think this was relevant to the main post but like. consider. #height differences make everything better right?? #but vildia doesn't have a height difference! they're both 183 cm! #EXCEPT. apparently vil usually appears to be taller because of his 13cm/5in heels #which means they CAN have a super cute height difference. idia can lean on vil's shoulder... #also i think it would be fun if vil finds out idia actually has a bit of interest in fashion and is like SUPER surprised by it #like the reverse of idia finding out vil is interested in gaming #and they should play animal crossing and do couples cosplay together #also i have no idea if the localization for that one vignette is more accurate than the fan TLs i've seen or not?? #but the fan TL version just makes more sense to me #okay i'm done now sorry #idia x vil #vil x idia

[sapphic-agent]

Sorry in advance for how long and wordy this gets.

My Hero Academia is squandered by the less than mediocre writing of Horikoshi. I will give him credit only on his ideas and concepts as the premise of the series and the setting are likely the only reason any of us are still tuning in, that and spite.

The show is too quickly paced and surprisingly for a complaint about a shonen, it's too action packed it doesn't offer much up in the way of quiet moments allowing characters to breath properly outside of conflicts and so I don't really care much about the conflicts they are involved in, especially when the thematic relevance of said conflict got spoon fed to me moments before it started in a shoehorned scene or a flashback.

Hori introduces themes of Heroic corruption regularly but never actually shows any corrupt hero's, and those that are said to be corrupt show very quickly that they aren't, usually at the detriment of others.

A complete reboot is necessary, slowing down the pacing immensely to the point where this war arc we are on will take place once they have all left UA. Have major events of the story take place staggered across the three years of UA, include "filler" with dedicated episodes to every student of 1A with mini arcs exploring the more important side characters such as Todoroki, Tenya, Uraraka, Tsuyu and maybe even Momo.

Completely redo Aizawa to actually perform to his own standards, he should teach the students to work on their fundamental "quirkless" capabilities as he more than anyone should know how easy it is to beat someone who has had their quirk countered to make sure they won't die in a situation where their quirk is useless, instead of threatening to expell them for having a weak quirk or non versatile quirk.

This can be done easily by just inverting his test. Have elementary/middle schools let kids use their quirks in gym and PE to help them understand their quirks and use them safely and give genuine context for why teenagers are expected to be skilled with their quirks when public quirk use is illegal. And have his starting test be about who is the most capable without them, showing him to be an unorthodox instructor and less of a hypocrite as that genuinely ties into his fighting style.

Have Izuku be quirkless for either half or all of his first year at UA. Have All Might take notice of him but still teach at UA to scout out a proper successor. Have Izuku manage to get into UA and do well in it's entrance exam as someone quirkless.

Make quirkless people exist and actually matter. 20% of the human race are quirkless, that is a much larger number than people realise coming in at a wopping 1.6 billion would be quirkless out of 8.1 billion. That cannot just be the elderly like fannon suggests.

Have Izuku go from the quirkless wonder to user of OFA actually matter, have him being conflicted about it, have other quirkless people actually have opinions on it, have people discredit him for being Quirked all along, only pretending to be quirkless. If you have him inherit the quirk at all.

Have stain be quirkless and have that revelation chill the world, have him being rejected from heroics for being quirkless have Stain parallel Izuku in many ways.

I could go on and on and on and on about a million and one ideas that would make the show/manga better but I feel like I've made my point well enough that there is so much here untapped that Horikoshi has, but rushed his way past for the next action scene and ultimately squandered.

Agree that MHA does need a major rewrite. It had such great potential and introduced a lot of intricate concepts for an average shonen, only to squander it at every turn. Like someone super smart in one of my reblogs said, "the story has a lot of interesting ideas, the author just has nothing interesting to say about them." A series that was built upon discrimination, inequality, and prejudice has done nothing more in the end than prop up the privileged, bigoted kid over the MC he abused.

Talk a about disappointing

#mha critical #bnha critical #anti bakugou katsuki #ask

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

Ok so here's the fairy tale meta thing based off a lie that I was talking about.

In Dead Apple, there's a flashback scene at Bar Lupin where Dazai explains the concept of apple suicide to Oda, while a track called "Dear Prince" plays in the background. There's a brief mix-up where Oda confuses the story of Snow White for Cinderella - but when I first came up with this, I misremembered what he said (I mixed up... his mix-up...) and thought the line was about Sleeping Beauty.

And I'm so unreasonably annoyed by this because that would've made so much more contextual sense. Why? Because they both involve an awakening. Moreover, there's a few interesting details in the environment of the older tales (I will not be using the Disney versions as the Dead Apple motifs actually connect better with the originals and also because I have never actually seen them... embarrassingly enough) that translate quite nicely to aspects of Dazai's life and bonds.

Specifically, there are some loose parallels to be found with Odasaku and the story of Sleeping Beauty, and Chuuya and the story of Snow White. (Note that this is not intended to be shipping fuel or anything; interpret it however you like, I'm just drawing connections.)

And yeah, I know this is an entire half-baked meta formed around a line that doesn't even exist but please just give it a chance or at least humour me please please please please please

Alright let's get the Cinderella thing out of the way first since I want to at least address it.

Cinderella has its origins in the old Greek story of Rhodopis, which sets up the main aspects of the story we know now: a servant girl from a poor background ascends to royalty through marrying a prince, who searches for her after finding her missing shoe. This doesn't really bear any resemblance to the rest of the movie or any other ongoing themes... unless you want to suggest that maybe Dazai's jumping from one side to the other was something akin to a "shoe-test"; that he was looking for a perfect fit. I think that's quite a stretch though and it's likely this really was just a throwaway line meant to show us Oda's occasional uh... airheadedness. If anyone has any further thoughts on this, I'd love to hear them.

It's a shame, really, because the slip up could've been given more significance and also because as an analyst of sorts it is my sworn duty to pull meaning out of absolutely nothing so I guess I took another step further here and made up my own line to analyze in stupidly excessive detail.

The entire point of this was meant to show how both the stories of Sleeping Beauty and Snow White have a theme of awakening, and so do Dazai's bonds with both Odasaku and Chuuya - they both have a function of "waking him up" in a sense. However, the means of doing so manifest very differently.

So, let's talk about Sleeping Beauty.

Sleeping Beauty has its origins in an old Italian story called Sun, Moon and Talia, which has many of the elements we know today but was uh. A lot darker. And way more non-consensual. The version the more modern story takes its roots from is Perrault's version. Here are the important bits to this analysis: the princess pricks her finger on a spindle out of curiosity, the good fairy puts everyone in the castle to sleep along with her for 100 years so that she will not be alone when she wakes, the prince does not wake her with a kiss but instead she wakes just by his presence and they sit and talk for a long, long time.

So, on to my delusional parallels. Part one: the princess pricks her finger out of curiosity. See, for Dead Apple, we have to rethink this a bit because Dazai brings up the concept of apple suicide, not murder. Of course, this is a parallel to himself and his disregard for his own life, so here we can take it that he did not "prick his finger" out of mere curiosity, but also, likely out of a desire to "sleep".

It's hard for me not to draw a connection between the curiosity aspect of the finger prick and Dazai's curiosity to join the mafia, especially with the next part - where everyone falls asleep as well for the time the princess is asleep. Essentially, no one will age or die. For as long as the princess remains unconscious, the world will not change. And if the princess perhaps, wanted this, then we can infer what is likely a fear of being left. Maybe even a fear of living. Dazai joined the mafia because he was curious if it would have what he sought. Instead, he spent his days trapped in an "oxidizing dream" as he detached further and further both from his humanity and from others. The mafia is already a place where people don't talk to each other openly and we know Dazai was even more unknowable than that - if he doesn't care about himself or others, the dream goes on. He stays asleep, and if he doesn't care, then he doesn't lose anyone - no one truly "dies".

As for the last part, there isn't much to say. Dazai warms up to Odasaku because the man just talks to him. And likes talking to him. And doesn't tell him to stop when he's being really freaking weird. But notably, Odasaku doesn't do much at first to help Dazai "awaken". It's only when he's about to die in his fight against Gide that he realizes he regrets not saying something sooner. Odasaku only has one chance to wake Dazai before he dies and he does it by shattering that dream that he will find what he's looking for. Paradoxically, that hope Dazai held onto was what trapped him in that singular mindset. Oda dies shortly after and the illusion is broken. Dazai wakes up, his world kickstarts where it had previously been stagnant and Dazai greets the sun and tries to live.

See why I'm slightly annoyed this wasn't the line now?

But hey, while we're at it, let's also talk about Snow White because the Dead Apple movie was actually a lot more firm with its connections than I think people realize.

Firstly, I would love people to know that in the original Grimms' fairy tale, Snow White doesn't clean the dwarves' house but in fact burgles it, eating their food, drinking their wine and falling asleep in one of their beds after testing each one, and generally leaving the house in complete disarray. Yeah. Not related to my point at all, but this sounds an awful lot like something Dazai would do (but more out of mischief than naivete of course).

Here's the important part though: Did you know that the Queen attempted to have Snow White killed not just once, but three times? The first two times, the dwarves were the ones to save her and quite quickly - they made a deal after she broke into their house that she would fix it up for them and maintain it in exchange for her staying with them in safety. It's an agreement of sorts, but as they became fond of her, they try and save her life in earnest. The poisoned apple is actually the third attempt to kill her, where the Queen bites into the white, non-poisoned part of the apple and Snow White, thinking it safe, eats the red half and falls asleep.

Hey. Remember the colour of the pill Dazai took in Dead Apple?

Yeah, someone on that team knows the original fairy tale.

Interestingly (and this is where I got really excited), there are three different attempts to kill Snow White (or, if Dazai is to be believed, three different attempts at her own self-destruction) - and there are three different instances where Chuuya "wakes" Dazai, twice while they're partnered (when they have an "agreement", terms in a sense as partners), and once in Dead Apple.

The first is in Fifteen, the infamous scene where Dazai shoots the body and Chuuya snaps him out of it by wrenching the gun out of his hands. I'm honestly a bit too tired to go super into that scene right now but I'm doing a little bit on it later - all that needs to be acknowledged here is that Dazai was out of it and Chuuya forced him back to earth. The second occurs during the Dragon's Head Conflict when Dazai is completely insensitive to the death of a mafia executive and Chuuya decks him for it. The now-infamous line "no one would believe that" is often misinterpreted I think. Chuuya says this in response to Dazai's "I'm human, too, you know." He's not saying "you're not human", he's saying "you are human but no one would believe that with the kind of shit you're saying and doing". It's the same kind of sentiment in the first scene where Chuuya intervenes, I believe. And it is a form of waking, in that Chuuya snaps Dazai out of his more inhumane moments - he basically calls him out and forces him to reevaluate; the epitome of a rude awakening.

Now for the Dead Apple scene proper.

Firstly, let's establish something. They are no longer partners in the mafia. They are even on separate sides. The framing of this changes Chuuya's actions from working with Dazai with occasional call-outs to bring him back to earth, to saving him in what is quite literally a rescue.

In the original myth, again, there is no waking kiss. Instead, in this third time, everyone assumes Snow White is really dead, that she will not be coming back. The prince, who happens across her, insists she at least receive a proper burial. But when carrying her coffin, one of them trips and they stumble, which jostles the princess enough that the piece of apple stuck in her throat is dislodged and she coughs it up, reviving. Uh...

Yeah.

Anyways this got kind of messy at the end and idk if it even made sense this is really just unhinged rambling so...

Tldr, Odasaku and Chuuya both help "wake" Dazai even if their methods and personalities are very different, which is part of the reason why both bonds are very important. Neither are particularly gentle with him, but waking, especially if all you want to do is sleep, is not a gentle thing.

#this is barely a meta but if i didn't write this up i felt like i was going to go insane #not my best work by far but i hope it's at least enjoyable #bsd #bsd dead apple #bsd meta #bsd dazai #bsd odasaku #bsd chuuya #do i tag with the ship names? sure ig #odazai #soukoku #skk #storyrambles #<-last tag is appropriate story has rambled for too long on this. a meta based on a line that doesn't even exist

[affiesque]

So, after surviving a crappy year, I decided my reward would be yet another rewatch of Desire Catcher. I know this fandom is kinda tiny, but I always enjoy reading other people’s random thoughts and observations so I thought I’d throw mine out there too.

There are, of course, a bunch of different crime-related plot lines in the show, but this is basically going to just be me yelling about Luo Fei and Lu Fengping, seeing as I remain obsessed with them. I’m always up for discussing these two nerds in love, so feel free to tag me or message me (*waves to @thinkonce-acttwice!*). I’m at about the halfway point now, so I’ll post again once I finish the rest of the episodes.

Overall, I really like Desire Catcher - the various bits of plot don’t quite come together in the end, but for me it’s more about the relationships and themes of revenge, regret, and forgiveness. So, lots of angst, which I’m always a big fan of, and which I suppose says something about me…

Luo Fei! Light of my life, the silent, broody, lone wolf cop - ACAB, of course, but he’s firmly in sad (not-so-little) man territory, which is catnip to me. Plus he has a collection of black leather jackets - need I say more?

Lu Fengping! Other light of my life - Luo Fei’s future boyfriend, I mean consulting hypnotist, the more outgoing, “quirky” one. He’s always in light colors, dashing around with a lollipop in his mouth (I know there's a cute connection with his mom about them, but that aside, “oral fixation vibes” anyone?), teasing everyone around him - contrasted with Luo Fei’s dark colors, grim expressions, and workaholic nature. Though it’s interesting that as the show goes on it becomes clear that some of Lu Fengping’s affectations are really a mask he puts on to hide his pain (yay, angst!).

Their first real meeting happens over a meal; it’s dark, it’s raining, there’s thunder in the distance - foreboding and romantic all at once. There’s definitely a teasing/flirty vibe there, though Luo Fei seems wary of Lu Fengping - in fairness, Lu Fengping is sort of using him for info on his mom’s murder case, though it gets a lot more complicated than that as time goes on.

While there’s a lot of emphasis on their differences (e.g., dark vs. light), it’s interesting to note how similar Luo Fei and Lu Fengping actually are, even if they don’t see it yet. For example, Luo Fei has trance-like visions as he imagines what happened at a crime scene, much like how Lu Fengping sort of walks around in someone’s mind/memories when he’s hypnotizing them.

So I know this is mainly about the boyfriends, but I want to say that I love all the other members of the investigation team too, especially Liang Yin - definitely not a fan of the “woman suffers for man pain” thing, but they do give her a couple of moments of reclaiming her agency, which I liked.

Luo Fei and Lu Fengping kind of dance around the whole I-know-you-know-more-about-my-mom’s-death thing for most of the first half of the show, at least until it all comes out when Lu Fengping hypnotizes Luo Fei (and WTF suggesting that Zhang Yu - you were supposed to be the show’s moral compass!). Like I get that by this point they’re becoming closer, feeling more open to each other, but still - you’re just rooting around in his brain without permission, my guy. Yikes.

I’m a big fan of parallels and I think we get a pretty significant one here between Luo Fei/Lu Fengping and the story of the relationship between Xiao Xifeng and Tu Liansheng. While you could certainly read it as just two longtime friends, the flashback scenes of them raising the abandoned kid together certainly give off a “couple-y” vibe. Given that the show can’t come right out and say anyone is actually gay/queer, to me it’s a way of floating the idea out there and letting people draw their own conclusions.

Speaking of reading into things, I had to go there and look up the various books shown strewn around Lu Fengping’s apartment. There were two romance novels (“Crimes of the Heart” by Allie Harrison and “Yesterday’s Bride” by Charlotte Walker), another female-centric novel (“Things to Make and Mend” by Ruth Thomas), a financial memoir (“The Age of Turbulence” by Alan Greenspan), and, my personal fav, some gay French shit (“Remembrance of Things Past” by Marcel Proust). Kind of an odd combo of things, but there are some bits that do seem to fit with the themes of the show - lots of misunderstandings, mistakes, not wanting to lose the people close to you. The Greenspan book is more of an outlier, but it does have the theme of “the invisible hand” - it’s mainly an economic term, but you could extrapolate it more generally to people acting on instinct, rather than in a calculated way, sort of like how Lu Fengping’s mom acts to save Liang Yin, setting off a chain of events (kind of a stretch, though). And I guess I don’t have to say much about the Proust - feels like the kind of book you’d use as shorthand for “some gay stuff is happening here, folks.” Plus, the book deals with memory and how people can perceive the same thing in totally different ways, which seems relevant to the mom’s death story line.

Getting back to the gay stuff, there were definitely a few things that made me 👀. First, when Lu Fengping says “no problem” a little too forcefully when Luo Fei tells him to wait outside while he changes - like, “don’t worry, bro, I totally don’t want to see you naked, nope, not at all, hahaha” (combine that with his comment “You don’t like men? Haha, neither do I!” in a later episode to Liang Yin - feels like he’s protesting a bit much). Second, they’re always kind of flirty with each other, even if it’s subtle. There just seems to be a bit of subtext in a line like “You’re in a pretty unique situation” when Luo Fei sees Lu Fengping facedown on the floor at one point, not to mention the looks they give each other when Lu Fengping ends up stumbling to his knees in front of Luo Fei (and you can’t tell me that that was a totally accidental push on the part of Lu Fengping’s mentor - he totally ships them too, IMHO). Third, you can’t overlook the jealousy that rears its head when Luo Fei sees Lu Fengping getting flirty with the (eventually evil) nurse, or when he thinks Lu Fengping brought a girl home to his apartment. Fourth, there are several bits of convo that play around with subtext and seem aimed at the audience with a wink and a nudge. For example, there’s the bit in the car where Lu Fengping brings up marriage (sure, it’s in reference to a different character, but Luo Fei has a justifiable WTF reaction), asks if Luo Fei has a girlfriend, and basically tries to set him up with a female client of his (who, it should be noted, sounds suspiciously like Lu Fengping himself - “very outgoing; your personalities complement each other very well”) in the span of about 10 seconds. Luo Fei gives him his best “bitch, please” look and ditches him - I’m with you on this one, boo. Then there’s a weird bit of dialogue when they’re searching a suspect’s very neat and orderly apartment - Lu Fengping says “A man living by himself can keep a place like this clean. He wouldn’t be that thing…” - long pause, pointed look at Luo Fei - “OCD or something like that?” The audience knows at this point that Luo Fei’s apartment is just as well-kept, and there seems to be an implication that Lu Fengping is actually referring to the stereotype of gay men being very neat. And how could I not mention the fight scene in the gym - beyond the groping, grunting, and full-body contact of their grappling session, the looks they give each other afterward, the small smiles when the other isn’t looking, Lu Fengping thanking Luo Fei for bringing flowers to his mom’s grave - it’s a lot.

DATE NIGHT! (Sorry, I just get really excited about this part.) So here we have Mr. Uptight, known-to-not-drink-with-his co-workers-ever Luo Fei agreeing to go out with Lu Fengping after work and proceeding to get shitfaced (or does he…? He seems suspiciously sober after Lu Fengping puts him to bed and leaves the room). It’s tropey (drunken piggyback ride), it’s sweet (Lu Fengping tearing up when he sees he’s been added to the work group chat), it’s typical man shit (drinking instead of talking about feelings). They’re both just so tender and raw right under the surface and it makes me slightly feral, ngl. Also, the bit with Luo Fei’s parents there in the morning - I love how Lu Fengping immediately charms them and how they rush off like, “oops, sorry son, didn’t realize you brought a 'friend' home - we didn’t mean to interrupt!” And, of course, Liang Yin’s knowing smile when she sees them show up to work together the next morning; at this point in the show I’m not sure there’s any character who doesn’t ship it…

On a sad note, poor Xiao Liu - all he wanted was for his boss Luo Fei to be proud of him. Sure, he fucked up a couple of times, but he still didn’t deserve to get stabbed to death like that, nor just become another brick in the wall of Luo Fei’s “man pain.” (Also, WTF Luo Fei - do not throw papers at your subordinates - not cool, bro.) I’m probably reading too much into things, but there was kind of an undercurrent of Xiao Liu having a little bit of a crush on Luo Fei - he seemed so sad that Luo Fei had drinks with Lu Fengping almost immediately after meeting him, while Xiao Liu had been waiting to do that with Luo Fei for years. Interesting to note too that Xiao Liu also favored lighter-colored clothing, much like Lu Fengping (more of the light vs. dark trope).

Alright, well, this got away from me a bit… Looking forward to the second half of DC and all that delicious angst. 🖤

#desire catcher #lu fengping x luo fei #lu fengping #luo fei #my recap

[joannerowling]

On the issue with James, I do think this is one area where the books aren’t ageless and have to be read in the context of an English school in the 70s written by an author in the 90s. Because by today’s standards, James is less of your garden variety ‘boys will be boys’ type bully and more of an actual sociopath well past the age of criminal responsibility who by 16 had committed one public sexual assault and was an accessory to attempted murder who backed out last second. But I don’t think that’s at all what Jo meant to convey.

Let me guess. Snape fan? :P

Look, my issue with this discourse has always been that only James seems to get so much flack for his most morally ambiguous actions. I mean, Hermione disfigured a girl her age with zits spelling "sneak" because she'd given the DA members out to Umbridge. Harry nearly gored Malfoy to death by using an unknown spell he knew was meant "for enemies". Yet, i've never seen anyone hating on James that would go as hard against these other characters.

On your first point: James wasn't an accessory to attempted murder who backed out last second. Sirius was the one who tricked Snape and nearly got him killed (which would have made Lupin an accessory to murder). James acted to stop it as soon as he realised what Sirius had done. His reasons for doing so remain obscure - Snape thinks he wanted to save his own skin because he would have been blamed alongside Sirius, but that's Snape's interpretation, not exactly the most unbiased source.

Next: i ressent people misusing the term "sexual assault" to describe what James does in Snape's worst memory (a take that, btw, i've only seen upheld as if it were common knowledge by Americans, or very "Americanised" fans). The definition of sexual assault is "unwanted sexual contact", and in the UK especially it pretty much means "rape without penetration". I do think Jo meant for it to be taken seriously (its parallel with the Muggles's treatment by Death Eaters in GoF is clear), only people didn't really at the time. Still. James humiliated Snape, i'd say what he did qualifies as sexual harrassment, and he's rightfully painted as the bad guy in that episode, but he didn't sexually assault Snape.

Also, because we only have that one scene to work with, everyone seems to forget the larger context, namely: Snape created that spell. Judging by the way Death Eaters were still using it 15+ years later, i imagine James wasn't the first nor the last in his generation to use it against another student. I always saw it as a bit analogous to those dangerous/humiliating games that suddenly become trendy with high schoolers until someone gets hurt enough for adults to intervene. I'm comforted in that interpretation by the fact that Snape implies James didn't even know HE was the one to invent the spell, suggesting it started as a thing Snape showed to other Slytherins to gain some social cred, which then spread to the whole school.

Anyways, if that makes James a sociopath, then Hogwarts must have been chock-full of them in the 70s, starting with Snape himself. Maybe the point isn't that Snape or James (or Sirius) are sociopaths, but that imminent war tends to turn people more prone to violence and less likely to abide by moral principles, or consider their designated enemies's humanity. I have no doubt that James morally justified himself and his actions by the fact that Snape belonged to the "bad crowd" of Voldemort's future recruits. Even though we readers know enough about Snape to be able to tell that he was never seriously convinced by Pure Blood superiority.

#replies #anon #james potter #severus snape

[bthump]

saw this comment on Reddit about the latest chapter and thought it was interesting:

“The shot of Rickert kneeling down over Guts lying face down on his stomach saying “Guts, is that really you?” parallels the scene of Guts finding Griffith in the dungeon, also lying face down. Just swap the names and they essentially say the same thing.

Personally, I do think the behelit will activate for Guts sometime before the story is over. Or at the very least, it will start reacting, seeming like it wants to activate.

Thematically, I just can’t see it belonging to anyone else. It’s our Chekhov’s gun.

I see only one of two things happening:

The behelit activates for Guts, and obviously he will refuse.

Or

He finds a way to infuse it into the dragonslayer to make it have the same potential as SK’s sword of actuation.

I’m leaning towards the former.

Though, there is one more possibility that I’m just now starting to consider: that the behelit belong’s to Rickert.

It seems like Rickert might become a major player for the final act. I think they might be building him up to be Griffith’s true foil. He evens looks a lot like a young Griffith with his new hairstyle. I’ve always felt like Rickert is the story’s moral center. He might not have directly suffered as much as Guts and Casca, but he still lost all of his friends — all of his family — and was betrayed by the man he once looked up to above all others. However, unlike Guts, instead of running off to seek revenge, or spiraling out into self-destructiveness, he faced the pain of his losses, honored the memories of his fallen friends, and turned his focus towards those precious few he had left in his life. The kid has been through a fucking lot, but he hasn’t let his pain harden his heart or crush his soul. Now, just like Griffith, he went from being a total nobody to an incredible leader at a very young age. But unlike Griffith, his reasons are not vain, selfish ones.”

Obviously there are elements in the comment that I know you will disagree with like the Griffith being selfish and the part where they say guts would never sacrifice. but I think the thing about the parallel with Griffith and also the stuff about Rickert is a thing I haven’t seen people consider yet. Sorry if you don’t like other peoples comments being posted here, I know you don’t like what happened with the metas but my intention isn’t to criticise this comment I just found it interesting and I kept them anonymous

Yeah no, I personally don't see anything wrong with discussing comments made publically, and yeah nothing about your vibe comes across as malicious or anything. I don't want to encourage these kinds of asks because they obviously do bother some people, but I'm not gonna turn them down either unless I get bad faith vibes from the asker, or whoever originally posted it makes it clear they don't want others discussing their takes.

So yeah my thoughts on the subject:

Basically I see their point about Rickert being the moral centre of Berserk - idk if he's a prominent enough character for me to describe him that way, but he's definitely meant to be a foil to Guts in how he handles the Eclipse and losing all his friends, and to illustrate a much healthier method of coping, forging new relationships and goals.

I think it's a stretch to suggest he's meant to be a foil to Griffith, a better version of Griffith in any sense. Like there's no indication that he's leading the troops here first of all, he's just one of them. I wouldn't describe him as a leader, certainly not without further information.

And I doubt the behelit is Rickert's, for the same reason I doubt it's anyone's except Casca's, possibly Guts', or mmmmaybe Serpico's: there's no foreshadowing of a despair condition or sacrifice material. It's possible Miura was just gonna cram it all in at the end, like surprise! lol, but idk, that feels cheap to me. It'd be disappointing if so, imo.

Also I do think there are Griffith in the dungeon parallels right now with Guts falling apart lol, so maybe that's purposeful? But I think Guts' despair is more likely to lead to the armour taking over than the behelit opening. Mainly because Guts doesn't need two separate ways to give in to his inner darkness lol, and now that he has the armour the behelit is both redundant and probably too permanent for a protagonist. The armour is perfect in that he can succumb and then be pulled back to himself after crossing a moral event horizon. The behelit is a little too conclusive whether he says no or yes to monsterism. Also the armour is just Guts' style. Passively make an agreement to become a monster? No, but lose his shit and start ripping people apart? Absolutely.

#ask #anonymous #a #b #theme: speculation #theme: behelit #theme: inner monster #character: rickert

[insomniactalks]

I had already planned on making this post after watching 3.04, and even received a message about it (LOL, cuz us PWs share 1 collective brain cell😂), so here's a quick (long) Portwell analysis! Plenty of gifs ahead, so read under the cut.

A moment that caught me really off guard was the following:

I'm not surprised EJ suggested a song that would allow Gina to shine after Corbin said they have to film something. But Gina's reaction to EJ even saying the word "love" was so genuine and full of excitement and giddiness. In the 3rd gif, she's so elated at the possibility of EJ saying he loves her (someday) that she clenches her hands to contain herself. Then she tries not to get too ahead of herself and claims she "didn't hate" hearing him say it. It feels very similar to her 2.09 talking head when she admits things have "changed a little" between her and EJ. Obviously, things definitely change for them by the S2 finale. So this was just an interesting parallel to me... it also seems like more foreshadowing of Portwell falling in love/love confession someday. They are also playing background music in the moment above that I don’t believe we’ve ever heard before. I could be wrong, so if anyone knows for sure, let me know! But it sounds like new music to me. It sounds like a guitar instrumental, with a romantic and hopeful feel. It starts the moment Gina smiles in the 1st gif, then ends the moment she stops smiling in the 4th. The music kinda encapsulates how Gina feels at that exact moment. 

Another moment that stood out to me was EJ and Gina at the beginning of “Love is an Open Door,” prior to the dream sequence when they're in-costume. EJ is clearly uncomfortable being thrown into the role of an actor again b/c he’s been so focused w/ being the director. He says he’s “a little rusty as an actor” before Gina nudges him w/ her shoulder and gives him encouraging words (”pretend it’s you and me frolicking across a field”). I think EJ does exactly what she says b/c the song eventually leads to a dream sequence, w/ EJ and Gina frolicking around the camp lmfaooo. I interpreted the part of the music video with EJ and Gina in-costume as Hans and Anna as EJ’s imagination, if he were to play that role in the musical. 

The part I wanna talk about is the very beginning of “LIAOD,” before the dream sequence, where you can clearly tell EJ is incredibly nervous and sings rigidly at first (not gifed but just look it up hehe). He can’t even look up as he sings “I love crazy” and seems extra expressive when he sings “I was thinking the same thing” (also not gifed. Sorry.) BUT the moment he starts to act/sing more genuinely is during the following lines:              

Living in his father’s shadow for all his life, this line really relates to EJ’s experience b/c he’s been trying to live up to Cash’s expectations of him (perfect son, athlete, actor, etc) while also trying to “find his place” in the world. Gina nods along as EJ sings this bit b/c she understands (as both someone who has also been searching for her own place/home, but also as someone who knows about EJ’s life, considering their 2.08 couch scene. He said his “entire life had been mapped out for him” (2.08) and Gina shook her head at the time b/c she couldn’t relate. But in the gif above, she nods her head in agreement b/c she gets him now, even if her experience differs.) 

The first time Portwell make eye contact (meaningfully!) during the song is this moment: 

Gina looks over at EJ while she sings “with you” and he does the same. He sings “I found my place” while looking at her b/c Gina helped him on this journey of self-discovery. Her words to him in the 2.08 couch convo gave him the strength to stand up to his dad about the whole Duke situation. Gina sings “I see your face” with another nudge in the shoulder (totes paralleling the shoulder nudge in 2.10!) b/c she really does see EJ for who he truly is. She even said it in 2.08 ("I see someone who tries really hard to do the right thing. He fails a lot. But he keeps on trying.") When they sing these lines, they’re not portraying Anna and Hans. They are just Gina and EJ, 100% themselves. 

Right before the dream sequence part of the song, we get this moment:       

Gina turns to EJ and offers him her hands. With more confidence than before, EJ happily takes them and Gina gives a reassuring squeeze. She’s silently telling him “we got this!” thru her body language b/c from this point on, they have one another’s full, undivided attention. They’re not just performing for Corbin and his documentary crew, EJ and Gina are singing to each other from this point on.  (I also just love the fact that Gina’s wearing a cute red dress and a heart locket. AND THEY’RE SINGING A LOVE SONG.) 

One last thing that I love about “LIAOD” are these scenes:    

EJ pushes Gina on the swing. Gina pushes EJ on the swing. EJ spin dips Gina. Gina spin dips EJ. Sure, he can be the macho leading man/hero, and she could be the damsel in distress, but that's not who they really are all the time. They are very much so reversing typical gender constructs in the most subtle of ways! And I absolutely love it! I just love how often Portwell are shown to be a team, and they've always got each other's backs. If she falls, he'll catch her. If he falls, she'll catch him. It's an equal partnership through and through. (It also takes a lot of trust to fall into someone's arms like that, and they both clearly trust the other to catch them!) AND just thought of this, but having Gina be the one to spin dip EJ further highlights her role as Anna as the heroine of the story. There's certainly no toxic masculinity on EJ's part because he's more than happy to have his girlfriend catch/spin dip him on national television, especially if it means highlighting what a star she is. AGHHHHH I LOVE THEM.

#hsmtmts #hsmtmts s2 #hsmtmts s3 #hsmtmts analysis #hsmtmts speculation #ej caswell #gina porter #portwell #portwell parallels #cash caswell #corbin bleu #frozen #frozen hans #anna frozen #portwell meta #portwell analysis #portwell supremacy #idgaf #best part about this show #thanks for reading!

[kiefbowl]

The final redpill is that being angry at men 24/7 keeps them in power over you, if you can’t be free even in your thoughts there’s no hope.

the worst thing about radfems is like

i fucking get it. men have hurt me too. for a long time, i was afraid of men, afraid that they'd hurt me and do worse to me then they already had.

i was 16 when my mother told me her story. an ex who'd abused and repeatedly raped her.

i asked her how she was able to move on and marry my father.

what she said broke my mindset.

if i was afraid of men, so afraid and angry that i never let anyone else in, he'd win. it would have worked. he'd have succeeded in breaking me. and that man didn't deserve to have that kind of power over me.'

radfems claim to want to protect women, to keep them from being hurt by men again but all they really do is keep themselves and other radfems constantly retraumatized.

you haven't escaped. he still has power over you.

This is like a freeform poem, dig that. I suppose you wanted notes and that's why you sent it to me, I'll take it line by line.

"The final redpill is that being angry at men 24/7 keeps them in power over you, if you can’t be free even in your thoughts there’s no hope."

I like the imagery of the Final Redpill, it set's the scene in a sort of dystopian medicinal frontier where radicalization happens in doses that are distributed to you and you swallow, and also lends itself to a digital landscape in the sense that the word "Final" is often used to describe a "Final Boss" in video games. A sort of endgame of radicalization happens in this piece, you can reach a Final Redpill in which there are No More Redpills to take, so be forwarned! It's very, very good to give strong visual cues at the beginning of a poem, something to draw the reader in.

The thing that confuses me is this sort of paradoxical language of the next clause. So the narrator admits men have power over "you" aka women, but it's being angry at men that makes this happen. Okay, but then why do they have power over women? Did women spontaneously get angry at men 24/7 and then that caused the power, or did men develop the power and then women are mad at it but then that means that women sustain the power? Ultimately the narrator is suggesting women's oppression is women's fault, which fair of course we all know that, but you could use more clear language. A metaphor or simile could help, especially if you relate it back to the "Final Redpill" in the first clause.

Maybe something like The final redpill is anger, men are kept in power over you by the very pills you choose to take. there’s no hope.

Adding "there's no hope" as a single sentence adds some punchiness and rhythm, something to consider, unless this is a message about hope, then we should discuss how to get that meaning across.

"the worst thing about radfems is like"

No notes, excellent use of white space.

"i fucking get it. men have hurt me too. for a long time, i was afraid of men, afraid that they'd hurt me and do worse to me then they already had."

this has particularly good rhythm.. I like the use of an uncaptialized "i", it gives a sense of commonality. Instead of "we", we are all "i." The narrator is both a woman and every woman. I like the two short sentences and then a longer one.

"i was 16 when my mother told me her story. an ex who'd abused and repeatedly raped her."

Again, the lower case "i" is good, unless you wanted to be specific to the narrator referring to herself. Using "I" here could be good to show a difference between the lower case "i" in the line above vs. the line here to demonstrate the specific choice. Depends on your meaning. It can make sense either way since so many of us have mothers whose story is this very one.

"i asked her how she was able to move on and marry my father."

I'm not sure if this white space is necessary, if it was brought up to your last line we ask the reader to draw parallels in the relationship between the two men in the couplet.

"what she said broke my mindset."

No notes, excellent use of white space! We are seeing a change of the narrative in the poem.

"if i was afraid of men, so afraid and angry that i never let anyone else in, he'd win. it would have worked. he'd have succeeded in breaking me. and that man didn't deserve to have that kind of power over me.'"

Punctuation is strange. I'm assuming the final (') is meant to be a quotation and this is a direct quote from the mother figure of the narrator.

"radfems claim to want to protect women, to keep them from being hurt by men again but all they really do is keep themselves and other radfems constantly retraumatized."

We haven't circled back to the imagery of the Final Redpill, I'd say that's a missing element. I was such a good, strong choice, this would be a perfect place to try to tie back into the poem.

"you haven't escaped. he still has power over you."

Very spooky line and interesting ending to the poem. Having an unspecific "he" that you haven't yet referred to ends the poem nicely, it give the reader pause. Is he an abuser and rapist? It loops us back to the first line that suggests it's women's anger that causes men's power, perhaps the poem is asking us if we accepted that reality too readily and he is the source of anguish. "you" aka women haven't escaped. and why? because of him. a man is within this poem and we've hardly given him consideration, that is excellent writing.

Overall, solid A-. Clean up the first line for more clarity and better rhythm and tie more lines to the Final Redpill imagery, and I think you've got a solid piece of writing here. Thanks for trusting my judgement! :)

[marley-manson]

So, Hepatitis.

Hawkeye’s scenes with Radar and Margaret were both v sweet and loveable, love Margaret confiding in Hawkeye and Hawkeye sincerely trying to make her feel better amid the come ons even before the ‘simple respect’ exchange, though ofc that was also great. Frank’s was funny. Klinger’s was also v funny but felt a little too much to me, with the violent outbursts. Hawkeye annoyed by BJ keeping him up at the start and then reversing it onto him when he’s hungover at the end was great. Loooved Hawkeye immediately deciding what to do in surgery when Potter asks him as chief surgeon and assigning BJ the job since he’s the only one who’s read about the procedure.

But my complaint about this episode is probably pretty predictable for anyone who follows me lol: I did not buy the psychosomatic back pain angle. The episode seemed to be suggesting that Hawkeye is deflecting his anger over being drafted onto Vernon Parsons, which uh... really? “I think maybe you haven’t made up your mind how you feel about being over here.” You think? You think Hawkeye isn’t quite sure whether he’s upset or not about being drafted? Really? Hawkeye? Hawkeye hasn’t figured out how he feels about it? Torn between frustration and enjoying the vacation, perhaps?

BUT to be fair I think my main issue here is framing, because I think this concept of deflected anger can work in theory, at least from a characterization angle, and the discussion about it with Potter just kinda sucked lol.

I’d frame it as: Hawkeye knows he’s angry about being there, but he can’t actually express the true depths of that anger. In part because of internal factors, ie he doesn’t want to become a bitter, fucked up shell of a person. And in part because of external factors, ie actually expressing his feelings will get him court martialed, and if not that it’ll at least alienate everyone around him. These are desertion feelings, push Frank into a helicopter blade feelings, let the next colonel on his operating table die feelings, or start screaming halfway through surgery on an 18 year old feelings.

Or, it could be just since Trapper left. I mean when’s the last time he gaslit a colonel into early retirement? BJ’s down for some schemes, but he arrived during the transition away from satire, so he’s never been Hawkeye’s partner in crime for the really satisfying ones that actively harm military officials. This would be taking the theme of Some 38th Parallels, in which rebellion fixes his dick, and running with it. Hawkeye’s getting ED and back pain because he hasn’t removed a colonel’s appendix in too long (and when he finally gets another chance, BJ ruins it anyway lol.)

I will say though, that maybe I’m still reading that scene unfairly.

“You think I’m mad and won’t admit it.” The way Hawkeye says that... like Alan Alda wrote this script but still delivered it wryly, like it’s an asinine suggestion from Potter. Potter maintains it and says he thinks Hawkeye’s been tying himself in knots the whole time he’s been here, so yk, in terms of writer intent I do think we’re probably meant to agree with him. But despite that, the way the scene plays out it’s more like what fixes Hawkeye isn’t Potter telling him to work out how he feels about being drafted, but rather Potter sympathizing with him, reassuring him that he’s better than Parsons, and telling him to take it out on him later, when he gets home lol.

And that also tracks as a contrast to BJ being unsympathetic about Parsons at the start with a “you’ll live,” and Frank taunting him about it.

Also I really love Potter telling Hawkeye to file a paternity suit to get back at Parsons lol, it’s such a good line it almost makes up for even the least charitable reading of the rest of the scene. The way it has this vibe of Potter deliberately playing into Hawkeye’s sense of humour to make him laugh... everything I went on about in that post about Mash’s organic comedy is nailed in that exchange.

#mash #mash s5 #marley on mash #hawkeye mash #mb i should've separated out my thoughts on hawkeye repressing anger lol it's an intereseting subject for its own post #oh well

[threewaysdivided]

Euughhh I can’t decide between #18 or #20, so I will let you decide :)

Meta asks for writers

18. Do any of your stories have alternative versions?

(Plotlines that you abandoned, AUs of your own work, different characterisations? Tell us about them.)

I think this may have come up as a glancing mention in the past but the Deathly Weapons you know is actually a stealth-re-write starting at around Chapter 10.  When I first came up with the idea, I had enough of a detailed outline to carry me to Interference, plus some loose notes for later plot-beats.  In that initial burst of unfettered creativity I kept going and freewrote up to roughly the equivalent of Chapter 17: Assessment in DW’s canon timeline.

There was some fun stuff in there (the “And here I thought I was just a pretty face” quip from Zatanna in Chapter 18/ Mission 1 comes from the OG version of Chapter 10) but there was also a reason I didn’t release those versions, and was already wanting to go back and re-do them.  The stealth-draft was incredibly barebones/compressed in places and some now-key scenes were straight-up missing (Propositions, Constants and Roads to Safe Places were all timeskipped over).  Plus I was leaning more heavily into fanon since I hadn’t decided to go back and revisit either show yet, which meant things were more surface-level and “standard” in a few ways.  In the stealth-draft, Ghost-Obsessions were explicit lore a headcanon which is fine but that I realised didn’t interest me or serve the story that much on consideration, Danny was more of an OP Gary-Stu type the OG version of the training session was a free-for-all spar where he beat the whole Team, which… no, and Danny and Wally’s conflict was a lot more superficial/arbitrary/unsatisfying.

I’ve walked myself to the stocks over this before but in the spirit of good-natured lampooning I’m happy to rummage through the old draft some more should you want further samples to jeer and hiss at.

20. Tell us the meta about your writing that you really want to ramble to people about?

(Symbolism you’ve included, character or relationship development that you love, hidden references, callbacks or clues for future scenes?)

Considering my status as a shameless meta aficionado who can and will ramble for up to 20 pages on the barest prompting, one could say you’re playing a dangerous game here, nonnie.

For the sake of brevity I’m going to rapid-fire a bunch of meta I’d love to talk about and let anyone who’s interested take their pick:

I haven’t found a place to really dig into it in-story, but I went and read Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland etc. collection for extra Artemis material, and there’s some interesting parallels you could read into between Alice/Artemis and The Cheshire Cat/Jade, and what it suggests about their dynamic.  It could also indicate some things about how they themselves perceive their relationship given that Jade deliberately took the name Cheshire as her alias in-universe.  The Nguyen-Crock sisters are interesting.

YJ!Wally deviates from many iterations of Comics!Wally in that he canonically has a loving and functional homelife rather than an abusive one.  I have some potentially-controversial but mostly sappy thoughts about why that changed backstory is actually good for this iteration of the character and what it lets him bring to his version of the Team.

The central emotional arc of Deathly Weapons is Danny/Phantom’s journey through grief to healing.  I like how the planned scenes ended up coming together in a pattern where he initially tries to avoid talking about it with other people, then starts to reluctantly talk when asked, then starts talking freely when prompted, and eventually starts willingly volunteering information as he begins to form new bonds and move forward.  It wasn’t a conscious thing when I first set them out but it feels correct in hindsight.

There’s lots of little things that I’m either setting up on purpose to pay off later or have found ways to bring back as echoes in late-game chapters:

Danny’s appearance at Cadmus has developed into a pretty seminal point for his and Team Phantom’s journey between leaving Amity Park and joining The Team.  More information to come in Equilibrium but keep an eye out for references to the incident or things about his left shoulder.

I recently did some Martian Meta in prep for M’gann’s later focus chapter but there’s also a dynamic I’ve started setting up between her and Phantom (especially in the sparring scene) and it’s going to be interesting to see if anyone picks up on where that’s going.

There’s a very late game scene where Danny is talking to Conner about Danielle and The Clone Thing where I have Danny planned to say “but either way, she’s here and she picked our side.  The how and why… guess it just didn’t take that long to stop mattering” as an echo of Bruce’s conversation with Clark in the YJ Episode Schooled.

There’s a conversation between Wally and Dick in the final chapters whose ending parallels the end of Danny and Dick’s scene in Trade Secrets, paying off a promise that will be made in Equilibrium.

And, as you can see, there is so much Equilibrium character-meta which I am desperate to discuss about but also don’t want to talk about for spoiler reasons.  I am going to be so normal about it when publication day comes.

Thanks for playing!

#Porque no los dos? #feel free to ask for multiple numbers #writer meta ask game #justwhumpythings' ask game #young justice: deathly weapons #Young Justice #DP Crossover #DP x DC #anonymous #3WD Answers #I also like to hide little bits of literary quotes or easter eggs from other series I like in the details of the story #During In the Mists there’s a planned conversation where the Team lightly pay out their mentors #and about half of it is references to embarrassing moments from other DC properties. #Carroll + Dickens + Shakespeare works all get random references in CH19 #later on the Team is fighting a magic user and his ‘special amulet’ is actually the Amulet of Sarmarkand from the Bartimaeus series

[kinetic-elaboration]

January 22: Secret Obsession

Last night I watched the movie Secret Obsession on Netflix because I wanted to watch something simple and genre heavy and maybe a little trashy--and it was perfect for scratching that itch. Afterward, I read some reviews of it, because I felt like part of the pleasure of this sort of media is reading other people being incensed/feeling smart about catching plot holes. NPR did a pretty great skewering. In general, though, I feel like reviews or reactions that are really mad miss the point. It's light viewing. It's simple in its plot and over the top in its emotions, it's obvious, it's predictable, it's stylized, it's genre heavy. It is, in a weird way, comfort viewing.

So, it doesn't feel particularly useful to me to point out plot holes. We're in Cinematic Amnesia territory folks: it's not going to make sense. And large holes like 'why didn't anyone care to investigate these four other mysterious deaths' and 'why doesn't this woman have any other friends or family looking for her' seem to entirely miss the point, in my opinion. Because that would make the plot too complex. Also, this is nominally a thriller but really it's more an exaggerated abuse horror story: the villain has all the attributes of many real life domestic abusers (isolating his victim, lying to her or even gaslighting her, being nice/sweet/romantic and then physically abusive in turn, etc.) but he's doing everything on a grand scale. She's not just separated from her family; they're dead. The abuser isn't just hiding aspects of his personalty, he's straight up created a new identity. The isolation involves a house in the mountains, a sabotaged cell phone and internet, and her own physical disabilities following her accident. It's all turned up to 11. That's the whole point.

That said, I had some suggestions for improvement.

First, I would cut the detective's missing daughter story line. I get that the point was to give him more substance and character, and a sort of personal stake in the whole proceeding. But there are really only 3 characters of any worth in the whole film, they are all archetypes, and he's one of the three. We care about him because he's The Detective. We know who he is because he's The Detective. And he's invested in the case because, duh, it's job. It seems more weird that other people AREN'T invested in it tbh. Further, that saving Jennifer would allow him to let go of his unfinished business with his own lost daughter doesn't gel. I know the idea is that Jennifer is like a surrogate or metaphorical daughter, and that saving her is like 'saving' his real daughter, but it just doesn't work. First, they don't know each other and we really only see one scene of them together, at the very end. It's not believable that he has a personal stake in her even by the transitive property. Second, she has no attributes similar to that of his daughter. Maybe she is now the age his daughter would have been, but that's never made clear. All we know is his daughter was 10. Jennifer is an adult. Third, though details are spare as to what happened to the daughter, there's no reason to believe it was a similar situation to Jennifer's--in fact, it couldn't have been so similar, since Jennifer's kidnapper fake-married her. Pretty sure that didn't happen with the 10 year old girl. I got the impression hers was a straightforward kidnapping, but Jennifer's situation really wasn't a straightforward kidnapping. You have to squint to see the parallels. Basically, if you're not going to really do the parallel or really dive into the trauma, just don't do it. Even I have limits on how half-assed something can be even in a film like this before I get annoyed with it.

Second, and speaking of half-assed, I would cut the nameless red herring guy. He's so obviously here to misdirect the audience away from the husband, but, look, if you've watched the trailer you know the fake husband is the villain, and even if you haven't....the fake husband is obviously the villain. If you're going to misdirect with someone else, at least give him.... a name, some sort of actual non-creepy reason for involving himself in this, some sort of backstory or something. Also, I think there are other ways to bring into the plot or otherwise resolve the elements he does, or tries to, provide. For example, his murder shows off fake Russell's rage. But I think this rage would be better showed slipping through the cracks with Jennifer on a day to day basis. We have that one scene where he gets mad when she won't have sex with him, and of course she's unnerved by the degree of isolation she's experiencing, but other than that he goes from Doting Husband to Violent Killer with almost no warning. The audience doesn't need to see him kill some other guy because we've already basically guessed he's the guy from the intro--we've seen his murderous rage already. And Jennifer doesn't see him commit that murder, so it has no effect on her.

The red herring's body is something creepy for Jenifer to trip over late, but I would have that be the body of her actual husband--way creepier and more distressing imo.

And finally, we need a red herring weirdo because the intro tells us that Jennifer became injured when she was running from someone--begging the question of who she was running from. Again, this is obviously the fake husband but if we're pretending we don't all already know that, there has to be another suspect. This can be solved by starting the action later.

My third suggestion is, then, start the action later. I rad one review that suggested it start after her stay in the hospital. I disagree with this. Her time recovering in the hospital shows off the nice guy/no red flags side of Fake Russell. It also explains why she might "remember" him as her husband or have fond associations with him. This is the courtship period. It's what built trust between them and what adds to his betrayal later. So I would include that sequence. But I would not include the circumstances of the accident. I'd either start it with her running into the road or, even better, arriving at the hospital. We'd hear random shouts about what happened, car accident, etc., but it would be as confusing to us as to Jennifer. There's a mystery there and an implied villain, but there's a lot going on. Best not to think about it. Then the flashbacks she has to someone attacking her would be more startling, and would mean the same thing to the audience as to the protagonist--a good place to be. Slowly, she and we would recognize BOTH that something very sinister caused her accident AND that her husband is not who he seems.

Finally, and this was also a suggestion from some reviews, it would have been more interesting to have Fake Russell set up the whole thing, to have planned the accident in order to confuse Jennifer, and make her physically reliant on him, so that he could make her his isolated mountain wife. Would this be realistic? No, but what else in this film is? And which is worse: he thought he'd just kill her, but then she gets into an accident instead, so he swiftly pivots his whole plan to show up to the hospital and claim to be her husband, having no idea that she isn't perfectly lucid and able to identify him as not her husband, or that he somehow planned her accident figuring that if she didn't get amnesia, she'd at least be in enough pain and disorientation to be gaslit into believing she just "forgot" him even if she absolutely did not? I mean, both unbelievable, but the second is way more sinister, which is what we're going for with villains in this particular genre, and also... out there in a more satisfying way. Like, he lucked into this wild and wacky evil plan, or he created a wild and wacky evil plan? If I'm suspending disbelief I want to suspend it for a villain worthy of the effort.

Also, while I assume the photoshopped images were for his own personal enjoyment, it would explain more neatly why he had them all set and ready to go when he walked into the hospital.

Anyway, not that this film was worth that much thought but I did have the thoughts, so. I enjoyed it. It was what it said on the tin, and that's what I wanted to watch.

#the year 2023 #2023: fandom thoughts #2023: movies

[pyroclastic727]

Color Symbolism and Marcy’s Final Emotional Arc

Sashanne is yellow.

No, look at it! Even though there’s a lot of green and red--we’ve seen that in Reunion--overall, most Sashanne interactions have a yellow wash over them. I think maybe the only exception to that is when they���re on earth, and they’ve got that somber green-blue color.

Now look at this. Marcanne is cyan. Look at how different Anne’s hair color is in each! Cyan makes red look more red, and yellow makes red look less.

Even Sasharcy has its own color, though I can’t say I have much proof of that, because. You know. When have they ever interacted. But it’s magenta, meaning that each pairing of the trio follows the subtractive color model. To simplify that: it’s like the primary colors of printing.

Anyone familiar with the show knows that color has a strong place in Amphibia’s symbolism. Each girl has their own calamity theme color, being green, cyan, and pink. They also have their own outfit colors that they gravitate to; for further analysis of that, I’d direct you to this post and its replies.

As for their relationship colors? They’re not just confined to those relationship scenes. Remember Anne’s favorite color, in her childhood? 

Before coming to Amphibia, Anne saw Sasha as first, and Marcy as second. She had a tendency to follow Sasha’s commands, even when she really didn’t want to. This subservience could be a subtle preference; maybe not of personality, but of attention. Anne was much more likely to follow Sasha than to follow Marcy. 

Even after landing in Amphibia, Anne had one yellow shoe on, one off. Besides being a hallmark of her design, isn’t it funny that she had lost part of the yellow from her wardrobe, at about the time that she stopped letting Sasha push her around?

In Season 2, it’s really obvious what Anne’s color is.

Cyan, to Anne, is the color of her heart. It’s all of her emotions, spilling out of her, fueling her. It’s a color given to her by Amphibia, by the music box, by the gift that Marcy researched, that Sasha suggested, that Anne stole. 

It’s a color she received from Marcy: the joy of being loved, the safety of having a companion by her side, the overwhelming, paralyzing pain of losing her. It’s the color of her heart, the color of her feelings. 

And yet, the yellow is still there. A yellow jacket that she put on when she got home. A yellow shoe, as the other keeps falling off. And now that she’s in Amphibia, we haven’t seen the cyan, not yet.

Why does this matter? Well, let me show you where else we’ve seen the Sashanne color scheme.

That’s right. Marcy’s nightmare. The sky in this scene is the sky of the polluted Amphibia, something Marcy wouldn’t have seen in the pickle jar. No, the reason why she sees this sky is because it’s yellow, it’s Sashanne-colored. A perfect place for the Sashanne monster to form a heart-shape with their torso and declare that Marcy is unforgiveable.

And what’s that in the background? Right, the famous balloons. Yellow and cyan, two colors that seem inconspicuous until you realize what they mean, where they’ve been, what they symbolize. The lockers behind Marcy are that green-blue that you see in the Reunion flashbacks. They’re the color of fear, and when you see what she’s afraid of, it’s that yellow sky and the idea of Sashanne having a better life without her.

And isn’t ironic? They are having a better life without her.

The parallels are obvious already, and as of writing this I’ve only seen Commander Anne. Swinging across a gap with a grappling hook. Saving Sprig from the stomach of a bug. Running into her arms to tightly hug her on the right side of the screen, then pull away with a crooked smile. Holding her by the shoulders, asking to not lose her, then watching her smile and ask for a bit of trust. It’s like Sasha is the better version of Marcy, doing the same thing that she and Anne used to do, but without the one mistake looming over her.

Where does that leave Marcy? Marcy, the person who brought her friends to another world so that she wouldn’t lose them? Marcy, who looked into the fear machine and saw her two best friends, swearing that they wouldn’t forgive her?

Sasha’s jealousy came from the idea that Anne and Marcy shouldn’t be getting by without her. Marcy’s envy comes from fear, the idea that Anne and Sasha seem to be much better off without her. 

Hell, she’s connected to a hivemind. What’s to say that she doesn’t see the parallels already? If she doesn’t see it now, then she will eventually, and relatively soon.

Isn’t that so horrible? That Marcy could watch herself be so easily replaced? That she could so easily come to believe that wanting Anne and Sasha is a mistake?

That’s where Marcy’s final battle comes in. @the-chaotic-lesbian​ pointed out to me that it’d be easy for the Core to use these fears against Marcy, to tell her that her friends don’t want her there, that she should give in. 

The thing is, that’s been Marcy’s pattern, this whole show. Backing away, letting her fear keep her on the sidelines. In Day at the Aquarium, she lets Anne go back to Wartwood. In New Wartwood, she accepts that the town won’t like her that easily. At the beginning of the series, she sends her friends to Amphibia, rather than ask them to choose her. (evidence courtesy of @starfoe​ ). She has a lot to be afraid of, a lot to run from, a lot to face.

But when she’s up against the Core? That’s something that’s willing to use her fears against her. Something that’s willing to pin her against her greatest fear: are Anne and Sasha better off without her, or does she deserve to take up space in their hearts? Does she deserve to be loved, to be liked, to stand next to them and assert that they won’t leave her, she won’t let them go that easily?

How perfect would it be? For the girl ruled with fear, the girl who brought about her own end...to decide, to fight for the fact that she deserves to be forgiven, to be loved?

#amphibia #marcy wu #anne boonchuy #sasha waybright #sashannarcy #.pyro #pyro.txt #amphibia spoilers #commander anne #amphibia predictions #amphibia analysis #amphibia color theory