#like the entirety of june apparently

[teejaystumbles]

Against all odds (part 3)

Part 1 // Part 2

After his work is done and Dream finds the time to retreat to his chambers, he pulls out Hob Gadling’s notebook and reads Hob's last journal entry in its entirety.

June 8th, 1989

Dearest stranger, my friend! 

I can't believe I am allowed to call you that! Let me tell you that I nearly fainted when I found your message in my notebook this morning. I've read the words you've written a hundred times by now and still I almost can't believe them to be real. I can’t believe I’m touching the pen you must have held, that I missed your presence in my room

As devastated as I was after you didn't come yesterday, as happy am I that you chose to contact me after at all.

I'm quite embarrassed about my drunken ramblings that you must have read. There's no lie in them, but I would try and put the truth into less desperate words if I could. I must seem like a fool, fixating on you like this, after all we've only met six times so far. Still, what I wrote, that you are my one constant in life, is nothing but the truth. Our meetings are fixed points in time that I measure this immortal life of mine by now. I try not to, but meeting with you has often felt like the start and finish of an era of Hob Gadling, despite it being probably more in the middle of several. Every centennial meeting with you was the most important appointment that I would plan and prepare for (as best as I could) for months, sometimes years. So if writing to you like this is the only way I get to speak to you then I will gladly take it, and thank you for it. 

But make no mistake, dear stranger - I would love to see you again and I hope you will be ready and willing to meet me in person again someday. Because

As we are sharing truths and have both admitted that we're lonely, I would like you to know that I have never been content with our schedule. If you're willing I would love to meet you a lot more frequently. A lot of things I'd like to tell you about are long forgotten again when we meet. I guess this book is a good way to share stories with you more often now, if a regular Friday night at the pub isn't your thing. I kept notebooks like this all my life, to be able to peruse them in preparation for our meetings and choose the best stories to tell you, because I knew I wouldn’t have enough time to share them all. We got cut short so often, I wonder how you appeared to know me so well without me telling you overly much. But then, that is what you do, isn’t it?

Like with Lushing Lou, you know everyone. And now you mentioned that you do not forget anyone. Do you truly know everything about me then? Is me telling you stories of my life more of an amusement than a necessity for you? Could you actually know it all with a glance instead of listening to me ramble for hours?

Please forgive me, my friend, I do not mean to sound offended. You wrote that you enjoy our meetings - and apparently my ramblings - and I know you would not lie to me.

You do enjoy stories, then. Is that it? Are you a collector of stories? Of histories? Or is your interest actually in my interpretation of these stories and events, in how a mere human experiences the things that are so easily visible to you? I remember the spark in your eyes when I told you about printing. I was such a dewy-eyed fool then, it almost makes me laugh to remember. Did you already know what Gutenberg’s machine would mean for the advancement of humanity? Did you see me finally shaking off my rough and bloody persona as a step in the right direction? Or were you simply interested, like you said, in my experience, and how I would change over the years?I admit, waiting for you to finally tell me who you are is hard for me. But I’ve waited this long and I will wait longer, and I won’t be offended if it takes you another hundred years to tell me. We have time, after all.

Much has happened in the last hundred years. Mostly war. Humans have reached new heights of cruelty. We have become even more ingenuous at killing ourselves. We have created weapons to wipe out all of humanity. We are one wrong phone call away from destroying all we’ve accomplished with the press of a button. People are overthrowing their regimes left and right and while that is generally a good thing, I am still looking over my shoulder, metaphorically, stashing money and valuables in uncanny places like a pirate of old, in preparation for what might yet turn into a true apocalypse.

It is stressful, and I admit that the new drugs are very tempting. I have not been able to resist trying most of them over the last two decades, either to be able to relax or to be able to feel something other than dread, to see some colours in all this grey.

I participated in both wars and it left me unable to sleep properly for decades. Not that sleep was anything to look forward to. If I tell you that I’ve not had a dream since before the first World War started you will surely think that I’m being silly. That I just don’t remember them. But let me tell you, about a week ago I had the first dream since, I think it must have been 1916 or 17. It wasn’t anything magical or special, (just something very simple, about lying in the grass on a hill, looking at the sky and watching bright blue birds fly overhead) but when I woke up I cried because I felt such a profound relief! Relief that I could dream again! 

I did dream of something strange soon after, though.I dreamed of a skeletal little man, mad and raving, chasing someone that looked like a weird bird man - and here I want to make clear that I do not intend to insult you, dear friend!, but this man that looked like a bird and at the same time was neither, he reminded me of you. I can’t really put my finger on it. Just something in the way he moved, maybe, or the tilt of his head-

Anyway, it was a strange dream, and I felt reminded of you, which is why I am mentioning it, I guess. I’m sorry for rambling about silly dreams. But their return (for I am certain dreams returned, I did not simply start remembering them again) has made me hopeful again.

Maybe times are a-changin’, who knows. They always are, and hopefully for the better this time.

I could tell you a lot more of the last century, of course, but I don’t know if you care to hear war stories. I do not necessarily want to drag all those unpleasant memories up, as it took me years of therapy to get over a lot of them, if you can forgive me for summing things up like I did.

I will think of better and brighter things to tell you and write to you again soon. I would be very happy if I found a reply from you in the meantime, but please use this book at your own leisure and don’t feel pressured to answer me every time I start rambling at you.

I hope to

Yours, Hob

Yours. Dream swallows and reads the word again, traces it with his finger. Yours.

Hob considers himself Dream’s. He knows it’s just an expression used when writing letters, but somehow Dream also knows that Hob means it to be more than just an empty phrase.

His.

Dream does not know if he wants Hob to consider himself Dream’s. Dream would not trust himself with another, not before and certainly not after his ordeal. Where before his imprisonment he had felt too sharp, too lonely, too easily enraged, he now feels brittle, too thin and too vulnerable. He cannot hold another’s heart and keep it safe. He cannot be trusted with the affections of another. He has learned that, over the last billion years. Every relationship he has ever had has ultimately failed. Because of him.

He does not want Hob’s and his relationship to fail. He intends to fix this friendship that he knows he does not deserve but cannot stop himself from clinging to. Few are truly loyal to him, Dream has learned, even fewer because they want to. Hob is singular in that regard, in his enthusiasm and friendliness when it comes to Dream, despite, or rather because he does not know him. And there Dream’s thoughts circle back to his predicament again.

He wants Hob to know him and like him, but Dream is terrified that introducing himself to Hob will leave their barely-mended friendship ready to break completely.

With a heavy sigh he stops moving, realising that he has been walking in circles in his chamber while his thoughts do the same.

Maybe it will be better to simply start writing.

#telling myself that last bit all the time #just sit down and write and some words will come #dreamling #the sandman fanfiction #1989 au #teejay writes

[you-remind-me-of-the-babe]

Another lovely year in this wonderful fandom. Here’s a little recap of how my year went:

My Writing:

Depth of Reason - Mature - 70k

How to Avoid a Scandal - Teen - 43k

Episode 3: The Diplomat, A Star Trek Redemption story - Teen - 13.5k

This list is much shorter than my list of fics written in 2022, but my fics last year were much shorter. Also, this word count is deceptive, because I wrote about 22k of Depth of Reason last year and about 20k of How to Avoid a Scandal last year as well. But! My writing goals this year were to finish these two WIPs and not take on any other projects until they were finished and I very nearly did that! Took on two projects (and more below), but I still finished these before the year finished, so pretty good!

Total words:

About 83k. Last year was more like 120k.

Other works:

Podfic of Petrichor - Teen - 34 minutes

Themes:

Finishing long works apparently! One was for my 2022 COBB and the other for my 2022 CORB. Even though these were started last year, they are the longest things I wrote since my first fic (49k) back in the second half of 2021.

Also, trying new things! Writing sci-if and recording a podfic felt very outside my wheelhouse at the time, but ultimately, I’m glad I went for it.

Top 10 fics I read in 2023:

Someone Wicked - Explicit - 60k by @artsyunderstudy

Three Months or 3,000 Miles - Gen - 3k by @larkral and art by @theimpossibledemon

Blood, Salt and Hummingbirds - Teen - 32k by @hushed-chorus

Restoration Ecology - The REmix (Baz’s version) - Explicit - 62k by @royalasstronaut

Good at Something - Explicit - 19k by @larkral

A Gift From the Propheseals - Mature - 6.5k by @skeedelvee with art by @letraspal

What Remains After the Storm - Mature - 86k by @hushed-chorus art by @erzbethluna

To Do, to Know, to Want - Mature - 8.5k by @facewithoutheart

Mishaps on Zoom - Explicit - 10k by @eelwinks

Swords Into Plowshares - Teen - 6.5k by @ileadacharmedlife

WIPs I’m excited to keep reading in 2024:

I Knew A Boy, I Knew A Man - Teen, by @shrekgogurt

Hiding Out In The Open - Mature, by @cutestkilla

A Little Bit Deadly- Explicit, by @emeryhall

Basil Pitch’s Diary - Teen, by @bookish-bogwitch

Other notable fandom things:

I helped to run @carryon-reverse-bang again with @angelsfalling16 as well as helped to put on a new event this year, @caught-on-tape-fest with @cutestkilla and @sillyunicorn

I met up with fandom friends while on a trip this past summer. Making personalized friendship bracelets as gifts, doing fic readings and crafts, and putting on our own Lady Ruth style tea party were some of my fave moments <3

I did a book club style reread of some of my fave fics with friends. I hope we do a few more in 2024!

It’s safe to say I engaged with this fandom everyday of 2023. I might get quiet on the main Discord server or Tumblr, but I’m certain I read, reblogged, wrote, DMd or otherwise participated in some way, shape or form throughout the entirety of the year.

Goals for 2024:

Read more fic! This fandom has such a wealth of works, my TBR list is a mile long and isn’t organized. I’d like to formally rework my AO3 bookmarks to exclusively show recs and either utilize the Marked for Later function or make a spreadsheet or something to better organize a proper TBR list so i don’t lose track of what I want to read next. Currently, having a dozen tabs open on my phone and another dozen on my iPad doesn’t really work well. If anyone has a brilliant system you’d suggest, please enlighten me!

I also want to read all of my physical canon books this year. I’ve only ever listened to the audiobooks! I’m currently reading my anniversary edition of Fangirl. (I think this is the prettiest book I’ve ever owned.) Up next, the Fangirl Manga, followed by the trilogy and Snow for Christmas.

More fandom meet ups! Already planning for June…

I don’t have any writing plans currently, so we shall see if/what I decide to create. I have a few ideas rolling around in my head, but nothing I’ve felt urged to put down in words. I’m sure I’ll write something, I just don’t know what it’ll be yet.

#That’s a wrap! #Love being a part of this fandom #Y’all are wonderful #here’s to another great year! #fandom year in review

[veerbles]

don't mind me, just trying to make a comprehensive timeline of soc/ck

seeing as grishverse is inspired by early 19th century russia, I'll be operating under the assumption that they use the julian calendrer. therefore:

beginning of soc: martius/march ("...the last gasp of winter before spring began in earnest.")

beginning of soc -> djerholm: 2 weeks ("When does[Hringkälla] take place?” / "On the spring equinox.” / “Two weeks from today.")

ice court heist: mid-martius

returning to ketterdam: early-aprillis/april ("It had been just under a week since they’d reached Ketterdam, almost a month since they’d left Djerholm.")

returning/inej's captivity -> rescuing inej: 1 week ("...Van Eck had said he would give them seven days [...] then he would begin torturing Inej. They were almost out of time.")

rescuing inej -> auction: ~1 week (failed sweet reef plan + "...fair auction [...] at the Church of Barter in four days’ time.")

auction: late aprillis-early maius/may

auction -> kaz/inej dock scene: 3 weeks ("In the three weeks since Kuwei’s auction...")

kaz/inej dock scene -> inej threatening pekka: ~1 week ("A month ago he’d been a rich man...")

end of soc: late maius-early lunius/june

overall: the entirety of the duology is around 9 weeks, plus one more week until pekka's epilogue, so 2.5 months total.

BONUS POINTS:

wylan arrived at the barrel three months before the start of soc, in the winter.

kaz and inej steal the dekappel six months before the start of soc.

inej joined the dregs "days after her fifteenth birthday", and since it's implied she'd been with the dregs almost 2 years by the start of soc, we can assume she was born sometime in the spring or summer. she turned 17 either during ck or right after. (EDIT: apparently she's a cancer according to leigh! so she was born in july or late june.)

EXTRA bonus points: using the fact that sailing time from ketterdam to djerholm is stated to be about 10-14 days, we can create a nifty (albeit roughly estimated, disregarding ocean conditions and like, the fact that earth is not actually flat) map of sailing time for all your captain ghafa uses:

ketterdam -> behz ju, shu han: 4-6 days

ketterdam -> os kervo, ravka: 6-7 days

ketterdam -> southern colonies: 6-8 days

ketterdam -> eames chin, novyi zem: 8-10 days

ketterdam -> djerholm, fjerda: 10-14 days

ketterdam -> weddle, novyi zem: 14-16 days

ketterdam -> leflin, wandering isle: 18-20 days

#six of crows #crooked kingdom #grishaverse #am I normal about researching books like a mfing academic paper? no. but it must be done #forever mad we don't know any of the crows' birthdays!!! #analysis

[what-eats-owls]

Feel free to not answer this bc there’s obviously a lot that could affect this and you can’t promise anything but do you have a rough timeframe of how long we’ll have to wait for book three? In the next couple years maybe?

This is actually a cool opportunity to illustrate how this particular flavor of sausage gets made in traditional publishing, so I'm happy to dig into it!

tl;dr: Ideally it'll come out next summer, but it may be pushed to fall or winter.

THE LONG VERSION:

Ideally, you want to stick with a book a year. We are doing everything we can to keep LT3 from having to release in Fall '24, because a) Fall tends to be when a lot of publishers release their anticipated heavy hitters, so it's a crowded field, and b) the election's going to be monopolizing everyone's attention.

However.

There are a number of factors in play, some I'm not even party to, but others I am, uh, uncomfortably involved in, haha.

First of all: I haven't finished drafting yet! I'm a little over the halfway mark. I wound up taking a less-than-voluntary six week break from the manuscript, first because Painted Devils came out and I was on tour, then shortly after I got back from tour I had a health issue that landed me on brain-scuttling meds for a week, only to have Grimoire release after I finished those, and then went out of town for four days after that, and only now are things settling enough for me to catch up on cleaning. Unfortunately, a six-week break also means I've had to make my brain fall back in love with this manuscript.... in the midpoint.... so. The engine's warming up.

Another factor is the title, weirdly enough. I've had a title in mind for years, but my publishing imprint (an imprint is a subdivision of a publisher, with its own name, editorial team and budget) announced an upcoming book with an extremely similar title, and that technically comes first. The author and I are both fine with having similar titles, but my publisher's sales team is apparently not thrilled. It may be a situation where they say, "If you absolutely have to have this title, you'll have to wait until January 2025 to release the book, so there's enough space between the two."

A third factor is my publisher's schedule itself! I may turn in the book with just enough time for it to come out, say, next June. But they could have an enormous book launching that month that they want to focus on, so, LT3 would be moved to July, or the schedule would be accelerated and we'd drop it in May. Or they just say "go with god" and release both books in June! Who knows! It also depends on how similar the other scheduled books are—releasing two comedic YA second-world fantasies in the same couple of weeks absolutely will cannibalize sales, for example.

And a fourth factor: This is the third book in a trilogy. Only the first two titles in a series are eligible for the NYT bestseller list (which drives more of publishing than we'd like to admit.) After the first two, the series as a whole can be considered for the Children's Series Bestsellers, but it's a lot harder to, say, collectively outsell the entirety of Harry Potter on a given week. Which is to say, my publisher may also be less rigid about what to do with LT3, since it's got long odds of being a blockbuster anyway.

*jazz hands* PUBLISHING!

#industry stuff #lt3 #look #listen #I just want my title

[seandwalsh]

If it’s not too much to ask, could you provide a rundown of Mario and Peach’s relationship throughout the history of the games — any developer insights and supporting material included if applicable? Their interactions have never failed to make me smile; I feel like every moment between them, no matter how simple, elevate my enjoyment of the games.

Do you have a favorite moment? For me, I think the ending of the first Paper Mario is my definitive Mario and Peach moment. Everything from the music to the scenery to how innocent it plays out perfectly encapsulates their relationship.

While other series, like Splatoon or The Legend of Zelda tend to have a greater focus on their worldbuilding and backstory, I think Mario’s greatest strength when it comes to its lore is its rich characters and how their relationships come together. You don’t follow the same main cast in The Legend of Zelda for more than a game or two at a time. With Mario, well - he’s always the same Mario. He’s familiar, and his personality is so strong that he continues to be the Mario we know, no matter the medium. It seems that Mario’s current primary developers, Yoshiaki Koizumi and Kenta Motokura, feel the same way:

"No matter what worlds he takes on, Mario remains Mario. Maybe this is strange but I find that fact very comforting,"

[Source: Yoshiaki Koizumi, Director and Producer of the Super Mario series, CNN Business, September 2020]

“…you can take Mario, or a Mario franchise character, and put them in pretty much any situation and it makes it okay. […] Mario carries it off.”

[Source: Kenta Motokura, Designer and Director of the Super Mario series, GameInformer, June 2017]

“Mario himself is a very strong character, so wherever he is he is strong enough to stand alone and be a good character. And even if he's next to a dinosaur, he's Mario!”

[Source: Kenta Motokura, Designer and Director of the Super Mario series, Metro, June 2017]

That’s not to say that Mario doesn’t have quite in-depth worldbuilding and backstory as well, but I think these characters are greatly understood by the people who work with them while largely being overlooked, misunderstood or written off by fans.

This is why relationships, like the one shared between Mario and Peach, can be such a highlight for players.

Mario and Peach, while not explicitly dating, are absolutely smitten with each other.

In fact, it seems that Mario instantly fell in love with Peach the moment he saw her, when she kissed him in Super Mario Bros.. Mario was so in love with Princess Peach that, according to the team behind Donkey Kong (Game Boy), it’s what caused Mario to break up with Pauline:

“Apparently the land of mushrooms is somehow in the vicinity of Donkey Kong's stomping ground that appears at the end [of Donkey Kong (Game Boy)]. Around that point, he meets Peach, and probably starts to have a change of heart [about Pauline] (laughs).”

[Source: Shigeru Miyamoto, Producer of Donkey Kong (Game Boy), Game Boy Donkey Kong Wonder Life Special - APE Inc. Official Nintendo Guide, June 1994]

“After that, Mario became famous, so Pauline must have gotten dumped (laughs).”

[Source: Masayuki Kameyama, Director of Donkey Kong (Game Boy), Game Boy Donkey Kong Wonder Life Special - APE Inc. Official Nintendo Guide, June 1994]

Paper Mario in its entirety is certainly a great example of Mario and Peach’s relationship. While the ending where they watch the fireworks is a highlight, the intro also showcases her attempts to spend time with Mario, eagerly awaiting him in the upper parts of the castle and wanting him to accompany her to the balcony.

“Oh! By the way, Princess Peach has been waiting for you.”

[Source: A Green Toad Girl, Staff of Princess Peach’s Castle, Non-player Character in Paper Mario (Nintendo 64), February 2001]

“I think Princess Peach has been looking forward to seeing you since this morning, Mario. She's been restless... hee hee hee... How cute...”

[Source: A Pink Toad Girl, Staff of Princess Peach’s Castle, Non-player Character in Paper Mario (Nintendo 64), February 2001]

“Oh, Mario! You came to the party to see me! You're so sweet! Thank you!♥ I was just resting a bit. It gets tiring, greeting all those guests out there! Nobody will bother us here. Shall we relax and chat, just the two of us? It was a lovely day today, so I'm sure it's comfortable out on the balcony right now. Would you accompany me, Mario?”

[Source: Princess Peach, Ruler of the Mushroom Kingdom, Non-player Character in Paper Mario (Nintendo 64), February 2001]

She gets worried about him while she’s kidnapped:

“I wonder what Mario is doing right now... I wonder if he's hurt... I'm so worried about him!”

[Source: Princess Peach, Ruler of the Mushroom Kingdom, Non-player Character in Paper Mario (Nintendo 64), February 2001]

Later on, we even learn that Princess Peach keeps a photo of Mario beside her bed, which she reacts to with a heart emoticon:

“A photo of Mario.♥”

She even gets embarrassed about it when Twink points it out.

Generally, the game makes an effort to highlight Mario and Peach’s love for each other beyond most other games in the series:

“Do you know of a place called Shooting Star Summit? It's near this castle. It's such a romantic place... It's definitely the best place for a date. Trust me. Maybe you ought to, you know, ask the princess to go there...”

[Source: A Toad, Resident of the Mushroom Kingdom, Non-player Character in Paper Mario (Nintendo 64), February 2001]

“Does Princess Peach have a special man in her life? She's such a lovely lady... Whoever she loves must be very special indeed...”

[Source: A Green Toad, Resident of the Mushroom Kingdom, Non-player Character in Paper Mario (Nintendo 64), February 2001]

Princess Peach has a very specific view of love, which she has actually expressed before in-game:

“Love... How do I explain? Love tells you when you want to be with a person forever. It makes you feel happy just to see that person happy, smiling...having fun. When you love someone, you will do anything to help when he or she is in trouble.”

[Source: Princess Peach, Princess of the Mushroom Kingdom, Playable Character in Paper Mario: the Thousand Year Door, October 2004]

It’s pretty clear that when she says this, she’s thinking about Mario, between his obvious outwardly happy nature or his willingness to do anything to help her when she’s in trouble. This is reflected in Peach’s own actions in Super Princess Peach, when she saves Mario from Bowser’s clutches. It’s clear from her actions across various games that Peach would do anything to help Mario, and she’s comforted by him even in times of peril.

From taking Mario on a romantic vacation in Super Mario Sunshine, to talking about how caring he is with her paper counterpart, to her team name with him being “Cutest Couple” in Mario Party 5 and Mario Party 6, it’s clear that these two have a strong, devoted and loving relationship with one-another.

But when it comes to my personal favorite moment between them, I feel that my answer is quite a controversial one.

My favourite moment between Mario and Peach is the ending of Super Mario Odyssey.

Now, now. Put your pitchforks away. The main issue with this is that people tend to completely misinterpret the meaning behind this ending, and while I’m not going to go into too much detail here, I think it’s important to understand the intended themes of Super Mario Odyssey.

“[Super Mario Odyssey] is a journey following Mario to save Princess Peach, one of his most [beloved], so we wanted to make this an epic journey.”

[Source: Kenta Motokura, Director of Super Mario Odyssey, Vice, June 2017]

“Mario and Peach's relationship has been a big part of the games for a long [time], and in this game we're getting deeper into it!”

[Source: Kenta Motokura, Director of Super Mario Odyssey, GQ, October 2017]

“I've always thought that Mario carries a bit of a torch for Peach. I think that's true even back in the 2D Mario games. If not, he wouldn't be wasting his time rescuing her over and over again. [As for if Peach feels the same way,] The heart of a woman is a mystery.”

[Source: Yoshiaki Koizumi, Producer of Super Mario Odyssey, GameInformer, June 2017]

It’s clear that Super Mario Odyssey’s story exists to highlight the intricacies of the relationship between Peach and Mario in ways that hadn’t been explored previously. This is why the ending of Super Mario Odyssey is so excellent to me.

“The ending of Super Mario Odyssey is the culmination of an adventure both magnificent and personal. An upbeat song plays in the background while the scene unfolds: the joy of being reunited with someone you've missed, the slight embarrassment that comes with thinking of the one you love, Mario and Bowser's open honesty, and Peach's independence. Through the theme of marriage - which had never been addressed in the series before we see another side of Mario, Peach, and Bowser. The relationship between the three looks like it'll continue for years to come. The odyssey they've embarked on is far from over!”

[Source: Kenta Motokura, Director of Super Mario Odyssey, The Art of Super Mario Odyssey, September 2018]

Mario finally makes his feelings known to Peach, through a proposal, but he does so in the worst possible way. Peach refuses to marry Mario because he was acting immaturely. Mario cannot handle losing control of a bad situation and often makes rash decisions. While the latter is sometimes a positive trait for him, in this instance it’s a flaw which caused him to fight Bowser for Peach’s hand. You can hear Mario grunting while attempting to push Bowser out of the way and get Peach to accept him.

This is not the Mario that Peach knows. It is not the Mario that she loves. Peach had just been kidnapped from her home, dragged around the world and almost forcefully married to a man she’s romantically repulsed by. She was rescued by the man she loves in the nick of time who was finally about to make his move and propose to her, before Bowser barged back in and ruined the moment, and Mario started acting irrationally. She was fed up, and rightfully so.

So she turns down Mario’s proposal, and leaves. Peach does not turn down Mario’s proposal because she doesn’t love him - it’s abundantly clear that she loves him very much - she turns him down because it was the wrong place, at the wrong time, for the wrong reasons.

However, her love for the Mario she knows still rings true. Their relationship is so strong that even after all of that, they quickly recover, as is illuminated through Peach’s forgiveness. She takes a breath and calls out to Mario, inviting him to come home with her. It’s a showcase of the love they share for one-another, one more potent than we’ve seen before anywhere else. A truly well-crafted study of these characters and the intricacies of their interwoven lives.

#super mario #princess peach #mario lore #paper mario #super mario odyssey

[frost-felon]

@ my anonymous asker: Your initial ask got eaten by Tumblr, so I'll be posting this as a separate post. You had two asks, so I'll address them both here, which works well, as I started ranting about the femme rep, lmao.

absolutely, like, 100% agree with you on everything you've said about the horrific lack of development with the interpersonal relationships between all the characters in jjk. the unexplained timeskip before the gojo vs sukuna fight made me SO MAD !!!!!!!! seeing it mentioned offhandedly. did such a massive disservice to gojo's character having his reactions to multiple deaths simply written out and missed so many opportunities for a more fulfilling narrative.

in general i feel that the relationships between characters in jjk are so... flimsily written. i have whole essays about how completely unexplored yuji and kenjaku are and how all the characters post-culling-game have suffered in favor of dishing out cool fights with fake-feeling emotional stakes. gege please start writing fights in a meaningful way... more than that please explore character dynamics outside of a purely tactical/background info way... is this the same man who wrote hidden inventory

Second ask:

my god don't even get me started on yorozu. atp the 'gege hates women' jokes can't even be dismissed that lightly I saw tsumiki's reawakening in the last jjk episode and literally said out loud don't piss me off again

Ah, thank you. I've been a bit worried about the in-universe time in JJK. If I'm not mistaken, the story starts at some point in June, and for the Juvenile Detention Center Arc/Super Happy Fun Killing Yuji Time, some point in July. Of course, Shibuya happens on the day/night of October 31st, and likely the wee hours of November 1st. The entirety of the Culling Games Arc takes place in about two weeks of November, as I recall; actually, maybe less, since the very start indicates that Yuji was on the run for a week. So many short timeskips happened early on, and had negative effects on developing characterization and worldbuilding, both of which I've thought were weak since the beginning. Worldbuilding moreso, but characterization issues were especially apparent with the second-years of Tokyo JJH and all of the Kyoto cast. This caused quite a crunch on Culling Games, since so much needed to happen over a short period of time, leading to a jumbled, molasses pace.

It's actually really interesting to me that Sukuna would agree to postpone the fight to nearly the end of December, and this would have given us more time to explore the newer characters and solidify the older ones; we really needed more interactions between Yuji and others that weren't full of misery. Or seeing Gojo adapting to life back outside the Prison Realm, especially given that so much has changed; for a character that values reforming society and raising a self-assured, powerful new generation, losing that society should lead to a re-evaluation of his priorities. Or like...develop Ieri! Hana! Miwa! And kill off Mei Mei or actually address her position within the cast.

Yeah, one of my biggest problems from the get-go was feeling that Megumi & Nobara was a dynamic that had been left to the wayside, even during early Kyoto Goodwill Arc. And those had been characters that were meant to interact regularly...literally what attachment did Higuruma have to anyone that wasn't Yuji?¹ I adore Yuji's relationships, but he's barely been allowed to have any after Shibuya. How is Choso doing, now that the only people (Yuki & Tengen) not related to him are dead or robbed of agency?

Speaking of...hoo boy, Tengen is a hell of a topic to untangle. And most femme characters really don't get to do anything. Nobara is fun, but suffered since day one with a lack of plot presence, and literally being removed from battlefields/character conflicts, lmao. Ieri straight-up doesn't matter, especially as the manga goes on--but even in Hidden Inventory, which I do think is likely the peak of JJK, she has no real impact. You could basically replace her with a medpack, and little would change. Mai gets a very good conflict with Maki, but just about nothing between then and her death. Maki has given up her niche and much of what made her engaging to become...a serial killer on the good side, suspiciously Toji-shaped. I really didn't like Perfect Preparation, and I dread re-reading it.

But "Gege hates women" was less of a joke to me, and more a hyperbolic version of a statement that I do believe in: "Gege shows a clear apathy and disregard for his femme characters." I noticed very early on in my initial read-through (to the end of 145) that many of the femme characters were simply treated differently than much of the male cast, and often given less to do. One time that I was truly disgusted, though, was how Remi (the lady with hair like a scorpion's tail, and a dependent personality) was handled, even before her ultimate fate in Culling Games. So much of that simply rubbed me the wrong way, and felt genuinely offensive, both in regards to women and to dependent personality-type individuals. And what happened to her later...man, those panels gross me the fuck out with how much they sexualize a woman who's about to get trafficked. I definitely have a lot to say on that, but I want to make sure I can actually post this before Tumblr fucks me over again.

As a note, I don't use materials outside of the story to gauge the effectiveness of the writing (and it's also because I'm a Naruto fan, so I know the Hell of databooks, nevermind some of the other art I enjoy), but I may be missing some things. Feel free to continue to make asks or to reach out to me via DMs. I do enjoy discussing JJK, whether it be for things it does well, things it does poorly, or for other reasons.

¹We did get some Higuruma & Kusakabe, but this came in late, and then Higuruma died, lmao.

#Jujutsu Kaisen #JJK #Spoilers #Jujutsu Kaisen Spoilers #JJK Spoilers #JJK Manga Spoilers #Uhhh... #Gege Salt #Gege Critical #Gege when I catch you Gege #< Seems to be the de-facto criticism tag. Lmao. #Maki Zen'in Salt #Maki Zen'in Critical #Ieri Shoko Salt #Ieri Shoko Critical #< These girlies get the worst of it. So they're getting Salt and Critical tags. #JJK Remi #< I don't remember her having a full name. If she does--I'll update. #Discussion #JJK Discussion #Asks

[jehans-flower-pot]

hi bbg sorry for the french jumpscare my phones in french because its funny but ‼️‼️‼️‼️ im so predictable

.005 again 😎

these are fun to look back because yeah march was smfs lockdown, august was when i listened to no place in heaven, june i looped cancer and dead lmao, may was ofc pretty odd and september was a simply a paramore month.

also look the guys theyre so shaped and theyre talkign to me

LOSER im in love w u

mika number 2 panic on the ranking lets gooo

jesus christ that is. so many minutes of fob

were u like chill in june lots of love deeply concerning tho

Mcr was my only emo trinity top artist deeply sadfor me. top artists were both from the top 2 songs btw and both of their peaks were in january bc they r seasonal depression songs. 3rd is bc i loop the entirety of fun home non stop sometimes and apparently they counted november this year ?? idk november ass musical anyway please listen to it. number four is bc i saw the front bottoms live in september and then fell in love w their bassist and then fell in love w her band and then looped their recent album for all of october (which btw u should check out. idk if ive said it before but need you around is soso us). mcr is there obvi but it peaked in august bc i got back from camp an had missed good music and also had made a friend who got literally every mcr song stuck in my head for the whole month w no way to listen to them.

#i was in. the top .5% of radiohead listeners. which isnt that wild until u consider the fact that i only listen to one song #and i just listened to it on loop for like 30 hours this year #FRENCH JUMpSCARE FR BTW #why in gods name is that what august is in french #also matching top genres <3< #malloy tag! #splendiferous mutuals <3 #panic is off my top five :pensive #(i have the cd now)

[no-barbies-for-quitters]

my mom has told me many times that she would know if i wasn’t myself by asking me what my #1 taylor swift album is.

she would know it wasn’t me if i didn’t say 1989.

and it’s always been this way. i was 10 years old when it was originally released. it took over my life as the first album i ever listened to fully.

around middle school i realized there was something about me that had irreversibly melded with 1989 when reputation came out. i wasn’t the biggest fan at first, and people (bc it was middle school) decided that it would be fun to say that taylor’s music was going to be exactly like reputation forever.

you couldn’t say 1989 was your favorite anymore and as a middle school girl who, looking back on it, was probably just as mentally ill as i am now if not worse, i had the great idea to stop telling people i liked taylor swift at all. i didn’t listen to a single one of her albums from reputation through evermore all the way through and only listened to midnights once the hype had kinda calmed down.

back in june my dad realized that for someone who, as far as he knew, didn’t really like taylor swift i sure did know a lot of stuff about her and apparently decided to tell him all of it. he surprised me and sent me and my mom to denver for the eras tour. before it even started i was joking with my mom about “oh i probably won’t cry during the songs everyone else does but watch me cry through like shake it off or something”.

apparently i had been given the gift of prophecy because not only did i cry through shake it off, but also the entirety of the 1989 part of the concert.

i realize now that both of my parents probably knew why i suddenly stopped liking taylor swift in middle school, because i went to a very small school so the same people who decided that 1989 wasn’t what real taylor swift fans listened to then were the same people who decided that folklore and evermore were the greatest things under the sun and hyped up midnights so much then claimed they hated it when, at least for me, it reminded me of 1989 a little bit.

when 1989 tv was announced all i saw on all my social media was “repost this to claim being a 1989 stan before taylor’s version releases!”

i didn’t repost a single one because why should i? everyone i knew who was reposting those were the same people from middle school and high school. i don’t need to claim something that i spent way too long trying to hide from people.

today marks one of the most important days in my life. not in a way like “oh i got into college” or anything. it’s an important day for me because it’s “acceptable” to like 1989 again.

the thing is, i don’t care if it’s acceptable or whatever. i just get an excuse to be as annoying as i want about this album. i’ve never been so excited for an album to drop. i feel like i’m going to explode from excitement. and if people ask why i’m so excited about this when i clearly never cared about any of her other albums (lies. they just weren’t my favorite), i just get to say that this is my album. everyone has an album they think of as theirs. this is mine and it always has been.

this is not only the day that 1989 tv drops. it’s the day i bring back a core part of myself and live it the way i should have been able to 9 years ago.

and by that i mean i’m not going to hide it for any reason ever because god knows that wasn’t good for me.

anyways, happy 1989 tv release to all who celebrate!

#taylor swift #1989 taylor's version

[arcplaysgames]

Back in P4G. Yukiko's whole thing seems to be that she's so anxious about her family's inn that she misses a lot of social cues, especially ones she doesn't want to deal with right now, like romance. Also, this dude from another school just showed up to ask her out??? Where the fuck is there even another school around here?

Don't go to a second location with strangers.

I've lived in these exact types of small towns, lmao. They call it a suburb but it's very rural. If you have a fucking field and multiple farmers around, that's a rural town.

holy shit chie. i'm trying to give you a fair shake here but damn. Punching people in the nuts and asking invasive questions and revealing your best friend has never had a boyfriend is a LOT.

It's very odd but even though everyone here is around the same age as the P3P cast, Chie strikes me as emotionally much younger. But hey, I was harsh on Yukari in P3P and got schooled when she turned out awesome. I got hope for you, Chie.

Okay so. School was let out suddenly because a murder. ALSO THE BODY WAS HANGING FROM A TELEVISION ANTENNAE. And come to find out, it was the local reporter who's embroiled in some... local... scandal thing? (If this game expects me to care about a councildude who did an affair, idk man, i just work here.)

[CARTOMANCY CORNER]

She was hung upside down. Interesting. As a Hanged Man Stan, I have to say that the card is often about a willing sacrifice. You are suspending yourself in an inverted state in the hope of having some sort of epiphany brought on from the new perspective. It comes at a significant risk though, as you may be dooming yourself to death or madness by taking that chance.

While the Wheel of Fortune is about fate being kind or cruel, Hanged Man is about taking the dice in hand and rolling them. I don't know if this lady was an investigative journalist, but if she happened to place herself in a dangerous situation in the search for a scandalous truth and died for it, that's Hanged Man to a T.

[/CARTOMANCY CORNER]

Anyway.

This shot is pretty.

Went to the shrine and it told me to get the fuck out. Hey, rude.

...

Well at least he let me ride on his bike, that's cute. I can't tell if I like Yosuke (not Yusuke, I guess that's ANOTHER Persona character, whoops) or if I just really like his voice acting. Hard to tell.

After class he invites me out for grilled steak as thanks and uh

This is entirely my damage of coming from an incredibly food-insecure upbringing, but man, what the fuck, Chie. You already KICKED HIM IN THE NUTS, you don't get to extract more concessions.

Okay, do I like Yosuke, or do I get Cheerful Bully vibes from Chie? HM.

also yukiko you're like 16, please don't even step on a weight scale, goddamn. send me back to Iwatodai, please. I think P4 has mentioned girls' weights more already than in the entirety of P3P.

Anyway, Yukiko is off to work on her very concerning teenage eating disorder while Yosuke takes everyone to the local...

Junes is easy to dismiss as a Japanese Walmart--

wait. i have to google something right now.

Okay, Walmart tried to move into the Japanese market by purchasing a chain called Seiyu, but as of 2020 they are almost entirely out of the game, sold most of their shares, and apparently they just don't do well in non-American markets. Interesting to know!

ANYWAY MY POINT WAS, Junes is less Walmart and more Target-meets-Costco. A very pleasant place to shop with good marketing and food provided on-site, but also still undercutting and screwing the local businesses. Yosuke works for TargetCo. Costget.

also Chie complains that Yosuke changed the plan from grilled steak to food court and I'm plastering on a smile and chanting give her a chance, we are less than two hours in here.

Saki works here too, she's "senpai" so I assume a senior, and Yosuke's got a transparent crush and she is Not Interested. Also the vibes are Bad, like she can tell Yosuke is a good guy but his business is putting her family's liquor store in jeopardy, so.

Man, remember when my group drama was whether Junpei and Akihiko could successfully talk to girls at the beach? Man. 😬😬😬

Saki comes over to basically neg Yosuke???? So our man Reverie asks her if she though Terezi and Vriska were pale or black or red until she leaves, saving the day. Phew.

Aaaaaaand here we go. Some PLOT. Thank you god. Everyone agrees to try the Midnight Channel thingie.

Did this game have these anime cutscenes originally? I avguely remember them but not how LONG they are. Were these repurposed from the anime or made bespoke? Anyway, they look great.

Saki is on the Midnight Channel, and then our heroic dumbfuck almost gets eaten by the TV.

good job, idiot.

#p4 #persona liveblog #cartomancy

[spatio-rift]

Well, his personality is unpleasant, but at his core he's a diligent and purehearted guy.

Kurofes: Imayoshi | Wakamatsu | Sakurai | Susa

imayoshis kurofes page translated in english in its entirety for your reading pleasure!! using alisayamins scans for the page above! it means a lot to me so i hope you enjoy it💞

Below the cut is the transcription + some clarifications & tl notes because there was no way i could put everything i wanted to say in that tiny profile box!

The ever-smiling gambler holding the reins of the Rising Tyrant

The captain of the individualistic Touou Academy! His smiling face conceals a cool composure. He speaks in Kansai dialect.

PROFILE: ● Height: 180cm ● Weight: 71kg ● Birthday: June 3 (Gemini) ● Blood type: AB ● Motto: Wisdom is found in acknowledging your ignorance (as in, true wisdom is knowing that you know nothing... socrates.) ● Favorite food: broiled eel over rice ● Hobby: watching horse races (without betting money) ● Special skill: fishing ● Best school subject: mathematics ● Committee: student council ● Family: father, younger sister ● Dislikes (not good with): airheaded people -> as in, according to this article about exactly this type of people, people who trust others (too?) easily, are easygoing and friendly with just about anyone, express their emotions (too?) freely, are positive and dont stay depressed for long, get easily distracted, etc etc… odd people in their own world, going at their own pace, who often make silly mistakes, but thats part of the charm. Apparently not to imayoshi though! (i encourage you to read the article though it was kind of interesting to see what kind of attitude or behavior in people might actually annoy him.) ● Special skill (basketball): between-the-legs dribble -> behind-the-back pass ● Type of girls he likes: attentive, considerate girls ● How he spends his time off: recreational fishing ● Why he started playing basketball: at the suggestion of his parent(s) ● Player he has his eye on: hanamiya makoto

Fans’ favorite characteristic: the main factor behind his popularity is… his wickedness!? He is so skilled at reading people that Hanamiya called him a mind-reader! His charm lies in the gap between his smiling face and his sharp wits.

A commanding presence with excellent game-making skills While his skills as a point guard are first-class, his mind games and focus in the heat of the game are his greatest weapons!

A word from Fujimaki-sensei! I actually had a model for him, but they were also quite mean-spirited. Well, his personality is unpleasant, but at his core he's a diligent and purehearted guy.

And the tweet at the bottom that i forgot to translate calls him cool for leading a team of various oddballs like a commander.<3

notes: the word used for ‘gambler’ in the title is 勝負師 which can also mean ‘risk-taker’, ‘a person who makes bold decisions at the risk of failure/leaving the outcome up to chance’. personally i think its a little odd considering imayoshi schemes (if it can even be called scheming...) in the first place to secure the outcome he wants from a situation... he doesnt leave it up to chance since hes actively taking measures to ensure it happens. and i can think of at least 2 separate times where it was said he actually doesnt rely on luck for what he does. still, since his profile mentions that he has hobbies related to gambling (and you know what they say about fishing being a gacha. LOL), i thought it would be funny to keep ‘gambler’. but well at the very least, i can say that recruiting aomine the way he did was quite the gamble indeed. then again i saw it being used in the page where they talk about traits commonly associated with the different positions (specifically in knb not real life basketball) so if thats something that most of the point guards in knb can be called as well maybe im just reading a little too much into it lol

also, i wanted to say... sorry if the title sounds a little weird. holding the reins... i tried to write something cool but i dont know if i succeeded LOL. it really just means hes the one leading touou (called by their edgy nickname).

i have since learned that 司令塔 is just the japanese term for playmaker but im not gonna change the title of the stats box bc like... “a playmaker with excellent game making skills” just sounds really bad lol

for the greatest weapons part... the text doesnt actually say ‘focus’, its 仕事ぶり which means like... workmanship. working style. way of working. something like that? i dont really know its a little too vague for me. its kind of hard to understand what its referring to... his attitude during games? the quality of his plays? or maybe something like hanamiya said, he just gets shit done? well, ill let you interpret that one whatever way you want.

also, when hanamiya calls him a mind-reader, the specific word he uses is actually サトリ (a yokai that can read minds. it looks like a monkey)

and the exact words fujimaki uses to describe the kind of person imayoshi is at heart are 真面目 (diligent, serious, honest, earnest) and 純情 (a pure and clean heart, naïveté, innocence... even i was surprised about this one). well, full disclaimer, he doesnt actually mention exactly who hes talking about in that second sentence (imayoshi or that person he took inspiration from). but since its his page, i assumed it was about imayoshi (it seems kind of weird to say this about a real person no one else knows, anyway?). (<- saw a jp tweet about this the other day so i can now say with certainty that fujimaki is absolutely talking about imayoshi when he uses these words) and while calling him purehearted was a little surprising, at the very least for the other one yeah that tracks. i guess hes just making it very clear imayoshis not meant to be bad or considered evil like hanamiya and haizaki

#kuroko no basket #imayoshi shouichi #knb #trucs #imayoshinobasuke #this is the first time in my entire life ive ever typeset something. i think i am dying #i want to translate wakamatsus entry as well but i dont think i will do all that again !! especially since he has 2 pages!! #dont look too hard at the title of the page. i know 💔 cut me some slack its my first time. #anyway not much new info in there i am aware its 2022 but it is so important that you know what fujimaki said about him. hes a good guy!!

[wildflowerswildhorses]

I have literally sat on this for about 18 hours (and spent the entirety of my work day thinking about it. I’m impressed I got any work done or that no one asked me what was wrong). 

At first, I hated that apparently Liv and Amanda haven’t talked. I mean, we can at least assume that they have physical seen each other in a while considering Amanda is obviously pregnant and Liv didn’t know (course though Amanda was probably like 5ish months when she finally told Liv about Jesse and who knows how far along with Billie bc that whole timeline is just a mess that I don’t want to dig through). I refuse to believe they haven’t at least texted or talked on the phone. 

But atlas, if we’re to believe that they really haven’t spoken since Amanda left or if they have, it was probably terse and short. To an extent, I can get it. 

These are two women who have been through so damn much, taken advantaged of by men, groomed in Liv’s case, assaulted, kidnapped, shot at (actually shot twice in Amanda’s case and probably actually shot in Liv’s case if that promo says anything), had crappy childhoods, toxic family environments, had everyone walk out on them (parents, partners, relationships) and they’re fucking traumatized and don’t like to deal with the root of their traumas with their therapists. (I need Lindstrom and Hanover to stage an intervention or something) 

Amanda and Liv are easily one of the most, if not the most important relationships in each other lives and is one of the strongest and realistic portrayals of female friendships that I’ve seen in media. They care so deeper about each other and that but it wasn’t always like that; they had a rocky start and have come a long way since season 13. Sure things may be rocky again right now; but that doesn’t change the fact about how loyal they are to each other at their cores. 

We’ve seen how Liv reacts when people leave her; she’s shuts down closes herself off and doesn’t reach out. So yes, she’s happy for Amanda and understands that Amanda had to make that decision to leave; but it doesn’t change the fact that it was just another person who walked out on Liv (and then didn’t reach out when she said she wouldn’t just disappear).

Shit, Stabler walked out on her, didn’t even have the balls to tell her he was leaving (she found out from Cragen) and then he shows up a decade later and blows up her life, they spend the next year and half in a weird fucking whiplash nonsense. Liv never dealt with Stabler leaving - she as much as tells Amanda that in the hotel room and then he shows back up and things are weird. Liv doesn’t reach out, doesn’t make contact because a part of her still thinks she’s gonna open up to him again, get close to him again and he’s gonna leave again. 

I can see Liv not at first reaching out to Amanda to give her time to settle cause even Liv knows Amanda doesn’t like change; but at the same time, Liv is still an NYPD Captain and has an entire precinct to manage - communication is probably gonna be slim pickings; but a few weeks go by, maybe a month. Maybe, just maybe, Liv is transported back to that June day in 2011 when Cragen told her Elliot put his papers in, she goes back to those days, weeks, months, years following of no contact. 

Liv roughly knew Elliot and Amanda for the same amount of time before they left (the only major difference in how they left is that Amanda told her) and maybe Liv thinks she’s re-living that same thing again and she can’t do that again. And so in true Olivia Benson nature, she closes off and doesn’t reach out. Doesn’t make that first move because she can’t be hurt again by another person she cares about even though she wants to and she misses her best friend but there’s also something hat won’t let her break the communication barrier, so Liv does the next best things and asks/gets updates about Amanda through Carisi - still waiting for Amanda to make that contact. 

Similarly, we know how Amanda deals with trauma - she closes off and she deals with people leaving her by lashing out. Choosing to leave SVU was probably the hardest fucking decision Amanda Rollins had to make - because this squad, these people, became her family over her tenure there; Liv and Carisi were the ones who broken down her ways and are the reason she started letting people in. When you let people in, you get attached and then changes are a bitch. 

There was nothing keeping Amanda in Altana, so leaving there was probably easy; but Fin and Liv and the familiarity - they are reasons to want to stay at SVU - but Jesse and Billie and Carisi are the reasons to leave. There’s gonna be a pull about what’s the right reason and what’s the wrong reason and even now, especially now, Amanda probably feels guilty about leaving; because she feels like she abandoned Liv. Hell, barely a month after Amanda left, Liv got jumped in the fucking street. 

There’s no doubt in my mind that Amanda wanted to reach out to Liv - she was just scared of letting Liv down, this woman who she looked up when she first came to svu and who has become such an important part of her life and is her children’s godmother. She loves and respects Liv’s so damn much and I think it terrifies Amanda that she could be letting her down by doing what’s best for herself - (even if Liv would never hold that against her)

Amanda is also probably busy as hell what with a new job and new baby on the way, maybe even apartment/house hunting - and then time goes by and suddenly it’s been too long and reaching out probably feels like the wrong decision because you waited too long. Maybe Amanda also tells herself that if Liv cared, she’d reach out herself. 

Also Amanda’s spent her entire life knowing that being independent and not relying on people is the only way to live. Yes, she’s been working past that - but a couple of years of therapy are not gonna just undo decades worth of trauma and damage that go as deep as Amanda’s. There’s gonna be back pedals too. A lot of them. 

That scene at the end of Organized Crime says so damn much even beyond the words that Amanda and Liv say and Mariska and Kelli play it so fucking well. You can tell they still love and respect each other, you can tell Liv’s happy for Amanda (and Carisi) but still hurt at the lack of contact, you can tell Amanda fells guilty for not reaching out. 

So that leaves Amanda and Liv in this weird limbo of what do we do now. And it’s gonna take some effort, but they’ll get back to where they were because at their core that love and respect isn’t going anywhere. 

#svu #svu spoilers #amanda rollins #olivia benson #rolivia

[adamworu]

Hi! I am not sure if this kinda question has answered here before but I couldn't find anything so I'll ask anyway. I was watching this review of the Rebuild films and it said some things I got a bit confused about. First was Kaworu not being a good person really but given how Shinji and Kaji kinda tell him off in the last film "him being like Gendo" and stuff I guess that makes sense. However the review also claimed that apparently Anno hates the interpretation of kawoshin being romantic and that got me really confused, like didn't he describe Kaworu being Shinji's male love interest? Or was it someone else who said it?

Shinji and Kaji don't necessarily tell him off while likening him to Shinji's father. The similarities are there that both characters invested themselves into piano and devoted themselves to another person in their entirety. The way in which Kaworu expresses that devotion versus Gendo is night and day, however. Kaworu's devotion throughout the loops didn't consist of creating and controlling an iteration of his devotion. He thought Shinji's ultimate happiness lay with the Evangelion while he ignored his own happiness.

Shinji's comparison to Kaworu to Gendo differs in FINAL than episode 24. 'You're like my father' is more tender and during a moment where he willingly became vulnerable. Episode 24's delivery of this line came from a place where Shinji closed himself off to Kaworu because he refused to confront the fact that his personal mission to kill the angels was deep-rooted in gaining validation (albeit, dishonest). But Kaworu gave him genuine kindness. Rather than address his cognitive dissonance, he assigns Kaworu at that moment to 'angel therefore must be destroyed.' He tried layering it on by the idea that 'only people who would hurt me are people like my father.' It was a front. In FINAL, he actually seeks to understand Kaworu's position and removes his Evangelion so he could have a chance to seek his own happiness. As for Kaworu's morality Anno states Kaworu's kindness here in a 1996 June Interview.

Anno describes Kaworu as an idealized male other for Shinji. He never stated an annoyance for Kawoshin being romantic. 

#evangelion #kawoshin #kaworu #shinji #neon genesis evangelion #correct me if i'm wrong

[persistent-wallflower]

Why do conservatives can't just shut up about the pride month. I'm gay and basically nothing is different for me this month in practice but you're apparently tormented by homosexuality for the entirety of June? 🤨 Sounds like a problem fully fabricated by yourself 🙄

#I wish I had problems like that #I wish homosexuality really was everywhere I look fr #enough

[latibvles]

SAD, BEAUTIFUL, TRAGIC.

beautiful, tragic // the weight you carry.

sometimes, pulling back can feel like shedding a second skin.

masterlist | gallery | taglist

SUMMARY: he's no longer her "Ronnie" and she isn't she isn't his "Daisy" — but mildly pleasant news is enough to disrupt that momentary revelation.

WARNINGS: as usual, discussions of death and war.

They’re in Carentan for the rest of the month — she sees very little of Speirs for the entirety of it, but now she can pick him out without even necessarily meaning to. Speirs, not Ronnie, because the whispers of his name seem to increase with the knowledge that he’s around, and none of them sound remotely similar to that of the boy who once lived across the street.

Speirs apparently shot his own man for being drunk on patrol, and sprayed several German POWs full of bullet holes — the numbers always vary. She’s heard as little as eight to as many as forty. Speirs is stiff, walks with near perfect posture even with a head wound, doesn’t have Ronnie’s teasing quips or boyish smile. She doesn’t understand how the boy across the street, the author of her letters, and the soldier she sees now all share one mind — but maybe it’s better if she can’t understand it, so she makes no attempt to question it.

He spends two more days at their field hospital, and according to Rita he’s a lot more agreeable — for a moment she thinks he’s hit his head twice, or maybe got into the limited supply of cough syrup, and Daisy doesn’t see a point in admitting she may have had a hand in his docility.

For the rest of the month they’re treating the wounded and the dying, supplies come in and beds empty out since, apparently, when you blow up German tanks, it becomes that much more difficult to push an army with tanks out of the area. Those they don’t have the supplies to treat, are sent to English hospitals. There are small-scale fights against German scouts — but no mortars going off, no more bombs, at least not close enough to put a proper dent in their troops. They make two more trips down into the town, these times, Ginny accompanies her, and it's more so to deliver supplies or receive wounded men.

The first time, Joseph Liebgott calls out to her from across the courtyard. She smiles at him and Ginny gives her a questioning look, which she dismisses upon their return by recounting the occurrences with his friend, Tipper. The second time, she fumbles with a box, but Eugene Roe is there to steady it, and they share a smile.

“Good to see you again, Miss.”

“Good to see you too, Doc.”

It isn’t until the end of June, that they’re told what the plan is.

Daisy sits on her cot and lets Patty run a comb through her long brown hair, working out the tangles and knots that she’d only half-dealt with using her fingers, and muttering her own soft scoldings about how Daisy ought to take better care of herself. Rita lounges on the floor, smoking a cigarette and seemingly off in her own world, when Ginny walks into their lodging, blonde curls undone from their updo, brushing her shoulders and framing her cheeks.

“They’re pulling us out, and a handful of others too. Other nurses are moving in to take our places, provide relief, but I’d start packing tonight.”

Daisy, who had just begun to doze from Patty combing her hair, snaps her eyes open and looks over at Ginny from her spot. As if knowing exactly what she was going to ask, Rita pipes up first.

“We bein’ transferred or something?” At that, Ginny sighs, running her fingers through her tresses and looking the three women over. In spite of things slowing down — she’s been running herself ragged with delivery reports, going to and from the neighboring aid stations and checking in with medics. Daisy notices the soft dark circles under her eyes, the way her shoulders hunch slightly.

“Maybe. Some of the men are falling back to a field camp near UTAH beach, they want us to do the same. They might be pulling the lot of us out and back to England for a bit. M’not sure yet.” Daisy pats the last bit of empty space on her cot, and Ginny moves to take it. She then pats the space on her lap, and Ginny obediently puts her head in it. She meticulously runs her fingers through the blonde’s hair as she lets out a heavy sigh.

“Don’t worry about packing your bag, Gin, I’ve got it, okay?” Daisy reassures, and Ginny smiles at that.

“You don’t have to do that, you know.”

“Well I want to, besides, you need sleep,” In the midst of conversation, Patty had switched from coming to now braiding Daisy’s hair with deft fingers, till it was long enough to just fall over her shoulder. She reaches to grab her pillow, lifts Ginny’s head, and then sets her head atop it. “No ifs and or buts about it, okay?” Ginny chuckles and nods, reaching up to give her a mock salute as Rita rises, dusting off her pants.

The camp is practically heaven in comparison to what they were working with for the past month. Hot showers, food, she shares a tent with Rita who’s notorious for turning in late, so it’s kind of like having a tent to herself.

The first night, she spends relishing in the hot shower, and if she scrubs her skin a little too hard — that’s no one’s business but hers anyway, rubbing at the knots in her shoulders, pressing at some of the bruises she’d endured from her own collection of minor accidents — collisions with too-solid soldiers, small abrasions, things of that nature. She collapses into the cot without even eating dinner, and God be willing — she has a long, dreamless, fruitful sleep.

The following day, she put on her dress uniform — meticulously tying her tie over her shirt, buttoning her jacket and ensuring her pin shone proudly on her chest, braiding her hair and twisting it into a bun as her mother taught her once before, then smooths out her skirt, examining herself in the mirror. Free of dirt, but dark circles still cling to her under eyes — there’s no blood on her face though, no scars nor injuries and for that she’s grateful.

She steps out into the morning air, and the sun shines down on her face. Daisy cherishes the warmth of it, listens to the clamor of men and women’s voices alongside the rumble of jeeps and the one-off sounds of animals, shutting her eyes for a second to take it all in.

For a moment, she feels just a little bit lighter.

“Daisy!” a voice calls out, and her eyes snap open, searching for the one calling out to her. She scans the area, only to find one Joseph Liebgott looking at her with a smirk that she’s slowly becoming more familiar with, and she makes her way towards him. He extends his hand, which she tentatively takes, and he lifts it up to spin her around, watching her skirt spin with her. She lets out a giggle at the action.

“Excited to see me, huh?” she quips.

“Just wasn’t expectin’ it is all,” is his response. She takes a quick look over the men he’s with — recognizes Talbert immediately, looks to his shoulder, and then back to him.

“How’s that shoulder doing?” He’d taken a bayonet to the shoulder blade the night of the Germans’ counterattack. From a fellow soldier. Nurses were notorious gossips. He reaches up to rub at it, and gives her a smile. She wonders how many nurses he’s managed to charm with it.

“Better than what it was, ma’am,” is his reply. There’s a man with blue eyes with them as well — Webster, she recalls, but allows him to introduce himself as Private David Webster to which she responds with Lieutenant Daisy Clarke. Webster straightens up to give her a proper salute. Almost immediately, Liebgott pipes up again.

“You didn’t tell me you were a goddamn officer.”

“‘Cause all nurses start as officers, and it’s not like I can order you around,” There’s a pause, and then she grins a little bit. “Unless you want me to.” She thinks of Speirs and his dazed look as she did, for all intents and purposes, order him around the hospital. Her shoulders shake with a small snicker and Liebgott’s brows furrow half-heartedly.

“Don’t go gettin’ any funny ideas.”

For a few moments, they stay like that, making conversation as she begins to annex information about Floyd Talbert and David Webster in with Liebgott’s initial remarks. This time, it’s actual knowledge rather than his abridged retellings, which she’s a little thankful for. Webster is certainly polite, but Talbert throws a line or two her way which is met with an amused roll of her eyes, but nothing more in terms of acknowledgement. Soon enough though, she’s able to pick out blonde curls a little ways away and quietly excuses herself, making her way forward to grab at her Captain’s hand. Ginny looks back, and smiles, and her fingers curl around Daisy’s hand instinctively.

“There you are, was looking for you.”

“Well that’s never good,” is Daisy's immediate reply, and Ginny scoffs lightheartedly, waving a manila folder with her free hand.

“I just wanted someone to bring this report to Captain Winters with me, I didn't feel like going by myself.” Daisy hums, then nods, looping her arm with Ginny’s and letting the blonde lead the way, looking over her shoulder and waving goodbye to the three men she was just conversing with. She hears Ginny giggle, and then turns her head to look at her. “They seem to like you.” she teases. Daisy rolls her eyes and waves her hand flippantly in the air.

“They’re boys.”

“Is that the same one from Carentan? The one who—”

“Ginny.” she whines, and all her friend does is giggle as they make their way into the building that the COs were using as an office. It’s little more than a rundown townhouse. They find the door, knock twice, and a familiar-enough voice beckons for them to come inside. Daisy doesn’t anticipate Ginny pulling her inside with her, but makes no noise of protest as she’s met with familiar blue eyes and much neater red hair. Captain Winters’ smile towards her is polite and amiable, but his gaze shifts over to her blonde counterpart, and she watches his eyes widen a little bit before he’s standing up a little straighter.

“Captain Winters,” Ginny greets, unlooping their arms as she makes her way towards him. “The list of names of the fallen soldiers from your company, their… Medical records are still with us. I took the liberty of writing down a couple of suggestions on what to tell the families when it came to the more gruesome bits,” Because it’s hard to tell someone their son got blown to bits by artillery without sounding insensitive is the silent addition. Winters nods at that, his expression becoming a bit more solemn.

She doesn’t say it out loud, but Daisy is grateful this isn’t her job. She looks around the barren makeshift office as Ginny and Winters exchange words she isn’t entirely listening to. She hears the click of the door, and then Winter’s gaze shift past her as someone unexpectedly bumps her — not too hard to lose her balance, thankfully enough.

“Speirs, did you need something?”

A chill runs up her spine as he moves past her, muttering out an “excuse me”. Her gaze fixates on him — on his olive green uniform, his gelled hair, the feeling of him brushing past, and her body stiffens. Ginny doesn’t seem to notice as she idles close to Winters, no doubt listening to the conversation between the two men — probably to see what the troops were up to. She feels smaller now, and takes that opportunity to slip past through the door, finding a spot in the vacant hallway to wait for her Captain.

Like a kid waiting for her friend to get out of class, she finds a spot on the opposing wall, and waits, just outside the view of the doorway itself, but she can still hear Speirs’ voice through the thin walls — even if she doesn’t want to.

Ever since seeing him again, he exists way too prominently in her space. He’s so there — and it isn’t necessarily his fault, so she can’t get mad at him at all, which is why when he steps out instead of Ginny, she pushes herself off the wall and goes to exit the building, rather than react in any way further.

#fic // sad beautiful tragic #band of brothers #ronald speirs #ron speirs #hbo war #band of brothers fic #hbo war fic #ron speirs x reader #ronald speirs x oc #ronald speirs x ofc

[777cherry-blossom777]

SPOILERS FOR STRANGER THINGS VOLUME 2

Ok here’s a list of why everyone is saying this volume was bad. (Part 3)

I’ll sort it into categories bc why not (each group is in a different post bc this is way too long)

CALI SQUAD 1

1. Their plot at first was so stupid. There was literally no purpose. They were running around trying to get the message about the military to El, WHO ALREADY KNEW. sure they didnt know that but at least give them a purpose!

2. When they did finally save El, they were absolutely useless. Sure Argyle got them the salt but the whole point of their group was El. Once again, the entire team relied on her. Like I said in part 2, the d&d game at the beginning really had me hoping for a new hero when Dustin rolled an 11 and got out.

3. Byler. I have soooo much to say on this but im gonna start with how the cast and Netflix themselves handled it. For the entirety of June (pride month) and before, they soaked up all the praise they were getting about finally making byler canon. From Netflix’s official account posting videos mocking El and Mike’s relationship multiple times, to the cast always confirming byler and being all giggly like it was going to be some happy ship, this was the type of queerbaiting I was definitely not expecting to see from a sci-fi YA tv show set in the 80s (the whole show is just gay, like not even counting the characters just the idea). In 2022. Do better.

4. Byler part 2. Yes Will is gay. Which means Netflix hinted at every opportunity that their ONLY TWO queer characters would be getting into a relationship and yet not only were they both still single at the end of the season, they were used to further straight relationships!!! Will’s pain and heartfelt monologue was just used to further the toxic straight relationship, and the painting scene was heartbreaking. Not only did we not even get a coming out scene (yes I get hes a kid but seriously with all the homophobia in this show they’ve said so many slurs its a little weird they cant say gay), but will was literally forced to watch as they excluded him from everything. Hes not a punching bag differ brothers, you cant make every bad thing happen to him.

5. Mike’s character. Related to reasons #2 and #3, but what is his excuse? He suddenly switched from a caring, protective friend (s1 and 2) to mean and shallow (s3 and 4). Out of nowhere he was awkwardly avoiding Will, his BEST FRIEND SINCE AGE FIVE, for no reason. Everyone said internalised homophobia, aka Mike using the classic ‘you make time feel things I shouldnt be feeling so im not gonna be around you anymore so I stop feeling this’ tactic. This would also explain why he never says I love you to El, and why the one time he did try to say it before volume 2 (in s3) he was awkward as hell and avoided the word completely. Seeing as this is apparently not the case, WHERE IS HIS EXCUSE?! He suddenly switched from treating Will like the light of his life to treating Will like shit. Ignoring him, excluding him, not even noticing him CHOKING ON TEARS WHILE WILL WAS LITERALLY SITTING NEXT TO HIM? No. That just doesn’t make sense with his s1 and 2 character.

Im gonna make another part for this group because I have more to say.

#byler #stranger things #stranger things 4 #duffer brothers hate squad #why volume 2 sucked #will byers #mike wheeler #argyle x jonathan #they would’ve been cute tbh

[cescapist]

The Sun, The Melody, The Wine

DATE: 12th of June PLACE: St. Mary’s Church, Fairford STATUS: Closed @valentin-talbot

“Those aren’t for you, girl,” Benny tutted and gave a tug to the reins, trying to dislodge Clever from her position chewing upon the Beach Rose bush, which sprouted its pink flowers at the boundary of St. Mary’s churchyard. Being a horse who rarely ventured into the town proper, she was taking the trip along the High Street with less than her usual level of obedience. Benny had already pulled her off of a Hawthorn at the street’s top, and she had paused in several places either to try and pinch leaves from bushes, sneak an apple from a passing basket, or simply – it seemed – because she felt like it. “Come on, come on,” he sighed with sympathetic regret, and with a heave she snorted, traipsing onwards towards the gate, at which point Benny pulled her up short, and dismounted.

“You’ve made us late, you know,” Benny said at her as he tied up her reins to one of the remaining hooks upon the long wall. His tone turned conspiratorial and humorous. “You’ll have to beg his forgiveness.” From Valentin, or from God, of course, not from Benny. Benny was a soft touch, and he reckoned Clever already knew that. This tardiness wasn’t entirely Clever’s fault, of course. Plenty of it was Benny’s; he had taken more time than expected to change from his Sunday best and into a riding suit, and had fussed about with uncharacteristic attention to detail when it came to the picnic packed in the saddlebag upon Clever’s rump. And there had been the selecting of the wine, too. Benny had been sure to get them a good wine. He wanted their day to be pleasant. Perfect. It was the least Valentin deserved.

The truth was, Vennt was nervous. He had been from the moment he and Valentin had left the house that morning, fearing somehow that stepping through St. Mary’s doors and into the dark, cool interior would chill Valentin’s feelings towards him. Despite covering his nerves up with bravado and blabber on their walk to St. Mary’s, Benny reckoned it had become painfully evident when he managed to attend the entirety of the sermon sitting still. He hadn’t paid attention, of course – not to the vicar who had come to St. Maur for the Season, anyhow. Instead, Benny had stared blankly towards the pulpit whilst distracted entirely by Valentin in the corner of his eye. Through each prayer, he had been listening only to the way his friend’s voice cradled each word. With each ‘Amen’ he had spoken particularly softly so as to better hear the conviction and honesty in Valentin’s mouth. During hymns, he had found himself smiling over-wide at finally hearing the high, gentle sound of Valentin’s singing, which was usually so far away as to be inaudible. Still, the anxiety remained, only calmed by Valentin’s unwavering presence, even if the similarly fraught nature of Valentin’s nerves had been apparent to him as well.

It had not helped to leave Valentin behind, without more than a reassurance that he would return soon with Clever and their lunchtime picnic. Benny had no desire to risk their happiness by acting outside of the behaviour expected between two male friends, and yet he had so very much wished to take Valentin’s hand, just once, before they parted (he had not, of course, but he had promised himself to later indulge in such an action when they were alone.).

Still, he was there now, and by the clock upon St. Mary’s tower he was only ten minutes late (which was basically on time, for Benny). He had made sure he was clean, made sure he was presentable, made sure he was handsome, even. His only goal now was to retrieve Valentin from Mrs Lancashure and the vicar whose name Benny had already forgotten, to whisk him away on horseback like the hero of some tawdry romance, and to find them a place all of their own, to enjoy the Summer, and each other’s company.

St. Mary’s door clunked when it was opened, the latch an old and ancient thing. Removing his hat and holding it at his chest, Benny stepped inside, and very gently called out, not sure whether Valentin was to be found there, or at The Priory. “Reverend?”

#;;thread #;;the fearful priest #June 12th #benny: shows up ten minutes late without starbucks but wearing his sexiest riding suit and with wine