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ambrosiagourmet · 2 months

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Did Laios have a plan

... when he made his deal with the Lion? How much of it was intentional and how much of it was out of his control?

Well. If I'm being honest I don't really want to try and provide a definitive answer to that question, because I think the ambiguity is, itself, part of the story. I've gone back and forth a few times myself, and I don't think either category - "fully intentional" or "fully coincidence" - is entirely true.

That being said, I would like to point out a few things that I've seen taken for granted as true. Things that, imo, are much more about the character's perspective, or about what the character WANTS people to think (well, that's really just the Winged Lion).

Consider this not exactly an argument for "Laios masterminded everything from the start and saved the world with his cunning," but more... "Laios considered what he was doing more than people give him credit for." Make sense?

Alright then, let's go:

So to start with, I want to show every time (that I could find, at least) that the question of 'does Laios have a plan' gets brought up. This is specifically after his Ultimate Monster Form is revealed, to be clear - the question isn't about if he has a plan in general, it is if he has/had a plan when he made this specific deal with the Lion.

Here they are:

You'll notice, in all of these instances, there never really is an answer given to the question. Either because there is no way to get one, or, with Kabru at the end there, because he explicitly doesn't let Laios answer. There's even a bit of an arc here: we start with a sort of desperate 'I've mostly given up but maybe this isn't as bad as it looks,' then get a more optimistic 'maybe we really are saved,' and finally end on 'it all worked out in the end, so we maybe don't need to know.'

But, as much as there is some genuine growth in Kabru's 'accept the outcome, rather than dissecting the truth,' I also think it says a lot more about him than about Laios. Kabru is the one trying to handle his questions and his uncertainty - as he said, he wants to confirm his judgement of character. He wants to feel like he had control over things.

And he lets that go! But he also doesn't actually get the truth, either, and his implied assumption here (that Laios, the wide-eyed monster-lover, probably just followed his desires), still relies on his judgements and assumptions about Laios.

But okay, these bits are all focused on the characters theorizing about Laios. How about we look at the character who actually tells us the facts ("facts"): the Winged Lion.

The Winged Lion has quite a bit to say about Laios and his monster form.

He says that Laios hates humanity, and would rather be a monster

I've talked about this a bit already, but the Lion makes a lot of claims and assumptions about Laios that aren't necessarily true.

First of all, let's just make sure we clearly establish that the Lion is being manipulative here. That may seem obvious, but it's important to understand that there is a difference between 'the truth' and 'a version of the truth specifically framed to prey upon your deepest shame and insecurities about what you really want.'

To point out a few quick-and-dirty contradictions here:

If Laios really hated all other humans, then the Lion wouldn't hinge so many of his other arguments on Laios' love for Falin and his friends.

the Lion claims that Laios "[doesn't] even care enough about the future of [the] world to express an opinion about it," even though Laios has literally expressed opinions on what he wants for the world, to the Lion's face.

In general, the Lion does not make a distinction between urges and choices (see, for instance: him using Marcille's subconscious fear of the canaries as a way to keep her from stopping the monsters from attacking in chapter 86).

I'm not saying there is not a piece of truth here, but also... we are not our darkest thoughts, and we especially are not those thoughts as defined by someone who wants to hurt and control us.

But let’s move on to the stuff the Lion claims about Laios once he has been turned into his monster form.

2. He says that (or rather, acts like) Laios is under his control

The Lion really enjoys grandstanding about how Monster Laios is an ultimate tool he has control over. He gloats about making Laios fight the others, and has him smash through the magical barrier.

But smashing the barrier is kinda the only thing that Monster Laios actually does for the Lion. He doesn't attack anyone. He doesn't hurt his friends, despite Chilchuck thinking that Laios has "turned completely into a monster." And he certainly doesn't simply let the Lion go through with his plan to eat everyone.

This barrier smashing is actually an interesting and odd thing for Laios to have done specifically, so remember that one. I'll come back to it later.

But, yeah, to the original point... despite the Lion's dramatics, all that Monster Laios does is pose, smash up a magic barrier, and then eat him. Not exactly under his control.

AND SPEAKING OF EATING THE DEMON...

3. He frames Laios attacking and eating him as thoughtlessly violent

This one is pretty funny to me, and the Lion keeps it up for the whole scene. I'm not sure how much of this is his genuine understanding of the situation, and how much is him intentionally framing things in the most insulting manner, but like... truly. The ego involved in this. To see someone who has, multiple times, tried to stand against you - someone who has literally wished for your non-existence, to your face - to see this person attack you, specifically, and have your first reaction be 'huh, I guess he's a reckless weirdo to the core???'

Incredible stuff.

And this part, too:

He claims that Laios can't recognize anyone, that he's out of control. And yet, the Lion is the only person that gets eaten here. He is Laios' singular target.

Hell, Laios even specifically attacks one of the bodies that is actively hurting Chilchuck. I don't know if that was entirely intentional on Laios' part, but I do think it's notable.

The Lion torments Laios' friend, and when Laios does something that interrupts that action, the Lion reframes it as unhinged violence. I don't know, there's something here about the way that cruel people only talk about the things people do to resist them as violent, and ignore the violence that causes such resistance in the first place.

In any case, the main point is that the Lion insists on treating Laios like an unthinking animal during this fight, despite the fact that Laios is clearly trying to accomplish something here.

And what exactly is Laios trying to accomplish? Well, the Lion isn't entirely wrong. Laios is trying to eat something. He tells us as much.

And truly, everything Laios does as a monster points to this. He had a goal. And he accomplished it.

Let me back up a moment. I need to explain smashing the barrier.

So, Laios first starts considering how to kill the Lion when he is confronted with the fact that his only other choice would be to kill Marcille. Immediately and entirely discarding that solution, because of course he does, he tries to wrap his head around what defeating the Lion would even look like.

He clearly continues thinking about this, as a nearly identical conversation happens a few chapters later, when Laios is once again told that killing Marcille is the only way forward.

Only, this time, he's started to come up with an idea for how to do this impossible thing.

Harkening all the way back to the Living Armor chapter, Laios draws on the same lesson - if the Lion has made itself part of the world, if it has made itself into something alive, that means he can kill it. And eat it.

But there's an important extra detail to this. If he's going to try and kill (and eat) the Lion, he needs to strike when it’s vulnerable. He needs to strike when it's eating.

This is why he smashes through the barrier. Again, nothing else he does as a monster really benefits the Lion. He doesn't attack anyone else. The only command he obeys is to smash the barrier. Because the Lion has to think he has won for Laios to be able to eat him.

Beat him. For Laios to be able to beat him.

The question of why Monster Laios wanted to eat the Lion is, I think, the most ambiguous part. Was he curious? Hungry? Did he fight for his own life, for his friends, or for all of humanity? Did he know how to win because he had planned everything from the start, or because he was driven by an unquenchable instinct to do whatever it took to survive?

I don't know that it is possible to say for sure. But I do know that the Lion underestimates Laios, through it all. He underestimates Laios as a human, and he underestimates Laios as a monster.

And in the end, after he is bested, even then I don't think the Lion ever gets Laios. I don't think he understands how much Laios means his words about the Lion being burdened by hunger...

or what Laios cares about most...

or what meaning there is in life, for him.

So I don't buy what the Lion is selling about Laios, generally speaking. I don't buy that Laios didn't ever know what he was doing, and I don't buy that he was nothing more than a hungry beast.

Well. I mean. He was a hungry beast. But he was a more than that too. He was the Devourer of All Things Horrible. And he didn't just happen into that title by chance.

#dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #laios touden #winged lion #dissecting how the Lion's negging works is a great exercise in understanding manipulation honestly #dungeon meshi spoilers #dunmeshi analysis

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rainydaydream-gal18 · 17 days

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I just want to say that the latest episode of The Bad Batch sealed the deal on my opinion of Phee.

She has grown on me immensely as a character, and I now have a very different view on TechPhee.

I didn't particularly like the attitude of her character at first, but I mostly clutched my pearls because literally any character they would've paired Tech up with would have had me doubtful lol. (Was I slightly jealous over a fictional man?? Apparently so).

The little comments about Tech telling her all about Crosshair got me though. The fact that this conversation took place at all gave me good feelz.

Then, just add the fact that she said, "any friend of Brown Eyes is a friend of mine."

She didn't say any friend of the Bad Batch.... She said any friend of Tech's. It was a show of her loyalty and affection for him specifically, and also, it gives a glimpse of how he felt about Crosshair despite the fact that at that point, our boi Cross still hadn't returned to the Bad Batch.

I just gotta' say. I've seen some negativity about her lately, about her demeaning them and whatnot. We saw him literally smiling at her multiple times in the last season. It didn't look like the face a guy who felt demeaned and disrespected...

Either way, you can ship or not. That is completely and entirely up to each person. Like anything else, we are all entitled to an opinion! I don't think you're a bad person if you don't like the ship. I won't sit here and assume that there must be a terrible motive for disliking the ship.

I'm just personally starting to think it's sweet. It doesn't mean that we can't all still enjoy some Tech x Reader! It's what fanfics are for. You can have fun no matter the outcome of the story.

I just felt inclined to share that!

I'm enjoying the show. I appreciate it. I'm looking forward to seeing where it takes us (also nervous, but you knowww).

There are more things about the show I want to touch on, but this was one that stuck out to me! Anyway, hang in there Batchers!!!

#tbb #the bad batch #tech #the bad batch tech #techphee #the bad batch techphee #tbb phee #the bad batch phee #the bad batch season 3 #tbb s3 spoilers #bad batch spoilers #bad batch season 3 spoilers

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eriexplosion · 1 year

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I've been thinking a lot about Plan 99. Most of the fandom has, whether we want to or not, because how do you stop thinking about it honestly? Now I've been riding the Tech's Alive train from the start, for a lot of reasons - I won't list them all out, because there's been some absolutely amazing meta on the topic. Shout out to @heyclickadee especially who's done some in depth posts about Tech's probable survival that I cannot recommend enough.

But the thing that I can't stop coming back to and turning over in my hands like a shiny object is the thought of physically disabled Tech. It's a storyline that I think is underrepresented in media, as well as a choice that preserves the narrative stakes while being reason enough for the cast and writers to get as emotional as they did discussing it during the panel. And, frankly, it's a realistic outcome. There's this tendency to hold up character death as the ultimate demonstration of realism in a narrative based around war, but for every soldier that never came home there's a soldier that made it back with permanent injuries that changed their life forever.

But what I'm especially focused on is how it all ties together with the narrative themes that we've seen through the show, and that have been especially prominent in season two. Tech coming back with a permanent disability, especially one that removes him from the field in some way, fits in perfectly with several things.

The first one is of course survival as a whole - we get a lot of focus on this, and the most notable moment is with Crosshair and the ice vulture. "They find a way to survive" and all. But while it's most prominent in Crosshair's storyline, it's not absent from the rest of the batch's narrative. We see their determination to survive, Tech most especially. Episode two is basically an ongoing demonstration of how hard he's able to go even when he can barely move, and we get that long focus on him when the line "I'm a survivor" comes in. Then we get episode four, which is entirely focused on his quick thinking, his unique processing, and how it helps him survive where literally any other human would have been killed.

Tech is a calculated risk taker, but he's a survivor. If anyone could make it through that fall he could, tying his plot in rather firmly with Crosshair's journey through that shared narrative of finding a way to survive.

Which brings us to our next major theme - choices, respecting them and, especially, living with the consequences of your own. Tech made a choice, he looked at the odds and chose to risk himself to protect his family. If he dies here, that's it, that's as far as he has to go and it's up to everyone else to live with his choice and his loss. The consequences of that decision become theirs to bear.

But, if he lives, if he's permanently affected by his choice, then not only are they dealing with the consequences but so is he. Dying is a single choice, living with permanent changes is a series of them. Coming to the conclusion that despite everything he doesn't regret any of it, that he'd do it all again to protect them is a choice too. All of which leads directly into a theme that was most notably laid down by Tech himself in The Crossing - the ability and need to adapt.

If Tech becomes injured enough that he can't go into the field, that's a major shakeup in the fabric of the team as well as his own self image. From the start, Tech has always been elbow deep in the missions. He's in thick of the fight, right there dual wielding to take down enemies, smacking droids with datapads, hacking, and he gets several points where he physically saves Omega. He's not a sidelines kind of nerd.

So what happens if he can't do that? Maybe he's hurt enough that he has to actually stay behind on Pabu permanently, maybe he can go with them and pilot but he can't leave the Marauder, either way how does he handle being put in a situation where he can't be what he was before on the team and they have to go into danger without him there to protect them or help? The team has to adjust to his absence, and he has to adjust to not being able to do Everything and fill every gap. He has to adjust to watching them leave, not knowing if they'll come back.

But they have to adapt. He has to adapt. That's what soldiers do.

Except he's not even a soldier anymore, not in the same way, he might still be a mechanic and a pilot, but he's not the soldier he used to be, and that's another narrative theme hit. Who are the clones when they can't be soldiers? What else can they do, what are their lives without war and fighting? If Tech can't do what he did before, what can he do, how can he help his family, who even is he outside of the role that was given to him?

The final theme that I think ties into this - the second season has put a real emphasis on culture and community, we see communities coming together to support each other in multiple episodes such as with the wookiees, the rescued miner kids, Pabu as a whole. And Tech dealing with the changes that new disability brings provides ample opportunity to see that community support in action.

Pabu is a village of refugees, people who have likely gone through exactly what he's going through. His living would give the opportunity to explore that further and provide yet another link between the Batch and Pabu, another example of their belonging. He can't be as self sustaining as he was before. He doesn't have to be. None of them do, they have a community now and it's okay to lean on them.

I keep coming back to Tribe, too, specifically that quote that got us all right in the heart. When a young one leaves, the trees weep. But when they return the trees sing. As this child has found his new home, perhaps, one day we all will find a new path.

At the time a lot of us thought about Crosshair. Now we can connect it very directly to Omega's kidnapping. Two lost young ones that the trees will sing for when they return. Hopefully we get to see that with Tech too. We've definitely had our weeping, so fingers crossed for some singing to come.

#the bad batch #the bad batch spoilers #the bad batch speculation #tbb tech

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saffronique · 1 year

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Ranking potential Kaladin fates from best to worst in my opinion. Obviously this is just my personal feelings:

Desirable Outcomes:

1: My Ideal World:

Kaladin stays romantically uninvolved, but ends up in a position where he is responsible for kids. Maybe he's a teacher, maybe he raises Shadolin's kids if something happens to them, maybe he raises Oradin. He would be great with kids, he's such a protector and I think the unconditional love of a kid would be good for him personally. He is ideal for a found family setup, honestly, and I don't particularly want to see him get paired off with a woman just to create a nuclear family.

2: Impossible but beautiful world:

Kaladin, Adolin, and Shallan polycule. They understand him, they love him, they are both capable of providing him with different types of support and won't be intimidated by his personality. Adolin is an absolutely crucial part of the puzzle here, though. To me, Adolin x Kaladin can work without Shallan, Adolin x Shallan works without Kaladin, but Kaladin x Shallan cannot exist without Adolin because it would be catastrophic.

3. Monster fucker win:

Kaladin ends up in a partnership with Leshwi that is probably somewhat ambiguous but has a distinct romantic undertone to it. They already have a warriors bond and respect/have a vested interest in each others continued survival. There's a deep relationship there for sure. I don't personally see it as romantic but I think it'd work fine if it was. Wouldn't detract from either character.

Neutral Outcomes:

4. The Easy Way Out:

Kaladin finds Tarah again and ends up with her. This feels like the most obvious and perhaps most likely possibility. It's boring, it's uninventive, I don't want to see it happen, but I guess it's fine? It's a nice conclusion to Kaladin learning to live in the present, but it just feels too easy.

5. Windrunner bloodline:

Kaladin gets back together with Lyn. She can do better tbh. I love Kaladin but hes a lot. He also is kind of a traditional type of guy when it comes to gender and relationships I think, and Lyn is the type of woman who wants to break away from tradition. They just don't fit to me. Only reason this happens is because they specifically want Kaladin to marry a Windrunner and have kids that seem destined to be Windrunners also until they're not.

6. Blaze of Glory:

Kaladin dies in book 5 saving someone else. It would be so so so upsetting for this to happen and unfair to Kaladin personally but it wouldn't butcher his character at least. Like it would suck, I would go catatonic, but it'd be like Vin and Elend dying. It seems like a believable fate for him to meet, as heartbreaking as it is.

Bad Outcomes:

7. White Woman Jumpscare:

Kaladin ends up with Laral. What can i even say about this. Childhood friends to enemies to strangers to Kaladin pitying Laral in a way that really pissed her off because of how condescending and patronizing it was. I don't want them together.

8. Chrom's fate:

Kaladin gets married to a random, unimportant woman between books 5 and 6 solely for the purpose of creating plot relevant children that will likely ultimately be used to hurt him.

9. Depressed together:

Adolin dies and Shallan ends up with Kaladin. Any outcome where Adolin dies is unacceptable to me but thus one especially. I love Kaladin. I love Shallan. I love them both in a relationship with Adolin, mutually or separately. But they cannot under any circumstances be allowed to date just each other. They understand each other's trauma and are drawn to each other, but neither of them is capable of helping the other process their trauma while also dealing with their own feelings. It's a relationship destined to crash and burn from my perspective.

10. Hell and hate on planet Roshar

Syl takes a physical form and gets romantically involved with Kaladin. Literally the worst possible thing I can imagine happening to either of them. Their souls are bound together, they are vital to one another, and they love each other, but not Like That. It's closer to a sibling relationship than anything. This particular situation could only arise from a gross misunderstanding of their relationship as its been developed thus far.

#my opinion #stormlight archive #kaladin stormblessed #knights of wind and truth #kowt #speculation

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jammatown919 · 1 year

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The Difference Between Penny and Pyrrha

So I got into an argument recently in which someone compared the deaths of Penny and Pyrrha in a claim that the revival theories were stupid, so here’s an overview of why I think comparing Penny and Pyrrha’s deaths actually highlights why Penny’s story should not end the same way as Pyrrha’s.

Also, if you’re thinking of responding with anything that boils down to “I personally don’t like the outcome you’re suggesting therefore you’re delusional but no I will not counter your actual argument”, kindly don’t! I find those arguments tiresome and pointless and will not be responding to them.

First up is their respective fairy tale allusions. Pyrrha’s allusion is Achilles. She is the literal representation of a tragic hero who is doomed to die. That is, ultimately, her purpose in the story. Pyrrha existed to be a heroic sacrifice. Penny’s fairy tale allusion, however, is Pinnochio, who gets brought back to life more than once. In the original story, Pinnochio is killed by hanging. Penny is killed by the strings of her weapon. Both are later revived. In the popularized Disney version of the story, Pinnochio is killed after an encounter with Monstro after rescuing his father. In V8, while Penny never directly encounters Monstra, Monstra is part of the catalyst of V8′s events, and Penny is killed an attempt to save others by getting the powers away from Cinder. Thing is, Pinnochio is brought back to life as a reward for his heroism. Specifically, he is brought back to life by the Blue Fairy, who Winter seems to allude to at this point in the story. Winter is central to a large portion of the theories involving Penny’s return due to on-screen clues.

Essentially, Pyrrha was doomed to die by the nature of her allusion. Penny’s points to revival.

Second, the fact that one character actually got some kind of pay off to the buildup of her relationships and one did not. Pyrrha’s most central relationship throughout the volumes she was alive is with Jaune. She actually gets a moment with this special, important person in her life before she dies. Penny, on the other hand, dies in the arms of someone who is arguably the least close to her out of the entire group (other than like, Ren, who never talks to her if memory serves), separated from her father and believing her best friend is already dead. And yes, Penny does get a moment with Winter, but as has been pointed out by other users, the relationship between those two so far has been more about Winter’s development than Penny’s. It feels less like a satisfying pay off to one of Penny’s relationships and more like Penny is being treated as a stepping-stone in the journey of a character who has been less central to the plot than her up until that point (not to say that Winter isn’t an important character, but Penny was far more set up to be a big deal). Unless of course both journeys are intended to continue, intertwined with one another.

Third, why would they have Jaune go through another arc of being traumatized about not being able to save someone unless he was going to be instrumental in the furthering of this unfinished plot thread? Jaune has already gone through having to come to terms with not being able to save someone and moving on from that and saving others wherever he can. Redoing this arc just repeats what we’ve already seen from him. Even if he moves past it by saving someone else, we’ve already seen that from him after saving Weiss and it adds nothing new to his character. However, I could absolutely see them doing this with Jaune specifically if Penny’s method of survival relied on him being there and her having access to his Semblance, and if he was going to be instrumental in saving a person who he thought he had already failed to save.

Fourth, Pyrrha’s story serves to highlight that heroic sacrifices of one’s life are BAD. Pyrrha accomplishes nothing but her own death. She doesn’t save Beacon. She doesn’t stop Cinder. She doesn’t protect anyone. Her death is a giant flag waving in the air saying, “DO NOT DO THIS”. Why would they then turn around and frame a heroic sacrifice as a good thing? Unless they were going to have it become a situation in which the person doing the sacrificing can actually be around to learn her lesson that throwing her away her life is never a good option.

#penny polendina #rwby #rwby v10 theories #rwby analysis

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mxanigel · 5 months

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what we have is each other

The lovely @socially-awkward-skeleton and @captastra tagged me to play with this relationship template!

That's a fantastic template for two people. And I hope to use it for Vix and Shadowheart once I explore more of their journey. But. Uh. My current brainrot is my AoT OT3. So I'm stealing this opportunity to share the latest version of their chart (OT3 template here).

Explanatory rambles below the cut!

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Hange is a chaotic non-binary mess of a leader soldier, Levi is a clean freak who blunt and crass and so deliberate with emotions that he doesn't express them like others do, and OC Shion is a broken sunshine character seeking joy on her better days and clawing for meaning on her worse ones.

[greeting each other] Levi consistently uses demeaning terms toward Hange. "Idiot," "four-eyes," etc. When he uses their name, it's a big deal. I haven't figured out what he'll call Shion, but since she confessed so early in their relationship, he didn't have a chance to come up with something like what he calls Hange before Things Changed between them.

[First to confess] ahaha yeah Shion first tells Levi she loves him in chapter 9. We're on chapter 23 and neither Levi nor Hange have used those words. (but we're getting so damn close aaaaaaa)

[First to kiss] Levi kisses Shion after she confesses. He can't articulate why. She doesn't press him to. He knows she's important to him, something he shows in a thousand little ways. (Hange's a force of nature and takes all of this in stride in chapter 10 in very Hange-esque ways.)

[Dies for the others] OHOHO the WAYS this could happen depending on timeline and adherence to canon. Dare I explore a worldstate in which Shion dies to save Hange's life? WE SHALL SEE

[Prone to hide their feelings] This condition is in Levi Ackerman's blood okay. And an innocent chapter 8 conversation leads Hange to hide their feelings for both Shion and Levi to some extent. Their affection? Not at all hidden. Their romantic feelings? BURY THAT SHIT. Until they can't keep it buried any longer.

[First to apologize after a fight] Shion is not one who tolerates strain between herself and those she loves. Especially if she's the person responsible for it. But when that strain exists for reasons outside of her control… she won't apologize for the sake of apologizing. And she's learning not to apologize for who she is or how she feels.

["Excuse me, they asked for no pickles"] Shion will sit there and roll with things (and may encourage others to do the same depending on the situation) but there is no freaking way Levi or Hange would accept any of the three getting pickles when they didn't ask for pickles, lol.

[Spoils the others] How said spoiling occurs depends on the person, but they're each ready able and willing to spoil the other two.

[Wakes up first] Levi canonically doesn't sleep much. So I headcanon that Hange has experimented with sleeping draughts (experiments which always piss off Levi regardless of effectiveness because Hange takes it as a personal challenge to slip him one without him noticing). But for this relationship, he's the first one awake which has already manifested multiple times in the fic. The very limited scenarios in which he wouldn't wake first are super fun to play with~

["What's updog?"] I took this line less literally, seeing it as which of them are the most casual in speaking to the others, most likely to make puns, etc. And that's 100% Hange.

[First to propose] Once the OT3 shakes off its rocky romantic restart, this is unnecessary. Hell, even before the official confessions, they're already a unit.

[Wants children] I actively avoid giving my OCs children. I stopped writing for one in part because it seemed like children were a likely outcome. And then Shion comes along and turns that on its head. So. There's a kid in one possible future. With three parents who love her very much.

[Didn't know they were dating] The they-were-already-a-unit thing I mentioned earlier comes into play here. I have mixed feelings about the word "dating" here only because it tends to have romantic connotations, and both Shion and Hange's initial feelings are strongly platonic. But given how much I adore Levihan and that this is my first-ever OT3, plus after thinking long and hard about how Shion eventually feels about Hange and vice versa, I decided all of their feelings would be considered romantic.

[Initiates contact] Shion holds back SO HARD from being affectionate toward Levi, but he picks up on that (and appreciates it) and works to communicate when he's more open to that sort of thing. Not that he's good at it, but he tries. Meanwhile, Hange is alllll about touching and other affectionate gestures, which helps further lower the barrier for the other two.

[Approached first] Shion kind of sort of approached Levi first (remember, she was holding back) and Levi, once he's open to taking another step, doesn't hold back. But I'm thinking about this romantically, and Hange is highly reticent to show romantic advances toward either one knowing that Shion has feelings for Levi.

[Says the L word first] Shion 100%.

[The oblivious one] I'm using "oblivious" a bit loosely here; Levi takes a while to sort through what to name his feelings, and Hange hangs out in denial for quite some time.

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No-pressure tagging people to play with either template and/or just skimread my OC+blorbo rambles~ @poetikat @mxkelsifer @milesmentis @arendaes @outpost51 @dr-paine @saraptor @perhapsrampancy @spindleweedss @marythegizka

#OT3: what we have is each other #fic: Cut to the Feeling #ship template

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gcldfanged · 1 month

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Meet the Writer

ᴡʜᴀᴛ ᴍᴀᴅᴇ ʏᴏᴜ ᴘɪᴄᴋ ᴜᴘ ᴛʜᴇ ᴄᴜʀʀᴇɴᴛ ᴍᴜꜱᴇ(ꜱ) ʏᴏᴜ ʜᴀᴠᴇ?

(CANON MUSES) -

Genesis: I actually HATED Genesis initially in the og CC game. I thought he was a lame addition and just like… idk, they wanted Gackt in the game so they made his presence plot relevant? OOOUGH, I was so mad… But then I saw how the rpc and fandom treats him, which is honestly even WORSE SOMEHOW??? So I decided to try writing him seriously and what do you know, I actually kinda like it.

Verdot: I literally have to make the content I wanna see in this rpc, such is my burden. my curse...

(OCs) - I wanted to write about the themes I have on my pinned and honestly, there were so many Tseng rpers who I am friends and mutuals with that knock it out of the fucking ballpark- I just didn't feel like I'd have ANYTHING new or good to contribute to the exploration of his character? So I made an OC :P And he's really changed so much! I remember when I was still making my own art for him and he wasn't QUITE like there the way I wanted him to be, but I didn't have anything better to employ as a faceclaim or reference to draw from. And then Cas was like "btw here's a manga about your HYPERFIXATION" and Kokonoi's general appearance and vibe was a great starting point to go off of instead.

Anyway, There's always things I had planned for Jae in the works or on the backburner, but he has really evolved over the span of years I've been writing him, so I really appreciate every person who took the time to check him out and build something with him.

ɪꜱ ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ᴀɴʏᴛʜɪɴɢ ʏᴏᴜ ᴅᴏɴ'ᴛ ʟɪᴋᴇ ᴛᴏ ᴡʀɪᴛᴇ?

You know, I have been becoming more lenient with allowing myself to write certain things. I always end up being afraid of how people will react to certain themes I explore because... let's be real, a lot of people are pretty intolerant to opinions that are different than theirs. So long as whatever I and/or my partner explore is handled with the care and respect it deserves, I don't really see an issue with much anymore. Hell, I was terrified to post that one drabble fleshing out Jae meeting Veld for the first time because I was afraid people would see Jae's reaction to killing someone as somehow 'excusing abuse' because he wasn't dancing on the guy's corpse and actually showed remorse for what he did. It's fears of what I write about being misconstrued like that that really makes me hesitant to even talk about certain ideas with partners. But I'm getting over that, little by little and step by step.

ɪꜱ ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ᴀɴʏᴛʜɪɴɢ ʏᴏᴜ ʀᴇᴀʟʟʏ ᴇɴᴊᴏʏ ᴡʀɪᴛɪɴɢ?

I actually love writing (as you can tell) introspective pieces. Something where you're really getting inside the character's head for a moment to see past all of their walls and facades, or sometimes you're still seeing what they tell THEMSELVES is the real undiluted truth, but isn't. I just love that kinda stream of consciousness really dig deep into the VOICE of a character exploration. Makes me feel lots of emotions.

ʜᴏᴡ ᴅᴏ ʏᴏᴜ ᴄᴏᴍᴇ ᴜᴘ ᴡɪᴛʜ ʜᴇᴀᴅᴄᴀɴᴏɴꜱ?

Usually I'll be doing something else like watching a piece of media or listening to a podcast and start to think "Ooh, my muse would love this" or "this makes me think of xyz muse wow", and it just kind of expands organically from there.

ᴅᴏ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡʀɪᴛᴇ ɪɴ ꜱɪʟᴇɴᴄᴇ ᴏʀ ᴅᴏ ʏᴏᴜ ᴘʟᴀʏ ᴍᴜꜱɪᴄ?

Music helps get me inspired initially, especially since I make spotify playlists for all my muses (and ships :P), so generally I'm cool with music, but usually I zone in too much on my own writing to pay attention. It's like my sense of hearing turns off.

ᴅᴏ ʏᴏᴜ ᴘʟᴀɴ ʏᴏᴜʀ ʀᴇᴘʟɪᴇꜱ ᴏʀ ᴡɪɴɢ ᴛʜᴇᴍ?

Both- There's always a general sort of... idea or outcome that me and my partner would LIKE to shoot for? And sometimes we just don't get there, because it really depends on what the characters do/say and how it's taken by the other muse.

For example, I was roleplaying a thread with @steeleidolon's Kunsel where he and Jae are trying to broker a deal and Kunsel ends up saying something to the effect of "your people" and he means the Turks. Jae, on the other hand, hears 'your people' and assumes Kunsel was bringing up his race and the perception of fellow people from Wutai or Hanuel being unfairly insular. So, it kinda went to shit, LOL.

It's little things like that that can color your muse's reaction to sometimes very different degrees than what you plan for!

ᴅᴏ ʏᴏᴜ ᴇɴᴊᴏʏ ꜱʜɪᴘᴘɪɴɢ?

I like complicated dynamics and no, I will never shut up about them. Ships for me don't even have to strictly be romantic or sexual in nature, so like- I have some interactions I'm still feeling out with @saishuu-heiki that are platonic but leaning in a distinctly enemy/frenemy/challenges other person kind of vibe? And I think it's great! They don't HAVE to be like "we're friends, we're lovers, or we hate each other'- Like, limiting all your interactions to one of those three options gets really boring for me...

ᴡʜᴀᴛ'ꜱ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴀʟɪᴀꜱ/ɴᴀᴍᴇ?

King_Kkeungi is my mangaka pseudonym for the Silent Manga Audition that I tried submitting to last year. People have called me just "King" (if they didn't know how to pronounce Korean) or "Kkeungi" before, so I tend to go by these handles now.

ᴀɢᴇ?

30s, I'm like Dagon: ancient and evil, spoken about in hushed whispers that the zealots who follow my dark lore worship-

ʙɪʀᴛʜᴅᴀʏ?

May 10th

ꜰᴀᴠᴏʀɪᴛᴇ ᴄᴏʟᴏʀ(ꜱ)?

Blue-greens like teal and turquoise, soft pastel mint, and pinky-purples

ꜰᴀᴠᴏʀɪᴛᴇ ꜱᴏɴɢ(ꜱ)?

Currently? PRIMADONNA by Kedarui! It's a sequel to their other song, Femme Fatale and has amazing lore and characters. It's just got fascinating kinda themes and imagery when you watch them back to back.

ʟᴀꜱᴛ ᴍᴏᴠɪᴇ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡᴀᴛᴄʜᴇᴅ?

The 2nd DUNE movie, holy crap, I was blown away!

ʟᴀꜱᴛ ꜱʜᴏᴡ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡᴀᴛᴄʜᴇᴅ?

Hell's Paradise, which I am still TRYING to finish.

ʟᴀꜱᴛ ꜱᴏɴɢ ʏᴏᴜ ʟɪꜱᴛᴇɴᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ?

Philip by millenium parade, my new go-to Jae song

ꜰᴀᴠᴏʀɪᴛᴇ ꜰᴏᴏᴅ?

Thai or Vietnamese food *drools*

ꜰᴀᴠᴏʀɪᴛᴇ ꜱᴇᴀꜱᴏɴ?

Summer... I just love the heat and the sun and the iconic imagery/sounds/themes like eating watermelon and wearing floppy plastic sandals, melting ice cream, hearing the chime of our furin while sitting outside on the porch of the house.

ᴅᴏ ʏᴏᴜ ʜᴀᴠᴇ ᴀ ᴛᴜᴍʙʟʀ ʙᴇꜱᴛ ꜰʀɪᴇɴᴅ?

I talk to regularly (like near every day): @ceaselxss, @annjiru, @phoenixshards, @sadistpet, @nightiingaled. Like talking with a lot: @speedchasing, @ofdeference, @hisnewera, @cwarscars, @contemptim, @steeleidolon, @altrxisme, @hxbiris & @hxvemxnd

The people who have known me the LONGEST are mostly discord only rpers now, but Tricky, HD, Kit, and Vixen I consider to be extremely close to me since we've been friends for... like over or around 6+ years and are still ongoing buddies who have met face to face before.

Then there's my ex-fiancee, but he doesn't do tumblr rp anymore.

This list also doesn't even cover ppl I write with/ooc interacted with over a long period of time like @ivory-paragon, @poeticphoenix, @reapersxfolly, @endweapon, @chthonicsurge, or @dcviltriggcr, so- I like reaching out to people and developing bonds! We don't even have to be on discord capslocking at each other, it's really cool when you can come back to an RPC and still have that connection without any awkward small talk?

#◈ ooc #◈ dash games #◈ MUNDAY

13 notes · View notes

raveneira · 5 months

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Hola amiga. Me alegra mucho saludarte y escribirte.

Cómo ya sabrás me gustan muchísimo tus análisis, me siento muy contenta cada vez que los leo, por eso estoy aquí pidiendo que nos hables sobre lo que piensas que pasará con sarada cuando descubra que sasuke está mal. Y también que nos hables de lo que piensas de la última interacción que tuvo kawasara, que te pareció?

Espero no ser inoportuna. Te mando un abrazo. Gracias por tus escritos.

No no its ok you didnt do anything wrong, I dont mind answering questions lol and Im glad you like my analysis, I appreciate your positive feedback so thank you.

As for what I think Sarada might do when she discovers Sasuke is wrong [thats what google translated it as] I think you mean when she discovers he's been turned into a tree? if so then I think she'll be pretty worried but she wont blame Boruto or have any anger towards him because this writing ALWAYS has to make her just so understanding and forgiving towards him about EVERYTHING but NOT others because this manga forgot that her idol was Naruto and she literally said she wanted to be like him, someone people can rely on who she'll reach out to and save the way Naruto saved her, but again this manga done forgot that character trait unfortunately.

So what do I think is gonna happen? she'll be shocked and upset but wont blame Boruto and instead blame herself for sending her dad off with him which got him into this situation because of her selfish request, which may open the door FINALLY for some big character development because this is NOT the first time her selfishness and recklessness has resulted in somebody else getting hurt.

So maybe this might be the time for Sarada to get some long overdue character development as she finally realizes her actions, or more correctly, LACK of action has consequences, and that when she jumps in or makes requests without thinking long term about the consequences or even if its a good idea to begin with, she's gotta deal with the consequences of it which more often than not will be negative.

Boruto no longer has his eye because of her, Sasuke has been turned into a tree unconscious while a 10 tails tree clone of him is eventually gonna try and kill them all because of her, HER CHOICES caused this outcome, the only positive that came out of something she did so far was saving Boruto's life, but at what cost? she saved Boruto at the cost of her father, she 'protected' Boruto at the cost of his eye because he ended up protecting her instead, do you see the pattern here? so hopefully seeing her father as a tree finally gives her a wake up call that she NEEDS to do better going forward and actually THINK before she does things instead of just acting in the moment without any thought of how things could go wrong.

Naruto was headstrong and reckless too, but he never caused THIS type of bad shit to happen as a result of his recklessness because even HE used his brain somewhat before he acted. The worst hes done was willingly let Kurama take over to attack Orochimaru for taking Sasuke which resulted in him attacking Sakura and giving her a really bad wound, which when told he caused this what do you think he did? he never let Kurama take over like that again and vowed to rely on his own strength so he would NEVER cause harm to anyone else like that ever again.

Sarada unfortunately has not learned that lesson yet which she should've when she made Boruto lose his eye but I digress...maybe this development was saved for the timeskip so lets see if she finally gets it after seeing what happened to her dad, only time will tell.

Now onto how I feel about the KawaSara interaction this chapter...well Im gonna be brutally honest, I dont HATE it but I dont love it either and its not even because the interaction itself was bad nah I actually like their little rivalry they have right now, it adds spice and an obstacle Kawaki has to deal with but also the one person [besides Sumire] he doesnt have to watch his words with and can just be himself with. But let me get my gripes out of the way first and then I'll go into the positives.

My gripe with the interaction is Sarada's attitude and dialogue because it just makes her look both stupid and petty for no danm reason

First off shes telling them to confirm with Ada about what happened, why is she let alone ANYONE treating Ada as a reliable source when she didnt even warn them about Code's ambush? when she didnt even send Daemon out to fight him which is LITERALLY the whole reason their all even letting them stay there? lets not forget that Ada can easily just LIE about anything she wants like she did about Boruto killing Naruto, they literally have specialized ninja that they KNOW are trustworthy who actually DO work for them that they could ask to verify Sarada's story by peeking into her brain but no she chooses to reccomend asking Ada for confirmation, thats dumbass moment number 1.

Her remark about Kawaki being Otsutsuki too was just plain PETTY for no danm reason, and stupid as hell in this context because Boruto has Momo inside of him [pause] actively trying to take him over so he can kill Kawaki, make a divine tree, destroy all life on the planet to make a chakra fruit so he can eat it and become a god, SHE KNOWS THIS

Yet shes comparing that to Kawaki who doesnt have Isshiki looming over him threatening to take over at any time, he simply has his powers, and with his powers he wants to wipe out ALL OTHER OTSUTSUKI WHO ARE ACTUAL THREATS TO THE WORLD and that INCLUDES Boruto since he DOESNT HAVE CONTROL OVER MOMOSHIKI AND HE IS SHOWN SEVERAL TIMES ABLE TO TAKE OVER BORUTO WHENEVER HE WANTS UNDER THE RIGHT CONDITIONS, so her comment here was just petty, which made Kawaki's response all the more depressing.

He explains to her that he's an Otsutsuki that kills Otsutsuki and that his power only exists to do that, and once he wipes them all out he'll gladly die, but until then he will do whatever it takes, and she has ZERO reaction to this and just says she wont let him do what he wants as a shinobi who aims to be Hokage 🤦‍♀️ like everything he said literally went in one ear and out the other GIRL BYE.

He's literally calling her out on her stupidity and she doesnt even catch it, she was petty pretty much saying well if all Otsutsuki are enemies are enemies that should be killed doesnt that include you, and his response is yea it does and I fully intend to die with all the rest of em but not till I get them first, and she just...she just doesnt even hear that.

You'd think there'd atleast be a pause like 'danm I didnt mean for you to actually agree to that' but nah she just moved past that like he didnt even say it and is just like 'I wont let you do what you want' when thats literally what hes been doing for 3 years straight while she's been getting nothin but ignored 😭 seriously this writing hates her so much because who tf really thought this was good dialogue for her? this only works if she was actually DOING something to hinder Kawaki in some way, which she hasnt, so she just looks goofy and unserious.

But thats it for my gripes, now for my positives.

For starters I like how this confrontation resembles their one back in chapter 28 when they first really interacted and they became friends

I love how even though the subject their arguing about is different, the paneling is still the same, Sarada appearing behind Kawaki and calling him out for doing something wrong despite not knowing all the details, Kawaki turning around and getting in her face to tell her off, and the Hokage stopping it from before it gets ugly and they both settle down as their told.

What I like about this is that when you look at these scenes side by side you can see the development between then and now, back then Kawaki had ZERO respect for Sarada, called her an asshole and basically told her to mind her business while yelling in her face.

Now Kawaki doesnt snap at her at all, the roles are actually reversed now to where Sarada is the one being more hostile than he is. Kawaki, unlike before, doesnt just shut her down and tell her to mind her business, but he actually takes time to explain to her when he really doesnt have to. See here.

Kawaki says does he really have to say this again? meaning they have had this conversation before more than once, so he has no reason to repeat himself anymore than he already has and could easily have brushed her off without saying a thing or just simply told her to shut up and butt out but he didnt.

Instead he takes time to not only repeat himself, but breaks down in detail EXACTLY what his motivations are, why hes doing this, and that he fully intends to die for all he's done by the end of this. Just like before, he gets in her face, but its nowhere near as aggressive as in 28 where he was actually being intimidating, but here he's relaxed, talking calm, and looking her in the eye, and responding to what she said, rather than ignoring it completely and just yelling at her to shut up.

Why is that significant? because his last line really hits home when you realize the subtext and see how meaningful it is.

Think about this for a second, for 3 years now everyone has been brainwashed into thinking he's Boruto, have been treating him like Boruto, have remembered him as Boruto, have been looking at him, talking to him, loving/respecting him AS BORUTO.

Sarada is the ONLY person [lets leave Sumire out of this cuz we havent seen them interact yet] who treats Kawaki AS Kawaki, the only one who when she's talking to him she's talking to KAWAKI, when shes thinking of him shes thinking of KAWAKI, when she looks at him she sees KAWAKI, anyway she treats him she is treating him as KAWAKI.

This may not seem significant on the surface but lemme put it into a little more perspective.

This is what Kawaki has had to deal with every, single, day, for 3 years straight since Omnipotence happened. Kawaki never WANTED or ASKED for ANY of this, but no matter how hard he tried everything just kept going more and more to shit because of him, but atleast back then he still had his own identity, but now? everyday is a whole new kind of hell he has to endure that wont go away no matter how much he rejects it.

Just before Omnipotence Kawaki said what he really felt about himself, what he saw himself as, and thats what makes this situation he's in now so hellish, because to Kawaki he's a nobody, an outsider that nobody would mourn if he died, he tells Ada to use her all seeing eye to look at him and see him for the powerless piece of garbage that he is.

This is what he thinks of himself, now lets see what he thinks of Boruto and then it'll all make sense.

Kawaki puts Boruto on a pedastal similar to Naruto but not nearly as strong obviously, but the point is, Kawaki sees Boruto as someone who NOBODY WILL BE WILLING TO KILL, as someone nobody would even CONSIDER killing regardless of the threat he poses, as the HOKAGES SON literally NOBODY would EVER turn against him, and NOBODY would ever even think of killing him knowing the consequences of nobody ever forgiving them for it.

Keywords to pay attention to here

He's the Hokage's son! Lord 7ths son!

Who in Konoha could kill him? the Hokages son?

An act that would turn all your friends into foes! who'd ever agree to take on such a task?

Why'd it have to be him!?

Kawaki emphasizes Boruto being 'The Hokage's son' several times, but I want you to pay attention to how he says 'Lord 7ths son' as well, remember chapter 60? Naruto officially claims Kawaki as his son, even if not on paper, Kawaki was just as much his son as Boruto now.

But look at how Kawaki percieves it, HE doesnt see himself as Naruto's son at all and sadly Naruto didnt do a good job convincing him, because when he mercy killed Boruto BY HIS REQUEST Naruto did NOT stand by him and kept his distance, acting awkward around him, and even sounding forced when he tried to give the 'everyone is family to the Hokage' speech which alone right there showed the distance between them now, because in chapter 60 Kawaki was his son, in 69 he's the same as any other villager and believe me, Kawaki felt that and thats why none of his attempts at reassuring him worked because he knew it wasnt entirely genuine and that he indeed held some resentment towards Kawaki for what he did, that Kawaki clearly was nowhere near the same importance as Boruto and that in the end Naruto would turn his back on Kawaki before he ever would Boruto no matter WHAT hes done or will do.

Am I dragging Naruto? no, obviously his bond with his biological son will be stronger than the one with his adopted one hes only known less than a year. But I will say when has that ever stopped Naruto before? he only really bonded with Iruka for a year before the timeskip and he viewed him like a father, he only interacted and bonded with Sasuke for a year and he considered him a brother he was willing to go to hell and back for, he knew Gaara for less than a year and he was IN TEARS when he heard the Akatsuki had attacked and killed him and nearly beat Deidara to death so bad Kakashi had to use the seal to calm him down before he went full Kurama mode.

So keep in mind while I do understand where Naruto is coming from as a parent, I still have to point out the inconsistency with his character because blood ties have NEVER mattered to him but it was always the BONDS he felt with the people themselves, whether short lived or long, Naruto always clung to those bonds WITH HIS LIFE and he instills this very message into Sarada in Gaiden, yes, the same Naruto in the sequel now, not past young Naruto like people try to argue saying 'he grew up' cuz no, this is grown parent of two kids Naruto preaching the EXACT SAME MINDSET.

So yeah, Im calling out the inconsistency with his character in the sequel because THIS IS HOW KISHIMOTO WROTE HIM EVEN IN THE PRESENT ERA its literally what the entire plotline of Gaiden was about, learning to value and treasure your bonds regardless of blood ties. Naruto literally grew up without NO family do he literally had to FIND and MAKE one for himself, and hes never done any more or less for his blood fam than he did for his found family.

But unfortunately thats no longer the case in Boruto so lets get back to that.

So you see the point? Naruto, atleast in the sequel is a total liar, he promised to keep Kawaki safe, he made him feel like this was his home, told him that they all see him as family now, he called him his son, everybody was telling him that this is his home now no matter what anyone says his place is in Konoha and Kawaki was almost starting to believe it.

But when Naruto's biological son was killed by Kawaki at his request everything changed, nobody was on his side, nobody visited him even though they didnt even know the truth of what happened yet, Naruto wasnt looking at him with sincerity anymore and his words were scripted word for word just what he always says to everybody, but not anything personal from the heart like he usually does. Yes their conversation was interupted, but he never made any attempt to continue it either and simply left Kawaki to sit with his half hearted 'forgiveness' anyone who knows Naruto knew it wasnt sincere.

So where am I going with this? that was the turning point, that is when Kawaki realized and accepted that he was completely and utterly alone and felt isolated from everyone else.

This is why he says what he does to Ada and why his words hit so hard because they let you see just how utterly ALONE and REJECTED he actually feels. He doesnt feel like hes a part of Konoha, he doesnt feel like Narutos son, he doesnt feel like anyone would care if he died, its literally PROVEN right then and there how easy it was for them to put a kill order out on him without hesitation just for THINKING he did something to Naruto and ATTEMPTING to kill Boruto but none of these people gave a DANM when Boruto stabbed Sasuke's eye out, tried to kill Kawaki twice, tried to kill Naruto, oh and ironically tried to get Shikamaru killed too, the same guy who put a kill order out on Kawaki didnt push for any kind of punishment on Boruto.

'But that was Momoshiki' so what? who's body is he in? who's body did he use to commit all those horrible acts? when Gaara kept failing to be able to control the one tails his dad tried to have him killed before he'd end up destroying the village [no I am not defending Rasa fk that guy Im just pointing out the principle] if somebody is a danger to the village, even if its of no fault of their own, IF THEY ARE A THREAT TO THE VILLAGE then they have to be eliminated, so the it was Momoshiki excuse doesnt fly because regardless they have NO way of controling Momoshiki and preventing him from coming out, nor do they have a concrete way of forcing him back once hes taken over unless under very specific circumstances which even then if he feels like thats gonna happen he can dip to another dimension through his karma and they'll have a hell of a hard time finding him if he does.

Bottom line? Kawaki saw that for him he was disposable, he was a nobody, someone they didnt care if he died and would kill easily without hesitation and NOBODY would complain, but Boruto? let me repeat Kawaki's words.

He's the Hokage's son! Lord 7ths son!

Who in Konoha could kill him? the Hokages son?

An act that would turn all your friends into foes! who'd ever agree to take on such a task?

Why'd it have to be him!?

Do I need to say more? Boruto is the Hokage's son, Naruto's son, NOBODY in Konoha would ever dream of killing him, because killing Boruto would turn literally everyone against them regardless of what harm he's caused and what threat he poses for the future, they will be hated for it BECAUSE HE IS THE HOKAGE'S SON.

And because Kawaki is the only one strong enough to do it and accept all the consequences that comes with it, he's the one suffering that exact fate, but whats saddest about all this...is that everything he thought about himself was proven right, every awful thing he thought about himself was proven 100% right.

So what does that have to do with his and Sarada's convo there? well I needed to break down all of what happened beforehand so I could say how much it probably means to Kawaki that Sarada isnt affected.

The reason I needed to point all that out was to make sense of why being treated like Boruto by everyone is so hellish, because he KNOWS how they really feel about him, they say it to him constantly.

Mitsuki is always following Kawaki around full of bloodlust that Kawaki says is suffocating and Mitsuki keeps saying how he wont forgive and definitely will kill Boruto for what he did

You have 2 random Jonin he's working with protecting the village just casually talking about how good it would be if Boruto and Code took eachother out

Then you have Hima calling him big brother the way she would Boruto which only irritates him more because he knows that affection isnt for him which is why he rejects it so harshly

So imagine how relieving it must be for Kawaki to have someone that he doesnt have to listen wish him dead to his face without even knowing it, someone not full of bloodlust wanting his head on a stake, someone not calling out to him affectionately because they think he's someone he isnt, and most of all...someone that he knows without a doubt that whatever she says or does for him, is for HIM.

So quite frankly her hostility contrary to popular belief actually doesnt even bother him, he welcomes it because he feels its what he deserves and more than that because its the only genuine thoughts and feelings aimed at him, unfortunately we dont have enough chapters yet to see the full scope of how this has gotten to him but I imagine 3 years of being seen as someone your not has to be EXHAUSTING, so even if Sarada is being hostile towards him, it probably means the world to him that shes one person who sees him for who he really is, Kawaki, not Boruto.

His words to her in that last panel is what made it clear to me that he actually doesnt mind her opposing him, he tells her point blank that he plans to die once he has wiped out all the Otsutsuki threats there are, why thats significant is because he'd never have to say this to anyone else, why? cuz they think he's Boruto so why does he need to tell them his goals as Kawaki? even if he did why would he tell them he's gonna off himself at the end of it? there'd be no reason to.

Not only that but he's said this more than once to her, implying they've bumped heads about this exact subject more than once, which again if Kawaki was annoyed by her and wanted to be left alone he would've never got into this conversation in the first place and just ignored her or told her to shut up. The fact that they've talked about this more than once says alot, because Kawaki has no reason to, once was enough, but if Kawaki is taking time out to explain the same thing over and over to her then thats more than enough proof that shes different from everyone else.

Everyone else he drowns out, ignores, or tells to stop acting or speaking to him a certain way, but Sarada? no matter how many times she confronts him about this same subject, he always takes time to explain it. You could say that was just exposition for the readers but in that case why have him say he was repeating himself? he could've just said 'Do I really have to spell it out for you?' which leads to the same exposition witn NO implications of them ever having this convo before, but the fact that they specified that he was repeating this, means they wanted the audience to know this was NOT the first time they've had this talk.

Personally, like I said we need to get more insight into Kawaki's thoughts now before I can make a accurate analysis, but personally and this is me being unbiased and basing it solely on Kawaki's character up till this point, but I feel like in his own subconscious way he enjoys Sarada's company and hostility towards him because its the one thing he knows is for him, it probably puts him at ease whenever Sarada confronts him about anything because its the only time where he can be himself now without being looked at as weird or OOC because hes not acting like Boruto, he was probably relieved when it was revealed she wasnt affected because it meant he wasnt totally alone with only Ada who he cant stand knowing the truth, but his former friend/teammate.

I imagine he felt indifference towards Sumire because she made it clear she was scared of him ever since she found out he killed Boruto, but until we get some actual interaction or thoughts from either of them we wont know for sure.

Anyway, I personally feel like Kawaki keeps repeating himself when he doesnt have to because she's the only one he can to. Unless injured or getting a check up Kawaki doesnt interact with Sumire at all, and Sumire from what we've seen so far has been keeping a low profile since she sees the situation is hopeless trying to convince people at this point, but Sarada is the complete opposite and is persistent no matter how many times she fails she is very loudly and vocally opposing Kawaki and Konoha. She says herself that she wont repeat herself too, meaning she's also said this to Kawaki more than once as well, and thats that she wont let him do what he wants as a ninja who aims to be Hokage.

These words are crucial because she's said this to Kawaki more than once about her Hokage dream, usually something that gets repeated alot in the Narutoverse by someone, especially to someone in particular, usually ends up having a really big significance in their relationship down the line. See Sasuke's 'your annoying' for example or him calling Naruto Usuratonkachi, or of course the 'because your my friend'. It doesnt matter what it is, if its something thats repeated consistently, its gonna have some big significance be it romantic or platonic, either way its gonna mean something big for those characters.

Anyway going back to Sarada, the fact that Sarada has been repeating herself too on this same issue just goes to show how adament and consistent she's been in opposing him, unlike in chapter 28 where she backed down and felt nervous when Kawaki got in her face, now she stands firm and looks him straight in the eye the same way he does her. He's not trying to intimidate her, but make her understand the situation and his perspective, and Sarada isnt trying to intimidate or threaten him either, but make him understand that she wont go along with doing things this way and wont back down no matter what, because the way Kawaki and Shikamaru is running things isnt how Naruto would've wanted, which is why she is their biggest opposers because she looked up to Naruto and wanted to do things the Naruto way.

Its no coincidence that in the very first chapter Sarada tells Shikamaru off about disagreeing with her opposition, its no coincidence that she snapped back using Naruto as her example of going against everyone to fight for what and who she believes in and tells him that the Hokage she looks up to is Naruto not him.

Then in chapter 4 she's now telling Kawaki something similar, that she wont let him do things his way as a ninja who aims to be Hokage, but not just any Hokage, but Naruto.

I dont want this to get too long so I'll sum up my final thoughts.

I believe Kawaki is relieved and subconsciously enjoys Sarada opposing him and is probably lowkey happy to not be alone in this situation with nobody he could talk to as just himself, to look at someone and be looked at and know that their looking at him, being around Sarada is probably the only time he can actually breathe without being subjected to brainwashed people treating him like someone hes not, or hearing this and that person wishing him dead, but with Sarada he can actually just speak and act as himself.

But most importantly anything she does or says to him will mean so much more to him than anyone else because from lets say Hima or Shikadai or even Inojin, if one of them were to get badly hurt or even die for him Kawaki will know its only because they thought he was Boruto and that they never would've done that if they knew it was him. But if Sarada does that, it'll have so much more weight now due to omnipotence because not only is she unaffected by it which means she did this KNOWING its for Kawaki, but the fact that even after everything hes done and how mad she is at him for it, she still put her life on the line for him or any other big gesture she'd do that'd show she cares. So when that moment happens its definitely gonna be an interesting scene, assuming Ikemoto doesnt botch it somehow...we shall see.

As for Sarada I believe in her own roundabout way she's trying to make Kawaki see that this isnt what Naruto would want, that in her own way she's trying to make him see the flaws in his logic, when she said he's and Otsutsuki too she wasnt saying that he should just off himself now or that she wanted him to die but that if all Otsutsuki are the enemy no matter what their motives are then doesnt that make him an enemy as well? regardless of his motives? and if all Otsutsuki must die simply for being Otsutsuki then shouldnt she just kill him right now? not that she could but she could try, she could say 'I will kill you someday' or some other death threat if she were actually saying he should die 100% and thats what she wanted but she doesnt.

Overall Sarada is just trying to make Kawaki see the holes in his logic, to make him see that this isnt what Naruto would've wanted, that trying to carry the weight of it all by himself isnt gonna be effective long term, especially now when something FAR BIGGER is going on that only Boruto knows about, so regardless of how he feels they are gonna have to set aside their differences and work together to deal with a far bigger threat and resolve a way bigger problem. Kawaki doesnt even argue with her about that, he listens to her and hears her out and most likely will agree to it since that will be the most efficient course of action.

Hopefully this will start to make him see that the solo route isnt the way, which if the FF isnt retconned we know it wont be, but maybe for a moment he'll see sometimes teamwork is nessecary and that he really CANT do it all alone. I believe thats the message Sarada is trying to send to him, the same one Naruto sent Sasuke, whether or not she'll be successful remains to be seen but for now I look forwards to seeing how they both develop from here and hear even more about whats been going on between them over these 3 years.

Antis think them being at odds and rivals with eachother now is somehow a negative that kills the ship when thats literally how many endgame ships interacted for a while before eventually coming together lol like ppl fr just gonna act like Jerza, Zervis, VegeBul, Taiga x Ryu, Tonari no kaibatsu-kun, Suzuka, Reimei no Arcana, and so on don't exist.

So like...I dunno, maybe ppl just aint seen alot of manga/anime or hell even media in general but regardless this really aint the ship killer antis think it is, its honestly just the beginning lol but Im never one to count chickens too early so I wont get too cocky, but antis need to start bein humble too cuz they are WAY too confident about KawaSara's downfall when things are just gettin good lol but hey more material for us to laugh at later when their once again wrong about everything they say about the ship and what'll happen etc.

I apologize for the lost post but I wanted to properly express my thoughts as best and clearly as I could but I might've over explained 😭 my apologies...but I hope you enjoyed my little breakdown regardless.

#rave responds #boruto manga #pro kawasara #anti-bsa #anti-ksu #manga spoilers

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v-arbellanaris · 1 year

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irt the sera discussion from yesterday I would like to add that she's also dismissive of city elven culture—it just doesn't come up as much bc inquisition does its very best to ignore city elves' existence. the most memorable example for me is a quote from her WOT entry—"stupid tree. didn't go, didn't stay" or something like that. You're definitely right, her whole deal is just internalized racism, it's not strictly prejudice against the dalish like some people claim lol. (I believe anneapocalypse has a meta on this exact subject actually) very frustrating that there's barely a hint of growing out of it though—if it were some other flaw, maybe id be fine with it (I do love when characters get worse.), but given that it's a white writer writing internalized racism. well. but that's a subject that's been meta'd to death by better writers than I.

yeah, i love @anneapocalypse's sera meta, it was very compelling to think about!!! and idk! unfortunately, i DO know people irl who are like this (and don't seem to be getting any better about it). again, on its own, i think there's a lot of value to sera's story, even if it's not my story - the problem comes when we look at specific details in sera's writing and how her writing fits into the overall portrayal of elves - and dalish cultures, as well as city elves which as you've pointed out are almost entirely erased in dai which is truly horrific when you are directly dealing with the aftermath of the slaughter of thousands of elves in WEWH.

from that perspective, coupled with how minimal sera's growth is (especially if you're a lavellan that didn't romance her but had to deal with her internalised racism with no way to call it out as the PC without resorting to ableist insults) (and i use minimal here not to discount that her growth exists but how tiny it is compared to what we have to face in-game in terms of her internalised racism, and how most of her growth is shoved into codex entries or into trespasser and even then it's a couple of throwaway lines, at best)... it starts to feel a lot less like a well-intentioned portrayal of internalised racism, with some hits and misses, with the intention of resolution and self-love being the outcome.

and again, what IS IT with bioware and having their white characters dealing with fantasy racism??? like, i'm sorry, but sera is literally white. there's a black woman IN GAME and no one even ACKNOWLEDGES that racism/colourism towards her exists except for one tiny banter with cole for a SPLIT SECOND... and vivienne, a black woman growing up in a heavily andrastian-influenced circle of magi with chantry values... literally has no character arc... even though she's a black woman supporting incarceration of her own people... but the white elf's got an entire arc about internalised racism???????????????? what is the narrative reasoning behind this???

AND ANOTHER THING! the issues with sera are also an issue present with a lot of the other characters in dai - you discuss slavery once with dorian, where he gets defensive of it, and even as a lavellan romancing him, it never gets brought up again until bloody tevinter nights, which isn't even in-game material. you can't argue with cassandra to disseminate the cure for tranquility or get to change her mind on ANYTHING; you can't argue with cullen about mages; you can't argue with vivienne about the circles (not with actual logical arguments with any kind of nuance, which is a limitation OF THE GAME when they can give vivienne lines of nuance for her arguments for why the circle should exist); you can't argue with varric's centricism, etc, etc. even if you do get to confront them, it's one or two lines that are then mysteriously never touched on again in game. in da:o and da2, they didn't do this well either, but at least they had leliana come up to an elven warden after they correct her to apologise - there's clearly an acknowledgement of where she went wrong, and an intention to be better, etc, which is SUCH a fascinating writing direction. you don't have that in... any of the other games. none of the characters are allowed to be wrong, unless they're pushing for justice or equality or freedom in which case they will do something evil (like slavery or mass murder) to make you doubt the validity of their argument. instead they're representations of a specific stance and you're expected to just accept what they say as fact - which is incredibly ironic for a game that hides most of it's deep lore via conflicting codex entries for a sense of realism when it comes to reporting real life events.

it's incredibly exhausting.

#asks #bioware critical #sera critical #dai critical #dao critical #da2 critical #dorian critical #vivienne critical #cullen critical #cassandra critical #varric critical #fuckin hell we're going all out on this one. this is touching a LOT of different things and meandered off the main topic slightly but #[shakes bioware writing] HIRE MORE PEOPLE OF COLOUR. HIRE SENSITIVITY READERS. HIRE LITERALLY ANYONE OTHER THAN THE SAME 3 WHITE CENTRISTS.

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calebs-hangout-corner · 6 months

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Tell me about Horrortown

Goosebumps: Horrortown is an absolutely fantastic city builder game set in a Goosebumps universe. Curly the Skeleton guides you through the game as its narrator, or at least he tries, Slappy likes to butt in with his own commentary occasionally. They are besties (There is one event that has different narrators who are actually based on two pretty cool horrortown YouTubers). It has multiple stories you can play through with the many different characters that are in this universe and live in this town.

It's also really funny because at the start of the game everyone is still new to monsters and such and freak out when they have to deal with them but the more the story progresses the more they're just "hey how much do you wanna bet our new neighbor is a monster?" and "man, another monster attack? This is the third time this week!" and not to forget "what? ANOTHER meteor crashed in town? Are we a magnet for this stuff or something?" They just become desensitized to the whole monster situation it's great. Sometimes the og characters from the books are here and I always love how they are integrated: Sometimes they are just here and will go through their stories (like Carly Beth Caldwell of Haunted Mask fame), sometimes they already went through what happened in their books (like Lizzie Morris, who comes to Horrortown to warn everyone of the Horrorland theme park), sometimes they went through their book with a different outcome (such as Dana from Egg Monsters from Mars, who died in the Horrortown timeline instead of surviving and his skeleton is visible in the freezer he was trapped in in the book, or Nat and Pat, whose sister Ginger, the protagonist of Beast From The East, is suspiciously missing from their life), and sometimes they're just adults and somewhere else (see: Zeke Matthews, who studies at College in Woods Mill and comes to visit, or Lucy and Randy Dark, who study abroad and are frequently mentioned)

The characters and their interpersonal relationships really make this game, idk how they did it but I absolutely adore playing through the different storylines and getting to know the characters!!! I also love some of the implications of the game that they never outright confirm but it feels really nice when you end up connecting the dots.

Example: Mrs. Dark, Randy and Lucy's mother, moved to Horrortown and sent her children to study far away because their father, her husband, was most likely killed by a monster hunter.

Example No. 2: Brooke Buchenberg's father is implied to be a hermit wizard that lives in the snowy mountains and abondened her when she was too young to remember him and she has untapped magical abilities because of it.

Example No. 3: Pat is trans, as she is a girl in the game but was a boy in the books and Nat and Pat are identical twins.

Example No. 4: Emile from Phantom of the Auditorium is probably a ghost in this timeline.

The game also still updates with events from time to time and I just AAAAAAA I love this game so much. I have literally so many ideas for it because the world just lends itself to so many different stories you could tell.

#burtle screms #goosebumps horrortown

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archivalofsins · 7 months

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@seariii I want you to know this is the most wholesome thing I've read regarding someone liking Kotoko in a while.

Also, you were right, the points we're seeing being made are from different places. Most of the defenses for Amane's mother's actions I saw were on twitter directly after the release of Purge March. The misogyny point has come up on multiple platforms though. I do know that people can be very insistent/aggressive when it comes to Amane being Innocent, but I've only heard of that happening. I haven't seen it myself because I'm not in the tag often on here due to reasons.

Although I must admit some of the times that I personally have discussed Amane I've been pushy about it and discussed her case in a way that can come off as self-righteous while comparing it to other prisoners' cases. However, that was directly after seeing people defending her mother's behavior while voting her guilty. Something that is ultimately not a thing I feel should be supported.

Her mother was wrong and it's really unfair to me that the depiction of an abuser is being sympathized with and given more leniency than the person they are portrayed abusing. So, I ended up being more aggressive than I should have been at times as well.

It is stressful to hear things like Kotoko may be beaten up during the intermission. It's a very valid concern for people who care about her character to have but it's a worry that everyone in the fandom shares when it comes to the safety of the prisoners that they care about. Ultimately, we can't really control what the prisoners do after the trial which can be very anxiety inducing for everyone involved. Especially since no one wants any of the characters to be lost before trial three. It's really complicated.

I haven't seen much about Kotoko being attacked outside of the context of Shidou with his "extract that fang" line. Which to be fair given how some within the fandom have discussed Amane's during her second trial he'd probably cease to be a threat to Kotoko's safety if she were voted Innocent. So, in that since Kotoko enjoyers and Amane enjoyers should probably just form an alliance. Logistically it'd be a reasonable course of action even if a bit unfair.

It would also be a better outcome than what occurred with Haruka and Mu this trial. Plus, could have fun narrative implications if brought to the writer's attention I mean this was said in the trial two commencement notice after all-

As they literally made visual allusions to trading and bargaining. Literally this is what comes up when you search bargaining in google.

Milgram isn't really being subtle or slick about it. They're just waiting to see which prisoners' fans are most successful at it at this point. Milgram has sort of been tempting guards to make deals with each other since the start of trial two. Well at least to me that's what it seems like.

The prisoners have even formed some alliances of their own or attempted to do so since the beginning. Milgram has implied we have more of an impact than we know and that some prisoners will change their behavior if they know it will benefit them.

Like this answer of Kotoko's for example,

How would that impact prisoner relationships? The prisoners can hear us after all if they know that we're in support of certain relationships and not others. I wonder how that would go especially attached to positive reinforcement. It could be wild and interesting.

What's a bit of harmless discussion between guards after all? Things like this are much better than going back and forth for each other's throat's tit for tat. Outside of that bit of deluded talk- Because coordination like that in this sort of situation is a pipe dream at this point.

Please keep talking about Kotoko because it's literally restoring my faith in humanity it may be difficult to fully understand but- I thought I was losing it there for a minute.

#gunsli rambles

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neu-apostolisch · 4 months

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As for Gale Discourse Cont., I think it’s also necessary to point out that he’s written as a Comedic Relief character. He unironically says stuff like “pish posh” and is voiced by a well-known (in England) comedian. Unfortunately, because this is a DnD based game, every character you interact with the most needs to be complex and have a tragic backstory and I have a theory his romance arch is heavily derived from Mr. Darcy from the 2005 Pride and Prejudice movie. I mention all of this because I am absolutely a Galemancer, and I had a bit of a turmoil about the interview myself until some other tumblr user (I can’t remember who) made a post about this. Seeing Gale through the lens of “oh he’s a silly little guy made to be the butt of all jokes but surprise! he has so much depth anyway” helped me take a breather and have fun with it again. Sorry this got rambley.

ok if you're rambling then i must be reading the dictionary. i think this is a good point to make, especially as an addition to the concept of how the writers view gale. and crucially, i don't think it really undermines people who found more depth in his character. because on some level this is true for every character in this game-- they're all an awkward trope and they grow as the game continues forward and you learn more about them. i'm glad that this perspective helped you re-enjoy the game!

a view of him as The Comic Relief Guy (and Arrogant Wizard) aligns with how the writers are talking about him, and a lot of characters can be viewed chiefly as narrative tropes. so, if galemancers and gale fans can bear with me here, i'll poke at that idea for a bit and why i think it's a good point to make within this long winded thesis i've been developing for two days.

wyll is probably the most obvious to start with in this trope analysis. he is objectively in the party, the voice of reason and a Good Guy. he will unambiguously support whatever the most like, goodhearted, positive, hero-type outcome. so we can classify him that way. i mean, his background is folk hero. then, you travel more with him and his story winds off in its own direction.

astarion is that foil to lawful goodness, and is presented as such. however, astarion also serves an important role in that he introduces one of the first instances of a potential party conflict to you. managing and understanding his vampirism is important to his character and to your party cohesion, at least in a roleplay sense. astarion is also meant to be a character that can frustrate you. think about the people who take bloodless, which is a literal stat negative, for him to be happy. that's an interesting trade that the writers are having you make, and in order to cure bloodless you have to use a spell slot. mechanically, this is the role he serves in the party narrative, and it's up to you the player to decide what you want to do with that. and then his story goes off in its own direction.

i could go on and position other characters in this stripped down way, but it's probably unnecessary.

with these two examples in mind, looking at Gale through this lens, i think he has a bunch of really important functions in the narrative and in the party dynamics. and similar to wyll and astarion above, you can come to view him beyond his initial trope. the biggest hurdle to his development is that his story is fundamentally integrated with the plot of the game. so, on some level, the narrative is unable to develop further on him because he still has that role to play. he has to still be able to kill himself even when the player has convinced him that his life matters because he is stuck in that narrative structure forever. he IS supposed to be the annoying guy who takes your stuff and eats it. you're supposed to have those moments of "oh no, what are supposed to do about this" just like lae'zel in the creche or with kithrak voss, breaking wyll's pact with mizora, and astarion's deal with raphael to kill yurgir. sometimes your companions make you do things that are really annoying.

but-- and this is the key-- gale's story doesn't have as much freedom to move beyond that, which is a fair complaint, even if there's not actually that much to be done about it in the grand scheme of things. (and i think this applies to lae'zel too, i just don't want to get too off-topic. and unfortunately i am not as familiar with her story, which is orin's fault.)

hopefully this comes across as me using your ideas as a springboard for my own, and not me twisting your words or hijacking something you said. i think that's an interesting perspective and thanks for sharing your thoughts!

#gale dekarios #gale bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #asks #bg3 spoilers #baldur's gate 3 spoilers #larian critical #bg3 critical

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thefairfolk · 11 months

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not even bones sucked.

except adair, that design was genius.

meanwhile nita’s over here being a horrible protagonist and basically making it virtually impossible for people to rout for her with the way she acts. she can’t just blame EVERYTHING on fabricio ratting her out to the black market. she yells at him that “you did this to me!” or “you made me like this!” like. no.

girl, you may have went through trauma, but you were literally faced with the choice to not be a torturer and murderer. and then you blame ALL of it on someone who simply started a butterfly effect that got you to where you are now?

take some responsibility for your actions, dammit.

and the way she treated diana and adair was just horrible and undeserved. diana did NOTHING to deserve nita’s stupid cOmEbAcK about her not being able to finish off her family’s murderer. she was nice to nita and even tried to get adair to let them stay at first- until nita (wrongfully, may i add) dumped boiling water all over adair, melting his skin off to reveal his true form.

girl- what- 😃

he explicitly stated to NOT bring police to his shop. she went and made it happen anyway, and was surprised at the outcome of being sold out? and still has the audacity to “tAkE rEvEnGe” on him so badly?

my biggest issue is honestly her deal with fabricio. nita can’t take responsibility for ANY of her actions and becomes defensive when confronted with logic and rationality. i used to think hate is a strong word for a character, but i can’t like her one bit.

the worldbuilding is also generally weak. mf, it wouldn’t take a genius to find out that the dangerous unnaturals list exists to make profit out of it. if nita’s just realising this at 17 (and this isn’t common knowledge), no offence, your protagonist (and everyone else in this world) is a pure idiot.

kovit ... i have mixed feelings about kovit. he’s on thin fucking ice.

and, oh yeah, adair is undeveloped and mid, but he’s at least pretty (it’s the grecian nose + gay pose for me).

#webtoon #webtoon critical #not even bones #not even bones critical #nita sanchez #kovit #adair #it's 4am who am i ranting to

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mdhwrites · 1 year

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Continuing with your thoughts on Belos and the non-characters of the protagonists, as I was watching WaD I realized I was rooting for Belos rather than the main character and I wanted your thoughts on that.

Although Belos' character needs the improvements you mentioned, he at least still has agency, in that he is moving the plot along through action rather than reaction.

He has a definable goal (genociding all witches) backed by clear motivations (puritanical belief system; a witch caused him to accidentally kill his brother). He has a plan to accomplish this (rising to imperial power; creating grimwalkers to bring his brother back to life) and yet still experiences setbacks (day of unity foiled; grimwalkers always betray him). He is no less determined, and suffers for his beliefs (rotting body; traumatic hallucinations) while he aims to recoup his losses and finally accomplish his ultimate goal (first attempting to possess the Collector and failing, then attempting to possess the Titan and succeeding)

In short, Belos is a more compelling protagonist than Luz, who has things happen to her without her input (her palisman hatching, Amity telling her how to get out of the Collector's dreamworld, the Titan explaining how she can win still, etc). Also, as you said, by the end of S3 she is at her most unlikable, making us less sympathetic to her. She has no personal goals of her own that connect to her as a character beyond desperately wishing to be accepted by others, which makes her out to be more of a people-pleaser than anything (read: a flaw).

I love Luz, I really do. But she could have been more than what she became. She wasn't allowed to have an impact on the plot, and I regret that. Literally any other main character could take her place and the outcome of the finale wouldn't budge a nudge. It ended up making me root for the villain over the actual protagonist, and that seems like a pretty big problem for a show.

Okay, I try to mostly do my asks mostly in order so this has been long overdue. Let's fix that. *cracks neck* Though... Really for that big statement... This isn't one I have a great into. I've made it clear that while I dislike Luz, I actually find her easier to talk about than Belos. That I personally could never root for him because I find anything good about him to be posturing that the show not only doesn't back up but actively undermines. That a good performance and some good lines don't make up for the fact that nothing he does really has a proper impact on anything or anyone. Worse yet, I've already talked about how people really need to stop asking for 'proactive' protagonists because they're not really a thing and commonly DEEPLY detrimental to your story. So... What am I supposed to say here? Simple: Let's talk about payoff. Because at the point where you're rooting for the villain, it's because you know that they can provide a bigger, more shocking payoff than the characters and that what they have been doing, the enjoyment they have been providing, hasn't been working. Because, especially with a racist fuck like Belos, you aren't rooting for him to win. You're rooting for him to genuinely come one second from the brink of winning. This is where sheer entertainment is actually kind of a big deal. 'The Rule of Cool' exists for a reason. If it looks badass enough, has enough production value and has you screaming at the top of your lungs, SOMETHING is going right. In my opinion, this is actually why I like Michael Bae's first Turtles Movie (I saw it in the break room while working at Walmart) because yes, they destroy physics. They survive shit they shouldn't. It has some really dumb shit in it but it is ALL fun. It couldn't pump the breaks even if wanted to because they ripped them out five years ago because YOLO MOTHERFUCKERS! This is a level of entertainment that TOH understood in S1 and seemed to lose until the finale of S3. It's part of why the magic being so boring matters because I'd overlook plotholes more if the magic inciting the plotholes was more fun. It's actually maybe the ONE kindness I'll give Eslewhere Elsewhen because the time portals get some good gags when they're first introduced and I'm not going to deny that. But how about Looking Glass Ruins? It's actually a perfect showcase of when this principle works and when it doesn't. Gus' retcon on illusion is dog shit. It is one of the worst, blatant choices with the magic system. But MAN that ending sequence with Gus! Does it make sense? Not really with just how ludicrously, stupidly powerful it does paint Gus. Does it make you actively question why he spent all of S1 doing jack and shit? Yes. Is it one of the best sequences in The Owl House and genuinely lives up to how terrifying the reality of Illusion magic is? ABSOLUTELY. It's why while I hate the glyph stuff in that side of the episode, I can't hate his plotline entirely because it's just a great fantasy sequence with some good use of horror elements.

But uh... What about that Amity and Luz plot? It's an extremely basic forbidden section, it makes no sense once you find out the head librarian is a chill stoner dude and the payoff is just a cheek kiss for Luz who incited the problem in the first place. She gets it for getting Amity's job back in a high stakes, dangerous adventure... That's off screen. If you're a Lumity shipper, you eat well enough to make up for the fact that really all they do is stand around and talk with multiple backgrounds behind them the entire episode, not even entirely making sense during those moments (this is actually pretty much the ONLY episode where Amity acts dumb because of Luz. Amity doesn't make enough mistakes in the series to justify that line, potent as it is. This is also the only time she's faced actual consequences for her closeness to Luz.) Worse yet, you're robbed of the adventure and potential comedy that is theoretically the core of the show for the sake of cute, gay panic. And I like gay panic but I also kind of want to see this book dragon. One of those is creative while the fact that it's a book mouse instead of a book worm is all that's special about "This creature eats documents and then can broadcast them." And you know... That's an episode where all the payoffs still work. THE ENTIRETY OF S3 IS ABOUT PAYOFFS THAT DON'T WORK.

Luz's angst? I've talked at length about how dog shit her character finish is and that dominates SO MUCH TIME? And what do you get for it? Stringbean? A character people rightfully were pissed about being way too special and not making any sense? And still reflects poorly on Luz's character finish by being literally the opposite of what she's talking about? I did a whole blog on this too.

How about Hunter being a Grimmwalker? We get one conversation with Gus and I guess Hunter getting possessed and then getting magic, one moment that is laughably short frankly and does NOT fix the issues with Hunter's 'arc' and I still despise him getting magic through his best friend dying because it meant we'd NEVER get anything interesting out of him not having his own magic and that's without getting into anything about disability allegories. Oh, and yeah, HIS BEST FRIEND DIED AND WE JUST HAVE TO MOVE ON FOR TIME. Belos' backstory? Entirely wasted to the point where people's frustrations with it come up like once a week in my Discord because it seemed to so clearly be building up to something only for Belos to come right back around to being a dumb, boring, racist villain with nothing more interesting to him. How about villains before Belos? Well, the Collector is poorly written, makes no sense and is written like he's actually five instead of five thousand. Kikimora is the only other villain and she should have been gone so long ago and what does she lead to? Another mech fight? Who we don't even get to see beaten but instead the bully character who has been literally nothing but a joke for over a season assures as she finally got put in her place. This is writing that from a viewer standpoint is ETERNALLY infuriating. You're waiting for something to happen and the closest you get for two specials, effectively four-five episodes of the show, is Willow angst about her magic and feelings in a way that hasn't been true to her character in literally two seasons. If ever. For a character who is 90% plot device for other characters.

Honestly, at that point wanting them all dead and to see the villain win, just for the sheer shock and brutality of it all, seems kind of reasonable when you can't expect anything satisfying from the heroes. I'd argue, in my opinion, they even fucked up Belos' death for a really bad jab at fucking Steven Universe. HOW MANY SHOWS DO YOU THINK REDEEM THE FINAL BAD!? It's a lot less than you seem to think Owl House so why don't you shut up, especially after you REDEEMED THE COLLECTOR AND DID NOTHING WITH HIM! That's not even a joke. They come up with a contrivance so he can't do shit and then he fucks off. Why? Don't fucking know. Maybe the writers realized that a childish god is really hard to write around and should have given it more thought. Like... Anyone who just couldn't give a fuck by the time they're fighting Dragon Belos, especially once Luz is just given a super form so it's time for the victory lap after she didn't have to work that hard to beat the Collector (that's the impression I've been given since NO ONE talks about the Collector's redemption. Literally the only scene I've seen from that part of the episode is Luz playing with Amity's face.) so the stakes are rock bottom already. And boy, the jokes of the episode don't help with it. The fact that it's callback after callback is cute and good for a finale but how many of these jokes are robbing any momentum of the moment? Fucking everything to do with the Collector in the finale seems to be this way where it's like "Hahaha. Okay now let's actually back to the point." Even when he's trying to be serious like not understanding death, I'm sitting here going "Okay but you wanted to play with corpses and grind bones. You don't get to do this shit and not piss me off." So wanting to just make everyone shut up through Belos winning? I can get it. I definitely wouldn't but I didn't watch S3 for a reason because I recognized that with how everything was written up to it and ESPECIALLY after the first special, I wouldn't enjoy any of it. Not when its only payoffs are in fanservice and romance instead of its magic, adventure, comedy, narrative, characters... You know: Technically all the things it pitched in its beginning. It pitched by claiming to be a professional, animated, comedy adventure. So why not root for Belos? You'll get just as much rooting for him as any other part of the show. +++++++

I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead, If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

And finally a Twitter you can follow too!

#The Owl House Criticism #TOH Critical #emperor belos #toh season three

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