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ghostmartyr · 4 years

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SnK 132 Thoughts

This month, more people scream and die.

Exactly as keikaku.

Unlike certain keikakus, however, this keikaku is still missing the essential element of a keikaku in that there is no actual keikaku there’s just a lot of people running around screaming while they try not to die and then the screaming only stops when they die.

People also die when they are killed.

...Maybe.

Before we approach the obvious, the most interesting part of this chapter to me is that once again, Eren is presented with the option of stopping. While he’s in the planning stages of his assault, it is explained quite plainly that strategic strikes will completely undo any country’s attack on Paradis.

Hizuru favors a limited test run of the rumbling. Yelena provides a tactic that uses only a bit of the outer wall. She explains the reasoning. She isn’t wrong.

We’ve already had plentiful examples of what the Wall Titans can do. They can swim. They’re easy to spot from the distance, but there is no ammunition or strategy that can deal with them. Running is the best option, and even that is a risk.

Systematically destroying every single port would have bought Paradis all the time in the world. Yelena has this discussion with Eren back when she is wanting Eldians to die out, so they have different view of what counts as a win, but if Eren had wanted to, he could have easily wielded his massive power to keep every nation’s military from fucking with them.

He doesn’t do that. Instead of a small portion of the walls, he wakes up the entire part. Instead of targeted strikes, he goes for armageddon.

Eren has options. Hange can say that Eren has no solutions, hope, or future, but the lack of hope is all that comes close to the truth. There is a solution right here. Fight anyone who would oppose you, and win. Make it clear that the assaults only happen because they made the mistake of declaring war on Paradis.

Eldians might be treated like crap everywhere, but Eren’s murdered plenty of Eldians with this plan. If his only care is the island, he could have worked to protect it.

Instead, even in the most generous of reads, he's deconstructed Paradis’ government in a time of incredible strife, sowing the seeds for an ugly civil war that has already had its beginning skirmishes.

Eren’s actions are destructive in every single category. When he first activates the walls, Armin still has that flash of hope that Eren is only using the amount of force he needs to put an end to this assault.

He doesn’t. He wakes up every single titan, sends them marching, killing people on this island he’s supposed to care for so much, and now his closest friends are stuck in a world where to prevent genocide, they are probably condemning their own people to an even worse future than they already had.

The thing about this level of power is that you can do what you want. No one can stop you. If this starts with people forcing Historia into a breeding farm, Eren can just murder anyone who’s in favor of that.

(Sidebar: I still am annoyed that no one came up with the obvious solution for that problem. If they need someone with royal blood to still be around in fifty years, just turn Historia into a mindless titan and ditch her underground with specific instructions each new Founder can follow. Titans are functionally immortal when left alone. They’re much less fragile than humans. Any dedicated person could easily kill off all the royal heirs, so might as well simplify the process, keep one royal heir around and relatively invulnerable. Then each Founder has easy access to their power if they just go to the right place. Obviously there are risks, but honestly it’s more straightforward than having a bunch of free-minded little kids be your backup plan.)

Eren can destroy an entire country before even the most knowledgeable titan experts can work out a reliable plan.

Paradis was never in danger. They had this. The rest of the world had a hundred years to forget, but a handful of public demonstrations illustrates the point very, very clearly. Yelena’s strategy was meant to serve Zeke’s plan, but if what Eren wants is Paradis to thrive, it works. He doesn’t have much time left, but he doesn’t need it to destroy other countries’ options of attacking Paradis.

Hizuru is interested in allying with Paradis because of this power. They’re the first. They would not be the last.

At the very least, this would give Paradis more time, which they’ve all seen the need for.

Instead, Eren chooses to destroy everything that might even consider being a threat to Paradis. There is no diplomacy. There is no measured use of force. There is no plan. There is the monsters he’s always hated, and falling so far into the darkness that the freedom he claims to want is destroyed by his own hands.

There were countless threads Eren could have followed, being a demigod. He very honestly could have done whatever he wanted.

So he did.

I feel like we’re still missing why. By the time his head has gotten blasted off, he’s encouraging his dad to murder the Reiss family, and he’s hallucinating himself as a child, I think it’s more than fair to say this war has won against Eren. He’s broken, and this is the path he’s on.

Maybe it’s as simple as thinking in such stark black and white terms that he needs a future with a guarantee, and death is the strongest guarantee he can come up with.

Except going back to just last chapter, this is not what Eren wants. It is not something he is approaching with the passionate conviction of being in the right. He’s in tears over it. He’s horrified by the future he causes, but chained to it because he knows he causes it.

It’s a difficult problem to explain. From a plot perspective, I’m frustrated because there are so many ways this didn’t have to happen. I’ve said before that tragedy should feel inevitable, and with each reveal of what Eren got up to in the shadows, this tragedy feels entirely avoidable.

However, from a character perspective, it does make sense that once Eren’s course of action has been decided, he doesn’t see the other options. The inevitability is a trick of his mind, but it’s a trick that he’s bought into completely, so the tragedy is found in how truly unnecessary this all is. The tragedy is that the most powerful person on the planet is a slave to his own mind.

Here’s where that stops working for me:

We see that character arc play out better elsewhere.

That’s Floch’s role.

Floch is an unlikable, divisive zealot who will happily kill civilians and throw children out of airships. He joins the Survey Corps when it’s the hip and happening thing to do, and has none of the conviction to back up their ideals.

He is the sole survivor of a suicide charge. Everyone around him dies in the space of a few minutes, and he’s left alone to make sense of it.

The only sense he finds is that this has to be necessary.

This is how they win.

The world is chaotic and vicious, and the only way to answer that evil is with evil. This world that hates them is not allowed to wipe them out, and anyone who tries will feel their wrath.

Floch doesn’t bother with mercy or kindness. He doesn’t mind that the rest of the world has to die for them to live.

This is how his world operates. Kill or be killed. Those are clearly the rules. Those have been the rules for a hundred years, more clear than ever when they step outside and are eaten on contact.

If the rest of the world lives, Paradis dies.

Paradis is home.

For as long as it’s existed, it’s been hated. Never mind that the current people living there are also victims of the Eldian Empire. They’ve lived in a bubble, and forces keep showing up to pop that bubble, leaving nothing but bodies in their wake.

It is cruel and appalling.

But Paradis is still alive.

Because Erwin murders all these new recruits, Paradis lives.

Floch is the only one left alive to know that so intimately.

It is not a kind assessment.

It is one he redefines his life by.

Answer devils with devils. Their enemy is the entire world. There can be no rest. There can be no sympathy. As long as the outside world exists, Paradis will be a target for its hatred, and that hatred will eventually succeed in killing them.

Floch believes this. Genocide is not something he has a problem with. He’s been living in a world where it’s Us or Them, and has repeatedly made it clear that he will choose Us.

Floch is a teenage boy who survives brutality he’s not prepared for, and reconstructs his entire worldview around the tactic that tries to kill him. He’s a dick, and he does terrible things.

He believes in what he is doing.

He believes that if he doesn’t stop the plane, Paradis will die. He believes that our little ragtag group of heroes are the final, greatest threat to his home. He believes that Eren’s evil is the only thing that will keep them all safe.

At the end of the day, his only hope is that the Devil is on their side.

Floch dies believing in that hope, and he dies to the people hellbent on destroying it.

It’s tragic and sad, because he could never see anything better.

Our first real introduction to him is him on a rooftop, arguing that a boy whose eyes sparkle at thoughts of the ocean is not a good contribution to the war effort.

On that same rooftop, his devil argues that that is exactly why that boy needs to stay alive.

I understand that Eren’s somewhere that we can’t really reach right now, but I don’t feel like the story has shared the thread of how things got this bad. I can point to a dozen different factors that finally broke the camel’s back, but I wouldn’t say any of those are the reasons canon is operating under. We know that Eren came completely undone when the memories of the future were unlocked, but as late in the game as Marley, he’s still devastated by what he’s about to do.

So why does he do it? Why this choice? Why this way?

I think I spent most of last month’s post arguing that, so I won’t belabor it much more, but... I really feel like something’s being overlooked, and I don’t understand it. It’s hard to say if the story simply has a much different vibe than I expected, so my mind is rejecting all this, or if it’s intentionally weird. I’d like to think it’s intentionally weird, because in my opinion that’s a much better story, but either way, right now everything Eren’s doing feels like an incredibly pointless detour.

...Sure, that will end the world, but who cares about that, give me my character work.

How did hope become an impossibility for Eren?

To less painful things, I suppose.

No one suffers like Mikasa suffers.

I like Annie. She has always, very emphatically, wanted nothing to do with this. She has pride in her skills, but she spends years of her life undercover for a government that hates her, planning the deaths of people she respects. I like her opting out. This has never been her war, really, and she’s finally among people who will respect that she’s done with it.

It adds to the sweetness that Reiner is one of those people, now. As her self-appointed leader, he drives Annie into things she can’t stand, clearly favors Bertolt, and is generally just a pain who’s trying too hard in all the wrong areas.

Reiner gets that, and instead of bullying her into participating when she doesn’t want to, he lets her go.

Annie finally gets to pick her battles without anyone negging her.

It’s not a resolution I expected, but it’s one I’m glad for. It follows the trend of our leftover cast being completely past done with violence.

Who knows if that will turn out well for them, but I like the story taking the gentler approach. The world’s ending, so they might as well take the time to be kind to each other. It’s the opposite path of what ultimately destroys Floch, and I love to see it.

The Survey Corps is represented by their yearning for knowledge. Understanding. For a hundred years, that yearning has been paired with war, and the dead bodies have piled up.

Now, the remaining bodies left who call themselves Scouts are kind of. done with that. They’ve seen too many friends die. They’ve built trains. They’ve seen the ocean. They’ve tried foods from other countries they didn’t even know existed.

Surveying the outside world required weapons because otherwise you’d die, but there’s a reason why Levi keeps on missing the promotion to Commander. Levi is a defender of humanity. When he dedicates his heart, he does it to protect people. Learning more about the world is a side effect.

To match the Survey Corps’ ideals, violence is the side effect. It’s not what they’re meant to be about. Yet somehow they’re all soldiers with huge body counts, guilty even of killing their countrymen.

Levi lets Erwin go on that roof because he rejects Floch’s desire to condemn one of them to being a devil for the rest.

That results in letting a boy who dreams of the ocean live.

Hange becomes the Commander and gets to see their world expand. New friends are made, new technologies discovered. New civilization. New, new, new.

Aaaaaaand it’s still all trying to kill them.

Hange begins as a recruit who hates titans. What saves Hange from that hate is curiosity. At the end, that curiosity and awe is still alive. Even heading into death, we return to that beginning spark of salvation.

“Titans really are... incredible.”

No one else in the world looks at these monsters and sees something amazing. Hange is enamored with them. The world is burning, these things are responsible, yet still. There is wonder to be had in looking at them. They are an incredible, impossible creation, and Hange gets to see them up close.

A world like that has to be called incredible.

That’s why Armin gets to be Commander. Jean’s there to help. Mikasa’s there to help. Connie’s there to help.

But the Survey Corps exists to go out into the world and understand it. If something is hidden under a rock, you lift the rock. If you don’t know why someone’s doing something, you talk to them.

The world is fucking beautiful.

If the person in charge doesn’t remember that, they’re all doomed.

(This is why Levi is not allowed to be in charge.)

It’s a good sendoff for Hange. Time spent with Levi, getting to be a chaotically cool genius who saves everyone... yeah. It’s a good finish.

But this better not be fucking going where I think it’s going.

Let me politely frame my issues with dream sequences and time travel in fiction. I feel that I have done it before, but let us revisit, briefly.

There’s this show called Supernatural.

A thing that happens enough time to warrant its use as an example is that characters see or go into the future, and find that everything is fucked beyond belief. It is all bad, everything is wrong, see how you must avoid this so it never gets this bad.

The frustrating part is that hey, these characters in the future should have the same degree of agency as this guest from the past. Except they don’t. Because the past character is the main character. Future crew is just an extended what-if, and soon the entire plot will be devoted to making sure this what-if never happens. They are not real main characters, so they don’t get to do cool stuff. They’re forever doomed to failure.

The ghosts of the Survey Corps watching the progress of their living comrades isn’t a new concept. Every veteran has been haunted by them. Seeing them at the end of the story, doing exactly what we’ve been told they’re doing... fine, okay.

I just am starting to feel like the story’s quaking for a reset button.

Everything is bad. The world is fucked up beyond repair. There is no plan to deal with it, except to try to keep the global genocide from living its dream. In a world where they succeed in that, Eldians will be more hated and feared than ever before, Paradis being wiped off the map will probably be an international priority, there will be no Founding Titan to protect them, and there’s no path to recovery.

Then we’ve got a shot of ghosts all looking over the current happenings.

We know from Paths magic that all of Ymir’s people are connected. This doesn’t use that imagery; it’s based much more simply in the oath all these soldiers swore. But the point is, we see dead people. At a point in the story where many, many dead people are being produced.

I don’t mind a character being welcomed to an afterlife. A lot of stories go there.

But I am a suspicious, terrible person, and getting a glimpse at sentient dead people at this time makes me wonder if we’re allowed the privilege because they’re going to be newly present in the story.

And I am fine if we go the way of a Madoka ending. It’s better than a Lelouch option, and I like Madoka.

The only thing is, if we are going to hit a reset button, I become very, very cross at some of the choices made. Because sure, the characters might have still made those decisions, but the author knows that things are free to go as badly as whimsy will take them, because it won’t last. And with how my primary objection to the current plot is that it feels unnecessary, and like the choice to go here was made without enough reason to back it up...

It hasn’t happened yet, there’s nothing more than a suspicion that it might happen, but there are some specific kernels of “this needs more canon explanation” that I think the story should have, and if we’re stepping into the afterlife, magic solutions don’t seem far off, and if we get a magical solution without first establishing the non-magical ways we first ended up here, I will have a problem.

But hopefully none of that will even be an issue, and I’ll look back and feel silly for bringing it up.

...It’s just that our main character is not only threatening, but committing global genocide, and as of right now, the win condition is a moral win where everyone lives to oppress Eldians another day.

-tosses charred confetti-

And I feel like that is an incredibly pointless and boring story, so maybe it is not the story we’re being told, so.

So.

To next month.

#Shingeki no Kyojin #SnK 132 #tl;dr #chapter post

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lixuagi · 4 years

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The Cure for Death - chapter 3

MC makes a fool of herself. Again.

For a few seconds, time seems to have stopped. Nobody knows what to do. -..-Specifically you, 069. Throw the kid in the well. He doesn’t deserve more than the others.- the panic pervades the little boy again and, this time, Julian too. -I can’t do that, sir– -DO IT! Or you’re going to have to sacrifice yourself.- all of this is happening because of me. It’s all my fault. –Come on, No.069. Or maybe you don’t want to change the opinion that the “saviour” of Vesuvia has of you? Don’t think that I didn’t notice your intentions. Romantic instinct manifests itself so quickly in you beasts… it’s repulsive.- Valdemar’s grin is so wide that it almost reaches their cheekbones. -So? Nothing, no reaction? All right. Those who are silent agree, after all. You’re both going to be killed. I’m not afraid to get my hands dirty, as opposed to you cowards.- I’m paralyzed as I watch the Questor grab the little boy by the arm. I thought it was all a farce of theirs. They didn’t look so cruel when they made me wear my uniform. Now I wish I never put it on. My goal is to save people, and not just regarding medical matters. I have to do something. I move towards them before Julian can put his life at even greater risk. -No! Leave the boy alone, please! Let him go back to his family!- I throw myself at their feet, clutching a flap of their coat tightly. -Oh? And why should I do that?- they stop their pace, while the little one kicks and squirms, but this does not seem to loosen their grip at all. –It’s my fault, not theirs! I’m the one who needs to pay. Please.- the last words are a whisper choked with despair. Julian quickly approaches, ready to stop me: -MC, no!– -Wait, 069. She could offer me an interesting exchange.- interrupts the Quaestor. -Go on.- -You can do what you want of me. You can fire me, or… or kill me, if that’s what’s needed to save that child and Julian. Take my life, too. I could never forgive myself for being the cause of the death of an innocent.- not again… -… Very well.- they open their hand, releasing the hostage. What?! No! You are crossing the line!- Julian’s cries are totally ignored. Valdemar’s focus is solely on my person, as they ponder how I should pay. –Everybody, get back to your work. Immediately.- this order, after a few seconds of shock, is executed promptly. –No. 069, bring our dear patient to the exit.- -But what will you do with MC?- -Oh, you’re really interested in her. This interest is going to be the next thing I’m going to destroy if you keep showing it like that. Now go, and don’t irritate me any further.- Julian is tempted to, but eventually he obeys, coming to the conclusion that it is better for everyone’s safety. I remain on my knees, covered by the long shadow of my superior. After a few seconds in which they relish my total resignation, they decide that they’re is full of it. -Get up. I’m not going to hurt you. I need you whole and alive.- I put my hands on the ground, giving me a weak push to get back on my feet. –What are you going to do to me?- -On your rest hours you will allow me to study you.- it seems a fairly innocuous request compared to their previous threats. I nod, without even trying to explain to them that magic is a phenomenon that cannot be studied scientifically. Depriving them of this option could lead to more stringent measures. –Now go to your office. Judging by the state you were in after treating another infected patient, you should be close to fainting by now. And that’s not convenient.- they stretch a hand towards me and I instinctively back off. They look at me like I’ve done something incomprehensible and they let a key dangle from their fingers. I relax my shoulders and take it, being careful to avoid any other contact. We both have gloves, but they don’t help me feel safer from them. I quickly walk through the clinic, and slip into the room marked with my number, under dozens of astonished glances that I have carefully avoided. I close the door behind me and slump onto it, finally letting free the tears I held before. With one hand I rummage in my bag until I come into contact with the smooth surface of the amulet, which I promptly clench to my chest. I almost feel like I’m hearing Asra’s voice. “MC, inhale and exhale. Inhaaale. And exhale. That’s it, just like that.” But when I look around, there’s no one there. It’s just memories. Instead of my best friend, there’s a bare cot. I’m struggling, overwhelmed by exhaustion. The absence of windows makes me lose the perception of time, and soon my vision darkens completely as I sink into sleep.

My dreams are confused, a mixture of blurred images and mingled voices. Slowly, I focus. I’m at an elegant dance, in a salon lit by crystal chandeliers and decorated with golden festoons. The music is distorted, slowed down, but around me the participants in their glitzy outfits don’t seem to notice. I, too, dance with them, dragged by an invisible force. Suddenly everything stops. The flames of the candles perish, and only the costumes and masks remain, slumped to the ground. The cold penetrates my bones. Something else pushes me. My eyes meet the empty ones of an animal skull, partly covered by a funeral ashy veil. The figure terrifies me more than it should as I start to shout, but from my lips no sound comes out. I can’t control my body or my will, as the gloomy mask gets smaller and smaller. It’s not it who’s walking away, it’s me, I notice as my back slams into a marble pillar. I can’t get away from it, I’m forced to stick to it, held still by invisible arms. I was sure that I was wearing a dress, but I feel a tickle on the nude of my ankles. Forcing me to lower my head is almost impossible, but I manage to succeed. A beetle is climbing my calf. It’s ruby-colored, it shines with it, as if it were filled with blood. It stops its march on my thigh, then sinks its little tusks in it. I let out a cry of pain, it hurts much more than I expected, the bite burns a lot and I feel the poison that the creature injected me propagate all over my leg. There comes another sting, this time on my hand. The exoskeletons that climb on my skin instantly become a myriad, and each of them wants its portion. A particularly painful wound tarnishes my view of vermillion.

I wake up and immediately snap to my seat, sweating and panting. I put my hands all over my body in search of any insect, the nightmare seemed so real that I could swear it really was. Fortunately, there is no trace of the creatures. I look for a clock, I could have either slept ten minutes or ten hours, but as I peer every corner of my dark room I notice a figure sitting at the foot of my bed. -Ah!- I jolt backwards, slamming my back against the wall. -Don’t worry No. 100, it’s me.- the more I blink, the more I focus on the Quaestor. Even if I was blind, the slightly hoarse and gloomy voice is impossible not to recognize. -For all the Arcana, Valdemar!- I hug my knees to my chest, like I was trying to cover myself. Then I remember I never undressed and I try to assume a vaguely relaxed pose. -Why, yes, it’s me. I heard a noise from your room and suspecting that you and No. 069 had decided to secretly meet, I decided to come in.- I blush. Then why are they sitting on my bed? -Then I felt something was disturbing your sleep and I decided to try and watch you. It might be a feature that peoplewith your power share.- I’m shocked, I hope that they didn’t really read my mind to answer me. In doubt, I shout “I find you very sexy, Quaestor!” in my head, in an attempt to cause some kind of reaction. But that doesn’t happen and I feel incredibly stupid. I notice that they have a notebook in their hands where they have already taken, like any good doctor, unreadable notes. -Speaking of Julian, I mean… 069. It’s not what you think…- I mumble, while my cheeks are already starting to redden. Valdemar tilts their head in their strange mechanical manner, puzzled. Hmm? Could you explain yourself better, young nurse?- -I mean…- I keep my eyes down, torturing my fingers. I don’t care about him that way. We just met. I just liked talking to someone. I find it… reassuring.- Maybe opening me up a little bit more might soften them. And most of all, I don’t want Julian to be penalized because of me again. -Oh, you young people and your strange rituals. If that’s the case, are you implying that you don’t find me reassuring?- their thin lips stretch into a smile that’s not friendly at all. I know the game they’re playing. Come on, MC, try to find something… nice in them. I scrutinize them carefully, unconsciously approaching my face to theirs, an action to which they do not react. As green as they are, they have a smooth skin. And their face is perfectly symmetrical. No, no. That’s not reassuring. Red irises, sharp teeth. Damn, everything about them screams “danger”! However, their face is so different from the norm that it is harmonious. If I were a demon, and I had a specific standard of beauty, I think the Quaestor would reflect it. -So?- they insist, by now my answer is making too much of a wait. Quick, say something that might be a good enough answer! I think my brain short-circuited, because the first thing I spit is, -It’s not like that, you’re very pretty.- and with that, I dug my own pit. As soon as I realize what I said, I cover my face with my hands, stammering apologies to profusion: -Sorry, I did not mean to…! I mean… I… ah! – they grab my wrists, carrying my arms on my lap. -This reaction is nothing short of interesting, let me observe it.- and this said, they proceed to embarrass me even more by approaching dangerously. The bastard is perfectly aware of their actions. -I’ve seen a lot of people in my life. Yet… farce or not, you retain a strange purity. Like a body immersed in formaldehyde, the years pass but…- they squint, occasionally batting the long eyelashes. -I have to admit, it’s a strange compliment…- I mutter turning my face, unable to sustain that penetrating gaze. When they decide they have put me in awe enough, they reassemble themselves, straightening their back and carrying their hands behind them. -Do you often speak in your sleep?- they ask, their head perpetually tilted. -No, as far as I know.- even if morally the Quaestor and I are polarly opposed, I trust their medical knowledge. Maybe one day they could, with some strange serum, make my energy infinite or share my power with others. It wouldn’t hurt to have someone with my same abilities next to me. Thinking about it, that question evokes something, it is undoubtedly a déjà-vu. Yes, I remember now. Shortly after the “accident” nightmares tormented me incessantly, sometimes even as a wake-up call. I was screaming in the middle of the night. I was repeating “sorry, I’m sorry” looped. Asra was always very scared and worried too much. I rub my forearm, I don’t have anyone here to take such care of me. Not that I need it, but I find certain attentions essential. A human cannot live without love. Maybe Valdemar isn’t human, that would explain their bizarre appearance and macabre behavior. -Now that I think about it, it happens to me in times of great stress.- -I wouldn’t have done that,- the doctor tells me, voice as flat as a summer lake. -What?- -I would never have been so reckless as to kill a healthy person and an employee of mine who is just as much healthy. That would have been just another futile and instinctive action.- astonished, I elaborate their words. That’s a nice reassurance. They may be sadistic, but they certainly wouldn’t do something counterproductive. -At most I would have dissected the child later to see what mutations your magic had caused to his organs.- I burst into laughter, taking it as a joke. -What’s wrong with you?- oh yes, stress is making me laugh more than I should. When I can calm down, my eyes are shiny. -You know, you have a special sense of humor, but I think the more I’m going to stay here, the more I’m going to understand it!- I smile, relieved. They would like to tell me that they were not joking at all, but for some reason, maybe even unknown to them, they do not. -Your emotions vary very quickly.- and with this they pin something on the notebook. I let the smile hover over my lips for a while longer. –No.100, I’d like you to answer a few questions now.- I barely stiffen up, immediately going back to feeling only a figure in a sea of death. An experiment, a freak show. I can’t ask them to call me by name, how could I phrase that? It wouldn’t be professional. -I noticed that your stress level increases very easily. It’s no good. For accurate answers we will simulate a relaxing situation. For example, I’ll call you by name.- what? No, that’s not possible. “Doctor, I find you very, very sexy, please examine me from head to toe.” No reaction. Either we’re extremely in tune and I’m not realizing it, or they’re very good at hiding the fact that they are a mind-reader. Yet my attempts to frame them have no effect! Let’s try something else… “Say that I can stop calling you Quaestor and that… I can call you Val.” The doctor’s face rises from the notebook to address me directly. -It should be optimal, like this. Maybe omit formal terms like “Quaestor”, but never do that in a work environment. Only during the study.- they didn’t say anything like, “Oh, call me Val,” though, so I’m probably making it up, I have to be. -All right, doctor.- -Hm… still too rigid. Just Valdemar. I repeat, it’s just a simulation—and with that I’m standing up. I’ve had enough, this is the ultimate proof! -Oh, my God! You, I mean, you’ve heard everything!- -Are you delirious, MC?- -You heard that I think you’re… – I shut up, the confusion on the doctor’s face would be hilarious in another context. -I don’t understand.- -Stop pretending, damn it! I’ve been thinking about things and you’ve said them out loud!- -I call those coincidences.- they scrutinize me like I’m a psychopath. -It’s happened too many times for them to be coincidences!- -Either you’re predictable or maybe, and it’s just a theory, I’ve spent so much time studying behavior that even the desires and thoughts of others are not a mystery to me?- -… oh.- I slowly sit down. I still can’t believe it. I managed to make a fool of myself again. Who knows what opinion they have of me, after all my anomalous attitudes today. -Pure curiosity, what have you thought of me before, MC?- I do not know if it makes me blush more the question itself or hear my name uttered so melodically by such a contradictory and authoritarian figure. -Oh, I. Nothing… I really like your headgear.- -Excessive compliments are indicative of lying, and you’re a bad liar.- they aren’t wrong. I hope they don’t press more on the subject. -… going forward with the analysis. Have you ever suffered from particular pathologies…- I squint, focusing on him. I only have to try one last time. Think of something that would upset anyone, that would generate an emotion in any mind-reader, think, think…

“BOO!” … no reaction. On one hand I am relieved, on the other I am now sure that I’m a very stupid person.

#quaestor valdemar #valdemar #the arcana #the arcana valdemar #the arcana mc #valdemar x mc #valdemar x reader #valdemar x apprentice #the arcana fanfic #The Cure for Death

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inkstaineddove · 4 years

Text

Renewal

Characters: Prussia, Austria; mentioned Germany and Russia

Summary: After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Roderich invited Gilbert to Vienna in an attempt to clear the other man's mind and provide him with an opportunity to get outside. They catch up, knocking the rust off their strange relationship after not seeing each other for years.

Vienna, 1989.

Gilbert looked around, shifting in his seat nervously and absentmindedly folding and re-folding the sleeves on his shirt. How he loathed Vienna, loathed it and this ridiculous castle. Roderich’s tastes had always been too luxurious for his liking, the home decorated to be an ostentatious display of wealth and filled with antique furniture. It made him so uncomfortable, afraid that he might sneeze and be forced into debt to repay the cost of whatever he ruined.

His host returned, placing two wine glasses down before them. "Why so anxious?" Roderich didn't have to be focused on Gilbert to feel the wave of unease rolling of him. It also didn't help that he could hear the incessant tapping of Gilbert's foot, a nervous habit he'd had for years. "I would've expected you to be relieved to be out of your own country. Are we no longer good enough for you here?" His voice lilted up at the end of the sentence, gently teasing his guest.

"I hate this city. The people here have always been so snobbish. Your home looks like a poor man's idea of a rich man. It always has, it's excessive." Prussia waved a hand in a noncommittal way. "It's....everything's a lot."

As he took a long sip of his wine, Austria sighed. "Are you done?" The Prussian nodded. "I figured it would be nice for you to travel again, now that you could. I didn't think me rushing to Berlin would do you any good. You need to see what you missed of the world." It was his roundabout way of saying it meant a lot that Gilbert would visit him first.

"It's strange though. When you're in a cage for so long, you get used to it. In a certain way it even becomes comforting. The isolation almost becomes welcome or that you feel you deserved it." Prussia's eyes were burning with an indescribable emotion when they locked with Austria's. There was a flesh of desperation in them, gone as quickly as it appeared. "I can't help feeling that, in some way, I deserved it for everything. Monsters belong to be imprisoned."

That broke something in Roderich. He felt his heart throb with sympathy. He forced himself to keep the eye contact, despite wanting to look away in fear of giving away too much. "You're not a monster. And if you are, then so am I." He smiled faintly, trying to make them both feel better in vain. "All you've ever been is a bit boorish, but that's not a criminal offense."

They drank in silence. Both had been more vulnerable with the other than they'd wished. It was still too new, viewing each other as confidants and uneasy friends instead of the enemy. It felt even worse to consider them on opposing sides now, not after they'd shared so much and fought against much worse. How could they think of each other as evil when they finally knew what true evil was? It would feel like a dismissal of everything. No, they'd have to learn to get used to rhythms of this new stage in their relationship and whatever it would bring.

Roderich passively observed Gilbert. He'd never seen the man so unsure of himself. Normally Gilbert's ego suffocated the whole room. He moved in a way that commanded attention, that challenged the world to consent to his will or face the consequences of disobedience. This was not the same man. His emotions were impossible to decipher, walled off in a place deep within. His eyes kept darting around as if he was searching for the nearest escape.

Gilbert reached for his glass of wine. Roderich snatched his wrist midair. "My God, Gilbert. What happened?" Scars crisscrossed Gilbert's skin. Most appeared to finally be disappearing for good, but many remained.

"Relax, I didn't cause them." Gilbert jerked his hand away, hiding it beneath the table. "It's nothing for you to be concerned about. It's better I took a few more beatings than the others." He gave a toothy smile, trying to bring some normalcy to everything. "You're the one who said it's always what I've been good for."

A dark emotion passed across Roderich's face. A sickly feeling crept into his stomach. "I may have said so, but I never acted on it in such a way." It wasn't unusual for him to be so furious in Gilbert's presence, but it was for it to be on Gilbert's behalf. "What a barbarian. Where's the humanity? To act with such cruel disregard for other's and their sufferings? What a big man, I'm trembling." He scoffed. "To think he was the boogeyman we were all so terrified of for all these years. To be so fearful of a coward is dishonorable."

Such strong sentiments were shocking. For once in his life, Gilbert didn't know quite what to say. Unworthiness overwhelmed him. He bowed his head, staring at his hands as they played with the lace ends of the tablecloth. "You don't have to pretend to care so much. I appreciate the invitation enough as it is. Save me your mock outrage."

"You think I'm pretending?"

"Did I stutter?" It was the most Gilbert-esque thing he'd said all day. In any other conversation, it would've been a revelation.

Roderich rubbed the bridge of his nose, exhaling loudly. How to get it through such a thick skull? "I understand that our relationship hasn't always been on the best of terms, to put it incredibly mildly. But you have to be a bigger idiot than I ever thought possible to not realize my feelings on you have changed." He chuckled, shaking his head. "Really, Gilbert, actually think about this. After my divorce, against every possible logical expectation, you were the only one to check on me. Not only once, you made a point of visiting every month to harass me and give me some semblance of normalcy. And you never mentioned whatever it was you were doing with Erzsébet! It was the most oddly comforting thing and, to my horror, I began looking forward to seeing you." He rolled his eyes. "Let's not even mention the last war. We were thick as thieves then, running off and getting into whatever mischief was necessary."

"You only worked with me then because you had to." Gilbert remained glum, but didn’t dare to look at Roderich squarely to prevent being proved wrong.

"Oh, please. Bavaria and Saxony shot down our offer, I could've done the same to you had I wanted to. But I didn't because I trusted your judgement and wanted in on your little scheme. And I don't regret that to this day, regardless of whatever the personal costs may have been." Roderich smiled and it reached his eyes. "Whenever I had the misfortune of meeting Iv-Russia," he stopped himself, refusing to use Russia's personal name out of principle. "I would hound him by constantly asking after you. How you're doing, were you holding up well, urging him to pass on messages to you from Ludwig and me. I would do the same on Erzsébet's behalf, but you were the focus. I had visions of you trying to be her savior and winding up in an even worse position."

Gilbert bit his lip, wearing an incredibly guilty look. "How did you guess?"

“Because I know you! Every time we'd sign a new treaty or agreement, you'd be begging me to make her life better. It got to the point where I was telling my advisors to throw in an expansion of Hungarian rights before we even began negotiations.” Roderich rolled his eyes. “You expect me to believe that behavior would've ceased, especially under rulers with a much crueler bent? Though I appreciate that it must surely make my monarchs look so kindly and benevolent.”

There was no point in even touching that last part. Especially when Austria would have ample examples of Hohenzollern excesses to throw in Prussia's face. Instead, he focused on how touched he felt over everything. Things really had changed for them, the tables had turned so completely. A warmth spread throughout Gilbert's chest. “I had no idea you asked about me.”

“I suspected you didn't. I have no idea why Russia would be so reluctant to pass on anything to you two. We weren't trying to spread Western propaganda, or whatever he would be concerned for. The only goal was to let you both know your family still loved and missed you gravely.”

“He wanted us to be one big, happy family. To do that, for some fucked up reason, he felt like he had to constantly tell us that no one on the outside cared in order to break us down. It really got to those who only had friends on the inside regardless of whatever Erzsi or I said to them.” Gilbert shrugged, nonchalantly. Out of everything that happened behind the wall, this facet concerned him least. Its effects on him had been minimal. He couldn't believe Ludwig, no matter the bad terms they parted on, would disown Gilbert and leave him to the wolves. The kid had always been loyal to a fault. “Wait, you missed me? And consider me family?”

The vein in Roderich's forehead began throbbing. “Why is this so difficult for you to understand?’ Grumbling, he hurried off and returned with a pen and piece of paper. “I'm going to make this very simple and I'm going to speak slowly so you understand. Look me in the eyes, if you misunderstand a word of this, I'm going to hit you." Once they made eye contact, Roderich continued. “Our relationship has changed, meaning things are different now. I regard you, Gilbert, as not only one of my closest friends, but as family. And not merely the most distant of cousins either, close family, the type of family you wish to spend time around and worry for when appropriate.” He quickly wrote something on the paper before sliding it over the table. "Here. Try carrying this around with you in case you forget again."

Gilbert picked it up. It read ‚Roderich und ich sind Familie.’ He folded it and tucked it into his wallet, unable to stop himself from smiling. Perhaps his existence wasn’t so pointless, perhaps there was some meaning to be gleaned from his life. "You're actually a good guy. A really good guy. I wish I'd realized it sooner." His heart felt so full it could burst.

It was Roderich's turn to be caught off-guard. He looked away, studying the Schwind that hung on the opposite wall. “‘Good’ is not a classification I would accept so willingly. At the risk of sounding too Catholic even for myself, we've all committed sin. I'm simply trying to learn from mine, even if it's a bit late in some cases.” His lips turned the slightest bit upward. “But I do appreciate the compliment.”

"You realized it sooner than everyone else we know." Gilbert sipped his wine, needing something to do with his hands. "Don't be so hard on yourself. That has to count for something." A coy smile slipped through. "Besides, I know you hid people in your homes throughout the war. You shouldn't look so surprised; you were always asking me to help you stock up on food and clothes and you suddenly had new servants here. What other explanation could there have been?"

Despite all the time that had passed, the acknowledgement of his deed caused Roderich's heart to race. The instinctual fear at getting caught took over, regardless of there being an absence of authorities who would arrest him for it. "Well, I knew many of the upcoming Viennese artists and musicians then. It seemed...such a waste of incredible talent and life." He paused, the memories coming in vivid technicolor. "Anyone would've done the same."

"You know that's not true."

There was a point there. "I wanted to at least sound humble, regardless of whether it reflected reality accurately." He folded his hands in his lap. This was something he'd never discussed before; it was a secret he'd kept close to his heart first out of a survival instinct and later out of a desire to not be viewed in a heroic light. "You yourself noted how my last name could be perceived, as had various Jewish communities here. Over the years I'd warmed up to them and begun to count many of them as friends, those especially who easily shrugged off or accepted the nature of our existence. To turn on them in their greatest hour of need seemed to me to be beyond reprehensible. I had grown close to many of them, been invited into their homes, to witness their births, deaths, and marriages. You'll understand more than anyone else that, for my own peace of mind, I had to do what was right."

Gilbert had listened in silence. The coy little smirk never left his face. “The ice king does have a heart.” At Roderich's bewildered expression, Gilbert barked out a laugh. “Relax! I'm only kidding! You're looking at me as if I just shot your dog!” He wiped a wayward tear out the corner of his eye. “What can I say? I'm not surprised by any of this. Despite your best efforts, you're not heartless. A couple centuries ago, I could see you ignoring everything and letting the chips fall where they may, but not now. You figured out that having a little humanity isn't so bad.”

Now, that was insulting. Roderich harrumphed. “You say it’s a joke, but must you make me sound like a being incapable of the most basic of emotions?” He folded his arms over his chest, rolling his eyes in the process. Oddly enough, the prickle of irritation felt comforting. Over Gilbert’s long absence, Roderich had naturally felt annoyed at others plenty of times. But being aggrieved over America’s brashness or Arthur’s arrogance or Francis’ smugness didn’t feel quite the same. Being irritated at Gilbert came as easily as breathing air, felt like the comfort of sheets against you at night. He hadn’t realized how much he’d missed it till this very moment.

Apparently, his face was giving it away. “What are you staring at me like that for?” Gilbert’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “Did I suddenly grow a third eye or something?”

“‘Or something’ for sure.” The corners of Roderich’s lips softened into an easy smile. “It’s nice to have you home, that’s all. It seems I really did miss you.”

Gilbert grinned, his most natural one yet of the evening. “I’m back forever now. There’s no more getting rid of me. From now on, you’ll be stuck with me till the end of eternity.”

“Threatening me so soon?” Roderich brought his wine glass to his lips, smiling. Against all odds, he was looking forward to the rest of eternity.

#aph prussia #aph austria #hws prussia #hws austria #hetalia #Axis Powers Hetalia #hetalia fanfic #hetalia fanfiction #hws fanfiction #aph fanfiction #hws fanfic #aph fanfic

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itsclydebitches · 5 years

Note

On that ask about show/tell, if I may, it reminds me in some ways of how Rose Quartz was treated by SU. She was always said by everyone to be perfect, yet everything associated with her in season 1 is dangerous, and what everyone says about Rose doesn’t match up with what the audience is shown. It seemed deliberate, to later sweep a rug out from under people's feet. Do you think it's possible that RWBY is setting up a similar rug with this idea of 'heroism=always right' and 'kids v adults'?

(You definitely may :D)

I’ll admit straight out that I don’t have the knowledge that a lot of other SU fans do. I’ve always watched the show purely for entertainment, mostly turning my brain off and just going along for the ride, allowing others to do the analysis, theorizing, etc. That being said, to my mind the discrepancy between show and tell in that case did seem deliberate, but the show actually acknowledged that conflict in a way RWBY has yet to. In SU we’re suppose to pick up on the disconnect and grapple with it, both to fuel interest—who is Rose Quartz really?—and, ultimately, learn more about the main characters. To provide a concrete example, we have Pearl’s obvious love and devotion, at odds with, as you say, the rather dangerous and at times even cruel choices Rose has made. We hear Pearl say “You’re wonderful” and watch her cry over Rose choosing to abandon them to give birth to Steven (among other potential flaws in her character). There’s a definite disconnect, but for me I never thought—like with RWBY—“Why is the show trying to convince me that Rose is 100% good when she’s clearly not?” The message seemed to me, “The show isn’t telling me to think anything, it’s providing me with information that I can now interpret for myself. Pearl believes Rose is 100% good, but we have seen otherwise. This tells us that Pearl’s perception is skewed. Her love has blinded her, just as their devotion and trauma have blinded the other gems. The stories they feed Steven are sanitized out of love (don’t speak ill of the dead), fear (did we lead that rebellion for nothing?), his age (he’s just a kid who lost his mom), and lack of knowledge (they don’t know a lot of what we’re shown). It makes perfect sense then that what they say doesn’t match up with our more objective knowledge. I wonder when the characters will learn/acknowledge what we the audience have known for a while: that Rose is a far more complex person than they’ve painted her as?” Which is precisely what the show does. We get to watch everyone grapple with these revelations and those arcs validate the audience’s reading of the text. We knew Rose wasn’t 100% good like everyone said she was and now we get to watch the rest of the cast catch up as they realize that. We knew that revelation was coming and anticipated it.

This acknowledgement of the discrepancy is particularly evident through Steven. He’s the one always asking questions about his mom, expressing anger, doubt, becoming frustrated with these platitudes he’s given that don’t add up to the facts—he picks at that conflict between Rose the story and Rose the person like a scab and, because he’s our protagonist, we do too. We’re encouraged to grapple with it, question it, decide for ourselves where we fall before Rose’s true nature is finally revealed. RWBY Volume 6 had none of that. It would have been a very different story if Ruby had pushed back against the rest of the team. Or the team had pushed back against her. If our newcomer (Maria) had pushed in from the outside. If the story’s structure had provided hints (i.e. music that conveys the message that Ruby is making a mistake in attacking Cordovin as opposed to the triumphant music we got, things like that). In short, if the volume had done anything to say, “We’re providing you with multiple perspectives here that you’re meant to debate. Do you think Qrow was justified in hitting Oscar? Do you think they made the right decision in stealing the airship? We’re acknowledging that there’s no black and white thinking here.”

Instead, the show insists it is black and white. That there’s one answer and the answer is The Protagonist Is Always Right. Every aspect of the show said loud and clear, “We agree with this! This is good! Hop on this bandwagon because absolutely no one is going to challenge it!” The closest we get to the story questioning any of the characters’ horrible actions is when the group reacts badly to Jaune attacking Oscar (and even then the show pulls back in the worst way: no one really calls Jaune out on his shit, no one reaches out to Oscar, there are no consequences to Jaune’s actions (like Oscar leaving, which everyone expected), Yang is only worried about him. The overall message is the same we got for episode after episode: the protagonists can really do no wrong. Even when we subtly acknowledge that they make mistakes there are no repercussions. There’s no growth. Those mistakes are inconsequential). It’s only through the viewer’s personal experience that we might question what’s happening on screen, because the story in no way encourages us to as SU does. It’s only thinking to ourselves, “Does someone who does all this really fit my definition of a hero?”

Thus, there’s nothing within the story itself, to my mind, that tells me RWBY is setting up something larger; that this OOC, protagonist-centric writing is setup meant to be turned on its head. Is it possible we’ll start Volume 7 with criticism of their actions? Absolutely, but so far I’ve seen nothing that makes me terribly hopeful it will be there. At this point I expect that any push-back will be framed as largely undeserved: Ironwood reams them out for their choices but the scene is highly sympathetic towards the group. We’re supposed to feel sorry for them getting punished over something they “had” to do, not satisfied that they’re finally learning from their mistakes. We already saw it with Qrow. Rather than encouraging us to take his fears about stealing the airship seriously, we’re instead encouraged to side with the group in viewing him as a pessimistic drunk who doesn’t want them to succeed only because he’s given up, not because the plan is actually absurd. The show came down hard on the side of kids in the kids vs. adults debate, thereby undermining any criticism adults might have. The show made Ruby’s plan entertainingly badass, pulled strings to make sure it succeeded, had Cordovin change her tune in the most absurd way, Qrow too, Jinn is randomly team Ruby, they walk away with absolutely 0 consequences… from a narrative standpoint everything is telling us, “They’re heroes who did the right thing.” If even evil, mean Cordovin ends up approving of Ruby by the end of it all, who is Ironwood to question her? He must be delusional. He must be wrong. Because every other character and every plot point is holding up a neon sign claiming that Ruby is right.

In comparing the two shows, it’s also worth keeping in mind that Steven Universe is just tighter writing all around. Is it perfect? Of course not, no show is, but it has been meticulously planned by Sugar from the get-go and I can easily see that work in the final product. When something doesn’t add up in Steven Universe, like with Rose, I have complete faith that this conflict is there for a reason. We notice it, the show confirms that we’re supposed to notice it, and it’s eventually resolved. Sadly, I don’t have nearly as much faith in RWBY’s writing.

#rwby #mymetas #spectralscathath #long post #steven universe

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classpect-musings · 5 years

Note

What's your take on the Heir of Space? I'd love to know!

Classpect Analysis: Heir of Space

Active or Passive: Passive

What they do: Heirs allow the manipulation of their aspect or allow manipulation through their aspect. Space is the aspect of beginnings/creation, creativity/art, randomness/variety, process, femininity (& fashion), passiveness, organisms, science (biology, chemistry, physics), space in terms of galaxies & universes, and space in terms of where you are (location) and what’s around you (matter).

Active equivalent: Witch of Space (Jade Harley)

Inverse: Mage of Time

The Heir of Space is someone who starts out passively embodying their aspect and having an abundance of it, often without realizing it. Regardless of whether or not they know it, their aspect protects them. One example would be if this Heir might be naturally live far from others, but this protects them since their neighbors are dangerous people.

With the Heir of Space you get an abundance of creativity. They come up with ideas for any kind of artistic expression and go with them on a whim, changing from one to the other very quickly. They might even recycle their old ideas into their newer projects to make something bigger and better. It’s likely that they have an interest in gardening, fashion design, or some type of artistic expression. In fact, they’re probably interested in many of these activities, since they are prone to shake things up so they have some variety. They’re very quirky and random, not really controlled by a schedule, and have sudden fits of motivation for a new piece or project. They aren’t great at finishing any of their projects, but they enjoy going through the procedure of planning them and just having some fun with them. They might also have some frogs as pets or even wear some galaxy-print clothing.

This Heir might be literally ‘spacey’ in that they have a low attention span and tend to drift into their own daydreams. They could be distant from others because of this. They also often take things as they come instead of worrying about it. Even if they mess up during one of their artistic projects and end up screwing up the whole thing, they can laugh it off and see it as a learning experience, because they see the process as more important than the product.

This Heir may also have an interest in science– physics, chemistry, biology, or even some whack kind of alchemy would be a good fit for them. (Though there is a likelihood they’ll be adept when it comes to genetics, considering their role in the game.) Relating back to what I said earlier about them being able to laugh things off, they’re definitely like that with scientific experiments, too. If something blows up in their face, they don’t care too much. This Heir views the learning process as more important. They might have a journal full of all their discoveries, along with creative– if sometimes unreasonable– theories about what these discoveries mean.

The Heir of Space needs to learn how to take hold of their aspect and consciously use/embody it. Since this is the Space player we’re talking about, this Heir will be breeding the Genesis Frog, a task that won’t be difficult for them. As long as they have a Knight to keep them protected and on track (seeing how this Heir has a habit of not finishing their creative projects), they should be good to go. They should not become overconfident as a result of their powers, and they must be careful not to become too loose on the process of creating the Genesis Frog, since a mistake could very well lead to some fatal consequences. And as they continue in the game, a (healthy) Heir of Space will be less inactive (though still pretty space-y), often reacting to things that happen in the moment and taking the game in stride.

The Heir of Space allows manipulation of Space or manipulation through Space. Unlike their active counterpart (Witch of Space, Jade Harley), who exerts her will so Space will do as she forces it to, this Heir uses their aspect more intuitively and naturally. The Heir of Space allows manipulation of Space, which includes teleporting, growing, and shrinking objects around them to fit the situation. This might show up in a more subtle way, too: everywhere they leap and turn during battle, the places they land and jump off adjust in size and place accordingly so they’re perfectly balanced (but these things transform back to regular size once the Heir has no use for them, unlike a Witch, who does more Space rule-breaking); this is more of an intuitive way that Space protects this Heir.

Space protects this Heir in other ways, too (often via changes in the physical properties of matter). They can teleport to various unoccupied spaces in the blink of an eye. They might even unconsciously do this, like if an enemy is charging at them and they don’t notice, poof! They’ve teleported ten feet away all of a sudden. This power might be bewildering for the Heir at first, but since they’re the type to go with the flow, they’ll probably get used to it very quickly, and once they’re at full power they’ll be able to teleport both with and without conscious effort. And then there’s their growing/shrinking powers, which they can use on themself just like Ant-Man. This will be an unconscious power at first, with this Heir suddenly shrinking to dodge attacks or growing to become more powerful. (Though they are more likely to be shrinking as opposed to growing in the earlier stages of their powers, since I imagine it would take less effort.) But they learn to actively harness that too and use it to their advantage in battle. The Heir of Space might also be able to change their density so that they suddenly become very heavy, making them harder to throw, or light and airy, which helps them jump higher. This can help to determine how quick or slow they are as well. Additionally, the Heir of Space can use their powers to become an amorphous blob. I’m not kidding. Besides changing size, they can change shape, shifting their very cells and framework around so they can dodge objects and enemies. At first it might just be their arm or face warping out of shape in order to get out of the way of something, like this example from the webcomic Paranatural:

But just as they will with their other abilities, the Heir of Space will eventually harness this ability in a conscious way and be able to twist themself out of harm’s way. Besides making them difficult to injure, it’ll also scare the crap out of their enemies.

At first, the Heir of Space unconsciously using their growing/shrinking, teleporting self and objects, shape-shifting, and density shifting will be more confusing to enemies than anything, and the Heir won’t have much idea what they’re doing, instead just letting stuff fly around them and going “Oh, okay. This is happening. Guess I’ll roll with it.” But once they can fully and consciously harness these powers, they can use them to a much greater extent, so they’ll not only be very disorienting to fight, but also very difficult to hit!

Furthermore, the Heir of Space allows manipulation through Space, which includes what I call a ‘gene scramble.’ This Heir’s powers encompass a lot of science-y stuff, considering physics (ex. density shifting) and chemistry (ex. rearranging their atoms). But for biology, they might be able to reach out and shift around the genes of creatures around them, essentially rendering their enemies’ very DNA useless, causing their system to go haywire. How utterly terrifying! It’s likely they can’t tweak very specific genes in a very permanent manner like a Witch can; it’s more like they send a general static shock or ‘gene glitch’ through an enemy.

Heirs also tend to inherit/embody/’become’ their aspect in some sense, so the Genesis Frog they create will likely be more suited to their tastes than that of the other players, though they didn’t plan it to end up that way. You might be thinking: If the Heir can become their aspect to some extent, can they become the Genesis Frog itself? And this is a question I find very difficult to answer. Perhaps an incredibly powerful and fully realized Heir of Space could embody the Genesis Frog to some in a larger extent. (In an especially cruel twist, if the Genesis Frog becomes mutated or dies somehow, the Heir could essentially sacrifice themself by becoming the new universe.) But in a smaller way, the Heir of Space could ‘become’ the Genesis Frog by having a large avatar of the Frog appear around them as a sort of protective shield. Kind of like a giant anime mecha suit, except, well, it’s a frog. Regardless of their power level at the end of the game, though, this Heir will likely have a powerful tie to the Genesis Frog and perhaps even be in tune with its state of being. For example, their teleportation powers are likely strengthened in the new universe they create, since they’re much more familiar with it as a result of their connection with the Frog.

As for a land for the Heir of Space, I suggest the Land of Stars and Frogs. The shining and seemingly bottomless ponds on this planet that the frogs swim in are filled with gleaming stars. The sky is always dark because the denizen knocked all the stars from the sky, and now the frogs stay in the ponds, terrified that the denizen will steal the stars from the ponds too if they leave them. At first the stars seem useless, appearing to be nothing more than shining rocks. But if the Heir can learn to unlock their power with careful practice and concentration, they can send the stars back into the sky, thus allowing the frogs to come back out.

As for weapons, we’ve seen varied weapons for Heirs (hammer, bow & arrow, psiionics) and typically more flashy weapons for Space players (rifle, lipstick chainsaw). The Heir of Space is pretty laid-back, so their weapon might be an everyday object, with their interest in science, gardening, and/or art might playing into it. Paintbrushes, paint knives, pens, any chemistry equipment, a shovel… Go wild. As they continue with their session, they could upgrade to more powerful weapons, especially ones that are effective both upsized and downsized. (Think of John’s Zillyhoo.)

In conclusion, the Heir of Space is an interesting classpect with the potential to become incredibly powerful and nearly unkillable thanks to their powers. Thanks for reading!

I’m so sorry this took so long. I’ve been incredibly busy with schoolwork and the like ^^; nevertheless I hope this was helpful!

#heir of space #heir class #space aspect #classpect #classpect analysis #godtier #godtier analysis #homestuck #hs

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imagitory · 5 years

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D-Views: The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Bonjour, mes amies! Welcome, bienvenue, to another installment of D-Views, my written review series for films produced or inspired by the Walt Disney company! For more reviews for films like Enchanted, Star Wars Episode III, and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, feel free to consult my “Disney reviews” tag, and please, if you enjoy this review or any of the others, please consider liking and reblogging! I look forward to writing more of these in the future for films like Wreck-It Ralph and Halloweentown, as well as Non-Disney films like Charlotte’s Web.

I recently put out a poll suggesting three Disney Renaissance films for possible review subjects, and although The Little Mermaid won that poll, this film ended up not far behind. (Thank you, @schifty-al and @mygeekcorner for your votes!) It’s one of my personal favorite Disney films of all time...The Hunchback of Notre Dame!

Victor Hugo’s classic novel Notre Dame du Paris, called The Hunchback of Notre Dame in English, seems like a very odd inspiration for a Disney animated family film, and that’s because...yeah, it is! When the Disney animators first brought Hunchback to the table, they were less inspired by the original Hugo novel glamorizing the architecture of Notre Dame cathedral, and more inspired by a graphic novel adaptation of the story, which was likewise much more influenced by the 1939 Hollywood film adaptation. Because of the historical context that 1939 adaptation was made in (premiering at Cannes during the rise of the Third Reich), themes of social justice were added to a story that originally was about how the “edifice” can outlast the flaws and sins of mankind. The “social justice” element is something that Hugo interestingly put more in his follow-up to Notre Dame du Paris, the epic brick book Les Miserables, but has since been similarly tied in the public consciousness to The Hunchback of Notre Dame, despite not existing in the original book.

The project was already an odd choice for Disney to take on thanks to the darkness of the book, but the political themes also were unique for a Disney picture as well. It clearly was a more “adult” endeavor, even though thanks to the success of previous projects like Aladdin and The Lion King, there were studio mandates demanding more comic relief, and even the marketing team was reluctant to advertise Hunchback as anything other than a family film. Rather than showing the artistry and darker scenes, the marketing almost entirely focused on the Feast of Fools and the gargoyles, highlighting the “Ugly Duckling” aspect added to the story and downplaying the more adult themes. In the end, it’s likely thanks to those poor marketing choices and the inconsistent tone of the picture that this movie failed to find its audience on first run. It only earned $21 million worldwide, compared to Pocahontas’s $29 million and The Little Mermaid’s $84 million, with mixed critical and audience reaction. Although it was nominated for an Academy Award for its music and won several others, it was noticeably less successful than other installments in the Disney Renaissance, and even now, Disney often doesn’t give Hunchback that much attention. Like Quasimodo, the film has been sort of locked up in its own tower...but now, today, I aim to bring The Hunchback of Notre Dame out of the shadows and give it the appreciation it deserves.

Our film begins in complete darkness, accompanied by resounding church bells and the amazing vocalizations of the English Opera Company, and from the very beginning, I’m just enveloped by the embrace of Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz’s unbelievable score. Choral music in general has always been something special in my family. My mum and dad were in choirs a lot of their lives: they even first met when they joined the San Diego Master Chorale in the 80′s. Choral music remains one of my mother’s greatest loves and passions, and when I saw Hunchback, it made the choral music my parents loved so much, which focused around a faith I hadn’t been raised with and didn’t believe in, that bit more accessible to me as a child. Mum, who studied Latin in college, went on to teach me about all of the chants and phrases Menken and Schwartz added to each song so that I could more appropriately sing along. It remains one of those Disney soundtracks that cemented our close bond, and I’ll always treasure being able to see the La Jolla Playhouse production of The Hunchback of Notre Dame with my mum and getting to hear the amazing choir and instruments live.

The Bells of Notre Dame, as an opening number, cannot be matched in how it introduces us all to the story, characters, themes, and tone of the piece. In just a few minutes, the music and lyrics perfectly showcases our setting, the theme of what makes a man, the atmosphere of fear and injustice, our villain, and our hero. Menken and Schwartz previously worked together on Pocahontas, but Hunchback in my opinion easily outstrips their previous collaboration. The use of church bells of all sizes to convey the solemnity, mystery, and grandeur of the cathedral at the center of the proceedings, and the clever use of Latin phrases -- it’s just unbelievable! As one example, in the sequence where Frollo (a judge in this version, as opposed to the Archdeacon) chases Quasimodo’s mother up to the stairs of Notre Dame and she pounds on the door, crying for help, the choir sings “Quantus tremor est futurus quando Judex est venturus,” which means, “What trembling is to be when the Judge comes.” And sure enough, the line comes to a horrible, horrified halt when Judge Frollo snatches the woman’s child away and throws her to the ground.

After one of the most epic musical introductions in a Disney film, we meet our sweet, gentle hero, Quasimodo, voiced by Tom Hulce, who is just such a ray of sunshine. Although I loved hearing Michael Arden as Quasimodo on stage, Tom Hulce will always be my Quasimodo. When I was a teenager, I went through a horrible “hating the world” phase where I only ever saw pain and suffering and felt not only powerless to make anything better, but worthless as well. During that time, I turned my back on a lot of the things that had brought me joy, feeling almost unable to enjoy them anymore. One of the very few exceptions, however, was this movie and especially the character of Quasimodo. When I was at my darkest points, Quasimodo never failed to bring me some light, not because he was particularly funny, but because for all of the misery in his circumstances, he never faltered in being gentle, creative, and kind. Looking back on how I’d been, I wish I’d had just a shred of Quasimodo’s grace back then. I wish I hadn’t allowed myself to fall into despair and resentment. Since I can’t go back, however, I keep Quasimodo in my mind sometimes whenever I’m going through something difficult. He’s kind of become a guardian angel of sorts to me, reminding me that my life is a precious gift and I shouldn’t take anything for granted. And really, I couldn’t do that if not for Tom Hulce and Quasimodo’s supervising animator, James Baxter. I truly am grateful to both of them for giving me a character that even now can be a symbol of everything I wish I could be.

Unfortunately along with Quasimodo, we also meet the gargoyles, Hugo, Victor, and Laverne. As a kid, I actually liked the gargoyles all right, but as an adult...yeah, they really break the mood. Badly. The worst offender is easily Hugo, which is a shame because I like Jason Alexander as a performer, but he just goes way too over-the-top-obnoxious. It would admittedly not be as bad if it were clear that the gargoyles were all in Quasimodo’s head, but Djali sees Hugo come to life at one point and they later help Quasimodo fight off the guards. I greatly prefer the way the gargoyles are handled in the stage production, where all of the saintly statues have their own voices that nonetheless reflect what Quasimodo is thinking and when Quasimodo hits his lowest point before Esmeralda’s execution, he forcefully banishes them out of his head.

Even though the comic relief is handled poorly, I certainly cannot say the same for the villain. Judge Claude Frollo is easily one of the most evil villains in Disney history. Tony Jay’s vocal performance is just chillingly resonant, commanding your attention and making you subconsciously shrink in on yourself whenever he speaks. It makes for a despicable, cold, cruel man -- the antithesis of a father, the true embodiment of a monster. Frollo is often compared to Mother Gothel from Tangled in how they both lie to, control, and emotionally abuse their charges (Quasimodo and Rapunzel, respectively), but I personally find Frollo so much worse than Gothel, because he not only cuts Quasimodo off from everyone, but he indoctrinates a gentle, kind soul like Quasimodo in his racism and intolerance against those different from him -- including Quasimodo’s own people, the Romani. Mother Gothel hoards Rapunzel away like a dragon hoarding treasure -- Frollo treats Quasimodo like a burden, beating into him that no one else would want him and that Frollo was such a “good man” to take him in. It’s just vile.

And now we come to my single favorite Disney song of all time -- Quasimodo’s aria, Out There. From the time I was little, this song spoke to me like few others did. Growing up, I was an only child with a huge imagination surrounded almost entirely by adults and who had a lot of difficulty relating to kids my age. I often liked being on my own, but it didn’t change how I often felt different and detached from the people around me, and as I got older, that feeling only increased. I moved a lot in my childhood, making it difficult for me to plant roots, and I rarely followed trends or popular norms, so I constantly stayed in the fringes of the crowd, enviously looking on at those who could fit in more easily than I could. I always tried to hide my insecurities, but they were still there, and when those insecurities took hold, I would often imagine the world being a place where I could be myself, just like Quasi does. Quasimodo’s longing to be “part of them” and lamentation of people being “heedless of the gift it is to be them” has always resonated with me, and even though it’s hard for me to sing Out There without shifting octaves, my heart swells every time I hear it.

The Captain of the Guard, Phoebus, is easily the biggest liberty that Hunchback adaptations have made with the original novel. The book version of Phoebus was more like Gaston from Beauty and the Beast than how he’s portrayed here, but I frankly have no complaints. Kevin Kline is wonderfully dry and witty in the role -- he’s more than a match for Esmeralda, being brave, noble, and sarcastic with seemingly no prejudice for those different from him. And then yeah, as for Esmeralda herself...as Phoebus says later, “what a woman!” Esmeralda was one of my very favorite Disney heroines as a kid, and she still is. The character of Esmeralda is often rather saint-like in her incarnations, but here we see both the “angelic” and “demonic” sides of her -- she’s fiery, but kind; rebellious, yet noble; anti-authority, but patient; distrustful, yet loyal. In the musical adaptation, when Esmeralda is first revealed, we hear Frollo, Phoebus, and Quasimodo sing this about her --

Frollo: She dances like the Devil!

Phoebus: She dances like an angel --

Quasimodo: An angel!

Phoebus: -- but with such fire!

Frollo: Such fire!

All Three: Who is she?

This is Esmeralda’s characterization and her relationship to the three male main characters in a nutshell. Quasimodo only sees the best of Esmeralda; Frollo only sees the worst of her; and Phoebus sees her for everything she is...as a person. And this is why she ultimately chooses Phoebus, unlike in the book where she solely chooses Phoebus because of his looks.

When we reach the Palace of Justice, I’m reminded that I have yet to accent how absolutely stunning every single background is in this movie. Yes, the animation overall is wonderful, whether in the character animation or otherwise, but there are few Disney films that have more atmospheric and beautiful backgrounds than this. It serves to give the movie such a wonderful depth and makes the setting feel that much richer and deeper. Admittedly one weaker aspect of the animation is the now-slightly-outdated CG background characters. They were made by taking a handful of templates and then mixing up their clothes and colors, so as to multiply them ad infinitum and make the crowds of Paris look bigger and more colorful. Even with that, though, you do sort of have to look carefully at the background crowds to notice, as there are lots of hand-drawn characters sprinkled in in front of those CG models that help obscure their repetition and awkwardness. Those CG crowds also make the city of Paris look appropriately overcrowded and huge, so I’m glad that they used the technology even if it was still so in-progress at the time.

Even though Topsy Turvy starts off so fun and festive, however, it soon devolves into a terrible riot where Quasimodo is bound and tormented by the crowd. I admit, the transition is a little abrupt, but it still works for me, as people can be so easily swept away by mob mentality and those in power -- namely, Frollo’s guards -- sometimes flaunt their authority by putting down others. Fortunately Esmeralda is there to save Quasimodo and give Frollo a much-deserved verbal smackdown. The following scene, though, is another example of the mismatched tone, stretching out Esmeralda’s escape with a lot of comic “hijinks” that don’t really add anything to the film and kind of serve as a big time waster, especially after it abruptly cuts off and turns much more solemn and sad as Frollo silently confronts Quasimodo and Quasi returns to Notre Dame in shame.

Hunchback’s focus on religion is, in my opinion, one of the things that made producing an adaptation of Hugo’s novel such a bold decision. I’m not a religious person at all (Agnostic and proud), but it was still really meaningful to me to see both the good and bad associated with religion, represented by the Archdeacon and Frollo respectively. Frollo, along with Pharaoh Seti from The Prince of Egypt, taught me as a kid that evil is not always self-aware and, more importantly, how much more dangerous evil is when it garbs itself in godliness and righteousness. That’s a valuable lesson, regardless of your religious faith. God Help the Outcasts may invoke God’s name, but it could just as easily be a prayer to the world, or even just to you as an individual. The Christian faith preaches that we are made in God’s image...so when Esmeralda asks God to help her people, maybe she’s in truth asking you to try to be the loving God they need.

Something unique about Hunchback is the wonderful friendship that develops between Esmeralda and Quasimodo. From the time I was very little, I made friends with both boys and girls, so it was so wonderfully refreshing to see a story where a girl and a boy became such close friends and supported each other so much. Yes, admittedly, Quasimodo is romantically interested in Esmeralda, but when he sees how much she loves Phoebus, he both accepts their relationship and treasures Esmeralda’s friendship all the same. He doesn’t wallow in bitterness upon Esmeralda not choosing him; he loves her all the same as the first real friend he’s ever had. Esmeralda truly loves Quasimodo and treasures their friendship too -- her choosing Phoebus romantically is never framed as her teasing Quasimodo or leading him on; she simply loves Phoebus and Quasimodo in different ways. And that I find so unbelievably cool. I also like that in Esmeralda’s and Quasimodo’s conversation on the roof, there are some strains of the deleted song Someday in the instrumental accompanying the scene -- you can hear a R&B variation of Someday in the film’s credits, but originally it was meant to replace the more religious God Help the Outcasts, only for God Help the Outcasts to be chosen over it. I agree with the filmmakers’ decision, but I still like Someday too. Quasimodo’s helping Esmeralda and Djali escape Notre Dame by climbing down the towers also beautifully foreshadows Quasimodo’s dexterity in climbing down to save Esmeralda at the end of the film.

Quasimodo and Frollo are both enthralled with Esmeralda, but as mentioned previously, they each only see the angelic and demonic sides of her, which is best encapsulated by the dual numbers Heaven’s Light and Hellfire. Heaven’s Light is appropriately sweet and pure, but I can’t beat around the bush here: Hellfire steals the show, not just from Heaven’s Light but from all other villain songs in Disney history. The song starts with a choral chant praying for forgiveness, which then segways into Frollo’s demented, mad raving about his lust, fear, and hatred for Esmeralda. The words are almost terrifying in their level of conviction and paranoia, which then devolves into vindictive, destructive mania, framed by the mournful echoes for “mercy” from the choir.

Right after Hellfire, we get one of my favorite instrumentals on the soundtrack called Paris Burning. The choir’s bustling, dramatic cries trimmed by the tense strings and horns of the orchestra just evokes fear and horror as Frollo terrorizes Paris. Then Phoebus finally takes a stand, refusing to set fire to the miller’s house and then, after Frollo does it himself, leaping in to save the family from the flames. In the musical, this whole sequence is accompanied by the amazing musical number Esmeralda (which honestly, every fan of this movie should listen to, it’s really worth it), but the film handles it unbelievably well with only a short scene and an instrumental that sears the final “Kyrie Eleison” into the audience’s ears like a fire brand.

Sadly, after this amazing, epic sequence, we once again are subjected to tonal whiplash when we return to the bell tower and the gargoyles decide to sing Quasimodo a song to cheer him up. Although I maintain Hunchback has one of the best soundtracks ever recorded, what stops it from being flawless is this song. A Guy Like You is not an inherently bad song on its own, but when combined with the rest of the soundtrack, its melody, tone, and out-of-place pop cultural references are just ridiculously jarring. It’s like we’ve been transported into a completely different movie, one less inspired by a classic French novel and a critically acclaimed film about social justice and one more inspired by Disney hits of the day like Aladdin and later projects like Hercules. As sad as it is, it’s kind of a relief when it’s over and we’re brought back down to earth by Esmeralda carrying a close-to-death Phoebus into Quasimodo’s tower.

Frollo’s arrival after Quasimodo agrees to hide Phoebus is excellent in its suspense. We can sense Frollo’s suspicion, and all the while, we’re so worried for Phoebus hiding under the very table he and Quasimodo are sitting at. Then Frollo, who we’ve only ever seen as cold, conniving, and controlled, bursts into a rage the kind of which we’ve never seen before, and for a second, he’s a demon himself. After his rage is spent, he sets his cruelest, most terrible trap yet: using Quasimodo’s feelings for Esmeralda so that he can capture her and the rest of the Romani. And at first, Quasimodo almost doesn’t take the bait, thanks to a short-lived pang of self-pity. At first he’s bitter about his heart being broken and considers not helping Esmeralda, as there’d seemingly be no “reward” in him doing so...but the feeling is quelled in seconds by the memory of Esmeralda and how much her friendship means to him. Quasimodo’s selflessness and goodness wins out in its struggle with his more selfish instincts...and this, in the end, is what makes Quasimodo a hero in my eyes.

All right, I guess with our entrance into the Court of Miracles, I should address the elephant in the room. I’ve called Esmeralda’s people “the Romani” in this review, but throughout the entire film, the term is substituted for the admittedly-period-appropriate slur “Gypsy.” I knew nothing about the Romani culture when I first saw this film and I profess no intimate knowledge of it now, but even with that, I have to acknowledge that this movie doesn’t always showcase the Romani in the best light. Although Quasimodo’s parents, Esmeralda, and (to a degree) Clopin are given relative sympathy, the sequence in the Court of Miracles doesn’t do much to endear them to the audience. These victims of persecution are not really given the focus they deserve: we never learn much about their culture or about why they’re persecuted, and we don’t really get to see how they live their lives as ordinary people. To someone who doesn’t know anything about the Romani, I don’t think this film would be the best introduction to their culture and heritage.

Our climax is accompanied by the best instrumental track in the film, Sanctuary! Whenever I hear this piece, I have to stay completely silent, drinking in every single line and note, so as to properly absorb its brilliance. The track has accompanied a lot of my writing in the past: it’s always helped me when I was writing a powerful, emotional climax, whether through the emotion it wrought from me or just from wanting to write a new scene to the music. This entire sequence, from a musical, writing, animation, and character point of view, is I think what made Disney decide to make this film in the first place. The pacing -- the character animation of Quasimodo tearing down the pillars -- the drawn backgrounds of Notre Dame -- the camera whirling over the never-ending crowd’s heads and up onto the cathedral as Quasimodo hoists Esmeralda over his head -- this is the heart of why the movie was made and what the entire film was building up to. This resistance against injustice and the protection of our sacred, historical institutions from hatred and cruelty is what Hunchback is and should be all about. Occasionally this battle scene is inter-spliced with comic bits that once again aren’t really necessary and kind of stick out (Laverne’s Wizard of Oz reference and Hugo’s impression of a fighter plane in particular are out of place), but it doesn’t ruin anything for me. Fortunately as the climax grows darker with the arrival of Frollo and the transition from Sanctuary! into And He Shall Smite the Wicked, the gargoyles take a backseat, and we get focus where we should’ve always had it: on Quasimodo, Esmeralda, and Frollo. Thanks to his love for his friend Esmeralda and the realization of his own self-worth, Quasimodo finally stands up to Frollo and breaks free of his poisonous influence once and for all. This line of Quasi’s has always stuck with me --

“All my life you’ve taught me the world is a dark, cruel place...but now I see the only thing dark and cruel about it is people like you!”

Even now this line is just so powerful. There was a point where all I saw of the world was its cruelties and injustices...but like Quasimodo, I’ve come to see that those cruelties are not inherent to the world or even to mankind as a whole. Humans are capable of both great evil and great good, but as long as the evil people of the world are allowed to seize control and exert their toxic influence over everyone else, the world and mankind overall will never become better. Like Quasimodo, we must stand against those who’ve embraced cruelty and hatred over acceptance and love. We must protect the brighter parts of the world that evil so wishes to snuff out. It’s a moral I think has only become more relevant and important over time.

Unlike in the book and musical, Esmeralda survives, and as much as I’ve heard people try to argue Esmeralda living is not true to the spirit of the original novel, I think it really suits the story being told and really feels just for both characters. Quasimodo deserved happiness; Esmeralda deserved happiness; and most importantly, this all the more highlights how different Quasimodo is from Frollo. Frollo says to Esmeralda, “Choose me or the fire” -- basically, if he can’t have her, he doesn’t want anyone else to...but Quasimodo doesn’t think that way. He cherishes Esmeralda and her friendship without any caveats or conditions: therefore him losing Esmeralda, whether to Phoebus or to death, doesn’t prompt him to commit suicide like he did in the novel. It’s not only a more uplifting ending, but I think a lesson in the selflessness of love, even if it’s just platonic love. And because Esmeralda loves Quasimodo just as much as a friend, she leads him out into the sun, where he finds even more of the love he deserves from the city he wished so much to belong in. Quasimodo doesn’t get the girl, but that was never what he wanted in the first place: it was merely to be accepted as he was.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame was one of the most formative films of my childhood, right up there with Beauty and the Beast, The Prince of Egypt, and Anastasia, and it remains my second favorite Disney animated film of all time. With time, I’ve seen more and more of its flaws, but those flaws don’t ruin what in the end is one of the most daring, revolutionary projects Disney Animation has ever tackled. Its artistry, from the backgrounds to the character animation, is exceptional; all of its major human characters are multi-faceted, complex, and real; its themes are eternally relevant and powerful; and its score and nearly all of its songs are just through the stratosphere in their quality. Hunchback, along with Beauty and the Beast, made me fall in love with France from afar as a child, a love affair that has only become more and more intense through the years, and Quasimodo and Esmeralda even now are so close to my heart. I wish so much to be as kind and gentle as Quasimodo and as brave and noble as Esmeralda, and I can only hope that at some point, if I ever visit Disneyland Paris, I might finally meet them. The Hunchback of Notre Dame may not have gotten the appreciation it deserved when it first came to theaters, but I’ll always be happy to hear Disney fans remembering it as fondly as I do. Who knows? Maybe someday, the world will be wiser and will give this film its time in the sun at long last.

#d-views #disney reviews #the hunchback of notre dame #disney #opinion #analysis #reviews #oh boy here i go

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nadziejastar · 5 years

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Well, first of all I loved his outfit. It’s similar enough to what he wore in BBS to make it feel like Isa, but still felt fresh. It looked like something a fashionable young person would wear. It’s based on a Roen-Gackt collaboration design. Nomura sure loves Gackt, lol. So Isa was considered important enough to get a lot of care put into his new outfit. This collaboration was probably done a long time in advance, like with FFVersus XIII. I’m sure Isa’s backstory was supposed to be WAY more fleshed out so that his character would make a MUCH stronger impression on the player by the end of KH3. So, the outfit was kinda wasted in a way. Isa’s whole character was just wasted potential, though.

In a room made of white marble, a large mirror reflected Demyx as he prepared to leave for the mission. He took particular care with his hairstyle, painstakingly manipulating the brown strands with a comb to make them stand straight up. Saïx observed him from behind with what appeared to be distaste. In stark contrast to Demyx, Saïx left his long blue hair unstyled. The X-shaped scar on his forehead was all the style he needed.

Having an outfit based on a J-pop star might tell us something about how Nomura originally viewed Isa’s personality. He actually seemed like a rather fashionable young man who took pride in his appearance. He even wore stud earrings. His style was different from other kids like Hayner, Pence, or Lea. Saïx didn’t have any interest in his appearance. But Isa certainly seemed like the type to style his hair and then some. For some reason, I picture him ironically spending even MORE time in front of the mirror than Demyx. Especially post-KH3. Isa was already shy. I think he would probably struggle with insecurity over having a scar covering most of his face. So, he would try even harder to compensate with nice clothes and accessories.

The KH3 ending outfit really doesn’t fit someone like Saïx, who had such a harsh and dreary personality. I can’t see Saïx choosing to wear anything like that outfit. Way too youthful and trendy. And definitely not the star and moon accessory, either. He’d throw up at the cute little moon on Isa’s BBS outfit. Isa obviously was supposed to have such a different personality than Saïx. I bet Isa is going to be SUCH an awkward character going forward, because they’ll feel obligated to keep his Saïx personality traits, which will clash so badly with the rest of his character. He’ll be this pseudo-villain/quasi-good guy that just will feel so out of place in a series like this. It breaks my heart.

A great number of Nobodies have lost human form, as have the Heartless. Yet the Nobody born of someone with a strong heart retains its shape, with but the faintest visible changes.

As far as the rest of his design goes, I thought it was pretty lazy. In my opinion, Isa’s character design needed much more of an update than what he got. Kairi looked more different after her haircut than Isa did in the ending. If anyone deserved to look different for KH3, it was him. But…he still looked almost exactly like Saïx to me. He has a bit more color to his hair and face, and his scar is faded. But that’s about it. Which I guess was intentional. Why bother changing his look? It seems like they gave up on whatever plan they originally had for Isa to be his own character who was totally distinct from Saïx. They’re gonna just pretend that he wasn’t Norted and treat him like he was the same as Axel. Which sucks.

Axel and Riku get along very well somehow. Since Riku has become a figure of Ansem, I don’t speak much with him, but he laughs like a different person when he eats Ice cream with Axel. Axel says he “Laughs to face bad feelings”, but it seems that Riku isn’t a bad person. At that Axel said ‘don’t laugh when you’ve got a gross face’, but Riku didn’t seem all that annoyed.

Also, Axel really liked sea-salt ice cream. You’ve eaten sea salt ice cream ever since you moved to that house. I wonder how you don’t break your stomach! It felt like he ate them to an unthinkable extent. Axel ate so much ice cream that the freezer in the computer room emptied every day.

Now as a villain, Saïx had a very cool design. He was handsome and had long hair, but...he looked mean and scary. He was supposed to. He WAS mean and scary. He was Xemnas’ right-hand man, after all. And if he was Norted, this makes sense. He was envisioned as a sociopathic guy who has bouts of uncontrollable bloodlust when exposed to moonlight. I like Saïx’s design. He was pale and almost vampire-looking? Or maybe Addam’s family. He was created as a bad guy. The whole idea was that he was a scary, unapproachable dude. He was sinister and creepy. Yet ironically his original self was the polar opposite. It made for a pretty cool twist, IMO.

“…Aw, is it good?” Axel teased. “Seriously, you’re like a little kid. Even though you look like a mean old man.” Riku made no response, keeping his gaze fixed on the computer screen. The comment did rub him the wrong way. But mentally, Axel was definitely older than him by at least a little. Not that you could tell from looking.

They were clearly going for a VERY different vibe with Isa. When I first played BBS, I thought that the visual difference between Isa and Saïx was extremely noticable. Isa looked a lot softer, sweeter and more friendly. The idea behind Saïx's design was: harsh and scary. The idea of a cute bunny rabbit representing his personality was supposed to be absurd. Saïx would be utterly disgusted if he was seen as “cute”. But the idea behind Isa's design was: cute and innocent. And Isa was indeed a little cutie. And he was innocent, too.

Saïx: We'll ensure he receives the maximum punishment.

Axel: Okay, since you worked really hard today, you get a reward.

Saïx’s Casual Gear is called “Dessert Time,” but the localization named it “Just Desserts", and I thought that was very clever. To get one’s just desserts means to receive the appropriate punishment for one's actions. But sea-salt ice cream is supposed to be a treat to reward someone who did a good job.

Saïx gave him a cruel grin. “You will lose everything!” And then the Claymore pierced Axel’s chest.

Saïx rarely smiles because he is cold and cruel. But he would smile when he’s giving Axel his just desserts.

“But sweet!” Lea added, and Isa smiled a bit. That was rare for him. Well, eating ice cream together, talking about silly stuff, laughing together—it was just what friends did.

Isa rarely smiles because he’s shy. But he would smile when he’s eating ice cream with Lea because he has a sweet tooth and loves dessert. It was such a cool idea. I loved it.

dichotomy

1. a division or contrast between two things that are or are represented as being opposed or entirely different.

2. the phase of the moon in which half its disk appears illuminated

Saïx’s Pandora Gear is called “Dichotomy” in the localization. Saïx had weapons called Lunatic, Berserker and Werewolf. The weapon representing his real personality is a bunny rabbit. The HUGE difference between Isa and Saïx was the whole point. My impression was that BBS wanted to emphasize as much as possible that Isa and Saïx were two very different people. And character design was one way they chose to do that. That dichotomy is what made Isa so interesting to me. If you want to make Isa his own character, you should go with a different character design, in my opinion.

“You’re in a pretty good mood,” Axel remarked. Riku glanced up.

“Seeing Sora just made you that happy, huh?”

“I don’t feel like telling you.” A little smile crossed Riku’s lips as he took another bite.

“Y’know, it’s creepy when you smile with that guy’s face,” Axel said dryly, following suit and nibbling on his own ice cream.

Silence fell over the room. He paused in his munching to stare hard at Riku, then finally asked, “What is Sora to you?”

The question caught Riku off guard. He groped for words. On the sofa opposite him, Naminé spoke up instead. “Sora and Riku are best friends.”

Like Terra, Isa was supposed to be cursed. Being Norted is no joke. That’s what a lot of the Beauty and the Beast parallels were about. Axel started teasing Riku for his ugly ass face the same time they were trying to figure out the organization’s next move. They were going to target those with strong hearts, and the Beast was one of those targets.

Belle nodded and silently walked out of the room. The trio went after her. The Beast was left alone with no company but the moonlight.

“You’re really just going to give up on everything now?” Sora said all at once. But the Beast only stared up at the moon.

Isa was supposed to be just as cursed as Riku was in KH2. And Riku changing his appearance fit perfectly with Lea and Isa’s story. Axel said Riku was creepy when he smiled with that face, and unfortunately that’s kind of how “Isa” made me feel in the KH3 ending. Since they took away the possession angle, I didn’t really see him as Isa. He still felt like Saïx to me. And seeing Saïx play and smile like that was kinda unsettling. And weird.

Axel’s eyes crinkled as he remembered his own best friend—the only friend he’d ever had, in fact.

“If your best friend goes away, you’re sad, and if you get to be with them, you’re happy,” Naminé added. “Isn’t that how it is, Axel?”

“…That’s about the size of it.” Axel nodded and sat down on the remaining empty sofa, staring at the sea-salt ice cream he held.

“So you are capable of sincerity,” said Riku.

Axel only shrugged at the jab and finished his ice cream pop.

Probably for this very reason, I could tell that Nomura wanted to take a different direction with Isa’s character design after he decided to make him a good guy and Lea’s best friend. You can see what Nomura had in mind for an adult Isa based on his illustrations of Saïx for 358/2 Days and KH2FM+. He looks different than he did in his vanilla KH2 concept art. His features lean a lot more heavily toward Isa in BBS. I really wished KH3 went in this direction with his updated character design. He looks much more youthful here, like Axel does. Also, I loved the fact that his scar was gigantic. It went all the way from the top of his forehead to the bottom of his nose. In KH3, they stuck with the old Saïx design, so his scar was a lot smaller. I like the bigger scar because it really shows that he was treated like a human lab rat (of course that idea was scrapped, anyways).

Beside the Beast, who had once been a handsome prince, stood a man in a black cloak. “It’s time you dealt with the girl. She’s scheming to take everything you have,” said Xaldin, his hood pulled low to hide his face. “Your castle, your treasures…and then your very life.” The Beast hung his head. His castle was a desolate place, ruled by a monster.

“Trust no one. Feed your anger. Only rage will keep you strong!”

“I’ve had enough of strength. There’s only one thing I want…” The Beast gazed, unmoving, at the glass bell jar around a single red rose.

What he wanted was—

“Hah,” Xaldin spat. “To love and be loved in return? Who could ever love a beast?” The Beast whirled again, his cape rippling. He glared and let out a roar of fury.

“Good. Let your anger rise!” With that, Xaldin vanished.

Axel didn’t really see his best friend when he looked at Saïx. He felt like Isa went away and Saïx took his place. His relationship with Saïx was based on his memories of the past. He self-medicated with ice cream to cope. It was heartbreaking. After the scene where Axel was sad about his best friend going away, the chapter about the Beast’s Castle begins, describing him as a formerly handsome prince. So on that basis, I wish there was more visual differentiation between Isa and Saïx. Most of the fandom is just going to see Isa as the same mean old Saïx since there was no attempt to differentiate Isa’s personality from Saïx’s personality and they look exactly the same, too.

“I don’t trust you,” Saïx replied flatly, the enormous Claymore in his hand.

“Traitors like you deserve to lose everything,” Saïx said.

Saïx gave him a cruel grin. “You will lose everything!”

They originally wanted Isa to have a distinct personality and appearance from Saïx—a lot more than just a new outfit. Isa was supposed to be a beautiful love interest cursed into being a beast. In the novel you can tell that Xigbar and Xaldin were pressuring Saïx to eliminate Axel. He was reluctant to do so on his own. Xigbar doubted whether he was even looking for Axel. Just like with the Beast, they were manipulating him to think Axel had been plotting to take everything from him. Deep down Saïx probably felt similar to the Beast. Like nobody could ever love him in his condition. I think that’s why he was so furious. Axel grew a heart, and then left him. But the only reason Axel grew a heart was because he remembered his feelings for Isa. It was a really cool idea. It's just a shame it never came to fruition.

#kh saix #kh isa #kingdom hearts #kh meta

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shadowsong26fic · 5 years

Note

yo tell me about Shamie, any universe

So, the difficulty here was in coming up with ten facts you don’t already know…XD

Anyway!

Ten Things About Shamie, applicable primarily to their usual canon-aligned timeline (as opposed to Valdemar AU or one of the ones where Mirah acquires them as an adult), though some of these apply to any and all versions.

For those of you who don’t know, Shamie is one of Zeb and Kallus’s four kids. They’re a former pickpocket/street urchin, the third by adoption order, probably the second-oldest, and Human. In modern-day Earth terms, they're agender. They grow up to be a priest in a faith devoted to a sun/fire deity that I still need to name.

Putting the actual list behind a cut because. Uh. I got wordy?

Ask me about my characters!

They’re not technically a feral child, in that they weren’t, like, Raised By Wolves or anything. But both of their birth parents were out of the picture by the time they were two (I think their biological father was possibly gone before they were born, but not 100% sure on that), and then they were on their own for about six months when they were around five or six, and then for about a year until Zeb found them when they were around nine.

I’m not 100% sure who looked after them between two and five, but it’s probably a similar sort of situation to the old woman who looked after Stef before that one Bard found him? I.e., looked after their physical needs/wasn’t especially cruel or kind, but mostly used them as a prop for begging, etc. Anyway, whoever this person was, Shamie’s memories of them are pretty vague and sort of neutral

So, basically, while their social skills are wildly inconsistent, their basic physical milestones were more or less met/language and communication development is more or less on track, and they have enough of a foundation to catch up where they’re lacking.

(Yes, yes, I know this is a thing that tends to get handwaved for the sake of Story all the time, and I’m still doing a certain amount of that, but there’s a limit, at least for me.)

Their original home planet was pretty far away from its star, and therefore lighting tends to be pretty dim or super artificial or both (though there was geothermal heating that gave it a naturally fairly moderate temperature range). Which is probably another reason they gravitated towards a sun/fire deity.

They’re pretty good at reading people/intent; so when they spot Zeb trying to figure out a way to break into whatever he needs to break into, they immediately peg him as Dangerous But Not An Active Threat/Not Scary and keep an eye on him from a distance.

…which probably means they figured out what he was up to and offered to help, rather than him spotting them picking someone else’s pocket and approaching them.

The fact that they then attempted to negotiate price (not…very well, they don’t really have much concept of long-range planning or how to save up or whatever at this point, so fifty credits seems like A Lot to them and that’s where they start, but they made a Spirited Attempt) is probably about 30% of why Zeb decided to keep them.

(Though, initially, Zeb actually kind of encouraged them to disappear/run off after they handed over the passkey he needed, because Let’s Not Get A Small Civilian Child Shot Today Okay That’s Bad.)

(Shamie considered doing that for a minute, but stuck around for reasons that are still fuzzy in my brain, and that just kind of cemented things.)

(Still the best text message conversation when he gets in touch with Alex about maybe bringing home Kid #3

(Also his mission report on the subject: “Did not in fact get the Small Child shot. Go me.”)

So, the way training for priests work in their faith, is that they go to seminary for about three years, and then are sent out as a junior priest for a sort of apprenticeship/internship, which usually lasts anywhere from one to five years. Pretty much every priest takes on a junior at least once over the course of their career. Depending on the kind of career track the junior priest is set upon, their mentor could be in a variety of positions/career stages, though usually the super high-ranked priests don’t take on juniors anymore, and the full priest is generally at least ten years past their own internship. Anyway, all this background to say that Shamie ends up mentoring probably at least three or four junior priests over the course of their career, including one of their ex’s kids.

(Generally, there’s a transition period when an older priest is retiring, especially for priests on the community rather than administrative/political track. This is sometimes, but not always done with an internship, which is how things worked out for Shamie. Their mentor, I think I’ve possibly mentioned, is a Togruta who in my head is played by Maggie Smith.)

They never quite grow to like the heavy snows/storms/how Cold things get in certain seasons (ask them about that time their generator shorted out during a storm and they had to go out and reboot it), but a) it’s still not as bad as Hoth, and b) the view–both of the higher peaks and of the valley below–and the sense of open space/freedom/nature/what have you make the weather patterns absolutely worth putting up with.

Once they got used to the altitude, they made a habit of trying to take one day a week to go hiking. Not so much for the scenery, but because there’s a particular contemplative state they get to when it’s just them and the mountain and the flora and fauna, etc.

(They technically serve a group of about four or five mountain towns, along with the surrounding rural area; their base town/where they actually live is roughly central, altitude-wise, and about as high as Machu Picchu.)

They tend to wear their hair in pretty feminine-coded styles, because they like them better. Probably part of why they let Orryn braid their hair so often. Most of the rest of their presentation is pretty mixed, at least until they’re ordained–their faith doesn’t really have gender differences in standard clerical wear.

While there’s pretty much nothing that they flat-out won’t eat (except that one thing they’re allergic to, or otherwise known to be toxic for humans/obviously spoiled/etc.), they don’t really like sweets/overly sweet things, as a rule.

While they’re pretty phlegmatic/chill about most things, there are a Few Things that genuinely get to them:

They have a Thing about arson.

And a related Thing about not being able to find/get to an exit.

Slugs or anything else that leaves a wet/sticky trail.

Or, like, sticky things in general tend to squick them out a bit. They don’t mind most other types of mess but if it’s sticky it’s Gross.

They really, really don’t like anything that obstructs their hands/fingers–took them a while to even get used to wearing gloves, and that’s mostly because the choice between Gloves and Frostbite.

(They tend to type one-handed, too; pretty much any task that can be done one-handed, they prefer to keep their other hand free Just In Case.)

Apparently, their biological father may have been a clone???

This will probably not be at all relevant since their birth parents aren’t super relevant in general but yeah it’s a Thing.

(…I mean. Assuming the clones weren’t engineered to be sterile, which is possible but I don’t think ever explicitly stated and also this is interesting.)

Also, I’m not sure anyone actually figures it out, unless Shamie has genetic testing done to check for potential issues moving forward–they possibly take more after their mother, appearance-wise (and they’re definitely Taller and Ganglier than any of the clones as an adult), plus there were a lot of weird environmental factors in their early childhood so ::shrug emoji::.

#asked #answered #tigerkat24 #shadowsong writes star wars #shadowsong writes self-indulgent bs #meme

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yawmanzo · 5 years

Text

Yaws Personal Reflection on Touka Kirishima

I'd like to start of with this quote by Touka in the novels.

“What the hell do you know? It's all because I can't eat, because I could become a target at any time, all because I'm a ghoul! No matter how much I try, there's a wall I can never jump over, and there's happiness I can never have. But I'm still hanging on to life. Despite it all”

Followed by this from part 1.

And of course this from Yomo.

As you can see there’s a pattern, and if I wanted to I could indulge you with a fuckton more Touka quotes/panels to further exemplify these, but I digress because I ramble too much and words alone aren’t enough to truly encapsulate everything in its entirety😒.

Alrighty then, let’s get this long rambling journey started! I dub thee:

“Strength in weakness and Weakness in strength”

What makes Touka such an interesting character for me in terms of her writing is that there’s a lot of nuances to her that make her so fascinating to read. Because of these elements, I feel as though leads to a general misconception/misunderstanding of her character in favor of either completely overlooking or simply dismissing them and marking them as purely simplistic and well… not important/uninteresting. I for one believe that there lies a profound complex simplicity and simple complexity of sorts to a lot of these nuances that can be very easy to miss, but are of crucial note to consider, most especially the subtleties to her growth in :re alongside many important thematic elements of the story, other characters and herself.

Adjacent with this is her own personality, decisiveness , selflessness and immense sheer mental fortitude in the face of adversity; living while losing things, moving forward with the little they have, in the hopes of gaining as little or as much as they can towards a peaceful world where such a thing is virtually taboo for ghouls and humans trapped in the bird cage.

Additionally is her journey being the opposite to Kaneki, wherein he became more ghoul like than human in pursuit of strength (since human is normally denoted as weak). Meanwhile Touka underwent an opposite journey in which she became more human like than ghoul, and there’s a fine dichotomy/conflict for balance between the two that we see with the tribulations faced in the story. In other words strength in weakness (Ghoul- human) and weakness in strength (Human-ghoul) and the various connotations.

Moreover is the conflict she herself feels as a ghoul in viewing herself as a monster, thus wanting to be more human,

even when others view her in a different light in conjunction with the earlier harsh actions she would make for the sake of her survival and of others.

We even see how she saves Kaneki numerous times when she didn't really have any obligation to do so in the beginning after considering his own plight in the world as a half ghoul with no place to belong to via Yoshimuras explanation. It’s due to her caring nature that on the surface comes off as very “hard” due to the exterior she puts up as a result of the life she’s lived.

Special mention to when he almost ate Hide after fighting Nishki in his starving state and her stepping in,

thus saving the both of them, something that made Hide very grateful towards her for. (And Hide being hype wing man since chapter 1)

And although her threatening to kill Hide and Kimi in relation to their human relations with Kaneki and Nishki comes across as very cruel, its also due to the volatile position that they have in human society as ghouls for security and safety.

For all intents of purposes, their safety takes preference, and we see how this does change in her being able to trust them with their secret, because it’s a risky one that could lead to them losing everything.

Which as we know, that level of trust didn't exactly work out too well for her and Ayato as little kids that forced them to fend for themselves in the world.

There are several instances where she does come across as real vicious and as Kaneki says “scary”, but also very caring in her own way during many stages of part 1 when he needed someone the most in the world, which is something he remains eternally grateful to her for in his life. She provided that foundation for him in the ghoul world.

As Uta mentions, she's continuously walking a very tight rope between both worlds and there's a constant struggle faced with everything that she deals with in which she simply cannot afford even the tiniest of slips.

What Touka has wanted from the beginning is a chance at a normal peaceful life, away from the violent lifestyle she was forced into as a ghoul, and all the battles and killings she has had to partake in.

Her envy for the life that humans live, her hatred for herself in being a ghoul yet longing for peace and understanding between both species are ones that continuously drive her character forward. ([x]- @encase great explanation of this!)

It’s always been the characters of a set case between her and Kaneki as stated earlier. Kaneki a former human was forced into the ghoul world yet was already living a violent and miserable human lifestyle. While Touka lived a harsh ghoul life which initially had somewhat of a human like upbringing with Arata and Ayato, before that life was lost. There's also her curiosity in wanting to learn more and be a part of the human world. (@wishes-upon-dreams has lots of good novel shots!)

These are two symbolic thematic attributes of Tokyo Ghoul between these two alone, and all the complications that come with it.

Another worthy line from her in the novels is wherein she and Kaneki make human food for Touka to give to her friend Yoriko after a misunderstanding they had.

Touka remarks on Kaneki attempting to taste the food whilst being aware that he's no longer a full human anymore. Kaneki admits that in the moment that fact was lost on him due to how the food looked and of course him wistfully remembering being able to eat and taste all these types of foods. She comments on which scenario is worse between the two: one who's lost an ability, or one who never had the ability to begin with.

“Who has it worse- someone who was never equipped with a function, or someone who had it and lost it?”

AKA Kaneki losing his ability to eat human food, and Touka never having the ability to eat human food.

Well at least her pregnancy later on gave that nice little cake development parallel.

So... a lot tend to dismiss her as too weak or bland of a character, or how her relationship with Kaneki stripped away her own “independent” character. In other words, her role of importance got reduced. Which… yeah there were times that her appearances got sidelined and so forth in us not seeing her as much. But I'll mention that briefly later with regards to Ishidas writing style with some of his characters.

Firstly, with the “independence” part… a characters relations they have with others doesn’t make them weak that goes concurrently with their very own distinct development. (obviously depending on the circumstances mind you and how its established)

In fact the narrative in TG shows how taking things up solely alone leads to more suffering and increased burden that ultimately comes crashing down towards said character without the bonds they form with others. (Eg Kanekis main flaw that Touka opposes with selfish V selfless that she explicitly exposes him for in part 1 with the bridge scene) Note that there are semblances that both invoke and affect each with in a complementary/similar yet opposing way that I've talked about before in the Touken reflection.

Kaneki takes everyone's burdens by himself in order to protect them, but he's not really the selfless martyr he thinks he is. They never asked for his protection, in fact they want to help and be with him, but he's terrified of losing them, thus opting to shoulder all their burdens. He pushed them away and avoided them in order to protect them, AKA Hide and Touka. In doing so it hurts both sides immensely in not being able to really save the other.

Touka can not only see a bit of Arata and Ayato (soldier of Aogiri) in Kaneki with regards to the whole pursuit of power and strength by waging war and advancing violence to protect, but also a bit of herself in some her own actions done to protect those she cares about that they themselves did not ask for. She hits the nail right on the coffin with him because she knows how he is, because she has that affect on him.

This is seen in the novels to an extent with her fighting off students that made fun of Yoriko. Yoriko mentioned that she didn't want Touka to do that for her even though it hurt her. The situation simply just made her more sad, along with Yorikos own lack of self worth in feeling like she was a burden to Touka.

When Touka partakes in her revenge against Mado and the doves for killing Ryouko in order to protect Hinami

a similar thing happens (which wasn't all violence as seen by her trying to give misinformation to the CCG and stir attention away from them).

Hinami laments that she never wanted revenge, but was rather just sad. In both instances Touka doesn't understand why her protecting them through those means was wrong at first, but we see how it affects her in each case with regards to the feelings of those she cares about.

Touka mentions Ayatos reluctance in not wanting to learn more about human society and wanting to safely protect him when it's the same human society that led to their parents demise and one that is systematically established to kill them . After all, humans are just food to them as ghouls, and ghouls are monsters to them right?

With these genuinely selfless actions and ideals, she realized how they pushed the people she cared about. Actually it's quite sad how Touka is always getting abandoned by those she cares about in her life, such as Hikari,Arata,Ayato,Kaneki, Hinami, Yoshimura, Irimi, Koma, Yoriko etc etc. Obviously each of these throughout her life have different factors to them through her own actions and those of others that led to being left alone and or tragically losing them.

Along with this is generally her struggle in communicating/expressing her true feelings towards others through words alone which can often lead to ironic misunderstandings in the moment that she regrets many times.

(which is a trait she shares with Yomo and Ayato).

“I'm really bad at sorting out my feelings, and although I try to put up a good front, I'm incredibly immature, and I hate that about myself”-Touka

Man the novels really are such gems with extra insight to her character. In essence you can show how she does have good intentions. She really doesn't want to lose more of her loved ones and be alone, unless it involves letting go in certain situations and considerations.

I’m not necessarily justifying her relapse in actions here, but you can see just how pissed off she got with Kanekis tragic heroism vendetta

,that and well the man straight up lied about not leaving her alone. (thanks Hide for the chin tip).

Yes Kaneki does genuinely want to “protect” his loved ones,

but he's doing it all wrong in never even considering their own feelings in regard to his whole quest and them being unable to help him, hence being selfish and not wanting to be alone himself. As we see, it’s something he eventually realizes due to Touka’s effect on him.

(which is another thing that both share, fear of being alone that they express differently yet similarly) Cool how the whole rabbit motif is used to exemplify this too, since they can die from loneliness due to the strong relationship bonds they form.

Doing everything alone is a constant no no in TG. Cough Kenny boy, rely on your loved ones, they love you. Though we see how and why he and many others in the story become that way with the whole “you're weak and lack of ability” perception for power and strength. It’s very understandable for many of these characters and it’s quite profound with the many layers to it aside from just the physical that at times come across as very contradictory. “Weakness in strength and strength in weakness”

Tangent, but this also goes in conjunction with Uries development in overcoming that very same flaw he had himself to where he realized it faster than Kaneki did.

And of course the whole point of the dragon arc to show that people, in other words everyone (ghouls and humans) HAVING to rely on each other to combat a common threat and achieve coexistence when needed to even with the flawed prejudiced nature of the human world towards ghoul kind.

Anyways, back to Touka chan.

I really do not believe Touka to be a “weak” character. In fact she’s very strong in her own way since there’s many different types of “strength” and complexities to many of these characters. One who’s strength does not solely rely on her physical abilities or quick thinking/hard work (I mean hell she caught up to years of school at a late age almost gearing up to go to Kamii university which is for proper smart students whilst working at Ainteku). And of course her curiosity on learning more about the world with regards to humans and ghouls that she later instilled in a rather practical sentimental manner as an “advisory” figure.

Ya’ll remember when she was basically hood AF in the streets with that underground ghoul dialect?

By the way holy hell she can speak two languages, that's pretty dope. Except for those skills in Japanese literature... lol that’s just a Rip😂

Point being there are many different testaments of complexity and strength she possess as her own character away from just “the physical”.

Growth

Touka’s character matures and grows a lot in :re becoming more passive, cool headed and wiser as the manager of :re. Like when I first read :re bruh, I was always like “woah this is Touka now? Damn she's changed so much” (and got more thicc)

even with some of her distinct traits still being there… Like her blunt and direct 0 fucks teasing sass, I love me some sass. She definitely lived up to Aintekus legacy and then some with Yoshimuras influence.

She valued the importance of peacekeeping as manager of :re, and its implied that her, Yomo and Nishki performed those roles, similar to how Yoshimura did with the bits of informants they had from others as well.

She became not just more empathetic but generally more sympathetic to an extent, understanding and kind towards others most especially those that wronged her, those she cares about and those she herself has hurt in the past. We see this time and time again.

Few examples include her giving Shinohara the flowers

tying into her forgiveness arc with Arata, the violent CCG perpetual cycle in general, and also got tied in with Juuzou

which got referenced as a point of contention for their characters during their encounter underground.

We see this with Shuu and her explanation for why cafe :re exists as an homage to Ainteku for humans and for ghouls to feel safe in (the spiritual home of coexistence) , as well as a place for Kaneki to return home to, as Yoshimura once wished for with Eto.

Touka prioritizes his well being and happiness over hers, even with the flawed situation wherein they both care about Kaneki in their own way and have differing viewpoints.

Shuu admits to Touka that she’s right in him being an egotist, alongside seeing her point of view when he fights Haise.

Touka also admits that she understands where Shuu is coming from, because she does desire for Kaneki to be with them.

Both parties raise valid points in their own way since they do genuinely care, however the difference in intent further shows that selfless nature of Touka in waiting for Kaneki to come back when HE needs to, not by forcing him when Haise had the whole Haise/Kaneki memory personality conflict that he needed to resolve himself that we see in the Rosewald and Cochlea arcs.

It’s also interesting to note how Kaneki in part 1 distanced himself to protect her from the ghoul world whilst being aware that she as a ghoul can never truly live with just being solely in the human world and the dangers that it possesses in it’s own right towards ghouls.

In :re she means for him not be brought back into the ghoul world due to his suffering in it for so long in order to protect his well being and happiness.

Yet the human world he lives in the CCG is also categorized by violence, suffering and conflict that Haise/Kaneki gets further thrown into. Plus we see how Shuu himself feels about that world due to what happened with his own family in their battle against CCG and Kaneki/Haise being a ghoul investigator. Both cases show how genuine and flawed these motives are, yet also painting the feelings they have in caring for the other in their own distinct ways that's not as straightforward black and white. “Selfish V Selfless”

She forgives her brother Ayato because she understood him to an extent with his faults (not that she ever harbored hatred for him in the first place because she loves him).

Touka sees why he did the things he did because. He wanted to become stronger in Aogiri and protect her, even though he hurt her, as Kaneki exposed to him in their fight. Cue 103 god damn bones.

“Does it hurt? I think Touka chan experienced more pain than that”- Kaneki

Yeah nah... That’s just tough😂 Later on we see how Ayato took this to heart by taking on the Black Rabbit persona in order to lure CCG investigators away from Touka, thus clearing her tracks.

With this she goes to assure him with sincerity in directing him in the right path moving forward despite everything, thus mending their complicated sibling relationship in their own Tsundere Kirishima way.

She gives Kaneki his will to live through her loyal love, influence and support spanning years and years of waiting with the undying faith she possesses towards those she cares about and to him. Not that she had to herself anyway since Kaneki always held her on such a high level of importance in his life throughout the whole story with ALL his personalities and their whole evolutionary dynamic as a whole.

That's another thing about her, that fierce faith is truly special despite the instances it isn’t rewarded.

I mean when this man was on the verge of losing everything and giving in on his plan to die in style, the thought of her and everyone else dying kept him going along with the Hide inner monologue during the Arima fight.

“It may not be stylish, but live”

She allows Goat and the lost ghouls (including the Aogiri children) to use cafe :re as their safety hideout away from CCG, that has CCG members themselves (AKA 0 squad). Once again reinforcing that spiritual home of coexistence.

Side note- another cool tidbit is seeing Toukas natural maternal instincts with children, something we saw bits of with Hinami and Ayato in part 1 as well as the novels.

Her taking care of the ghoul children with Hinami and reading to them were always super adorable to see in also foreshadowing her as a mother and just generally a very kind caring person which she's always been at heart.

Next big demonstration of her growth we see is the convo with Amon in which they both come to a mutual understanding of the circumstances that forced their actions in such a cruel world of kill or be killed.

alongside her offering advice to him about going to see Akira in relation to her feelings about Kaneki.

Then there’s the Akira convo with Hinami: which remains one of my favorites indications of how much she’s developed from part 1 (also because of how similar Touka and Akira are in many ways... I love em). Chapter 120 was one of the first major steps towards seeing how these characters can break the human/ghoul violent perpetual cycle with general empathy and even sympathy to an extent as difficult as it may be. To instill hope into their world, where all they knew was hopeless continuous bloodshed.

Being able to confront Akira directly with what happened, not being focused on continuing the cycle of revenge.

Going on to showcase some semblance of being able to relate with her own experiences and of their fathers in painting the cruel intricate nature of both sides in regards to the actions they take- be it survival, revenge, power to protect, or all the above. Thus slowly shifting Akira’s ingrained beliefs and perspective to it’s core.

It's interesting how Ishida mentioned inspiration from a war documentary applied in the reconciliation between Akira and Hinami , and Touka was the one that initiated that through her development and teachings from others and her own life experiences.

(Shout to Sen for the translations! @kenkamishiro)

Mind you this was a VERY complicated and tough situation wherein those wounds aren’t somehow magically healed between them, but at the very least the continuous cycle of vengeance was subverted in order to move forward.

She's often seen as a very forgiving person towards others in :re, too forgiving at times actually, which is one of her biggest strengths and weaknesses. Or that she doesn't “fight hard” enough and let's go too easily. But one can also see why she's like that, mainly due to the priorities she sets and well… she ain't got time to dwell on things like revenge, war and violence anymore even if it's completely warranted and justified. She's seen and experienced first hand what that does to herself and others time and time again. She knows the script and prioritizes moving forward away from that, even if it hurts her and them having to constantly pick and choose in the process.

As long as a situation of conflict can be resolved in any way, they'll continue to live and survive in the world. Mental fortitude is a big strength of hers when it comes to pressing forward in the face of adversity.

It’s even more notable to notice this development when looking back at the violent, angsty and tragic harsh life she lived as a ghoul with Ayato from childhood towards their teens years. After all it's a kill or be killed world, one where the strong take from the weak, and the weak are the ones that perish.

That and how viciously she lashed out at others, herself and the world through violence and rage due to that bloody ghoul lifestyle. The hard harsh exterior, soft kind interior continuously interchanged, intertwined and crossed several thresholds.

Highkey nice heavy parallel to Hikari and Arata though. As Yomo mentioned, Hikari used to be quite savage back when she was younger until she calmed down later on in life with her family, and where Arata was a really kind pacifist type ghoul, her death led to him later becoming a “monster” out of revenge that resulting in his downfall. In many ways also applying to both Touka and Kaneki with their own unique divergences. And of course the parallels between Ayato and Yomo in regards to their respective pursuits for strength and revenge.

“The world is power, let’s use power to decide who’s superior. Careless idiot. You are weak. So you lose. Just like father.”- Ayato

“Who is the strongest? I fucking am”- Kaneki

“...I want to become strong”- Yomo

“I also need to get stronger”- Touka

“Strength in weakness and weakness in strength”

“Strength” and “power” as a whole is extremely intricate, with all the different types of it in its many variations/forms that come with their own respective advantages and disadvantages.

So many of these different attributes and aspects we see to be something that many characters in the story come to admire from Touka as a person, a ghoul , sister, friend, wife and manager of :re/ fellow leader of GOAT along with Kaneki and right hand man Shuu.

Sure Ishida could have definitely utilized and actually showcased more scenes with her doing things in which we could see a lot of this development/moments onscreen, especially the first half of :re (as a matter of fact I’d be on the first train to destination MORE TOUKA STUFF AND WRITING EMPHASIS PLEASE)

But one can also deduce the salient impact of her smaller scale actions/motivations that attribute to the plot, many characters and the very essence of the story thematically and even that of her character. A phrase I always use to describe that belief is “Yo Touka is doing bits” which basically means how those moments may seem really minuscule at first, but are actually very meaningful.

This also includes her evolving personality from part 1 as a consequence of the melancholic and painful stoic adverse nature of the world that genuinely did affect her for many years on end. There’s also kind of parallel with her really. Second half of part 1 Touka scenes weren’t as much in favor of Kaneki and other characters development, but they were very impactful in their own moments, in contrast to the first half of :re with a similar sentiment.

Plus I mean well, one can see how much Ishida struggled with writing his main cast of characters in :re with part 1 characters and side characters with some getting more development/ specific writing priority over others in different fashions alongside MANY plot points and concepts. That and yes several plot points and character interactions with her did get dropped in the story/didn't get as much development on screen as they should have, which mind you isn't just exclusive to her character alone like in the case of several others. One little missed opportunity is the Yoriko reunion that didn't happen on screen which was really unfortunate as that would have been so emotional to see for them both, (and me since I kept waiting for it)

But at least she saw her wedding with Bujin to make sure she was ok

and them reuniting offscreen during the end time skip was good. Ichika loving aunty Yorikos bread and Mucchans apples is a blessing, so thank goodness for that.

And yes there's a lot of other stuff that could be mentioned as well that would have been great to see onscreen, but eh what can you do.

While many favor her character in part 1, which is fair because my god she was fire AF🔥

it’s also important to notice all the subtle factors that led to her personality and growth shifting the way it did from a teenager to young adult whilst still maintaining her distinct “Touka” traits (then again I love her in everything so😅). That’s the whole point of it, to show how people change in life, what would be the point if she remained the exact same as part 1 in terms of writing?

Again, different strokes for different folks, but I personally appreciate both depictions and find them very fascinating in their own rights especially with their flaws that continuously kept me glued to her character even with the discrepancies in screen time.

In other words, I find her journey very interesting to read and interpret, particularly since there’s a lot of writing cues to her in favor of being designated in deciphering rather than explicitly stated in all lines of text and dialogue. Perhaps that’s the main issue with some aside from the whole her not being shown as much? The fact that a lot of the writing is nuanced in several ways and not as right in your face with text panels/ inner monologues and inner character thoughts emphasized and fleshed out? Either way, those visual cues/elements of show don’t tell and at times “less equals more” being implemented in the story are ones that always make me so passionate about her character. To ascertain her thoughts, feelings, actions and motivations when the narrative doesn’t state it as right in your face but rather deduced through the already established notions and elements that are set/keep getting set.

I have no idea if I’m making sense😑

But yeah that’s how I see it. Like something as simple as her just not saying anything, or words being omitted in favor of emphasis being placed on subtle visual representation in a panel just makes me want to always see more of her and decipher her thoughts without her even having to state all of them outwardly. This conveyance without the need of many words (which don’t get me wrong would be greatly appreciated in many instances!) doesn’t really hinder her as boring to me, rather very intriguing, but again each to their own you know?

Continuing on her desire to be with those she loves and not be alone, in other words to gain as much as she can with the little available while losing things. She told Ayato the same sentiment which can ESPECIALLY be meant for Kaneki too.

“Rely on others for a change”

An aspect of her strength stems from her ability and strong personality in which she carries herself when all the odds are against her, and when she herself is very limited to what she can achieve by herself alone in the world, yet continues to fight either way. In other words… she’s realistic in seeing the world as it is with all ones flawed strengths and weaknesses in the face of the tribulations they face and the choices they must make for better or for worse, positive and negative. It also shows the priorities she places in fighting reactively, in other words when she HAS to or in regards to those she cares about where she would rather avoid using violence to solve conflicts in :re unless pressed to do so in response to something or when pressed.

Eg. Saving Shuu from CCG investigators that were on his ass.

The Kirishima family and Banjou squad Cochlea fights to save Hinami thanks to Kaneki’s aid.

Versus the Arima squad members

Sneaky sister save as mask 33.

and versus Arima himself (which honestly that's just a Rip for the whole family).

Being aided by Eto to push on forwards.

Fighting off Special class Kyoko Aura, Mougan and other CCG members with the other ghouls namely Yomo, Banjou, his squad and Hinami when they themselves were already fatigued. And of course protecting Ayato

showcasing her emerging two wings with that based Hikari Yomo lightning ⚡⚡

Later combining forces with Kaneki and 0 squad to escape.

Then there's her fight against Mutsuki that endangered not just her and Kanekis lives, but led to the destruction of :re. The whole shit underground wherein they got attacked whilst already starved and with little resources, forcing retaliation to survive.

And of course operation save Kenny and Tokyo with dragon. (Title drop)

That doesn’t necessarily make her “weak”, or one who doesn't do much fighting because she's a damsel, particularly when she’s PREGNANT from 128 to the 170s. She fights only when pushed to do so.

Again in 123-124 she held her own against Mutsuki (who’s very strong) when her cafe got destroyed by the oggai and kept her cool, suppressing her emotions when taunted with Yorikos fake “fate” in an attempt to get her all triggered (once more showing her development in :re as part 1 Touka would have definitely lashed out in justified rage)

We see she's clearly hurt by this in 124 despite her trying desperately to subvert that fact and not showcase that much emotion when Kaneki asks if she's ok. She's obviously not as another home/dream of hers got crushed, and its conveyed so effectively yet subdued without her even saying much via her vulnerable posture and her switching the subject to Hide in order to deal with her own feelings about Yoriko, but also that of how Kaneki felt about both Hide and Touka in this painful situation.

Both distanced themselves from their friends in order to protect them, yet yearned desperately to see them. Kaneki did the same with Touka and Hide, Touka did the same with Yoriko and Haise/Kaneki, and as was revealed via talking about Hide- was something he couldn't do anything about. Because if he thought about it, he'd just be consumed by the desire to see them again. Cue Akon “Lonely, I'm mister lonely” and them rooting like rabbits.

You can see how without even saying anything through her facial expressions how Touka feels,

She’s able to connect everything in regards to how they mutually feel the same about this with their friends and their own feelings for each other. Both were terrified of the other dying.

Which of course led to them finally being able to close that gap of loneliness and pain in which they made love and consummated their relationship.

Despite all the fuckery of the world around them, all the war that they were in, for just one moment they were finally able to experience happiness in the darkness that both had craved for so long with each other, and it speaks volumes to one of the most important and emotionally resonate symbolic messages of the series. Breaking the barrier between both worlds.

Ghoul-Human

Hell speaking about the unplanned pregnancy, let’s go back to the human esc journey. The narrative has explicitly explained the dangers of human food consumption for ghouls since the very beginning.

In her fight with Ayato, it’s clear how this type of lifestyle has considerably weakened her full ghoul potential in reference to her one Ukaku wing

and lack of that cold ghoul intensity she used to have as Shuu states.

As mentioned before, Ayato finds her wanting to be part of human society (that denotes weakness) to be idiotic and dangerous due to what happened with their parents and Arata’s upbringing.

Leading his pursuit for ghoul strength and hatred towards humans in Aogiri (which does change through his own development later on)

Yomo also criticized this during their training via her eating Yorikos food to fit in so much at school (novels and part 1)

and the Itori talk to Kaneki about the failures of ghoul-human hybrids which also gets referenced later with the flawed half humans.

Later we see Touka ask Kaneki about how Eto was kept alive with Yoshimura a ghoul father and Ukina a human mother. The difference of course is the reverse in the situation for a ghoul mother.

And of course Mutsuki’s taunting during their second big fight where Touka was at a clear disadvantage.

SHE KNOWS human food is bad for her body due to its weakening effect. It's been a reoccurring thing for her ever since her upbringing with Arata and what influenced her curiosity in wanting to understand humans and the world they live in. Simultaneously it’s almost like she herself is fighting against that known fact and still trying desperately to fit into some kind of normal human esc style of life as a ghoul when she knows she realistically can't.

To be able to enjoy things like cake, burgers and so forth when her ghoul body prohibits this. After all as ghouls they have no choice but to eat humans. Kaneki himself is even baffled by the lengths she would go just to uphold Yorikos feelings over her own. I mean she could easily just lie and not eat the food at all right?

And yet she still goes the extra mile to not only protect Yorikos feelings whilst endangering herself because she cares so much, but also fight against the notion of her being a ghoul to an almost foolish extent.

It’s why the whole “don’t die, push through me, live” as she’s forcing herself to eat human food to try save her unborn child Ichika is so powerful in contrast to the strong will by Ukina (a human) who actually can digest and cannibalize human meat for her hybrid child Eto.

For a ghoul to eat human food, is essentially like hell, and if she didn't, her body would naturally consume the foetus, furthermore adding to the perception of her being a monster by taking her own child's life. Her chance at becoming a mother and starting a family would be lost. That's why she’s willing to do anything to give her child even the faintest 1% chance of survival, regardless of how it may hurt and weaken her or how slim the possibilities of success are. [x- great commentary by @mamasaiko and @lilacflamesss !)

That’s why her becoming pregnant didn’t hinder her character to me, it restricted her full potential absolutely, but it also presented the opportunity to put her into extremely constrained dangerous scenarios wherein her immense fortitude and willpower would be tested to its limits with regards to her ability to always make choices, for better or for worse. Again it’s that strength we see numerous characters admire from her. The hybrid pregnancy is something that should be a very positive thing and very well is as with the whole hope and symbolic aspect of the series for some semblance of light in the darkness.

It presented the main core message of coexistence in breaking away from the tragic cycle that several characters looked towards, yet it was also one due to situation/wrong timing that added more struggles and tribulations to be faced. THAT’S THE CONFLICTING DILEMMA that was so damn enthralling and stressful AF to bear witness to!

Her being able to make tough choices time and time again whether she likes them or not. The underground alone had her being forced to lead the ghouls (including children) out of danger and leave her loved ones in order to protect herself, her unborn child and the lives of those ghouls. From Yomo,

to 0 squad,

to Hinami all in quick succession… SHE DOESN’T WANT to leave her loved ones, she hates doing that with them having to protect her and being abandoned. But in the situation it’s something she HAS to do by trusting them with that faith. In fact we see in her situation with Hinami how desperately she tries to aid her even with her weakened condition by getting all pissed off.

It was only when Hinami told her to go protect the children did she finally make that choice.

We don't even see her clouded facial expression or her thoughts, their blocked, which further adds the front she's trying so hard to put in order to remain strong and keep going even though we know it's absolutely killing her inside. She tries to reach out Hinami, but she knows she can't waste more time in hesitating with her decision given the situation, because if she did… well they'd all get fucked.

It's also quite poignant to note the arcs of both here. Hinami herself is still by all means a child of sorts, or rather a young adult protecting her older sister figure, as Touka did for her in part 1 and the novels.

Hinami's character development is one for strength and self worth, and it was depicted very beautifully yet sad with her monologue about her own perceived weakness she expressed to Ayato and how she viewed Touka and Kaneki in being a burden to them, hence seeking strength by joining Aogiri.

Hinami was able to fight side by side with Touka in her weakened condition, both watching each others backs.

Which is something that makes Touka proud in how much Hinami has grown, yet it also adds to the whole “living while losing things” in that situation in trusting her strength against such volatile odds in order to press forwards with her own survival, that of her unborn child and that of the other helpless ghouls when she hates doing so but has to do so. Like Ryouko did for Hinami.

Special mention is Hinamis admiration for her stemming all the way from the beginning “strong, delicate, beautiful”. You did wonderfully in becoming all that and more with your development too Hina👏

When she sees Yorikos letter, SHE WANTS TO SAVE HER and you can see how shocked and pained she is her just by her facial expression

but given Goats very volatile position and Kaneki “dying” at the time, she simply can’t as it would jeopardize their whole organization, and thus she chooses her family, Kaneki and their child when Kaneki himself struggles with his own indecisiveness that could have truly been a trap to lure them into action not based on fortified assurance.

This is another instance Kaneki greatly admires in contrast to his flaw in being indecisive and choosing.

The circumstance itself places this cruel obligation on her to make those choices, but she makes them either way because she has to, otherwise as we’ve seen in TG, failure in making a choice leads to more tragedy. Shit even MAKING choice or choosing not to MAKE a choice can still very well result in that. She COULD have very well elected to save Yoriko, similar to how they went to save Hinami in cochlea (with Ayato, Yomo and Banjou squad) or save Kaneki when he get got captured by Aogiri

in contrast to how she elected to save Kaneki in the dragon arc (joining forces with CCG and the ghouls). These are all separate choices due to different circumstances and considerations that she makes within those emotional situations, and I love the little line in 148 that she says to Nishki.

“What should I do?”

She contemplates all the factors and elements available in making a choice. Can they with just the ghouls save Kaneki and Tokyo at large? How do they do that in the first place with the limited resources they have? All she’s known is loss, so... should they just carry on living with that for their own survival when Tokyo is in danger? [x]

Like… there's a lot of unspoken suffering that she was going through in that whole arc alone. Her very own husband and father of their child who called her a monster in the beginning,

became one himself in order to protect them and see her again by devouring most of Tokyo consisting of humans, ghouls and children when they were all on the brink…

That's tough... and really fucked up. But given the pushed situation (that sure could have been subverted prior), a choice had to be made once again in which they'd face the consequences either way.

Whilst I’ve said that a defining trait of hers is that decisiveness and ability to choose, she herself always contemplates her choices and the consequences thereof even when they are purely emotionally driven. Should I do this? Should I do that? What if I had done this? What if I had done that? In fact that’s the thing about TG in general with MANY characters. As a matter of fact it applies to the whole cast in general really.

The choices they make, and how it’s not always about whether they are “right” or “wrong” but about how they’re made and how one continues pushing forward from said choice. “Forever choosing, forever being chosen”

And of course the dilemma between one's desire for even the tiniest semblance of happiness opposed to the tough predicament they face and all the outcomes that results from it that prohibit such.

“Why do things have to be like this?”

Her breakdown at the end of part 1 added greatly to that during the Ainteku raid where they lost everything. She wanted to go help everyone, she didn't want to lose them, yet Yomo stopped her because they had to choose not to in order for them to keep on living with Yoshimura, Irimi and Komas sacrifice, otherwise it would have all been for naught. “Live while losing things”

Kaneki chose to go fight in order to aid/protect everyone because he was tired of not being able to do anything anymore. As a result, it led to his subsequent “death” and tragedy (with the exception of buying time for Irima and Koma v Arima)

In fact he ponders what if he had chosen to stay away and gone with Touka and Yomo. Perhaps he'd have been able to work with them in the new cafe?

Perhaps if Touka and Yomo went to fight with Kaneki they'd make a difference? Perhaps if Kaneki didn't go all alone in 143 of :re the situation may have played out differently in contrast to how Furuta exposed him?

The answer is yes, no, maybe, maybe not. No one knows, and it's easy to continuously contemplate every single possibility and theoretical outcome. All that matters is how they have to make those tough choices and live with them, no matter the cost.

Also the fact that we only rarely see her true vulnerable, insecure and visible emotions other then when she's like... angry or something is another trait I find very interesting. Because when we do, it’s impactful and hits home just how much she tends to internalize within herself. In other words, the front she puts on. Her always suppressing her emotions with that strong mental fortitude speaks volumes of the struggles she continuously undergoes internally and externally.

That emotional breakdown was just building bruh.

The fact that we don’t have to be told exactly what she’s thinking or how she’s feeling, but are rather shown how she’s trying to hold herself together even with her face either turned away from the reader or her turning her back in several panel illustrations denotes so many melancholic elements to be interpreted within the story.

Another side note- some are actually quite funny and aesthetically appealing to me. She just looks so tired/bored and like... done with everything with those half lidded eyes that convey so much (Idk I just relate heavy AF with that😂)

Hence always looking for those subtle details in her character that add so many layers. Ooo also the times when we get to see both her eyes (true feelings), that's super cool.

Relying on the strength of others is not weak in wanting to help protect them. I mean nothing is wrong at all in wanting to become stronger by yourself for the sake of others, but going completely solo and shouldering all those burdens with just one's own strength is completely detrimental to the highest degree.

In fact her fighting with that pregnant condition when she shouldn’t have and being able to fend for herself before said condition along with her Ukaku stamina issues, stress, lack of sleep and starving inevitably prohibited her full potential is in itself also inspiring. Like dude wtf she's out here fighting with all those disadvantaged restrictions that endanger her? That's badass. Being faced with the predicament of WHAT TO DO versus WHAT ONE CAN DO with limited means. And yet with all that, she still dug Kaneki from dragon by herself after fending off Mutsuki

and the dragon clones

with the timely aid of Urie, Saiko. Even Mutsuki, the one she fought prior and tried to reach out to peacefully given the dire situation and not their own personal differences.

Symbolically the wife of Kaneki, and children of Haise Sasaki came together to save him in that instance with the foreshadowing of the Qs and dragon.

Touka was key to the dragon arc in general. That was the point of the whole arc, further showing the fruits of her development as well, combining strength with others, both humans and ghouls. All elements needed each other to succeed. There’s a reason Hide went out to look for Touka in the ghoul camp.

Not to mention how crucially important these two are throughout the narrative in reference to the fool's journey namely the Magician (Hide) and the High Priestess (Touka) to the fool (Kaneki)

“The Magician and High Priestess are absolutely equal in importance and value. Each is necessary for balance” [x]

He himself was extremely vital in gathering all the different sides and information for the pieces to be in place such as Marude, Urie, Kimi with the CCG, recruiting Amon and Akira, and of course Touka with the ghouls.

Touka leading the ghouls there after being ignited by Shuus emotional fire speech

and all the assurance to combine their strength and efforts with the CCG was a true indication of that. Great stuff by all 3 Aces (Touka, Hide, Shuu) right there. [nice catch! @kanekikenunot]

Touka coming up with the ring idea was of extreme importance, in fact it was the very idea that kick started the whole operation in the first place!

Beforehand was her translating the underground ghoul dialect thanks to Ayatos adventure underground

in order to form the pieces necessary to ignite the operation by condensing the seemingly impossible search for Kaneki to being more focused and fortified to the point that they could track him down with Shuu and Mirimos influence with the metal detectors.

Worthy note is the perception she emits to Hide in always not being able to save Kaneki and him always saving her. We know she has saved him numerous times physically, emotionally, and mentally and the same with Kaneki to her, but it's important to note how she mentions “this time”.

It's like despite all the times they've saved each other with all those different aspects, something always caused them to get separated or to face more and more suffering painting all the times as somewhat futile. And this time, given the monster he's become, she means to truly save him at all costs no matter what.

And my god, chapter 160 is one of my favorites due to the parallel with 145 where Kaneki lost control becoming dragon with it having no dialogue whatsoever in favor of pure visual storytelling.

You could just feel the sheer immense strain, pressure, rampant despair and pain of Touka desperately trying to save her husband.

A Silent Scream is what I call these two chapters that I talked about before, wherein the omission of words paints the whole “a picture is worth a thousand words”.

Her breakdown was so emotionally resonate with how we hardly see her like that. Referencing back to the visuals without having to be shown lines of text or dialogue. Something as simple as her finding Kanekis hand grasping her parents ring (the bond that ties their own marriage together) in pressing forward like a centipede with Touka as his sole motivation and strength, is definitely something that destroys her in which you can just hear the horrifying scream she emits.

Because she's not just reminded of her impending failure with the current situation, but also the tragedy that befell her own parents, and the cycle of revenge she was a part of with Mado that aided in her ability to empathize with Akira and Amon. [good eye! @dreamofcentipedes]

It's these little tiny details that are always there, and while sure some may be a stretch in providing more depth/ over reaching, they remain considerations that add so much. For a moment she ponders if the tragic cycle is something they'll never be able to break free from, whether it's something that will always keep them trapped in the birdcage, unable to fly towards a clear blue sky, something she always looks towards in many panel illustrations. [x]

And yet despite it all she never gave up, her faith kept pushing her forwards to continue the mission. And she was able to succeed. Her efforts and choices were not in vain.

Yo... scope this little line here.. “Don't push yourself ok”

Touka… Dude… We don't deserve you honestly. Finna say that after all the fuckery you just went through in pushing yourself... smh

Still out here not resting waiting for your man's to wake up and be ok.

Top tier I swear...(PLS GET SOME SLEEP)

Which then shows another instance of that non verbal communication during her embrace with Kaneki. Within that one swift motion and the “thump” sound effect presumably of their hearts beating, she conveyed all she needed to without having to say anything.

Thank goodness she was finally able to rest by the end and chill with Saiko is best Saiko, because honestly… She needed that.

And although she had to continue waiting (god how long has she had to that ?) for her loved ones to return,

that fierce faith was fortunately rewarded with Ayato and Kaneki returning in the end.

Like I said, one of the many reasons I admire Toukas strength so much is that it strays away from the typical norm that would usually warrant a narrative tool in making one “weaker” via the ghoul-human journey just for the sake of it or for her to be “helpless”.

“Go, you are not just some onlooker, nor are you powerless. You just have other things to protect right?”-Yomo

And I just… really want to root for her to overcome all the odds that are placed in her and everyone else's paths in whatever way they can. “Strength in weakness, weakness in strength”

It’s not exactly an underdog story classification, but instead to me points out an interesting conflict between ones seemingly futile (at the time given the high failure rate) yet deepest desires/ wishes for some semblance of hopeful happiness in the world. And ones need to survive by any limited means often being forced to make hard to impossible choices accordingly so to protect and live with the few means available to them that they can achieve by themselves alone, and or with that of others.

Bruh… I could go on rambling forever and I'd still be missing several points😓 that many others have mentioned too. But essentially her undying love, selflessness, compassion, faith, and strength are qualities that have always stood out to me in their own right since the beginning until the very end. And in general it’s just truly satisfying that by the end all her suffering, waiting and perseverance paid off. Although it was never explicitly stated, many (including myself) speculate that she did open up another coffee shop by the end, which would be a really nice ribbon bow touch to that as well. 3rd times the charm?

She was finally to gain the normal life that she never thought possible with the combined efforts of both sides, the worlds that Kaneki found a place in. Being able to peacefully live with her family, husband, baby girl Ichika (with another boyo on the way) and loved ones.

Her wish for happiness was granted.

Personally Toukas character journey has truly been a pleasure to witness over over the course of the series, and it’s one that has forever put her in such a special place in my heart, compelling flaws and all😄

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arcticdementor · 5 years

Quote

To be sure, this is a man speaking. But the fundamental quality of this kind of approach to art, culture, the public square, and the rest of it, is evidence of a disordered and out of control femininity. And an equally dysfunctional and abdicating masculinity. A comment left by Youngamconreader on another thread got me thinking about this. I think there is a direct connection between the sexual orientation and gender identity and "alternative family" topics that this blog often discusses, and what's going on in a story like this one, here. I think we are collectively experiencing a massive breakdown/derangement of sex, of masculinity and femininity, and the damage is felt in every single corner of our society and our politics. The "pink police state" (Poulos--check him out) that is coming into being is the product of a miserable and frustrated femininity, which holds the field almost without opposition due to the near-complete abdication of men, who are, sometimes I think almost "to a man," in today's society, nihilistic and disengaged. For those who would say Trump proves that this is not true, I would say look at how he stands alone--at least in America and indeed in the Anglosphere. Everybody agrees that he is sui generis; all of the establishment of his own party just wants things to go back to the way they were; there is nobody who even remotely resembles something like a successor. Also, it is telling that one of the major reasons he won is because he is an online troll, but rich and famous enough to do it under his own name; he is the stand-in for huge numbers of men who have nothing but contempt for today's world but who only reveal their views and feelings anonymously. In large measure, men are opting out. Our bourgeois and hugely wealthy and powerful nation is decadent and its people are soft and domesticated; and, what is worse, the men of sensitivity and intelligence, of taste and discernment, are disgusted by what they see -- a rotten culture of placelessness, hideous architecture and built environments, unbelievably bad art and culture, degenerate music, films made for lowest-common-denominator global audiences, films that are so much more hideous than what was being done for decades, even as early as the 1930s, that it boggles the mind (every single person involved in CGI production should be lined up and shot), universities that have destroyed their own liberal arts programs -- OK, I need to stop myself, but you get the point, they are disgusted by what they see -- primarily they are disgusted by the *domestication* of the people they are supposed to look up to and/or emulate -- and they withdraw. We know about the video game and pornography addicts, the shut-ins, the "incels," but there is very much more to it all even than that. In the meantime, there is relentless, endless, earnest propaganda directed at women like a fire hose, constantly telling them that the essence of their own womanhood is bound up with their bourgeois career success. Nonstop messages received during their schooling, on TV and the movies and the internet, from bougie parents, tell them that they should reach for the stars (by *working*, always by working) and never to settle for just being a mother or just a wife. This has been going on for a long time, and many Boomers are certainly true believers in it -- my Boomer mother certainly believes it like a religion, God bless her -- and it is certainly true that if you have no training or career you are going to be more financially dependent and/or more financially precarious, and the Boomers, who divorce at the drop of a hat, greatly fear that. But my generation and the generations after (I was born in the early/mid 80s) have been taught constantly and relentlessly that work/career is identity, is the *point* of life, and quite frankly women got it MUCH more than men did, since the idea was to correct or change the unfairnesses/biases/power imbalances of the past. And it has resulted in a huge number of women who are unhappy and unfulfilled. It turns out that a life of making PowerPoints or pushing papers or running workplace conflict-resolution trainings or whatever do not really fulfill people; those women who substitute career for family entirely, or who find themselves torn between the two and not very sure they are finding a balance that they will ultimately be very happy about when they look back on their life, know that something is not right. I think we all used to have a much saner approach back in the day, before "career" was a word much used, and before resume/CV culture was so widespread; people may have been a lot poorer, but at least they understood that a job was about doing something that somebody or other had to do, and putting food on the table and a roof over the head of their kids; at least people weren't being sold a bill of goods by their parents, their teachers, authority figures, and the culture as a whole about what the point of being human and living life really is. I don't blame women for being unhappy -- I think the way our culture *relentlessly* propagandizes women that their very femininity and their very identity is bound up in bourgeois career success is one of the very cruelest aspects of life in "late capitalism." It is worse for them than for us men. It is not just that there is nothing wrong with having and raising children -- an incredibly difficult and honorable job. It is that the vast majority of people are not going to find true purpose and meaning in a consumer capitalist society (or probably any other society) just via their work alone. Selling phones or cutting hair or writing ad copy or processing loan applications or playing the Pachabel Canon for the three billionth time at weddings might not be so bad, you might even like it OK most of the time, but it is not the same thing as, say, raising your child, at least not for most people, and certainly bourgeois career success should not be so incredibly inappropriately stressed in our society to the point where increasing numbers of women -- women who want kids! -- are waiting until they are 37 to start families and freezing their eggs and the rest of it. It is just cruel and it alone by itself is enough to make me strongly dislike this consumer capitalist system we live in. Women are unhappy and are sort of flailing about projecting their unmet needs and frustrated desires in numerous directions. They are frustrated with the aforementioned nihilistic and disengaged men, they are pissed that they work outside the home and inside it too and they still struggle to make ends meet and especially to find the time they need, they lose out because a consumer capitalist society constantly f***s them over by creating an arms-race situation for intrasexual competition. In a more conservative and traditional society, say a society that frowns on makeup, women do not have to compete in that sphere. But in a society like ours, if certain women have the money and time to do a lot with makeup, then suddenly large numbers of women have to spend the time and money on it too just to compete or keep up. This does not make women better off. A consumer capitalist society squeezes them constantly. A society in which the health-care system is a disaster -- and I don't care if you hold the typical liberal views about why it's a disaster or the typical conservative views about why it's a disaster -- hurts women more because they rely on it more for basic biological reasons. Woman carry a human being inside them for a significant period of time (if they have kids) -- nothing men have to deal with ever compares to that health/biological-wise. All that said, women today -- who are not being well served by our current economic/cultural/social orthodoxy, at all -- are playing a major/primary role in this disordered and I think semiapocalyptic woke politics. Chesterton was not afraid to write, and did write, about why he opposed women's suffrage, and he said that in human history, women *have* been queens (including some very good ones), have been monarchs, have certainly wielded power -- but it is precisely in the context of *democracy* that they have not had the vote, not in human history or at least Western history. And, indeed, as he put it, women have/had not been given the vote precisely because they are in some sense too powerful, they are absolute rulers in their bones in a way that men are not. There is something to this, even if in our age we cannot tolerate or hear it. One of the things that amuses me is the way -- and they used to do it more often than they do now, but perhaps you know what I mean -- conservatives often lament or attack depictions, in TV or movies, of the married couple where the man is a stupid shlub while the woman is the smart, knowing, sensitive, and competent one. I agree with the conservatives who see this as anti-male---sure. But to me, it really means something else. The reason we see men depicted this way and women depicted that way is because men tolerate it and women would not tolerate the reverse. What it means is that men give in, don't want to deal with it, don't want to fight, while women will NOT let it go, will do what it takes to make the man understand that it is NOT worth his time and energy to go there, to do X annoying or undesired thing, etc. So, we have men depicted as losers, and women depicted as anything but. There is a lesson here. This is *exactly* the same dynamic that we see with conservatives and liberals, with the Republican and Democratic parties! If, for example, Roe v. Wade was overturned, there would be an efficient, effective, organized, identify-every-single-pressure-point-and-*squeeze* response from upper middle class women that would bring the entire Republican Party to its knees within days. It would be a massacre the likes of which you have never seen. Every single HR and public relations department of every single company on the Fortune 500 list would tell the wholly owned and wholly craven Republican Party exactly what to do--stand now right now-- and that would be that. I don't mean to say that conservatives are all men and liberals are all women, but the conservative "spirit" of the current moment is very male (the natural law arguments! Good Lord!) and the liberal "spirit" of the moment is very female. And it is no contest, at all. Women understand that men are less socially adept (quick: what is the ratio of male autists to female autists?) and that men, while unquestionably stronger physically, are more conflict-averse and more predictable (as everybody knows, men want certain things and it's pretty easy to know exactly what they are and to use that information to one's advantage; whereas, as Freud so perfectly distilled, the question of what women want is itself so difficult to answer as to be a kind of female superpower) -- and women use this for everything it's worth. And today, in our democracy, we see the consequences, as a kind of feminine disordered or frustrated impulse holds the field basically unopposed. This idea that this mural -- to get back to the topic of the original post! -- needs to be torn down because "it makes the children feel unsafe" -- here we see a feminine sensibility both disordered and displaced but winning the field because there's hardly anything else with the will to stand up to it. The masculine counterpoint to this smothering mother has withdrawn -- perhaps to 4chan, perhaps to Pr0ntube. Conservatives used to love pointing out that in the inner city, the family had completely broken down to the point where the matriarch/mother was the only influence in childrens' lives and husbands and fathers had ceased to exist. Well, we see that now in our society/culture as a whole. Somehow, the mother alone, the feminine quality alone, does not yield great results, when not counterbalanced with the masculine.* Things become disordered and even monstrous. I am a gay man, and I can't help but think that, when I do this, when I write about this stuff, Camille Paglia (PBUH) should be my model and my inspiration, because she saw so clearly, and so strikingly, from the outside, so to speak, the great and immortal interplay and relationship between male and female that produces *all* of us, and that is essential to -- not only beauty and art, but order, form, and *lastingness*, things that do not die. We all and every one of us need a society in which the male and the female are counterbalanced and juxtaposed and brought together in a great tension and a great union. The disordered and indeed cataclysmic collapse of the male and female counterbalance is impacting us everywhere, and in ways we do not even realize -- I firmly believe that. There must be a return and rediscovery of the masculine force and the masculine will -- to connect this to the posts about open borders, to a masculine will that says "no, I am drawing a line" -- how many of you have read Sexual Personae, and the CENTRAL role that the idea of "drawing the line" plays in that book? Men "draw the line," which is why men have dominated almost beyond measure the realm of visual art in human history. There must be a return to this, or the nation will dissolve into the primordial swamp that Paglia says represents--not the feminine, but the feminine when outside of civilization, the feminine in a state of nature and crude and unformed.

Matt in VA

#quote #long quote #very long quote #matt in va #the american conservative #comments section

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mic-and-cheese · 5 years

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Please info dump about your husband...I wish to know more about him!

AAAAA OK I DIDN’T THINK I’D GET THIS FAR

Idk where to start so I’m just gonna ramble?? I guess??? Puttin it under a readmore bc it’s long as FUCK

I think one of the most interesting things about Buddy is his backstory? Like he used to love supers but now hates them because his idol rejected him? I’ve seen a lot of different interpretations of his past, and I apologize for starting off on this note but Buddy comes off to me as someone who was neglected as a child, so he has trouble with empathy, other social skills, and doesn’t really have a way to healthily deal with stress, which lead him to go down the path he did. I think he was born in a small southern town, but moved to Metroville and became enamored with superheroes because he’s now living somewhere where he can see and meet them personally. He views Mr. Incredible as a father figure because of a lack of a father or other male role model in his life and he probably feels like maybe his life would be better or that he’d be more loved if he had powers, and he’s been constantly told and lead to believe that he can’t be a hero without powers, so telling him that is a sore spot for him.He started messing with machines and learning how to fix them because his family didn’t have enough money to fix or replace things around the house when they broke and he found that he really had a passion for building and creating. Of course, he’s a really smart kid, he loves to read and loves math and science and did well in school, but some adults kinda thought he was a nightmare to be around cuz he’s a lil bit bratty and tries to get attention, but he got along well with teachers and other adults who recognized that he was talented and gave him the attention he needed. Buddy is really used to having to cause a lot of trouble to get what he wants or to be listened to, which is a trait he still kept into adulthood. His first real invention that wasn’t just him tinkering around with whatever he could find was his rocket boots, and he made them with spare parts he found or bought. He’s met Mr. Incredible a few times before, but he was hoping that being able to show off his talent would impress him enough to let him be his sidekick.Ever since he was young he’s always been an entrepreneur, making money by fixing stuff for neighbors and taking other odd jobs.Even after he was rejected he still loves superheroes, or at least the idea of them, even though he doesn’t really like them as people anymore but I’ll get to that later.The interesting thing about him really is just how much I can estimate about him just from what little info we know about him in canon, and how many ways there are to interpret him. I’ve seen him be interpreted as a kid who was spoiled and didn’t know how to deal with rejection, and while I can’t say I like that interpretation, but it is possible. Even though his backstory is interesting, his personality is just…??? Lovely??? I mean it’s really not but I think it is. He’s just??? so geeky and adorable and I love seeing him get so excited over superheroes even though he has a love-hate relationship with them, and he’s just fearless and probably a bit of a dare devil? He really seems like the sort of person who would try anything at least once and doesn’t get embarrassed easily. I mean it’s just so amazing how he’s an evil mastermind but like, he’s still Buddy ya know? Like he still has his excitable, nerdy, funny personality, but he can also be downright terrifying? It’s interesting from a character writing standpoint of course but like, just? On a personal level??? I mean his personality alone flusters me because everything about him (save for uh, the murder) is something I find obviously given the subject of the blog, really attractive. Like he’s not afraid to be himself or play around and he embraces self-insert esqe enjoyment so like??? How cool is it to have an f/o who may also have f/os or at least be supportive of self inserting!!Of course even though theres a lot about his personality that’s cute, there are a lot of things that aren’t, so he’s not really the best with empathy, and he can be pretty cruel, petty, selfish, and he has difficulty opening up to people but I do think that he’s open to learning and changing with someone he trusts, and can be really sweet when he wants to, even if it is a little awkward.One thing I really love about him is how you can tell that he’s got a life and interests outside of Kronos. Like yeah he’s really focused on his plan obviously, but his personality is just so strong in the things around him and the things he does and says that make him feel so much more dimensional. For example, a lot of his tech is integrated with or inspired by nature, so I really think he likes biomimicry, probably because he’s learning how to one up nature, aka basically what his entire motivation is. I love that he’s obviously just got cute little tics like how his eye twitches in the lego games or how much he likes to gesture and hum and whistle. (also his humming is so cute oh my god)And I’m just constantly in awe of how smart and resourceful he is. I mean my love of tropical islands aside, Nomanisan is just… impressive. Like its so ingenious to build his base literally into the island in a way that makes use of its natural features, such as the underwater landing pad, secret exits, underground passageways, and of course the lava wall, and I just can’t help but wonder how he came up with all of that and how long and how much money it took? And thats just taking about the things on the island that are canon. I mean, from my own speculations I figure that the island not only has that amazing lava wall, but is built to redirect the flow of lava to prevent any volcanic activity on the island, keep lava and ash away from expensive tech (the rocket and mantajet for example) and provide power to the island via geothermal energy. Maybe even a little use of wave energy too if necessary since it’s a pretty good option for a place surrounded by water. I assume Buddy chose the island for its resources, (namely a metal alloy that one of the books mentioned) considering he’s made it pretty self sustaining with what it already has after implementing all his tech. The location, being far from any other place, really, and outside of any governmental jurisdiction is good too, so when you really think about it, he probably could have gotten away with a lot of the things that he did, which is, uh, pretty impressive to say the least, not to mention the real world location of Nomanisan (Easter Island) doesn’t face the sorts of hurricanes and harsh weather you’d expect for a small island in the middle of no where.And I mean??? He’s a genius inventor villain who is still extremely in tune with nature to the point that it inspires some of his inventions??? How cool and unique is that??? I’m sure the island must be an amazing place to be, I mean the beaches and caves, rivers, waterfalls… it must be such a joy to explore. And I dunno, I’ve always imagined that working for Syndrome could be kinda fun sometimes. I mean, he is a pretty funny guy with a good sense or humor, and surely guarding and what not all day must get boring, so I’m sure he’s not opposed to having some fun every now and then.And he’s certainly not ashamed of what he considers fun either! I have a feeling he’d like scale models and collectibles and would go to the ends of the earth for a rare one that he particularly likes, especially if they’re ones he gets to build himself. I’m sure he’s a huge fandom geek as well, like name any 50’s-60’s sci fi movie and he knows it by heart. And with all his animal inspired inventions, I’m sure he loves going out in nature and watching the unique wildlife of Nomanisan. Given Easter Island’s own wildlife, I’m sure sharks and whales, and even some really interesting lizards would be pretty common around there. (And given how much forest it has in comparison to Easter Island, I’m sure there’s A LOT more than that. Maybe even rare species only native to the island.) I also really see Buddy as the sort of guy who just loves new and exciting experiences, no matter what it is. Like if it’s something he’s never done before, he’s on board!With all that in mind it’s just so wonderful just how much of a well rounded character he is. I mean he’s happy, nerdy, childish, and excitable, but he’s also bitter, revenge driven, and unempathetic. That being said, his relationships with other people all have such an interesting dynamic to them. He adores Bob for his ingenuity while still hating him enough to try to kill him and his family, and he cares for Mirage but doesn’t really know how to show it. Like I said earlier, I think he was neglected as a kid, so he never really learned how to properly regulate his emotions, so a lot of the time he’s pretty conflicted. He’s an extrovert who wants to be loved and adored, yet he’s too scared to trust after being betrayed. He has a hard time relating to people and thus doesn’t understand how his actions can hurt them when he means well, for example, betting Mirage’s life or saving people from his own robot without proper regard to his surroundings that a truly well meaning hero would have (aka, throwing a tanker truck just to make a spectacle out of saving a mother and child with no regard to what damage the truck could have done).Of course, while his scenes with Mirage can be interpreted as him not really caring for her, I think it’s the opposite. I think he knew that betting her life was the only way he could have saved her (he couldn’t have pulled her away from Bob, shocking Bob could have shocked her, and if he had shown any weakness for her, Bob could have used that as leverage against him, whereas if he shows no remorse, if Bob had killed her he’d just have a dead lady on his hands for pretty much no reason). Granted as well meaning as he was, I don’t think he understands how that hurt Mirage. He sees that he saved her, and doesn’t expect her to be mad about it, but the reality is that she honestly does have a right to be mad about her life being risked, especially when he never clearly communicated that his intent was to save her.Somehow I’ve gone this far without even talking about why I like him??? I mean I don’t even think I’ve ever fully explained why I like him. I’ve tried, sure, but I don’t even think it’s something I can actually convey in words? But I’ll try??? Anyway, he’s literally everything to me, and I don’t just mean that in a sappy romantic way. I’ve always been fascinated with him since I was 6 years old and saw the movie for the first time. He reminds me of happy memories with my dad who passed away some years ago because I saw the movie with him and I remember how much it confused little 6 year old me. Like the fact that the movie started with interviews was the wildest thing to me, and I don’t even think I could even comprehend the plot until much later on. But during that first experience, I don’t know what it was but something about him always stuck with me. Funnily enough one of the things that stuck with me was his joke from Jack Jack Attack and that was the first joke that I knew I didn’t understand but knew I would someday and I literally made a mental note back then telling myself that I knew I’d understand it, and well, thanks for remembering that 6 year old me, because I get the joke now and it’s still funny to me. (I also never actually realized that the guy silhouetted in front of the lava was supposed to be Syndrome until like last summer and I always just thought that was something that was never explained haha.) Anyway after seeing the movie with my dad, he asked me who my favorite character was. I said Violet since I thought saying otherwise would have been weird at the time, but in reality it’s always been Syndrome and that’s just an important memory to me.And now he’s that memory and so many other things to me. He’s what finally helped me recover from a rough couple of years by showing me that people could still create wonderful and impressive things despite being cast away by someone that they once adored and that my success wasn’t based on their approval, which finally helped me shut them out of my life and become so much happier. He helps me manage my anxiety because all the things that make me scared would be nothing to the guy who still wore a cape and rocket boots even after they nearly got him killed. And of course, I love him because he’s nerdy, excitable, brave, and smart, and even because I feel like I can understand his lack of empathy. He’s just such a well rounded, multifaceted character that it’s almost hard to believe he’s fictional haha. With all that combined, he’s one of my my special interests too! I mean it’s hard not to want to know everything about such an interesting guy right?But even if you can’t see the appeal in his personality, it’s no question that he’s just amazing in terms of his accomplishments alone. I mean he can’t be any older than like, 28 max (I consider him 25 though, since the closest we ever get to a canon age is mid 20’s) and yet he’s a billionaire with his own private island, at least one successful company, and groundbreaking tech that makes today’s tech look simple, but he did all in the EARLY SIXTIES.The mantajet in particular is just awe inspiring to me, mostly because I love planes, but I mean, most planes take 15 years just to be conceptualized. Buddy created a completely automated, uniquely shaped, supersonic, semi-aquatic jet with the ability to hover in under that time. It’s like if the SR-71 Blackbird were a luxury all-terrain vehicle! And I am just so endlessly impressed that it can go underwater, like I’m sure its entire design was based around that ability, since the engines would have to be strong enough to withstand literal tons of water going through them, which is why I suspect they’re placed in those cavities above the wings, to direct air and water to go through them in the right way while also keeping them intact in the impact! (they may be waterproof but they are unfortunately not (or maybe fortunately, depending on how you look at it) uh,,,, Syndrome proof) And the “manta feelers” probably help the plane hover and also serve as the landing gear??? UGH IT’S GENIUS, SUCH RESOURCEFUL GENIUS.Of course I’ve gotta talk about the design of his aero boots too!! He’s come such a long way since the rocket boots!!! I’m so proud of him!!! The new boots are just as genius as the mantajet, really. They have vents in the sole, probably to either keep them from overheating or to draw in oxygen to use for combustion. I love how the metal strip is implemented into the heel and up the back of the boots, that’s probably where the fuel and engines are housed, and man, I can’t imagine how much power they’d both have to generate, those tiny little engines. I’m sure they run on some pretty efficient stuff. And how the soles of the boots look like they can come off of the main boot itself, I’m sure that makes for easy maintenance! I also love how the animators added the detail of the screw in the arch of the boot so that it articulates properly, rather than just saying “yeah whatever he can walk fine somehow with these half-metal boots.”And then there’s Zero Point Energy??? I mean, ZPE is actually based off a real scientific concept that would essentially harness infinite energy. I think about this on the daily and I still can’t comprehend it. He harnessed infinite energy. In the 60’s. And made a device small and powerful enough to literally generate it in the palm of his hand. Since all of that energy is generated in his gauntlets, it’d have to pass through his hands to reach his fingertips, so not only can he generate it, but he created a suit that can conduct infinite energy around him so that it doesn’t hurt him. Like no wonder he’s so protective of ZPE. (On that note, this is exactly why I think he designed his suit and not Edna or Galbaki. He’d never trust anyone else to design a suit with his most valuable tech built into it)Not to mention, how interesting is it that a ruthless serial killer villain like him chooses a technology that doesn’t harm his target and instead just freezes them in place!Also also can I talk about just how amazing the other features of the gauntlets are? I mean they hold a small bomb that can produce a big enough blast to in theory kill the nearly invincible Mr. Incredible. He’s got a laser powerful enough to make a clean hole through the roof of a house, and those gauntlets can take a hell of a beating too, considering it was thrown all over the city during the final Omnidroid fight with minimal damage. Oh also the little sliding cover over the buttons is cute.Ok ok, next there’s the energy prisons. I assume they work on ZPE since they’re able to suspend victims in mid-air? I literally shouldn’t be so excited about this thing but I can’t even get over how ingeniously HORRIBLE they are. I mean I don’t want to get into any details, cuz if I do I’ll go into scarily gruesome territory but those things are terrifying. They work with almost any sort of super he could possibly be keeping prisoner with such a pretty simple idea really, just by suspending them against their own weight. The only fault in them really is that Violet can get through them, but he may not have necessarily known that beforehand since I doubt he had any force fields to test them on (or at least any “organic” ones).Implementing the monorail system is such a perfect idea too!! It makes it easy to get around, keeps guards from getting lost, works on all terrain, and keeps supers from seeing things they don’t need to see, so long as they stay on the tracks they’re supposed to be on.And speaking of hiding, while not technically tech related, I don’t know if he knows about the KRONOS carved in the cave, but I bet you he does know about that cave and all the other hard to reach areas of the island, since there’s an I2 deleted scene that shows he knows how Gazerbeam died, and the guards know to split up to catch Dash in one of the caves. Also related to Kronos, I like to make fun of his computer room for it’s impractical at best, dangerous at worse design, but listen. The security system. It’s brilliant. He’d have to engineer some sort of substance that stays compact and non-sticky while not in use, but that can quickly expand and maintain its strength to capture intruders. And the victim would still have to be able to breathe through them too?? And like how do they come off?? I’m sure that’s an interesting process too. The “fire randomly” approach is also interesting, since it pretty much leaves no escape. And what about under the walkway??? Like what’s way down there??? I don’t even have a theory for that, really. And and and how does the security system for that room work? Does it recognize unfamiliar noises perhaps, since it was triggered by Bob’s suit tracker, cuz if it were triggered by just random noise, I’m sure Syndrome or Mirage would have accidentally triggered it before. Oh, also also also x3 the computer screen automatically shuts off once the security system is activated, which is a nice touch, so that the enemy can’t get any more info as soon as the system is notified. Having only one way in and out of the room is clever too.I JUST WANNA KNOW MORE ABOUT NOMANISAN’S SECURITY PROTOCAL OKI wish we had seen more of the technology that he used for Mirage’s message too. Like, he obviously uses the voice matching and scanning technology on the island (the security bird and life probe) but what about that illusion effect on the tablet?Also I mean, I’m sure being an arms dealer during the Cold War in itself has got to be extremely lucrative, but that doesn’t even account for how high tech his other weapons that weren’t mentioned must be.Ok, ok I think that covers all of his other inventions. I haven’t talked about the Omnidroid yet because hooo boy do I have some things to say about that beautifully terrifying piece of tech. I love that he used an iterative process on it to build upon its design (also the idea that he respects the strength his self-proclaimed nemesis enough to build up the robot to prepare to fight him), and I’ve actually gone back and tried to figure out the reason behind the changes he made in each iteration. And listen. How long do you think it took him to build and test all those robots? A few years maybe? Nah son, using the movie’s timeline, I’ve calculated that if he were working at a consistent pace throughout the project, it’d take FOUR MONTHS. 10 highly advanced ai robots. Fully drafted, programmed, built, and tested in 4 months. Oh and did I mention HE CREATED AI. LIKE ACTUAL AI.And his control over the Omnidroid (at least Omnidroid 9 anyway) is brilliant too. He’s got perfect control over it, and the reason I bring that up is because Omnidroid 10 tried to kill him. I’ve spent a long time wondering why he had perfect control over 9 but 10 disobeyed him, and my conclusion is that he implemented some new code in 10 that would make it act more destructively, thus making it more difficult to control but he never actually expected it not to listen to him because he didn’t actually test it on the island since, uh, having a 10 story tall rampaging robot on the loose near your base isn’t a good idea. I also headcanon that 10 was built to self destruct when defeated so that no one could trace its origins back to Syndrome had he won and been considered a hero.With that long ass section out of the way I’d finally like to bring up that if Syndrome did indeed create all of these inventions, that’d made him a computer programmer, aerospace engineer, possibly a civil engineer, a chemist, the inventor of harnessing infinite energy and ai, and thats only what I can think of off the top of my head.Another one of my favorite things about Buddy is that I love how easy it is to imagine him as a way more fleshed out character than he really is. On multiple occasions I’ve heard other people say that he seems like someone who would love conventions, or probably be an internet troll, and other things of that nature that relate more to his interests and personal life. I mean sure, anyone can headcanon anything for any character, but the way people headcanon Buddy just feels very… natural? Very fitting? Like, he’s a character that’s very easy to imagine having a life and hobbies outside of his evil schemes.Another little interesting thing is how he’s pretty much his own downfall. I mean sure a lot of his losses can be attributed to the Parrs defeating him in some way, but his most glaring faults are usually things that he could have prevented had he acted a little differently or planned a little differently. I dunno I just think that’s interesting for no particular reason.And one more thing I haven’t really discussed/seen discussed as much as I really think it should because it’s an interesting part of his character is does he see himself as a hero or a villain? And There are some interesting interpretations to that question as well. For example, if he views himself as a hero it’s probably because he doesn’t believe that superheroes are actually good people at heart, and that they just put up a facade of being kind and helpful to the public, which he uses to justify his atrocities. Or perhaps he legitimately does see himself as a hero for wanting to give normal people the opportunity to be super, or maybe he thinks that he’s doing a service to the world by killing off the people who are simply putting up that facade of good, or perhaps he sees himself as a victim deserving of a “redemption.” And if he sees himself as a villain, maybe he doesn’t understand or want to acknowledge the full weight of his actions, because it’s all a game to him, or maybe he does see himself as a bad person beyond redemption, so he decided that being a supervillain was fated or required of him. Regardless of which idea he believes, it’s obvious that Syndrome very much so lives (and has always lived) in his own fantasy world where things do play out exactly like how comic books do, and that his actions have no real weight to him (except when he feels like he’s been wronged, because he views himself as the protagonist or antagonist of the “story” aka making his own emotions relevant “plot points,” even if no one elses’ emotions (except maybe Bob’s) have any importance to him) because it’s all a comic book in his mind.Anyway there’s my nonsense rant

#oops #Anonymous #ask

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