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destinyc1020 · 1 year

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Could you explain further why you think that tom was the dumper?

I just want to see if our thinking matches

Oooof....So many things....so many things lol..... GIRL!😅

Get yourself some wine (or hot cocoa lol) and pull up a chair, cuz it's a LOT.....

Here are some of my reasons for why I suspect (I don't know for sure obviously) that Tom was the one to initiate the breakup:

Zendaya was still wearing Tom's shirt and watch around the FFH press tour/premiere time (if YOU were the dumper, why on earth would you rub salt in the wound and do that??)

She accidentally said "cuddling with my boyfriend" when talking about her "perfect day" on the red carpet (again...did you FORGET that YOU were the one who broke up with your bf?? OR.... lol😅 )

Z seemed blind-sided by the Tolivia pics, but at the same time she made it seem like she didn't want people thinking that Tom had cheated on her.

The fact that she got with JE AFTER Tom was spotted with Olivia (not beforehand 👀). If Z had dumped Tom, why didn't SHE get with someone else before him?? Usually you don't just wake up one day saying "Oh, I'm going to dump my bf of 2 years!" No..this stuff has been brewing... So if you were the initiator, it's cuz you've been thinking about it for a WHILE lol. But Tom got with someone else before she did. Then, she herself decided to move on and started dating JE. This is precisely why I don't think anything "funny" was going on btwn her and JE prior to the Tolivia pics hitting the internet. I think JE saw them and reached out to HER. If he had known she was single long time ago, he would have reached out long time ago right?? He would have dumped Cari long before August right?? 👀

Z had bought a keyhole neckchain for Tom and he started wearing it during the London FFH photocall thingy. Now, if YOU dumped a guy, why would you be gifting him jewelry?? Unless, you had already ordered it beforehand, and it was custom-made for him and you decided to give it to him anyway?

Then there was this tea from someone close to Z:

Now, I'm not saying you cant' be "heartbroken" when you're the dumper in a broken relationship (you can be!), but the way this was worded, it made it seem like Z was heartbroken that things didn't work out btwn them....

Another thing is, Z didn't even dump Trevor who was cheating behind her back lol. You really think she dumped Tom who is the nicest, most upstanding guy she's ever been with?? For WHAT exactly?? LOL You've seen how MUSH she is with him.... We never saw it before cuz they kept it behind closed doors. But now that we see how "girlfriend Daya" is, and we know how sweet Tom is, you really think she said: "You know what.... I just think we need to breakup"? 😅

Then, there was THIS "tea" that an Anon spilled to me. I use the term "tea" VERY loosely here, because who knows if it's even true??? I just know that supposedly there were TWO versions of the "Audrey" tea that was being told around.... This version actually makes the most sense to me...

Another thing that always struck me as odd is the fact that I feel like Tom must have reached out to Z when those NYC/Jacdaya pics came out. Cuz they were still trying to be relatively "friendly" up until then on social media (trying to act like nothing was wrong/different lol), and then BAM! After that!??? Whew chiiiilllle..... Tom unfollowed Darnell and Deja.... Then from that point on, Z paid Tom DUST! 🤣 Tom is definitely the more impulsive one, so I feel like he probably also impulsively initiated the breakup also. I don't think that if Z were the one who broke up with TOM that he would have been hitting the fan so hard at those pics. He would have been like, "Well....she's moved on...she dumped me....". The fact that he was so bold in probably contacting her is because he deep down must have known that she still loved him. He knew he wasn't the initiator of the breakup in other words. Just my hunch.

Tom's "I broke my heart myself" comment seems very obvious that it wasn't HIM who was dumped.

Tom also initiated his breakups with Elle, Olivia, AND Nadia. 👀👀

Tom's reaction to the Tolivia pics in the GQ interview was also very telling. If you were the one who was DUMPED, why are you worried if people caught you with another woman? Yea, sure okay....maybe it's the first time your little fans have seen you with a woman before lol...but still. He seemed disturbed. I think it's because he knew that once those pics got out, there was no turning back now on Zendaya's end. 🤣

Then even when he reached out to her for the Emmy nod, yet again I got the impression that he felt like HE needed to be the one to ammend things. I feel like if Z had been the dumper, SHE would have been the one trying to get on HIS good graces, not the other way around.

Anyway......

I know some Anons HATE It when I bring up the exes or post these post, but it's the best way I can consolidate what happened around that time, and I added all of the tea and receipts from around that era so that I didn't have to keep repeating myself lol. 🤣

Some other reading for your enjoyment if you want to get more backstory.....

TL;DR Version: We obviously don't know for sure, so all of this is just speculation. I just haven't seen strong enough evidence to lead me to the belief that Z was the one to initiate the breakup. And sad to say?? I actually think Tom had more reasons to initiate a breakup than Z did lol...

#sorry for the dissertation

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rogers-the-musical · 2 years

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Why couldn’t Peggy not have known about Hydra?

they killed everyone that got in their way. “Shield would have stopped you…Accidents happen.”

Peggy was at the top, maybe not the whole time, but most likely near the top. Whomever made these discoveries were likely killed before they could bring them to her.

I have a feeling Zola had to be very careful to stay on Howard/Peggy’s good side. It’s canon that Howard was close with him (surprise surprise), and I’m sure he was very careful to keep everything away from Peggy’s nose that he could. I’m sure he manipulated her. Which brings me to number four:

Even the best spies can be manipulated in the right circumstances. Zola was a master manipulator. I’m sure, targeting Peggy (as smart as she was), mixed in with getting rid of evidence, wouldn’t have made her like or trust him—but it may have kept her from suspecting him in the moment.

Things were kept low, up top, while she was still at the head. Hydra was lying low during those days; getting rid of evidence mustn’t have been that difficult. Under her guidance, Hydra knew they wouldn’t have stood a chance trying to recruit big-time, or come out, etc. With an elderly and retired Peggy, as well as Colonel Phillips, this makes it prime time for someone much less trained to come in, Hydra to start sticking their heads in big places, and for them to still keep it under wraps.

#I mean I’d be scared of Peggy #Peggy Carter #Agent Carter Director of Shield #Agent Carter #Howard can be so stupid sometimes #in the right circumstances #tell him he’s great and he’ll love you #Steve Rogers #sorry for the dissertation #Feel free to add on/comment/disagree #just don’t be a jerk

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churchrummagesale · 3 months

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October 2020

#i'm back everyone!! sorry i was writing my dissertation whew #35mm #north carolina

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bluebells-and-dragonflies · 4 days

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God, the intimacy of Astarion feeding from you.

Astarion drinking from your neck as he pulls your body closer to his in bed, his chest up against your back, his arms wrapped around your waist. It's a casual thing, now, his whispered can I? and your answering nod, as much a part of your bedtime routine as your bath or his curl care. You sigh as his fangs pierce your skin and his fingers flex against your stomach. His breath hitches when the taste of you hits his tongue, and that's familiar too, the physicality of it, the noises he makes low in his throat as he drinks, the way he grows warmer against you as your blood begins to flow through his veins. Nothing else makes you feel so heady, so intoxicated- so comforted.

Astarion drinking from your wrist when he’s starving for it and can’t wait to get you more comfortable. Pulling him into an alleyway one night on the way home from the Elfsong because you can see how badly he's craving in the way he can't keep his eyes off of the pulse point in your neck. He seizes your arm with both hands (can I? Yes-), bringing the soft skin on the inside of your wrist to his lips. He has just enough presence of mind to kiss the heel of your hand distractedly before he bites, fangs sliding through your skin and into the vein. The sound he makes can only be described as a growl, something feral and possessive (and you'll never tell him that it turns you on, since he would be insufferable about it- a promise to yourself that lasts exactly as long as the space between the moment and the next time you're tipsy and want him).

(NSFW Below!)

Astarion drinking from your inner thigh, one hand holding your leg steady and the other cupping your cunt. You groan, eyes shut in pleasure, as his thumb comes to rub your clit. The pain of the bite is barely pain this way- it collides with the pleasure in your belly and sends you almost out of your mind, overwhelmed with sensation and heat. He takes you all the way there, takes just enough from you to have you relaxed and pliant and soaring somewhere above your own body, plays you like an instrument with all the knowledge of you he's gathered over the months, the years. He knows when you're close, knows to crook his fingers inside you just so, knows the reaction he's going to get when he pulls away from your thigh for just a moment and looks up at you with dark eyes and tells you to come for him, he wants to see it, you fall apart so beautifully and it's all for him, isn't it, tell him how good he makes you feel and when you climax with his voice in your ear and the scent of blood on the air he has the audacity to laugh at how well he understands you, your body.

He's soft, after, softer than he'll ever be with anyone who isn't you. He licks you clean before he takes you to the bath, carrying you with the strength your lifeblood gives him. It's the least he can do for you, with everything you've given him: not just your body, but your trust, your closeness, and he will never stop being grateful.

#astarion x you #astarion x reader #astarion smut #astarion x tav #astarion bg3 #.astarion #.nsft #i'm never gonna be normal about this sorry. one day y'all are gonna get a dissertation on the incredible intimacy of sharing blood #side note but...i feel like astarion doesn't usually feed during penetrative sex because he Will just lose his mind. feral. out of control #he makes that mistake with you one (1) time right at the beginning of the romance in act 1 and swears he will NEVER do it again (lying)#anyway. my askbox is open. for like minds. and unlike minds actually

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heartagasm · 1 year

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Can we just take a second to appreciate the growth of Ava’s protective instinct towards Beatrice over these past 2 seasons because it’s suPERb. In season 1 we see the first time Ava reacted, completely subconsciously, to Beatrice in danger

at this point she’s not aware of her emotional connection to the halo’s power, and has way less control of what happens - so even though she does shatter the bullet and save Bea’s life, she also blows everything in the room backwards including herself. Even Beatrice gets pushed back (although super softly) as you can see her recover briefly to run over to Ava after

THEN we start to get spicier protection in season 2 when Ava does react with more understanding of the halo’s power and her feelings towards Beatrice, and not only does she accomplish a much harder goal (poofing away a demon???)

but this time Ava able to handle the blast AND it doesn’t get anywhere close to Beatrice. She does clearly have a blowing back effect on people next to her (cue Miguel/Michael folding like a lawn chair part 1) but Ava is learning to control the power of the halo and how to use it to protect specific people... or in her case specifically Beatrice

and then of COURSE because third times the charm, the last one is my favorite. This time it’s intentional, Beatrice knows Ava can control the power and she tells Ava to let go, and Ava nods AND pulls Beatrice in telling her to hold on

WHICH if we look at past experience showing Ava having a forceful blast that surrounds her after using her power, her instinct should initially be to tell Beatrice (and Michael I guess) to run so that they don’t get hurt, but she knows at this point that whatever power she releases won’t hurt Beatrice because Ava would never let it. I mean look at Michael ! ! !

Dude folds like a lawn chair (PART 2) as if he were one of the possessed enemies Ava is releasing a blast towards. Even though Ava thinks logically she’ll be able to protect both of them, her internal instincts are only thinking of protecting Beatrice in the moment and the halo’s blast reflects that.

Bonus is watching them walk away without a second glance at anyone because to them, as long as they’re both safe, it’s mission accomplished:

Thanks I’ll be here till 2049 talking about this show and couple

#sorry this was so long it's giving dissertation #avatrice #warrior nun #warrior nun s2 #i'm not even tagging spoilers because WATCH FASTER #here's the thing #this was a top tier trope for them #protective ava eSPECIALLY when she doesn't even realize it #chefs kiss #anyways can someone who is better at gifs do like the side by side of these #cause this was thrown together in 5 seconds and in a rush #please and thanks #CANON AVATRICE LETS GO PEOPLE

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somegrumpynerd · 1 month

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This little interaction made me so happy! Killer really fought through Dream to give Cross his necklace back

Asjlkhdkgkd I'm so glad you liked it!! I had fun putting a little story into that one ^^

And, because I am normal and don't think about these guys for hours every day, here's some backstory:

When Cross first joined, Killer actually took to him pretty quickly (Dust and Horror did not get warm welcomes). Which is to say he immediately started flocking to Cross to annoy him and compete with him on missions. Cross didn't have the benefit of knowing Killer already to see these were affectionate annoyances, so to him Killer was just some guy who had a problem and wouldn't leave him alone.

During that mission, Nightmare was calling a retreat when he put a hand to his chest and realised the heart locket was gone. Killer saw him looking all around frantically and had a good idea what was lost, since it was the one thing Cross would absolutely not part with since he joined. So, Killer ran back out towards the stars to look for it, because why learn self preservation now. It was the first thing to convince Cross that Killer actually was being (relatively) friendly, despite all the annoyances.

And also, a doodle of the afterwards of that picture

because it's probably the only time he's managed to get Killer to shut up lol

#Ask #blinddreams24 #Truce au #Thank you!!! I'm really genuinely so happy people like my silly little comic ^^#Sorry you got a whole dissertation in response I just like thinking about these two in particular lol #Cross's locket is very important to him he Does Not mess around when it comes to that thing #It also goes with my hc that Killer is lowkey touchstarved as hell #He has not had many hugs in his lifetime as Killer so the casual affection without having to taunt someone into a fight was game changing #Cross kind of became second in charge of watching for Killer's stages as they became friends #Also in Dream's defence he thought Killer was charging back in for round 2 #When he just scooped up a necklace and ran off Dream felt bad for shooting but it was partly on Killer for searching with a knife out #Oh my god this is like an essay I'm so sorry I can't shut up about these guys #UTDR #UTMV

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starryjkoo · 4 months

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It’s really funny when people are like - but JK hung out with x person 10 times this year! - and it’s like, okay, and then he chose to spend the next 18 months, 547~ days with Jimin? 😭 You might really want to rethink that argument friend. JK had other options, other people he could have gone with, other programs he could have tried for, a later date he could have enlisted on, and yet he chose JM, and vice versa. They didn’t even have to enlist with anyone, they could have gone individually like everyone else in the group. No one was expecting them to enlist together. And this is also probably the furthest thing there is from company content or fanservice considering we’re not even going to be seeing them for the next 18 months and I doubt they’ll even talk about their time in the military. It’s just so silly. “JK and JM were never together this year!” buddy, they’re literally together RIGHT NOW 😭

#jikook #I don’t agree with the ‘they didn’t see each other all year’ thing btw #I just think it’s a really funny argument #considering the circumstances #like oh they’re going to be seeing a lot of each other #and pretty much no one else for the next 18 months pal #so where does that leave us #I'm already halfway through making another rant post 🤓#finally spent a day catching up on everything #sorry for possible future tag spam #maybe I’ll even post my JK promo dissertation for good measure #and sorry if this seems like i'm trivializing the military #that is definitely not my intent

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19burstraat · 2 months

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KERCHMEN ‼️

#sorry this is taking so long. uni dissertation+ lack of confidence + girl help is a deadly combo #my fics #kate chatters

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lowpolysonic · 1 year

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the only way i got through this month was by drawing @helioshellion‘s sonic majima design during lectures

#gave him the classic + low poly treatment ofc. also drew the shoes so inconsistently sorrie </3 bad at shoe drawing #i had fun doing these tho i love this guy. creature. anyway back to writing my dissertation #majima goro #yakuza #ryu ga gotoku #sonic the hedgehog #majima #munna's art

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attonposting · 1 year

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Okay, so Carth keeps coming up lately, both by people who love him and people who don't, and I thought I'd throw my two cents into the ring.

People complain that Carth is sexist, a lot. And I get where that's coming from, I've got the same issues with his romance as anyone else. I love the bones of Carth's character and remember him very fondly – he's tied for my favorite character from KotOR I, even! But the writing is... flawed, to say the least, and in a way that goes past just 'poorly aged.' I don't think his lines themselves ever go worse than awkward, but there's some more fundamentally unhealthy stuff written into his relationship that I suspect wasn't intentional.

What I find interesting, and what a meme just very succinctly pointed out, is that many of the same people who have beef with Carth are cool with Atton. Who is definitely the more sexist of the two, both incidentally and deliberately. And it's a really interesting differentiation between the two pilots/f!PC love interests/earlygame buddies, because I think their palatability comes entirely down to how the games portray that sexism. So this is my attempt to figure out why one thing works and the other kinda doesn't.

Carth Onasi is introduced as a stand-up guy. He stays behind as long as he possibly can to save other survivors on the Endar Spire; he believes in the Republic wholeheartedly, he serves to protect and approves when you do the same, and other characters sing his accolades. He's supposed to be wholesome, but with PTSD-related trust issues that cause friction between him and you.

Atton Rand is the opposite of that. You find him in a jail cell, he's untrustworthy and a cad, at any given moment he's either abrasive or lying through his teeth, he complains when you help people, and when you get to the bottom of his trust issues, you find out he's a worse guy than you ever could have imagined.

It's much too oversimplified to say that Carth is supposed to be a good person and Atton is not, that's not where the problem comes from, but it will become relevant later.

When Carth starts flirting with you... okay. The biggest, most obvious problem is that the game wants you to be into it. Carth flirts and continues to flirt after you can tell him to stop. Sure, whatever; that's not egregious. You can respond to Carth's flirting positively or negatively, and that's great... but when you do respond negatively, the game loves to pull you into these playful insult exchanges where your PC shouts and pouts while Carth taunts you. There's where the issues start. Even when the player is trying to shut him down, they get dragged along for the ride anyway, and the narrative decides that this is also romantic. Thus KotOR I only has a shallow understanding that it's presenting a situation a woman may want nothing to do with. It's kind of impressive that you can actually call Carth sexist in-game, and yet it doesn't feel like the game actually understands that he is in fact being sexist.

Actually, no. Maybe I'm reading too deep into this, maybe this is why I'm so forgiving to Carth as a character, but I don't think the problem is Carth, I think the problem is that the game is being sexist in this particular spot. I was more annoyed by my own return dialogue options than anything Carth said to me - especially the ones where I was being mean. It felt like f!Revan was being pigeonholed hard into the writer's idea of 'women', that it was not an especially flattering or nuanced view, and there wasn't anything that I actually wanted to say. Definitely the writer did not understand my perspective as a player – but that's not a problem unique to K1 and it's one even the sequel is super guilty of at times, so I'll move on for now.

When Atton makes skeevy remarks, you always have at least one dialogue option to call him out for it, and you cannot ever react positively to what he says. Either you smack him down or you ignore him. This is extremely important. Yes, you could argue that it's not as accommodating to how different players might react... but what this establishes is that the game is self-aware. It does not think what Atton is doing is in any way attractive, or that it should be interpreted positively. Instead it acknowledges what a lady's probable reaction to his unwanted advances would be and encourages the player to express it, and the way that's written isn't a playful back-and-forth, it's the Exile snapping at him and Atton backtracking. Atton's being a piece of shit, but instead of stirring up chemistry, the narrative goes out of its way to mete out karma – hence everyone else on the ship mocking him, or the comically topical details like him being an unwashed loser who smells terrible and scratches his junk in public. Whether you like Atton or not, the game wants you to know that it thinks he sucks, and you are never left feeling like there is an unsettled score.

On the contrary, this lack of self-awareness is what makes Carth's romance in K1 hard to swallow if you didn't start out receptive to it. When you can react negatively to Carth's comments, it doesn't feel like you can do so in an intelligent way. The tone is very “Ugh, MEN, amirite” rather than “I don't like the turn this conversation has taken and would like to just be your colleague again” or just “Stop.” - which is probably what you wanted to say if you were just platonically enjoying or less-amicably bickering with your dorito-jacket companion when the gorgeouses started coming out of left field.

Worse, when you actually can shut Carth's romance down, it involves being a dick to him and stomping hard on his personal issues. Like I'd understand if a player was angry with him at this point, because again, you've been forced into a romance arc even when you were telling the game no as much as it would let you - but there's a huge difference between wanting to tell a guy to back off and wanting to shit on his dead wife or his Sith kid or his blown-up planet. I dunno, I'm not that vindictive! I think there's only a couple of options at the very end of his romance tree where you can turn him down... not even amicably, it's still rude, just without being a Grade-A asshole, and by that point, you have been through a lot of flirting you presumably didn't want to be involved with. Generally, the game won't let you break things off with him without being a dick, even if you never agreed to board that train in the first place. Now loop back to the way that K1 unfailingly portrays Carth as a great guy, whose flaws have nothing to do with his upstanding sense of morality, and there's where the dissonance comes from. Not only does the game push you into his romance after you said no, it makes you the bad guy for trying to get out of what he initiated.

But there's another issue in the timing of the Carth relationship. He starts his flirting while he's expressing intense distrust and standoffishness with your PC. With Carth's nonstop skepticism about your trustworthiness, and constantly bringing up his issues with you... at least during Taris and Dantooine, it comes off more like his attraction to you is superficial and not as a result of him growing to like you, something that's pushed by how it's always focused on shallow hooks like your appearance or your 'cute' attitude. It's very awkward. I do not think this was the writer's intent. I think Carth's supposed to be captivated by what he's seen you do, and that's just going in recursive loops in his paranoid little brain and making things harder for him. By the end of the romance, it's extremely clear that Carth's into you for you. But it's clumsily handled at the start.

Contrast this with Atton, who starts off aggressively sexist towards a female Exile, fifty times more offensive than anything Carth ever does. Literally the first line he gets is leering at the PC's forced state of undress, mocking her vulnerability, and he continues in that vein for much of Peragus. He creeps on your nudity at least four times off the top of my head, he ogles you, he complains about women, he tries to hit on you, he even contemplates the possibility of Sexy Kreia (which is a level of dickery I can scarcely comprehend.)

But that tapers off and disappears around the time he starts showing actual romantic interest in your PC, like when Kreia threatens him and it's revealed how much your opinion matters to him, or when he asks Bao-Dur for advice. And a female PC never sees it again. This creates the opposite impression – that Atton's attraction is a result of your time together. Sure, he's still a pig, but it follows that he wasn't making serious passes at you on Peragus because his behavior now that he is actually interested in you has changed. And it implies that in an actual relationship, that would not be how he'd view or treat you, which I think is crucial for how willing people are to ship Atton with their Exiles.

Now, this is all a product of how K2 did not actually answer that question and let you romance Atton, because with Carth, it's the opposite and you see exactly how he behaves once he gets into a serious relationship. It involves spanking. Things could be very different if K2 actually had fleshed out romances. It's hard to say, because both the PC and the crew were very thoughtfully written (I will take a bold step here and say that K2's characters were on the whole written much better than K1's), but on the other hand, Atton is still the worst and I'm pretty sure the game would want to remind you of that if you agreed to play tonsil hockey with him. And it may have crashed into the same pitfall that Carth's did; if the game railroaded your interactions with Atton up to some point, it'd leave a bad taste in anyone's mouth who wasn't already signed up for the ship.

With the way things are, Atton not only gets a free pass to be interpreted as generously as his fans want and easily ignored by those who weren't keen on him, he even gets an interest boost from this because people will always want what they can't have.

Anyway. With a male PC, you'll continue to see Atton make sexist remarks towards other female characters and can even have a wingman chat with him that is entirely him projecting his issues all over women. He doesn't make these comments with a female PC, suggesting that he's on his best behavior... but that he'd still totally be a leering asshole if he wasn't trying to impress you. With a male PC and Carth, his sexism is nonexistent, again probably because he was never intended to be sexist and it's a product of clumsy/oblivious writing.

There's an additional layer with Atton and the question of how much anything he does is an act, but that doesn't exonerate him from any of the crap he says. I could write a separate essay on Atton and his relationship with women, but the guy is very much a womanizer who's terrified of the idea of intimacy and has a lot of shitty opinions that stem from his defensive need to believe that nothing emotional is ever real or relevant to him. He might've been casing the Exile on Peragus, but his chauvinism is genuine.

But I digress. The tl,dr; is that Atton acts less sucky the more he crushes on you and Carth acts more. Combo that with how their respective games make Atton pay for being creepy but give the strong impression they want you to go along with Carth's nonsense, and it's a little less mystifying why Carth gets so little benefit of the doubt while the King of Trash enjoys fandom sexyman status. His romance is almost predicated on the fact that he's a scumbag, where Carth's is very confused to whether the awkward parts should exist or not.

There's a bit more that kinda hurts Carth. The flirting... well, from what I remember it just got “wow, okay then” later on, and I found it way more silly than offensive in any way, but him repeatedly bringing up how you remind him of his dead wife doesn't help the relationship much and suggests that Carth may be projecting someone else over you. I can live with that, drama's tasty and it doesn't prevent a real connection from burgeoning. You can make the exact same argument for Atton anyway, and I think his is way worse. My major issue is at the end of the game. Mr. Trust Issues does not react well to the events on the Leviathan, when it turns out he was right to have kept an eye on the PC all along. It's great payoff! And I absolutely adore his discussion after that, when he admits his struggles to reconcile you and Revan, how he tried but he can't hate you, how helping you gave him something real when revenge only left him hollow. Seriously, for all the shade it gets, there's some really great stuff in his romance too - you just have to stick it out long enough to see it. But then, on Rakata Prime, Carth seems to reconcile his crisis of faith and finally, wholeheartedly decide to love you in a way that falls flat on its face. He confirms you're a good person because you're not Revan anymore, like Revan is some purely evil part of you you've now cast off, when... that really seems more like denial than anything else, and not the foundation for anything healthy.

Seriously, I wish they'd handled that with more nuance. It would have counted for so much in my books.

All of that said. I know I just went after the man like a vending machine with a stuck bottle of chocolate milk, but I think the sexist vibes in Carth's romance are worst at the start and that he does not deserve the sheer amount of flack he gets. I've seen far worse offenders in the world of video game romances, and this might drive some controversy in and of itself, but I vastly prefer Carth x f!Revan to Bastila x m!Revan. There's a whole 'nother pile of issues in K1's other official ship (f in chat for Juhani), and I think those are much harder to deal with than the ones here. If anything frustrates me with Carth's romance, it's how unnecessary all of the bullshit is. I really want to get into it! The concept is perfectly fine! I love the character! There's good stuff in there! And when I replay KotOR, it's not that difficult to close my eyes to the bleh parts and enjoy the rest, especially once the first couple of conversations are past. Again, all Carth needed was a more conscientious writer at the wheel.

I'd be really interested in hearing other people's takes, both on how they interacted with either of those romances or where their interpretations differed from mine. I only have my own perspective and that of a few people I've talked to over the years, and I'm given to understand this is something of a fandom hot topic!

#carth onasi #atton rand #kotor #kotor 2 #kotor ii #basically a dissertation on how framing makes all the difference #i'm sorry carth #i love you a lot but your writing is so bad #kotor remake pls fix

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animalshowdown · 3 months

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Phylum Round 1

Annelida: Segmented Worms. This group includes earthworms, leeches, and many classes under the umbrella of "polychaete". This diverse phylum encompasses deposit feeders (eating dirt), detritivores, scavengers, deadly ambush predators, filter feeders, parasites, herbivores, and more. They are broadly defined by their repeating body segments and parapodia, which are nubby appendages used for both movement and breathing. Some have curved jaws for catching prey or scraping detritus off of rocks, while others have wide, elaborate feather-like fans for filter feeding. While able to crawl freely, a majority of marine Annelids spend most of their time in self-built tubes or burrows. Among their many important functions, they play a key role in mixing soil/sediment, breaking down decaying organic matter, and providing a key food source to countless other animals.

Nematoda: Roundworms. Split between free-living and parasitic, terrestrial and aquatic, Nematodes inhabit just about every environment on Earth. Nematologist Nathan Cobb once said (paraphrased) that if all matter on Earth disappeared besides Nematodes, we would still be able to identify where everything used to be, simply by the thin layer of nematodes left behind. In the harsh environment of Antarctica's Dry Valleys, these worms dominate the relatively barren ecosystem. The roundworm C. elegans is a widely-studied model organism in science and medicine. Nematodes are also known to parasitize humans, due to their ability to enter a dormant larval state within the muscle of a carrier animal. This is part of why we fully cook pork; to kill any parasites in the meat.

#showing my bias here oops #WORM ON WORM VIOLENCE #sorry y'all I'm literally writing my dissertation on annelid worms <3 come talk to me about bioturbation #and nutrient cycling at the sediment-water interface <3333 #nematodes are cool too though! very interesting little guys #cw parasites #annelida #nematoda #animal bracket #tumblr bracket #bracket tournament #poll bracket #phylum round 1 #phylum

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destinyc1020 · 2 months

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Hi 👋🏽 lurker here. I love your page but honestly feel too grown to comment on tumblr most of the time 😂

just wanted to chime in to say the biracial/black women convo is important and I really appreciate your perspective. I’m around Zendaya’s age, (slightly) older and I’m also a (biracial) light skinned black woman. Same foundation shade as Zendaya actually 😂. I can tell you this discourse was not a thing growing up. We were black, considered black by society, etc. it wasn’t until the past 5 years that I’ve seen people feel the need to distinguish us as “biracials” and honestly it has been a little hurtful and neglects our experiences as biracial black people. Yes we have privilege, absolutely. Now that I live in a city, I feel that more readily. I was also raised around a lot of white people so I can adapt fluidly in white spaces, which has been immensely helpful in my career. But all grass isn’t always greener on the other side, if that makes sense.

For example, I grew up in a rural sundown town. Guess what? I was the only black person many of them had ever seen, and on top of that being biracial made me, and I quote, an “abomination”. Can’t tell you how many times I heard that growing up. And I imagine even in hollywood there are remnants of some of that (less harsh) sentiment there. Is Zendaya privileged and does she have access to more roles because she’s lighter? Yes. Is she still probably fighting off “stereotypical” castings, being met with executives who say “a black star won’t make us money in China/Korea/europe/whatever”, is she offered less than her white counterparts, probably also yes. I think it’s important that we can acknowledge that Zendaya (and light skinned black people) is more privileged but I get so salty when I see people try to strip her of her identity or overly criticize her because she’s “not black enough”. I feel like the discourse around biracial people in particular has been on fire in recent years. I can understand the frustration people feel with society around light skinned folks and I absolutely admit that some light skinned folks abuse their privilege or don’t give back, but the discourse is really stripping us of our identity as BLACK people. I’m a black woman, society sees me as such and I am PROUD to be a black woman. Having one white parent doesn’t erase that from my identity.

hopefully people don’t take this the wrong way, but thanks again for your take. Love your blog!

First off, thank you so much for your sweet and kind words about my blog Anon. 🥰 I appreciate it!

I also wanted to say thank you so much for providing your views and your input as a biracial black woman. As a monoracial black woman myself, I can't personally know first-hand how it feels or what biracial black women experience in this country. It's nice to hear the "other side of the coin" for a change.

You and I are probably around the same age, and you're right, growing up there wasn't such a huge demarcation line btwn who is "black" and who is "biracial". Back then, everyone was just considered "black" if you have "one drop" of black blood lol. 😂 But over the past few years or so, there's really been a strong desire for some to classify. I get it... I think biracial black women (especially) do get a bit more favorable treatment in society and people tend to treat them differently, and they're deemed more "beautiful", etc. Not always, but a lot of times the underlying current is there, and it can be frustrating for those of us who are monoracial black to constantly see society uplifting ONE type of beauty over the other. I can see why some want to "clarify" or put certain people in a box.

I think everyone's experiences might be unique just simply due to their skin tone, or even how someone looks, attractiveness levels, size, region of the country they're living in, etc. So, there are a LOT of factors, so I totally get it.

With that said, I totally agree that while it is definitely frustrating to see certain ones in the "Black Community" being given opportunities more than others, at the same time, we really don't know what some of these "lighter-skinned" actresses have had to endure, what they're being told, or how they can be made to feel like an "other" or a "token" for some of them. 🤷🏾‍♀️

My main gripe with Hollywood is that it seems as though monoracial YOUNG black women are constantly being ignored in the industry. 😔 Growing up, I used to at least be able to name some popular monoracial black women who were famous/popular. We at least had Keke, isn't Raven black? lol..... But now days?? It's very hard to even see monoracial black women (young) who are given lead roles in mainstream films.... We're RARELY playing the lead, or even the love interest. 🥴

A lot of roles meant for "black women" are going to biracials lol. Again, I'm not mad (I love to see a fellow woc getting some shine), but it would just be nice to see some black women onscreen who look more like ME, and who are around my age. Yea, it's nice seeing Lupita Nyong'o (for example), or Angela Bassett (who I LOVE!), Kiki Layne, Janelle Monet, etc.... but every now and then, it would just be nice to see some younger monoracial black women who look like myself on the major screen again. 😔 Anyway, let me stop rambling....

#sorry for the dissertation #good points!

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kyouka-supremacy · 2 months

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Who in sskk would you say has the higher IQ?

IQ as in, conventionally smart? Then definitely Atsushi does. I'm sorry. I've said it many times before, but I don't think Akutagawa is a particularly perceptive person. Or witty. Or intelligent in general. It's due to external factors, he never got the chance to have anything that could resemble a proper education; but it's also a matter of his nature, he's just so impulsive, and narrow-minded, and stubborn, he really has the thickest skull ever. But seriously, especially in a world full of geniuses, Akutagawa simply doesn't shine for sharpness of mind, and is way too impulsive and instincts-driven to be a person that relies on reflection or rationality. Everything that Akutagawa does is the epitome of irrational, it's one of the greatest appeals of the character.

Atsushi is smart,,,, I've talked about this also, and I think it's less sustained by canon than for Akutagawa, but I like to think he's a very observant and perceptive person whose intelligence doesn't show because he's constantly surrounded by geniuses, but still he is smart. When it comes to observations skills, I find it easy for him to have them due to his childhood of ill-treatment and abuse: as a defense mechanism, he learnt to be especially observative of people's behaviour in order to tell what sets people off and be able to prevent any escalation, I think that's a widely shared abuse survivor experience. Something among these lines is shown in chapter 51:

I also think Atsushi is a very fast learner. He's observant, and that results in him constantly absorbing other people's knowledge. He's often asking for explanations for Dazai and Ranpo's reasonings, and although I know more often than not it solves an expositive role in the storytelling picture, there's still the fact that it makes Atsushi a person who's constantly trying to understand the reality surrounding him. Atsushi is also shown to be very cool-minded and calculating in fight: from him sliding under Akutagawa and attacking him from behind successfully eluding having to face him front-off in chapter 4, to him retracting his tiger limbs to escape Rashomon's bonds in chapter 12, to the strategy he elaborated with Tanizaki (and his ability to catch up on that) to defeat Lucy in chapter 16, to his attempt to outsmart Fitzgerald in chapter 34 (that, although failed, was still driven by rational thinking nonetheless), and the list could go on. The way in fight Atsushi is shown to ponder over and implement the advices people like Dazai or Mori offered him further makes me believe he's really good at absorbing information. And Atsushi is probably book smart, too! He's compelled by reading to the point he would even risk the orphanage director's punishment just to sneak into the library and read (not explicitly supported by canon, but I can take a guess). According to the second guidebook, he spends his leisure time borrowing books from the library and studying. Overall, he really seems to be rational in all the places Akutagawa is on the contrary driven by impulses¹.

It's like… A physics law when it comes to sskk, that Akutagawa will have the most despicable trait while Atsushi has the trait that is conventionally considered the best; or at least that's as far as my characterization of them goes. Atsushi is beautiful, Akutagawa is ugly². Atsushi is polite, Akutagawa is rude. Atsushi is pure, Akutagawa is stained. Atsushi is smart, Akutagawa isn't. Atsushi is lovable, Akutagawa is destined to cause repulsion in everyone he meets³. In the end, none of this matters: they're no different where it counts, that is, Atsushi isn't any more morally just than Akutagawa is. Atsushi in not any more good than Akutagawa is (I actually suspect the contrary is true). But as far as appearances go, it's still important to portray them as opposites, because Akutagawa being unlovable and Atsushi receiving all the love Akutagawa didn't get for being his contrary - even though deep down they're the same - is almost everything their relationship is about. It's also a big part of why they act like they do towards each other: it's source of Akutagawa's bottomless envy for Atsushi; it's source of how devoted and loyal he will grow to be for him - reaching the point of giving his life for him -, because he can't see Atsushi as anything but perfection. It's source of confidence and of that certain justified hatred towards Akutagawa Atsushi feels because to his eyes Akutagawa is about the worst person to have ever walked on earth. It's source to their wish to annihilate the other as the opposite they can't exist at the same time of. It's the reason Akutagawa had to die, because he's not the good one. Overall it's also expression of Akutagawa's thematic struggle to be good and unavoidable failure at that because of the constraints of a narrative that never wanted him to be good.

But I also think they can make it work. More precisely, I think sskk can make it work when both of them can overcome and defeat the narrative dichotomy they found themselves stuck into: by recognizing that deep common ground of “we're the same” and that where it matters, in morals, neither of them is better or worse than the other. The Beast universe exemplifies that for us readers, but they don't know Beast, so they'll have to realize it by their own. About that, I think Akutagawa already caught on, because he was faster to call out the hypocrisy of Atsushi's good guy façade, and from that it's a short distance to realizing that, as much as he hates to admit it, at his core Atsushi is not that different from himself. It's taking a little more for Atsushi to realize, because it's harder to get down from that higher moral pedestal he believes himself to be on, but with his whole reevaluating Akutagawa after he stopped killing and sacrificed himself for him (and then saved him again. And then showed him how formidable of a team they are when they find a common ground.), I think he's getting there.

Tl;dr: Atsushi is smart and Akutagawa is stupid and yes it fits their personalities, but way more importantly it's consistent with the themes they carry that translate in what their relationship is like.

¹ For further reading on how Atsushi can be witty, please refer to @/gloomierdays's tags on this post. ² For further reading on how Atsushi and Akutagawa's looks can be used to reflect their characters themes, please refer to this post. ³ For further reading on how Akutagawa being not smart (as far as conventional definitions of smart go) ties to his character themes, please refer to this post.

#Answering this exactly one month late I'm so so so so so sorry #To be fair if I didn't set my mind on writing dissertations for every ask I get I'd probably be able to answer them faster #Seriously again I deeply apologize for taking so long ///////#atsushi nakajima #ryūnosuke akutagawa #sskk #shin soukoku #bsd #bungou stray dogs #mine #people asks me stuff #I don't even think Akutagawa likes reading lol.#I think he's so restless and impatient‚ his attention span is really far too low to sit down and read something leisurely.#This might as well be my most fandom unpopular sskk opinion of them all ajkfafliugefligwfkqwjyg

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burst-of-iridescent · 1 year

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the official zutara dissertation (p.6)

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Now that we have discussed both Zutara and Kat.aang from a Watsonian and Doylist perspective, we will do the same for the second half of the canon pairings: Mai and Zuko. In this final section, I will prove that Mai.ko’s relationship was incompatible, dysfunctional, and did a disservice to both Mai and Zuko’s character arcs, as well as the themes of the show overall.

BOOK 6: THE DUMPSTER FIRE OF MAI.KO

Why Mai and Zuko don’t work in canon

1. Mai and Zuko have fundamentally incompatible character traits.

Zuko’s fundamental character trait is empathy. Mai’s fundamental character trait is apathy. Zuko is fiercely emotional, expressive and cares deeply about others, even strangers he doesn’t know. Mai is reserved, closed-off and barely seems to care about anyone, even her own family members. It’s true that opposites attract is a common romantic trope, but successful execution of this trope lies in the fact that those differences are compatible in a way that betters both parties, whereas Mai and Zuko’s do not.

Zuko and Mai are canonically unable to reconcile these differences between themselves. Zuko wants Mai to be more open and expressive, calling her a “big blah” and telling her “I wish you would be high strung and crazy for once instead of keeping all your feelings bottled up inside” (Book 3: The Beach). Mai finds it impossible to live up to these expectations, sarcastically apologizing for not being “as high strung and crazy as the rest of you” and yelling at Zuko and Azula to leave her alone when they press her into expressing herself (Book 3: The Beach). Zuko cannot accept Mai as she is, wanting her to fundamentally change herself, while Mai is unwilling to make this change and unable to understand the need for it in the first place.

While these conflicting traits would create a dysfunctional relationship in any circumstance, it is particularly unacceptable when both parties are about to become rulers (of a nation recovering from war, no less) – a position that demands compassion and empathy. When Mai doesn’t even seem bothered about her own brother being kidnapped (Book 2: Return to Omashu), how is she supposed to care about the people of the Fire Nation? When Mai was ready to order around servants for the fun of it (Book 3: Nightmares and Daydreams), how is she supposed to dedicate her life to serving others?

2. Mai does not truly know or love Zuko for who he is, bringing out only the worst in him.

With Mai, Zuko plays the role of what he believes to be the “perfect” Fire Nation prince. He is lazy, spoilt, and obedient to his father and the Fire Nation – all of which is entirely antithetical to who Zuko is at his core.

The Zuko who relentlessly hunted the Avatar for three years with dogged determination, discipline and effort, who stood up for an enemy village, who spoke up in a war meeting at thirteen to save innocent lives is not the Zuko who lounged around eating fruit tarts and silently sat by while his father planned to slaughter millions – and yet the latter is the Zuko that Mai “loves”, even though this is the complete opposite of the person Zuko is, or should be. Zuko himself admits as much, even outright telling Mai that though he was finally the son Ozai wanted, he wasn’t himself (Book 3: Nightmares and Daydreams).

If she genuinely loved Zuko, Mai should have realized this and pushed Zuko to stay true to who he is – but she never disagrees with or disapproves of Zuko’s behaviour in the Fire Nation. In fact, in most of their scenes she seems to enable it, encouraging him to laze around and dragging him into nihilistic self-indulgence and pessimism with her. The Mai that we see with Zuko is undoubtedly Zuko as the worst version of himself.

Zuko is an idealist, someone who never gives up, who believes in doing the impossible, and at the end of the show he is in a position where he desperately needs those qualities to recover from a century of war and change his country. The last thing he needs is someone who cannot share a similar vision, who “hates the world” (Book 3: The Headband) and can only react to it with cold indifference at best. (Hmm, I wonder if we know another female character who always chooses to see the best in the world and actively works to improve it?)

Ideally, a good romance has characters be drawn to each other because they see and love one another for who they are, but neither Mai nor Zuko are able to do this. The Zuko that Mai loves is completely unlike the person he really is, while Zuko wants Mai to be the opposite of who she truly is.

Ultimately, this makes their relationship impossible to buy, because neither appears to like or even know the other for who they really are, and everything we are shown of their personalities and dynamic seems to suggest that there is no reason they would even fall for each other in the first place.

3. Mai and Zuko cannot truly connect with or understand each other, making their relationship appear shallow and based purely on physical attraction.

The incompatibilities in Mai and Zuko’s personalities makes it impossible for them to connect on a deeper level, forcing their relationship to remain shallow and stagnant.

Mai’s lack of desire to express herself means that she does not open up, and in turn frequently cuts Zuko off when he tries to. In their very first scene together, when Zuko tries to discuss his worries with Mai, she tells him that she “didn’t ask for his whole life story” (Book 3: The Awakening) and promptly shuts him down. This pattern continues to be sustained throughout their relationship, with Mai failing to understand why Zuko is upset not to be invited to the war meeting and even glibly insinuating that he should be happy not to go, given the incident that occurred at the last one (Book 3: Nightmares and Daydreams).

When Zuko needs comfort or reassurance, Mai’s response is to either kiss him and just tell him to stop worrying (Book 3: The Awakening) or suggest that he abuse his power over his servants (Book 3: Nightmares and Daydreams), which in and of itself proves just how little Mai actually knows Zuko if she thinks that would genuinely cheer him up. Mai cannot meaningfully support Zuko, because she doesn’t truly listen to or understand his concerns in the first place.

This, coupled with the fact that Mai never really opens up about her own feelings and thoughts, makes it impossible for them to truly connect on a deep, intimate level. This restricts their relationship to be characterized by kissing, flirting and fighting, none of which seem to indicate a genuine, lasting love on either side. Ultimately, this leaves the impression that the only thing really holding Mai.ko together is pure physical attraction, and nothing more.

4. Mai and Zuko’s dynamic is toxic, and would make them both miserable in the long run.

Mai and Zuko are fundamentally incapable of giving each other what they need in a relationship.

Zuko, an abuse survivor, needs a partner who wears their heart on their sleeve, who can be both kind and direct, who understands him without excusing him. He does not need a partner who orders him around by making him get food for her, or repays his efforts to do something nice for her with ingratitude (Book 3: The Beach). He does not need a partner who puts his life in danger for her own petty grievances (Book 3: The Boiling Rock, Part 2), or who belittles and “jokingly” threatens him to stay in the relationship (Book 3: Sozin’s Comet Part 4).

Zuko’s dynamic with Mai reveals a severe lack of communication, sensitivity, and support. While this would be frustrating in any circumstance, it is particularly toxic given that it repeats many of the patterns of abuse that Zuko endured in his childhood. The last thing Zuko needs is to spend a lifetime with another distant loved one who seems impossible to please, who leaves him struggling to figure out what they need from him and makes him feel small and inferior.

On the other hand, a lifetime with Zuko would also mean unhappiness for Mai – not only because Zuko wants her to be someone she’s not, but because the role of Fire Lady would be extremely suffocating for her. As someone who apparently grew up with parents that stifled her (Book 3: The Beach) and is bored very easily, having to spend the rest of her life dealing with the rigid, tedious machinations of politics and ruling would be torture for Mai. Coupled with her inherent lack of emotional qualities necessary for the position, becoming Fire Lady would spell disaster for Mai, Zuko, and the country as a whole.

The Narrative Failure of Mai.ko

1. Zuko’s development at the end of the show has outstripped Mai’s and having them reconcile is an insult to his character.

When the show ends, Zuko has completed his redemption arc and is unquestionably a hero. He has unlearned the nationalist indoctrination he grew up with, made amends for his mistakes, and is nothing like the person he used to be in the Fire Nation.

Mai, however, has undergone none of this growth. She is never shown to question the Fire Nation, disapprove of Fire Nation imperialism or disagree with the Fire Nation’s actions. In their last interaction before their final reconciliation, she still believes that Zuko is a traitor, accusing him of betraying his country and clearly not understanding why he defected (Book 3: The Boiling Rock, Part 2).

Mai ending up with Zuko when she is never shown to grow out of her beliefs or actually work against the Fire Nation on her own terms makes absolutely no sense. She and Zuko are on entirely different paths, and it took Zuko – someone far more empathetic than Mai – years to turn against the Fire Nation. It does Zuko a disservice to suggest that he would willingly be with Mai when he knows that she, at this point, does not share his ideals or beliefs, and has a much longer and more difficult journey ahead of her to get there (it’s also questionable if she ever does really get there, given that she doesn’t appear to care about people she’s not personally involved with).

Had Zuko never defected and instead turned into yet another war-mongering Fire Lord, Mai would have stayed with him. When Zuko has a complete perspective change and pivots in the opposite direction to who Mai originally believed he would become, she still stays with him. Mai ending up with Zuko when he has undergone such a huge change and she hasn’t, loving two entirely different and essentially contradictory people, is utterly nonsensical.

2. Mai’s characterization is retconned to justify her redemption.

“I love Zuko more than I fear you!” is certainly a cool line... except nothing about how Mai is set up until The Boiling Rock earns that statement from her character.

Mai is more than eager to join Azula when she comes to recruit her, even when she finds out that they’re going to hunt down Zuko. At this point, Mai has no reason to believe that Azula will bring Zuko back to the Fire Nation safely, but shows no hesitation about potentially capturing and hurting Zuko, even smiling when Ty Lee says “It’ll be interesting to see Zuko again, won’t it?” (Book 2: Return to Omashu)

Mai defies Azula on multiple occasions with no concern, which implies that she is either unafraid of Azula, or does not believe that Azula will punish her even when she disobeys her. She refuses to enter the sewers to fight Katara and Toph, saying “she can shoot all the lightning she wants at me, I’m not going in there” (Book 2: The Drill) and releases the Earth King’s bear without a fight despite the fact that she is clearly supposed to be on guard (Book 2: The Crossroads of Destiny).

Unlike Ty Lee, there is never a moment before her betrayal where Mai seems scared of Azula – and the animators do add moments of Mai breaking her apathetic façade (such as when Ty Lee hugs her), so they could certainly have done the same in other scenes to show that Mai is secretly afraid of Azula and doesn’t agree with her actions. As it is, there is no distinction made between what Mai does out of supposed fear of Azula and what she does of her own agency, and this makes her redemption and characterization unbelievable.

3. Mai’s redemption is unsatisfactory and undermines the importance of redemption as one of the show’s major themes.

Apart from her retconned characterization, the only other build-up to Mai’s redemption is her betrayal of Azula to save Zuko – except this betrayal doesn’t happen because she experiences growth and rejects the ideology of the Fire Nation of her own will, but because Zuko switches sides, for some reason Mai doesn’t even understand.

If the writers truly wanted to redeem Mai’s character from the start, she had to be shown to distance herself from the Fire Nation in some way, or at least participate in Fire Nation militarism only under duress (as the show did with Ty Lee, which is why her redemption is far more believable). Instead, they characterize Mai as an outright villain, and then try to redeem her at the last minute.

This is particularly galling given the emphasis the show places on restitution as a part of achieving redemption. Zuko’s redemption is satisfying because he doesn’t immediately earn it after one good deed – he has to genuinely see the error of his ways, and then make amends for the hurt he caused. Yet, despite the fact that Mai also hunted the Gaang all over the world seemingly of her own volition, and showed absolutely none of the growth Zuko went through, she’s automatically redeemed because she saved Zuko and his friends once?

Unless Mai magically saw the light while in prison (which isn’t canon, and off-screen character development is not development in any case), neither Zuko nor the Gaang should be comfortable being around Mai at the end of the show, let alone playing pai sho with her in a tea shop. Team Avatar’s easy acceptance of Mai, and Zuko’s willingness to take her back, is a slap in the face both to Zuko’s hard won redemption and to the importance the show places on earning redemption.

4. Making Mai.ko canon undercuts the entire narrative purpose of their relationship, which was meant to illustrate why Zuko made the wrong choice in returning to the Fire Nation.

The reason why Mai.ko is so dysfunctional is because the audience is supposed to see that it is wrong. We are not meant to root for Zuko to find happiness with Mai, because Zuko’s arc in the first half of book 3 is intended to prove that his choice to return to the Fire Nation was 100% the wrong one.

Everything about Zuko’s time in the Fire Nation is supposed to make him uncomfortable and miserable, to show him without the slightest hint of doubt that he is not where he’s meant to be. His relationship with Mai is another seemingly “perfect” aspect of this life that is supposed to make him happy, but does not because it is fundamentally wrong for the person he truly is. When Zuko decides to defect, the decision is supposed to be clear, no longer something to struggle with, because he finally realizes that everything he thought he wanted is not what he really wants. He has changed too much for that, and the fact that he does not want those things any longer is good.

Making Maiko canon after this completely undercuts both this arc and the severity of Zuko’s choice to side with Azula, making it seem as though it’s not all bad that Zuko betrayed Iroh and Katara because he got to reconnect with the love of his life, when really it was unequivocally the worst mistake Zuko ever made. It adds ambiguity to Zuko’s decision to turn traitor, insinuating that he had to “give up” Mai to do the right thing, when the point was that he didn’t really have to give up anything because he didn’t want any of this any longer, and so it was not a struggle at all.

Nothing about his time in the Fire Nation was right for him, and both Zuko and the viewer were supposed to realize that, because that is what drives home the impact of Zuko’s wrong decision in the Crossroads of Destiny, and what proves that Zuko has changed for good. Portraying Maiko getting back together as something positive hurts both this narrative and Zuko’s character development as a whole.

Ultimately, Mai.ko does not work because it is a shallow relationship attempting to force together two fundamentally incompatible people, cheapening and undermining both Zuko and Mai’s characters and arcs. It’s evident that it was not intended to be endgame until extremely late in Book 3, because the set-up, development and progression of this ship is entirely unsalvageable – and only makes Zuko and Katara’s relationship appear even more perfect in comparison.

#anti maiko #the official zutara dissertation #zutara #yes i know this is mad late i am so sorry #but in my defense i fucking hate mai.ko #pretty much done now! just the conclusion left #ty for sticking it out if you made it here

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