#to him they aren't just 'versions'. they are real people. different than his own friends but important to him just the same

[000marie198]

Plz plz plz let them be brothers

#THE HUG #sonic the hedgehog #sonic #miles tails prower #tails nine #nine the fox #miles nine prower #sonic prime trailer #sonic prime #prime sonic #sonic prime season 2 #sonic prime s2 #sonic has come to care abt these shattered versions of his friends just as much as his real friends #to him they aren't just 'versions'. they are real people. different than his own friends but important to him just the same #prime bros

[wekiaam]

2D NEWSIES: What I would change

I just realised I've been making fake concept art for a nonexistent animated Newsies adaptation for four years now. Over time, I've been getting so many ideas for this adaptation if it ever became real, I thought I would share them with you guys! This includes story changes, cut and additional songs and ideas for characters and style. I would love to know your thoughts on these!

When I started making concept art for "2dsies" as I came to be called, I intended for it to be based on the Broadway version and the Broadway version only. However, stories on stage differ a lot from stories told on screen, it just doesn't work the same way. I do still prefer the storyline of Broadway Newsies, but I think the best version would be a combination of the best parts of all different versions, plus some necessary changes. I would want Newsies to be a love letter to every production we've had, to everyone who made happen and every theatre kid who's been geeking out over it since 1992, while also being its own standalone movie that can be enjoyed by anybody. I am in no way an adequate screenwriter, these are just a few suggestions I have for a better story!

Story

Like I said, the story will be based mainly on the Broadway storyline, meaning we still have Artist Jack, Katherine, and most elements from the show that aren't in the movie. It will, however, be quite different from the show and the movie, and maybe add some more of the real events from the newsboy strike. There are still some details and scenes I would like to add and some I would remove completely.

- I like the history lesson opening from the movie, it gives people just enough background information on the real historical events the story is based on. I don't know if it should be Racetrack or Jack narrating, though.

- In Santa Fe (prologue), Crutchie mentions he's afraid the other boys will find out about his bad leg, even though they all literally know him as Crutchie, and it seems to be the first time Jack tells him about his dream of going to Santa Fe, even though they've clearly been best friends for a long time. It feels off, UNLESS they only just met, which is why I love @raggedy-albert 's theory so much. I would have the scene start off with them as kids, and have them grow up throughout the song.

- I want to add a scene in the beginning of Katherine at the New York Sun to establish her character and motivations, and possibly a little foreshadowing. Just an idea for a scene; she goes to the editor to let him read her story covering the trolley strike, but he reminds her of "her place" and that she's lucky enough to be in the position she's in and that she should go review a vaudeville or something. This would not only give her a similar motivation to the newsies, but also, if we're gonna bring the women's rights movement into the story let's do it right!

- Of course I'd also like to add more romantic interactions between Jack and Katherine, to make their relationship more believable. However, I don't think they should be a couple immediately after the finale, I was more thinking of an open ending to their relationship where Jack takes his first step to staying in New York by finally asking her out.

- Maybe add the actual scene where Jack and Davey visit Brooklyn instead of having them tell the other newsies what Spot said right before Seize the Day. Show don't tell, you know?

- A scene where Jack visits Crutchie at the refuge, similar to the one in the movie, but with the sadness Jack describes it with in the show. Again, show, don't tell. Show me how Jack visits the place of his nightmares again only to find his best friend in a worse state than ever and being unable to save him.

- Katherine punches Jack after the rally. Give it to me.

- Additional scene after Jack and Katherine's song after the rally where Jack formally apologizes to the newsies. Because in the show it just cuts from "omg he's a sellout *spits on the floor*" to "yay captain Jack is back" and it just doesn't sit right with me.

Songs

- There should be an entirely new Pulitzer song. The Bottom Line is good but by far the most skippable song on the cast recording, and The News Is Getting Better (the off broadway cut song) is a little Better but not quite the evil capitalist song we need.

- Swap Something to Believe In for When I See You Again. It's such a sweet song and I think it suits Jack and Katherine a lot better. It's much more "Neither of us know what tomorrow brings but when I'm with you I know we can change things for the better, even if it's scary but for now let's be here together and forget the world for a bit" instead of "I love you but I'm still gonna chase my cowboy dreams"

- Cut Letter From The Refuge, since my idea was to have this be a scene instead.

- Some lyric changes!

In Santa Fe: "Crutchie's callin' me, he's fine, just too damn slow"

In Once And For All: add this lyric from the movie, "Better to die than to crawl".

In Seize the Day: "Friends of the friendless seize the day, raise up the torch and light the way", not in the song but in the reprise where all the working children of the city gather before the finale.

Additional: "Still it seems like the dream of a boy, not a man", from The Truth About The Moon, a cut song from the movie that was supposed to be sung by Sarah. I don't know where I would put this lyric, but it could be said or sung by Jack as he realises what he's really looking for is not actually Santa Fe.

Characters:

- I want to add more girls to the background newsies, first of all.

- Sarah still won't do anything for the plot, but Davey and Les could mention that they have a sister. She's still canon to me.

- Speaking of Les, let's make him more likeable and also more helpful.

- Snyder has two scary dogs with him at all times.

- Just and idea, maybe Denton could still be a character if we replace Darcy with him, or maybe combine the two. Have him be Katherine's chaperone and friend formally, but also her reporter bestie. They could be a fun journalist duo!

Style

- The movie will still include the iconic choreography, which means it couldn't be fully 2D, but rather a mix between hand drawn and CGI.

-I would love for the backgrounds in the movie to be similar to impressionist and romantic art styles from the 19th century, to really sell how it's a story told from Jack's perspective. Especially his dream-like imaginations of Santa Fe would be brilliant in this style.

- I want to include a lot of weather foreshadowing. Rain right before Seize The Day and the sun breaking through when Davey starts singing. Mist surrounding Snyder and sudden darkness whenever he's near. A beautiful sunset when Jack and Katherine are alone on the rooftop. And of course, partly cloudy, clear by evening. It's such a cool way of visual storytelling when you have a plot that has no magic involved, like in most Disney movies.

- The real people characters' designs (Pulitzer, Hearst, Roosevelt) can be based on political cartoon caricature versions of themselves.

And lastly, quotes from the movie I liked that could be inspiring for the animated movie:

-"When I created the World..." "🙄" and "Where was I?" "You created the World, chief?"

- "No, we'll be just a bunch of angry kids with no money"

-"What, you couldn't stay away?" "Well I guess I can't be something I ain't." "A scab?" "No, smart."

Many of these ideas are still in development. Some might work, some may not, but I will be basing any future work I'll post on here on these ideas. I would love to see you guys  discuss and add on to these!

#newsies #newsies broadway #broadway #2dsies #jack kelly #livesies #92sies #1992 newsies #katherine newsies

[balioc]

Holiday Engineering: Lamptide

OK, let's put my money where my mouth is.

Lamptide is the invented-from-scratch holiday that I actually celebrate. It has its roots in a roleplaying game that I ran some years ago with @cloakofshadow and @mirror-lock, but after the game finished, I decided that I wanted to import a modified version of the festival into real life.

And it's worked very well! Or so I posit. We've had well-attended Lamptide celebrations for a couple of years running, and not only do people show up and enjoy themselves, there's a distinctive holiday spirit. The weird rites and activities do in fact happen. Which is possibly just because my friends are good sports, but...I think we're reaching the point where some version of Lamptide might well take place without me pushing it along.

As a holiday-engineering project, it's a work-in-progress. I am still tinkering with the observances, and the pieces definitely aren't yet all in place. I don't personally have the expertise to create some of the holiday stuff I'd want to create. Moreover, the population that celebrates Lamptide is still very small, and in some ways homogeneous -- mostly childless urban professional-types -- so the holiday doesn't have the context that it would need to manifest in all the forms that I imagine for it.

But I'm proud of it. And, at the least, it provides an example of what it looks like for a holiday to be built from the ground up.

Vibe. This is where I started. (Both in the RPG and in real life, actually.) In the RPG, Lamptide is an intercalary day, and like many intercalary festivals it's a weird and occult time. In real life, of course, I do not control the calendar. But even so, Lamptide is meant to have that same feel, manifesting as a carnival of spooks and revelry. To some extent, it's meant to serve as a Halloween-like that works better for me than actual Halloween does.

And much like Halloween, in theory, its core rituals can be practiced in three different "modes" depending on context. For families with kids, it's a cutesy holiday of flamboyant fun. For older kids and adolescents, it's a holiday of mischief and boundary-pushing (in a way that is, I hope, less obnoxious than the adolescent version of Halloween). For independent adults, it can be contemplative and/or literary and/or Spicy and Sexy, to taste.

Theme. In a highflown theoretical sense: Lamptide is the festival of narrative conquering material reality, of ideas and illusions becoming more-real-than-real. It is the day when you leave the sunlit world behind and walk back into Plato's cave, because our art allows us to create such beautiful shadows on the walls.

(The "lamp" of Lamptide is, notionally, the lamp whose light reveals what-is-not.)

In a more-everyday sense: Lamptide is a festival of magic.

Timing. Lamptide is observed on the spring equinox. There are a few reasons for this, some of them rooted in stuff from the RPG, but the big one is that it's almost halfway around the calendar from Halloween. I really don't want to compete with Halloween, to the extent that I can avoid it; I would lose that competition very hard. And there are enough obvious points of similarity that it's a real danger.

Early spring is also a good time for holidays generally, in the contemporary US. There's relatively little going on then, and people feel kind of festive because the worst of winter is over.

Mythology. The personification of the holiday is Father Lantern, an ogre-like character who carries a lamp. In the (notional) tales, he shines his lamp on you, and in its light you see an otherworldly version of yourself -- a creature that you could be, if you left ordinary reality behind. More prosaically, if he shows up at your doorstep and you offer him candy, he will tell you stories (or gift you with media).

Father Lantern is mostly a funny and approachable figure. He is long-winded and pretentious, in love with the sound of his own voice. But there is meant to be an edge of menace to him; he is an ogre, which means that there's always the danger that he'll just eat you, especially if you're a child. (This is not a behavior-enforcement thing -- he's not Krampus, and Lamptide is not that kind of holiday. Father Lantern's whims are inscrutable.)

I haven't yet experimented with having someone play Father Lantern, in the way that people play Santa Claus, but it's an obvious possibility.

Decorations. You put lamps and lanterns everywhere. If you can keep your celebration space lit entirely by lantern-light, that is to be commended. Silhouettes and shadow-plays are very much in the holiday spirit.

Holiday attire. Masks -- masquerade-style masks, the kind that allow people to eat and talk comfortably -- are very strongly encouraged. (When I throw Lamptide parties, this is the only thing about which I actually nudge people.) In terms of creating distinctive atmosphere, this fires on all cylinders. A space full of masked people feels otherworldly and ritualized and, well, magic. And the symbolism is super on-the-nose.

Fancy and flamboyant clothes are also encouraged.

Ritual interactions. The Lamptide tradition is to greet people with curses and maledictions. This is done in the spirit of theater superstition; it is a topsy-turvy intercalary carnival, after all. "Die in a fire" is the standard form of cheery holiday well-wishing, although you're encouraged to be creative if you're so inclined.

(Does this mostly give little kids an excuse to be gleeful about saying stuff they'd normally never be allowed to say? Maybe.)

Activities. There are two big ones.

Divination. Lamptide is a time for fortune-telling. Tarot cards are my go-to, and offering Tarot readings at Lamptide parties has proven to be a big hit, but any form of divination at all -- ranging from Actual Fucking Haruspexy to "let's ask ChatGPT about our future husbands" -- is praiseworthy. When my son was less than a year old, I had him crawl around the floor and choose Symbolically Portentous Objects like he was the infant Dalai Lama or something, and it was great.

Bribery, especially candy bribery. One of the core dynamics of a Lamptide celebration is that you walk in carrying candy, or other things that you're happy to give away, and you offer your prizes to people in exchange for them doing stuff that you want them to do. For families with little kids, this is a chance for the parents to reward their children for showing off cool skills / desired behaviors in a concrete ritual framework, and for the children to get their parents to do silly stuff. For teens, it's a structure for something that's essentially Truth or Dare with more flexibility. The applications for Spicy Sexy grownup parties are left as an exercise for the reader.

(I have thoughts about expanding the candy bribery thing into a practice of Reverse Wassailing / Trick-or-Treating, essentially, where you walk around town offering strangers candy in exchange for singing with you or otherwise doing cute harmless stuff. I haven't yet worked out exactly the right feel, though. And, well, things being how they are, you need a pretty thick social skin to be willing to offer strangers candy without a widely-accepted social framework.)

Undeveloped aspects of the holiday, which I hope to flesh out in future years:

Traditional food. We don't really have anything other than candy, right now, and it's an obvious lacuna. Lamptide isn't really a sit-down-for-a-nice-dinner kind of holiday...although I guess it could be...but I suspect it would be useful to come up with some kind of Classic Lamptide Hors d'Ouevre or Classic Lamptide Crudité or something else appropriate for a party where people are milling around doing different things. (Not a dessert, I don't want to compete with the candy.) Sadly, I have no culinary genius, so I'm going to have to outsource for this one.

Music. @cloakofshadow has written some alternate lyrics for Christmas carols, but a thriving holiday should really have its own songs with their own distinctive melodies. Which means that I should probably find a competent composer to help me out.

Gifts. It would be very In-Theme for Lamptide to be the holiday when you give people the books / movies / video games / etc. that you want them to consume for your sake. I haven't yet done anything with that idea, but I am definitely considering it strongly.

#holiday analysis #lamptide

[somethinabouttwistedwonderland]

FLOYD LEECH HEADCANONS

semi in-depth Floyd Leech relationship headcanons

I'm a Floyd fangirl, so the first character I'm making headcanons for is him! However, this will definitely be a wild ride due to just how fucked up Floyd is in general, so bear with me here as we go through all the green, red, and even black flags that our beloved unhinged eel has <3

IMPORTANT INFORMATION! ⚠️ ⚠️ PLEASE READ:

Before we start, I'd like to say that this is a set of relationship headcanons for a VERY unhinged and deranged character, one who does what he wants whenever he wants, and has shown ZERO real connections that aren't made out of anything aside from a superficial interest. So be weary that these headcanons are very "dead dove: do not eat". These are made from a very basic character analysis of Floyd.

This is NOT yandere content. Floyd is NOT a yandere don't come at me with that shit lmao. Floyd is just not all there mentally. Rated Mature due to toxic relationship mentions.

Table of contents: Floyd Analysis, Courting portion, relationship portion, miscellaneous portion, fluff portion (because we need a break from the toxicity), other people portion, overall.

CONTENT WARNING(S): VERY toxic relationship. Floyd being Floyd. unaware manipulation, abuse, oh so very many red flags. Cycle of love and neglect, objectification of the reader. Pushing boundaries. threats. violence. Lack of any empathy from Ocavinelle, Floyd losing interest. Floyd is VERY silly /neg

—————————————

Character analysis portion

When thinking about how someone would be in a relationship, we first have to analyze their characteristics, and BOY. We have a lot to discuss regarding Floyd Leech.

Floyd is a character who does things on whims, barely commits to anything unless he thinks it'll be interesting, and doesn't think about the consequences to his actions, even if his actions hurt others.

As Azul never fails to mention, Jade and Floyd do not see him as a friend, but as someone interesting who they keep around, and who they can drop like a bad habit any time they ever feel bored of him.

Floyd's lack of regard for the people around him is something that affects them very much, as Floyd is sometimes even eager to see others suffer, saying it's quicker to break bones than threatening someone.

Floyd is a very smart character as well (when he wants to be, of course), however Floyd prefers to stick to violence and forcing his way through things if possible, rather than scheming and manipulating like his calmer (albeit just as unhinged) twin brother.

Basically, Floyd is a character who does whatever he wants, whenever he wants, whenever he feels like it.

Onto the "courting" portion; Floyd noticing someone and falling in love is, in all likelihood, probably very unlikely. However, Floyd's version of love is most likely different from our own, due to the way he thinks.

For Floyd, what he might mistake for "love" could be something else entirely, and this is a very bad thing for the object of his "affections." For him, he could see it as finding you interesting, looking for ways to annoy you or make you squirm.

Floyd will start his "romantic journey" by going straight for what he wants: You. Floyd immediately bothers you, asking you things about yourself, and giving you a nickname (assuming you're not Yuu).

Floyd's "interest" in you is a lot more invasive than a regular person's interest in someone they "like". Floyd takes his spot in your personal space, inquiring about you, trying to figure out what makes you so interesting in his strange eel mind.

Depending on the object of his affections, this "interest" in you could be many different things. It could simply be that he thinks you're incredibly attractive, or something you did that amused him, anyways, he wants you to keep entertaining him for a long time.

I personally think that Floyd is rather clueless when it comes to romance as it was never really something that interested him. However, now whenever he sees a couple in the street holding hands, or a couple making out in an alleyway, you're always the first person to come to mind.

I am of the opinion that Floyd isn't the type to be interested in romantic relationships, so this is honestly just a passing thing for him as most things are.

Onto the relationship portion: Floyd makes sure to do everything that interests him together with you. As Floyd is someone who doesn't care about how others feel (unless the way they feel interests him in some way), Floyd mostly ignores how you react.

He doesn't care if you don't want to be with him or not. You're his interest now, and he's never treated anyone like a person before, why would he start now? To him, you're nothing more than something that amuses him.

He's happy to see your reactions to how he treats you. The idea that he gets to act like a sweet lover interests him. So sometimes he'll cradle you in his arms and gently push your hair out of your face. As you start to feel comfortable in his arms. He immediately lets go, starting to get bored of you.

The cycle of love and neglect from Floyd definitely hurts you mentally. Depending on you, you might start to crave the affection he gives you when he expresses interest in you, you could be terrified for when his mood swings hit and he gets bored of you.

Threatening you and seeing you scared isn't something that Floyd is above doing. In fact, seeing the fear on your face is something he can't get enough of, and it sparks his interest in you even more.

Floyd either doesn't know you have boundaries, or just doesn't care. No matter what your boundaries are, he'll find a way to push them if he wants to.

He's very focused on his own interests, and not yours. If you advocate for your boundaries, Floyd will most likely get annoyed and threaten you. If you try to avoid him, then he'd try to bother you even more, after all, he does love the chase.

There's many ways you can react to Floyd's... actions, however, many of them lead to you getting hurt more than just mentally, so you have to be incredibly careful when dealing with a "lovestruck" Floyd.

As Floyd's "love" is just an intense interest in you, he sort of expects you to behave like another interest would. That is, like an object that sometimes behaves in funny ways. So whenever you do something that upsets him, he is quick to threaten you in order to make you shut up about whatever it is you're whining about now. Of course, if you're whining about something silly, he'll poke you and laugh.

He loves making you embarrassed in public, he thinks your red face is cute. He is very into PDA, and always pays attention to you when the rest of his surroundings are boring.

If you really do love him, then I'm sorry to say, but this relationship won't last. Sure, he could find you interesting for a few years, but eventually he'll get bored, and drop you like a bad habit.

Onto the miscellaneous portion:

Floyd often takes you to clothing stores, having you watch as he puts on a mini fashion show. He also enjoys putting you in cute clothes like a dress-up-doll.

Of course he squeezes you until you feel your ribs break. Of course he drags you down into the murky depths until you start to thrash around for air. Of course he force feeds you expired food to see how you react. Of course he bites you until you bleed. Of course he thinks it's hilarious when you try to run away from him.

A relationship with Floyd might be scary, or even uncomfortable at times, but one thing it will never be is boring.

Since Floyd takes you everywhere he goes, there are some fun moments, too. He teaches you how basic parkour moves, he takes you swimming, he goes out to dance with you. Any one of his interests, he's all too happy to share with you.

He doesn't think too much about the future, so if you bring it up, he says "Whatever happens, happens!" and brushes you off.

Onto the fluff portion; there aren't many "truly wholesome" moments when in a relationship with Floyd.

However, maybe one day Floyd will realize that... hey, he loves you, and yet, whenever he sees the romantic scenes on the screens, the lovers hate seeing each other cry. He'll think. And he'll think. Does he hate to see you upset? He thinks it's funny, but that's not what it's usually like. He'll reflect.

One day, he might see you get hurt, and get pissed at the one who did it. Afterwards, he might comfort you in his arms. But is it just him acting again? You don't know, but you can't bring yourself to care.

Mornings waking up next to Floyd can be cute. His sleeping face, his arms around you.

When he's in the mood to love you, you can bet that you've got yourself a very sweet and very tender boyfriend, even if it's all an act, a part of you thinks he might actually love you as he gently rubs your shoulders and kisses your forehead.

He likes to give you random gifts! A cool looking rock he found, a large stick that can be used for hiking or pretending you're on a journey, or a neato piece of trash.

His love of clothes extends to loving to see you in them, especially cool shoes. You and Floyd will try on high heels and stumble around. Depending on your skill in heels, he might laugh as you fall, or he'll be very impressed with your ability.

Onto the other people portion; The people around you often feel bad for you, asking how on earth you could get Floyd to treat you like that, etc

Azul is quite annoyed by Floyd's newfound toy, as Floyd spends less time taking "orders" from Azul and more time messing with the object of his "affections".

Azul feels bad for you, honestly. He knows how Floyd is, and by seeing how he treats you, Azul knows how awful it must be. However, he doesn't interfere, as he has no place for empathy, really.

Jade is quite amused that Floyd is so interested in you. Jade doesn't quite see it, but whatever makes Floyd happy.

Jade doesn't feel bad for you in the slightest, finding a sadistic delight in seeing Floyd terrorizing you. However, he tells you that he's there if you need him, letting you cry your feelings away, while he's right there, patting your shoulder. This, however, is just his sadistic way of seeing you cry. Jade has always been just as bad as his brother after all, if not worse.

OVERALL

Overall, Floyd isn't someone who takes interest in having close, sappy relationships with others, and treats his partner like he does everything else. He hangs around with them, spends time with them, and when in the mood to act like a good partner, he does. But if he loses all interest in you, expect to be dropped like a bad habit. Don't expect a future, and don't expect to be treated like anything other than a passing fad.

Anyways!! This post was on the very serious side, seeing as I brought up just some of the mental trauma one would go through in this kinda situation. I'm aware that many people think Floyd is a very very silly guy, and I am of the opinion that he is silly, but a lot of people neglect just how toxic his kind of behavior is, and I really wanted to bring out that side of the conversation without implying that he's a Yandere. Floyd strikes me as the type to just take someone along with him if he thinks they're funny, and this shows with how he and his brother interact with Azul, actually.

Despite the lack of anything really cute and fluffy here, I hope you enjoyed my take on one of the most interesting characters in Twisted Wonderland, and how they'd be in a relationship! I plan on making another one of these character analysis relationship headcanon posts soon (that's hopefully more healthy than this one.) so keep updated!

#disney twst #twisted wonderland #twst #twst x reader #dead dove do not eat #floyd leech #floyd leech x reader #azul ashengrotto #jade leech #twst floyd #twst azul #twst jade

[whetstonefires]

I hope you're having an excellent day 😊😊😊 What about Wei Wuxian as Naruto?

Thanks! It was pretty good. I organized my embroidery floss and took advantage of being alone in the building to dance around like a maniac for about 20 minutes. My cat hated it. My knees aren't sure they approve either.

Wei Wuxian as Naruto has a lot going for it right out the gate. Orphaned sunshine boy protagonist types, now we're cooking with propane. They're even both fox coded!

However, at the risk of stating the obvious, if Wei Wuxian were Naruto he wouldn't be Naruto anymore. That is. Fundamental to Wei Wuxian is that he is brilliant and talented and he damn well knows it. He would excel without effort in ninja school--not as much as he did in Jiang Sect unless he unlike Naruto was still getting personal mentoring in honor of his late father, but still.

Difference is, when this Wei Wuxian slacks off in class and the teacher tries to embarrass him, if he reels off the correct answer and then reinvents senjutsu from first principles in a creepy-sounding way for a lark just to show off, the teacher is not going to think that he's just like his annoying late mother. (Though he'll still have one. Kushina and Cangse Sanren are fairly similar Dead Mom archetypes too.)

The teacher is going to think things like, no real child would say that shit and I'm expected to teach the monster fox that killed my family basic ninjutsu I hate this I hate this we're all gonna die.

So basically this Wei Wuxian gets his Yiling Laozu reputation mod as part of the starter pack. I don't think he'd handle it super gracefully! But not the worst, either.

Not even as badly as he did in the actual version, probably, on account of he doesn't know his own dark secret. So he can't self-isolate to protect it. Though him pulling away from people once he does learn would be cool.

He'd probably have forged slightly stronger social ties rather sooner than Naruto did, even if he was just as neglected and radioactive; Wei Wuxian doesn't care what people think of him nearly as much as Naruto does, but in some ways he's a more genuinely social person, and he's got much better social intuition, so it's easier for him to figure out what people want and either do that or not do that on purpose.

He'd have at least a bunch of casual friends. Mostly civilians, and other kids from ninja school whose parents told them not to play with him but they did anyway.

Wei Wuxian cannot do therapy no jutsu. He does not have that ability to confront and exist with emotional discomfort or that intensity of interest in what is going on with other people.

He does however have some level of Friendship Beam Attack (the plot to some extent hinges utterly on how effectively it hit Wen Ning) and it would presumably be more effective, in a shounen context.

But that's the thing, Wei Wuxian isn't really built to confront shounen manga style problems. Or, well, he is, but he's overbuilt for them; they're his bread and butter. One of Naruto's key motifs, early on at least before we got into the heavy power creep, is not being a genius.

Wei Wuxian, by definition, is a genius. He is the kind of guy who walks up to shounen manga sorts of problems scaled to what ought to be his level, handles them, and goes 'what, like it's hard?'

Wei Wuxian is designed to be destroyed not by external threats but by his own loyalties, politics, and lies. (Which was a point of confluence with Itachi I didn't really touch on because the flow was so different lmao.)

He's also, otoh, designed to be destroyed. Naruto is designed to start off artificially low and climb steadily up toward heaven. (Ymmv on how this worked out but he sure did escalate.)

You have to pick which schema to apply when performing the fusion--I mean, it's not either-or, the whole deal with Wei Wuxian is he goes through the entire arc of a tragedy and then comes back to life and stars in a romcom. These things can superimpose and stack. But there are structural decisions that have to be made early.

So anyway, Wei Wuxian as Naruto is not going to enter the Genin Team phase of life with the same priorities, even if he has largely conducted himself about the same way hitherto. 'Proving himself' so 'people will accept him' is not a motive that works for this character--you basically have to give him actual precious people earlier just to get him to care about attaining ninja rank at all.

Otherwise he would probably much rather loaf his way through his teens stealing jutsu and making trouble. Which is the well-adjusted reaction to the idea of becoming a child soldier, like. He likes recognition but 'showing off' is a reason he does dumb fun things, not difficult high-commitment ones. He's like if Shikamaru had ADHD and no parents.

Being twelve is going to make him dumber, but I can't see it making him not the kind of person who stops caring about his marks in school if the teacher is hostile.

If Wei Wuxian here isn't acting out of appreciation for the Hokage raising him, or something like that, you have to give him a practical motive to enter military service like 'Konoha stops supporting orphans out of the public purse at thirteen so he's got to get some kind of job and ninja is the least boring option' which. Is significantly less like either Naruto or Wei Wuxian in terms of reasons to do anything, and starts getting into solidly OC territory.

The whole fact that Konoha's worldbuilding centers around an attempt to move away from decentralized clannish social organization and promote the idea of shared, communal social institutions and (in theory) civil society, and the ways this does and does not work out for people especially considering it is still a relatively small military dictatorship, honestly interfaces super interestingly with how, in Mo Dao Zu Shi, one of the underlying challenges backstopping all character choice is that there is no feasible alternative to the clan system, and you have to pick a family-faction to depend upon and submit yourself to, or face the world with no safety net.

Like. Huh.

.....Kishimoto is honestly unusually-for-shounen well-grounded in the genres he's riffing on tbh, for all my bitching there were some very good reasons his work found such success; I would have liked to see what kind of story he produced without the insane pressures of the Weekly part of Weekly Shounen Jump. I wonder if he'll ever publish again. For all I know he already is lmao.

So anyway, however we manage it we get Wei Wuxian on his genin team with like. Lan Wangji and Mianmian or whoever. Actually that's hilarious. Yeah, make it lwj and lqy, both of them so done with his shit.

Setting up some wild role-reversal here--Lan Wangji being the one to go Away and Wei Wuxian asking him to stay? Or Naruto-person leaving into the dark, and Sasuke-person remaining and calling for him to come back? Either way. Getting some inversion. Tasty.

Where does this leave Jiang Cheng, though? Because in a lot of ways Uchiha 'Deuteragonist by Editorial Mandate' Sasuke is straddling both roles.

In many ways Wangxian is much more like if Naruto had an endgame romance with Neji. Which is a great ship tbh, I saw very little of it back in the day?? In a series with a smaller cast or with less Sasuke Creep (not sasuke being a creep, it's like power creep) it would probably have done numbers.

...Naruto going away for that timeskip really limited his opportunity to make connections in the village huh.

I guess it depends on the kind of narrative you're trying to put together. On one hand, you can do Jiang Fengmian as the rather-more-involved Third Hokage, with Jiang Cheng as an aged-up Konohamaru kind of figure. And then Jiang Yanli is standing in as both Iruka and. I know I know the ramen guy's name. Ichiraku. Soup! XD Emotionally significant soup!

But with a different backstory than either lmao. Kurama very possibly killed Yu Ziyuan in this universe, though I can't visualize her as a midwife.

[[[Why do I have so much Naruto lore on tap, there is no life value in knowing Sarutobi Hiruzen's wife was at ground zero of the Kyuubi attack because she was the expert overseeing Uzumaki Kushina's childbirth a;kdj;lafdks. I do not remember the things I was actually studying in high school nearly this well.]]]

(Actually Jin Ling is Konohamaru and Jiang Cheng is aged-down Asuma. But whatever.)

And in this case Wei Wuxian's genin team is Lan Wangji and Mianmian under idk who. Lan Qiren, possibly, although he seems more the Ebisu type. Lan Xichen? (It's not like he can serve as a plausible Itachi. Can you imagine.) Actual Kakashi, possibly; we can't replace everyone with mdzs characters; the cast sizes don't square.

Kakashi training Wei Wuxian is very funny to think about. He deserves this.

Or on the other hand for a different pacing and focus, the genin team is him, Jiang Cheng, and Jiang Yanli under Jiang Fengmian, who dies sometime after or probably during the climax of the chuunin exams. And Sarutobi stays Hokage, and probably doesn't die during the chuunin exams. And we aim for a Naruto/Neji kind of romance storyline lol.

What is the Lan Wangji equivalent of Neji exposing his caged bird seal in front of god and everybody and ranting (it is very unclear at what effective volume though you'd think the proctors would have shut him up if he could be heard from the stadium seating that shit was sedition) about his traumatic backstory and the deep injustices in his family's system of hierarchy? I'm gonna say Not That.

Wei Wuxian versus Lan Wangji important ideological-conflict bonding duel in the Chuunin exam finals sounds excellent though.

Either way Wei Wuxian is going to get much more thoroughly involved in the ugly ninja politics than Naruto ever did, and he's going to hate it so so bad and at least temporarily lose so so so hard. A likely story element is he becomes troublesome enough he winds up having to flee the village ahead of a scheme by Danzou to (fatally) rip the Kyuubi out of him and implant it in some thoroughly conditioned ROOT kid.

Maybe Wen Ning?? Idk. I'm mostly saying this because Wen Ning 1) canonically gets Victimized and Transformed and 2) shares some notes with Sai. And this means he's leaving, in part, for Wen Ning, which ties into some plot and character stuff from their original narrative. You could make it work.

Also him taking the replacement human sacrifice with him when he books it would be hysterical.

Anyway he's branded a missing nin and it is, canonically, illegal for him to tell anyone who doesn't already know about the kyuubi thing, so both Jiang Cheng and Lan Wangji are appropriately what the fucking fuck and receive no adequate answer. This is a workable plot element.

Either the Jiangs or the Lans are the Uchiha, here, which has its own story value, lots of fun to be had. Gotta engineer a way he's protecting Jiang Cheng--does Danzou want to make him the jinchuuriki? Is Orochimaru or his replacement making a play for Jiang Cheng's bloodline limit, whatever it is, fun if it's eyeballs, and Wei Wuxian bargains to give him a jinchuuriki instead? Hmmm.

You want an inside and an outside threat, the obvious viper and the political spider, so you can silo information and make sure nobody entirely knows what's going on.

If it's Jiang Cheng who's assigned the role of bloodline limit macguffin, I have the very wicked urge to cast Yu Ziyuan as some combination of Itachi and Obito. Very Vader kind of effect.

Jin Guangyao as Kabuto, excellent, I need that innocent smile and those torture skills. This may require making Jin Guangshan much smarter than he really is just to fill out the ranks, or again you can keep Danzou as himself.

Tsunade is amusingly enough occupying an overlapping Baoshan Sanren and Wen Qing position; given one of them impersonated the other that time you'd have to do something with that. She's also got some Yu Ziyuan vibe up ofc. Tsunade just contains an entire franchise's supply of girlboss tbh.

Who could possibly stand in for Jiraiya, nobody, but at the same time. Wei Wuxian (with internal sapient asshole nuke) apprenticing under Jiraiya of the Sannin sounds like enough problem-creating goofy jackass genius clown energy in one place to open a singularity. That's too much. No narrative could survive.

Anyway someone please feel free to write this, I am intrigued but also will 100percent never ever put in the time it would take to realize any version of this concept.

#ask #hoc est meum #ramblebrambleamble #mdzs #naruto #fusion #meta #ig????? #return of the son of the jane bennet cinematic universe #fanfiction #the thing about protagonists is they require a story #if lwj is neji then mianmian is tenten #who is Rock Lee? #hard work...pays off...but lwj holds him in contempt...there is no such person???? #actually it would have to be Wen Ning #he's friends with Wei Wuxian and lwj's petty jealousy grudge is even fiercer and pettier when he is thirteen #haha then wwx casually ships lwj/lqy while lwj resentfully imagines wwx/wql #phantom love triangles that do not exist! two of them! #beautiful #if you need wen ning elsewhere then disrespect rock lee's name and plug su she in as their third #this is so fun and so not productive i have so many other things i should be doing a;ldsksdf; #i play a lot with the dog thing but i'm pretty sure #the number one creative reason wwx is afraid of dogs is just #that's a traditional way for foxes passing as humans to give themselves away #motif~~~~

[magadauthan]

Ep 24: Sin

@trigun98watchparty Knives emerges from his Plant bulb and begins his endgame. It's unclear to me whether it took him that long to recover fully from the beating he took in July, or whether he just prefers hanging out in his light socket when he's not ranting at Legato about causing Vash eternal pain.

(gonna try to get two of these done today so I don't miss the Ep 25 party haha)

--Legato rides in NML's version of a Cinderella coach, are you fucking kidding me, you blue-haired drama queen

--Chapel might be a GHG, but being forced to shoot his star pupil in the back is a bridge too far. Kudos to him for getting a dig in at Knives before he's obliterated.

--Meanwhile, Midvalley is wondering what he's done with his life; all he wanted to do was play sax and now he's signed his life away to a homicidal, psychotic blond guy with terrible fashion sense.

--Vash is trying. He's trying so damn hard, and his usual tricks aren't working. Life goes on around him, with ordinary people enjoying their ordinary lives, which is everything he ever wanted, and instead he's alone again with his best friend dead and his brother's henchmen dogging him at every turn.

--Meryl asked, and for his own reasons, Vash told her. He thought she'd finally give up and let him go, and then she and Milly would be safe. He'd rather her be alive in the world without him than put at risk by being with him. He couldn't protect WW, who was armed and dangerous and more than capable of handling himself. Little Meryl, with her little derringers, doesn't have a chance.

--And Vash tells her everything. Having all those scenes from his childhood in the montage leads me to believe that he's not mincing words to her about what he is and where he came from. Maybe, in a roundabout way, it was a challenge - would you, could you still accept me, knowing what I am? (Yes.)

--Milly needs Meryl. Milly pushes back, out of enormous love for her senpai, for WW, and for Vash. The time is coming, and soon, where Vash is going to need someone who loves him for who he is, no matter what he is. Milly is grieving terribly, but she knows that with WW dead and gone for the crime of believing in Vash, Vash is in a worse place than ever. It's come to do or die for Vash, and he's becoming inclined towards the latter option.

--The fight with Midvalley is... kinda boring. It doesn't add a whole lot to the story except another mini-boss. Again, Orange, if you use him, please do something memorable with the big pimpin' jazz guy besides having him soliloquize.

--You do get a feeling that Midvalley isn't doing this because he wants to. He signed on for the health benefits because the jazz club wasn't paying enough, and now he's embroiled in a fight to the death with Vash the Stampede. (the "oh, shit" face he makes when meeting Knives says to me that he didn't think Knives was ever going to show up for reals.) Sucks, dude.

--No matter how much Vash pleads, it's not going to make a difference to a nihilist like Legato. Vash can hold a gun at him - Legato knows he's bluffing. Vash can try to appeal to Legato's humanity - but Knives has been in there messing around with his psyche so much that Legato genuinely hates his own humanity.

--One bullet. One shot, and it all stops, and all it took was for Legato to massacre thousands of innocents, kill Vash's best friend, threaten the girls, and insult Vash's mother to his face.

--It's a lie, of course. Knives isn't done. Knives will never be done.

#trigun #trigun 98 #trigun 98 watch party #Day 24 #Sin #vash the stampede #meryl stryfe #milly thompson #legato bluesummers #midvalley the hornfreak #vashmeryl #vash x meryl

[beautifulpersonpeach]

is so cute how jm keeps promoting and supporting jk bpp! they love and support each other, jk even said how jm promotes 3d on live. it makes me scratch my head how pjms say they want jm to stop promoting other members. i saw their pages in the tags. all they do is talk about jk and other members dragging them. all the time. they don't even talk about jm a lot, only jk and scandals and hoping bad things happen to jk and they want jm to stop promoting him. don't they know jm? you know how ppl say like idols like fans bpp? i've never seen fans so not like their idol like pjms and jm. they act like everything jm says he hates. how can they be like this?

*

Ask 2:

bpp i'm the same anon for pjm and jm. one pjm even said if they were jm's friend they want to tell him to not promote jk. why are they like this? can you pls explain this to me? i'm trying to understand them.

***

Hi Anon,

Are you asking me to explain akgae psychology to you?

Because if you are, I want to preface this by saying you're wasting your time observing people like that. Akgaes are just awful people who happen to develop a superficial hyper-fixation on an idol. Their attachment to their idol is superficial because it's so narcissistic. Their behaviours are more a reflection of their natural states than anything to do with Jimin or even how they see him.

It's why a PJM can think Jimin, who has said on camera more than once that he cuts off real-life friends who talk badly about BTS, why that PJM can unironically think they, a random 'fan', would get a listening ear from Jimin to tell him he should stop posting Jungkook on his Instagram.

Like, it's not even that they're delusional. It's that they're just really shitty people.

It's why they worship and idolize Jimin so much, putting him on a pedestal for being oh so selfless. The reality is that while Jimin is generally a very considerate person, he's not Mother Theresa (as she was known in her lifetime not the reveal afterwards lol). Most of what PJMs place on a pedestal is just Jimin being a decent human being and acting in ways other members have done at some point in different circumstances. But for them, it's the pinnacle of altruism because they can't relate. They can't imagine themselves being that kind or that decent, they can't even begin to picture the sort of relationship Jimin says he has with BTS members because they've got no analogs in their real lives. Akgaes are like judgy old nuns who pick people apart over the smallest human slights, and they actually enjoy being hateful. Hating is 90% of the reason they're here. Their happiness for Jimin stems from him introducing them to a world of six other people in the group plus their millions of fans for them to hate. Jimin has practically supplied them with a lifetime of hate fuel.

For an akgae, there's no bigger jackpot.

Nobody has to like someone because someone else likes them. It's fine if they (or anyone) dislike Jungkook, other BTS members and/or anyone Jimin says he respects. But the difference with an akgae is that their dislike of BTS members is tied to their love of Jimin, shown by the amount of time and attention they devote towards hating, disparaging, and actively looking to harm those members, while in the same breath imagining they're Jimin's friends and buddy buddy enough to tell him to ditch the members. Ditto for the other member akgaes because they all think the same way.

It's frankly kind of hilarious but also a bit psychopathic because all their actions show is that they don't actually like Jimin. They don't like who he is and what he does. They tolerate him because associating with him helps them achieve other goals through him, plus because they don't actually know him, they're more than fine believing that their own version of him is true to life.

This is also how shooters within ARMY approach BTS as a whole, relative to the wider music industry. The common thread that connects people like this, is that they aren't here for the right reasons.

But, as with all things in fandom, c'est la vie.

Jikook will still keep jikooking because nothing - not rain, not shine, not hail, not tornadoes, typhoons, droughts, floods, or tsunamis, will ever stop Jimin from gushing about Jungkook. And vice versa.

Jikook are just built different. And everybody else will just have to deal.

#jikook #jimin #jungkook #bts solo stans #bts chapter 2 #fandom behaviour

[stormikitty]

Soulmate au.

Danny and Kaldur are soulmates, but Danny is from a different world, and in the world Danny is from, people just don't have any way of knowing that someone is their soulmate, and most people don't believe in soulmates; so Danny has no idea that Kaldur is his soulmate, but Kaldur knows Danny is his soulmate from the moment they meet.

Maybe Danny has been in (the soulmate au version of) the DC universe for maybe a couple of weeks or a couple of months before he and Kaldur meet, and found out about people in this world having soulmates and a way of knowing who their soulmate is pretty early on, but doesn't expect to have a soulmate of his own. He joins the team, and is talking to them about how things are different in his universe and how some things that are apparently real here that aren't in his world were a little surprising, and then Kaldur arrives, having overheard some of the conversation before he walked into the room. He walks into the room and just stops for a minute. He immediately realizes that Danny is his soulmate. He knows that Danny knows about soulmates to some extent, but also knows that just isn't a thing in Danny's world, and Danny doesn't seem to realize that Kaldur is his soulmate. Kaldur decides maybe he shouldn't say anything about it just yet because this world is still new to Danny and Kaldur doesn't want to overwhelm him or freak him out or anything like that, so he quickly acts like nothing is going on and introduces himself to his new teammate (who is also his soulmate) and makes an effort to get to know him. The rest of the team know something is up, but don't tell Danny anything, and Danny remains oblivious.

As Kaldur and Danny get to know each other better, they both fall more and more in love, but don't know how the other feels.

Kaldur tries to move things along, slowly, wanting a romantic relationship with Danny, but not wanting to overstep any boundaries and unsure how Danny feels about him.

Danny realizes he has a crush on Kaldur a few days after they meet, but with what he knows about the universe he's in right now, Kaldur probably has a soulmate out there somewhere and he's way out of Danny's league anyway, so maybe he should just try to ignore the way Kaldur makes him feel and try to be happy just being friends with him.

Also Jazz and Dani/Ellie came to this world with Danny because they're his sisters and the 3 of them needed to get to somewhere safer than their world after a reveal gone wrong (Danny has a Y-shaped scar on his chest to show just how wrong it went).

I might write this. I have ideas for it. I have headcannons that don't necessarily NEED to be included that I'm GONNA PUT IN THE STORY ANYWAY because I want them to be included. I just don't know how I'm gonna write this yet.

#danny phantom #dc #dp x dc #danny/kaldur

[isan0rt]

I keep Xehanort posting on account of how Dark Road made him so extra fascinating and I keep turning him over in my brain like a rotisserie chicken but today I'm thinking about how DDD and KH3 for Young Xehanort really was like, Kingdom Hearts: Re:Traumatization; Distorted Cognition.

(Side bar I really do think, for him, those games happen in that year between his two meetings with Master of Masters. It's the most obvious explanation for his radicalization, and like. I know he's often referred to as Young Master Xehanort but I think that's as in, he's the young version of Master Xehanort, but he's not actually a Master himself yet. If he was, he wouldn't be condescendingly talking down to Xigbar in Re:Coded about how he will get No Name; he would already have been granted it. He's still on his world tour, and will take the test after all this.)

Really though from the first world he appears in, shit is fucked for him. This dude is like 19, only four years out from watching all but one of his classmates get murdered, and now he's going through This Shit while on his 'stew alone in your own feelings with no emotional support' study abroad.

The first world he appears in is Traverse Town where the fucking Reaper's Game is going on. Four dead teenagers who all really want to live, two boys and two girls, and the younger girl, the little blonde, the baby sister is visibly younger than the others, and her older brother loves her so much and wants to save her so badly but he can't, can he? They're already dead. Xehanort's there watching these four split up from each other and having to manipulate them but it doesn't matter, they're all already dead.

Prankster's Paradise. It's fine, this is just a dream, and besides, Pinocchio is just a doll. His feelings aren't real (no matter what you feel coming from him) and they don't matter.

The Grid. Just programs, and for that matter just copies of programs. Their feelings aren't real (don't worry about what you're perceiving) and they don't matter.

Quasimodo is an outsider, lonely and isolated, and he'll never be accepted. Watch how he's treated for it. Think about whether you (Xehanort) were ever really accepted in Scala, or if you'll also always be second fiddle even with no one else left. You can only rely on yourself, and the future your older self has laid out for you.

Sora, in The World that Never Was. He's a walking time bomb; an empath with no control over his abilities, and totally unable to stop taking other people's pain into himself. He has already imprisoned three other hearts inside himself because he can't let go, and he is already cracking under the strain (Anti Form. Rage Form. Even Data Roxas tells Data Sora he'll destroy himself if he can't learn to let go). Sora is going to break, and Xehanort has seen what happens when an empath who can't handle the burden of other people's emotions catastrophically shatters under the strain. Get Sora under their control, before he goes critical.

Toy Box. They're just toys; spilt them up from each other and watch how they fall apart. They aren't strong enough to handle things without dragging on each other. Their feelings aren't real and they don't matter. You can reproduce the conditions of your own trauma and see that the outcome will be the same, that Baldr could never have been prevented and there was no way to save him (See, Angelic Amber just needed to be stopped by force. But then Buzz...). They're just toys. It doesn't matter.

Sora again. See, he's broken. He couldn't handle the strain. But... What's he doing? He can't save his friends, they're already dead. It can't be done; it shouldn't be done. How dare he; what's so different about him? What gives him the right to have them back? But Sora can't really have his friends returned without consequences, surely-

See? It destroyed him. Sora couldn't let go of his attachments and accept his grief and it destroyed him. Just as Xehanort warned. Just like it destroyed Baldr. Attachments only cause suffering; Xehanort won't let himself be ruled by them. He simply won't get attached to anyone else, ever again (but what about Eraqus- what about his dream friends- what about-).

And all while surrounded by Nobodies, hollowed out of all but the tiniest seed of the potential of a heart, and Replicas, only copies. Their feelings aren't real, and they don't matter. All that matters is the goal. Don't worry about the negative emotions other people are feeling about what you're doing. It's for the good of the worlds, they simply are too shortsighted to understand. A cat will also fight you when you try to pill it, but you are bigger and stronger and know better, and this is what you have to do.

It's fine. It's fine. Their feelings aren't real, and they don't matter.

Do what has to be done.

#Xehanort #Kingdom Hearts #Sora #(tagged because there's a couple paragraphs in there about maybe the source of Young Xehanort's like really intense resentment of him) #To be clear all this is an attempt to explore Xehanort's totally distorted way of thinking and not like #A representation of what is objective fact in the games #Xehanort's trauma gives him a super fucked up view of what the world is like and It's Bad #Get therapy Xehanort!!! (He won't) #Tbh the fact that he's so full of himself and just naturally thinks he's better than other people is one of the things l #That fascinates me about Xehanort #He is deeply flawed and in particular it's his hubris that really fucks him and that compels me

[errantnight]

I wanna know what specific bird wings Angeal, Sephiroth, Kunsel, and Zack would have.

I already know Chococloud and Genebirb (chocobo and phoenix/whatever ridiculous birb I'm thinking of at the moment)

Hype I got one already!

Angeal:

I think that Angeal would have dove wings, but more like a mourning dove - I know they aren't white but I can do whatever I want here in imagination-land. Pale cream colored with flecks of black and a little shading of blue along the edge.

I think it's pretty obvious that he has a lot of issues, many of them stemming from being forced to grow up so fast. He chose to go with making honor his entire personality and I think he regrets that because it means he had to be the responsible one at all times. Some people probably think he's a Debbie-Downer because he's always ruining their fun (when their fun is doing something rash and dangerous to life and limb with bonus thousands of gil property damage.)

Its easy to forget when he's mentoring a teenager that he's barely out of being a teenager himself.

Sephiroth:

Vulture wings. They're a symbol of his subconscious image of himself, something that's surrounded by and consumes death and waits for those around him to die.

He was sent into battle as a literal child, regardless of understanding how horrific the entire thing is. He knows that something about himself was a disappointment, he couldn't commune with the planet, so instead they twisted the purpose they'd bred him for from life into death.

I think it would be interesting if for some reason he just can't use Cure Materia because of his J-Cells since she's a parasite. So many people died around him and he couldn't do anything about it - casting a healing spell at someone across the battlefield would make so much difference but he can only use potions and you just can't get there in time in the heat of the fight.

So all he thinks he's good for is bringing death and having it follow in his wake.

Kunsel:

First of all there's not really any real backstory for him, so my personal headcanon version of Kunsel is that he grew up in Wall Market and had to do a lot of shady things as a kid. His family owned a tiny shop and lived over it but they lost everything when they couldn't pay protection money and he ran errands to keep himself fed and sheltered and a lot of them were probably drugs and other illicit goods.

Wanting to make more of himself he used his skills and called in a lot of favors to make a new spotless identity for himself before he applied for SOLDIER. He never really gave up his contacts though and works both sides at times - selling and buying info from anywhere he thinks it will be and he's great at leaving false trails that don't lead anywhere!

So his wings are from a western scrub jay! They are very sneaky birds and hide hoards of food all over the place - but they're incredibly wary and watch out for any other animals watching where they go. If they think they're being followed they quickly grab their food and hide it somewhere else. Sometimes, if they can't shake a tail (ha!) they'll pretend to hide food to lure the other animal to that location and instead hide it somewhere else.

Zack:

I've seen a couple people give him parrot wings but if anyone is going to have raven wings it's Zack! Ravens are so smart and incredibly social. They work with wolves in order to find prey and its almost a symbiotic relationship.

Zack makes friends everywhere, and he can look really silly sometimes and be very loud and boisterous but when it comes down to it he's intensely loyal and a lot more clever than he lets on.

He has such himbo energy, and his constant dropping into squats to burn some of that energy off remind me of how a raven bobs its head as it walks around.

Crows and ravens have been seen to have 'funerals' when they find one of their own has died - BUT researchers think they're actually investigating to see what killed them to determine if its a danger to their flock. A MURDER investigation if you will. Ravens remember and will attack people that have been mean to them as well!

He absolutely has the Raven attention span for ooh shiny with his ADHD but when its important he focuses everything he has on figuring out what he needs to do.

For the record I absolutely would like to see Genesis with phoenix wings - but only after Minerva has cured his degradation. From the black wings/ashes to red and gold rebirth.

For Cloud I like snowy owl wings. They're solitary and territorial and Cloud was lonely as a child.

#ask #asks open #ffvii headcanons #headcanons #ff7 #zack fair #sephiroth #angeal #kunsel ffvii

[avisisisis]

To be fair to YJ, they did reneg on the idea that the speedforce didn’t exist on earth 16 because I think they realized the implications of not having it (aka making earth 16 not connected to the dc universe among other petty flash things) but they did say that people in that universe don’t know about it yet and that’s why I tend to think an easy out would be in the trauma of the event Wally misremembers how he got his powers and doesn’t remember the lightning storm outside and even his strict agnostic magic isn’t real mindset (that is def no where close to his clap if you believe mindset in the comics, and is more Barry’s mindset) is a way of protecting his own preconceived notions and mind from whatever he saw when he first entered the speedforce which may have been his own first “death” or maybe alternate versions of himself.

One of the things that @babyflash has talked about is Wally as a kid/teen experiencing weird speedforce shit mostly alone like getting stuck in happy death day time loops via thawne/Savitar among other things.

The pain of being some semi sentient demension time monster’s specialist little boy I guess: a Wally west story

Ohh I could talk about Wally not being /human/ all day. I can imagine everyone being weirded out by him not because they know he's not human but because of the little things

Just imagine — and yeah this is Danny Phantom body horror level, maybe even more — how horrifying it would be to not know that there's an eldritch being among humans but to know that you're it. I don't know, I just think people should talk about the potential this has more

I want the characters to notice thay “Hey! This is not normal!” and just not care. I want them to realize that Wally's everything has always been kinda off but writing it off as superhero stuff

I want the little things to be shown more in media. Like how speedsters somehow always know when someone enters the room even if they currently can't hear/see for X reasons. Or like how they seem to be constantly vibrating, or how they generate lightning when they get too excited

I want someone to look at their friends and realize that they're not aging. At all. Even though Flash is supposed to be one of the most ‘normal’ ones of the league in terms of humanity, he's still not aging, and that's honestly really scary if you think about it

It'd be cool if someone realized that no, speedsters aren't impatient, it's just that everything goes so slow for them and hey, you wouldn't be able to sit still either if 5 minutes was 5 hours to you. Because speedsters tend to overthink everything. You'll walk up to them and ask them a question and they've already thought of 100 different ways the conversation could end

I think it'd be very cool if someone, idk, wrote a fanfic about the league (JLU) somehow losing their powers and Wally panicking because oh no he can't think anymore. Everything's suddenly going so fast and he's gotten used to acting slower for everyone around him so now that he doesn't have to do that he's so slow to react. He's way more anxious than usual because now he has no time and there's nothing he can do about it because he has no powers

Speedsters tend to enter Flash Time whenever they're feeling down so that people don't notice. Now that he can't, the team notices how much more quiet and sad and scared he looks, and it's honestly terrifying because he's the happy, funny one! If he's not laughing, then the matter is way too serious for them

The last time he didn't smile in battle was when he almost died fighting the Brainiac/Luthor thing

I also think it'd be cool for them to have like, little twitches or ticks (is that what they're called?) sometimes that are usually unseen because of their powers, but if they lose them...

Idk. This has sm potential and ppl need to talk more about it

#he loses his powers and immediately has a panic attack #bc what the FUCK #he's so used to being connected to the speedforce #to being its vessel its creation and its way to feel emotion #that now that it's gone he feels. empty #there's no lightning running through his veins now and he is panicking #i know that taking away a speedster's power is basically impossible but still #i mean an inhibitor collar would be able to stop them from using their powers #but it wouldn't cut their connection with the speedforce #it'd just make them unable to use it #but the prompt is fun #dc #wally west #the flash #justice league #justice league unlimited #young justice #young justice cartoon #speedsters #speedforce #flash

[ladyluscinia]

As someone who is nebulously in the “Izzy is a bad person/ not an Izzy fan” camp, your posts have helped me realize something pretty important. A big part of why I hold those opinions is because I view Izzy through the lens of symbol and allegory rather than complex personhood. Maybe that’ll change in season 2 as we learn more about him, but as of now I think that’s a big reason why I and many others are quick to judge and excuse wrong doing against him. For some it’s simply difficult to connect with him as a character, and much more accessible to see him as a reminder of hypocrisy within the queer community. Hell even a reminder of that one old friend who for whatever reason just CANNOT let the fact that you’re growing as a person go.

I don’t know, what do you think about the concept of there being a difference between analyzing characters as people and analyzing them as representations of larger societal issues?

Interesting question...

I mean, I am a big proponent of "characters aren't real people and that's important to remember when discussing them", which does dovetail nicely with a lot of discussion on "What is this character in the story?" And a character being a symbol or representation of something else abstract or systemic is a perfectly valid option. Nigel Badminton, for example, has a twin brother who loved him, but absolutely none of us give a shit about how his death affected Chauncey emotionally because both of them are really just symbols of oppressive societal power / Stede's childhood trauma / bullies in general / etc. The show only cares about their deaths insomuch as it affects Stede, and Stede literally admits he doesn't even feel bad about it.

They are such straightforward examples of narrative tools all the way down to their deaths, which are pure symbolism via black humor. Like, Nigel falls on his own sword because he can't stop mocking Stede to take him seriously for two seconds, and Chauncey shoots himself in the head the moment he fulfills his role in Stede's story because it's a hilariously dark joke that this happened to Stede twice.

To take this to Izzy however... Ok, so three major questions once you think a character is representing something:

What is this character representing?

What is the story trying to say about it?

How direct is the represention? Or to put it another way: How much of a person are they vs just a symbol?

Because most characters with any decent amount of screentime are going to naturally become more "people" than "symbol". It's not an either/or situation. OFMD creators have been very open about how the show is looking at toxic masculinity, for example, so I think it's pretty safe to say Izzy is the character on screen most pushing that mindset via the abusive pirate culture he's firmly planted in. I also think the show has a lot to say about classism, and Stede is pretty obviously the designated character for that. (I also think Lucius is, because he's kinda picking up the furthest extreme of Stede's version of piracy just like Izzy is Edward's, but that's a meta a little to the left of what you asked.)

But Stede is a lot more than just "rich guy", and despite the fact you don't exactly root for the rich guys in classism narratives, we are supposed to root for Stede. His arc is about learning. The show's message is broadly not upper class positive - look at the French partiers - but Stede can escape it in a way they can't because he's also a character in his own right, and the show's overriding theme is about growth.

I think Izzy is certainly complex enough to be a character, unlike the other antagonists who are kept mostly offscreen. He has a major connection to one of the mains, which tends to automatically convey a level of depth. He also just... doesn't function effectively as a pure symbol of oppression, because he's not bad enough. There's so many writing decisions where it would have been so easy to make him worse. More aggressive. More textually bigoted. More directly harmful. And they didn't. (...Fuck it. Linking to that time I said this and got immediately blocked.)

An example that's been getting me recently: In his very first episode, why didn't Izzy steal the hostages? That's like basic antagonist setup. Especially for people that think overt racism is at play here at all (I very much do not) it would be the simplest thing in the world to have him steal them from the natives for some stupidly easy early work on that front, and establish it with a line of dialogue. Instead the line we get is "Oh, we sold them to some guys." They had him pay for them.

And all of this I think ties back into that second question of "what is the show trying to say," because I do not think the answer is "Izzy is just our stand in for bad people and we do not care about him." Especially not if he's the designated representation of toxic masculinity, because I think Izzy-as-a-character is clearly suffering under toxic masculinity. He's specifically also a victim of the system, and it's kind of a fucked up and pessimistic message to say victims of a shitty system deserve to be written off as a comedic punching bag and die unhappy. Isn't it better thematically if he's a person like Stede who can learn to be better???

We're in a world where Edward's backslide into the toxic masculinity aligned system starts with 7 attempted murders + mutilation and abduction, and we're going to forgive this and give him a happy ending. At this point the show's message is approaching incoherent if Izzy is irredeemably evil and deserves to suffer.

#our flag means death #i feel like there should be a cut in this but i didn't know where to put it so... #also i skimmed past question 1 because it's both really simple and really complicated #but like. there is a reason there's so much debate on what exactly izzy represents and it's entirely possible he's just not meant to be X #(for example - homophobia. the writers have said they downplayed its importance in the show and izzy is the main onscreen antagonist) #(that plus how much i dislike the implication of edward being close to someone bigoted against him means i just don't see it) #i joked earlier today that we're all just gambling on our interpretations of izzy being the right ones until season 2 drops #and like. we kinda are 🤣 #izzy hands ofmd #character arcs #ask #anon #ladyluscinia #doylist vs watsonian

[rallamajoop]

Obsessed with you Dracula beauty and the beast au! Who are your top 5 favorite dracula characters?

Thank you very much, kind anon (and many apologies for all the months I've kept you waiting for a real answer). We still have stuff planned for that AU, but Em has been hella busy lately running conventions and recovering from covid and all that, and so things end up on the backburner longer than they really should.

Now, if you're asking me for my favourite characters in any version of Dracula, the top spot can only go to Peter Cushing's Van Helsing(s) from the Hammer Dracula films (a quick glance at my Peter Cushing tag will make this pretty hard to deny). But if we're talking Stoker's original Dracula novel, then VH is not even going to make the top 5.

So, without further ado:

1. Mina Murray/Harker Dracula is an ensemble novel, and Mina is neither the first nor the most vocal of our narrators, but there are ways in which it feels more like her story than any other single character's ‒ and I love Mina. Aggressively sensible and practical even in the face of horror, but still human enough to take the reader through a full roller coaster of emotional whammies, Mina is the kind of heroine you just don't get in gothic novels of the era ‒ or even most of the following century, sad to say. Even if the other characters' little Mina-appreciation-society thing gets a bit OTT towards the end of the book, it's not like they're wrong to appreciate her ‒ and I can only dream there might someday be a single adaptation of Dracula that really does her justice.

That said, there is a damn good Mina in the bizarre-by-excellent 2002 silent-film-ballet adaptation, Pages from a Virgin's Diary, played by CindyMarie Small. But my favourite 'Mina' from any adaptation would have to be Kate Nelligan from Universal's (WOEFULLY under-appreciated) 1979 Dracula, which is ironic for a number of reasons, not least of which that this is one of those adaptation which have swapped the names and spend the film calling her 'Lucy'. Getting back to the list, though, it probably won't surprise you to find that the two other characters who love Mina best take out spots 2 and 3.

2. Jonathan Harker Jonathan's the kind of character who could only have come out of the Victorian era, yet there's so much about his arc that feels subversive even today (and it's been so great to see tumblr take to him).

It's so easy to dismiss poor Jonathan as a coward, a weakling, a fool (plenty have) ‒ but then, people still just aren't comfortable seeing a male character so disempowered and traumatised by a predator like Dracula. It's all very well to do that sort of thing to Mina and Lucy, but to a man? Let alone a man who survives the experience, is "forgiven" by his pre-existing love-interest, recovers through the support and validation of friends and professionals, and goes on to get a happy ending. Nor does Jonathan get nearly enough credit for the way he evolves into a grim, knife-wielding badass towards the end of the novel, the first to throw himself into the fray with his old tormentor ‒ even the one to slice open Dracula's throat in the final moments of the book. He even manages to use his boring solicitor's-clerk skills to help bring Dracula down!

Now, I'm fully aware my opinion on Jonathan has been biased by seeing so many others express these same ideas (from Cleolinda's old posts to FFA's distinctive JONATHAN HARKER WOULD NEVER-anon, whose points I found so convincing I wound up kind of writing fic about it). But I don't just love Jonathan in spite of his detractors ‒ I love him because he's a heck of an endearing woobie-survivor all in his own right. Also, he and Mina are adorable, and goddamn do they earn that happy ending.

The only adaptation I've seen to come close to Getting Jonathan Harker Right would be Michael Pink's Dracula ballet (NOT to be confused with Pages from a Virgin's Diary, based on a completely different Dracula ballet ‒ seriously, there are so many), and even that refuses to give me any really good Jonathan-reference shots. So I'll just use this one again, which does at least tie into why so many mainstream audiences might find Jonathan's story (ahem) uncomfortable.

3. Lucy Westenra ‒ and she is so close behind Jonathan I could really just declare a tie. Here's the thing ‒ there's a 'Lucy' in every Victoran Gothic novel I've read* (because if the monster doesn't victimise some truly pure, sweet, innocent young soul, how will we know how monstrous he is?) She's always someone's love interest, and she usually dies tragically. It's the kind of role you could pretty much fill with a demure lamp ‒ so it says a lot that of all those Lucies, this is one one who feels like a real character to me.

Lucy may be sweet and fragile and sheltered, but she still gets to do things. She expresses herself as eloquently as any other narrator, she turns down two proposals because she knows her own heart too well to lead anyone else on ‒ and even in the wake of her weeks of illness and own mother's death, she has the presence of mind to take charge, calm the servants, and write down a record of events she knows she might not live to tell. In a book with three proposals, two engagements, and one wedding, I will still argue that easily the best-developed relationship is the one between Lucy and Mina ‒ some of the most memorable chapters of Dracula are just the two of them, exchanging correspondence and spending time together. In other words, I can buy Lucy as a person, not just an ideal ‒ and that only makes her death all the more tragic.

It's one thing to tell me how lovable a character is supposed to be ‒ it's another to actually make me love them, and Stoker actually pulls that off.

It seems to take a ballet to really get Lucy right, so have another pic from Pages from a Virgin's Diary (Michael Pink's Lucy is also great, as is Krzysztof Pastor's ‒ did I mention there are SO MANY?). And let's throw in that great Disney-Lucy concept from Joseph Szekeres again, while we're at it.

4. Quincey Morris Quincey's an odd one: a character who was obviously supposed to be much more important in Stoker's early concepts, but whose role in the finished book is mostly limited to bringing the tally of Lucy's suitors up to a round 3. But whenever he's actually on page, he's just such a breath of fresh air! In a novel packed with long-winded, very-British characters (and Van Helsing, who's only worse), Quincey will reliably cut to the heart of the matter in a handful of words. In a world where Jonathan takes a week to figure out he's dealing with a vampire, Van Helsing won't say a word without being allotted time to prepare the equivalent of a full powerpoint presentation, and Seward never even comes up with a theory as to where all Lucy's blood is even going, Quincey shows up in the morning and has figured out that this sure does look like a vampire problem before lunch. And while everyone else is busy having an extremely-long-winded strategy meeting, Quincey's the only one to notice a suspiciously-large bat hanging out over the window and go for his sidearm. Arthur really couldn't have had a better, er 'friend' to 'comfort' him after Lucy's death (if you know what I mean). Quincey's great.

I can't even really complain that Quincey's so ignored in most Dracula-adaptations ‒ it's a long book, and you've got to cut something. But he does at least appear in Michael Pink's ballet, so have a pick of him and Arthur having a threesome er, dancing with Lucy.

5. Dracula. Look, you can't do a top-X-Dracula-characters and not find space for Dracula himself. What do you think this book is about? For a figure who's been adapted, reinvented, and flanderised to the point of absurdity over the last century, there is something rather charming about going all the way to back in the Stoker's novel, and discovering that even the original Dracula was simultaneously utterly terrifying, and kind of ridiculous. He brings living babies home in sacks to feed his wives! (He meets Jonathan on the road in what has to be a fake beard.) He arrives in Britain aboard a ghost ship in the midst of a storm! (He prepares for the journey by amassing a teaboo-level 'research library', and tries to blend in by wearing a straw-boater hat.) He delivers an extended, gloating speech about the futility of his enemies' crusade against him, when he's already claimed both their women! (Then he turns tail and flees before they can catch up with him.) I will never know if Stoker meant all this stuff to be as funny as it is to me, but I love it all regardless. On some level, even the OG Count Dracula was as human as any of us.

Obviously, I had to include Christopher Lee's Dracula here, but I am also inordinately fond of Johnny Chang's Dracula from Pages from a Virgin's Diary,

* The others would be Elizabeth from Frankenstein, Flora from Varney the Vampire, and Sybil from Dorian Grey, if you want to know.

So, in conclusion... well, there's a lot to love about Stoker's characters and his novel that you won't find in any adaptation ‒ but some of the ballet versions come pretty close. What can I say, apparently some gothic novels just call for OTT musical adaptation.

...and on that note, I really should poke Em a bit about how that next Harker-and-the-Beast bit is coming along. *g*

#Dracula #Mina Harker #Jonathan Harker #Lucy Westenra #Quincey Morris #Mina Murray #asks #Dracula meta #How this became so much about Dracula ballets? #IDEK

[hamliet]

Okay I have a question for you re Brian/Michael. Now I'm no huge fan of Michael's mostly because I just find him boring overall as a character. His personality traits aren't something I enjoy in my faves he's just meh.. each to their own nothing to do with Brian at all. Michael's just screams safety and vanilla to me whereas Brian/Justin are excitement and danger yk.

Whilst I don't hate Michael as some people do or completely despise his friendship with Brian. I can see why they're friends and I understand the importance of them in each others lives - that's not to say I enjoy it. There are aspects on both sides I find irritating and make me roll my eyes.

But the one thing I've never been able to understand are the Brian/Michael shippers. Like what do these people find appealing about shipping these two romantically. How does it scream reciprocal to them? I mean on both sides they would absolutely be the worst couple purely from a non biased shipping stand point just no...

Could you ever see them as an actual couple to root for?

Yay QaF ask!!

Oh dear GOD no to the couple thing! I absolutely could not.

To backtrack a bit: no worries about not liking him--to each their own! To that extent, I imagine something appeals to people about their dynamic. If it appeals to some, like, you do you boo I don't care, have fun. From my perspective, though, there was 0 way to make a Michael/Brian romance work from a storytelling or character perspective.

But I do think the fact that the original British show does have their counterparts (Stuart and Vince? was that his name?) getting together might have created the expectation. But ultimately, Stuart and Brian, Vince and Michael, and especially Nathan and Justin were very different characters. Also, while the UK version is very well-done, its themes are much less idealistic than the US version, and it's a bit more realism-based in terms of tone.

I honestly don't think Michael was ever in love with Brian so much as he was in love with the idea of Brian. Brian was this... idea of safety and childhood to Michael, a hero. Of course, this is ironic because Brian and safety do not fit together lol (well. Besides condoms). Essentially, it's a paradox (and a complex one, which is why I love Michael actually--I loooove complexity!):

Michael truly loves, but is not in love, with actual Brian as he is, flaws and all. Michael wants this Brian around forever as his BFF.

Michael is in love with an ideal romantic image of Brian that does not exist and which he knows damn well does not exist. But:

Michael genuinely, from season 1 episode 2, states that he does not want Brian to change. So if Brian changes to Ideal!Brian, Michael wouldn't actually have the person he actually loves anymore.

Hence, it's impossible for Michael and Brian to ever end up together. Michael was pursuing what he knew he could never have. He does this partially to avoid having to grow up himself and partially out of low self-esteem (not believing he deserved to be loved back).

Michael's relationship with Brian is a good foil with Justin and Brian's, because Justin's is more like:

Justin is in love with Brian, but needs to learn who Brian is and what loving Brian means. It doesn't mean loving Ideal!Brian.

Justin knows his own worth--to an extent--and thereby is able to push Brian to grow into a better version of himself while still accepting flawed Brian.

But, demonstrating that Justin is actually in love with real!Brian, flaws and all, Justin insists in the end that he doesn't want Brian to entirely give up his vices for him. The Brian he loves and the Brian he wants around are the same.

Of course, in the end the Brian Michael loves and wants around are the same too, it's just not romantic. While Michael links Brian to childhood, Justin links Brian to growing up (losing his virginity, etc.) In a story that is essentially about Brian's Peter Pan Syndrome, that's significant.

Anyways, that's some convoluted rambling that I'm not sure if I conveyed well, but yeah. That's why I think they had 0 chance of every working together.

#ask hamliet #michael novotny #brian kinney #qaf #queer as folk #qaf meta #queer as folk meta #britin #justin taylor #brian x justin #queer as folk us 2000

[hyacinthsdiamonds]

F1 drivers are not characters from a tv show that you can dissect and analyze. They're real, living, breathing, complicated, complex people. The fictional version of them in your head (good or bad) is just that; fiction. We don't truly know these people and they are just that; people and like every other person on this planet they have their own set of traumas and losses they have to deal with. The only difference is they aren't afforded the same privacy to deal with them. People speculate to pass the time but quite simply, we don't know what goes on behind closed doors, not really. We end up just funding the rumor mill and keeping that wheel turning.

I'm highlighting Mick and Max, but it goes for every driver, have seen the very worst infractions and breaches of privacy the media and people in general have to offer.

Mick has seen it literally his entire life and it got infinitely worse after Michael's accident. He was 14 and having to be coached on how to deal with the media because vultures were already scrounging looking for story. He's been the subject of so many narratives - good and bad and just downright intrusive - at this point I doubt the media itself even remembers half of them. I do want to be clear regarding one that has been doing the rounds not in the media but on here too recently; Seb is not Mick's second dad, he's a friend and mentor figure but he is not Mick's father. Mick has a father; that father will always be Michael. No one could ever take Michael's place. They've both clarified that many times but people have refused to listen.

Max's father is for lack of a better term a controversial man. We've read the stories, even heard some of them directly from the horse's mouth. He's glorified by some for the things he did that ended up "creating Max", and he's called out by others for a long history of abusive behavior (regarding to not just the incident in the South of Italy with Max but his behavior with his past romantic partners as well), who say Max is who he is in spite of that, not because of it. We don't know these people, we'll never know the full truth, we're not entitled to the full truth. Abuse and domestic violence are serious topics, serious topics that impact real life people every single day, it's not a fucking theme to exploit for a Tumblr post for a few notes. We've heard the stories, Max and his family lived them. It's not our place - it has never been our place - to tell him, his mother, his sister, ex-stepmothers etc how to live their lives afterwards.

We all get dealt a shit hand at one point or the other, that's just how life is. Just remember that there's a person at the other end of the screen and that just because an F1 driver is a public figure, it doesn't their privacy doesn't matter or that they're any less real or human than you or I. Their lives are not a story or a fiction. As someone who lost her father and has faced speculation on my childhood and the way I grew up (of course not in the media but I have an awful family member who I caught spreading outright lies about me and my close family to multiple people), I can't even find the words to explain how intrusive the post about Mick and Max's relationship with their respective father's is/was (last I checked it was still up). Violation is the only word I can come up with.

You don't have to like every driver but Jesus Christ going into their personal trauma is the only time you felt any human sympathy towards them? Empathy and decency are clearly things we all too easily take for granted. You don't have to like every driver but you do not have like someone in order to emphasize with them, especially when it's the fictional version of them you dislike; I'm going to quote Max Fewtrell who put it best, you don't know them. You don't have to like every driver but you can remember that they are an actual living breathing person before posting hate and/or violence/death threats. You don't have to like every driver but you don't have to be a dick about the drivers you dislike and that goes for everything.

#f1 #formula 1 #max verstappen #mick schumacher #formula one

[aeide-thea]

watched witcher 3x03 and it really is just like. this show continues to lurch wildly from scene to unconnected scene. which could work if they were written and costumed and acted well enough that each vignette was compelling in its own right, so that you wanted to keep watching even though nothing quite hangs together or makes sense yet? but they really. aren't.

and they keep introducing all these bit characters, i guess in an attempt to convey that geralt has History and Connections, but it's just feeling to me like, why are we foregrounding all these interactions that should have been background. did i really need to learn all these names.

also i continue to feel like ciri is just. too old. like fundamentally you can't take the naïveté and petulance of a child, or teenager at most, and paste them unaltered onto a twenty-something and expect to garner the same level of sympathy for her! also like. minor point but if they're on the run would she really be religiously applying her clumpy little maybelline every morning. she looks more overtly made up than most of the adult characters on the show, and like, i know we're in fantasyland and not any actual specific historical time period but it does feel distractingly anachronistic to me nonetheless.

also like. you're really asking me to believe that surly taciturn traumatized geralt would open up to this random 'friend of his mother's' about his childhood. like. i get that, again, we're attempting to establish that Geralt Has History, but like. you can't just have him infodump without any consideration of what he's like or who he's talking to??? like—i understand that we basically gave up on any notion of consistent characterization for him, or even a clear throughline to an evolving characterization, after s1, but. why is he opening up to this random druidess as if she were yennefer. what is happening.

like do i want to see jaskier's big gay romance (which based on radovid's beleaguered-weasel characterization so far i cannot imagine doing anything but going up in flames in the back half of the season??? like, clearly radovid is going to fuck them over the second he's caught in a political bind, the only question imo is whether jaskier also fucks them over)? yes. but is the rest of this worth sitting through? extremely debatable.

did love vespula's dress, ditto jaskier's costuming. also yennefer's struggle to balance who she knows how to be in an aretuzan context vs who she wants to be for ciri (and for herself?) was compelling (although, again, i'm really struggling to buy the idea of her as mother to ciri when the two actresses have, like, a seven-year age difference. like i get that it's found family and not literal but. it just doesn't ring true, i'm sorry). but on the whole this really was just. a jumble.

also emhyr is just not icily intimidating enough. like he's supposed to be this always-five-steps-ahead omnipotent manipulator or whatever, as i understand it, but even setting other versions of canon aside, this version of the story needs him to be that! and instead he's like. a potatoface in a molded plastic breastplate. action figure villain.

also okay this really is the last thing but. what is up with all this 'the evil mages all have their faces grotesquely burnt off' shit. can we not do better by real live people with facial differences than that.

#critical #tvblogging #and i guess file it under #kakos kaischros babey!! #for that last item.