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lurkingteapot · 11 months

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Every now and then I think about how subtitles (or dubs), and thus translation choices, shape our perception of the media we consume. It's so interesting. I'd wager anyone who speaks two (or more) languages knows the feeling of "yeah, that's what it literally translates to, but that's not what it means" or has answered a question like "how do you say _____ in (language)?" with "you don't, it's just … not a thing, we don't say that."

I've had my fair share of "[SHIP] are [married/soulmates/fated/FANCY TERM], it's text!" "[CHARACTER A] calls [CHARACTER B] [ENDEARMENT/NICKNAME], it's text!" and every time. Every time I'm just like. Do they though. Is it though. And a lot of the time, this means seeking out alternative translations, or translation meta from fluent or native speakers, or sometimes from language learners of the language the piece of media is originally in.

Why does it matter? Maybe it doesn't. To lots of people, it doesn't. People have different interests and priorities in fiction and the way they interact with it. It's great. It matters to me because back in the early 2000s, I had dial-up internet. Video or audio media that wasn't available through my local library very much wasn't available, but fanfiction was. So I started to read English language Gundam Wing fanfic before I ever had a chance to watch the show. When I did get around to watching Gundam Wing, it was the original Japanese dub. Some of the characters were almost unrecognisable to me, and first I doubted my Japanese language ability, then, after checking some bits with friends, I wondered why even my favourite writers, writers I knew to be consistent in other things, had made these characters seem so different … until I had the chance to watch the US-English dub a few years later. Going by that adaptation, the characterisation from all those stories suddenly made a lot more sense. And the thing is, that interpretation is also valid! They just took it a direction that was a larger leap for me to make.

Loose adaptations and very free translations have become less frequent since, or maybe my taste just hasn't led me their way, but the issue at the core is still a thing: Supernatural fandom got different nuances of endings for their show depending on the language they watched it in. CQL and MDZS fandom and the never-ending discussions about 知己 vs soulmate vs Other Options. A subset of VLD fans looking at a specific clip in all the different languages to see what was being said/implied in which dub, and how different translators interpreted the same English original line. The list is pretty much endless.

And that's … idk if it's fine, but it's what happens! A lot of the time, concepts -- expressed in language -- don't translate 1:1. The larger the cultural gap, the larger the gaps between the way concepts are expressed or understood also tend to be. Other times, there is a literal translation that works but isn't very idiomatic because there's a register mismatch or worse. And that's even before cultural assumptions come in. It's normal to have those. It's also important to remember that things like "thanks I hate it" as a sentiment of praise/affection, while the words translate literally quite easily, emphatically isn't easy to translate in the sense anglophone internet users the phrase.

Every translation is, at some level, a transformative work. Sometimes expressions or concepts or even single words simply don't have an exact equivalent in the target language and need to be interpreted at the translator's discretion, especially when going from a high-context/listener-responsible source language to a low-context/speaker-responsible target language (where high-context/listener responsible roughly means a large amount of contextual information can be omitted by the speaker because it's the listener's responsibility to infer it and ask for clarification if needed, and low-context/speaker-responsible roughly means a lot of information needs to be codified in speech, i.e. the speaker is responsible for providing sufficiently explicit context and will be blamed if it's lacking).

Is this a mouse or a rat? Guess based on context clues! High-context languages can and frequently do omit entire parts of speech that lower-context/speaker-responsible languages like English regard as essential, such as the grammatical subject of a sentence: the equivalent of "Go?" - "Go." does largely the same amount of heavy lifting as "is he/she/it/are you/they/we going?" - "yes, I am/he/she/it is/we/you/they are" in several listener-responsible languages, but tends to seem clumsy or incomplete in more speaker-responsible ones. This does NOT mean the listener-responsible language is clumsy. It's arguably more efficient! And reversely, saying "Are you going?" - "I am (going)" might seem unnecessarily convoluted and clumsy in a listener-responsible language. All depending on context.

This gets tricky both when the ambiguity of the missing subject of the sentence is clearly important (is speaker A asking "are you going" or "is she going"? wait until next chapter and find out!) AND when it's important that the translator assign an explicit subject in order for the sentence to make sense in the target language. For our example, depending on context, something like "are we all going?" - "yes" or "they going, too?" might work. Context!

As a consequence of this, sometimes, translation adds things – we gain things in translation, so to speak. Sometimes, it's because the target language needs the extra information (like the subject in the examples above), sometimes it's because the target language actually differentiates between mouse and rat even though the source language doesn't. However, because in most cases translators don't have access to the original authors, or even the original authors' agencies to ask for clarification (and in most cases wouldn't get paid for the time to put in this extra work even if they did), this kind of addition is almost always an interpretation. Sometimes made with a lot of certainty, sometimes it's more of a "fuck it, I've got to put something and hope it doesn't get proven wrong next episode/chapter/ten seasons down" (especially fun when you're working on a series that's in progress).

For the vast majority of cases, several translations are valid. Some may be more far-fetched than others, and there'll always be subjectivity to whether something was translated effectively, what "effectively" even means …

ANYWAY. I think my point is … how interesting, how cool is it that engaging with media in multiple languages will always yield multiple, often equally valid but just sliiiiightly different versions of that piece of media? And that I'd love more conversations about how, the second we (as folks who don't speak the material's original language) start picking the subtitle or dub wording apart for meta, we're basically working from a secondary source, and if we're doing due diligence, to which extent do we need to check there's nothing substantial being (literally) lost -- or added! -- in translation?

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starheavenly · 1 month

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Deadlock, Ratchet, and Pharma toxic yuri love triangle. Inspired by bloominglegumes dratchet yuri cause they're so big brained

#like those published reylo fics but with transformer lesbians #in this essay i will #dratchet #ratchlock #humanformers #deadlock #pharma #ratchet #maccadam

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flayyr · 8 months

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divorcespark fic + oc shit. i don’t think tf oc stuff is looked at by anyone but i tacked it on anyway

ocs belong to @onyxstic and myself

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ducksbeloved · 16 days

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lol i wonder if lucy came up with the "high 5 heroes" party name

#fantasy high #dimension 20 #fhjy #fantasy high junior year #lucy frostblade #this is an old draft but ive chosen to believe this is true #bc (about to do annoying surface level analysis) smth about them changing their name right as they lose her :(#like she was what grounded in that younger more innocent state and once... whatever happened to her happened they either couldnt bear #or didnt care to keep the name without her there to temper their crueler behaviors yk #idk im very interested in their whole deal beyond just 'annoying bad kids foils' ifeel like things drive thattype of action & transformation #did not expect to write an essay in the tags damn #rat grinders #my posts

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reel-fear · 1 month

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Bendy And The Power Of Representation

So those graphic novel pages huh? Seems I posted my cover post at just the right time because literally minutes after I was informed the preview pages came out and uh. This is Buddy and Norman!

Oh dear... I'll put the full graphic novel pages down below but I have so much to say on how awful this is it'll need several posts. However, right now I want to mostly talk about representation and briefly touch on why it's so damn important + inform others about the current shit Mike and Meatly are saying about the books n such.

Now note: All the things I'm saying below are based on my personal experience, maybe some people don't care about seeing the representation of their identities in the media they consume. Maybe some will think I'm merely being dramatic and I might be but I'm not lying when I say I personally believe being represented and seen in the media you consume can be one of the most wonderful feelings in the world.

Look I'm not here to argue with people who think that Norman in particular was never meant to be a person of color, I would argue he is very coded but the points I'm making here are not about how Norman particularly had to be black. The point I want to make is the lack of diversity in our cast in general and how Norman's design has heavily dwindled it considering most people [including myself] rightfully assumed he was at least one of three black characters in our cast. Not according to this though and looking at the the rest of the pages our chances of seeing any kind of decent diverse character designs dwindle more.

So firstly... Buddy a character who has been said to experience discrimination for being Jewish, lacks any kind of ethnic features at all. That's... Cool but yeah I think this shows a rather grim future for the character designs as a whole.

Also, Norman... As I mentioned he was largely assumed to be black due to his southern dialect, his voice, and other factors. But nope, he's a generic white guy. With... Gross looking hair tbh...

Sadly this is not the first time the topic of poor representation has come up concerning Bendy either.

[note how he disregarded the other mentioned minorities and specifically cites LGBTQ+ characters]

This sucks as a response but sadly considering Mike's recent behavior it seems to fall in line with the Bendy team's general lack of care towards representing anyone who isn't straight and white.

So how did Mike respond to all of this? Well...

TDLR - "Who cares if the Graphic Novel we're selling to our fans for full price sucks, we now no longer consider the books canon."

This is horrible, I know Mike and Meatly are only really in this for the money, the fact BATIM is in the state that it is proved that, but they really couldn't have been less obvious about it?

So basically when it benefited them, AKA when it meant people would have to buy the books to understand important lore like Boris' identity... [the character you spend all of chapter 4 trying to rescue] They were considered canon... At least the author sure thought so.

Hell even in the tweet Meatly made here he doesn't say the books aren't canon, he just says they're not needed to understand Bendy's world. Now Mike is using that as a shield instead of doing the right thing and saying "You're right, the poc in our fanbase deserve better we'll have it fixed right away!" Like most reasonable people would considering how his studio has literally been accused of bigotry, poor rep, and general lack of diversity before. Why risk making more people avoid this franchise?

Also just... Imagine how insulting it would be to be an author who helps flesh out so much of this world and gives its characters depth like NONE of the games have managed to do, filling in plot holes, creating a timeline for events, etc... Then because they couldn't bother to change the graphic novel for ur story to be better they instead throw out all ur writing and declare it non-canon.

If I were her to put it bluntly I'd feel insulted and horrible. Why make her do all the work of making sure her works align with the timeline and game's canon if they're not part of it?

I can't speak for her obviously but Meatly and Mike know of her account, so speaking out against this could very much risk her being fired or at least not allowed to work on Bendy anymore... So I would take all her tweets on this situation with a grain of salt. She very much is not in a position where she could be honest if she was against this.

So with all that history now, the question I'm sure many are wondering is... Why does this even matter? Who cares how diverse the characters are when it doesn't affect the story?

Well for one thing, if you think like that consider having more empathy for your fellow human beings but also it does affect the story. One of DCTL's themes is about the bigotry of the period it is set in.

Now the Bendy team has managed to make the discussion of this book centering around their bigotry which is ironic in a way I almost find funny... Though this entire thing is just a bit too hurtful and upsetting to find any humor in, at least for me...

But another thing is representation can bring people such joy when it's done with care. It really shouldn't be understated how far it can go to make people feel more comfortable in their own sense of self to have a franchise choose to represent them and their experiences. I know this from personal experience.

Now if you've been following me for a while, you know I'm a big fan of Transformers. I no longer engage with it much due to baggage from the fandom's awful treatment of me, but before I left I remember being able to witness the release of Transformers: Earthspark first few episodes.

These introduced the Maltos the family who meets the Transformers and serve as our protagonists and guess what?

It's a family of Filipinos!

Now look I'm not Filipino, but I am half Mexican and I have a lot of love for that part of me. So seeing the representation of any Spanish culture in this franchise I loved made me so happy! I remember just watching the first episode I was happily telling my partner how fun it was to see people like me and my family in a world I love!!

But it didn't end with the Maltos in fact... There was another character who spoke to me, their name was Nightshade. Their pronouns are They/Them and they spoke about it on the show! Not just mentioning it and moving on but actually sitting down to speak about their experiences...

This clip in particular really turned them into an absolute favorite among fans and well... I'll let you see it for yourself.

This scene... Fills me with a joy I cannot describe. It is the creators of a franchise I love telling me they see people like me and find the stories of people like me important enough to include in this series. There really is nothing like being able to say there are Non-Binary characters in a franchise I have so much love for. I was far from the only one too.

This is amazing, this is wonderful, this clip and character were moving to so so many people and...

This is a joy the Bendy creators have no interest in giving their audience. They don't care how you feel as a queer and/or black person, which... Hurts...

I... Discovered I was trans while in the Bendy community... It was where I learned the word Non-Binary and started using it for myself. To me Bendy will always have that connection... But the devs themselves seem to hate the idea of being forced to actually represent that in their games... And I still haven't really gotten over that pain or betrayal if I'm being honest.

So...

With Norman now being portrayed as white here, we are down to two black characters. Thomas [who Meatly has claimed is white in the past] based on a vague conversation with Sammy in DCTL they could easily ignore... And Jacob.... A book exclusive character which according to Mike means he is non-canon.

If we don't count Thomas' vague talk with Sammy about disrespect as confirmation he's black [which the devs don't seem to think so] then we have one black character in all of Bendy... And he recently got retconned into non-existence. Great.

Look... The Bendy fanbase has always been full of wonderfully diverse designs for the staff and even more diverse people creating them. Bendy's fandom was built with the work of queer people from all kinds of places.

If the Bendy team continues to show how little they care for anyone who isn't straight or white... I wonder who they are counting on to buy this book or in general financially support their franchise?

I know right now, I am furious, I am hurt and I most certainly don't feel like buying a book that's currently just a massive fuck you to the fans and I hope I've expressed why I feel this way in an easy-to-understand way here...

Either way, I will not be forgetting this anytime soon and I hope the fanbase does the same. Maybe just maybe, if there's enough backlash to this series of horrible decisions they'll learn better.

Right now, it's kinda of our only hope for a better future, and if you know any poc who are into Bendy right now... Maybe consider making sure they're feeling okay.

I know from experience how much this sort of thing hurts, to have the creators of a world you love straight up tell you they don't intend to fix the fact no one in their stories represents your identity or life...

What I'm trying to say is...

This is a really low point for Bendy and its fans... Even more for the poc who have to witness such ignorant and careless attitudes from Mike and Meatly towards their feelings.

Please don't forget them when you discuss these tweets or this situation. That's exactly what Mike and Meatly want right now.

For them to be unrepresented and therefore... Unheard.

#batim #batdr #bendy and the ink machine #bendy and the dark revival #seriously though we cannot let this slide #ramblez #please please keep talking about this and why its not okay #Ive already had people saying to not be too mean or disrespectful to mike over this and to put bluntly #if mike is gonna be this blatently disrespectful to his fans he deserves whatever he fucking gets #this is such a horrible situation Im just glad I got the chance to speak positively in this essay #I mean not about bendy but I got to gush about how cool it is that transformers has a nonbinary character in it so that was fun #this is what Bendy could have and refuses to... Oh well more motive to make Showtime ig #but seriously what is the point of supporting these indie devs if theyre gonna be just as horrible abt this shit #as their corporate competitors #at several points bendy just feels like every other horror game out there but worse #its so so so frustrating

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thatturtleleon · 8 months

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big sis and little bro

#i could write a whole essay on the relationships in prime #found family trope has me screaming sobbing into my pillow #tfp #transformers prime #transformers #tfp bumblebee #tfp arcee #macaddams #maccaddam

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bongo-clash · 2 years

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AU where ghosts attain the right to exist after a pro-ghost propaganda censorship law means that Paulina’s 200k Phantom x Reader strangers-to-lovers slowburn gets deleted and Casper High get so collectively mad about it that they literally riot in the streets. Danny is saved from corrupt government forces by the power of weird prose about his ghost-eyes and Y/N’s inability to just hold his damn hand. It’s like if My Immortal permanently altered the course of human rights activism.

When it first gets deleted Tucker calls Danny at like 6am yelling about how it’s gone- and on the one hand, the GIW having the power to enact laws like that is kind of terrifying. But on the other hand, it’s So Funny that the first thing they did with that ability was get rid of some teenage girl’s Phantom fanfiction. (“I mean, if you think about it, that’s as ‘pro-ghost’ as you get.”)

#Like 2 months later Lancer sets an essay on historically controversial media #And at least a third of the students turn in something about Paulina’s fic #One of them is Paulina #He can’t even argue it. They all get As.#Every time they talk about transformative works in class Someone has to mention it and Lancer will never know peace again #“I always wanted to watch in real time as a piece of literature changed the course of history but not like this."#“Not like this.”#(he reads it out of curiosity Once and she could maybe use an editor but the green light symbolism is clever reference)#(it also means he's setting Gatsby for their next text)#danny phantom #danny fenton #paulina sanchez #dp au #danny phantom au #danny phantom headcanon #dp headcanons #dp hc #Bongo's Aus!!!

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gritsandbrits · 11 months

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Wrote this after watching a video about fandom's weird vitriol towards child characters and some time reflecting on my own experiences as a "bad" kid.

I feel like fandom is a little too harsh on kids and teens for making mistakes or responding to negative experiences in the "wrong" way. And even when they do grow out of it or shown to be good numerous times their flaws are still held against them or mocked. Even adult characters don't get this treatment (usually).

#analysis #children #characters #acceleracers #transformers #beast wars #wendell and wild #gravity falls #mabel pines #kat elliot #mark wylde #nightscream #beast machines #ATLA #my essay #tropes #writing

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staijey-the-creator · 6 months

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I swear it is so funny watching everyone go feral about the ES Prowl leak and everyone guessing/wanting what hes gonna be like.

Anyway I think that he's gonna be an absolute ass, but when it comes to the kids, at first it's the same asshole behavior, but soon becomes mother hen to the Terrans. In this essay I wil-

#/j lmao #i dont have the energy #for a whole essay #I just want him to have #a little mix of all the prowls #transformers #transformers earthspark #earthspark #earthspark spoilers #prowl #maccadam #tf earthspark #tfe #Staijey Speeks

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mayathexpsychic · 1 day

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silly drawing i made for my last upper division communications assignment :) i got 100% on this so i will post it on tumblr for funsies

#the assignment was to take one of our essays and transform it into a different mode of communication #so . they were probably wanting a powerpoint or something like that but this is what i did instead :)#also my essay was about autism being underdiagnosed in girls :]#my art

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monocle-teacup · 2 months

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Another strange tendency the show has is to pretty much shame multiple characters that have negative emotions. For a show that's all about empathy, it seems to be a case of there being strings attached.

-Robby being understandably upset about moving to Witwicky is pretty much met with "Don't talk to me that way young man, now sit down and shut up."

-Mo is self explanatory thanks to Prime Time

-Dot's response to Mandroid pouring his heart out about his backstory is essentially, "Sucks that happened to you, but that doesn't entitle you to be an asshole." His backstory doesn't justify his actions, but the show makes no attempt to actually address the fact how his point about how dangerous TFs are is perfectly valid and it's entirely screwed up how humanity suffered so much because of giant alien robots.

-Humans that don't think TFs are the best are automatically treated as assholes. Of course Mandroid and Croft are assholes. I'm talking about the fact that surely there are humans that went through something traumatic because of TFs and simply don't want to associate with them but don't go around spreading hate.

-The deleted scene from Missed Connections where Nightshade has a line about not understanding the whole family thing. That could've been such an interesting idea to explore, but again the show has as a very GET WITH THE PROGRAM OR ELSE VIBE GOING.

#tf #tfe #transformers #transformers earthspark #tf earthspark #earthspark #analysis #essay

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wifetomegatron · 7 months

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i'm tired of studying, so here is a poorly written love letter essay on my infatuation with lonely women, birds in cages and transformers.

i have always had this fascination with the psychological ruminations on self-hood & identity. often, the stories closest to my heart have wealthy, waifish, women at the heart of their narratives. not always because they're relatable, but because from their point of view, the narrator is trying to hide something from the audience. to conceal the chaos and conflict that surrounds us with an illusion of peace —tethering on the edge of rose coloured glasses. alienated in this little bubble, a golden cage is still a cage.

and sometimes, to some people, the loneliest place on earth is a big house with windows high enough to reach the ceiling. because they echo back the depth of our aloneness.

now, how does this relate to transformers? well, i have always been the kind of girl to combine two interests in one. and so i am aching to write about frivolous, indulgent women drowning in denial, forced to confront the isolation gnawing their hearts open like a sick, open wound. all because they get thrown into absurd situations where they cross paths with war-tired titans so detached from the idea of ever returning to a life before chaos.

one suffocates in peace while the other chokes on impossible dreams.

i want a naive, prestigious, overly idealistic, investigative prosecutor from earth aboard the lost light, sent to keep an eye on megatron only to end up falling for him. because the moment she spends time alone with him: she gets a metaphorical slap across the face about her privilege and has to confront the sheltered, ignorant set of lenses she's been viewing the world through. whereas through her, the former warlord learns to tear down his walls brick by brick, starting with all the skepticism and temper. and the icing on the cake is that they learn from each other. there is a hole inside her chest, and he tells her he carries one too.

i want tarn to suffer a sudden lightheadedness from having walked into a bar on the shores of hedonia to spot a human woman singing behind the cloud of smoke and shadow. pearls and silver, glinting under the light like a forbidden present. her beauty comes from how lonely she looks with her eyes closed and mouth open, mic between her delicate fingers. tempting. alluring. it was like looking in the mirror. and the djd leader never learned to love anything else.

i want rung ( who in this hypothetical au is not primus for plot reasons ) to sit across a liaison who revels in the idea of sleeping alone in a big alloy ship because it takes her mind away from her empty childhood: where silk sheets and feathered pillows feel colder and harsher than any metal. the hug he gave her at the end of the session was the first time she was held and it didn't feel like he was there to hold her together.

i want swerve to compliment her when she's tipsy and borderline drunk by the table of his bar and for her to hide her face and cry because she finally feels beautiful — truly, sincerely, beautiful. that out here, surrounded by an alien crew who couldn't care less about how she presents herself, pretty words suddenly don't feel transactional anymore.

i want this terrified and secluded bird inside of me to finally find a home within the arms of tall, metal mechs. mechs who are familiar with the vast, empty stretch of space. and is not terrified of lonely women and their quiet, self-destructive vices. and maybe that's why i love self-inserts so much, and writing on this blog breathes life into me — the nightingale in a cage meets a spaceman tired of fighting, and maybe only together can they find some sense of freedom.

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ikkosu · 19 days

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Before I head off to beddddd, switching it up real quick👀. How does PHARMA evil doctor man fall in love.

OuhGHH !! Good night compy!!

I've been thinking about this a lot !! woohee a little ramble down below (a little bit gore-ish at the end!!)

(have you seen that one panel of pharma asking if CD was okay??? Oh gosh his expression melts me he's so soft)

(In my SSAU ehee )

Pre Delphi pharma would have a stable relationship with his human. It starts off a bit rocky because human doesn't like him that much. (His personality and all) and after a while they adjust to his disposition and boom colleagues. He's an ass because of his ego but he means well, like hes an actual sweetheart

But when he begins to spiral down. Most of the doctors kind of avoid him : (eh, pharma's having another cold day, he'll get through it) but human doesn't think that way.

Human is the only one who notices his mental state and he's kind of, well, flattered?. Because human is nice, they banter win him as usual (especially leeches the praise from human like blood)

But eventually their friendship becomes a little not normal and turns into a love-hate thing

Becaus when he starts spiralling down, extracting t-cogs and all, he's not always able to perform the crucial surgeries, so human is the one to take his place, and gets all the praise

He's impressed, but at the same time he wants to clock human with a beam rod. Pharma resents human taking all of his spotlight but what is he to do? If he stops, the hospital will burn down so he'll have to suppress that envy

Eventually that envy becomes infatuation when he realizes human is reading his medical thesis, following his footsteps, using his techniques (praising him alsthiugh he's never the one doing the surgeries!??!)

and he thinks 'more like delude' himself into thinking the human IS THE ONE infatuated with him,,,so yeah,,,,

Human doesn't even know what their relationship is. Pharma's always staring at them like he wants to gut them, and sometimes staring at them like he wants to devour them (in a,,,yk know 🌚 way)

Cue unhealthy pining that borders between I want to carve your insides out with my chainsaw, hang your organs on the wall and I'm going to lock you up in my habsuite and you are NEVER going out.

#i cant beliebe i just lored out a whole essay #idw transformers #transformers #maccadam #transformers x reader #transformers idw #pharma #ikkoasks #idw pharma #pharma x reader

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